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"The Rounds" Friday, February 11, 2005
* * * * * * * * * * Headlines Diran Art Show Opening Night at the FCCT a Smashing Success PM's Thai Rak Thai Party Wins in a Landslide North Korea Says It Has Nuclear Weapons Incredibly, the Cool Season Hangs On Some The Office Bar and Grill Sports Schedule for This Weekend Foreign Tsunami Relief Volunteers Need Work Permits * * * * * * * * * *
Diran
Art Show Opening Night Richard K. Diran's opening night of a month-long exhibition of 8 of his paintings, collectively called "The Week of Seduction," at the Foreign Correspondents Club of Thailand last Friday was a huge success, I'm happy to report. Since the exhibition is free, there isn't any way to know the precise number of people attending, but I was there from 8:15-10:15 P.M. -- the show started at 7:30, but I was late -- but based on what people told me about the first 45 minutes and what I myself observed during the 2 hours I was present, I estimate the number of people attending was at least 300 people. And if someone were to tell me the actual number was closer to 500, I wouldn't have any trouble believing it -- the food and free drinks Richard put up 20,000 baht towards certainly got used up quickly -- and the FCCT is noted for its very moderate prices on drinks and food. As a friend of Richard's, I was ecstatic on his behalf. He later told me that he received one single negative comment, a heartening experience for any artist. The local media came through, both major English-language dailies affording Richard substantial coverage, especially The Nation. In fact, columnist Roger Beaumont conducted a most excellent interview with Richard that ran in last Sunday's edition, 2 days after the opening night, but timed to try to keep the fires of interest stoked. (On a side note, I called Roger to tell him he did a brilliant interview, brilliant in every way. He spent quite a long while with Richard then distilled the raw results down to a very readable, engrossing interview.) Richard himself was pleased to no end, of course. A good friend of his and his wife organized about 10 of her university friends to be there to serve refreshments, and he had been worried they would end up with nothing to do. Interestingly, when I wasn't looking my (sort of) girlfriend took a look at the paintings. She hadn't even wanted to go and tried to squirm out of it at the last minute, calling me from the doctor's office saying she was running late but for me to go ahead. I insisted she go, late or not. Ya is an Isaarn farm girl with only 4 years of formal education -- not someone you expect to appreciate fine art, especially surreal visual art. When we went home that night, I expressed yet again my appreciation for her going to show Richard support -- she knows him, but not well -- adding I knew she isn't interested in that sort of thing. (Luckily, the volunteer serving girls invited her to join them at their table; Ya knows the gal who did the organizing. That gave her something to do while I glad-handed around.) She floored me when she said she had indeed looked at all 8 paintings. Thinking maybe she was throwing me a nice sop, I asked her if she liked any of them. She immediately mentioned one -- by name -- and described it at considerable length and what it meant to here. I was amazed -- not to mention impressed. I've long known that despite her lack of formal education she is very bright, but I certainly never expected her to get anywhere near out of the show what she did. And that's a tribute to Richard's talent. (In case you're curious what surreal art could possibly fire an Isaan girl's inagination, Ya's favorite painting is "The Temptation of Eve.") By all means, if you're in town anytime this month right to the end of the month, stop by and take a look; Richard's canvasses are . . . well, one can't help but get involved with them. And their intellectually both challenging and complex. [Thursday, February 10, 2005] * * * * * * * * * * PM's Thai Rak Thai Party Wins in a Landslide The dominant prty in the last government, Prime Minister Thaksin's Thai Rak Thai ("Thai Love Thai) party won a huge majority. While as far as I know the final official results aren't in, exit polls showed the party winning 396 seats in the 500-seat national parliament, a stunning 79.2% of the total, allowing Thai Rak Thai to assume unchallenged -- and unchallengeable -- leadership without having to form a coalition government. There has been much speculation about possible negative implications of any one party enjoying such extraordinary power in a democratic parliamentary system such as is place here in the Kingdom. But it doesn't take a political scientist to figure out such a huge majority also imposes moral responsibility for good governance squarely on the ruling party and its leader -- Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra. Now the Thaksin government has an essentially