I used to visit Thailand normally for around two months at a time from January to March. This is what got me really interested in living there. I thought to myself how could I possibly live long-term in Thailand? The answer came to me - why not teach English?

I enrolled upon a tefl course back in 1999 and got my certificate early 2000. I hung back a little due to the fact that I was nervous about making such a big move, leaving my home. which was a rented council flat and so on. Roll on January 2003. I'd decided that this was going to be it, so I walked out of my flat and off I went to Thailand armed with a little knowledge and a few print outs. I had the names of a few big players in the private language industry such as Siam Computer, English First, etc. I guess I planned on contacting that type of employer first.

So I arrived in Thailand on January 5 2003 with a rough plan in my head and a couple of grand in my pocket. I stayed in a hotel on Sukhumwit Road at first and then I moved into a cheap monthly apartment near ngaam wong wan Nonthaburi a few days later.After about four days rest, it was time to hit the streets and go job hunting. So I left the apartment and walked down the road to the mall so I could get a minibus into town. I then noticed what looked like a small English language school. At the time I mistakenly took the place to be a branch of English First, a language agency that was on the top of my list to try.

I thought to myself what a stroke of luck! So I walked in and saw a guy and a girl there and told them that I was looking for a job. They then told me that they were only a franchise branch and I should contact their head office in Bangkok. They gave me a phone number and I headed back to my apartment and rang the main office.

The school said that I could come down for an interview the next day. I thought great - I've hit it big here. So off I went and had an interview with the head honcho. He promised me a lot. He offered me a whopping 27,000 baht per month and a contract for 25 teaching hours per week. I snatched his hand off. I felt that I'd hit the jackpot, plus a work permit! I mean back home I was working 37 hours a week and here in Thailand I'd only be doing 25!

Well, my first gig was at the ngaam wong wan branch and I'd teach a couple of hours in the evening to adult classes. I must admit that in that first lesson, I was really nervous. Then about three weeks later one of the admin staff from the main office called me up. She said that they had a teaching job for me in a government school. I went down to the office and the admin staff accompanied me to this government school in Bangkok. This was to be my first 'proper' school gig

Those first few months I'd literally do anything and teach anyone. Grammar courses? yeah I'm your man! Business English? yep, count me in......and anything else that came along. However I was then starting to clock up the hours. Not only was I working 18 hours in the government school every week, I was also teaching Tuesday and Thursday nights in the language centre. After that, my employer would ask if I could cover Monday and Wednesday nights because one of the teachers had gone on a visa run. So I did. However the teacher had not gone on a visa run, in reality the teacher had either left or got the sack. The school would then slot me into his or her classes and I would inherit these classes permanently

I was now working 18 hours per week at the government school and teaching night classes at their centers based all over Bangkok from Monday to Thursday. Then I was asked to cover weekend classes! - two hours on a Saturday and two on a Sunday. Then sometimes four hours on a Saturday. These classes were all over town from ngaam wong wan to laksi, and all their other far-flung branches across the city.

Not only was the travelling wearing me out but I was also clocking up a lot of wasted hours sitting in slow moving traffic. I was working harder than I'd ever worked before in my life. Most nights I was getting in at 9 pm, having something to eat, preparing lessons for the next day and then hitting the sack at 11.00. Not much of a life is it?

After a couple of months I was so tired I decided to confront the management and say this is too much. I did just that and I was allowed to get rid of the night classes just so long as I kept the weekend classes, which I agreed to.

I wrote a book called The Thai-English bar guide. The book took me about six weeks to write in all. A couple of months after it first hit the bookshelves, the German edition then appeared and now I believe that it's out in Swedish and some another languages. I loved writing this book and it got some great reviews on other websites. My only regret about it was that I had to tone it down a little in order to get it past the Thai censors. A few months later my publisher informed me that Asia books were refusing to stock it due to it's content. This was at the height of one of Taksin's moral crusade campaigns. Luckily for me Asia books must have reconsidered their plans because it's currently on their shelves.

The head honcho called a few teachers into the Bangkok office to discuss his new venture with a private school. He'd now got the contract for a private prathom school. We were all sent there to teach the summer course from March – May 2004. We taught the summer course at this school and come mid-May the school opened for the next academic year. It was then revealed to us that not only did we have to teach English, we were also expected to teach maths, computer, science, P.E and social studies. The pay was to be 32,000 baht per month. This was a real bad deal I thought to myself, especially as other teachers just teaching English were getting 32k.

I also decided that there would be too much paperwork, lesson planning and administration involved in it. I made a decision to leave this school, however I would still be doing a bit of part-time weekend work for the language centre. The plan here was that when the new school semester came along, I would perhaps be able to pick up extra work from them. I would basically wait to see what unfolded

Yes - a very well-known language provider that specializes in sending out its teachers to Thai schools.

Firstly, I was put into a small school in Pakkret. It was a nice easygoing school although very poor. I liked it there from day one. I was the only foreign English teacher and I enjoyed my role. I worked there for one year. Then the Nonthaburi teacher project started up and the school no longer needed 'agency teachers' because the Nonthaburi government was supplying them for free.

