ผมชื่อทอมนะครับ, ไปที่ Kenai, Alaska..
จบ AFS แล้วก็อยู่ต่ออเมริกาจนจบปริญญาตรีเลย ที่ Utah State University
แล้วก็มาเรียนMBA ที่ Sasin..
ปรกติเป็นคนอยู่ไม่สุขเลยมีงานอดิเรกเยอะครับ เช่น:
Football, Basketball, Scuba Diving, Photography, Boxing, etc.
พวกเพื่อนๆที่ไป AFS อเมริกา ผมเริ่มเบื่อแล้ว.. เลยอยากจะรู้จักเพื่อนๆ ที่เหลือบ้าง

หลายคนอาจจะเคยได้ยินชื่อ “ทอม อเมริกา” มานาน แต่ไม่มีโอกาสได้รู้จักตัวตนจริงๆของทอม
วันนี้ก็ถือเป็นฤกษ์งามยามดี เรามาดูกันดีกว่าว่าชีวิตของเพื่อนเราคนนี้ที่เพิ่งแต่งงานไปหมาดๆ
แถมยังมีธุรกิจของตัวเองอีก จะเป็นอย่างไร

Profile

ชื่อ - นามสกุล : ธนรัตน์ ลี้ตระกูล
ชื่อเล่น : ทอม
ชื่อใน webboard : Tom
ไป AFS ที่เมืองและประเทศ : Kenai, Alaska (USA)
ที่อยู่ปัจจุบัน : รามคำแหง 21
สถานที่ทำงาน : SM Tower 21st Floor, พญาไท

• ก่อนไปทอมอยู่โรงเรียนอะไร มีเพื่อน AFS#31 คนไหนมีมาจากโรงเรียนเดียวกันบ้าง

Please, let me first apologize in advanced that I have write this interview in English. My written Thai is an equivalent of a third grader (That was when I left Thai schools). I have tried, and failed miserably to answer this questionnaire in Thai. Sorry again kub!

Anyhow, I went to a school call the International School of Bangkok (ISB), no one else from AFS#31 went to this school.

• ทำไมถึงสมัคร AFS ทั้งๆที่ภาษาอังกฤษของทอมก็ดีอยู่แล้ว

Well, it wasn’t actually my choice. One of my parent’s friend’s daughter went on an exchange program to Canada, then my parent’s friend came and told my parents about the wonderful experience that her daughter had, so naturally, they told me to go take the exam. After that, numerous number of my parent’s friends and relatives, sons and daughters went on this program.

• ทอมจำได้ไหมว่าสอบข้อเขียนที่ไหน และสอบสัมภาษณ์ที่ไหน

I am very embarrassed, because I have NO IDEA where I took these exams. But I do remember sneaking into the bathroom with TorNZ (who is my friend during the pratom years at St. Dominic) to… ahem.. smoke.

• มีเพื่อนในห้องสัมภาษณ์คนไหนที่จำได้บ้าง

hehehe.. My mind is again drawing blanks..

• ไป Orientation Camp ที่ไหน บรรยากาศเป็นยังไงบ้าง

Hahaha, good story here.. I went to the orientation camp in Kao Yai, if I remember correctly. I will have to confess to you first that I was not a very good lad during the time. .. ต้องบอกก่อนว่าตอนเด็กๆเนี่ย ทอมค่อนข้างดัดจริต เกเร และโตเร็วไปหน่อย เห็นพวกพี่ๆเขาเล่น snooker ก็ไปเล่นกับเขา, พี่เขาก็แซวว่าสาวไม้ยังกับต่อง, ตกเย็นก็ชอนพี่ๆเขากินเบียร์ วันรุ่งขึ้นนี่ชวนเพื่อนๆหมอทุกหอเลย วันนั้นเนี่ยมากันเป็นเกือบร้อยเลย เกินเหล้ากันถึงดึก แต่สนุกมากเลยครับ. Anyways, I did remember that the พี่ๆ were very sincere and caring, and that those of us that met that first night, because friends til this very day.

…me and my super handsome nephew in law

• วันขึ้นเครื่องบรรยากาศเป็นยังไง มีใครมาส่งบ้าง

The usual, my friends from school, my family, and my girlfriend at the time. To tell you the truth, I was pretty sad, because I had to leave my girlfriend (now ex). As expected, the relationship didn’t last very long after I left, but we are still good friends.

• เล่าให้ฟังเรื่องการเดินทาง และวันแรกที่ไปถึง

My camp was at Tacoma Washington, and although I was pretty sad when I first arrive, but it was not for very long. You get there, and you meet 200-300 hundred new people from all over the world, talk to them about their cultures, their life, do activities with them, it was once in a lifetime experience and I wasn’t sad for very long. I didn’t have to adjust much because I used to live in other countries before, and went to a school where the majority of the students are US citizens. So no culture shock, just plain fun.

