Montatip Krishnamra Talk To Rotary Club of Ann Arbor North On June 20, 2013

Monatip Krishnamra talk to Rotary Club of Ann Arbor North on June 20, 2013 about Thailand relationship with the United States.

Our speaker was Montatip Krishnamra, a teacher of the Thai language at the University of Michigan for more than 20 years.

Montatip reviewed the history of U.S.-Thailand relations, a friendship between two very different countries that has endured for 180 years.

Most Americans were introduced to the country and people of Thailand through the 1944 novel, “Anna and the King of Siam” and the Broadway musical, “The King and I,” starring Yul Brynner and Deborah Kerr. “The King and I” is a beloved film all over the world, except for one country --  Thailand.  In Thailand, the portrayal of the king is considered undignified, so the film has been outlawed! One of the first things that Monatip did when she arrived in the U.S. was to see the classic film, which she said she loves!

The first American to visit Thailand (Siam) was Edmund Roberts, a trader who arrived in 1833, under the auspices of President Andrew Jackson.  President Ulysses S. Grant was the first of many U.S. presidents to visit the country. President Barack Obama is the latest, although he also visited the country before he was president.

Many members of the Thai royal family have been educated in the United States. The current Thai king is a U.S. citizen, born in Massachusetts when his father was a medical student at Harvard.

Dr. D. Bradley was an American missionary who spent his life in Thailand, helping the people there to come to accept Western medicine. 

The Peace Corps, announced on the steps of the Michigan Union by then presidential candidate John F. Kennedy in 1960, has sent hundreds of volunteers to Thailand.  The first Peace Corps volunteers taught English to Thai students. Later, Peace Corps teams switched to construction projects.

Now Montatip teaches the Thai language to U-M students.  She says her students know that they are not going to make tons of money by learning the language, but they say they want to speak Thai so they can order Thai food, which they love!  Although the country’s culinary heritage is rich, Thailand also has McDonald’s and Krispy Kreme donuts!

Montatip concluded her presentation with a few words about Rotary in Thailand. We learned that: 

• The first Rotary meeting was held in Bangkok in 1930 and the Rotary Club of Bangkok was chartered in 1932.   
• Rotarians in Bangkok built a music pavilion to honor their king’s musical ability.
• Rotarians at the RI Convention in Bangkok set a Guinness World Record for the largest “smiley face” ever created.