So it was on to the next school. The school was convenient for me, because at that time I'd moved to a small condo in Bang Yai for only 1,500 baht per month. I was able to save quite a lot of money at this school because the salary was good and I was still doing weekend work at a language center. But all good things come to an end. Lightning did strike twice and all the agency teachers were laid off and replaced with Nonthaburi project teachers.

I then landed a job at a school in Nonthaburi itself. However it wasn't just a straight English teaching gig; it was an IEP intensive English program. The parents had paid extra money for their kids to study English everyday with a native speaker. This was going to stretch me because I needed to come up with new games and activities for every single day. This I managed to do to even my amazement. It wasn't going to be all plain sailing at this school though as I was going to find out very quickly. The head of the IEP, a middle aged Thai battle-axe with some kind of grudge against foreign teachers, was gunning for me.

I first knew something was up when I got a call from the Thai school liaison woman that I'd known for a long while. She told me that the school had a few niggles with me. 1. My accent 2. I taught with nothing in my hands! Well, there was nothing wrong with my accent and what did the school want? - for me to carry books in my hands when I was teaching? Ridiculous. So I just ignored it.

Another major downside at this school was that Thai teachers would come into your lesson unannounced and observe you. I had had teachers observe my lessons at other places but this was going to be very different. The battle-axe and two other Thai teachers would interrupt you mid-lesson and start trying to pick you up on points in front of the class. I didn't like this and it was getting on my nerves. It was really rude too.

In one lesson my boss stopped me and started asking me to explain grammar points. That was the final straw. I just lost it. I said you know more than me - you teach them! I marched out of the classroom and called the agent to tell them I was quitting and the reasons why.

Credit where it's due, my employer did manage to smooth things over but the battle-axe still managed to get rid of seven foreign teachers that semester. I believe that eventually no agency would do business with her and she ran out of options.

Yes. to tell you the truth when the franchise closed it really knocked the wind out of me. It was a place that I liked and it had such a friendly atmosphere. I did get an opportunity to work for the Nonthaburi project but that didn't really appeal to me. There were too many moans and groans coming from people I knew who were working on it. I stuck to the devil I knew.

I enjoyed the rest of the semester that year working at a really nice prathom school in Bang khae. Again I was the only English teacher there and it things were good but 21 contact hours per week was a bit much. But the school was easy to get to and it was a really friendly laid-back place. The teachers used to bring me food and coffee into my room when I was teaching and the kids were ok. After teaching higher level mattayom students for so long I was wondering how I would adapt to lower ability students. As luck would have it, I breezed it! All I had to do was rethink my games and activities and present them in simpler forms and bobs your uncle - all went well. Teaching prathom was a breeze and I began to wonder why I hadn't really done this from day one. Still, you live and learn.

One thing that was getting worse for me was the gradual visa erosion here in Thailand. I mean when I first showed up here back in 2003, it was simply a case of handing over my passport, filling in an immigration slip and handing over 1,600 baht. Then I would go back seven days later to pick up my passport with a one month stamp in it. This system was quickly stopped and I ended up doing border runs with a visa run company. Other than that I'd fly to a consulate in Laos, Singapore or Malaysia and hopefully get a 3 month non-immigrant B.

I then started getting a one-year non-immigrant B visa from Hull in the UK when I flew back home for a visit. Then even the 1 year B became difficult to obtain because new regulations stated that from late 2006, to get a non-B you had to show proof of a bachelors degree or something like that. With these new rules, coupled with my mother having a stroke and ending up in hospital in late 2007, I decided that it was time for me to go back to the UK. On top of all of this I had my own health problems, which I was concerned about because there was a history of bowel cancer in my family. So it was back to good old blighty for me.

I ended up back in the UK in January 2008, living with my mum in her small two-bedroom flat. She recovered from her stroke but now she's on a lot of medication along with a pacemaker. I also got myself a job which is really difficult in this part of the world (Blackpool)

I had an operation to remove a couple of non-cancerous growths from my lower bowel. And I started an open university degree course which will take me another few years to complete. And I got myself a council flat within six months.

My Thai girlfriend of now nearly seven years comes over twice a year to visit me and next year I'm going to visit her in Thailand. I plan to return to Thailand after I finish my degree with the open university here and my girlfriend will be entitled to take early retirement from her job in one of the Bangkok ministries where she has been employed for the last 20 years. She'll get a small lump sum and a small pension for retiring early but she's fed up with the job and wants out.

I intend to use Thailand as a base and my idea is to create my own online web sites to generate an income which will allow me to travel and live where I want anywhere in the world. I will take my girlfriend around with me because she will be free from her employment shackles and we'll move from country to country and return to Thailand whenever we want.

The degree is my back-up plan, so if things don't work out I'll be able to pick up a teaching job to make ends meet. I also intend to further my studies through the university of London's external program and pick up my masters and then my PhD. This hopefully will make me future-proof!