ItsPhuketTownNotCity

Pardon me for being late to this thread, but the OP's question is right up my alley. I will soon have this dilemma: the US or Thailand for my kids to grow up?

My wife is Thai; we have 2 kids 8 and 11; born in Singapore but lived in Thailand their early elementary school years. 5 years ago when my job in Thailand crapped out, we moved back here to midwest U.S. In one or 2 years, we will be in the situation to have the option of staying here or moving back to Thailand.

There are some very excellent comments on this thread. Here's some of mine:

1. My wife is not deep down happy here. Yes, she hangs out with Thais who work at the local Thai restaurant. Yes, she wants the best for our children. But, deep down, she is not happy here. She's gets more depressed every year. The weather is colder, the culture is different, and she is away from her family Thailand. I worry about her.

2. As some posters here have commented about Europe, the US is converging with Thailand in living standards. It's becoming a 3rd world country. I lived outside of the U.S. for the most of 30 years before moving back here 5 years ago, and the difference is startling and mind-boggling. What kind of university degree and future will be there for my kids here in the US in 7 or 10 years? Will it be that different than Thailand?

3. What is education? My children go to the best public school here in my city. Big whup. They wouldn't miss much in education not going to school... I would say that my children would be just as happy and well off - or more - growing up in Thailand if either: (a) I was working full time and I could afford private or semi-private school with at least a minor education in English, or - more preferable: ( be part-time or retired, and "home school" my children in English and in the sciences in English while living in Thailand.

For me now, it's up in the air. It's great to have options and choices, which I am building.

I agree, NBD. It's a sweeping generalization with lots of factors involved, including one's definition of quality of life. But the gap is closing. Another poster pointed out rightly so the percentage of income spent on housing/expenses vs. savings in Thailand vs. UK, and another poster pointed out cost-of-living differences. If you throw in safety (physical security) and weather and simplicity (lack of nanny state and regulations), one could make a case for Thailand and SE Asia.

Bendovid,

Some very oood comments here on this thread. You don't have to make an either/or choice now and before children come into the picture. One yellow flag is that you and your wife like to eat out at restaurants and don't like to count pennies (or baht coins) - just getting by financially in Thailand won't work for you.

My advice is to formulate a 2 or 3 year plan with budget and outcome, and stick to it. Cut your spending down to bare minimum. Stay in the UK and pay off your flat in London as much as you can so that it can be a source of income if/when you return to Thailand. Have your wife with you as much as you can. Figure out an online business (one that you can eventually do from Thailand) and get that up and running. Then see where you are at the end of your plan and then make the next move based on the results.

4 years ago, I got laid off from my regional SE Asian job while I was living in Phuket with my Thai wife and 2 kids. My choices were move back to Singapore (or to Bangkok or Hong Kong) for work, or move back to the midwest U.S. near my family. I chose the latter with a 4 year plan to move back to Thailand, but that has been shattered as my wife has her group of Thai friends and my almost-teenage kids are very happy with their lives. Yes, it's my responsibility to raise them through university but deep down there is a part of me that is completely miserable: I spent most of the last 35 years living outside of the U.S., and living in my hometown in midwest U.S. is one of my worst nightmares. Family aside, I absolutely despise living here.

Don't underestimate how Westernized your Thai wife will become livng in the U.K. as one other poster has mentioned. If part of your love for her is what she is as a Thai living in Thailand, then you might not like the outcome if she becomes Westernized (and, in my wife's case, gains 25 pounds (12 kilos)).

To repeat: children aren't in the picture yet so still have 2 options. Groom the remote business so that you can do it from Thailand and pay off your flat asap so that you will have a small source of income no matter what.

As other posters have said, Asia has become the center of the world. The U.S. is rapidly becoming a third world country (probably the same in the U.K.). Where do you want your children to grow up and where is the best place for them to have their families?

Please feel free to add your views or more recommendations.

Syl.

