Douggie Style

go see her in person. ask her. if she refuses then thats that. obviously it sounds like an easy move on her part to do this for you. It also sounds like it is warranted considering the past betweent the two of you. On the other hand though doing things just to score favour points its offisde.

thanks, good point, I had the opportunity to see her today but decided to just let it go..she did say she has been busy and just bought a restaurant ..so will give her the benefit of the doubt.

Normally i like doing favours, when in the mood, this case was a little different because it was a difficult situation over a period of time and she pressed me, but as Burnsie pointed out it was probably an expectation I should help being in the higher position.

A favour is given....not taken.

Was she your employee? If so as her Boss you are expected to do those things to help....as an employee or ex-employee she doesnt feel duty bound to help you. If she is an ex-employee it would seem that in her eyes, the worker/Boss relationship is finished, you had a working relationship not a friendship.

Is she qualified to do what you ask of her?

If she was a co-worker and not an employee....again it seems the working relationship is over and friendship is not on her agenda.

Interesting..yes she was an employee....I think you have probably hit the nail on the head...good answer thanks....altered my perspective for the better

All the previous posts are good.

For low level stuff, having a wallet full of the local embassy business cards can be useful, but only if you don't have something better.

It worked in Bali every time I was stopped by the local pizza, sorry police boys lounging in some dark ally. I used to wave the cards about with a bit of a indignant attitude and a 'call them', quite funny really being in boardys and a 'Bali' t-shirt........

For the technical minded the above is derived from ITAA 97

26-52 http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/con...240/s26.52.html

26-53 http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/con...240/s26.53.html

I am not sure if the tax angle is all you have to worry about......

Hey all,

Hope this does not sound racist but has anyone had experience getting a favour returned from a Thai person? or for that matter getting a favour in the first place?

It's a genuine situation, there is this employee at my old office, I did a large amount of free advice & work for her over a few years, the work covered all sorts of situations, from housing dramas to a large amount of work on her visa [a difficult case].

Recently I asked her to verify my body of work over the phone to a third party, she was not at all keen, not even bothering to answer my emails. I phoned her on another pretext and the response was again fairly lack lustre...there is absolutely no reason I can think of apart from her just seeing it as a nuisance.

It doesn't really bother me, but having been asked a few favours in my time does anyone know how it works the other way?

DriveImage XML is free and fast, thoroughly recommend it.

On another (unrelated to families) thread a member was talking about how some mothers blindly accept & excuse everything their children do, while onlookers might be quite frustrated at the child's behaviour.

I've actually experienced this, myself, on many occasions. On long-haul flights, I've been disturbed by kids running amok, while the parents completely ignore them (in one case, actually putting in earplugs & going to sleep!) I've seen children acting in ways that could be a danger to themselves or others and either the parent(s) paying them no attention whatsoever, or just smiling beatifically at them & doing nothing about the impending danger. Recently I had some property of mine destroyed wilfully by an older child. While his mother was initially very sorry, she excused his behaviour by citing his extreme sensitivity.

I tend to be the other way. I'm fairly strict with my son and constantly trying to make sure he's not bothering others or putting himself in any danger. However, I am aware that people (Thais particularly) sometimes think I don't give him enough leeway.

I'm not talking about smacking, here, BTW. I think there are plenty of ways to introduce & enforce rules of behaviour, without resorting to smacking - timeout, removal of privileges, star charts & rewards etc, etc.

So, does our parenting style cause potential problems in our children? How do you get that happy medium?

Edit - typo

Sounds like you are making your child aware of how other people feel..which IMHO is a great and practically useful thing to give a child...thumbs up.

I am sure this will cause howls of protest but IMHO a parenting style fostering the childs ego and selfishness appears much more common and increasingly so.

This is much to the detriment of the child and society.

Reasons may be the death of the larger family and rise of the sole child family, higher incomes and less time [more 'things' to give in place of time], media intent on selling down, less parental holiday times and most importantly a lack of understanding and knowledge of how to appropriately parent.

Parenting is one of those things where our views and 'style' often seems to be a reaction to our own experiences rather than based on any underlying framework or theory, for example an child with over rigid parents may be an over slack adult and vice versa.

This is fine if you come from a 'good' parenting background but otherwise may just perpetuate or exaggerate any dysfunctional behaviours.