• มีเพื่อน AFS จากประเทศไทยอยู่เมืองใกล้ๆหรือเปล่า

The closest AFS Thai friends lives close by in a town call Juneau. Which is the distance between Thailand and Hong Kong. Alaska is pretty big.

• ตอนไปเจอ Host Family ครั้งแรกบรรยากาศเป็นอย่างไรบ้าง

My host family is funny, unorganized, and is one of the most caring people in the world. They came to pick me up pretty late and we went back home together, and upon entrance, I see a giant pile of laundry sitting there in the kitchen and living, with my host brothers trying to do an emergency cleaning and cover-up. I pretty much lived like that for the remainder of the year. My main shore is dish washing and taking out the dog to pee.

• เล่าเรื่อง Host Family ของทอมให้ฟังหน่อยนะ

We live in a Alaskan log cabin, with very minimal, repeat, minimal modern days stuff. No cable, one bathroom, with about seven thousand feet of snow outside (that I had to constantly shovel). As for pets, there were goats, ducks and one cool little Cocker Spaniels who’s name is Paisley. My host parents, Phil and Eileen Bryson have 4 children in total. The first one, Kathleen, is a bi-sexual journalist living in London, the second is a hard-core partying lawyer, Patrick, living in Oregon, the third is a prom-queen social worker, Karin (who actually just came last year), in San Francisco, and lastly, my bro David, who at first was a nerd, but I turned him around when I was there. They are the most sincere people you can ever meet in this world. They still are still a constant inspiration to me that there are things in life that is more important than work and money. I was their second exchange student.

• ทอมอยู่โรงเรียนอะไร โรงเรียนเป็นอย่างไรบ้าง

My school’s name is Kenai Central High School, and it is quiet a small school with about 400 students from seventh grade to twelve grade. It is a typical American high school where people are separated into either groups of the Jocks and the populars, the Artists, the Nerds, the Mechanics and Workshop students, the Pot Smoking Potential Dropouts, etc.. Luckily for me, I had my wingman-best friend fellow exchange student from Italy Stefano Rampulla (who I’m actually visiting next month). We mixed it up, and we are proud to say that we got along with everyone, we played sports with the jocks and drank and smoke with the potential dropouts. Oh and plus he was probably the most handsome student in the school, so girls were always hanging out with him.. I was just tagging along.

• วันแรกที่ทอมไปโรงเรียนเป็นอย่างไรบ้าง

It was good. I actually have already known a lot of the kids there because I was playing American football in the school team, and their practices began before school starts.

• เรียนวิชาอะไรบ้าง

My aim was to get a high school diploma when I was there, so I had to do all of the curriculums required to get a degree. So, regular AP courses, US History, Yearbook. Oh.. I had to take a sex education class with the freshmen, and that was really fun. Towards the end when I had already collected the classes required, I was taking fun classes like Weight Lifting, Choir, Photography, etc.

• เล่ากิจวัตรประจำวัน ทั้งวันธรรมดาและเสาร์อาทิตย์

Let me tell you first, that there is absolutely nothing to do in Kenai, Alaska. From going out to Rome at Silom Soi 4 and Vibration at the Novotel before I went, I arrived in a town where there was drinking age. At first I was getting bored out of my mind, but slowly, I began to adapt. You would never believe what I took up. My activities in Alaska includes mostly playing sports for the school, being American Football, Ice Hockey, and I was the assistant coach for the high school girl’s soccer team (no male soccer team here). I also spend my time doing a lot of outdoor activities such as camping, hiking, rock climbing, in the summer time, and snowboarding in the winter time. I think this lifestyle has changed me for the better.

My host family also is very unique people, even with American Standards. They are the type of people that goes singing from door to door during Christmas, they are the type of people that walks 20 miles to camp just to see the sunset, they are the type of people that go to help people build their houses, Easter Egg hunts, Clam Digging at the lake, and I did all of that when I was there (sometimes, unwillingly, because of early Sunday mornings).. They were very sincere, down to earth people.

Parties

• งานอดิเรกตอนอยู่ที่นั่น

Sports and whatever my host family told me to do. Oh, I did start taking up cooking as my hobby.

• มี AFS Camp หรือเปล่า

There was 2 official AFS Camps, one to Alyeska to snowboard with all of the other exchange students from nearby, and another was at Mt McKinley (largest mountain in N. America) to camp. If you guys havn’t been to Alaska, I can tell you this right now, it is one of the most beautiful place in this world. I have been known to constantly talk about the 7 hours Sunset in Alaska when I’m drunk with my friends in Thailand

• ได้ไปเที่ยวที่ไหนบ้าง

I went to most of the camping sites, ski resorts, local malls, etc.

