by Dr. Iain Corness
The
Thai Garden Resort seems to have a penchant for employing tall, composed,
willowy blonde Germans with blue eyes as guest services managers. While
talking with Alexandra Mueller, the current holder of the position, I was
reminded so much of her predecessor, Janine Tillmans, and it was revealed
by Alexandra that she and Janine worked together for four months, for a
hand-over period last year. However, the stimulus for these two German
ladies to come to Thailand was completely different. For Janine fresh out
of training, “I was just looking for an interesting opportunity to
practice all the things I had learned.” However, for Alexandra, who had
already been working around the world, the reason was rather to rejoin her
family! But more of that later.
Alexandra was a young German lady who wanted to travel.
At school she excelled in languages and as her high schooling was coming
to an end, she thought about what she could do. “I was thinking about a
way to travel around the world, without being rich!” The answer was to
take an apprenticeship in Hotel Management.
This was a three year course incorporating both
theoretical and practical in all the departments of a hotel. “You learn
how hard it is to clean up the rooms, and how hard it is to be a GM.”
She found her course absorbing and “more exciting than I thought in the
beginning.”
At the end of three years she had her certificates in
Hotel Management and began looking at where she could work, remembering
her travel ideas, “without being rich.” Switzerland looked good as her
starting off point. “I went there because of its reputation in the hotel
business,” said Alexandra. She also admitted that in Switzerland the
salary was much more than she would have received in Germany.
Initially she found it difficult to join a new team in
the hotel, this being her first real job placement. There were
communication problems, even though she was in a German speaking part of
the country. There was much difference between her ‘high’ German and
the local Swiss-German dialect, but in the hotel industry, there was
always the universal language to fall back on - English, fortunately one
of the subjects that she had excelled in at school.
After her year in Switzerland she began to look further
afield. Spain interested her so she began to learn Spanish while she was
looking at the hospitality job opportunities there. Unfortunately, at that
time there appeared to be none other than some very low positions, but
there was a chance to join a five star property in Portugal’s Madeira
Island. This property was looking for a receptionist who could speak
English and German. This made her the number one choice for the job.
From the outside, to be able to live and work in a five
star resort on a romantic island sounds like the ideal, but there are
drawbacks. “It (Madeira) was very small. After six months there was
nothing left to see or do.” She began to look further afield again.
In Madeira she had been learning Portuguese and had
also met a few Brazilians who had been holidaying there. In Brazil they
spoke Portuguese, so why not go there with her elementary Portuguese,
learn the language further and work there? That was the theory, but
unfortunately the practice was not so easy.
She moved to Brazil and enrolled in a language school
while she looked for work. After four months, she enrolled in a second
course at the language school while still looking for work. Life was not
all that easy either. It seems that Brazil is a very dangerous place.
“You cannot walk around carrying a handbag or wear ear rings. You have
to watch all the time. You cannot leave your handbag on a chair in a
restaurant. There are people there with nothing to lose, so cutting off
your finger for a ring means nothing to them.”
Against that sort of background, life somewhere
(anywhere!) else was starting to look very attractive. Her widowed mother
and her sister had moved to Thailand two years previously and were sending
her regular bulletins, including extracts from the Pattaya Mail’s
employment columns, showing that there were job opportunities if she were
to join them. Forgetting about Brazil, she came out to Thailand.
Her sister was correct when she said there were job
opportunities. “I got this job (guest services manager at Thai Garden
Resort) four days after my arrival,” said Alexandra proudly. She was
also lucky in that Janine was still around to help her get used to the
position, and they did the high season together. “This is my first high
season alone,” said Alexandra. “I wish she were still here,” she
said somewhat wistfully. However, I am sure that anyone who can survive
eight months in Brazil can survive a high season here!
Once again with her affinity for languages, she is now
studying Thai, to add to her English and Portuguese, but admits that she
finds the Asian tonal language harder to learn than the European ones!
I asked Alexandra if she had some sort of ‘master
plan’ mapped out for her life from here. Was she ambitious enough to
make it to the top as a GM? “Not any more,” was the reply. “I like
my privacy too much. As a GM you are married to the hotel, and I’m not
that sort of person.”
Alexandra now seems very content in Thailand. She is
engaged to be married. She can wear her rings in public without worrying
that someone will cut off her fingers. She is with her family and has a
job she enjoys. Life for Alexandra Mueller looks to be very fulfilling;
however, she did admit that watching Thai TV soap operas to try and
assimilate the language was a problem. “It can make you quite crazy!”
As a failed Thai language student myself, I can understand her sentiments
exactly!
