Living In Thailand Blog
Thursday 10th July 2008
Conventional wisdom dictates that the Thai hot season peaks in April. In the south of the country, at least, April isn't so much a peak as the beginning of a plateau. By definition, if it was a peak then the temperature would start to drop in May but that isn't the case.
Today was very hot, and there have been several other very hot days recently. The rain does come occasionally to offer some respite but for some reason the temperature seems to rise before a storm. Coupled with the accompanying rise in humidity, this can be quite oppressive.
I've taken to wearing a wide-brimmed hat whenever I am outside and it has helped immensely. The new glasses I have darken when exposed to sunlight, and that also helps. However, even with these precautions, I still get headaches fairly often as a result of too much sun.
Southern Thailand isn't the hottest part of the country in the hot season but it is hot all year round and that can be quite tough to deal with. My gut instinct tells me that eventually I will move to somewhere further north that has a genuine cool season but now isn't an appropriate time to do that.
I bought some headache tablets today and that brings me on to another area of difficulty with the Thai language - classifiers for nouns.
English has classifiers. We don't go into a shop and ask for a bread and a milk; we ask for a loaf of bread and a bottle (maybe carton) of milk. These are classifiers. The only difference is that in Thai they are used far more extensively.
Instead of 'two children', the Thai would be dek sawng kon (children two people). The classifier for packets of things is sawng (with a mid tone) which is similar to the word for 'two' except that the latter has a rising tone.
If I ask for 20 packets of electrolyte powder - yee-sip sawng - this can sound like the Thai number for 22 if the tone is wrong.
The headache tablets I bought today come in small packets but I didn't know the classifier. The pharmacist told me it was pairng. The book 'Thai Reference Grammar' (by James Higbie and Snea Thinsan) tells me this classifier is just used for packs of medicine.
There's no quick or easy way to learn. The book I mentioned above lists nine pages of classifiers but I don't intend trying to remember them all. As with anything else, you tend to remember the ones that are used often but there will always be lots of Thai classifiers that I don't know.
ซอง - sawng (classifier for packets of things)
live syllable + low class initial consonant = mid tone
สอง - sawng (two)
live syllable + high class initial consonant = rising tone
แผง - pairng (classifier for packs of medicine)
live syllable + high class initial consonant = rising tone
แพง - pairng (expensive)
live syllable + low class initial consonant = mid tone
I noticed that an additional warning has appeared on the packets of Nurofen I bought today. I can't remember seeing it on previous packets of the same medication.
The regular wording on the packet is 'Relieves the Cause of Pain and Fever'. But underneath those words now is the disclaimer: '(fever not caused by Dengue Virus)'.
Dengue has been a big problem across this whole region for a few years now, and even sophisticated Singapore hasn't been immune with deaths from Dengue occurring in Singapore, as well as in Thailand and Malaysia.
I have encountered the species of mosquito that carries Dengue and they aren't pleasant. With their black and white stripes, they are very distinctive. Unlike 'regular' mosquitoes, they are active during the daytime and very aggressive. I've actually been chased by them.
There were lots of Dengue related news stories last year but I can't recall hearing much about it so far this year. That was until today when I spotted a story in The Nation about Dengue in Ratchaburi province where four people have died so far this year.
Tourists visiting the famous floating market at Damnoen Saduak might want to take extra precautions against mosquito bites as this is one of the districts that has been declared an emergency zone.
After being in Singapore last year and seeing how serious the disease was being taken there, with lots of public awareness through advertising campaigns and punishments for people being careless by providing environments for mosquitoes in which to breed, I was critical of the general apathy in Thailand.
However, also mentioned in this report is that residents in Ratchaburi have been instructed to remove all standing water from their properties, and that this ruling is being enforced with fines and jail sentences.
This is more very good news. I'm not sure what's going on in Thailand at the moment but the way things have suddenly started to change for the better is very encouraging.
Wednesday 9th July 2008
The queries people put in to search engines in order to find information continues to be a great source of fascination for me - even if I can't quite figure out how they arrive at my pages.
