InBangkok.org

There was an interesting approach to a story about Manuel Zelaya on the official radio news this morning: the story covered Zelaya leaving Honduras, some months after he had been ousted in a military coup, much of which time he spent in the Brazilian Embassy in his own country. The story first reported...
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I know that stories beginning ‘Is it just me or …’ cry out for the answer ‘It’s just you, you clown’ but … Is it just me or does this story represent one of the more important things that should be changed about Thailand? It is in the Bangkok Post and entitled ‘...
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As part of my exciting rock’n’roll lifestyle, I will a couple of days a week walk from the office here to the Carrefour supermarket on Ladprao Road. The other day I was doing just that very thing but a little later than usual and I noticed that more roadside space had been opened...
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Not terribly surprising but Denmark spanked Thailand 3-0 in the last round of the highly ‘coveted’ King’s Cup, while Poland (or some time of people playing as Poland while the first team was probably busy elsewhere) knocked off Singapore 6-1. As a result, Denmark finished top with three wins, Poland second with two,...
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When I lived in fin de siècle Korea, I used to listen to the American Forces Radio station (remind me to tell you my death of Princess Di story some time) and one of the programmes that was regularly broadcast was that of Rush Limbaugh. For a while, listening to Limbaugh was quite...
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Thailand lost 3-1 to Poland in the ‘ coveted ’ King’s Cup yesterday, while Denmark saw off Singapore 5-1. I didn’t get to see the game myself – I rarely have chance to watch anything – but based on the Bangkok Post report, it seems to have been fairly one-sided, with the Poles...
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Breaking Bangkok Bird News: Well, it turns out there are two types of myna bird: yesterday morning as I walking along the soi, slightly bleary-eyed, I saw a bird that I thought looked different because of its Mohican style haircut: blow me down if it isn’t the White-vented Myna (Acridotheres javanicus), which is...
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After news yesterday that pro-democracy supporters are planning a protest close to Suvarbabhumi Airport, the SET opened up 0.36% this morning , showing that business supports the move. Ridiculous? No more so than the disgraceful story in the Bangkok Post yesterday claiming the SET was down for the same reason.  
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It looks like we may have a month or so of intensified political action as the pro-democracy UDD movement is rumoured to be widening its campaign to take in a number of targets. For example, today we can see: A rally outside the Department of Special Investigations to find out whether and for...
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The 40 th King’s Cup tournament has kicked off in Nakshon Ratchasima with a victory for Thailand over Singapore . The ten-men Thais, wearing their ‘unlucky’ yellow shirts, were reduced to 10 men when Teerathep Winothai was sent off early in the second half but shortly thereafter got the only goal of the...
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Suthon Sukphisit in this week’s column in the Bangkok Post writes about the Vietnamese community at Ban Yuan (er, House of the Vietnamese) in Samsen. Specifically, he talks about the food available in and around the community early on a Sunday morning – the time is relevant because, as he notes, many of...
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A new evil stalks the Kingdom seeking whom it might devour: a police officer ran his car down an embankment before shooting his wife and threatening people who had come to help with his gun. The reason? An excess of diet pills . Yes, really. Apparently, an excess of these dangerous poisons can...
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The King’s Cup kicks off in Nakhon Ratchasima on Sunday and will feature not just Thailand but also Denmark, Poland and Singapore. Not sure what kind of sides Denmark and Poland will be able to put out but I imagine that Singapore will be up for a shock. In the run-up, Thailand won...
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Khun Pruek Bupphakham, executive vice-president for commercial affairs for Thai Airways, has been fined 100,000 baht for his part in the Wallop scandal in which 400 kg of excess baggage was smuggled from Japan into Suvarnabhumi and through Lost and Found to avoid customs. What was inside Khun Wallop’s baggage has not yet...
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Speaking of wholly incredible utterances, military-installed PM Abhisit Vejjajiva was summoned to the home of the Invisible Hand himself, the Puppet Master General Prem Tinsulanonda to receive new orders ahead of the next round of political disputations. Denying claims made in various newspaper reports, Khun Abhisit observes: “Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva insisted on...
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From the Bangkok Post : “The Department of Investigation will ask Interpol to help track down a key suspect in the murder of a Saudi Arabian diplomat 20 years ago. DSI deputy chief Narat Sawettanat yesterday said he would visit the Interpol office in France later this month to make a request for...
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Japan has been the largest investor in Thailand for many years – cheap labour costs (suppressed by state-mandated violence and assassination in the past, obviously it could not possibly happen today) and a culture of deference in combination with the food and the climate have combined to attract Japanese investors. Thai workers have...
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… they will spread out and block the entire passageway.
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It was Walter Benjamin who observed that ‘Every fascism is an index of a failed revolution.’ There is little doubt that the PAD Yellow Shirt movement has become a fascist movement in terms of the rejection of democracy, the promotion of an extreme form of nationalism and the elevation of mythical, heroic elements...
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More evidence of the clear, rational and forward-thinking of our beloved military: exorcisms of evil spirits are to be held at two locations to rid the Kingdom of bad luck: “ Mr Niphon said when the prison was removed to make way for a 20-storey apartment block for senior officials, it...
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” … the professional soldiers, members of that curious esoteric world which has so little contact with the civilian world, and works in such different ways.
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During the 1970s in particular, the threat of Communist and other insurgents hoping to attack government representatives meant that they were pretty much confined to Bangkok, unless they were prepared to accept the ignominy of huge security presences. Today, the in no way self-satisfied military-installed PM Abhisit Vejjajiva is in the southern border...
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It was no surprise – the Thai team has been firing blanks for a while, partly because of the injuries to strikers and more particularly because of a lack of guile or, under Bryan ‘Robbo’ Robson, any particularly convincing plan to score a goal. The Jordan team was not very good but well...
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It is quite well-known that Thailand suffers from a lack of accountants – there are plenty of bookkeepers (the only word in English to have three consecutive double letters) but few real accountants. This has been a limiting force in the internationalisation of Thai firms. I had assumed that this was to do...
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The history of much of mainland Southeast Asia has been, before the modern age, one of under-population and the inability of kings to establish effective control over regions remote from their directly-held power bases. One of the principal shaping forces of that history has been the terrain – thickly forested, mountainous with river...
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What is reconciliation? Many of the supposedly great and good have called for reconciliation in Thai political life as a means of ‘healing wounds’ and providing ‘unity’ – but these are nearly always self-serving attempts by members of the elite to influence the pro-democracy movement to give up its political aims and return...
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We had unseasonal winter rain in Bangkok this morning – it’s an unusual phenomenon, sufficiently unusual to prompt me into suspecting evidence of global climate change (which would probably be hasty – the climate is very complex and records are skimpily kept. When I am called upon to talk about climate change here,...
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In the wake of blood-stained butcher Suchinda Kraprayoon’s applause for the Abhisit Vejjajiva administration, this from Slavoj Zizek: “The ‘conspiracy-theory’ provides a guarantee that the field of the big Other is not an inconsistent bricolage: its basic premise is that, behind the public Master (who, of course, is an impostor), there is a...
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Thailand put three past a weak Zimbabwe team at the Thai-Japanese Friendship Stadium last night, which was pretty much the minimum expected against a team that pitched up on Monday with only five of their regular squad apparently included. Will there be asylum seeking activity? Manager Bryan ‘Robbo’ Robson, who is on the...
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Did you know that Thai players – including newly-crowned world champion Pakorn Nemitrmansuk – lead the world at scrabble?
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