Letter Of The Week.

[Mobi]

In a world where we are terrified by global warming, worried about when the next coup will occur, wondering whether Thaksin will ever get punished, mystified as to why farangs try to pretend their wives weren’t bar girls, and speculating whether the new airport will ever become the promised ‘Hub of Asia’, it is refreshing to know that at least one person has got his priorities right.

Here is his deeply disturbing and provocative letter, as published in yesterday’s Bangkok Post:

Off target

I am beginning to lose patience with your Target word game (Outlook section).

The rules clearly state "no plurals" and "no foreign words" but the next day's solution regularly includes plurals such as "lice" and "data" and foreign words such as "dolce."

At the same time, so many perfectly authentic answers are omitted that my scores are regularly in excess of what the game estimates as "excellent."

For example, your game of last Friday gave as the sole 9-word solution "repugnant." However, in Camford's "Varsity Vocabulary" there is an entry for "puntanger," as the equivalent, on the rivers Isis and Cam, of road rage. Hodhauler's "Dictionary of the Building and Allied Trades" notes that the fifth step on a ladder is known as the "pentarung." And Inlaw's "Glossary of Kinship Terms" reveals that a parent's sister who is about to give birth has, since Elizabethan times, been called a "pregnaunt." But none of these perfectly acceptable words was listed in your solution.

Please improve your vocabulary forthwith.

ALEC BAMFORD

Hear! hear! – what is the world coming to!!

[WaiWai]

So un-Thai in so many ways ...

But cheers to Alec and his Dictionaries. He's clearly enjoying his daily tussle with the Target game .

[dumspero]

Hear, hear!

Oh, wait, I don't wish to be repetitive. (No doubt the bastards won't take 'pleonastic.')

[WaiWai]

A neoplasm apon them !

[ColPyat]

I'll never forget Edith Clampton's letters in the Post. Absolutely hilarious.

If anyone remembers, here are they in Book form:

http://www.dcothai.com/product_info.php?cP...;products_id=41

[sinom]

I'll never forget Edith Clampton's letters in the Post. Absolutely hilarious.

If anyone remembers, here are they in Book form:

http://www.dcothai.com/product_info.php?cP...;products_id=41

Ahhh good old Edith, the only reason to buy the Post

Edited May 10, 2007 by sinom

[brahmburgers]

If a well-versed intelligent person like Mr. Bamford taught English in a Thai school, he would be breaking the law if he did not have a verifiable degree or certificate to do so. Instead, there's a plethora of Thai nationals teaching English - some of whom could barely order a hamburger at an Alabama drive-in. I've had Thai university students (studying English) come to me nearly in tears - as a result of being given English-related homework that's difficult and often patently incorrect - by their Thai-national English teachers. The students ask me for assistance, but I can't assist because the assignments are too miscombobulated for me to decipher. Good luck to Thai students, and good luck to the Mr. Bamfords who, despite their firm handle of English, should not be teaching the language to Thais if not fully credentialed.

Off target

I am beginning to lose patience with your Target word game (Outlook section).

The rules clearly state "no plurals" and "no foreign words" but the next day's solution regularly includes plurals such as "lice" and "data" and foreign words such as "dolce."

At the same time, so many perfectly authentic answers are omitted that my scores are regularly in excess of what the game estimates as "excellent."

For example, your game of last Friday gave as the sole 9-word solution "repugnant." However, in Camford's "Varsity Vocabulary" there is an entry for "puntanger," as the equivalent, on the rivers Isis and Cam, of road rage. Hodhauler's "Dictionary of the Building and Allied Trades" notes that the fifth step on a ladder is known as the "pentarung." And Inlaw's "Glossary of Kinship Terms" reveals that a parent's sister who is about to give birth has, since Elizabethan times, been called a "pregnaunt." But none of these perfectly acceptable words was listed in your solution.

Please improve your vocabulary forthwith.

ALEC BAMFORD

[Totster]

Each to their own I spose... !

totster

[leisurely]

My letter of the week is 'L'

[Mobi]

The plot thickens.....

