Johpa

A couple of other farang homes being built near there. It's a nice area.

There goes that neighborhood. I use to have some drinking buddies over at Mae An and further up at the always notorious Naa Heuk. Does "farang" home mean those high walled haciendas belonging to some Don Farang?

7-11 is operated by the CP corp, that is why you can pay for CPAC using the CP system installed in all 7-11's.

What this price rise will mean is that all the small retailers can increase their prices. I am not totally upset.

I would guess that some of the price increases are the result of increased transportation costs. But when CP is involved, you have to think of financing of their projects outside the Kingdom towards where they divert a wee bit of their Thai profits. Chaiyo!

And what other small retailers? In the towns they have gone by the wayside.

Of course, they could always sell the rusting aircraft carrier. That would contribute to the cost a bit.

How dare you mock the mighty HTMS Chakri Naruebet! I can not think of a no more deserving home for a $15 million dollar helicopter than upon the decks of the mightiest carrier in the world. Is there not a more symbolic coupling in a land whose symbol is none other than a white elephant and where everything is for sale.

Sorry ding, dual pricing occurs in many places in the USA. When I lived in Virginia, the county park was FREE for locals, visitors paid $7 dollars per car. Same in Pennsylvania. Locals pay $20 for a hunting license. Out of state $110, over 5 times the price. All PA state parks have a low price or free to residents and much higher fees for tourists. If you work for Walmart, you get a discount and first choice on sale items. No one seems upset about the fairness of these things in the USA. Different people are treated differently.

All the people complaining about dual pricing going on in Thailand should get out and see the world a bit and realize that it goes on everywhere. Considering all the other things that are very cheap and reasonable in Thailand, it seems silly to complain about this.

I see nothing wrong with Thai citizens paying a lower price than non-Thais.

'nuff said

Nuffy, you miss the point here. In the above US based examples, fees are based solely on residency. You show a drivers license which demonstrates residency and you don't pay the entrance fee. Same applies to other fees, including State college tuitions. And nothing prevents one from establishing residency in a State.

In Thailand, the implementation of the dual pricing fees are based upon things such as race and nationality. Perhaps I am not as well traveled as you, but I have not typically seen dual pricing elsewhere where the implementation of that policy is based upon such standards. And comparing it to employee discounts is absolutely ridiculous.

As for the other ridiculous posting by Sunrise"

Oh, the terrible plight of the caucasian man being visciously discriminated against in every corner of the world! Woe is us! Let's all hold hands and sing "We shall overcome"!

These are complaints of a mildly irritating yet discriminating act in a very specific location of the globe about an equally specific government policy. You might want to get some professional counseling about those choral voices you are hearing in your head.

I've been there. But it remains 'natural'.. in that tourists don't go there much.. I wouldn't call it that natural because of the serious deforestation there. Actually only a handful of areas get like 95% of the tourist traffic; it's mostly a logistics decision: "The Tribes" need to be close to other stuff, like waterfalls, elephants, bamboo rafts etc. As soon as a village is not strategically located in a tourism sense, it gets few visitors.

Every highland village is what it is and not a single one is unnatural. Sure we might nostalgically lament some imagined romantic notion of a bucolic past that may or may not have existed, just as I lament the loss of Samui or even Chiang Mai of yesteryear. The degree to which a highland village has been impacted by "modernism" is usually a function of the proximity of all weather roads and schools.

Most younger hill folks have attended Thai language preschools, and have gone on to attend a Thai language or Kham Muang speaking elementary school. Most are conversant in basic Thai. In areas of high ethnic diversity they might also speak some of the neighboring languages (they are not dialects). When I first came to Thailand many years ago, Lahu was the lingua franca around the Chiang Mai/Chiang Rai region surrounding the Kok River, but it has been Thai for decades now. And of course most minority people in Thailand are going to borrow Thai words for vocabulary that does not exist in their native language, just as that ultimate bastard language, English, borrowed from French and Latin. Perhaps then English is also a "limited" language.

As far as the tourist traffic, what is most desired is close proximity to other villages of differing ethnic flavors. There are relatively few areas where you can hike a few kilometers each day for a few days and encounter at least one new ethnic group each day. And these routes are fairly regulated by the Chiang Mai trekking association that carefully choreographs treks so that they do not collide. Having a waterfall, well waterfalls are pretty darn common, rafting or elephants are just extra bonuses. There are still areas around Mae Hong Song and Khun Yuam where there are very few tourists as you can walk for days and only encounter Karen or Shan villages.

