In terms of present-day Thailand, to speak of urban life essentially means to speak of Bangkok, for though many provincial capitals have grown rapidly in recent years the national capital is the ullimate city to every Thai. One out of every ten Thais lives in Bangkok, which is 45 times bigger than Chiang Mai, the second most populous city. The metropolitan area now covers some 1,537 square kilometres on both sides of the Chao Phraya River and new suburban areas are continually being added.

Almost all major domestic and foreign companies are located in the capital, as are all government ministries and most of the country's leading educational, sporting, and cultural facilities. The greater part of Thailand's imports and exports pass through Bangkok (though this may change as Laem Chabang deep sea port expands to feed the Eastern Seaboard and 90 percent of the motor vehicles in the nation are registered there. It is the focal point for Thailand's aviation, railroad, and communications nelwork. as well us the chief destination for the majority of tourists who come annually to occupy its more than 200,000 hotel rooms.

Given such fact, it is not surprising that Bangkok acts us a magnet for people from all parts of the country. They come to be educated at its schools, colleges, and universities, to find employment in its numerous factories and commercial firms, or simply to see its famous buildings and monuments and enjoy its highly varied pleasures. Both literally and meiaphorically, all Thai roads converge on the capital.

By contrast, provincial cities tend to reflect regional characteristics. Hat Yai, for example, the south's major city, is growing rapidly but is still very much a projection of the tin and rubber industries that dominate the region.

 

Chiang Mai in the north is both a coordination point for the agriculture of the area and also famous as a centre of northern culture and traditions. Similarly, such northeastern cities as Nakhon Ratchasima and Khon Kaen, while prospering from local development, are essentially provincial in all senses of the word.

 

Only Bangkok, with its huge. diverse population, its shopping centres and highrise office buildings, and iis cosmopolitan sophistication, presents itself as a city in the international sense of the term. Thus to understand modern urban culture in Thailand, it is necessary to examine the capital in some detail.