This is not to say there is a 'right' way to parent, there isn't no more than the right way to paint, however a 'good' parenting style will bring the best out of the child and certainly make them happier.

On a practical level, there is a wealth of information available covering many different styles, which when adopted consistently, without ego by either parent, IMHO leads to improved outcomes and a happier family.

As a quick final point, IMHO smacking is totally unnecessary but a life without boundaries produces unhappy brats. Kids thrive under an impartial, consistent, discipline system which must be secondary to a loving fun environment.

The system that works for us is similar to the super nanny with the naughty corner the final result. The books we read underscored a youngs childs primary drive is the desire for parental attentention and therefore the use of it as an effective discipline tool.

Many times I have walked away at the start of a full blown temper tantrum in public places, despite the crowd and absolutely filthy looks it attracted, this was done knowing it was part of a structure of good parenting applied impartially and not simply based on my particular mood at the time. It worked.

As to kids on long haul planes they just don't mix...

edit -> Well, I correct myself again. I should stop doing this in the wee hours - however, the basic fact doesn't change. Paragraph 1 is for 120 days but less than a year. Paragraph 2 is for a year or longer. As Donna's contract is for a year, she qualifies under Paragraph 2.

Thanks that clearly answers my Q about if it was for a year or more or a year or less.. Other people were stating 'more than' 1 year and and it sounded like a year or less..

Just my 2c would be that it sounds to me that she is entitled to her severance pay for working the full year, I dont see how your entitled to one months notice when a contract ends. Effectively I see that as 12 months notice the contract will end on a set period and I dont see how assumptions of a roll over, or how 'performing usual duties' type arguments create a guaranteed 'rolling' contract going forward that would require notice. I mean it seems pretty specific in a Contract of Employment shall expire upon the completion of the period specified in the Contract of Employment without the need to give advance notice.

Basically you signed on for a year, you worked your year. at the end your entitled to the severance that the year built up.

Hi, look I am not across the topic, so forgive me if this is off the point, but the issue of having a continuing or rolling contract [and therefore entitled to the severance pay] or not seems to keep coming up.

If I read it correctly Bendix seems to be saying this is fairly irrelevant as the courts will read any statutes down to favour the employee whereas other posters are being much more technical.

Is it not open to the court to deem a continuing contract based on the facts? especially if it appears short contracts are used as a sham to subvert the intent of the legislation which is apparently very pro worker. [am I missing the point!]

....deleted for clarity....

One thing I am not sure of is the tax situation of severance. In Australia, for example, it's tax-free. I'm not sure what the deal is here.

A good topic and useful post.

Small point, I think in Australia, severance pay is concessionally taxed as an ETP

[of course, speaking generally you are only required to pay Australian tax if you fall within the residency or source of income requirements.... which would be another topic altogether]

Any ideas on how to stop a baby crying - 4 month old.

When I hold her, which seems to be all the time, she cries. As soon as her mother holds her, she stops. She is really driving me mad.

Should I try to hold her more often?

How long will it last? I can't remember with my last one.

I myself think this is a baby that has learned early to get what it wants. She's controlling you by crying, resulting in getting what she wants and that's her mothers attention. I think you give her to her mother as soon as she starts to cry hence she now knows what to do to get her own way.

I'm proberly wrong, and will be corrected, but don't give in too easy. She isn't going to injure herself if you let her cry for a long time ! Keep hold of her when she cries and don't pass her over to her her mother. A case of who will give in first. I'm sure I'm right in that children right from day one are learning on how to get control of their parents and will carry on doing it until they realise who is in control.

There is this whole school of thought on controlled crying, which I think is where you are coming from, sort of developing a Pavlovian response etc.

Contrast that to places where anyone will placate a crying child which anecdotally leads to less crying and happier kids [no I don't have references but use this method and it has worked wonders].

There is also an Australian lady who has been quite successful in developing a method for understanding what the cry means to fine tune your response.

IMHO at 4 months, it is completely natural the baby will be well attached to the mother, don't stress it, at a certain point her preferences will change and may even flip flop back and forwards.

The worse thing you can do is worry about her not liking you etc as that will only make you tense which the baby will react to quite instinctively [not having developed other means of communication they are good at reading body language].

all the best

Here's a quote you might like :

'Somehow we expect spiritual truths to be complicated, understood only be keen theological minds. The sayings from the Dhammapada show us just how un-intellectual it all is. What may seem like empty platitudes are accurate instructions for leading the best life imaginable.'