3 words: MOVE TO SINGAPORE

Phuket is what it is and I worry that over time goody-goodies like you will have an influence to make the place less decadent.

Sure there are alot of pubs, but they offer visitors what they want: If they didn't they would close up quickly.

My base of operations is Patong and as much as I detest the place and have come close to taking up my Thai friends offers of moving in with them in Kamala or even Rawai, I can't leave it. I like excitement. I like convenience and I don't drive in Thailand.

Nothing says Thai culture like Thais beating each other up with billiard cues, my friends drunken karaoke escapades, Issan clubs, and watching fake Thai punk bands elicit screams from the hookers at Galaxy. I'm living Thai culture baby.

You're my hero. Full stop.

doing business in this country is crazy...if you don't have people trying to scam

you constantly, the police will gladly relieve you of your money if the opportunity exists.

buyer beware x 1000

My golden rules for living in Thailand which I have followed successfully for the past 10years:

Don't start a business

Don't marry a Thai lady (or her family)

Don't drive anything (car or motorbike)

Keep a low profile

Don't appear to be rich

Don't act like a prat

That's pretty good but here some modifications:

1. Keep a low profile

2. Don't appear to be rich

3. Don't act like a prat; especially, don't make a Thai lose face in public

4. If you run a business here, the more money you are taking out of a Thai's pocket - even if it is legitimate competition - the higher the risk

And most importantly:

5. Never make yourself more valuable being dead than being alive

Some good examples here of when a thread has run its course...

Well, the topic won't, as several lawsuits against PG are coming up soon.

For someone who claims to be so well connected to them you sure dont seem very well informed.

I never claimed to be well informed, I left Phuket last year and do not get the hardcopy Gazette - I get the Pattaya Mail though and it is amazing how many foreigners are spoofed, drugged, scammed, doped etc -

I found out about this content issue of PG on ThaiVisa and find it bizarre - stranger than fiction - the only thing that jumps to mind is perhaps a policy of making it more of a family newspaper than a lager louts rag, market research suggests that the cream of quality readers wanted a variety of entertainment - there was a smaller groups that wanted gore and violence but the Gazette has more of a global rather than niche focus, as the PG is the island's family newspaper what is probably needed to satisfy the whiners is for someone to set up a hardcore The Phuket Private Eye or maybe a The Phuket Village Voice - you would then have your choice of a friendly family paper or a yet to be created paper for hardcore exposes, murder, kinky katoeys and YaBa busts

The Phuket Post is even more conservative and the front covers always seem to be crumpled up which puts me off from buying it.

If the Gazette can get all this blog attention and PR then it must still be rustling some bushes

Some say there is no such thing as bad PR

Thanks for all of your comments and knowledge, cyberak.

I wonder what makes the Gazette exist? Meaning, the advertisement dollars. What do the advertisers think when they put in expensive ads in the Gazette? Are they thinking that a world-wide readership of the online version will make them money? Or do they think that folks will pick up the hard copy on the island and then they will reap rewards from that?

I am totally curious and am drawing on your previous experience. What do you think?

Cheers.

look befor you leap, this is thaivisa, it should be as good as it can be, dont trash it

That's a joke, right? The Thaivisa Phuket forum? But I digress...

OK, in all fairness, I'll go buy a copy, give it a thorough read, and get back to you.

The comment that started the other original thread on the PG was this comment from the Gazette itself here at this self-absorbing article entitled "Gazette Online smashes visitor records": (http://www.phuketgazette.net/dailynews/index.asp?Id=7010) "Contributing to the rising traffic on the website are... ...and an editorial policy adjustment in which crime, though not swept under the carpet, is now given a lesser weighting in the newspaper's content mix, with recreation, sports, and business assuming a greater role."

If you click on the statistics link at the bottom, you can view what I think is a very amateur page that states things like "The visitor counts below are presented NET of traffic generated by search engine bugs." Does this mean that somebody used a Thai-English dictionary to translate the Thai word for web 'crawlers' to 'bugs'? I don't understand that. Looks very shoddy to me.

