Meet our friends from the Thai Team

The first image that comes to your mind when we say Thai Team will probably be the dark tanned looking thais we see at coro cup but i'm afraid not for here. They do not plainly associate themselves with the thai team instead, they call themselves the International Team. But to make it sound more politically correct, its "Thai Team-International". We took time off during lunch to find out more about them.

Teiki, Skipper
A 22 years old French born a sailor, living on the boat since his first cry. He works on the boat, bringing sea lovers out on his boat for a few weeks to do all sorts of sea sports. At the same time, he will take time out to surf. He dislikes it when crews don't show up on time. There was one incident he loves to share about, during a mark rounding in Langkawi regatta, his bowman disappeared into the hatch to do big business. He is multi-lingual: French, Spanish, Bahasa Indonesia, English and a fair bit of Thai.

Valentine
Like Teiki, she is a French as well. Her life is surrounded with partying (really happening girl!) and now she has found a new interest, sailing. Her first keelboat experience was during the Langkawi regatta that we participated last Feburary. An adventurous girl who loves to try everything except one thing: her hate for chocolates is just like our hate for no wind. An amazing thing that she does.. flipping the beer coasters 17 times consecutively.

Mia
She comes from Perth and also grew up on the boat, to be exact a 30 ft boat at the age of 9months. She has been racing on keelboat at the age of 16 (now she is 21). Apart from sailing, she enjoys kiteboarding and wakeboarding. Photography is her interest when she is not out at sea. We asked her what she dislikes. She non-hesistantly said, boats that budge on the start line. Now is that a hint for Team SMU? Hrm...

Chas
I must say, he looks more mature than his age. He is only 20years old. I guess it is largely to due to his dislike for sunscreen and he has never applied them despite the countless times he goes out into the sun. He started keelboat sailing at the age of 14 and the largest boat he has sailed on is a 80ft Swan for the Manila to Boracay race. Although he is a British, he grew up in Asia. He also sails on Jelik, the 72ft boat we saw at Langkawi regatta.


Shay-na
When we asked her what is her nationality, she shrug her shoulders and say i don't know. She has been staying in so many countries that she doesn't know where is her physical home but for sure we know she can speak darn fluent thai. Shay-na started sailing keelboat when she is 13 but when she is not sailing, she let her artistic nature take control. She loves to draw and take photographs. Her imagination runs wild.. she wants to be a coconut drifting in the sea, free of all worries.