Well, that depends on what your definition of "is" is. Where would the challenge be if it weren't all parsed into meaninglessness?

Be careful or I might trot out my book of well worn platitudes [sort of like hair extensions for the intellect ], the current favourite is>

life is always infinitely more complex than it appears on the surface

I don't know what it means but it is good at parties when the subject is beyond me or the cheese plate is disappearing. In conclusion it just demonstrates the limits of the human mind [page 3].

Seriously, there is some very interesting stuff in the previous posts, a lot is beyond my current readings, personally I feel the essence of good writing is to reduce jargon and simply concepts which is kind of what the quote was about.

look forward to reading some more on this thread..especially the differences between karma & dharma.....

Here's a quote you might like :

'Somehow we expect spiritual truths to be complicated, understood only be keen theological minds. The sayings from the Dhammapada show us just how un-intellectual it all is. What may seem like empty platitudes are accurate instructions for leading the best life imaginable.'

I (or anyone else I know, in fact) has never, ever been ill from a KFC or McDonalds meal. People all over the world eat McDonalds and KFC.. I eat it quite often (All the skin on the chicken , drink and some of the fries too) and I am very healthy and never ill.. So maybe its just you who is having a problem with KFC and McDonalds, I dont think they would be as busy and popular as they are if they were SOOOOOOOO deadly unhealthy and make you sick, as you say... (Just my opinion, though, not asking for you to agree )

hahahahaha

[ps: The last two CEO's of McDonalds are both dead, at least one who made a boast of eating it every day]

Mr Bell became CEO just hours after his predecessor and close friend, James Cantalupo, died of a heart attack during a management meeting in April aged 60. Nine days later, Mr Bell was diagnosed with cancer.

The damage takes time, so I guess you are young and still spunky, but yeah it tastes great....

+ check the conditions on the visa + the DIAC website

With respect,

John K why the flurry of emails in support of Stickman?

Do you have a vested interest?

It seems Stickman has his own website and contacts and can surely defend himself personally if he so wishes.

Not a flurry of support, but that is what he gets daily. Between reader submission, communications about information for his next weekly, comments that may end up in the weekly, and so on. That is just his normal volume. I think before he went off line he was getting over 30,000 unique hits a week, that is a lot of readers on his site.

As for my comments I am trying to be as un-bias as I can. I am just interested that people are basing their comments on fact and not speculation. The subtle choices of words can suggest and not imply, and often people build on another persons misinterpretation. I think you will find my posts rooted in fact. If we let this continue someone may have said stickman was showing pornography in classes. I like many don’t always have time to read the entire content of longer threads so fact can go astray quickly if there is a break in continuity. There is a phrase that sums this up, it is called a ‘Witch Hunt.’

Ok fair enough no one would want to be tarnished in that way. If thats your only motive, surely you can see it's better to declare that earlier on?

You may be a fan, an advertiser, a friend whatever, by not declaring your bias/interest you diminish your point and if anything just make the Stickman look like he is paying for support.

It would be great to hear from the Stickman himself.

night all.

With respect,

John K why the flurry of emails in support of Stickman?

Do you have a vested interest?

It seems Stickman has his own website and contacts and can surely defend himself personally if he so wishes.

I think he may advertise there and be a pal ;-)

It is funny how he knew nothing about the brothel, knew a bit about the bars but compared them to RCA but now he knows about threats to Stickman and claims Stick could take 50k a night away from a bar just by not mentioning it - ROFL

Yeah, yes it is! and soooo persuasive.

With respect,

John K why the flurry of emails in support of Stickman?

Do you have a vested interest?

It seems Stickman has his own website and contacts and can surely defend himself personally if he so wishes.

Replying to the original post:

As an employer, it is definitely something to consider.

As regards what is slavery, I think you would need to read the definition in the relevant Thai code [maybe someone can post that] and then consider each element .

Here is a definition from another jurisdiction:

For the purposes of this Division, slavery is the condition of a person over whom any or all of the powers attaching to the right of ownership are exercised, including where such a condition results from a debt or contract made by the person.

In that jurisdiction, freedom of movement outside the abode [despite any appalling employment conditions or physical violence] works against the presumption of slavery. It is difficult to prove slavery.

In contrast, if you have a servant living in a gated house, without a key, some type of restrictive contract etc etc you may well open yourself up.