"How do young Catholic nuns relieve sexual tension?" (from an Internet surfer somewhere in the USA). What a fascinating question. I haven't got a clue but if you find out, please let me know. This one reminded me of the old joke about two nuns sharing a bath. "Where's the soap?" asks one; to which the other replies, "Yes it does, doesn't it."
Someone else located in Chicago was interested in 'beautiful girls with big ears'. With the exception of one girl I know who has very large ears, Thai girls don't generally have huge ears. However, I've seen some Thai girls who have ears that protrude so much, they are almost forward facing.
It's not at all unattractive though; on the contrary, I find it very attractive. This will be added to my mental list of things to get photos of.
Tuesday 8th July 2008
The Thai language can certainly be challenging at times. Shortly after I started learning Thai about four-and-a-half years ago there were a couple of things I noticed fairly quickly. The first was that after learning the Thai word for something, I would often discover another word in Thai for the same thing (both verbs and nouns).
Secondly, Thai words that sounded identical (to my untrained ears, at least) meant completely different things. I can differentiate a little better now but it's still tough. Tones and vowel lengths are extremely important to get right but they can be very difficult to master.
What's more is that similar sounding words can make sense in a sentence but give completely the wrong meaning. The classic example, quoted by every beginner, is the difference between the Thai words for near and far.
ใกล้ - glai near (falling tone)
ไกล - glai far (mid tone)
Even now, I find myself using supplementary hand language whenever I attempt to say 'near' or 'far'.
The vowel used in each word (which is the first character, written before the consonant or consonant cluster) is a different character but has exactly the same sound (ai) and function. The second letter (g sound) and the third letter (l sound) form a consonant cluster (gl), that is, there is no implied (unwritten) vowel in between the two consonants.
The initial consonant of the consonant cluster is a mid-class consonant, and the first word (near) uses the second tone mark (of four) which is written above the second letter of the consonant cluster. A quick look at the tone rules for words that use tone marks tells us the word has a falling tone. If you imagine calling out someone's name from afar, and imagine how the sound will change as you run out of breath, that is a falling tone.
The second word (far) doesn't use any tone marks so different tone rules are used. Syllables that end with the short vowel 'ai' are considered 'live' syllables, and a live syllable with a mid-class initial consonant results in a mid tone.
Let's move on to a less-quoted example of the difference tones can make.
Thai has four consonants that make an English 'S' sound:
ซ ศ ษ ส
And also:
ท is a 'T' sound and ร is an 'R' sound
But ....
ทร as an initial consonant cluster also makes an 'S' sound.
This may sound weird but it is no weirder than a P and an H coming together to make an F sound when you think about it.
The adjective 'beautiful' is commonly used in Thailand.
สวย = beautiful
There are no vowels used, just three consonants that make S W Y sounds in English. It is pronounced something like su-waay with a rising tone. Just try to speak with an Australian accent to approximate a rising tone. The Land of the Rising Intonation.
However, there is a very similar sounding word that has a less complimentary meaning:
ซวย = unlucky, hapless, unfortunate, ill-fated
You will be reprimanded (in a joking way) if you try to compliment someone on their beauty and get the tone wrong.
Again, there are no recognised vowels, and the three consonants make S W Y sounds in English. Does this sound familiar? With no vowels and no tone marks, how do we work out the tone? For this, I will have to guess a little because my books don't quite cover this particular example.
The long 'ai' sounds very much like a live syllable because I can continue voicing it. The 'S' consonant used in 'beautiful' is a high class consonant, while the 'S' consonant in the other word is low class. (Yes, in Thailand not only are there 'hi-so' and 'lo-so' people, but there are even class distinctions for the writing system!)
Live syllable + High class initial consonant = Rising tone
Live syllable + Low class initial consonant = Mid tone (I think)
The language is beautiful, especially the written language, but it also represents quite a challenge.
On the subject of making stuff up (see yesterday's entry), some things seem so wacky in Thailand that I sometimes begin to doubt my own sanity. What is quite reassuring, however, is that my views are actually endorsed fairly often by Thais.
