Ombra

On my Google News feed this morning, there is a story from the New York Times about the building that collapsed in Bangkok after the earthquake. It is written by three reporters: two men with Anglo names and an Indonesian. It includes this sentence: 'At the perimeter, the father of a Pakistani worker told reporters people were praying in temples all over Thailand.' I was surprised to read that a Pakistani was working on a construction site in Bangkok and that his father should refer to temples rather than mosques. Isn't it more likely, though, that the interpreter asked the man where he was from, and he said Phaak Isaan? Then the Americans made a mistake that Imade a very long time ago.

Half a container's worth, not a dozen pairs of jockey shorts.

I came to work in Thailand in the late 1980s. In those days, a person's baggage used to come by sea. When mine arrived, a bloke phoned to tell me. When I asked him how long it would take to clear the Customs, he said it would be anything from six days to six months. Depending ...

Why does the policeman have his hand on the bloke's shoulder and not his throat?

So someone on the City Council is in the fire extinguisher business?

I agree with GreasyFingers. Although I wrote that my cat was attacked by dogs, the cat in fact was an animal that was abandoned, like so many others, during Covid. She arrived at our door in a terrible condition and my wife took her in. I never wanted a cat because I am aware of the damage that they cause, and I see that in Scotland the government is considering allowing people to own cats only if the animals spend their lives indoors. Cats are cute but very destructive.

I can sympathise with you entirely. My cat was attacked by four dogs a week ago, and they would have killed her if I had been seconds slower in getting to her. They bit her half a dozen times, but not deeply. It was a narrow escape, but she was so terrified that she didn't eat for four days and hardly moved. Thailand is the home of the irresponsible dog owner, and in my case I think that these four dogs belong to farang who lives nearby, or they are strays that he feeds. I am very sorry indeed for your poor wife.

Being able to buy booze only 21 hours a day is truly awful. I think that I'll have to move to Cambodia.

This is a great thing for Thais. And wasn't this all begun by Pee Tony?

You are right. My mother was born in 1920 and died in 2004. When she went to a supermarket, she calculated the cost of items faster than the cashier and she had the exact amount of money in her hand when the cashier told her the total. It was normal with people of her generation. And she complained about younger people's failure to do the same.

How can a person be coerced into spending 40 million baht?

Yes, indeed. It doesn't look like a photo of the main Rangsit road.

True. But dinner plates have almost doubled in size since the 1970s. Most people are eating far more than they need.

I don't think that I have ever seen a Toyota Land Cruiser in Thailand. I used to work in the UAE and I saw them every day.

There is an article in The Daily Beast today in which RFK Junior describes Donald Trump's diet as 'poison.' He says he lives on junk food and Diet Coke and that he has never seen him drink a glass of water. How does an overweight 78-year-oild man eat like that and yet work a ten- or twelve-hour day seven days a week? Is every meal accompanied by a handful of pills? It reminds me of Morgan Spurlock's film 'Super Size Me,' in which he lived for a month on hamburgers and fries - and died at the age of 53. That someone can eat like that amazes me.