And there are now loads of "tok doi" (a reference to an old Thai comedy film "Karieng Tok Doi"), hill folks who have come down the hills and live in Chiang Mai . Many speak fluent Kham Muang with little trace of an accent. They rapidly assimilate towards a full Thai identity. They are not selling trinkets at the night market although some highland women and men do sell their bodies at the bar-cum-brothels of Chiang Mai.

i m talking about those women in colorful hill tribe garments who walk around all over night bazaar selling jewelries n ornaments...

Well she doesn't wear hill tribe garments when in town, but this one hill tribe princess keeps harassing me to buy jewelery and other silly ornaments on the rare occasion I visit the night bazaar. And I really hate it when she gets this bee in her bonnet to have me dress up like some freaking Shan drag queen and take a family photo at one of those silly photo shops at the front of the original night market building.

But if you must, the Akha version of mai aow (I don't want) is ma guh.

I am married to a Thai lady, we lived in Bangkok for 11months, and have been in the UK for 3 years in total. my wife has constantly sent money to her parents and I figured that if we got them to invest some of our money they could perhaps almost self sustain, and not need my wife to constantly poor money into them.

In rural Thailand, having a Farang son-in-law is the definition of self-sufficiency. The best thing you can do is find an investment for yourself that will generate a few thousand baat a month and that will eventually pay off the original investment, and then you send that generated income in your in-law's direction.

I appreciate I'm meandering off topic here but it's the usual falang rant!

Unfortunately Johnny No-Stars at the ticket booth has a limited education/travel opportunities and thai-centric world view passed down to him by those who know whats good for you. Theres a lot of em in the west too tho, so its not just educational opportunity!

Have you noticed how taxi drivers the world over share the same political views?

I had that Thaksin Shinawatra in the back of my cab the other day, told him what I thought, -shootings too good for 'em etc etc.

OK so discrimination is based on appearance, so what else is new.

and where doesn't this happen? I'm not leaving because of it. Not before Kristallnacht anyways.

Not that I disagree totally upon the ""farang rant" aspect, but there really are not that many institutions in the more modern world that openly discriminate based upon race in the manner that the Thai elite does. Certainly at the individual level there is discrimination based upon looks and race, but it is rare outside the medieval countries in the Middle East to be so blatant at the corporate and government institutional levels. And it is more a Sino-centric world view than a Tai-centric world view. And although I have found many cabbies around the world to share certain personality traits, I have found their political views to be quite varied.

I just pay whatever the "least fuss amount" is, on the extremely rare occasion I find myself at one of these places.

Stuffed if I'm going to take my work permit on the road with me, I actually think it is illegal to take your WP from your place of work anyway.

From a legal point of view, a work permit does not make one chao thai, the term the documents use for "Thai national".

guns dont kill people ,people kill people .

That is just conservative Christian American small willy NRA claptrap. People with guns kill other people with ridiculous ease.

I just want people out there to know that not all Americans share that tragic and stupid NRA sentiment.

Seen this morning in the newspaper:

India

Authorities say "no" to weaker U.S. dollar

Indian authorities have ruled that tourists visiting the country's monuments must pay at a fixed local rupee rate rather than in dollars to shore up revenues as the greenback falls against major currencies.

Entrance to many sites for foreign tourists in India is priced in dollars and then converted to rupees, meaning that authorities have been losing money this year as the dollar slid more than 12 percent against the local currency.

The government had fixed a $5 entrance fee for World Heritage sites like the Taj Mahal and $2 for other monuments at a time when the dollar was worth about 50 rupees. The dollar is now worth around 39 rupees. The new rate for World Heritage Sites is fixed at 250 rupees, meaning a foreign tourist will pay the equivalent of about $6.50. (That is about 220 baat)

So perhaps 400B is asking a wee much for local little waterfall parks like Mae Sa, Mok Faa, and countless other minor natural attractions that happen to be situated within National Forest boundaries, locations where little in the way of amenities, other than primitive toilet facilities, are provided. So we can perhaps conclude that the 400B fee is really all about greed, combined with a tinge of racism, and stuffing corrupt officials pockets with money, and with little thought to maintaining natural park sites as the travesty of garbage and commercialism at the slightly larger sites like Mae Sa Waterfall would indicate. A 200B fee for tourists at significant sites like the Grand Palace may easily be defended, but the 400B fees at these secondary trifling locations is a joke. Maybe some of you neo-sahibs working in the tech industries feel like you might be working in a glass building and don't want to throw stones, and so pay these ridiculous fees without complaint. But I for one will continue to avoid these fees when in-country.

