TigertoThailand & elsewhere: Old friends & an anniversary

Wednesday 21st October

Britbike & a 10th anniversary celebration

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After a few days winding down at my friend's house, it was almost time to ship the bike & fly home. Two more visits to make first though.

The first was to Britbike Triumph in Bangkok.

When I moved from Indonesia to start working in Thailand in 2005, there were no Triumph's around. Britbike set up as the first Triumph dealership in 2007 and I bought my Triumph Bonneville from them in early 2010.

At that time all the bikes had to be 'imported' even though some were made at the Triumph factory in Chonburi near Pattaya, as the factory had been set up as an export only operation. The net result was all bikes attracted import duty, which at +100% made them very premuim indeed.

So when I started riding a Triumph in Thailand (I had previously had one in the UK in 2002) I was part of a relatively exclusive club of less than 180 bikes in the whole country. At that time big bikes of any kind were still quite rare.

They are a great team at Britbike and have since expanded to 7 dealerships around the country and Triumph is becoming much more visible as a brand.

I popped into the showroom to say hi and of course grab a photo.

Next stop was a return to the factory that I had visited the previous week, as one of my finish lines.

PZ Cussons factory in Thailand manufactures, amongst other things, all of the Imperial Leather soap sold in the UK, Australia & many other countries. I was responsible for building the new export factory in 2005 and ran the operation for several years until I moved on to work in Africa.

So 2015 marked the 10th anniversary and I was invited to join the celebrations.

The Thai's have a wonderful way of combining formality with fun at these sort of occasions ....

The factory had been closed for the day so all staff (about 300 people) could attend. The day started early at 0730am with 7 local monks performing a religious ceremony and chanting for about 90 minutes, during which we had to sit cross-legged on the tiled floor in quiet contemplation.

Suddenly the Tiger's seat seemed so luxurious!

Once that was done we served the monks with their breakfast.

Finally there was more chanting & the water pouring ceremony.

A silver ceremonial jug is used to pour a continuous stream of water into a similarly styled bowl, whilst the monks are chanting. All those present have to touch the jug or touch someone who is holding the jug throughout and the stream should be continuous. I have done this quite a few times over the years and always found it quite a touching ceremony, for some reason.

Religous formalities complete, there was time to catch up with some old friends & colleagues.

.... and then we moved outside onto a stage that had been set up for speeches

Who gave this man a microphone?, they really should hve learned by now!

Speeches & formal ceremonies over, this being Thailand, there was of course food, music & dancing girls. Sorry no photos, I was too busy eating, chatting & watching!

As the event came to a close, I was asked to ride my bike up to the stage area, which of course presented a photo opportunity, which many people for some reason wanted to take part in.

Here is a short selection.