by Dr. Iain
Corness
The
director of the Pattaya Language and Computer School is a sprightly
Englishman, Ken Bebbington. He has had a life that has taken him all over
the world, to satisfy an inbuilt inquisitiveness, but has finally reached
home base in Pattaya.
Ken was born in Shropshire, England, in a large family
with three brothers and two sisters. One of his brothers was his identical
twin, 20 minutes older than he. Being a twin affects your life, according
to Ken. “You dress the same, you think the same because it’s the same
opinion from two people. We always went everywhere together until he got a
girlfriend when he was 18. That upset me,” said Ken looking in
retrospect. However, some differences in their character and abilities
showed early. When his brother’s bike broke down, it was always Ken who
fixed it. (Their father said that his twin was smarter than Ken, because
he sat back and let Ken do the work!)
When they were 16, both applied to join ICI, but his
twin failed the eyesight test, so Ken began his ‘solo’ journey. He was
indentured to ICI to become an engineer, and he did well. However, from
the time he turned 17 he wanted to see the world. “I was crazy about
joining up in the Merchant Navy,” said Ken. “I wanted to see other
places, but I was the only one in my family that wanted to do this.” (In
fact, his initially inseparable twin is still living in the family village
in the UK.)
When he was 20, he managed to obtain his father’s
permission to join the Merchant Navy and he was released by ICI to allow
him to join the Merchant Navy. However, even after getting his father’s
consent, it was not that easy. The various shipping lines did not want raw
land lubbers. The first question to any applicant was “Have you been to
sea before?” A negative response and you were out the door!
Ken was lucky, however. He walked into the offices of
the Pacific Steam Navigation company just as they had suddenly found
themselves short of young engineers. Despite his lack of experience, he
was hired as an engineering officer.
His dreams of seeing other parts of the world began to
come to fruition, as he visited the Caribbean and the west coast of South
America with Pacific Steam Navigation. He then changed shipping lines to
join Canadian Pacific Steamship Company, visiting Quebec and Montreal in
the summer, with Mediterranean and Caribbean cruises in the winter. An
idyllic life for a young man with adventure in his mind. He also studied
for and gained his Marine 2nd Engineering certificate during this period.
The young and carefree Ken did as many have done
before, gain some additional responsibilities by the time he was 26, with
a wife and children, so it was time to look for a shore job. He joined an
engineering firm in Derby, Fletcher and Stewart that specialized in
manufacturing sugar processing machinery.
Based in the UK, he was still sent overseas
occasionally to supervise construction in Nigeria and Colombia, plus other
regions in England. By the time he was 38, the occasional trips had become
more frequent, and he was transferred to the permanent overseas staff of
the company. In this arena he very quickly was given extra
responsibilities, beginning as a mechanical supervisor to eventually
become the project manager for the construction of raw sugar factories and
refineries. This took him to Kenya, Iran, the Sudan, the Philippines,
Argentina and Vietnam.
Ken had already admitted that he was a workaholic, this
being a family characteristic, but perhaps the best example of this was a
brief sojourn in Argentina. Two days after he arrived there, the Falklands
War was declared (1982) and he was told to get out in a hurry. Did Ken
down tools and flee? Of course not. There was work to be done and he did
not leave until he had everything ship-shape and in order, even though he
was rebuked by his superior for not getting out quickly when advised to!
When there was work to be done, Ken made sure that it was done. That is
his nature.
After 26 years with Fletcher and Stewart, while working
for them in Vietnam and seconded to a Danish company, it was time to
retire. However, it did not really happen. He was immediately snapped up
by the Danish engineering firm and Ken reported for work the next day,
working on the same project in Vietnam, but now employed from Denmark.
He spent two years in Vietnam, but was pleased to leave
as he felt the money in the Danish aid project was not being spent
properly. “I was never one to sit about doing nothing,” said Ken, even
though his superiors were of the opinion that it didn’t matter, everyone
was still drawing salaries.
The Danish company continued to send their English
employee all over the world, including Bangladesh, Central Africa,
Thailand (three times), Mexico, China, Malaysia, Indonesia and Turkey.
It was during his first trip in Thailand in 1989, he
met his Thai wife Lamai, a graduate teacher, and they rented a building in
which Lamai could teach, to keep herself occupied while Ken was away. For
Ken, he finally had a home base too. Thailand with Lamai.
He retired in 1998 and they purchased a building in
Central Road and set up the Pattaya Language and Computer school. This has
been a very successful venture with over 4,200 students successfully
completing their courses. So successful, that Ken, now 73 years old, is
too busy to even play golf! Mind you, he’s not complaining. The
workaholic needs the stimulation.
Ken Bebbington probably does represent the best of an ‘old world’.
A world that was based on hard work and personal endeavour, in family
harmony. “If you’ve got loving parents, you’ve got everything you
need in life.” It was certainly everything that Ken needed.
