Hugh Parker is the managing director of Volclay Siam, a
firm that deals with bentonite clay, a compound with uses in the metal
casting industry. He is an American, but a self-deprecating person, who
right at the start of the interview when I was confirming his position as
MD at Volclay said, “It sounds too pompous. I call myself the country
manager.”
Hugh was the only child of an American father who
worked for the US State Department and a British mother who worked for the
World Health Organization. Both parents were used to the peripatetic
lifestyle and travel was very much part of young Hugh’s early memories.
He had actually been born in London and before settling down in Washington
had been in Africa and Canada.
At
school he described himself as being better than average, but a B grade
student. “I had my moments of complete and utter failures - like the
French language!” When he finished school he knew that he was able to
write passably well and opted for an English Literature major at
university.
Like many young men of the day, he then indulged
himself in more travel, doing the classic Europe by Eurail, and then with
the trendy beard and long hair, while listening to the “Grateful
Dead”, did the India and Nepal self discovery tour.
With that safely behind him, what did he do with his
Eng. Lit major? Teaching? Research? No, he ended up working in a boatyard
in New England, “basically as a labourer.” This he did for a couple of
years but slowly he slipped into teaching, where he was involved in
teaching English to Cambodian refugees.
This in turn led to a somewhat serendipitous meeting
with a Chinese professor in New England. They became friendly and Hugh’s
Chinese associate was very much involved in setting him up for his first
Asian posting. “I was looking for something to do and he arranged for me
to go to Wuhan in China to teach English at the Wuhan Institute of
Technology.”
This idyll was soon shattered however, with the
Tiananmen Square massacre, and Hugh departed China but was not desirous of
returning to America. With a friend, he went to Hong Kong and started up
his own company there. He taught English, they became agents for some
chemical companies and despite much hardship and a very steep learning
curve it was a success. “We made money in Hong Kong. We were pretty
proud of it. I worked pretty darn hard; there are not too many people who
could start up a company in Hong Kong with no business experience. We did
it on credit cards - a way that I wouldn’t recommend to anyone!” And
wasn’t that the voice of experience?
By the early 1990’s Hugh and his friend decided that
they should expand the company to become agents for the fertilizer
business to accommodate the boom in the golf course industry in Thailand.
In true democratic fashion they tossed a coin to see who would go to
Thailand. Hugh won the toss, though he does admit that at the time he
thought that he had lost!
Hugh based the business in Bangkok and stayed there for
four years, but they could see that the writing was on the wall for the
Asian (Thai) economy and sold out in 1996 to new owners, though as part of
the deal Hugh stayed on to assist the new management.
By now, Hugh was settled in Thailand. He had a Thai
wife and the start of a young family, so when another friend asked him to
come on board with Volclay Siam down here on the Eastern Seaboard for the
start-up he accepted. It did not take long before he had become general
manager and then managing director.
It also did not take long for his family to grow too,
“I got lucky. I found the right woman who is the mother of my two boys.
They are three and a half and six months, and I spend a lot of time with
them.” There was no doubting that Hugh is a very proud father.
For Hugh, success is happiness. “Find where you’re
most happy in life. Not by any means is it the number of toys you have or
money in the bank. It’s realising your lot in life.”
His advice to the young people of Asia is to get a good
education and learn to speak two languages. “Try to get a really
balanced work experience and enjoy yourself. The next century is the Asian
century!”
Like many people who have made Asia their home, Hugh
has “outgrown” his American heritage. With the multicultural exposure
he had as a young child, and his own later life experiences, he has become
an international, rather than an American abroad. “I describe myself as
a citizen of the world. Change is happening and I don’t think of myself
as an American in every sense of the word.”
Finally I asked him how much of his success was
attributable to “luck” and he answered forthrightly. “You make your
own luck in this world. I’ve had a couple of nice breaks, but I’ve
worked darn hard to get to where I am.”
And that is Hugh Parker, a successful “was once”
American who is very happy just being a family man here in Thailand, and
is incidentally, a worthwhile member of our international community here.
