When Will Thailand Catch Up?

[Old Croc]

How come no one nice ever wins the lottery?

I won once.

Old Croc, care to take a poll to see how many TV members think you're nice?

You're right, that mightn't work out well for me

Still, no one from TV has actually met me.

Edited February 22, 2006 by Old Croc

[Uma~~]

Wes Turner is a idiot by the sounds of it.

Sounds like a grumpy man who trying to take a swipe at Thailand because his woman left him.

Why do you want Thailand to be like the US??

Oh but he's a millionaire though (in Canadian dollars) didn't you know that makes him somebody special here in Thailand? I can say from experience he has spent sufficient time in Thailand to believe that having money will land him any woman he wants.

[bendix]

I had to leave Bangkok last week and make a quick trip back to London.

Beggars on the street, and the most appalling crime everywhere. Half-witted young (and not so young) guys and girls spilling out of the pubs at night, shouting and fighting before heading off to clog their arteries with fish and chips and processed kebabs. The most appalling traffic in ugly cities. The signs of wealth being a hocked up ex-council house, bought on 50 year mortgages and now having to be resold, because the price of cigarettes means they can't afford the repayments.

So-called affluent people condemned to tasteless holidays in Benidorm. Most of the Benidorm visitors not knowing or caring in which country they are, so long as they can get their Steak and Kidney Pie and Chips for 'me dinner'.

Such good managerial and organisational skills that all the UK industries have been bought by Americans, Japanese and now the Chinese.

Racial tension everywhere. Fear and hatred in most people's eyes. People shuffling along the streets, moaning about the cold, the costs, avoiding the eyes of everyone else.

I wonder when the UK will catch up with Thailand? Do you think they might like some help from us?

[sierra01]

I had to leave Bangkok last week and make a quick trip back to London.

Beggars on the street, and the most appalling crime everywhere. Half-witted young (and not so young) guys and girls spilling out of the pubs at night, shouting and fighting before heading off to clog their arteries with fish and chips and processed kebabs. The most appalling traffic in ugly cities. The signs of wealth being a hocked up ex-council house, bought on 50 year mortgages and now having to be resold, because the price of cigarettes means they can't afford the repayments.

So-called affluent people condemned to tasteless holidays in Benidorm. Most of the Benidorm visitors not knowing or caring in which country they are, so long as they can get their Steak and Kidney Pie and Chips for 'me dinner'.

Such good managerial and organisational skills that all the UK industries have been bought by Americans, Japanese and now the Chinese.

Racial tension everywhere. Fear and hatred in most people's eyes. People shuffling along the streets, moaning about the cold, the costs, avoiding the eyes of everyone else.

I wonder when the UK will catch up with Thailand? Do you think they might like some help from us?

You paint a gloomy picture mate, just which part are you from? I'll stick to sunny, sleepy Bognor, the most fuss you get there is on pension day, those OAP's wield a mean walking stick if you try to jump the queue Thai style

Wes, time to keep your head down for a while me thinks!

[Simbo]

Please ignore their insults, Wes. They are only jealous. I'll be your friend anytime you need one. How much did you say you won on the lottery? Seriously though. as someone, who has never been to London and seen the begging there, you should not comment about Thailand's millions of beggars. while the roads are congested with mercedes, porches, ferrari,s, bmw's, and many other up market cars that are and will always be out of reach of many, many westerners.

Shame on you.

[Cassandra]

I had to leave Bangkok last week and make a quick trip back to London.

Beggars on the street, and the most appalling crime everywhere. Half-witted young (and not so young) guys and girls spilling out of the pubs at night, shouting and fighting before heading off to clog their arteries with fish and chips and processed kebabs. The most appalling traffic in ugly cities. The signs of wealth being a hocked up ex-council house, bought on 50 year mortgages and now having to be resold, because the price of cigarettes means they can't afford the repayments.

So-called affluent people condemned to tasteless holidays in Benidorm. Most of the Benidorm visitors not knowing or caring in which country they are, so long as they can get their Steak and Kidney Pie and Chips for 'me dinner'.

Such good managerial and organisational skills that all the UK industries have been bought by Americans, Japanese and now the Chinese.

Racial tension everywhere. Fear and hatred in most people's eyes. People shuffling along the streets, moaning about the cold, the costs, avoiding the eyes of everyone else.

I wonder when the UK will catch up with Thailand? Do you think they might like some help from us?

Some interesting observations here a few of which ring true.However the comments mainly seem to refer to the brutalised working class.Although the "love Thailand/hate UK" brigade don't like to hear it, for middle class and professional Brits life is better and more prosperous than it has ever been.

[zzap]

Please ignore their insults, Wes. They are only jealous. I'll be your friend anytime you need one. How much did you say you won on the lottery? Seriously though. as someone, who has never been to London and seen the begging there, you should not comment about Thailand's millions of beggars. while the roads are congested with mercedes, porches, ferrari,s, bmw's, and many other up market cars that are and will always be out of reach of many, many westerners.

Shame on you.

It's not the observation of problem areas or social discrepancies (millions( ) of beggars?), but the patronising attitude which raised a few eyebrows.

[bendix]

Some interesting observations here a few of which ring true.However the comments mainly seem to refer to the brutalised working class.Although the "love Thailand/hate UK" brigade don't like to hear it, for middle class and professional Brits life is better and more prosperous than it has ever been.

Isn't everyone in Britain middle class now, Cassandra?

[Martin]

I had to leave Bangkok last week and make a quick trip back to London.

Beggars on the street, and the most appalling crime everywhere. Half-witted young (and not so young) guys and girls spilling out of the pubs at night, shouting and fighting before heading off to clog their arteries with fish and chips and processed kebabs. The most appalling traffic in ugly cities. The signs of wealth being a hocked up ex-council house, bought on 50 year mortgages and now having to be resold, because the price of cigarettes means they can't afford the repayments.