True slavery is an odious practise and anyone doing it deserves whatever they get, it is really a quite a pleasing decision, it will be interesting to see how it pans out and if the old boiler does do any jail time.

Cheers Ourmanflint.

If you see that as being paranoid there is a great documentary on how the Indonesian security services are fabricating terrorist incidents; the pay off is they are the largest recipient of anti terrorists money (I believe over 200m), most of which does not require any real account as does aid monies.

(taxexile @ 2007-04-15 07:52:17)

any link to that ?

Tax here is the link as promised, correction it was a report not a documentary.

For other readers; follows is a transcript of a Dateline program aired on the SBS channel on October 12 2005, it is heavy reading, the program is very clear.

It explores the sordid links between the Indonesian intelligence services and various SE Asian insurgent groups including the Acehnese.

It further claims elements of the Indonesian military were actively responsible for a series of blasts and assisted in the support and development of some of these organisations, the goal was to obtain (vast) funding for anti-terror activities from Western countries.

If you have read the whole thread the parallels and relevance to southern Thailand should be obvious.

http://news.sbs.com.au/dateline/index.php?...headlineid=1033

This link is better formatted but may not be as complete:

http://www.adelaideinstitute.org/Australia/indonesia.htm

(thanks to mods for the light touch in this thread which has been much to the benefit of the discussion)

If you see that as being paranoid there is a great documentary on how the Indonesian security services are fabricating terrorist incidents; the pay off is they are the largest recipient of anti terrorists money (I believe over 200m), most of which does not require any real account as does aid monies.

any link to that ?

I'll see if I can dig something up later...probably not today.

All this talk of a pan Muslim nation is a nonsense, merely useful propaganda to justify the one size fits all yee ha cowboys.

I thank you for making me recheck the facts. Rather than go of topic here are links to the recent history of Iran .

http://www.mideastweb.org/iranhistory.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran#Modern_I...2.80.93_1979.29

‘In 1953, President Eisenhower authorized Operation Ajax, and the CIA took the lead in overthrowing Mossadegh and supporting a U.S.-friendly monarch; and for which the U.S. Government apologized in 2000’ source Wikpedia

In brief, it is a sordid tale of western meddling, duplicity, rape and pillage worthy of any spy novel. A case study of how to create an extremist state.

Briefly, the current levels of distrust and paranoia resulted from the Russian, British, CIA et al installment of a series of puppet governments in an attempt to control the oil wealth. This is acknowledged historical fact.

Ayatollah Khomeini was equally a reaction to that outside influence. Prior to that the country (who I believe see themselves more as Persians) was rather moderate, forward thinking and even had a long standing Jewish community.

Directly on topic, I concede there is a Pan Muslim nation movement, but it is overblown. It is a distraction and a tool of fear mongering that avoids engaging with the moderate majority.

The extremist wins if they cause an over reaction from the security forces, each new atrocity generates new converts. Eventually the whole thing degenerates into all out guerrilla war.

This same paranoia is why the US is (and will) lose in Iraq, this cowboy mentality that there are ‘good’ guys and ‘bad’ guys leads to a heavy handed and unsophisticated response; for example they will not engage with Syria or Iran on a so called moral premise, tying their hands in this way they remove a practical method to reduce arms being used against their own troops. I can think of no greater failure in a government.

I think the South is near a tipping point, it can go either way.

(Mods please leave intact, the outside points are directly relevant to the Southern insurgency and used to illustrate different approaches)

According to documents seized by Southeast Asian security agencies, the final goal of this “brotherhood” is to establish an Islamic mega-state encompassing Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei, southern Thailand, and the Muslim areas of southern Philippines. Bertil Lintner

YaleGlobal, 24 November 2004

Of course you know so much more than the joint intelligence services of many countries worldwide.

The intelligence service collect masses of raw data, analyse it and put forward probabilities to the end users. Therefore the intelligence is filtered and interpreted at various stages by human analysts, equally as subject to bias and influence as any other human.

A case in point was the intelligence on Iraq (supposedly the worlds best), completely wrong on all three critical points:

1. No WMD

2. Saddams non existant link to Al Queda

3. No efforts to obtain uranium

I think the myth the intelligence services are somehow infallible or always correct is naïve in the extreme; to rely on those views alone is dangerous. Logically the wider the sources of information you read the more accurate you are likely to be.

