A guest speaker at Pattaya City Expats Club this week, Iain delighted 60 members with humorous remembrance of his living legendary status. Often mistakenly believed to be Australian by birth, this baby first saw the light of day around 80 years ago in Northern Ireland, and then Scotland, before turning up in Australia in 1955 on an assisted passage scheme. Asked about his job intentions, Iain told his parents he wanted to be a motorbike speedway rider. When his parents cried no way son, he offered to switch to cars which were safer “as they had double the number of wheels.”
As is well known, Iain compromised by studying to be a doctor and taking his final exams in England before beginning a medical career in Gibraltar – there was a long waiting list for Bermuda – and returning to Australia by working as a ship’s doctor. “I found out too late I also had to be the ship’s dentist and got a 10 minute crash course in extracting teeth.” The captain advised that he’d only need to pull one tooth on the voyage, before adding to a perplexed Iain that “you’ll make such a mess of it with your pliers that no other patient will come near you afterwards.”
Iain then opened his own medical clinic in Brisbane but, true to form, opened the city’s first fast-food Thai restaurant in 1989. But his life-long passion has been for motor racing which he described as “90 percent concentration and 10 percent fun”. He built his first MGB racing car under his Brisbane house and formed his own team in 1990. First visiting Thailand in 1972 on a whirlwind tour, Iain has lived in Pattaya for the past 23 years, a destination he chose because of its Bira racing circuit. He now lives in east Pattaya with his two teenage children.
His catalogue of activities here almost defies description. He became (and remains) a consultant to the Bangkok Hospital Pattaya and spent his leisure time car-racing. But he still found time to write two books on farang life in Sin City as well as writing copiously for the Pattaya Mail. Perhaps no journalist in history has written so many columns for a single publication under his own name as well as pseudonyms. He was restaurant reviewer Miss Terry Diner (Mystery Diner), Harry Flashman the professional photographer and Lang Reid the book worm. Not to mention Automania and a medical advice column written under his own name.
Iain concluded his talk by sharing screen pictures of the cars he has loved and confirming the maximum speed he has ever driven is 300 km per hour. “But the high speed in racing plays second fiddle to concentration,” he said. Sadly and following an operation for kidney cancer, Iain’s health deteriorated and he was forced to resign from driving late last year. “But I’d still like to try another drive,” he told his audience with a twinkle in his eye. Car racing is in his blood and always will be. Energetic, professional and with a ready wit, Iain is surely Pattaya’s most accomplished and diversified foreign resident. Once asked what he would do if offered the keys of the city, he replied, “Ask for a duplicate set of course.”
For more information about the PCEC, visit their website at https://pcec.club. To view a video of Dr. Iain’s presentation, visit the PCEC’s YouTube Channel at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r6BYm5Fzgvc
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