Thais are quick to praise and slow to criticise. It's not often they are very critical of anything about Thailand but when they open up it can be quite revealing. I had an extremely interesting chat with a university lecturer recently and his views of the Thai education system were completely in line with my own. I may expand on this later.
On another subject, while out and about last week I saw that the shop where I purchased a new pair of eyeglasses recently was covered in new banners advertising a big summer sale. I went in to see what this was all about (and also to use this as a feeble excuse to chat to the cute girls).
"No," they told me, "There is no more discount than usual, the prices are exactly the same as before."
I've tried to make the point many times that sales in Thailand mean nothing. Everything is 'discounted' every day of the year which means, in reality, that nothing is discounted.
They probably do this to catch people out who are passing through and think they have encountered a genuine sale but what you realise when staying in the same place is that the only thing that changes are the banners advertising these pretend sales. The prices remain exactly the same.
Japanese firm 'paid bribes'. Why doesn't this story surprise me?
The good news is that I am sensing a strong cultural shift among Thais regarding this kind of corruption. For a long time, the concept of corruption didn't exist in Thailand. When the Thais did start talking about it, they had to borrow the English word. It went with the territory that people in high positions were entitled to skim the surface for their own benefit and no one questioned what they did.
This was perfectly normal - and acceptable - and the reason why for so long there was such an apathetic reaction to corruption. But things have started to change. The case of the three lawyers jailed recently for contempt of court (with attempted bribery charges pending) sent out a strong signal.
This latest case involving a Bt2 billion tunnel project for the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration (BMA) in 2003 is linked to the current Prime Minister who was Bangkok governor at the time. This could get interesting.
The other interesting story at the moment concerns the disputed Preah Vihear temple on the Thai/Cambodia border. Thais are furious about what has happened recently and their anger is all directed towards one man, foreign minister Noppadon Pattama, who they accuse of ceding Thai sovereignty.
Before he took up this post, Noppadon was Thaksin's personal lawyer, as well as being Thaksin's mouthpiece and unofficial minister for propaganda.
It beggared belief how Samak ever became PM and how Noppadon ever became foreign minister but the Thais do seem to like giving people enough rope to hang themselves. With a series of court cases lined up against Thaksin and his wife, who knows what will happen next as his top lieutenants continue to fall.
Monday 7th July 2008
My students are a rich source of information. Hopefully they learn from me, but I also learn a lot from them. In two separate conversations today I learnt things I never knew before. Having acquired this knowledge, however, I need to clarify a few things here.
If I don't, there's a danger that people may think, "What is he going on about?" or "What's he smoking; and can I have some?"
The impression that is starting to form in my mind is that I live in a particularly lawless corner of Thailand. Also, that as far as law enforcement is concerned, Bangkok is a lot stricter than elsewhere.
On Saturday, I talked about a couple of local markets that sell all kinds of cheap goods as well as some nasty looking weapons. What I found out today is that the stalls selling these items are trading completely illegally. I also found out that these markets are well known throughout Thailand.
The weapons are illegal to sell, as is the case in other civilised countries, and the foodstuffs come in from places like China but no import duty is paid. That's why everything is so cheap.
What confused me was the manner in which the stalls operate, in that nothing is obviously underhand. These are not shops selling legal goods above the counter and illegal ones underneath. Neither are they selling stuff out of suitcases while someone keeps a lookout on the corner.
Neither is it like Panthip Plaza in Bangkok where Thais approach people in a clandestine fashion asking if they want pirated goods but don't actually sell stuff openly. Everything is very, very open.
I was told that the police do turn up occasionally but when they do, the shops close for half an hour and then reopen as soon as the danger has cleared. However, I've been many times and have never seen this.
The other conversation was related to the lawlessness on the roads that I talk about often, and this also seems to be more of a problem locally than elsewhere. The person who told me said that when he is in Bangkok he doesn't need to be as careful while walking around on the streets compared to when he is at home.
This would also explain why the recently introduced law making it illegal to use mobile phones while driving has made absolutely no difference in my neck of the woods.