So-called affluent people condemned to tasteless holidays in Benidorm. Most of the Benidorm visitors not knowing or caring in which country they are, so long as they can get their Steak and Kidney Pie and Chips for 'me dinner'.

Such good managerial and organisational skills that all the UK industries have been bought by Americans, Japanese and now the Chinese.

Racial tension everywhere. Fear and hatred in most people's eyes. People shuffling along the streets, moaning about the cold, the costs, avoiding the eyes of everyone else.

I wonder when the UK will catch up with Thailand? Do you think they might like some help from us?

Some interesting observations here a few of which ring true.However the comments mainly seem to refer to the brutalised working class.Although the "love Thailand/hate UK" brigade don't like to hear it, for middle class and professional Brits life is better and more prosperous than it has ever been.

I am in the "love Thailand" army, but not the "hate UK" army. So I am not in this joint brigade formed from the two.

I now have mixed feelings about the UK. I still love parts of the UK, but I hate what has happened to it (i.e. what it has done to itself) over the past quarter century.

Until I retired last year, I had visited the UK for a considerable part of every year, either for a holiday from a job in the Far East or for a period of work in the UK.

Although I could have a pleasant time in some delightful countryside in the Midlands and the North, amongst middle-class relatives and friends, I noticed more and more 'private greed and public squalor', and a growing 'underclass', and a worsening of quality of life for the 'working (but not salaried) class'.

When I funded my visits by working as a Substitute Teacher in some of the roughest and toughest schools, I saw a side of the UK that doesn't impinge on those prosperous middle class and professional Brits, but it has certainly got them worried and they are not happy bunnies.

So I don't agree that they are having it 'better'.

As well as this Forum, I also visit and am active on a Forum for teachers in the UK schools. They wouldn't advocate Thailand 'catching up' with them.

[MyNameIsFarang]

When will they catch up? Never. Why? Xenophobia, authoritarianism, corruption, cronyism, deforestation, pollution, bad economic policy, relative lack of natural resources, poor educational standards, absense of a mature and informed body politic, and the list goes on.

[DavieA]

When will they catch up? Never. Why? Xenophobia, authoritarianism, corruption, cronyism, deforestation, pollution, bad economic policy, relative lack of natural resources, poor educational standards, absense of a mature and informed body politic, and the list goes on.

Don't tawk abou the Uk like tha 'Geeza' or iw <deleted> ya!

[wiki256]

very good read. thx martin.

[BAF]

Is there anything wecan do to help & would they listen?

Yes we can (and we are largely doing so) but since helping them develop to Western standards is harming us why should we in the first place?

Fortunately they aren't really listening and Thailand won't catch up anywhere in the foreseeable future

[steveromagnino]

Is there anything wecan do to help & would they listen?

Yes we can (and we are largely doing so) but since helping them develop to Western standards is harming us why should we in the first place?

Fortunately they aren't really listening and Thailand won't catch up anywhere in the foreseeable future

Sorry, I am not reading this clearly....

You are saying that by being here you are helping, and this is somehow harming you?

I am curious to know what you are doing that is helping, and how exactly this is harming you?

[skylar]

undrinkable tap water we had when my gran was a kid.

It wasn't so long ago that the Australian states of Queensland and South Australia had undrinkable tap water... in the last couple of years.

[Martin]

This topic pointed to superficial ways in which Thailand hasn't 'caught up' with buying in to what the West peddles.

At a deeper level, there is the question of whether it has ever been to Thailand's advantage to do so.

Apart from enriching a small 'elite' group of Thais in the import-export field (be that anything from rice to mobile phones), why should an agricultural country provide industrialised countries with food and accept their products in return (be they anything from rifles to Coca Cola)?

When the US dollar collapses and takes the euro and the pound with it, the Thais in rural Thailand will come to the rescue of those who come home from industrialised Thailand by feeding those formerly-'rich' cousins.

And won't Thailand be lucky that it hadn't done too much 'catching up'.

And won't those farangs who had got here before the gates had to be shut feel lucky (provided, of course, that they are seen to be 'sanook' and not unwelcome).

[britmaveric]

This topic pointed to superficial ways in which Thailand hasn't 'caught up' with buying in to what the West peddles.

At a deeper level, there is the question of whether it has ever been to Thailand's advantage to do so.

Apart from enriching a small 'elite' group of Thais in the import-export field (be that anything from rice to mobile phones), why should an agricultural country provide industrialised countries with food and accept their products in return (be they anything from rifles to Coca Cola)?

When the US dollar collapses and takes the euro and the pound with it, the Thais in rural Thailand will come to the rescue of those who come home from industrialised Thailand by feeding those formerly-'rich' cousins.

And won't Thailand be lucky that it hadn't done too much 'catching up'.

And won't those farangs who had got here before the gates had to be shut feel lucky (provided, of course, that they are seen to be 'sanook' and not unwelcome).

Stay off the Yabba - seriously warping your thinking mate!

[markuk]

And the moral is: Know where you're going in life... you may already be there.

I hope that i am not already there - really dont want to work in Bangkok for the rest of my days..... as much as its fun now!!

[barryofthailand]

And the moral is: Know where you're going in life... you may already be there.

I hope that i am not already there - really dont want to work in Bangkok for the rest of my days..... as much as its fun now!!

I read that story. How true it can be.

Barry

[thaibebop]

How come no one nice ever wins the lottery?

I won once.

Old Croc, care to take a poll to see how many TV members think you're nice?

Hey, for a cold blooded, rough skinned reptile he ain't too bad.