And clearly someone in the Israeli embassy knew Thai culture well enough to convince the young woman to accept the deal.

Do we know definitively that this what the Israeli Embassy advised her to do?

Is this their standard protocol in serious crimes such as rape? To take 600 Euro and forget about it?

We only know from the news that she had contact with her embassy and that she accepted the offer. You are correct in inferring that all else is conjecture. But I am more comfortable with assuming that she took the offer upon advice and not against advice to the contrary. This is fairly standard protocol in this type of "he-said-she said" situation. That being said, please do not infer that I think rape not to be a serious crime. But for better or for worse there will often be a perceived difference, although not necessarily a legal difference, between a late night out going the wrong way and someone breaking into a home and violently raping a stranger.

My brother-in-law works for the local "Oh Pa Ta" and it took me quite awhile to find someone who could tell me that the abbreviation stood for Ongkaan Patana Tambon (Sub-District Development Organization). It is not that the villagers did not know the organization, the office, the employees, etc. They just did not know the full name. And I am sure it is easy to find ma fellow Ahmericans who do not know the official name of US government agencies like the CIA.

I tried to Google the "อ.พ.ต." องค์การพัฒนาส่วนตำบล and found no reference. The more common organization is the "อ.บ.ต." or "องค์การบริหารส่วนตำบล" which is usually translated as the "Subdistrict Administrative Organization", sometimes referred to in English at the SAO. Could you ask your brother-in-law to write the Thai name of the organization for us? I would be interested to see the the development entities. I did find "องค์กรพัฒนาเอกชน" (Private Development Organization - PDO), but not one associated with the Tambol. The difference between the word องค์กร and องค์การ, I am given to understand, is that the latter refers to government organizations while the former can be either a private or a government organization. An NGO, for example is องค์กรเอกชน (คำย่อ non-governmental organization)

Please let us know. Thanks.

You are absolutely correct, I had forgotten the correct formal name, and once again have displayed my failing memory, which is why I post less frequently to the Thai language forum than before.

there is also the possibility that the boy has a relative in the police dept.

It is all a matter of your family's phu yai, maybe within the police department, but that is not necessary.

I don't know the specifics of the club in Chiang Rai, but my son, when in-country, frequents the clubs in Chiang Mai that attract both young foreign tourists as well as young Thais. Now he speaks fluent Thai and hangs out with the young Thai folks and from what I can see these clubs attract young Thais from fairly decent families, not necessarily hi-so, but certainly not the real lo-so criminal element. So in the end we have a "he said, she said" dilemma, and likely a "he" who has a family of some influence, or at least who were able to contact a phu yai whose own phu yai was able to communicate with the Israeli embassy. And clearly someone in the Israeli embassy knew Thai culture well enough to convince the young woman to accept the deal. This will clearly make some here unhappy, those who would want to see the investigation proceed as it would in their home countries. But this is Thailand, and since the alleged attacker was probably not some lowly tuk-tuk driver who would have found himself in deep doggy doo doo, this is probably the best Thai solution that saved face for both sides from the perspective of the phu yais involved, who do possess what little facts are available in this case.

China is a giant country. Thailand is a small country. It is only natural/inevitable that the Chinese would control Thailand.

Inevitable as in the Chinese control of Vietnam?

Yet here is poster number two who makes my case. Is it any wonder that a variety of historical determinism found such a receptive ground amongst the Han? Manifest destiny may become the relatively benign precursor of something far worse in the 21st century.

i would be very surprised if there weren't the same Chinese influences and power segments in Vietnam as Thailand. Is this not the case?

Thailand is controlled lock, stock, and barrel by the Sino-Thai elite. The same is not true in Vietnam and has not been true since the Vietnamese expelled the Han invaders centuries ago, one of the few people to expel Han occupiers. That is not to say that ethnic Chinese did/do not have a major interest in the Vietnamese economy, but they do not run the country as they do in Thailand.

It used to be the old Oasis bar.

Remember when the owner of the Oasis Bar locked himself upstairs and someone - his wife? - had to keep him supplied with a bucket and pulley that he would pull up by rope, filled with food and drink?