The nature of this 'blog' medium is that it describes personal experiences. I can only talk about what I see and experience. I don't make things up but just because something happens locally doesn't necessarily mean it is the case all over the country. That's probably an important point to remember. Also, that everything is just one person's viewpoint and, as such, shouldn't be taken too seriously.
Sunday 6th July 2008
I thought it might be good occasionally, using photos, to include a few personal insights into my life in Thailand (though not too personal, I hope you understand).
I had lunch with a couple of Thai friends today and the photos show where we ate, plus a couple of dishes from our meal. The restaurant is on the edge of Songkhla lake.
The fish, in Thai, is known as bplaa sumlee. I know very little about fish but I think it would be known as a Black-banded Trevally in English. It comes deep fried, topped with shredded unripe mango (the same as you get in som-tum), dried anchovies, cashew nuts, chillis, lime juice, etc. It's good; very good.
One of the important aspects of Thai food is mixing together different tastes. The fish meat is quite sweet, the anchovies salty, and the unripe mango and lemon juice sour. Everything works really well together.
Everything is eaten with rice, naturally, and we also had barbecued squid (bplaa meuk yaang). The squid here is always very soft from being so fresh. This particular specimen was full of eggs but I'm not a big fan of any type of fish eggs.
You can also see a plate of mixed vegetables (put puk ruem mit) which are stir-fried and come with a kind of oyster sauce. It is very common for vegetables to have some kind of meat included and these ones came with shrimp. As well as being tasty, Thai food is also balanced, healthy and - provided you stay away from the tourist areas - cheap. The cost came to a little over Bt100 per person.
Saturday 5th July 2008
I took a stroll around one of the local markets today. Nothing unusual about that. I've done it a hundred times and know exactly what is sold. But today was a little disturbing for reasons I will give in a moment.
It's a typical Thai market, but not a fresh market; this place doesn't sell meat or any other perishable food. It's not as tacky as it seems at first. Among the cheap electronics and replica watches there are genuine goods, and the prices are lower than elsewhere.
I've bought memory cards from there without any problems, and a friend of mine bought a Casio watch. If you are careful about what you buy you can get a bargain. This is also where pirated software, music, and movies can be found; not to mention some pretty hardcore pornography.
There are also bargains to be had with the foodstuffs being sold. What is sold are such things as dried fruit, tea, coffee and biscuits. Most goods are sold in sealed foil, and are well within the expiry dates. I buy chocolate wafers from another very similar market and the price is about two-thirds that of the local supermarkets.
Nothing very disturbing so far, you may think, even though some of the explicit graphics on the porno DVDs make me wince a little. As I mentioned a few days ago, I am becoming quite fond of dogs these days but the line has to be drawn somewhere.
The other line of goods at this particular market are weapons. I watched a Thai guy today testing a vicious looking flick-knife. There isn't much that can't be bought: knives, swords, night sticks, knuckle dusters, high voltage stun guns, aluminium baseball bats, and all kinds of martial arts weapons.
In the past, I've viewed these things with a bemused curiosity but in light of what has been going on in London in recent years (and seems to be getting worse), I felt very uneasy today.
Only yesterday, I was reading about the young boy in London, Shakilus Townsend, who was beaten with a baseball bat and repeatedly stabbed by a gang wearing hooded tops and bandanas. So far this year, there have been, on average, about three murders of this type in London each month.
Today, I saw the same kind of weapons with which the young lad was murdered freely available; for sale to anyone with enough money. Seeing them for sale is one thing, but realising there are people who will use weapons like this to murder other people is quite chilling.
Thailand, thankfully, doesn't have the same black gang problems that London has. However, I would imagine that despite airport security measures, these weapons are inevitable smuggled from country to country, I know it's someone's livelihood but I find it very difficult to understand how these things are allowed to be sold so easily.
Friday 4th July 2008
It's Independence Day and there was evidence today that the considerate Thais were being culturally sensitive by acknowledging a foreign holiday.
When my local branch of S&P finally stopped playing Christmas music in March, I thought Christmas had officially ended in Thailand. Today, however, while shopping for tea bags in TOPS supermarket, I was treated to a nice rendition of 'Have yourself a merry little Christmas' over the department store PA system.