Also, check the vistor / page hit numbers:

Number of Visitors: 67,182

Number of Page Views: 89,832

This is the first time that I've checked (last time was over a week ago), that the # of Visitors exceeded the # of Page Views, which - again - made no sense to me. Even with this stat, if only 1/3 of the visitors viewed more than one page then that's not exactly something to trumpet. That whole article and stats page looks fishy.

Anyway, that was the cause of the first thread's Original Post.

Cheers.

Seems like this blog has been invaded by a bunch of pseudo journos that do not believe in fair competition - if you can make a better newspaper then do it and let me know! Talk bout poor human remnants that cannot afford a copy, so cheap they have to make do with a 45 second peep, the Gazette is for those who can afford half a dollar to enjoy a good read covering the entire Nation's highlights, cheap eats, fine dining, hidden gems and much much more.

I have not seen the Gazette recently but hopefully it has not gone downhill, I know there were numerous plans to improve it.

How do you know about this new editorial policy? When I was at the Gazette it was full of crime exposes - every murder on the island was reported without fail with the dutiful Steven Fein at the News Desk - Steven is a very professional news editor and believes in socially responsible reporting

Who has made this policy and why? Has Steven left? perhaps Apirak Hongthong has cleaned up all the crime and there are no more crime stories to report

Reporting crime is a form of crime suppression in itself and without reducing crime it is difficult to maintain steady flows of good tourists, if what you are claiming is true then it would be a crying shame, the island needs dedicated journalism to ensure sustainability

Yes, that's one good piece of journalism (give credit where credit is due) but that looks like a visit from the police; when I see the word 'raid', I envision the police making a surprise appearance and hauling stuff away on the spot like documents and computers.

That was over 4 months ago and since then there's been a huge turnover and reduction of staff at the Gazette and, evidently, a change in policy (though there seems to be internal confusion about this even).

This and the other thread are about the current state and quality of the Gazette. Try to stay on topic, grasshopper, or open another thread entitled "The Glorious History of the Phuket Gazette (Pre-Crap Era)"

I know that there was a lot of great news in the paper with the Gazette getting regular scoops. There were some raids at the Gazette during October, there is a video of the Phuket Gazette being raided on Youtube viewable by following this link:

The Phuket Gazette ran a story about foreign child laborers working in slave like conditions on Phuket island, there are thousands of illegal laborers on Phuket and they are often the victims of extortion.

A few days after the story was printed minibus loads of officials from Phuket's labor department starting coming on a daily basis to "investigate" the reporters and editors at the Phuket Gazette's offices. Someone had filed a complaint at Sala Klang claiming amongst other things that John Magee was a danger to internal security and Worapot Ratsima signed authorisation to investigate the Gazette.

Notice the very large unzipped handbag that Janya Yingyong likes to drop on people's desks while reciting her scripts - in the video she is speaking Thai saying things like:

"I am above the Thai police."

"I go to all the police stations on Phuket island and know all the police here."

"I have everyone's personal files at my home."

"I will investigate everyone, I know that there must be something wrong"

"Are you afraid?"

The article first appeared on Monday, October 6, 2008 on the web then on the 10th in print

Child Labor in Phuket shames Junta

PHUKET: Burmese daily newspaper True News was ordered by the Press Scrutiny and Registration Board of Myanmar to suspend publication for two months, following its publication on September 30 of a large image depicting a Burmese child working on a construction site in Phuket.

Mr Yeni, News Editor at The Irrawaddy, told the Gazette that, An anonymous freelancer in Rangoon told us that the censorship board has ordered True News to suspend publication for two months due to a front page photograph that ran a caption reading: A Burmese child working on a construction site in Phuket, Thailand. Apparently the editors of True News were found guilty of not sending clear draft layouts to the Press Scrutiny Board.

