antsrule

I am not sure why people think utopia can be achieved by this. Somehow it feels like a feeble appeasement to the Thai populace. Has this method worked anywhere in the world?

"More developed" countries like Holland even gave free heroin to addicts on houseboats in Amsterdam.. What about the alcoholics then? Forgive them cause they don't know what they're doing. Guess they need dutch coffee shops here sooner or later.......:jap:

I am from Holland, and the main reason to supply free methadon (not heroin however!!!) is to give the junkie his/her daily fix, so they don't need to steal/rob/scam to get the money. It is not really the junkie who causes the problems, but their actions (petty crime in general) to get the money for their fix (i.e. stealing car radio's and such, breaking into houses, etc). Collateral damage is far greater than what they get...

Dutch coffee shops are very strictly regulated, as they will immediately be closed and loose their license when they find anything stronger than weed and hash on the premises (including on their customers!). There is NO alcohol at all in the coffee shops!

If Thailand ever comes to legalizing softdrugs (weed and hash), I volunteer to open a Thai chain of coffee shops along the Dutch model. I am sure it would work, and there would be a lot of customers (thai and farang alike). It is also good for the government as they can tax it, same as alcohol and tabacco (these two drugs have the most addicts, but they are legal and every government in the world is making a LOT of money on it)

Dutch Proverb: "A happy smoker is not a trouble-maker! (een tevreden roker is geen onruststoker)" :jap:

It is great that you to try to make people reasonable about pot and hash. People have been expecting reason to win over governments for almost 50 years. Canada finally was moving slowly in that direction but then along came PM Harpo and his majority who will succeed in passing a bill that gives families who grow a few pot plants more jail time than convicted child molesters.

Good luck with your cafe's, I won't hold my breath. By definition, you cannot use logic to defeat stupidity.

One thing I really like about Thailand is the market financing system where a few people get together and loan each other capital to purchase stock. The great thing about it, no banks , no government, no single person controlling the purse strings.

There are no winners in these political "loan" scams except the banks. The reason is that governments produce money based on loans and no money is created to pay interest. Interest money does not physicaly exist therefore some borower will lose. This problem does not arise in self-funded loans such as is done in Thailand. Sure the rates are high but the money is there from sales to pay it back. The people are the winners all around. Borrowers have stock to sell and lenders make a nice profit. There is no middle man with a high salary working in a big expensive building to suck up as much money as possible. There is just the people helping each other and profiting together.

American banks have seriously damaged the world economy because they think they can continue to extract money from the poorest of their people. They are not alone, a major Canadian bank earned the equivalent of 12,000,000,000 baht in the first quarter of this year on fees and late charges alone. Not only do late charges come out of the pockes of the poorest people but the bank brags about their profits. Your banks are only marginally better because the King (and your lovely ex-bank governor, bless her heart) recommended the elimination and reduction of inter bank fees (LLTK). Wow the banks sure whined about that but lo and behold, the profits keep coming in.

Tell your politicians to stuff their hollow promises as neither they nor the banks will provide any benefit to the farmer. Promises to raise the farmers selling price for rice to 15,000 baht per ton are flat out lies that cannot be delivered without robbing other poor Thais. The world price may improve, not because of the politicians but more likely the weather, which means less rice is driving the price but not benefiting the farmer who, obviously, has less rice to sell. The only way to improve the farmers lot is to get rid of middle men. It is the only way!

Incidentally, when you see that communications executives are the richest people in the world and that your phone bill is always a lot more than you expected, you need to realize that these people are the biggest thieves of all. I am sorry that Thaskin is one of these people because Thai's working poor need strong representation but not from the very person who gouged the public so he could reach such useless levels of wealth. He may be a good man but he has no business representing the poor and disenfranchised. Good business people do not make good politicians because they expect people doing what they say. Businesses are not democratic.

combat experience for Hun Manet's military career?........... the nuts and bolts wow.... good daddy....hun sen

only in early 30's... that's interesting

military ranks.....funny thing in cambodia

there are 4 navy admirals in that country

means 2 admirals per boat

FYI I once read that Bulgaria's navy was bigger than Canada's

Yes, losing a sattelite is very unusual,......up until now. I see on the internet that over the next 2 years we will be hit by several mega blasts of sattelite destroying ionized plasma from the sun caused by an immense surge in magnetic storms. As we speak, Venus is have one of it's biggest recorded storms ever at it's north pole. Is there a connection? Is there a gigantic increase in the amount of energy coming from the sun? Check it out yourself. Apparently, we have already been hit by the biggest blast in several years and a much larger blast glanced off our magnetic field. On the positve side, the northern (and southern) lights are fantastic in some places, unfortunately not in Thailand.

