Jon Ferris

I moved to Bangkok for a job that lasted eighteen months and a city that kept me for ten years. Buying a car never made sense here, so I did everything else: the pink and green meter taxis, the orange-vested motorbike boys at the mouth of my soi, the Skytrain when the roads seized up, the red trucks up in Chiang Mai that stop wherever you bang on the roof, and more two-in-the-morning airport runs than any person should volunteer for.

For the first year I made every mistake there is. I got stung by a tuk-tuk driver who took me to a gem shop instead of the Grand Palace. I stood at the wrong end of the airport arguing with a tout while the real taxi queue moved along nicely one floor below. I got into a songthaew going the opposite way and paid for the privilege. Slowly, the system stopped being a wall of confusion and turned into something I could read, and I realised almost none of it is written down anywhere a visitor would find it.

Thailand Taxis is where I wrote it down. Not fares and timetables that go stale in a month, but how each way of getting around actually works, how to use it without the beginner’s errors, and what to do when the obvious option has just fallen through at the worst possible moment. Wichai Thongchai, who has driven Bangkok’s taxis and ride apps for over twenty years, keeps me honest on the details only a driver would know.