13 people everyone who works in a Bangkok office will know
Meet Bangkok's most annoying co-workers. Illustrations by Panita Thiraphapong
8 years ago
The One Who Eats Really, Really Smelly Food
You know it’s lunchtime when she unclips that tupperware box and releases “the smell.” Don’t expect it to ever be a salad or simple fried rice in there. Nope. It’s som tum pla ra, day-old kao mun gai, laab ped and kanom jeen nam ya or nothing. Pray you don’t have to sit next to her in the next meeting.
The Lunch Indulger
Lunch break to this girl doesn’t just mean a quick trip to the khao gaeng shop downstairs. It’s a two-hour event involving an Uber to the other side of town, a Greyhound Cafe, and an old friend she worked with at her last job. Not cool.
The Boy Who Was Born to Work in Marketing
He wears glasses that look like barcode scanners, talks in words which only an ISB kid turned Maryland business grad would understand, and has a Rolex which definitely wasn’t bought on any salary your company pays. After work, find him in Vesper using that same business speak to not get laid.
The Pantip Addict
There’s a reason she chose that desk up against the wall so no one can see her computer—and it’s not for peace and quiet while prepping spreadsheets. The hunched shoulders and face inches from the screen are tell-tale signs of an employee lost in the deepest recesses of a Pantip beauty thread.
The Farang
He first stepped foot in Thailand for a yolo gap-year and fell in love with beaches, Khao San Road and Leo beer. But things are different now. He dresses well, he has responsibility, he’s happily married to a Thai woman. For the third time. Brownie points among co-workers for every luk-krung baby he brings to the office.
The One with all the Connections
You’d hate him… if you didn’t need to ask him for so many favors. He got you into Wonderfruit, he can get you tix for Kolour in the Park, heck, he even has a drawer stuffed full of free Au Bon Pain vouchers. The office needs people like him (though it’s best not to let him know it that often).
The Woman Who Dresses Like a Nine Year Old
She wears the same clothes as Minnie Mouse, communicates exclusively in Line stickers and sits at a work station which looks like someone from Sylvanian Families puked on it. No one has any clue what she does, but having her round’s too adorable to care.
The Hipster
His clothes are a perfectly color-coordinated vision of perfect monochrome perfection: trousers cut just above the ankle, pens poised in pocket of Oxford shirt, and B200 thick-rimmed Chatuchak Ray-Ban’s disguising the guilty little secret that he does in fact have perfect vision.
The Really Fit One
While you can hardly muster the energy to wake up in the morning, he manages an intense Crossfit session before work, eats quinoa at his desk, and even says no when someone comes back from lunch with moo-ping. MOO-PING! (Seriously, how do these people live?)
The One Who Always has a Hangover
Her screen is adjusted to the lowest brightness, she’s got a liter bottle of water next to her, she moves slowly and is annoyed at everything. She was at Dark Bar last night. And Parking Toys the night before that. And Dark Bar again the night before that. And Parking Toys the… you get the picture.
The One Who Never Has a Hangover
They party just as much as the one who always has a hangover. You know they do! Why? Because you’re the one who always has a hangover. So why can they hold a presentation together and you can’t? This, unfortunately, is the shit-show called life.
The Parallel You from Another Department
For all your working lives have to do with each other you might as well work in a different universe, let alone the same office. And yet she’s always... there: changing trains at Siam, walking to the coffee station, enduring pregnant silences from hell in the elevator. You hope that one day you’ll know her name, but this thing’s gone on way too long for you to ever ask.
The Person Who is Never at Their Desk. Ever.
Quick trips to 7-Eleven and smoke breaks are the only reason she comes to the office at all. You’ve heard rumors that she got in at some point today, but it’s 2pm and her desk still looks as empty as Yodpimarn River Walk.
See also: Don't Be That Guy: A guide to Bangkok's most annoying people
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