PaullyW

"Mushroom"..must be the English word of the month in the Thai press, havent we already had mushrooms this week in the "Thai ladies selling used knickers on line" news story ?

"Hub" must be so past tense now and the new buzz word is "mushroom"

But I must admit...the concept of predatory mushrooms scares the h*ll out me, see what happens when man genetically modifys food ?....what's next bi-polar apples ? narcissistic bannana's ?

I'll warn the wife so she keeps her wits about her when she's in the mushroom sheds picking tomorrow morning.....

<<Members of the Anti-Corruption Organisation of Thailand gesture during a press conference yesterday, after calling on the government to rid the rice-pledging scheme of graft.>>

Umm, isn't it a bit late?

These guys are like watching a bad soap opera. So funny it's hard to contain oneself. They are all clowns -- the entire lot of them here.

All style, no substance. All words, no meaningful action.

^^ can't edit my above post.

Only thing I might disagree with is the number of sounds point you made. Thai in fact has more sounds (individual phonemes) than are found in standard English. Thai particularly has a whole range of vowel sounds that are not found in English. So, sound wise, there's enough there, in my opinion, to be interesting. I really like the way Thai sounds -- esp as compared to other regional languages. I find the tones interesting to listen to.

I have observed that the reason Thais don't understand lots of things is because of the Thai language, when educational literature is translated from English to Thai it becomes, literally a joke.

Thai as a language has no place in the modern world, coming to Thailand as Sanskrit as an ancient language was bastardized into a new language (Thai previously was mainly only a spoken language)

Fix the the English skills first so the Thai people can learn the other subjects otherwise just accept that Thailand will always be a backward country as is many African states that refuse to give up their crippled and inadequate languages. The Thai language is incapable of explaining complex subjects,

In a thousand years English will be the only language on the planet except for a few desperately poor backward areas (the planets native language) so the sooner the education ministry accepts that the better.

When sentences of Thai are directly translated to English it resembles what one would regard as "Cave Man Language"

ie;

When in a high class restaurant the Thai will say "Me hungry much" or just "hungry"

When asked is Khun Chy at home all day today? the Thai will answer "in"

When asked exactly how many kilometers is the the next village down this road. The reply is: "far" or "far much"

Its very good the minister agrees with me, so perhaps now moves can now be made to change the ancient system?

Do any other TV bloggers have any more gems of Thai expressiveness?

Yes, I have observed this in my studies of the Thai language. The interesting things, however, is that Sanscrit and Pali (which Thai/Khmer came from) can be fantastically complex and describe very complicated concepts. I suppose some of that ability may have been lost in the 'bastardisation' of the language upon leaving India/Sri Lanka a long time ago.

I'm not an educator, but I think the biggest advantages for Thais who learn English fluently is 1) they will be better able to reason more thoroughly and 2) they will have access to a worldview and all manner of related information that exists in English language and not in Thai language.

Speaking English very well is a nice bonus as well, but as long as they can make themselves understood to others in English, one could argue that it is enough. It need not be perfect or very impressive for the native speaker. But, the reasoning, logic and world of information that is opens up may have an extraordinary impact on this country. You can't accomplish these things very easily or at all in Thai (which is a beautiful language but which is not suitable for learning, discussing most modern topics of importance or in places where you want to convey technical meaning with precision. It's the reason contracts in large companies here in Thailand are almost always done in English/German/Japanese, etc.

Thais think in Mickey Mouse terms because their language is a Mickey Mouse language. The impact of language on learning has been well studied.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathoey

So sad for Thailand Same same every day another random Thai shooting what is happening to the Land of Smiles.

Very much like dozens (if not hundreds) of other countries.

It is not so easy in hundreds of other countries for foreigners to provoke natives in similar disproportion to extreme violence like this. Thailand most certainly has both a violence problem (as many countries) as well as a racism (in-group/outgroup-ism) problem.

Also, the fact is irrelevant to many here as we are not in or Sudan, Iran or North Korea. Rather, we are in Thailand.

"What this guy did does deserve punishment of course, but I seriously doubt if his intent was murder, certainly not of the bystanders who got hurt." &lt;deleted&gt;? If you want to just scare someone, use firecrackers. Here is a link to stats from 2002. I don't think things have changed all that much for the better, but that year Thailand had 20k murders with firearms (Number 3 on list), and USA had 9.3k (4th). http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_mur_wit_fir-crime-murders-with-firearms

at take a look at the per capital gun homicide rate in Thailand.

http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_gun_vio_hom_fir_hom_rat_per_100_pop-rate-per-100-000-pop

Hopefully it's gotten a lot better later. This issue has been debated many times on TV...

that stats seems to be totally off and wrong.

Do a search in TV. It's been debated a bunch of threads and you can make up your own mind.

Basically Thailand has 1/6 the population of the US.

So for example let's say there are 10k deaths of this or that... To compare it to the US rate then multiply by six and compare.

