Thailand
Cops nab killer, publish best police station photo ever
“It’s that guy, got it? Not me. That guy. Over there. Him.” —From the Phuket Gazette
In Bangkok, the ‘cigarette police’ are unfairly targeting foreigners with littering fines (Tip: You don’t have to pay!)
In an effort to clean up its streets, Bangkok has begun issuing on-the-spot fines for litterers. Meant to discourage littering of all kinds, the program is instead being used by the “cigarette police” to frighten foreigners into opening their wallets. The Bangkok Post did some investigating — and lets slip one important fact.
A psychic vagina tree, homemade shotguns and expats gone wild: What’s going on in Phuket, Thailand?
hanks to its large population of expats, Phuket is already a weird place. In recent weeks, though, the popular island has been making more headlines than usual. Here’s a rundown of noteworthy items.
Thai Nippon Rubber on track to become world’s ‘largest’ condom producer
If it’s true that a Thai company will soon produce most of the world’s condoms, you better hope they’re making different sizes.
In Thailand, traffic tunnel faces delays over feng shui concerns
Public works projects rarely go smoothly. If it’s not the cost overruns, it’s the lazy contractors; if it’s not the environmental worries, it’s the worker strikes. But how about bad feng shui? For elderly ethnic-Chinese residents of Phuket, Thailand, a new traffic tunnel will bring damnation by interfering with the island’s spatial flow. According to [...]
Wife’s nagging drives Thai man to steal $6 and a cellphone
With a haul totaling about $6, Sittha Rattanaphan’s caper wasn’t the Crime of the Century. But the 36-year-old Thai man’s explanation of the theft is pure gold. From the Phuket Gazette: Chalong Police at 5pm on Wednesday arrested Sittha Rattanaphan, 36, at the Andaman Seaview Hotel in Karon, seizing as evidence a Honda motorbike and [...]
McDonald’s to sponsor professional soccer team with cash and free burgers
Wherever you go in the world, you find two things: McDonald’s and soccer. It’s fitting, then, that the Golden Arches will soon grace the jerseys of a national soccer team. For a reported $750,000, the Big Mac maker has secured a three-year sponsorship deal with Thailand’s national team, currently ranked 110th in the Fifa rankings. [...]
Sieg Heil, Siam! Hitler billboard doesn’t go over in Thailand
A billboard advertising Louis Tussaud’s Waxworks in Pattaya, Thailand, has ruffled some diplomatic feathers. What’s the problem? Oh, just a certain world leader who, you know, might be controversial. From the Bangkok Post: The operator of a waxworks museum in Pattaya has been forced to cover up a giant billboard of Adolf Hitler giving a Nazi [...]
Popular tourist town hosed down in high-profile anti-flu effort
It was less about genuine flu prevention than it was an unapologetic act of positive public relations when a Thai tourist town was hosed down this week. From The Pattaya Daily News: On 15th June 2009 several Pattaya political figures and officials joined the crowds in a concerted clean-up campaign to reduce the spread of [...]
Buddhist monk killed while collecting alms
If you think of Thailand only as The Land of One Thousand Smiles (a nickname that gets very tired very quickly), you need to look into the southern region where separatists have been fomenting violent, bloody civil unrest for years. Violence has escalated in recent weeks. Last week, 11 Muslims were killed in an attack [...]
‘Bar mat mum’ denied U.S. visa for Thai theft conviction
Annice Smoel has bad luck when it comes to vacations. I first wrote about Smoel in May, when she was released from a Thai prison after serving 18 days for stealing a bar mat. Now she’s being denied entry to the U.S., where she’d hoped to have a Disneyland adventure with her kids. From News.com.au: [...]
After 18 days in Thai jail, Bar Mat Mum heads home
I’m no angel when I travel, but I choose my criminal endeavors carefully. I bet Annice Smoel, aka Australia’s Bar Mat Mum, will do the same from now on. If she ever travels again, that is. From News.com.au: Annice Smoel has been released from detention in Thailand and is free to travel home. Ms Smoel, [...]
Thai authorities struggle to explain mysterious deaths
If you’ve seen The Beach, you’ll recognize Maya Beach on the Phi Phi islands in Thailand. It’s beautiful, fun, cheap and remote enough to feel detached from the rest of the world. Lately, Phi Phi has been making headlines. For the wrong reasons, naturally. On May 2, the body of an unidentified foreign man was [...]
WTF BKK, $4.50 ATM fees?
As if the red-shirt riots weren’t enough. Thailand’s tourism industry may lose up to $2.8 billion this year. Yeah, billion. But as protests were hogging the headlines, a consortium of Thai bankers quietly kicked the tourism sector in the balls by increasing foreign-card ATM withdrawals to 150 baht. On a bad exchange-rate day, that’s $4.50. [...]
Thailand is a mess
I was in Bangkok during the run-up to the coup that ousted Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra. By all accounts, Thaksin is a real bastard. Corrupt and fond of croneyism of the highest order. The protesters, wearing uniformly bright yellow shirts and headbands, shut down parts of the city on several occasions. One protest was held a [...]
How to handle a thieving staff? Not like this.
A few years ago, I traveled non-stop for nearly two years. Since much of my time was spent in Asia, I stayed in a lot of dirt-cheap hellhole guest houses. I was idly backpacking, but I was working — so I had a laptop, expensive Nikon digital, even a mini disc recorder and microphone. I [...]
