A lot of people are so fast to bring criticism against Thaksin and his crew when they ran the nation, and so much so that they brought him down with a coup and attempted to turn the whole country against him. As you know, he subsequently fled to the UK, he had little choice.
When the military rulers then took over, one of the first things they did was get rid of the remaining two english speaking radio stations, and turn them back to Thai. This was an atempt to get nation back to being proud of itself I read somewhere and not seen as a major step backwards because criticism of the government isn't looked favourably upon at all as we all know by the ordinary public.
Well at least Thaksin was at least trying to bring this country into the 21st century with some of his thinking and planning. His APEC speech in 2003 (or what it 2004?) wasn't bad in terms of at least sounding like you're in touch with the outside world. At least his english was f**king passable.
I read an article last months that criticised Thai people of almost all class for having "one foot in the village" in terms of mentality and attitude to money, which I can agree to to a point, in fact I agreee to many points about this remark:
Do I need to walk through Chatuchak Park after my run and watch the peasant folks extracting plastic water botles from the bins five minutes after I've thrown them in there?
Legless beggars line the streets around tourist areas and tourists think they are part and parcel of the world here in Thailand, well they're not. They were placed there by some 'well meaning' mafia, possibly the Indians I think.
The sight of ambulance crews atempting to get me to donate cash to their cause when they stand outside the BTS showing me pictures of accidents is also disgraceful. This is 2008. The country's government should be funding this and making it also a law that ambulances in emergencies should be able to have priority in traffic and no way have to wait behind some so-called rich show-off in his Toyota Corolla yakking into a mobile phone and not taking any notice of it.
And in the mornings if I wanna buy fruit, a pick up truck blasting out megaphones telling the whole area about it will not make me think "I'll have some of them pineapples" at all, it makes me close the windows all the more. That's forceful sales that could also be counted as bullying tactics. Getting people out of bed to sell your wares is a stupid, dictatorship type mentality.
Will it ever change under this ageing 71 year old Samak?
Last edited by DJ Pat; 19th May 2008 at 11:29.
When I was in America a guy told me to 'have a nice day' but I didn't, so I sued him
Was reading in the paper about new laws introduced in February regulating the sale of liquor. It's now, among other things, prohibited to sell liquor to someone so intoxicated that they are almost unconscious.
I've seen a couple of different ads on TV to discourage people from smoking. They both feature lit cigarettes which are of course censored and blurred out of the picture.
And speaking of censorship, men are regularly seen clouting women on the soaps, but heaven forbid anyone should be seen drinking a beer.
Yes. No. Hang on, maybe. WTF is your point?Originally Posted by DJ Pat
Take me down to the paranormal city where the girls are green and they have three titties...
Oh, won't you please take me home?
where do the indians keep their legs?
Under the table, usually...
Actually, I think they use them to combat the ground beef problem in India.
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We must take our actions to their logical conclusion...if the conclusion of any action means the end of the species...then that action must be viewed as antithetical to nature...and anyone performing that action must be considered insane...
Yes. They're not allowed to use real cows, so one mans' meat, as they say...
i suspect they place them along a soi with the sign "spare change. we have no bodies."
This is life in the big city Pat. Sorry if all this is an affront to your delicate sensibilities.
I know where Pat's coming from. He's having a little pop at the 'village mentality'.
You should have been with me in Tesco Lotus on Sri nakarin yesterday Pat. I usually go at about 8am to avoid those with the village mentality but unfortunately I was running a little late yesterday.
Next to the cooked food section is a table of whole cooked chickens priced at about 79 baht each. They are completely cooked, ready to be warmed up in the oven or served cold and unfortunately not displayed behind a perspex screen or similar. I stood there for five minutes in jaw-dropping astonishment and watched a Thai couple in their early 20s, with their son of about six or seven years old, finger every bastard chicken. The woman, all bare skin and cheap tattoos, actually stuffed a fist inside one of the birds at one point. The guy, all Bata flip-flop and home highlights, went more for placing his palm on the breasts of each bird and giving each one a fucking good press. Then he would grab the finger of his son, all spiderman outfit with a worn arse, to stop him running away. No doubt it was a finger that had only moments earlier been shoved way up a nostril.
The worst job in Thailand must be the man who has to sit down with a blue marker pen and mark a number two on the two-baht coins to stop people thinking they are one-baht coins.
Careful Phil, if Ken were here he'd be getting pretty worked up by now...
(Strains of 'You got my temperature risin' like El Nin-Yo!' in the background...)
Moon Lander Champion!So...how was the chicken then Phil?
This behavior is not limited to buffaloes.
I've noticed that old chinese cows love to touch every piece of produce on the rack before making a selection.
It's not so bad Charlie if we're talking about apples or onions (stuff that can be washed or peeled) but you can hardly run a cooked chicken under the tap.
Right. Another example is that japanese bakery place. You better get there early before all the stuff is prodded, poked and squashed by Khun Stoneface and her greedy tongs.
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