The week that was in Thailand news: Mr Prayut – put up that wall!

[rooster59]

The week that was in Thailand news: Mr Prayut – put up that wall!

 

 

While Donald Trump was busy over in the States trying to keep the Mexicans out I was beginning to think that the Thai prime minister was maybe thinking on the same lines.

For there really were a lot of mischief makers in the kingdom this week and not for the first time the foreigners were causing most of the headaches rather than the locals.

Although the Thais were out in force suited and booted in their best non-red garb welcoming the long lost Chinese for New Year, one got the feeling they could have done without some of the other less savory visitors who deigned to darken their borders.

Top of the list were the two men – one British and one South African – who hired a van and went to Pattaya with murder in mind. Now it would be easy to point to the idiocy of some of their mistakes in giving the Thai police a leg up in discovering who they were virtually before Tony Kenway was even cold.

But the fact remains they did what they came to do and escaped back across the border to Cambodia where they remain.

According to reports they rented their getaway vehicle – a scooter – in their own names and got caught on CCTV in broad daylight. Only then did the driver of the getaway vehicle think it prudent to shave off his beard.

But gone they are, and now the Thai cops will be hoping that Phnom Penh plod will be able to come up with an arrest. Fair play to the Thai police on this one for though they were given those healthy hints they wasted no time. And they are not spilling the beans for what they obviously know regarding the background of Mr Kenway who, despite having four children and a once smiling Thai wife, looks decidedly dodgy.

Boiler rooms have been mentioned and we are not talking Chinese laundry here. Money laundry more like.

Also putting the “D” in dodgy was the Aussie pensioner down in Surat Thani who decided to celebrate Australia Day with a traditional ‘barbie’. Well not that traditional as it happens – he set fire to his marital bed in an apparent though futile attempt to burn his house down after his missus and her kids left him.

He really should have invited his mates round for a celebration of her departure but instead he grabbed a kitchen cleaver and was wielding it menacingly when the firefighters arrived. The blaze was soon extinguished though if the wife returns he will need to visit Home Pro.

A slanging match ensued and watching the video Rooster was somewhat perturbed to realize that he could understand southern Thai dialect much better than Australian, whatever it is they try to speak. He seemed to be burbling on about losing his shirt to his nearest and darnedest.

I am sure even if the fire fighters and neighbors knew what he was rabbiting they might have just said: “Hey buddy…get with the program!”

But not all foreigners were guilty as charged this week. One who may be thinking if only I hadn’t come to Thailand was the Italian who went out for a stroll with his wife on Jomtien beach only to be killed by a falling branch.

I know he was 91 and it’s tempting to say in British parlance that he had had a good innings but anyone who has missed out on a cricket century will know how much it hurts to get so close. I got 24 once and that was painful enough.

Anyway, Giacomo, we are very sorry about all that and hope it didn’t spoil your visit to the country too much. If it is any consolation at least you will be spared the enormous time your relatives will waste trying to get a single baht in compensation from the local authority.

Another person who won’t be getting a bean in insurance is the Koh Pangan hotel owner who lost half her jewelry in checked in luggage. Although the company was not named of course, Eborneezer Airlines were quick to point out that Mrs Cratchit would get nothing – even though it was very quickly established that it was the said airline’s handler in Samui who Cockneys might say had “half inched her tom”.

Though on second thoughts half inching a tom sounds a bit like a Thai girl having a less than satisfying bedroom experience, even if that was the case for the hotel owner when she realized her diamonds were gone.

But what would possess someone to put 300,000 baht worth of valuables in a checked-in bag?

Maybe like many of Chinese ancestry at this auspicious time, she has money to burn.

Out in force at airports throughout the country were the Tourism Authority of Thailand bods in their fancy oriental costumes welcoming the Chinese tourists back to the fold who they had scared off following the zero-dollar tour debacle. A case of TATs resembling twats.

In Bangkok they were handing out orange soap to the “trut jeen” tourists and as far as I could see they had barely sniffed the new arrivals before doing so. Still we all know that no one takes as many showers as the Thais who, as countless corruption cases prove, always seem to come up smelling of roses.