Beware the pentarung

Thanks to Alec Bamford for writing about my favourite wordgame, Target. I immediately went online to order the dictionaries Bamford is the proud owner of. Quite some expense, but definitely worth it to beat the game regularly.

My husband does not play the game, but I try and educate him by teaching him to use the nine-letter words and I now have to caution all players of the game: there is some risk involved. My husband last weekend was doing some maintenance around our home and garden and I had told him the pentarung wasn't too sturdy. Just a few minutes later I heard him fall down, hard, from the ladder.

He was in pain, but managed to say: "Sorry, dear, I mixed up the heptarung and the pentarung."

On a happier note, my pregnaunt just had her baby, pregnuncle is relieved all went well. They deserve some happiness, pregnuncle has only last year suffered severe injuries after a very nasty example of puntanger being meted out to him during a rowing competition.

MARGA E A BEYLER

[kmart]

Couple of Pulitzers here too;-

No pity for landless

On the front page (Post, May 13), you have a photo of landless farmers arrested in a Surat Thani protest. The next day, on May 14, is a front-page photo of 85 cars and pick-ups that belong to the same landless farmers.

While it is easy to sympathise with the landless, it is very difficult to feel sorry for anyone who owns a car.

FRANK LOMBARD

Bangkok

Eh?

------------------------

Feeling short-changed

I walked into a Siam Commercial Bank branch near Soi Udomsuk 50 off Sukhumvit 103 road, armed with a plastic bag full of B10 and B5 coins in the hope of exchanging them for a 1,000-baht banknote. The teller refused my request and gave me that "are-you-crazy" look and explained that I would have to deposit the coins into a personal account. Fine. I can live with that. I don't even have an account with the SCB.

My question is, what are banks for nowadays?

A. BURANAHIRUN

Piggy banks?

[DeathbyDurian]

Feeling short-changed

I walked into a Siam Commercial Bank branch near Soi Udomsuk 50 off Sukhumvit 103 road, armed with a plastic bag full of B10 and B5 coins in the hope of exchanging them for a 1,000-baht banknote. The teller refused my request and gave me that "are-you-crazy" look and explained that I would have to deposit the coins into a personal account. Fine. I can live with that. I don't even have an account with the SCB.

My question is, what are banks for nowadays?

A. BURANAHIRUN

Come to my house A. Buranahirun, I'd be glad to exchange a 1000B for all those coins!

Laundry and motocycle taxis tend to deplete my supply too rapidly.

[Mobi]

Just in case you thought the Bangkok Post didn't have it's priorities right, let me restore your faith in it's ability to stimulate interesting and controversial debate:

Firstly, back on target:

Targetting plurals

Getting back to the vitally important topic of the "Target" game, spotlighted by Alec Bamford's recent letter and the witty reply it provoked, allow me to add my own pet gripes.

As Mr Bamford implies, the game appears to be designed by someone with a limited imagination and a computer programme that doesn't recognise irregular plurals. As far as I'm concerned, the ban on plurals makes no sense at all: if plurals are acceptable in Scrabble, why not in Target?

Besides, countless English words function as both nouns and verbs, so that only the context can indicate whether they are plural or not. Take the words "ships" and "shakes": in "I saw three ships...", "ships" is undoubtedly plural; in "He regularly ships gold ingots to China", it's a third person singular. The same applies to the phrases "Three shakes to go, please" and "He shakes his fist every time he sees his ex-wife". Words like "faces", "names", "pens", "stands"... all illustrate the fact that one man's plural is another man's third person singular.

My other major irritant is the daily repetition that the target words must contain the "large letter" in the middle. Harking back to that little optical illusion puzzle we've all done as kids, the middle letter is exactly the same size as the others; it only appears bigger because it's on a different background.

STEPHEN MALONE

And a timely and useful solution to coinless banks:

Coinless banks

Khun Buranahirun's letter (Postbag, May 16) complains of the difficulty in trying to exchange 5- and 10-baht coins for a banknote at a Siam Commercial Bank. I wish he would take his business to the Thai Military Bank, where I have my account. On more than one occasion, I have requested coins in exchange for a banknote but was informed that the bank had no such change.

