If you decide to stay here, you may pass through a phase where you feel this is not so much the Land of Smiles as the Land of Grinning Lunatics. But you will soon find yourself developing an admiration for flood survivors or victims of the economic crash, for example, relating tales of deep personal tragedy whilst struggling bravely to preserve the Thai ideal of a face ‘yim yaem berk baan jaem sai’ - ‘smiling like a flower in full bloom or a clear day’.