Another Rangoon source said that True News had submitted the layouts, but the Board failed to censor the photo. Major Tint Swe, head of the censorship board, was then reportedly scolded by Information Minister Kyaw Hsan for the oversight, said Mr Yeni.

The editors and reporters of True News are now afraid to give interviews with anyone outside Myanmar. We are unable to find out where, exactly, the construction site is in Phuket. We are very interested in covering stories about Burmese migrants in Phuket.

The Junta are paranoid and strange. The Burmese regime is not like any other government; they focus only on how to control media, especially when they work with journalists outside Myanmar. With the exploitation of child laborers, the Junta feel that they have been exposed for lacking care for their own citizens. Later this year we plan to visit Phuket ourselves, he added.

There will be a lot for them to report on here.

The plight of Burmese workers in Phuket is well known to island residents. They are commonly seen huddled into the back of trucks and at squalid workers camps across the island. The camps have mushroomed on the back of a real estate boom driven largely by foreign investment in recent years.

The situation made international headlines earlier this year when 54 unregistered workers suffocated in the back of a truck in Ranong while en route to a construction site in Phuket.

A crackdown followed, and on June 11 former Kathu policeman Decho Kaewnabon was gunned down in front of his Patong home in a murder that remains unsolved.

Decho, dismissed from the force for involvement in Burmese labor rings, allegedly continued in the business. His murder is widely seen as a silencing killing ordered by other influential traffickers.

There have also been numerous extortion attempts made against Burmese workers and those who employ them, often by people posing as government officials.

One registered Burmese worker who resisted an extortion attempt was shot in the face and killed in Kathu on March 30. Although there were many witnesses, that case also remains unsolved.

visit http://www.phuketgazette.net/dailynew...

to read the original, at first it looked like the Phuket Gazette was shaming the Burmese Junta; in the end it turned out to be a double whammy with the Phuket Employment Department also being shamed for their practices. Records show that many islanders had filed complaints at Provincial Hall against the Labor Department but they were not taken seriously.

The head of Phuket labor - Nattaya in the green shirt - has since been transferred to Phang Nga and the new head Khun Decha requested that these highlights be uploaded to Youtube as a deterrent to other officials that may be led astray. Khun Decha stated that Janya Yingyong has been transferred to the airport after internal investigators from the Ministry of Labor found that Khan was a victim of relentless immoral harassment. A case is now being prepared for the National Counter Corruption Committee to pursue.

Khun Decha initially tried to argue that the Thai media make these exposes but then conceded that they were not as hard hitting, concise and deep as those in the Gazette.

Mr Ping!

What news was not reported at the Gazette? Whilst I was there as Chief Reporter there was nothing that the Gazette would not run except a small paragraph about Mr Kanasanan - The Gazette always had scoops and exclusives, sometimes censorship is necessary otherwise expensive court cases follow.

It is a newspaper - what newspaper do you know that prints everything? Seems like some of you have kiddy axes to grind!

The Gazette was the first paper to highlight child labor, the atrocious labor camps at West Sands, Rawai mugger bust, floating military warehouse, CCTV corruption involving the Patong mayor, the dodgy developers and their illegal billboards, IP violation busts from music to watches - - - and much more so put that in your pipe and smoke it boyo!

Name another publication that comes even close to this quality, hahahaha you are gobsmacked chummy boy, reality dawns - the Phuket Gazette - The Island's ONE and ONLY truly original English language newspaper

[cue Jethro Tull's Living in the Past]

This and the other thread is about discussing the quality of the current Gazette, which IMHO is toilet-paper worthy. It takes about 45 seconds to thumb through it at a Family Mart and figure it out.

What are you on? Or - perhaps the better question is - what are you not on?

Aside from your obvious obsession with the Gazette you have an interesting nik, ItsPhuketTownNotPhuketCity.

Wikipedia tells me:

"On February 13 2004 the town was elevated to city status (thesaban nakhon)."

Which is correct?