However, after a little persistence and charm on my part, and in wonderful Thai style on theirs, the staff and security guards turned out their purses and pockets and collectively managed to give me the required coins. Only in Thailand!

MARTIN R

There! don't you all feel better now.

Edited May 19, 2007 by Mobi D'Ark

[kmart]

I think that the "Readers Digest" has more cutting edge journalism that the Post these days.

[Jai Dee]

However, after a little persistence and charm on my part, and in wonderful Thai style on theirs, the staff and security guards turned out their purses and pockets and collectively managed to give me the required coins. Only in Thailand!

MARTIN R

Love it!!!

[farang prince]

In a world where we are terrified by global warming, worried about when the next coup will occur, wondering whether Thaksin will ever get punished, mystified as to why farangs try to pretend their wives weren’t bar girls, and speculating whether the new airport will ever become the promised ‘Hub of Asia’, it is refreshing to know that at least one person has got his priorities right.

Here is his deeply disturbing and provocative letter, as published in yesterday’s Bangkok Post:

Off target

I am beginning to lose patience with your Target word game (Outlook section).

The rules clearly state "no plurals" and "no foreign words" but the next day's solution regularly includes plurals such as "lice" and "data" and foreign words such as "dolce."

At the same time, so many perfectly authentic answers are omitted that my scores are regularly in excess of what the game estimates as "excellent."

For example, your game of last Friday gave as the sole 9-word solution "repugnant." However, in Camford's "Varsity Vocabulary" there is an entry for "puntanger," as the equivalent, on the rivers Isis and Cam, of road rage. Hodhauler's "Dictionary of the Building and Allied Trades" notes that the fifth step on a ladder is known as the "pentarung." And Inlaw's "Glossary of Kinship Terms" reveals that a parent's sister who is about to give birth has, since Elizabethan times, been called a "pregnaunt." But none of these perfectly acceptable words was listed in your solution.

Please improve your vocabulary forthwith.

ALEC BAMFORD

Hear! hear! – what is the world coming to!!

I stopped doing the Target game after it caused me to bite my dog and scratch my wife's ears.

[baabaabobo]

This one in the letters page of the Phuket Gazette has been getting alot of hilarious replies ...

Chauvinism lives on here in Phuket

Yet another example that chauvinism is alive and well. "Richard", from France, interviewed in the article on Thai/foreigner relationships in the April 14 Gazette certainly proves his own bigotry with his statements: "Modern European and Western women want to be like a man, they argue…, don't want to stay home… or cook… They want to have a career."

Thank you for re-enforcing my argument that Western men crave Thai women because of their willingness to be compliant personal household servants. Does this man honestly believe that Thai women have an abundance of choices, yet consistently choose marriage over independence?

May I suggest Richard take a look at the classified ads in the national newspapers and count just how many well-paying jobs advertise "male only" and how many jobs open to women list as requirements "under 30, with picture".

Give Thai women the same opportunities their Western sisters have been fighting for almost a hundred years now and let's see how many of them would actually "choose" to marry men like Richard.

Aside from keeping Richard's house and cooking, another of his requirements in order to find women suitable is "long, black hair". He's careful to add though that other men will have other requirements such as, "blonde, short or tall".

I also found it interesting that in the same article, "David" states "classic features, small frame" are what he considers important. He consistently refers to females he finds attractive as "girls", but those who are not up to standard are called "women".

Good grief, I am saddened to realize that we have taken but only a small step in the long journey BACK toward true equality of the sexes. Until that time, it seems women, or "girls", are to be rated and cherished on a scale of their perceived physical attractiveness and willingness to serve.

Christy K Sweet

Cherng Talay

Male misconceptions

In regards to Chauvinism lives on here in Phuket in Letters to the Editor in the April 21 issue of the Gazette, while I certainly understand the points the writer presents, I suspect that Christy has a few stereotypes floating around of her own.

