When Pawarin Ramanwong, a Thammasat alumna, saw friends selling and buying goods on Facebook, she sought to do the same thing to help generate income for those in need during these trying times. Pawarin created a private group on Facebook—named Maha Wittayalai Thammasat Lae Karn Fak Rarn (translated as Thammasat University and Promotional Space)—and invited friends in the retail scene to sell their merchandise. These friends invited more people and, within three days, a Facebook group of 20 people became an online community of 10,000 buyers and sellers, all of whom are linked to Thailand’s second-oldest university in some way. “I believe there are these invisible strings of brotherhood that somehow bond us,” says Pawarin, who also mentions that she has been receiving a lot of messages, even from strangers, thanking her for how she’s helped save their business.
This casual business model is so successful that many universities in Thailand, including Chulalongkorn and Kasetsart, have their own alumni-led online marketplaces, most of which have more than 100,000 active members.
You can peddle or purchase nearly anything in these marketplaces, from drool-worthy crispy pork to organic vegetables to a rare Patek Phillippe watch to a piece of land worth a billion baht. But there’s also something going on beyond the transactions—a different form of connection that involves e-meeting long-lost friends and an exchange of entertaining comments and writings that induce smiles and laughter, and alleviate people’s fears and anxieties.
“Not everyone joins the group to buy,” says Pawarin. “They come to have a good time.”