Yes, I have a current obsession with the Gazette to the extent that I want - and will help - another local English news outlet to rise to the occasion and bury it. I have my reasons and I believe that I am on the side of justice. When I post about it, I am unemotional and I stick to facts as much as I know them and try to be very considerate about making any personal attacks; in this era of metrosexualism and wussiness, it's so easy for people not to be able to distinguish between negative criticism and personal attacks. I just don't like it when others try to put lipstick on a pig regarding the PG, and I don't like it when somebody tells me that I should bite my tongue.

About Phuket Town/City being technically a city, you are correct - but I walk around it all of the time and it just looks like a town to me - in a good way. When I see to it referred to as "Phuket City", I cringe. And even saying "Phuket Town" sounds nicer than "Phuket City". So I guess it's just my preference or nickname for Phuket City - yech, it still doesn't sound right

Cheers.

The Phuket Gazette is like the bible - good bed time reading. Many editions of the Phuket Gazette are highly sought after collectors items amongst the more refined islanders. Some old editions of the Gazette have become quite valuable indeed, I doubt this can be said about many other newspapers.

I haven't bought a print edition for months and I use old back issues laying around the house as emergency toilet paper. I guess that doesn't qualify me as a refined islander

Since when have PG's offices been regularly raided?

The Gazette reports all the crime that it finds out about. All the other Thai language newspapers have police scanners and so are able to get a lot of information this way. The Phuket Gazette cannot have them on the premises because the offices are regularly raided and they are illegal.

Really? I'm curious as to why the offices of PG attract so much police interest...

I assume its because the gazette is ocassionaly critical of 'powers that be' in phuket. Ill check and get back to you on that.

Yeah, that's a weird one - off the top of my head I can't even recall a police visit to the office in the last 5 years or so.

James is new so he deserves a mulligan but I hope he doesn't get thrown under the bus before he reaches the 6 month mark

I don't know how the place stays in business. There never seem to be more than a mere smattering of guests around (for such a huge resort), and now it seems to be feeling the pinch.

And their near-empty buses continuously tear back and forth across Phuket Town at breakneck speeds. Very dangerous.

I don't mean to pick this apart, but the ME has been there for about a year and a half, no?

I am not familiar with the hierarchy and titles, but Chris Husted used to be the top editor (I believe) and he used to manage people and I believe he answered to the owner, so I assume he was the ME. He left PG a month or so ago to take a job in Brunei.

Looks like the Upper Crust of PG is reading this thread - it has put up lots of articles on their web site the past couple of days.

Talking about Phuket Gazettes little cars!!! Could you please ask your drivers to slow down a bit when driving around Phuket. And stop your drivers jumping to the front of the queues at traffic lights?

Not very good advertising your papers name on vehicles, if the drivers drive like complete idiots with no respect for other road users!!!

Maybe one day your be doing your own story about one of your cars involved in an accident!!! Makes me want to buy a paper straight away.

Syl.

Syl,

Those are the Phuket Gazette TV (PGTV) cars you are talking about. PGTV is a completely separate elite entity and anybody at the newspaper is way too much of a commoner to be afforded the pleasure of driving those little spanking new white sh*tboxes.

The only way a Gazette newspaper reporter could use a car would be to use their own, at far below the standard corporate price for reimbursement for petrol and maintenance; plus, that mythical reporter would have to take full responsibility for any accident whether it was their fault or not. And that's using their own vehicle.

Sounds like a place that I want to work :-)

The Phuket Gazette cannot have them on the premises because the offices are regularly raided and they are illegal.

If you know of a crime then telephone the Gazette and tell us about it and we will write about it.

The people that are there now are doing the best they can with the resources they have.

Quite funny. I thought police scanners would be used in cars ready to go to the crime scene; oh, but wait, you have no reporters, and if you did have reporters, they would not have Gazette-supplied cars.

Hmmm, the OP was about the Gazette not reporting crime stories any longer. So, you are taking your own initiative? And you take phone-in stories? Maybe you should get together with the ME and owner and check this out first.