completely free hand to pursue the national interests, without any defense that the opposition is playing a spoiling role. About all the opposition can do now is to protest, but without any political or policy impact to speak of. The central question for foreigners living and/or conducting business here is what the attitudes of the majority of the ruling party towards foreigners will prove to be. If those attitudes are positive and internationalist, then the future bodes well. If the opposite were to turn out to be the case, then the opposite would hold true. Observers are hopeful the new government will seize the opportunities before it to initiate wise, thoughtful programs for the nation. [Friday, February 11, 2005] * * * * * * * * * * North Korea Says It Has Nuclear Weapons In a disturbing development that has major security implications for East Asia, the government of the reclusive Stalinist state of North Korea has announced that country possesses nuclear weapons -- weapons it is apparently capable of delivering regionally, including, for example, to Thailand and the western Aleutian Islands. Leaving aside the debate over whether it is hypocritical of the other nuclear powers to protest North Korea's possession of these weapons of mass destruction, the fact is there is little, if any, reason to suppose the erratic North Korean leadership will automatically be responsible as a nuclear power -- if it is such, as this announcement is not simply a propaganda ploy. Only the United States has ever used nuclear weapons, and the 2 times she did so was nearly 60 years ago. None of the other powers having nuclear arsenals have ever used even one. It's true India and Pakistan are newcomers to the nuclear club, but in the relatively short while they've possessed such weaponry, they've proven responsible to date. A bunch of us here have talked about this development, with concern, foreigners and Thais alike. Fairly or unfairly, we all find it all too easy to imagine the fruitcakes in Pyongyang launching arbitrary strikes just to show they can. It's hard to comprehend how it must be to be a North Korean. When I lived in Beijing in the latter half of the 1980's, I became friendly with a North Korean who was attending a university there. He eventually told me he was the son of a former minor official in North Korea's Foreign Ministry who had been sent to a European country and allowed to take his family. The son also told me that as his father's assignment neared its end, he sat the family down and told them he was going to ask for political asylum (which he did, and which the entire family received.) Most tellingly, the son told me his parents apologized to the children for reinforcing the party line that the reason their nation was sealed to the world, for all intents and purposes, was that the rest of the world's population was envious of the paradisiacal North and would pour over the borders to take advantage of the "privileges" of being a North Korean. And the son told me he had completely believed it until his family moved to Europe, where during their several years there daily life itself assaulted their government's official lie. That's the mindset in command of nuclear weapons, if the North isn't just spouting in the wind. Complicating the issue that in the same announcement the Pea Brains of Pyongyang also announced they were pulling out of multilateral talks on the issue. You can darned sure bet security officials will be monitoring the situation carefully and closely. Heck -- they can't afford not to do so. My semi-educated guess as a longtime China watcher is that the folks in Zhongnanhai, the leadership compound in Beijing, are going nuts, especially given their former "lips-and-teeth" relation with North Korea, as the late Deng Xiao Ping was fond of saying. I would be amazed if the Chinese haven't gone through back channels to warn Pyongyang that if they launch any weapons against a regional country they, the Chinese, will react strongly. After all, that country has enough problems of its own without having to worry about a rogue nuclear state on its doorstep. All we can do is watch, wait, . . . and worry. [Friday, February 11, 2005] * * * * * * * * * * A good long while ago I wrote about The Corner Bar at the intersection of Sukhumvit Soi 11 and The Green Route, a bar then owned by an American friend and his then-wife, a Thai lady. Well, stuff changes. As of last night that friend sold the bar to Taffy, proprietor of New Square One Pub here in Washington Square. Before things went sour for the former owner, my American friend, I went to the venue on occasion, even though it's off my normal beaten path, just to be supportive. And I always enjoyed it: his former wife was always nice to me personally, and his staff attentive, not to mention prompt, friendly, and excellent in serving customers. Now Taffy has taken over the bar, and even the former owner feels that last night, the first