valentines ideas?

[Arkady]

The Novotel Ploenchit in Bangkok is advertising a Valentine's Day dinner package including a bottle of fizzy white wine. Not sure if they:

a) realise it's a religious hotel but intend to flout it;

realise it's a religious holiday and intend to substitute soft drinks with no refund;

c) don't realise it's a religious holiday and, when they do, will substitute soft drinks with or without refund.

Guess I'm not going there to find out.

[wym]

It sells nowadays as we live in a consumer society - however if you do a little reserch you will see the tradition dates back centuries.

So if I follow the reasoning, Christmas and Easter were also fabricated by Big Brother in order to relieve the sheep of their funds?

Or maybe we participate in it willingly because it's part of human nature to celebrate traditions - the fact that it involves spending money is just a symptom of the times.

No, we live in a consumer society as the result of completely conscious mass programming using techniques refined by the Nazis and post-war America.

Valentine Day's roots are originally a pagan holiday, as with Christmas and Easter and others, all co-opted by the Church.

The card tradition is a few hundred years old, but the flowers+chocolate, expanding to dinner+gifts, now even the jewelry biz gets into it is DEFINITELY a commercial marketing phenomenon.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/sex/valentines-day/7187784/History-of-Valentines-Day.html

[wym]

The Novotel Ploenchit in Bangkok is advertising a Valentine's Day dinner package including a bottle of fizzy white wine. Not sure if they: a) realise it's a religious hotel but intend to flout it; realise it's a religious holiday and intend to substitute soft drinks with no refund; c) don't realise it's a religious holiday and, when they do, will substitute soft drinks with or without refund. Guess I'm not going there to find out.

Novotel is a religious hotel????

And do you mean there is some Buddhist holiday coinciding with 14 February this year?

Or the fact that it happens to also be a Catholic saint's day?

The latter doesn't make it a religious holiday by any stretch, any more than Christmas is for secular people.

[Shurup]

Most Thai women from all ages love chocolate. Get her some Belgium or Swiss boxes.

Bizarre how different our Thailands can be.

I guess those that aren't poor may have experienced sweets as a child and be more like farang, but 95+% of Thais I know can't stand chocolate, or anything that sweet.

there is almost no thai products like drinks that arent overly sweet in the fridge of any shop

even the ice coffee at the side of any road is so sweet its barely drinkable

i thought thais loved sugar ....................

I agree - Thais love sweets - sugar is everywhere, but I also agree with WYM saying Thais can't stand chocolate, it least it's been mine experience with every Thai I know.

[wym]

Didn't say "all", nothing can be said that's true about every last one.

Just those raised in poverty-stricken upcountry farming villages who might see a 7-11 or other air-conditioned shop just a few times a year.

Which is still the majority of the country, but probably only barely these days, when I came here was maybe 70%.