Thanks for your criticisms, I do not have all the answers, but I do know you can either add heat to the situation or take it away.

There are powerful vested interests in adding heat, and the start is to win the propaganda war thereby creating fear and mistrust in the public of Muslims. This equates to further power and budget increases, this is as relevant now to the South in Thailand as anywhere.

If you see that as being paranoid there is a great documentary on how the Indonesian security services are fabricating terrorist incidents; the pay off is they are the largest recipient of anti terrorists money (I believe over 200m), most of which does not require any real account as does aid monies.

Well as a Muslim , i for one find there actions sick sad and disgusting ,And everything that has been done down south in the name of Islam.It has nothing to do with islam, and goes totaly against everything a Muslim should belive in.

I am not a pefect Muslim far from it ,But as i have said all the actions of a few so called Muslim, do not represent Islam ,or its teachings at all far from .And if those people really did know there Islam then they would know that the acts they are doing is totaly wrong and forbidden .InshAllah they will taste the fires of hel_l for what they have done to that poor girl.

Inshallah...

that unfortunately is the great get out clause isn't it? Whatever happens can be excused as "gods will".

I agree that this has nothing to do with Islam as many millions of muslims see it, the Islam of the Quran! But I really wish more muslims would stand up and voice their displeasure in the face of those who claim they are representing all of Islam and behave in this appalling way.

Do you think ordinary muslims in the south of Thailand would be able to voice their own displeasure.. of course not, if they did they would suffer the wrath of those allied to the insurgents as well as those in their own communities who through fear would turn on them.

I'm glad you at least are allowed to say what you like in this situation. I doubt you would be able to if you lived under Sharia law.

First,it's such a bad crime that we all feel sad and rage is boiling in our hearts for this brutal act.

Then:

I really preffered not to indulge is such topic cuz it would always lead to hear the morons of both sides!But if u insist on blaming the whole religion for a brutal criminal act of some bunch who doesn't represnt all muslims that would be unfair cuz most of the muslim ppl do not accept such deeds ,BUT they can NOT stop it .Its just as simple as you being helpless to stop the drugs or prostitution in your own country or even stop THE KKK from being racist !!!so if u think u can do something or change all the beliefs of all the ppl as u wish or as the way u were raised that would be really superior from the usual superior minds who used to conquer the world and FORGOT all the masacares and bloody history they had or still committing till now.

Remember we are all humans(unless u deny that) some are good and some are bad but if u keep the genelization attitude as your law then you should accept me to think all the Christians r killers and bad ppl of what they had done in Iraq cuz I guess u heard of the American soldier who raped a teenager and BURNED her parents and her little sister alive(its the seem deed of those F...G muslims in the south,eh?) u can see the link here http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/6384781.stm

BTW that soldier got only few months sentenc cuz he confessed !!!!!!!

Do u remember Abo Gharib prison scandal ?should we think all the Americans are pervert and .....?

Should we curse and kill or hate all the americans in the world for that act? I would say NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Each person is an indivisual even if some ppl were rasied from the same parents and enviroment and they differs compleletly sometimes.

To all posters :Pls just try to think more and use your brain before accusing or stereotyping the media or some troublmakers who usually live on others disasters.

And then u can claim there is no islamphobia

PS, that reply for all the posters who suffer the same issue

Excellent post, injecting some logic into the topic.

Operating from a position of outrage or moral superiority, does not lead to good decision making.

There are many examples of where it does lead, one outrage answered by another until the whole bloody mess resembles a snake swallowing it's tail.

You only have to look at the Bush response to anything to see an example of a one size fits all style of thinking and where it leads.

There needs to be a more strategic rational considered response, work on those segments of the community who are moderate, reduce tensions where possible.

People have different values but at the end of the day they all crave security and the chance to earn a living, start with that.

I am disappointed with the progress down south to date, and this latest absolute disgrace.

How can a human burn a young woman alive?

How can a human stack, tightly bound Thai-Muslims protesters, one on top of another until 78 die screaming and kicking for air?

How many contributers were as vigorous in rejecting that outrage and if so why not?

It's a circle, you break a circle through a circle-breaker.

All this talk of a pan Muslim nation is a nonsense, merely useful propaganda to justify the one size fits all yee ha cowboys.

1) Is there any way to check under her name to see if there is any record of her giving birth to a child?

Officially, no, not without a court order. In practice, yes.