The maximum will occur from now until late 2012.

The good new is that most of the blasts will miss us, many low orbit satellites will be protected by the dark side of the earth and we will have a couple of hours warning. Furthermore, the earths' magnetic field will protect the surface of the earth from destruction by these blasts.

The bad news is there is the remote possibility of some really poor timing and the earths' magnetic field reverses at the wrong moment and 1/2 the world gets fried. God would really need to be annoyed with us. Think of it, a 4 billion year, really expensive experiment trashed in a flash. Nothing left but ants cleaning up.

http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2006/10mar_stormwarning/

Ask your Thai GF/wife to say "fluff" I guarantee she will pronounce it "flupp".

Until she can master the word fluff she cannot truly speak the Queens English .

Here are some good words for Thai natives to perfect.

"very, ferry, pill and throttle"

Also, a Thai speaker will let their tongue tip touch the roof of their mouth in different places. Westerners may hear "L" or "R". A bit tough for Thais to separate.

wow, you bad rascals. What timing. On top of your news item, the Canadian government announced Canadian men must wait 5 years after divorcing an international wife before bringing in a second international wife to Canada.

I told my Thai girlfriend that this was true. Now I will say it is 1/2 true. She will ask me l if I am sure. I will say no

Well, I don't know much about predicting emergencies. I can predict that my wife will stop at every shoe store in the market and buy a pair. I like to see her happy. I would also like see everyone happy. We cannot avoid some emergencies but there are others we can avoid. Thailand will go nuclear power, there is no other way that can provide the energy the Thai people require. So, here is a way for Thailand to avoid a future nuclear emergency.

See what Nuclear Engineer Dr. Takashi Kamei and his friends have to say

http://www.itheo.org/articles/takashi-kamei-appointed-itheo-japan-representative

The best energy is from the sun. Better yet is to have a piece of the sun here working for us. This is called the fusion reaction. The fuel is hydrogen and the byproduct is the same Helium we use in balloons. We cannot do that yet. We will. Until then, hot Thorium salt may be the answer.

The Defence Ministry has earmarked a Bt6.9-billion secret budget for the upgrade of six F-16 AB fighter aircraft, including the installation of an air navigation system and maintenance costs.

Which, after the requisite people have had their slice of the gateaux, will consist of a single sheet of A4 paper taped to the inside of the cockpit window with " SKY " and a large arrow pointing up and " GROUND " and a large arrow pointing down printed on it in red marker pen.

And if there is a mountain?

The mountain should have a large warning sign made if an upper and lower part

the upper part is upside down and says "Low Clearance"

The lower part is right side up and says "If you can read this you aren't going to finish"

Nov. 2008 during the yellow shirt airport shutdown, I stayed at the Thong Ta with the army parking on the highway to the airport outside my window.

One of the British guests went to the commander and demanded to know "Why aren't you doing something to clear out those people?"

The commander got a serious and ponderous look on his face and said "Somebody might get hurt".

Here are a couple of posibilities

1) I had a problem exactly like this. I discovered that my machine froze after 15 minutes of no activity. The timing was always predictable. It was a problem related to the power management settings, Try playing with that if you have a predictable outage (ie. the number of minutes after "no activity")

2) You may have a memory problem that halts the system whenever bad memory is accessed. Depending on the problem, you may not get the implicating beeps during startup. Some memory problems are not discovered at boot time. Try a full memory scan.

3) you have a damaged version of Ubuntu, not too likely as these issues are usually detected when you download.

Keep looking for related events or processes that are active when you halt.

Look at ps -ef frequently to familiarize yourself with running processes.

Which Englishman said something like "Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel"? Dr. Johnson?

At least it isn't a Buddhist temple, given that the Buddha taught all suffering is caused by attachment.