A quite common misconception of Thai women, and Asian women in general, by Western women is that they are submissive and nice quiet little ladies who will do anything we Western men say. Absolute rubbish!

Anyone who is either married to or who has a friend married to a Thai woman knows that they are not submissive little things bowing to our demands.

A friend of mine was married to a woman who had him working two jobs day and night to make as much money as he could. And try coming home a little late with a flimsy excuse… no explanation needed here!

There is probably still a level of “man work” and “lady work” around the house. I wash the cars, fix things around the house and do the more manly things – she does the dishes and laundry and the things she is better at.

To me that division of labor makes sense. Would Christy rather she change the oil in the car and her man do the laundry? (My ironing is beyond abysmal.)

As to the points about job ads having age specifications and requiring photos – those aren’t just for women – look a little more closely and see that adverts that are looking for males often have the same requirements. Photos are a typical requirement for a job application here and age limits, while I abhor them, are quite typical as well.

I’m tired of Western women dismissing Thai women – I think they should release their anger somewhere else– like at the diet center maybe…

Benjamyn

Rawai

Dear Benjamyn of Rawai (see Letters to the Editor, April 28 issue), you prove my point on chauvinism so beautifully, I doubt you’re even aware of it.

Was your last statement meant to insult me by making a reference to a standard of weight in women that is acceptable to you?

There we are again with those male aesthetic requirements for women that was the subject of my letter to the Editor. FYI – I weigh 115 pounds and am 5 feet 6 inches tall, practically Thai-sized except with a much larger bust.

While we’re on the subject of attractiveness, how many Western men in Thailand are exploiting local women because they can’t attract females in their own countries? Could you be one of them?

And as for me “dismissing” Thai women, or having anger toward them, I was being sympathetic to them. I cringe for her every time I see a lovely young Thai woman with a Western cretin twice her age who is so obviously beneath her.

If you think Thai women have equal opportunities as men, then you are either delusional or just plain ignorant.

By the way, I can change the oil in a car, in fact I’ve torn down the 351 Cleveland engine on my 1970 Mach 1.

And Benjamyn, my name is Ms Sweet to you, thanks.

Christy K Sweet

Thalang

The boys bite back

With reference to the last letter from Christy Sweet [One Sweet reply, Letters to the Editor, Gazette May 5-12.]

First of all I would like to congratulate Ms Sweet on her slender figure and large bust as it seems so important to her that Gazette readers are made aware of this.

If Ms Sweet can contemplate an opinion that differs from her own I’d like to express one.

In the 17 years that I’ve been coming to Phuket I’ve seen very few, if any, Thai women truly “exploited” by Western men, but have seen so many Western men exploited by Thai ladies.

The general consensus seems to be, if I’m going to be exploited by a woman it might as well be by a young, pretty one with an attitude oh so different from Ms Sweet’s.

It seems strange that she chooses to live in Phuket. If she truly “cringes every time she sees a lovely young Thai woman with a Western cretin twice her age” then this must be one of the few places on earth that she will spend all day cringing.

Stuart Hooper

Patong

[farang prince]

Ms. Sweet, anyone can tear down a 351 engine in a Mach I Mustang. Were you able to put it back together again? If so, you are my dream girl.

[PhilHarries]

Does anyone remember the series of letters to the Bangkok Post, must have been in the mid '90's, regarding whether the salt should be in the single or multi holed pot? Absolutely hilarious, it even got down to a Frenchman claiming it was all ze fault of zose dammed Eeeenglish who stole zem from us Francais but were to stupeed to ask 'ow to use zem. You rarely get such level of entertainment in the letters page these days.

[WaiWai]

It seems strange that she chooses to live in Phuket. If she truly “cringes every time she sees a lovely young Thai woman with a Western cretin twice her age” then this must be one of the few places on earth that she will spend all day cringing.

Stuart Hooper

Patong

I'm whoopin', Stuart !

What was the conclusion of the salt debate ?