'Jingle Bells' is a popular year-round ring tone in Thailand and it's not unusual to hear it at this time of year when someone's mobile phone rings. Thais like Christmas tunes, apparently, and they also like Christmas trees and fairy lights, so these too stay in place long into the new year.
So funny!
Thursday 3rd July 2008
I haven't talked about immigration matters for a while, so here is today's serving of paranoia, speculation, and conspiracy theories.
I've just done my 90 day reporting and it was a formality. It should always be a formality but I had problems with one particular guy last year who did everything he could to be obstructive. This was the same guy that leered at and made racy comments to the secretary who accompanied me to assist with the paperwork for my visa extension.
She was so offended by whatever he said that when it was time to go back again, she didn't want to, and I had a real task on my hands getting her to help me again.
Anyway, he seems to have disappeared and the immigration officers I have dealt with on the last few occasions have been extremely helpful, courteous, efficient and professional.
When I got my first one-year visa, I honestly didn't know about the 90 day reporting procedure. I got my visa in Penang and no one said anything about it there; neither did Thai immigration at the border say anything when I returned to Thailand. At some stage I contacted the local immigration office about something else and was told then that I had to do it. I've been doing it ever since.
It's no big deal. All you do is present yourself with your passport and copies of the relevant pages, fill out a ตม47 form, and that's it. They give you a receipt which tells you when to go back again and there is no fee involved. Apart from passport and visa details, the main piece of information requested on the form is your address in Thailand.
The language of communication these days appears to be Thai. I don't know if it's an official or semi-official policy, or whether it's just because the officers can't speak much English. One guy last year asked how long I had been in the country and then started ranting that I should be able to speak Thai.
What he didn't do was check first to see if I could speak Thai or not, but I got the message and now I just speak to them in Thai. My Thai isn't that great but the standard questions are generally quite easy to understand and answer.
The subject of the 90 day registration procedure is relevant (I believe) to my next point.
I recently started teaching some postgraduate students and two of them are from the Middle East. The two Arab gentlemen were missing for the first few lessons and it transpires they were down in Penang trying to get student visas after entering the country as tourists.
They had immense problems in Penang and ended up staying there for 20 days trying to get things sorted out. Eventually they got visas but only the three-month, single-entry variety. This means they will now have to get more letters written and deal with local immigration in order to get their visas extended so that they can continue their studies.
They have the full backing of the university and they are probably bringing quite a lot of money into the economy but still, the Thai Consulate in Penang gave them a hard time.
This is exactly what happened to me last year in Singapore. It always used to be the case that if you had a work permit it was easy to get a one-year, multiple-entry non-B visa. That, apparently, has changed.
Armed with signed contracts and a fully valid work permit, I had to wait 24 hours just for the Thai Embassy in Singapore to decide whether they would give me any kind of visa at all, and when they did eventually, I only got a three-month, single-entry type.
I too had to return to Thailand and ask my employer to write more letters before contacting the local immigration office for an extension. This got done but it was a hassle and the single-entry status didn't change. This means that if I want to travel outside of Thailand now, I have to pay for re-entry permits otherwise my visa gets invalidated.
I was trying to understand why this kind of thing has started to happen and I think I know.
It is well documented that many foreigners used to live in Thailand permanently on back-to-back 30 day border stamps. No one knew anything about what they did and whether it was legal or not, where they lived, whether they did legal work but worked illegally without work permits, or whether they paid taxes. The term commonly used is that they lived 'under the radar'.
There were also a few high-profile news stories of paedophiles and a child murder suspect who had been caught living in Thailand as tourists, while supporting themselves financially by working illegally with Thai children as English teachers.
But even with proper visas, it also used to be possible to live kind of 'under the radar'. A foreigner could get a visa from an Embassy or Consulate outside of Thailand and then not have any dealings with Thai immigration apart from at the border when entering the country.
As I said above, when I got my first one-year visa there was no enforcement of the 90 day registration process and I didn't do it until I was told to, but that was only by accident. Had I not contacted the local immigration office about the other matter, I could have gone a long time without doing it.