Thank you, that pretty much sums it up

I discovered from my brief time in several different Thai schools and grade levels that the problem arises primarily from the associations that students make especially in M1 to M4. Boys ignore the teacher and girls chat. In a class of 50, this is a big challenge even for an experienced teacher which I am not. I have heard that what goes on in many classes is referred to as "Edutainment". (see www.stickmanbangkok.com/teaching.html )

I would not be so quick to blame any teachers. I have only rarely seen a Thai teacher lose their temper and in my opinion it was effective and well deserved. I personally do not tolerate a male student striking a female student in anger, something I have seen and intervened in 3 times.

One answer is convincing students that the most important choice they will make in their school life is who their friends are. This is more important than deciding what you want to do with your life because your choice will decide for you. Parents have a BIG part in this. Smaller classes would help but that is still not the main problem.

Bus driving is a very important job in Thailand and many male students are headed for that profession. I think a good field trip for students who think school is a waste of time, would be to take the #26 bus from Minburi all around the entire circuit past Mo Chit and back. This is a very difficult job that is repeated several times a day by the driver 6 days a week. A rush hour run would be especially informative. Working a shop in a market is another good one. Teaching the in's and out's of the market finance process, building inventory, talking to the crowds all day. So you want to be a teacher? That's another thankless task. It's all about incentive.

Is there such a word/phrase in the Thai language as Environmental Concerns? Why am I not suprised about this report.

rural thai- every street is a tip, countryside is used as a tip, local people try to burn bottles and tins with the rubbish, thinking it will-burn. school education, enforce the law on sugarcane burning, black bits falling from the sky, we call it black snow, again police nowhere-no patrols, not care, dog sh--t everywhere. Kids throwing plastic out of cars-learn from mum. unclean houses and kitchens-outside most houses are like gypsy camps. This is a disaster--Bkk-canals--under the noses of the mayor and officials. Food markets stink, no health checks on sellers. all rivers polluted-so the fish for sale are full of poison. this is last years report-and the years before. No one is doing their job properly-goverment departments are using money allocated on other money making contracts. I live in a rural village, if anyone dissbelieves me then he has blinkers on. It is serious, but like everything reports and a news splash and its forgot. Sustainable-was a word we used in helping other countries-AID- if it wasn't no money was forwarded. This government should follow -sustainable.

When I came to Thailand it was because I was, like most visitors, enamored by the culture of tolerance, family strength and a life that seemed to have less stress in general. I have witnessed many of the things you outline in your comments and here were my thoughts. I am a farang, I have no right to comment, this is an issue for Thai people. But now I realize that the wonderful tolerance of Thai people works against them when it comes to the environment. I see this same issue when I am in a van with a reckless driver. I don't say anything and the Thai people don't say anything for the reasons noted above. However, we are all hanging on for dear life.

My other mistake was to assume "Well everyone else seems healthy, I shouldn't worry". Then I read about the extremely high rate of fatal liver disease cause by liver flukes in undercooked fish. Now I am beginning to worry about the safety of the food I am eating. Even UHT milk has issues here.

I also marvel at the destruction of the sense of hearing among Thais who constantly are bombed with very dangerous levels of noise. What is it, considering there is a widespread belief in Buddhism, tranquility and enlightenment, that causes Thai people to enjoy these insane levels of intense sound? For me, this is one of the great paradoxes of Thai society.

If your tired of having pirated software, viruses, S..L..O..W hardware or just tired of Microsoft, MAC and the way of life you must assume to be at their party, switch to UBUNTU Linux and everything is free, fast and not locked down. Setup a private could. Get a XOOM with Googles Android, connect it to your cloud.

The last time I ran Windows (last month) they wanted me to pay for a driver so I could watch movies on windows Media center. ARE YOU KIDDING ME? You think you will miss all this stuff you have come to rely on and it's all there in UBUNTU. Office, chat, browse, my CAD software, and I can watch movies without them constantly stopping to catch up. Yes I have an old machine but it is easily fast enough now. KMA apple and microsoft, I pay no more.

I was worried about losing some software so I loaded on UBUNTU on the same hard drive as Windows. I can boot into either one but now I haven't been back to windows for a week

Be interesting to scrutinize the busting authorities' computers and households. I'd bet dollars to donuts they all have pirated stuff in their homes ....software in their computers, DVDs, etc.