Listen, this is nothing personal. I am sure you are all working yourselves to the bone and I'm not taking anything away from that.

Good luck. I'll ping you in 6 months and see if you are still there.

To be honest, there is such a thing as diplomacy and not slinging mud for the sake of it. Sometimes it's better to bite your tongue.

EDIT: I mean, people know who I am. Talking dirty will only come back to bite me.

""There is no reason why readers can't send letters to the editor and make suggestions. If you don't like something in the paper, tell them -- they will listen."

There's a small chance they will listen, a smaller chance that they will think about it, and an almost nil chance that they will act on it. Only when ad revenues drop will any action be taken.

"...I understand that those guys have been pulling some long hours in recent months".

Phuket Gazette employees have been putting in long hours since the dawn of time. Nothing new there.

You are trying to defend the indefensible and put lipstick on a pig. I have no clue who you are but I resent the false situation that you are attempting to portray about the Gazette. Bite my tongue? Have we reached the point that truth is verbotten?

With all the discussion and criticism of the Phuket Gazette I've seen over the past few years, I find it curious that nobody ever mentions the other local English language "newspaper" - the Phuket Post.

I don't buy or read either one, but looking at both websites, the Phuket Post looks like more of the same (and perhaps even weaker on the news front).

Just curious as to why the Gazette is always singled out, while nobody ever mentions the Post.

Well, I've never met any disgruntled/p*ssed off ex-Post employees as opposed to the Gazette; witness Chris Husted's going away party - by and large there was one common denominator of the attendees.

I don't think the Gazette is actually owned by Nation. The two have an agreement, but Nation doesn't own PG. I also don't think it's true that PG is told what it can and cannot print. The decision to focus more on softer stories is purely editorial and can be attributed, at least to an extent, to a change in managing editor.

I don't know if you are all aware of this, but the PG experienced a huge turnover in staff not so long ago. A lot changed at PG, so I think you have to cut them some slack while they are finding their feet, so to speak. There is no reason why readers can't send letters to the editor and make suggestions. If you don't like something in the paper, tell them -- they will listen.

I have my own thoughts about the direction the PG has gone. I tend to be more picky about style, such as the lack of unfamiliarity in the datelines, use of grammar, spellings and so on, but I understand that those guys have been pulling some long hours in recent months and they are doing the best they can. Not all decisions are good, but they do work hard to produce the end copy. Staffing has always been an issue at the Gazette, but it looks as if they now have a team who should be able to work towards better things.

Well, you or your life partner must be one of the 3 remaining Gazette staff that existed some months ago (most quit or were fired).

The cause of the continuous turnover in staff is that the owner, Mr. Magoo, sucks the life out of the employees until they quit (or are fired on unreasonably and on unlawful grounds) and never gives his employees the tools to do their job properly. He is only interested in keeping costs down as low as possible while sucking money from advertisers.

The new Managing Editor has no newspaper experience, no experience living in Phuket, no knowledge of Thai or Thai culture, and is basically clueless but he is a great butt-licker.

They do no more local crime news solely because they have no on-the-ground reporters any longer.

They have more outside-Phuket news than local news because their only means to get news is to borrow/steal from other publications. Oh, yeah, they do have freelancers that contribute, but most of them don't even live in Thailand and the articles are generic pablum.

There is a huge demand and hole for local news. To be honest, I get mine from ThaiVisa and Phuket-info forums which, at present, are the best news sources. Phuketwan needs more daily content and it could easily surpass PG, but as long as advertisers keep paying lots of cash for advertisements, nothing at PG will change.

Too bad. Mr. Magoo invested lots of cash in PGTV, which nobody watches, and a new office opening soon that will become an echo chamber because of lack of employees to fill it. That money could have been put into ground reporters, cars for ground reporters, camera equipment, police scanners, and other stuff that would have made it top-notch and second to none.

'Nuff said.