What seems to be happening now is that Thai Embassies and Consulates in neighbouring countries to Thailand (the rules are different for distant countries) are only giving out short term visas and then forcing foreigners to get extensions from their local immigration office in Thailand.
And what do local immigration put a lot of importance on when granting extensions? The first thing I was asked for was my 90 day reporting receipt. This is important to the folks at immigration because it tells them where I live, and that's an important piece of information for them.
I asked if it would be possible to get a further visa extension locally when my current extension expires, or whether I will need to go outside of Thailand again for a new visa. I was told it was possible to do it locally but the 90 day registration receipt was mentioned again as being a key document. This was good news.
It all seems to be about wanting to get foreigners living in Thailand completely into the system; and everything is now very closely tied together. The details of my visa, my employment, my work permit, my tax payments, and my address are all linked. If they want to contact me for any reason, it is now very easy.
It's a good thing, and nothing that other countries don't do already, but for some reason a strange situation existed in Thailand for a long time where foreigners could live there indefinitely, but they could do so without officially existing, and no one knew anything about them, or how to trace them.
That is no longer the case as the net continues to be drawn in.
Not only do I have no desire to return to the UK, but the thought of how much things cost there terrifies the life out of me.
There was a time when I used to convert baht to pounds and think how cheap everything was in Thailand. That no longer happens. These days, I convert pounds to baht and say to myself, "How can anyone afford to live in the UK?"
Take watching a football match, for example. I used to stand in the terraces at Upton Park in the late 80's and early 90's for around £10 (I can't remember the exact price). My first season ticket cost £180. For the forthcoming 2008/2009 season, that amount would not be enough for top price tickets to three games.
£63 pounds to watch West Ham. At current exchange rates, that amount is Bt4,190 and of course a day out watching football doesn't stop at the ticket price. There are also no guarantees that a game won't be 90 minutes of boredom - I've seen a few of those in my time.
Considering how much guaranteed pleasure can be had in the space of two hours in Thailand with Bt1,000, an Isaan massage girl, and a bottle of Johnson's baby lotion, it could be a while yet before I get to attend another professional game of English football.
More good news as 92 young street racers get suspended jail term. Some of the kids arrested were under 15. This is another example though, of how there is generally more law enforcement in Bangkok than in the provinces.
In provincial Thailand, the kids continue to race around and the police don't seem bothered. The Fast and the Furious was a cult movie in Thailand and it seems to have inspired a lot of young Thai males.
As I have said before, most of the racing I see isn't about gambling; they do it purely for the thrill of speed and for their own amusement. Although there are a few cars involved, most of the street racing is done on motorbikes. Nonetheless, it is dangerous, highly annoying and extremely antisocial.
Wednesday 2nd July 2008
I seem to remember making a comment recently about how I had tried to isolate myself from external factors over which I have no control. The sad truth though, is that in a global economy none of us can be an island.
The current global economic woes that began about a year ago just seem to be getting worse and almost everything that happens externally makes my life a little worse. However, I'm not alone; and there are many poor Thais suffering a lot more than me.
Compared to this time last year, the pot of money I have invested in various stock markets that will supplement my retirement fund eventually is now a lot smaller. I check my portfolio at the end of each month and June 2008 was almost as bad as November 2007, but not quite as bad as January 2008. The monthly decreases have not been insignificant amounts of money.
As the stock markets have crashed, so too have interest rates fallen, meaning that the interest I earn from my cash savings has also fallen. Just to make things worse, exchange rates haven't moved in my favour either, and the value of my UK property has continued to fall.
Two useful airline services - the direct flights from Hat Yai to Singapore and Phuket - were cancelled last year and I see that more domestic routes have been cancelled as a result of increasing fuel costs. I can't wait for the opportunity to get up to Chiang Rai again, so was saddened to hear that Nok Air has decided to cancel its Bangkok to Chiang Rai route.
The Nation also reported that several major airlines are cutting long-haul flights into Thailand next year. The Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) has revised its estimate of visitor numbers for 2009 down by two million.