Fact is, we all have pirated stuff around the house. I'm not justifying it, but it's just the way things are. And yes, it can get overdone, and there are inherent problems. Pirated software often has malware, pirated DVD's are often poor quality (I've got a Johnny Depp DVD which spells his name on the cover; 'Johnny Deep').

I also produce copyrighted material: several books, some music, and an audio book, - so am concerned about piracy from the other end of the trough. I'm not big selling author, but even the little guys (like me) don't want their material copied and sold cheap - particularly if the copies are poor quality.

The other side of the coin are the stratopheric residuals paid to entertainment stars - some making tens of millions per year. For most people, there perhaps no such thing as 'too rich' but come on, a million dollars per 1 hour episode for acting in a sit-com!? It's factoids like that which make it ok, in my view, for impoverished folks to get some entertaining DVD for $1 instead of $15.

Surely one of the biggest superstitions of all is the belief that a man could be born to a virgin, walk on water, distribute an unending supply of bread, get out of a cave blocked by rocks in spite of being dead, etc.

I mean, come on!

Good one. And so true. Amazing how many can actually believe that stuff.

Easy people, remember this is one good salesperson who saved herself from being stoned to death after falling for some Roman centurions bull%&^t line about coming to Rome on the back of his horse. I always wondered if his name was Paul?

Good music often comes from trauma, especially from Russian composers. Perhaps Pletnev will take up composing to express the event although the trauma is much less than what Dmitri Shostakovich went through composing his seventh symphony about the siege on Leningrad. In that symphony, the ultimate truth is exposed by the singular flute melody of one remaining bird that sang to the still living victims.

I only bring this up to put things in perspective a little for everyone.

Here is a link where you can read about this stunning event when the first public performance of the symphony was broadcast from the beleaguered city, August 9, 1942.

http://www.revolutio...2/leningrad.htm

It is difficult for we who swim in the river of indulgence to free ourselves by climbing onto the shores of suffering, but without struggle there is no life, without poverty there is no freedom, without analytical thinking there is no progress and without tranquility there is no enlightenment . Happiness is a choice we make. But on the other hand, I did buy a guitar today and I am really delighted ;>)

Good Luck Mikhail!

Man you're scaring me. I was just thinking "Thailand is almost as bad as Yemen". I lived there long enough to learn that road signs and lights are strictly only suggestions but obviously they do not have the same issue (no booze probably).

It is too bad you did not include China's numbers. Those people are even more outrageous drivers than Thai's but they place 89th whereas Thailand placed 126 or something like that, out of 200 countries in terms of who had the most road fatalities (200 being the worst per 100,000). There are way fewer motorbikes per mile of road in China so I suspect that's where the difference lies. I can tell you with some authority that driving in Chinese cities is a near miss every 4 minutes. Crossing a road for a pedestrian is actually much safer in Thailand than in China but I am not aware of any stats on that.

I also know that there is an unwritten rule in Thailand among some motorbike drivers, "If you are going faster than everyone else you don't need to worry about whose behind you"

Tailgating is a bad issue here. every van I ride in seems to have a driver who speeds and tailgates. As a farang I don't like to say anything and the passengers, as Thais', don't like to say anything either. On the good side, we always have a mix of Buddhists, Muslims and at least one Christian all praying together for our lives, that must be good karma except I don't think there are normally any Hindus in the van.

Booze, motorscooters and tobacco. If pot was legal I'd say have a joint and stay home, but it's not legal and it never will be so what can I say?

In 2004 the following figures were fatality rates based per MVK (Million vehicle Kilometres)

Thailand: 2.85

Canada 0.01

France 0.02

Germany 0.02

Italy 0.01

UK 0.01

USA 0.001

Bahrain 0.002

Egypt 0.44

Oman 0.04

Yemen 0.11

The figures are directly from the Thailand Accident Research Centre.

Looks like I will be here for the long term and I NEED my guitar. From the other post I looked at, the best idea seems to be to ship by standard mail. This item is something I have owned for many years. It is an acoustic classical (nylon string) guitar in a hard case suitable for shipping. It is in good shape so no scratches or obvious wear except for strings and frets. It is worth about $600 new, so nothing special except to me but obviously I do not want to pay some ad hoc "fee of the day special". I can buy a similar looking used guitar here, same manufacturer, for $100. It does not sound the same so I don't particularly want to buy one here.