I guess it probably would have been in Bangkok but not sure.

Location is irrelevant, it's at the national level.

Is there a national registry of births or is it local to each city or do you have to check with each hospital?

See above.

We're not married so will they give out this information to a stranger not connected with the person who gave birth?

Not likely, unless you do get married then you'd have a right to know.

2) Is there any way to find out if she's been married before?

Yes.

What sort of records on marriages are a kept?

Marriages and divorces both as well as marriages ended by death of one spouse. Always includes name of both parties, date and place of registration, identity numbers on both parties and if marriage ended often some data on why.

Same sort of question as with the birth records. If I look at her ID card will that tell me if she was legally married before? I can't read any Thai so if anyone has some help about this I'd need to see a picture or a copy of the Thai words that distinguish between a married and unmarried person on the ID card.

น.ส. ("nong sao") = Miss = Either never married or was once married, now not, and went through some hard steps to not be a "Mrs" anymore.

นาง ("nang) = Mrs. = Has been married, may still be married, etc.

3) If an unmarried Thai couple have a child, can the father even get legal custody of the child?

Both lawful parents of a Thai child have equal rights of custody until a court says otherwise.

I would have thought that the mother would automatically get custody unless they were married.

No, although it would weigh against the father in a custody fight.

The child is a boy if that is of any significance.

No significance at all until a court gets involved, then only a little.

If the mother wanted to get custody of the child, what would be involved and would it be expensive to do?

If a court has already given custody to the father, that's that, unless there's a significant change in the status of either parent and a new court case is undertaken. If a court hasn't ruled, then she still has custody rights in full.

Edited for clarity.

Excellent answer. You may find also something useful on the house registration paper, how you get the copy is up to you.

What's with all the other paternalisitic moralising claptrap? The guy asked some simple common sense questions, if you can't answer it why bother posting?

I take your point , Doggie Style, but I think we are on somewhat different frequencies.

I was specifically referring to the police immediately pronouncing a: the cause of death, b: whether foul play was involved and c: the motive for the murder, if answer to b: is yes. All this is done after only a cursory perusal of the evidence.

However, with better education, they might stop doing it. I assume this is the point you are making.

(apologies for the delay)

Yes agree on both points! however I do wonder if it is the police or the reporters or a bit of both who lead to the Scooby Do crime summaries?

Also from your second post, just reinforcing it is such a mixed bag, IMHO the 'seniors always know best' culture is not given as much weight (and I believe becoming even less so) in some sectors as others.

cheers

This question smells of the 'seniors always know best' culture which furthermore states it is impolite to correct them even when they are patently wrong.

I recall a ridiculous incident in which I was involved. I had a legal document from the UK that I was informed had to be witnessed by a notary. It turned out anyone could witness it but I digress.

I went in to a lawyer's office in Bangkok. Virtually no English was spoken. I explained in Thai that I had a property transfer document from the UK that required witnessing. We were all sat in the main office and I was addressing the lawyer, his two subordinates and the receptionist. It wasn't rocket science as I knew the words for witness and property transfer. The explanation, involving a few questions took around 5 minutes. After I had finished, the lawyer turned to his staff and said in Thai," It's like this, the farang said....." repeating verbatim what I had said in Thai with everyone listening.

But the explanation had to come from a senior. And seemingly was not valid until it did.

Thus using this mindset as the senior party which the police will be in almost all dealings, the BIB become accustomed to being expected to give definitive opinions which will rarely be contested.

In fact, the reaction of the police when shown to be wrong is now one of indignance and denial.

I'd better stop at this point before I begin to resemble the avatar of the exploding poster. Can't remember whose it is.

Well Briggsy, as a generalisation -fair comment, however there are a few Thai police who are very well educated, have excellent English and study offshore in western police academies.

It is a bit unfair to lump them all in with Mr Plod on the beat who doesn't really have any incentive to further his training or push the boundaries and just goes with the flow.

THe situation is really no different in many western countries not that many years ago, it is amazing how short the collective memories were. My local cops were as thick as two short planks, it was only in later times did a degree become necessary and the standards improve.

In days past it was (and still is) the norm, in some sectors of Thai society, to send the kids off for an English, European or whatever education, from the age of 9. I have met Thais who like nothing more than a bacon and egg breakfast and have better English than me, not to mention a string of western degrees, it is still a very stratified society something that is not always apparent at first instance.