If one believes X number of deaths to traffic in Thailand are 20k then 20K times 6 =120k.. That is a lot higher than the US.

Whatever your opinion on the exact numbers in Thailand I doubt you come away thinking the traffic or gun homicide rate in Thailand is low.

We might also anticipate that statistics gathering, reporting and/or police work is not nearly as good in Thailand as it is in countries like the US. The stats for Thailand might indeed therefore be far higher even than we think. Surely they know this and have a tourism reputation to keep up to speed.

Not sure if it's been said already, but you'd be wise to be careful and not 'disrupt' things too much here. It's quite common for those kids to be 'employed' by dangerous criminals who would not hesitate to remove you from this existence if they thought you were inferring.

Be careful.

If the well-connected, dodgy Thai lawyer has threatened your life/safety, the best thing to do might be to leave it all behind and relocate to another firm etc. Unless you believe his is an empty threat.

Problems are several.

1. not enough public transport -- esp MRT and BTS lines. Weren't there supposed to be 12 BTS lines by now, but 10 fizzled out due to corruption and political problems?

2. BKK roads are sh!t (potholes, lanes that are too narrow, etc)

3. the conveyer style lights which make us wait for 5 minutes sometimes rather than smoothly moving traffic a little at a time

4. lacking of lights in so many critical places allowing people to make U-turns in the middle of what are essentially highways (absurd)

5. bicycles and other small vehicles clogging up the road and causing slow automobile traffic due to their habit of driving between car/truck/bus traffic

6. drivers who generally do not understand how to drive well (for example, not signalling to turn, or turning across multiple lanes to make U-turn on highway or the weird, inconsistent Thai habit of signalling opposite)

7. government subsidies for certain vehicles which encourage people to own more cars

8. Asian FACE which expects Thais to have a car even if perhaps their budgets would be better served by taking public transport (even in it's pathetic, limited form)

9. Overall piss-poor traffic engineering here. Only other places where I've seen such poorly thought out roads are in African countries and some parts of India.

I'm sorry but the OP is largely unintelligible to me. I tried reading it twice.

"On Wednesday Thailand agreed to cut the price it pays for farmers' rice crops by 20%, in what may be the first step in unwinding a disastrous rice subsidy program. This retreat won't undo the fiscal damage already done by the two-year-old scheme, which saw the government buy local rice harvests for as much as 50% above market rates and then fail to engineer a similar price hike globally. But it does provide a good lesson in the dangers of meddling with markets.

Earlier this week the government of Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra admitted that its rice scheme had lost $4.4 billion for the 2011-12 growing season, a huge sum for a program sold as cost-neutral."

-- taken from: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324577904578557050631839748.html

From WSJ: Thailand's Ruinous Rice Subsidy

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324577904578557050631839748.html

"On Wednesday Thailand agreed to cut the price it pays for farmers' rice crops by 20%, in what may be the first step in unwinding a disastrous rice subsidy program. This retreat won't undo the fiscal damage already done by the two-year-old scheme, which saw the government buy local rice harvests for as much as 50% above market rates and then fail to engineer a similar price hike globally. But it does provide a good lesson in the dangers of meddling with markets."

Taken from: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324577904578557050631839748.html

besides, whats the difference in the distance? australia, britian, singapore blah blah either way your kids arent coming home till vacation and you arent staying with your kids. the biggest distance is your commitment to your kids

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Singapore would mean popping home for weekends is practical, lots of school holidays have short breaks mid-term, public holidays create 3-4 day weekends etc.

And Dad can go visit the kids anytime as well.

And, when you go to visit them, you can enjoy the higher quality PRC hookers there. It's legal there. Very nice to have a good steak, some good, strong beer and an eager PRC bird willing to do nearly anything for a reasonable price...

If you have the money, NIST, Pattana and ISB in Bangkok are equal to or better than other schools in the region.

Wrong.

Not only are the schools not as good.

The OP must remember that only a certain percentage of learning takes place in class. The rest occurs somewhere other than class. Thailand is a terrible place to raise kids because you can't control all the things they'll learn outside of school and your home. If they intend to stay here, and if they are half White, then fair enough -- it mostly doesn't matter. They will be successful -- mostly by virtue of their skin colour.

There is a certain uniqueness to Thailand (and possibly some other SE Asian countries), that make a subjective or even an objective assessment of "poverty" extremely difficult. Comparing it to a perceived poverty line in the west is not logical in my view.

The Thai culture is somewhat unique in the support of the immediate and extended family. This is something that we in the west have great difficulty in understanding or appreciating. There is a levelling that occurs in the economically poor sector of Thai society that means very few get (or are allowed to get) to the stage where they are truly homeless and/or starving. Wealth is redistributed by the family itself to ensure hardship is minimised to a point that the poverty line is not reached. If a Thai does get to the point where they are literally living under a bridge, are unkempt and begging, then this would often appear to be the result of alcohol/drug abuse or psychological issues that the family can not or will not assist with. I define poverty as the inability to maintain the lower level of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs.