I did not bring it with me when I first came as I had a bad experience previously but not with shipping. My previous classical guitar was thrown into a swimming pool and shot to smitherines by an AK47 during the 1994 Yemen civil war. Apparently it was a religious issue with this particular combatant. I would prefer it if my current guitar survives. In Yemen it was essential to pay "bakshish" in order to get something shipped on time and in one piece. I had to go through a Yemeni to accomplish that. It is different here, but how different?

http://www.economist.com/

blogs/babbage/2010/09/stuxnet_worm

I broke the URL in 2. Hopefully you will see it all this time.

http://www.economist.com/blogs/babbage/2010/09/stuxnet_worm

Check this worm out. It affects Siemens control systems.

It is an interesting story how Bombardier came into being. A man (Monsieur Bombardier) lost his son due to illness because they could not get through the deep snow to reach the hospital  (rural Quebec). He subsequently invented the snowmobile. They now manufacture regional passenger aircraft, light rail etc. This does not prove anything, it is simply an interesting story.

Bombardier's software apparently delivers tighter control allowing spacing of the trains closer together and BTS needs to do something to improve service. Although I can't say what the answer is, I can say this, the Stuxnet worm is a major potential disaster for all of us. Whether it is part of BTS thinking or not, I also cannot say. 

Hey, Asiawatcher, If you want to quit using products because of the name, I would suggest you could start by telling people not to drink anymore coke. In that case you would be doing us all a favor.

In Canada there is a saying "Always get the real McCoy"

Mr.McCoy was a black railway worker who invented the automatic oiler for train wheels. People all over started copying his idea but they could never match his quality. It was the railway running gear manufacturers that coined the phrase.

Work hard and stay several steps ahead of the competition. Don't get even, get better.

I bought some knock-off Calvin Klein underwear here 2 weeks ago, big mistake, next time I'll get the "real McCoy"

I remember in '69 listening to "Crazy" smoking Thai sticks. In those days it was the best available anywhere. I wonder how much extra cash would have been pumped into this economy if the powers that be had a more enlightened outlook on pot. This is after all, the land of "enlightenment" in many ways. Unfortunately the business has gone to BC (primarily Vancouver Island). It is a 360,000,000,000 baht per year business and there are estimated to be 40,000 small grow operations in a province with a population less than 4,000,000. In some places, 1 in 4 homes are growing. Just in case you are wondering why Canada's economy isn't collapsing as quickly as the American economy.

That doesn't include the Hemp as fibre business which could be gigantic MUCH to the concern of the synthetic fibre business. For those of you who do not know, the synthetic fibre business is the most powerful lobby group against hemp. They have been so since before WWII.

I learned recently that someone scientifically determined the lethal dose of pot for a full grown rat.  It is 2 kilos dropped from a height of 20 metres.

Like my mom once said when a nurse told her she needed to lose weight "All my life people have been telling me to lose weight and you know what dearie? They're all dead now" 

Give'm the finger Willie.

Hi Mr. Maxman

You seem ti be a "Tea Party" kind of guy. I lived in Texas for 10 years. I love Texans, they are very polite and generous people. I do worry about the tea party as it may eventually run the US and defacto have it's finger on the trigger so to speak. But what worries me the most is the unscheduled missile firing off LA. The most probable source is a N. Korean sub that only wanted to prove to Kim Il Sung that they could do it. They won't advertise it but they are gloating in the knowledge that they can now deal a city killer to US soil. Now that is scary. Yes it would mean the annihilation of N.Korea and the more or less a lot of innocent N. Korean civilians but it would also mean the destruction of Seattle (and Vancouver effectively), LA and San Francisco Bay area. The US is highly vulnerable to a submarine attack. 

I don't have any argument with your politics or those of the other readers, I just wanted to share some probability deductions that are hard to get rid off.  Dare I mention that the ants are waiting and ready to adapt to the higher rad levels.

So, what is the best way to prevent this scenario? Maybe you should talk to the pacifists after all what would happen if Kim Il Sung suddenly realized that the US was not his enemy. Do you think that is a possibility? Certainly would save a lot of lives. 

Good luck Max