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[title]Long before hashtags, influencers and TikTok, there was a small blue book that could be found tucked inside every backpacker’s pocket. Its author? Joe Cummings – the man who wrote the first ever Lonely Planet guide to Thailand and lifelong Thaiophile who introduced a generation to the kingdom’s best temples, towns and tuk tuk rides.
As a writer myself (with a few Lonely Planet books under my own belt, as it happens) I couldn’t help but jump at the opportunity to interview the legend himself on a recent Time Out Thailand podcast episode. Before I knew it, we were sat together in the podcast studio inside Sukhmuvit 31’s Public House. As planned, we switched into Thai – a second language for both of us – to begin unravelling the stories, surprises and side-quests of a writer, musician, actor and accidental cultural icon.
His first calling to Thailand was spiritual
Cummings’ story starts far from the tropics. Born in New Orleans and raised everywhere his army father was stationed, he grew up without a hometown – ‘we moved every two or three years,’ he recalls as we discuss his father’s role in the Army.
With travel in his blood, it’s little surprise that when he finally flew the nest, his compass pointed due east. Landing in Bangkok in 1977, he arrived just as Thailand was entering one of its most fascinating eras – a time where stories were just waiting to be told.
Thailand in the late ’70s, he says, was ‘slower, quieter, and the air was worse.’ With no BTS, no overpasses and buses belching black smoke (yes, the same ones we see today), Bangkok was both chaotic and captivating. Eventually, though, the city gave way to Chiang Mai, where he found calm, creativity and a community – making it a city he’d call home for more than a decade.
But before that, and before any guidebook even crossed his mind, a single paperback discovered on a dusty university library shelf changed Cummings’ life forever. A book of sermons by Ajahn Buddhadasa Bhikkhu, one of Thailand’s most revered monks – no doubt a rare find in western United States at the time. It was as if it was fate.
‘His writings and his understanding of Buddhism is unlike anywhere else,’ says Joe. It was an unlikely calling for a Californian student in the ‘70s, but that book set in motion a spiritual migration that would define his life.
After graduating, he joined the Peace Corps partly as a means to reach Thailand – where he orchestrated a cunning plan to meet Buddhadasa Bhikkhu in person. ‘I stayed with him for three weeks, and ever since then, he’s had a strong influence on my life.’
While fate didn’t make him a monk, it made him something else: a cultural bridge. That quiet curiosity for Thai spirituality shaped how he wrote about the country later. But what would stick with Cummings the most was not the chants or the meditation. It was the realisation behind his very being and the soul-stabbing insights of his great Buddhist teacher.
‘One day we were walking in the forest, and he asked me, why do you like to travel? I said it was to increase my knowledge, meet people, learn about culture, architecture, things like that. He replied, no it’s not. You like to travel because wherever you go, you’re not the owner of anything.’
A life defined by backpacks and notepads
Those words would quietly guide everything that followed. Travel, for Cummings, became less about collecting stamps and more about surrendering to experience.
But, like any self respecting traveller of the era, he scoured information anywhere he could find it: people, monks, signposts and libraries. One day, he discovered Lonely Planet’s early Myanmar and Sri Lanka editions. Enamoured by the writing style, and impressed by how much they helped him explore these places himself, he wrote to founders Tony and Maureen Wheeler via aerogram with a dreamy hope of a reply.
His pitch? ‘There are twice as many tourists in Thailand as in Myanmar and Sri Lanka combined – why not let me write a guide for here too?’
After a few weeks, another aerogram was returned. The Wheelers bit. Cummings’ sample – two pages on Koh Sichang – earned him a respectable monetary advance and a one-way ticket to history.
Travelling the country by rickety bus, sleeping in temples and gathering tips from night-market drinkers, he mapped Thailand one encounter at a time. The result – a slim 128-page book became every backpacker’s bible, and arguably Cummings’ passport to a lifetime of stories.
More than Lonely Planet
Over the next 25 years, Cummings continued to write for Lonely Planet, cementing his place as one of the brand’s defining voices. Yet, his career soon began to spill far beyond the page.
In 2003 – the same year he first met Anthony Bourdain – Cummings’ phone rang with a request that sounded more like a prank. A Thai fixer friend had been contacted by the producers of A Bigger Bang, the Rolling Stones’ world tour documentary. They needed help finding places in Bangkok for Mick Jagger and the band to unwind, eat and party.
‘My friend didn’t even know who the Rolling Stones were,’ Joe laughs. ‘So he called me. I told him, ‘Yeah, I might be able to help.’’
A few weeks later, Cummings found himself on the streets of Bangkok, sipping a bottle of Singha with one of the planet’s biggest artists. While in town, the band’s Mumbai gig was cancelled and Mick decided to stay longer, visiting Laos, Cambodia and other cities on Joe’s advice.
The trip was so impactful that, the story goes, after Mick Jager’s girlfriend committed suicide, he returned to Luang Prabang, and spent 10 days in the very temple Cummings recommended to him all those years ago. No doubt searching solace and spiritual healing, much like Joe at the start of his journey decades before.
‘A very comfortable bed’
After 40 years in Thailand, Cummings has earned his stripes as both scholar and local. Ask where you’ll find him on a Friday night, though, and the answer isn’t a library – it’s a bar stool. His favourite haunt? We Didn’t Land on the Moon (Since 1987), a wild, art-soaked bar with roots in Chiang Mai and a cult following in the capital.
Today, his career spans all creative corners – writing songs for blockbuster Thai films, acting in countless movies and authoring books that range from travel and culture to spirituality. Beyond Lonely Planet, Cummings has penned Sacred Tattoos of Thailand: Exploring the Magic, Masters and Mystery of Sak Yant, Buddhist Stupas in Asia: The Shape of Perfection, and Chiang Mai Style.
On screen, he’s appeared in films such as Morrison, Inhuman Kiss, Cave Rescue and The Cave, while also lending his creative hand as a songwriter and consultant for television and cinema. He’s led Anthony Bourdain through Thailand for Parts Unknown, and even plays guitar in a Rolling Stones cover band (the irony, of course, isn’t lost on him) – at 70-plus, he still remains one of Thailand’s most quietly extraordinary figures.
A foreigner who captured Thailand’s heart better than most locals ever could. A man of many lives, all of which are centrifugal to his unique identity and dare I say inspiration to any budding Thaiophile, just like myself.
As our microphones settle and the nerves fade, I can’t help but joke by saying ‘you’re pretty much a piece of Thailand furniture now.’ He grins and fires back, ‘then I’m a very comfortable bed.’
Catch the entire interview, complete with English subs (and a few edited grammar mishaps – Thai’s both our second language remember) on Time Out Thailand’s YouTube channel here.