But it was gratifying to see the dancers and smiling Thai welcome even if the name “Year of the Cock” threatens to take the edge off the glee. Rooster draws solace that finally his time might have come….I’m going out right now to get a lottery ticket.

Giving the naughty foreigners a run for their money in the last seven days were that staple of thaivisa news, the taxi drivers. It always amuses me that in every Thai headline that refers to this sub-species of humanity they are always called “chauffeurs”. Is it a case of Thais getting me on a double whammy of irony or do they just not get the nuance of the word!

The latter I suspect as the Thai ironist is a rare beast. When I hear chauffeur it always conjures up Parker the butler from Thunderbirds taking Lady Penelope on high speed rides in her Pink Roller, rather than the nasty piece of work using a shopping trolley to ram some innocent members of the public in a Bangkok parking lot.

Our hapless driver was apparently upset with not having any customers – maybe he should try a little civility or failing that why not one of those peaked chauffeur’s caps; that should do the trick.

Our second taxi story kicks off this week’s Rooster awards. “Rooster of the Week”, for want of a better title, goes to the chauffeur (I’m getting the hang of this now) who picked up some drugs cops after a radio call. They secretly videoed him taking a selfie and I thought for a moment they were going to book him for dangerous driving.

Not a bit of it – it was all a sting and when they reached suppression HQ our hero was promptly arrested because he was wanted on a Korat drug warrant.

“Straight Face” of the week award goes to metropolitan police chief Sanit and his paymasters who continued to assert there was no conflict of interest in a top cop getting 50,000 baht a month to promote the interests of a Thai booze company.

Clearly the force are squeaky clean when it comes to beverages though you could tell that to the chief of Pak Thong Chai nick who was relieved of command for admitting that he was too hung over to make a meeting of top brass.

The Thai press screamed indignantly “Mao mai teun” (drunk and won’t get up) in their headlines but Rooster thought if more police stayed in bed it could go some way to solving problems in the country.

Just missing out on the straight face award was True Corporation. Instead their execs were pictured gleefully telling us how wonderful they are while taking our favorite channels off the air and cutting the internet we have already paid for. I’ll give them the Catherine Tate sponsored award entitled “How Very Dare You”.

The “Animal Lover” award goes jointly to British PM Teresa Chamberlain, I think it is, in Washington sucking up to a chap in the White House for the sake of “peace in our time” and a trade deal, and the driver in the north of Thailand who braked sharply in his pick up to avoid flattening a snake.

As much as the British people should be wary of their leader’s motives so were the drivers following the pick-up equally aghast – the animal lover’s actions caused a five vehicle collision or as the wag of a headline writer observed: “Python pedestrian precipitates pick up pile up”.

Finally my funny bone was tweaked early in the week to see that the Thai authorities have come up with a National Morals Promotion Master-plan. Intrigued, I read that no less than three sub-committees had been formed and the scheme was going to be trialed at schools in Roi-Et and Buriram.

I feel sorry for the kids but additionally NMPM is hardly a memorable or even pronounceable acronym – how much better if they had called it the Planned Internal Morals Promotion.

P.I.M.P. would have been so much easier to remember.

Rooster

 

 

-- © Copyright Thai Visa News 2017-01-29

[peterb17]

Rooster as good as always - and for those who keep up with the news- very subtle stuff dropping the ' h' in Teresa. 

Well done- of course you could have just made a mistake ? 

P 

[aslimversgwm]

Brilliant - as always - and don't forget us gays are REALLY going to enjoy the 'year of the cock/rooster'. Be afraid - very afraid!

[wakeupplease]

1 hour ago, peterb17 said:

Rooster

Does it again, at least he/she makes me smile more that Thailand does these days

[tukkytuktuk]

Brilliant - as always - and don't forget us gays are REALLY going to enjoy the 'year of the cock/rooster'. Be afraid - very afraid!

Why? What has a rooster or cockerel got to do with being homosexual?

[aslimversgwm]

Try a sense of humour for just onice in your life eh!? Gay guys like cocks and this is the year of the cock. Get It?

Sent from my SM-J710F using Thaivisa Connect mobile app

[aslimversgwm]

'Onice s/b 'once' obviously - Damned predictive text but where it got onice from Lord only knows!

Sent from my SM-J710F using Thaivisa Connect mobile app