I wrapped up 2008 with a 16 day trip to Thailand. I fell in love with the beautiful landscape, the gracious people and delicious food.

I spent my time lounging on the beach and bombing around on a motorcycle though the mountains, and managed to stay completely offline while I was there – OK – I checked personal email twice – but it was so nice to unplug and veg out. I didn’t think about work almost the entire time I was in Thailand, but I observed and heard a few things that triggered some new ideas.

Speaking with Thais in Bangkok, many are worried that Thai will become the second language of the blue collar workers in the city. To succeed in their tourist economy, the ability to speak English is a must. I noticed a few Thai billlboards advertising various products, and a website URL was usually provided at the bottom. The URL was in English, and this made me reflect on how the Roman alphabet has taken over the Web and become the global standard.

Sure there are tons of Romance languages that use the Roman alphabet — Spanish, French and Dutch, just to name a few. But what about the rest of the world that utilizes a different alphabet? The Thai language is based out of the Khmer language!

Because of the Web’s development in the West, non-Latin based languages have had to make do with their .co.th (if you’re Thailand) or .co.jp (if you’re Japan). Even though the website itself may be in the country’s native language, they have to rely on the Roman alphabet to reach their site.

I suppose not considering this before was a bit naive on my part, but having lived in the Western world for 26 years, I’d never given much thought to how the rest of the world surfs the Web. Thailand will remain special and I’m grateful the experience opened by eyes.