Did he (RIP) lock himself in or did the Dragon Lady lock him up?

China is a giant country. Thailand is a small country. It is only natural/inevitable that the Chinese would control Thailand.

Inevitable as in the Chinese control of Vietnam?

Yet here is poster number two who makes my case. Is it any wonder that a variety of historical determinism found such a receptive ground amongst the Han? Manifest destiny may become the relatively benign precursor of something far worse in the 21st century.

Not quite like Tibet. Tibet is more of the traditional colonial model of the distant past. The overseas Chinese "takeover" model is more like the Jewish method for coming into controlling the media and finance of various countries; although the Chinese method is usually all aspects of the economy. It's not a true concerted effort... it's just a natural course of events that occurs because of the attributes of a particular group of people.

I rest my case. So how do you say Sieg Heil in Mandarin?

Does 1936=2008?

Myself I'd call it a master program, rather than plan, as IMO the takeover wasn't a concerted effort, but merely the result of two fairly different ways of life colliding, overlapping, with one side collapsing as a simple matter of physics.

Sure, just like Tibet. Master program, master race, same totalitarian mindset. I for one am not particularly happy to see Han power and influence increase.

Bad for tourism so these things are kept quiet.

...and perpetuate.

In this case my guess is that it is the foreign philanthropist who has the money to keep the issue out of the press and thus allow his NGO to move forward. It does not preclude the perpetrator of the crime from going free.

Las Vegas has to be the worst bar in Chiang Mai!

Yea, but it has been one of the worst bars in Chiang Mai far, far longer than any other drinking establishment in the city. In fact the only other establishment that seems to have been around for that long is maybe Darets.

Interesting, stateman. But when you listen to the news on the radio or television, you often hear the person say "saw," or whatever, without the identifier, when they are abbreviating something. Obviously, when they're abbreviating the name for the military junta (I forget the exact letters, offhand), it's clear to everyone what they're referring to even though they only use the sounds. (But I'd bet that even some Thais don't know the full proper name; only the abbreviation...and I'm fairly certain the same holds for more esoteric proper names or bureaucratic or political terms that are abbreviated. In fact, I have asked "the man/woman on the street" what some abbreviations I've heard or read in the news stand for, and many do not know.)

You are absolutely correct that many Thais use abbreviations referring to various government agencies and organization without ever knowing the full proper name. My brother-in-law works for the local "Oh Pa Ta" and it took me quite awhile to find someone who could tell me that the abbreviation stood for Ongkaan Patana Tambon (Sub-District Development Organization). It is not that the villagers did not know the organization, the office, the employees, etc. They just did not know the full name. And I am sure it is easy to find ma fellow Ahmericans who do not know the official name of US government agencies like the CIA.

As for the Thai alphabet, it is a slightly different type of alphabet than is the Roman alphabet in that each consonant is associated by default with a particular following vowel. (Look up abugida at Wikipedia) Although the consonants refer to the same consonant sounds in Thai, they historically refer to other consonants in Pali/ Sanskrit that do not exist in Thai such as the /sh/ sound that, conversely, did not exist in Latin and thus requires two letters to represent the sound in other European languages. But because phonological features affect tones the different consonants representing the same consonant belong to different "classes of consonants" based upon these historical features.

It is a bit confusing, but the consonant classes represent real phonological features, some historical, and are not simply random classes of consonants.

Bump, anyone have anymore details on this story?

Money can either talk or, in this particular case, keep things quiet.

Yes been to those--not the insect one though--and agree that they are nice little provincial museums. But I think Thailand should be ambitious and build a serious world-class museum. There's an enormous amount of art and history and society to showcase here. I'm not saying that a museum is the be-all and end-all of everything, but in the context of a discussion about how to boost tourism, it's not a bad idea.

I haven't visited in many years, but the National Museum in Bangkok was a rather nice place to spend a day. They use to have free tours provided in English, and some other languages a few days a week. I remember it as being a very nice place indeed, a quality cultural institution that always seems to be under represented by the TAT.

And I am using all my willpower not to respond to the poster who felt the Spotlight represented the acme of nightlife in Chiang Mai.

Well- it certainly demonstrates to the world (those that are watching) that the Thai judiciary is, contrary to international opinion, not turning a blind eye to child sex abuse...

I would hope that this one convoluted story would not lead anyone into making that false judgment. The sexual abuse of students by teachers, especially in the rural areas, is still common and rarely is acted upon by the legal authorities.