The article I have linked to mentions the reason is because of 'political tensions' but if Thais really believe that, they are deluding themselves.
Contrary to popular belief here, all foreigners don't have bottomless pits of money. For many normal people, a trip to exotic Southeast Asia is an expensive proposition and with so many people tightening their belts just to survive the current economic difficulties, I suspect that exotic vacations have slipped down their list of priorities.
There is a lot of dependence on tourism in Thailand. It makes up a big chunk of the nation's overall economy and in certain areas it accounts for almost 100% of the economy. It's a strategy that has worked well up to now but it is risky.
Another risky strategy was Thailand's attempt to become the 'Detroit of Asia' in the field of vehicle production and assembly. With increasing oil costs and increasing concern about the environment, that market is also likely to come under pressure.
I don't feel as wealthy as I did a year ago but I can survive. For poorer Thais though, they are really feeling the effects of rising oil prices and general inflation, and many are having trouble making ends meet.
One of my students was telling me about her parents who live in a rural area of Trang province. She comes from a large, poor family and her mother buys rice in large sacks. These used to cost Bt800 not so long ago, but the price now has risen by over 50%.
It's the same with most foodstuff, and the cost of transportation has risen significantly. Some large Thai companies have started paying employees more to offset the cost of inflation but what about the millions of Thais who don't work for large companies or the government?
One sector of the economy I believe will continue to do well is medical services. Vacations are a luxury but people will never stop getting sick, and with such poor service in countries like the UK, health tourism to countries like Thailand continues to be a viable option.
My mother was a health tourist earlier this year. She went to Singapore, however, as it was more convenient for her to stay with my brother than come to Thailand. Several vertebrae had started to collapse and as nerves had become trapped she was in a great deal of pain, being effectively housebound.
The response from doctors in the UK was very poor but in Singapore she saw a surgeon who diagnosed the problem and did a great job of fixing it. She says that the problem is 100% fixed now. I'm sure her experience would have been similar had she come to Thailand.
With lengthy waiting lists, there is actually a debate raging in the UK at the moment about whether the National Health Service (NHS) should reimburse patients for being treated abroad if they cannot treat the patient quickly enough.
Like my mother, I suspect that most health tourists coming to Thailand for operations would be paying privately so it's unlikely the NHS will pay for you to have your ingrown toenail sorted out in Phuket where, of course, you would need to stay for another couple of weeks to fully recuperate.
This current recession is making life difficult for many of us, including many Thais, but I think that lessons are being learnt and we will all come out of it a little wiser and stronger.
Tuesday 1st July 2008
Having been brought up with cats around the house, I have always had more of an affinity with felines than with dogs. However, I am slowly being won over.
There are some fabulous dogs in this country, just like the one in the photo that I met yesterday (click on the photo for a larger image). There were a couple of pups of about the same age that I assumed came from the same litter. Not only were they super looking dogs, but they had a perfect temperament, and simply oozed personality.
What's more, is that dogs like this are free. You meet them at temples and wandering around the streets. Thais pay lots of money for things like Shih Tzus and Pugs but why would you want to pay out good money for a toy dog when you could have a fabulous mutt like this for free?
So, what are the most annoying dogs in Thailand?
The typical temple and street dogs are no problem. They sleep most of the day and can't be bothered barking at anyone because they are too lethargic. Some seem to be aware it is their dog duty to bark at strangers but the exertion of opening their mouths to make a sound is too much for them, and they fall asleep again.
I occasionally see some 'dangerous dog' breeds but generally they aren't a problem either. I'm not an expert but I understand that dogs are trained to be aggressive, or otherwise, and the Rottweilers I have encountered in Thailand have been fine.
No. The most annoying and troublesome dogs in Thailand are ...... bloody poodles. There are a few close to where I live and they go crazy whenever I walk past. If ever there were candidates for sausages laced with rat poison, these are them.
They're only brave, however, when they are on the other side of a fence or gate. I sometimes see the same dogs on the street when there is nothing in between us and they don't make a sound.
Pesky little things.