Pukky was born just over 40 years ago in the small province of Maha Sarakham, which is located in the very centre of the Isan region of Thailand. She was the eldest of three well-spaced children, with a sister born six years later, and a brother a further three years on. Pukky’s father made a modest living as a rice farmer and her mother tried to supplement the family income in a variety of ways. Shortly after the birth of her son, Pukky’s mother left the village to work with her sister in Bangkok, taking the position of nanny with a wealthy foreign family, leaving her children in the custody of relatives in the village, as was common. Although this gave Pukky a large degree of freedom, it also came with responsibilities, she being the oldest. Pukky recalls that from the age of eight she was preparing and cooking simple meals for her siblings and washing clothes. Despite this, her time in the village is remembered with fondness, as Pukky was always happy. The children had time and space to explore, to play together, to invent their own fun. While they had very few material possessions, they had boundless freedom and that was priceless beyond measure.

When Pukky was 15, her parents separated and Pukky’s father was no-longer a presence in her life as he remarried and had a new family. Pukky’s mother had three children to support and educate on her own, so she left Thailand to work in the gaming industry in the US. This was further confirmation to a young Pukky that there was a whole, other world waiting to be explored. As a late teenager at university, Pukky was not particulary impressed with her life in the nation’s capital. She was used to wide vistas, natural beauty and time to notice and savour it. Pukky found that Bangkok didn’t truly suit her, or meet her expectations. Thanks to funding from her mother, who worked hard to provide for all her children, upon graduation Pukky headed to the Université de Mons-Hainaut in Belgium, close to the French border, with the intention of staying a year to study French. The 12-months turned into a much longer stay when Pukky met the Belgian man who was to become her husband, and now her ex-husband.

Pukky ended up spending from early 2009 until November 2023 living abroad, first in Belgium and then in France, giving birth to her daughter Angelina, now 11, during this time. Pukky felt expected to contribute to her husband’s business in an accounting capacity, despite finding it incredibly boring. In 2015, after the company fell on hard times, the couple left Belgium with very little to their names, to start afresh in the construction business in France. It was an incredibly stressful period for Pukky, who was pregnant at the time. It was also an object lesson to Pukky that it is indeed possible to make a new start as long as you have the correct mindset.

August 2018 was Pukky’s first encounter with Hua Hin, on holiday from France with her husband. The pair enjoyed a pleasant vacation, but it never crossed Pukky’s mind that Hua Hin would play such a significant part in her future. Pukky uses the metaphor of a bird in a cage to describe her relationship with her ex-husband. In October 2023 he announced that the family would be having yet another fresh start, this time in Hua Hin. He packed his wife and daughter off to Thailand while he stayed a further month or so in France finalising his affairs. Pukky and Angelina found themselves in a new place with few contacts. Furthermore, Angelina, then nine-years-old, had been raised a francophone, with little Thai and even less English, with a Thai mother who had had no say in the relocation decision. It is fortunate indeed that Pukky is such a resilient, resourceful and optimistic woman.

Pukky only needed a quick look at the local area to realise living in Hua Hin would allow her to recapture some of the natural beauty and serenity she remembered from her childhood. She instinctively felt that she would be able to “find herself” in its tranquility and return to living in the moment. Pukky found a school for Angelina where she would be spared the pressure of exams, and given a positive and supportive environment to find her feet with both Thai and English. Her biggest desire at the time was to help Angelina feel the freedom she herself had experienced in childhood. Angelina has made good progress in this, and now spends her weekdays at home with Pukky and her grandmother, who retired from her work in the US in 2022 and is now able to help look after her family. Angelina spends her weekends with her father, who still lives locally, despite the ending of the pair’s marriage in October 2024. Pukky and Angelina are great friends as well as parent and child and show physical affection for each other often, even now still choosing to share a bed.

Once the cage door was flung open, Pukky was keen to start exercising her own capacity to make decisions. She used funding from her divorce settlement to open her own fitness business which she named Gym Queen, despite having little business experience of her own. Pukky is a woman unfazed by entering a male-dominated world. She is often asked if it is a female-specific gym, and responds by saying it is open to anyone who wants to feel empowered, regardless of gender or sexual orientation. The Queen in the title is about having a mindset of a queen. Pukky believes that a queen's mindset is characterised by self-reliance, empowerment, and responsibility, combining confidence with compassion, wisdom with decisiveness, and a focus on personal growth, setting boundaries, and serving a greater purpose while prioritising self-care and authentic self-expression. It's about taking charge of one's life, owning one's worth, and leading with integrity and grace, not arrogance, to benefit oneself and those around them. That is exactly what Pukky and her two staff members at Gym Queen model to the customers.  “It always seems impossible until it’s done”, attributed to Nelson Mandela, is Pukky’s favourite saying.

In Hua Hin, Pukky has found she can be more confident than she ever imagined, and that she is perfectly capable of making sound decisions. Pukky wants to continue learning about human psychology, since as a business woman she knows that her job lies in understanding what here clients really need and then delivering it. She acknowledges that her greatest achievement is not in business though, but instead is in putting herself and her daughter first in every situation. Pukky relies on her inner energy, prioritising it for what is important rather than worrying too much about other people’s problems. To add to her mother’s love and support, Pukky has developed a “family of the heart” of around ten local individuals. She is strong and has not closed her heart to the possibility of a future romantic relationship, however, it will be on her terms if at all. Once bitten, twice shy. Pukky looks carefully at forming new friendships, wary of wasting time and energy on relationships that are not “real”: not reciprocal.  She knows she truly deserves all the good things in life. 

Pukky is thankful for her Buddhist beliefs, which have helped light the pathway of her life. She is a firm believer in karma, knowing that to give is also to receive. While business success is important to Pukky, it is less central than the ability to share with those in need, financially, physically and above all, emotionally. While she is working, Pukky always takes the opportunity to engage and laugh with the customers. It’s her personal recipe for success.

Gym Queen is not only a gym, it is a symbol of a modern woman: one who dares to love herself, dares to begin and never give up on her dreams. Pukky wants all her customers to be able to stand alongside her and proudly declare “I am enough.”