How does IT life work in Koh Samui (Thailand)

    By the standards of the average Habr reader, our company is not so unique. But, nevertheless, the peculiarity is that we all work remotely, both with customers and with employees. Tales of Thailand did not pass us by, and some of us tried to spend some time on Samui. We have drawn conclusions for ourselves that we would like to share with you. This post does not try to compare different places of the country, but talks about where we ourselves spend most of the time - the island of Samui.

    The weather outside Moscow suggests that Thailand has begun a new season and everything that is written below may be useful to someone.

    Programmer with a snake

    Infrastructure


    If you have not been to Koh Samui, you should still have heard something about prices, food and leisure in Thailand. From the point of view of programmers, managers, marketers and other people who need Internet more than air conditioning, there are some things that need to be discussed separately.

    First of all, in Samui, as in all of Thailand, there is a good 3G mobile connection. Enough to call on Skype, work with the browser. Regarding quality and stability, I will say this - personally, I had enough speed to do daily quests in World of Warcraft and go as a healer in LFR. For a full-fledged raiding this is probably not enough, but in order to quickly close the working issues - completely.

    WiFi internet is in any bungalow, it can be bad, but it all depends on your ability to choose places. Thais listen to the client and, if necessary, change equipment, in extreme cases, you can ask to draw an additional line. I heard from someone that they refused him, but this is rather rare, as the owners of resorts hear a question about the Internet from every potential tenant.

    Transport and shops, the search for housing and dozens of other issues that have been discussed in thousands of other posts, it makes no sense to repeat. If something specific is interesting, then you can ask in the comments and we will answer. Separately, I note medicine. It is better and better than that which can be obtained in Russia or Ukraine, but buy insurance in advance.

    Apple stores, regular computers, tablets and phones are sold at stores at reasonable prices, there is where to fix broken screens and other breakdowns.

    Coworking in IT Complex


    At the entrance to the Lamai area, there is a beautiful office building that stands out from the surrounding Tais buildings. It contains some local IT companies, but the main feature is that it has a full-fledged coworking center - with WiFi, meeting rooms and computer-equipped workstations (in case you do not have your laptop or you like Windows XP with an interface in Thai).

    Prices, I hope, will make owners of other coworkings think:
    • Internet subscription per month 2000 baht
    • The cost of the negotiation is 150 baht (we have not used it yet, so we need to find out the exact tariff)
    • The cost of a workplace per day 10 baht

    I hope this “advertisement” does not destroy the existing peaceful and working spirit of the institution, but adds new faces. The working day takes place in a quiet and cool room under the supervision of a cat. The atmosphere is conducive to productive work, at least because those who were too lazy to do something just do not get there. The flow of people is small, and everyone quickly recognizes each other and continues to communicate outside work.

    By the way, we took several people into the team as a result of meeting at IT Complex.

    People


    The atmosphere is made up of people as well. In order to understand who you have to deal with, it will be easier to talk about the event that we held in the middle of last season, in February. There are many people working remotely on the island. Someone writes music, mobile games and applications, sites, someone is engaged in SEO / SMM. Of course, there are realtors and downshifters who rent grandmothers' apartments in Moscow, there are both enlightened people, tourists, and noisy companies. But they did not interest us much. Those who come to live and work, in general, behave quite quietly in the literal and figurative sense.

    Such people live quietly in their homes with their wives, children and cats. They work in the time zone of their main team, go out to eat for lunch and get food, but do not go to Chaweng's discos. They have their own circle of friends, they try to settle in places not intended for short-term tourists. They, like us, build long-term relationships with people around us.

    Living in a permanent holiday mode is very difficult, those who come for a week have different priorities for people who have come for a long time. And after some time it becomes difficult to listen to another drunken company at night, but it’s even harder to part with people who turned out to be really good and pleasant in communication, and, alas, it is time for them to leave home, because 2 weeks of vacation have ended. Keep in mind.