Ironically, even the poorest Thai also seems to achieve much of the second, third and fourth level of needs just because they are Thai and the way that Thai society functions. All this despite any real wealth or income, even by Thai standards.

There's a bloke up my Soi that sells bottles of petrol. Lives in a tin shanty that's maybe 3 metres by 2 metres built on public land at the side of the soi. It has a bed platform, and all his meagre possessions are in there. He's always clean and well dressed, always has a smile and is great for a laugh. He has a granddaughter visit occasionally for a few days, has friends up and down the soi that he always visits and half his customers wave to him from 100 metres away and fill up themselves and leave the baht. He has the odd drink,always has food, pops away for a day or two now and then (dunno where too), and often has a mini party with the local taxi drivers. I'm sure we all know or have seen people like this in all parts of Thailand.

By any western standards he is well below any kind of poverty line in the strictest sense. If you applied a Standard of Living measurement, then also well below the west and any of us would baulk at his living conditions. If you apply an arbitrary "Quality of Life" measurement, I would say he'd be well up there in the top percentile.

http://www.google.co.nz/url?sa=i&source=images&cd=&cad=rja&docid=oyOtiOjIpFhDOM&tbnid=PQ7uncv8K58y8M:&ved=0CAgQjRwwAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fweemanbradley.blogspot.com%2F&ei=E8O6UeOWHYywiQfUqoDgBA&psig=AFQjCNH-5qV7_xoRWZHZr-dEYPWo2nwTZw&ust=1371280531518471

Good anecdote. I think it's also a point to remember -- for those of us who came from poverty or had other indirect or directed experience with poverty in a Western country -- that some of these qualities are very regular in the West as well. Our societies weren't always modern and relatively rich. Let's not get carried away with our admiration of the Thais on this topic. It's human nature to not want to wallow in misery. People the world over in rich countries and poor smile much more than many of us with no experience in that venue would anticipate.

In my opinion, it's more impressive in rich countries where poor people generally know how far from comfort they actually are.

I have a very, very deep respect for Western sacrifices that brought us to our relative privilege and I take many opportunities to remind people that we scratched and kicked and clawed and bleed our way to where we are.

they are not as honest as others that's rubbish. some are honest but the majority are full of it.

Clearly you just don't have a clue how to read people if that is you conclusion. That, and you don't get out much.

What the frack does reading people have to do with honesty? If someone is being honest, it is the truth and how it is interpreted is irrelevant.

When I talk about poverty to friends in the Western World - I differentiate it by saying that there are few desperately poor here. The distinction being that shelter of some sort is easily managed and food will be provided at any temple - the monks will share. And it seems to me that many middle or lower middle class people in the West, living paycheck to paycheck, have a deep rooted fear of becoming homeless.

One definition of poverty says - it is measured relative to what your neighbor has -

I have always felt that most poor Thais have a better life and are happier than most middle or lower middle class Westerners..

I agree, but let's not forget that 'better' must be defined. Not everyone (especially many Christians) believes that to be happy is the most important goal in life. Western society (at it's best, especially) requires great sacrifice. That is our burden to shoulder and I'm sure many would prefer to shoulder it knowing that it plays more to typical Western values and goals in life. Japan is also an extremely difficult place to live and survive, but I doubt you'll find many Japanese who would trade their values and 'world' for the Thais' and Thailand.

<snip>

As you can see, a synonym is 'want' or 'to want'. In this sense, someone is poor who lacks or wants for much more than he/she has. In that sense most Thais might be thought of as rather poor, as is the case with most of humanity.

^^ I'm sorry PaullyW .. but I have to suggest that is a definition of poverty as from a Western viewpoint will the topic at hand is from a Thailand perspective or context.

So, then perhaps we should use a different word and the OP should need to describe the question outside the context of the word 'poverty' which has a very clear meaning.

I'm happy to wrap this one up --

As you can see, a synonym is 'want' or 'to want'. In this sense, someone is poor who lacks or wants for much more than he/she has. In that sense most Thais might be thought of as rather poor, as is the case with most of humanity.

why some man would be with a ugly woman like her !!

Look closely at the jaw area and mouth. She is a he!

Just when I thought this thread couldn't sink any lower - it does!

What sort of people is Thailand attracting that they cannot distinguish between a woman and a transsexual?

I completely agree. Not sure why so many can't see it's obviously a guy.

Apparently, Thailand attracts loads of us old Farang geezers, many perpetually on drink, who can't disguish between men and women, bar girl or non, educated or not, schemer or not, etc.

Again, what happened to him is still terrible and wrong. And, if there was foul play, I hope they get whoever is responsible.

why some man would be with a ugly woman like her !!

Look closely at the jaw area and mouth. She is a he!

By your logic, I must be a woman!!!!

No, yours is rather masculine. A bit hairy, though.

why some man would be with a ugly woman like her !!

Look closely at the jaw area and mouth. She is a he!