Parties

• เหตุการณ์ประทับใจของปี

There were so many I can not even begin to tell you which one. I share a couple.

All of us male exchange students flew up to Fairbanks, Alaska together and camped. One of the Chaperone bought us a keg of beer and we just got smashed together. I have a picture of 8 drunk exchange students from Turkey, Italy, Sweden, Finland, France, and Thailand mooning the camera. (Mooning is when you show your bare buttocks to the camera).

At the graduation party, me and Stefano each had a standing ovation and very loud cheer from our classmates when we were introduced.

หลังกลับจาก AFS

• กลับมาวันแรกรู้สึกอย่างไรบ้าง

More mature. I became a better person by going to Alaska with AFS. From a spoiled irresponsible brat, Alaska taught me to be more responsible and hard-working.

Alaska was a life changing experience for me.

• การเรียนเป็นอย่างไร กลับไปเรียนที่โรงเรียนเดิมหรือเปล่า

Nope.

My Hobbies

• หลังจากนั้นเรียนอะไร ที่ไหนบ้าง

Well, from what I have learnt, I rotated by working in the summer time in Thailand, and study during the school year in the States. Received my bachelor degrees from Utah State University. Got my MBA from Sasin.

Just got married

• มีเพื่อน AFS ที่เรียนด้วยกันหรือเปล่า

Nope. Although I did attend some classes for fun at Sonnie’s school and ABAC with Tay.

• ได้กลับไปเยี่ยม Host Family หรือเปล่า

Nope, but they actually came here.

• ตอนนี้ได้ติดต่อกับเพื่อน AFS หรือเปล่า

All of the people on the web board from the US have been communicating with each other ever since we came back. Bim+ lives two door down from me, Omm’s family is from the same town as my dad in Lam Poon, and the rest I get to see sometimes, but wish it was more often.

in the pool with my wife

• ประวัติการทำงานจนปัจจุบัน

I have had numerous number of jobs, from delivery boy to consulting, ever since my freshman year in college, so let me instead tell you the path on how I got into opening my own company. During my University years at Utah State University, one of the jobs I had was being the International Student Council President for organizing large events. I had to manage about 600 people and create an event that was attended by about 20,000 people, and was also nominated for the international student of the year award. After that when I was going to Sasin, the school sent me on a business plan competition to compete with to MBAs from Asia call the NASDAQ Moot Corp, and I was the captain of the first team ever won from Thailand.

After graduating and working for my dad at Metrosystems PCL for a while, my dad told me to go open my own company..

• ตอนนี้ทำธุรกิจอะไร มีสินค้าหรือบริการอะไรบ้าง

Well, the company is call Digital Associates. We are a very technology intensive company that does a lot of thing with Sound and Image recognition technology. Basically, we are the only company in Thailand that knows exactly how many times a song or an advertisement has been played on radio, TV and other multimedia channels. It is used for copyright payments, advertisement monitoring, market analysis, and is used by all of the major record labels (Grammy, RS), and Media Agencies. We have also won the 2nd runner up prize for the Innovation of the year last year from the Ministry of Science.

Work

• ทำไมถึงคิดทำธุรกิจนี้

Well, to sum up short, it’s a long process of analyzing what the market needs, and what I’m good at.

• จุดเด่นของสินค้าและบริการของเราคืออะไร

We are the only that can do it Asia (beside Japan and Korea). It has a real benefit, and is used by people like Ar Guu+, P Suki, etc. on a daily basis for decision making. It is almost impossible to copy, because we have a patent. And it’s a recurring revenue model like UBC, AIS.. they pay me monthly, and I don’t have to try to sell to them ever again, because they would always need it.

• ที่ผ่านมามีอุปสรรคอะไรบ้าง

Too many to mention just one.

• เชิญชวนเพื่อนๆมาใช้บริการได้นะ

Well, there is one branch of the business you guys might be interested in. We are in the process of creating it. You guys know how Thailand never has a “nation wide music chart” like Billboard chart of the States? It is because nobody knows before what are the songs that has been played the most on the radio and TV stations. Now, you do, because of our product. Hopefully, you will see something soon.. It’s call TMP chart (Thailand Most Played), and I’m working on the business model with Toom’s boss at Inspire Entertainment actually.

ที่อยู่ แผนที่ เบอร์โทรศัพท์ของบริษัทที่ให้ลูกค้าติดต่อได้
www.intensivewatch.com

• คำถามสุดท้าย คิดว่า AFS ให้อะไรกับเราบ้าง

It was a turning point in my life, that made me into a better person.

• อยากเล่าอะไรเพิ่มก็ได้

Good job doing this website!

ถ่ายรูป..อีกหนึ่งงานอดิเรกของทอม