    BarCamp “aiSamui”


    We decided to meet such people and get to know each other better. Therefore, they made the event in BarCamp mode and modestly organized a meeting on Facebook. To avoid random people, we tried to limit advertising only to acquaintances and their acquaintances. Everyone was personally warned that we did not want to see random passers-by. For several days of such a partisan announcement, people sent each other more than 80 invitations. Honestly, we began to fear that we would not be able to find a roomy enough room, as a result, exactly 50 arrived and all, albeit with difficulty, fit into the room. AiSamui literally immediately formed several sponsors (with t-shirts, drinks and other little things).

    The composition of the guests of the event pleasantly pleased us (the total turned out to be more than 100%, because some voted several times):
    • Programmers - 40%
    • Company owners / managers - 30%
    • SEO / SMM / marketing - 20%
    • 20% of creative professions (designers, UI / UX specialists)
    • A certain number of people who did not identify themselves (probably from MMM / BM and other pyramids)

    Those who could not come added to the group on Facebook . The level of reports was high, the speakers prepared as serious events. Unfortunately, we did not make video reports, because we did not plan the success of the event. What they regretted later, but there is a video about the event itself.



    At the conference, guys working in:
    • Neatpeak.ua
    • Hewlett packard
    • Homemoney.ua
    • Giperactive.ru
    • startup metamedia.com

    So I paint in detail for those who may be, think about whether your pair of hands and the head of a specialist can find a job. We do not give guarantees, but people who live and work on Samui often look for someone, or work in companies that know how to work with remote employees.

    According to our estimates, such a working community is formed only among Russian-speaking people. According to reviews from people from other countries, they communicate, but have more fun together, rather than doing business.

    This season we plan to repeat aiSamui, and will organize a second conference around the middle of February 2014. Come, it will be interesting!

    Minuses


    So that the article does not look like an advertisement for the island, let's try to talk about some common disadvantages:
    • The island has a relaxing atmosphere, even a workaholic has an internal summer switch, it’s probably genetic.
    • The island is located in the tropical zone, so insects and snakes live with you, or rather you are visiting them. Many of them are dangerous. Cockroaches are so nimble that sometimes it seems, if they were a little more organized, they could give not only change, but also pick up your motorcycle and your clothes
    • Tales are a very dangerous form of transport, many neglect personal safety, as a result, in the worst case, death
    • On the island, there is a high probability of contracting Dengue fever. For some, even the first time, severe complications can occur
    • The island is always hot, some do not tolerate the heat very well

    As an example, I’ll say that I once woke up in a room and found a brown snake under the bed (those that are dangerous but green, they say, are not scary for humans). It was not possible to agree with the snake, and the hostess called a special person who killed her. Frankly, I never thought that snakes are scary, but with surprise I found in myself a natural fear of these creatures.

    How the island influenced our business


    We are a small company, now we have only 7 people in our staff, we are engaged in SEO, and our employees are located in different parts of the world. But on Samui you can meet us more often. We have grown into a full-fledged company from freelance projects and we understand that the result does not always depend on a beautiful screen and hospitality expenses for secretaries. However, this should be clear to most of the audience of Habrahabr.

    Since we work with customers very closely, our lifestyle has begun to influence them. Honestly, at first we were afraid to tell customers that we were not in Moscow, but gradually began to believe in ourselves, because when a client is satisfied, it doesn’t matter where you are sitting. Now, out of several dozen clients, almost a third managed to come to visit us on the island, assess the situation and get to know the team members more closely.

    Summary


    We will not invite everyone to immediately drop everything and fly here, we do not advertise Samui as the only place abroad or in Thailand to which you can go. There are several large places in the country where people go: Phuket, Pattaya, Hua Hin, Bangkok, Northern Chiang Mai and even Koh Phangan. Koh Samui is one of the places that has its advantages and disadvantages. But we like it here and would like to communicate with those who are busy, looking for employees who would share our values, or invite customers to visit.

    Welcome to Samui!

    Mikhail Kashkin (@xen), specifically for the Hyperactive blog.

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