night of Taffy's ownership, was a bellwether day for the bar. As Chuck, the former owner put it, "The atmosphere was a hundred per cent more energetic than before." The receipts Taffy reports certainly support that contention. Let's just say I wish I were netting that much on a daily basis! Despite the bar's not being in a venue such as Soi Cowboy, Nana Plaza, Soi Zero, or Patpong, it is well-situated due to 2 factors: The Green Route is heavily traveled by those in the know, and it is situated extremely near the hugely popular Q Bar. This stands despite the lack of immediate parking -- there is public parking just down The Green Route on the opposite (north) side of The Green Route. I had intended to go there last night, but backed off after I received a phone call from a mutual friend indicating my timing would be off, despite my tilac's yammering at me "We need to go see Taffy, we need to go see Taffy." (She knows and likes him.) But given the phone call from the mutual friend, I decided to give it a miss last night then to go tonight. So you'll be reading a bar review in next week's column. The bar doesn't have a land line yet, and I'm not about to pass out the personal hand phone number of Taffy's sister-in-law -- she's running the place -- although I have it. For now, you'll just have to physically go to the place to check it out. And Daraporn, the sister-in-law manager, is a 100% complete, total sweetheart in her own right; everyone (including me) is madly in love with her. DO drop by. Taffy thinks he won't have to spend much time there, but he himself is the chief draw at New Square One Pub -- pretty Thai ladies are a dime a dozen (and I don't say that disrespectfully of Thai Womanhood, merely factually) -- so my and others' feelings are that he will end up having to spend a considerable amount of time there. Meanwhile, visit http://BangkokAtoZ.com/Taffy's to get a bit more information on the bar. But, hey -- he bit it off! [Friday, February 11, 2005] * * * * * * * * * * Incredibly, the Cool Season Hangs On Some Though the days are warming up a bit -- not badly, but a bit -- the nights and early mornings remain amazingly pleasant for this late in the year, so near the hot season. Tourists coming here now, when we're entering the low season, are in for a pleasant surprise in terms of the weather. We've had nearly 3 months of wonderful weather -- a record by far during my decade in this magical Kingdom. The nation is recovering as nicely as can be expected from the tsunami disaster December 26th of last year. And tourist destinations outside the 6 affected provinces in the South were entirely unaffected. There are other concerns, but so far they are largely theoretical. Avian flu? -- I'm eating chicken again, and I'm still clucking, though I do check any chicken to make sure it is WELL-cooked before eating it. The change in government was no change at all other than now a single party enjoys absolute rule. And the beauties of the country remain the same: a pleasant climate, beautiful beaches, mountains, jungles, etc., exotic wildlife, and a warm, friendly popilation -- Thai and hill tribe people alike. So come on in -- the water's fine. [Friday, February 11, 2005] * * * * * * * * * * The Office Bar and Grill Sports Schedule for This Weekend Here's this weekend's schedule of broadcasts of sporting events at The Office Bar & Grillo just off Sukhumvit Soi 33:
Fri Feb 11 * * * * * * * * * * A couple of days ago I did something very unusual for me, forwarding a chain letter, because I thought it was worthy. It was purportedly written by a passenger on board a Boeing aircraft delayed in part so some V.I.P.'s could board, guys who turned out, according to the story, Marines returning from Iraq. And, the story went, they were accorded a heroes' welcome. And, at the passenger's suggestion, the one who wrote the tale, all the non-Marine passengers waited to let the Marines disembark first. But a good friend caught me out of school, a friend to whom I mailed the story; the aircraft in question can't seat anywhere near the number of passengers the writer of the tale mentioned in the e-mail I foolishly forwarded. But I want all you Jarhead-Leathernecks out there to know my HEART was in the right place -- even if I dropped the ball on checking out the facts! [February 11, 2005] * * * * * * * * * * Foreign Tsunami Relief Volunteers Need Work Permits If The Phuket Gazette is to be believed, foreign volunteers working for free, paying their own ways entirely, need work permits from the Thai government, according to a story in that esteemed publication headlined "Work Permits for Charity Workers?" Kinda hard to believe, isn't it? Folks give freely of their time, labor, and money to come (or remain in) a country to help -- and they have to face this sort of bureaucratic red tape? Reminds me of America, my homeland, where everything can be difficult. Now I feel bad. I've had a number of inquiries from abroad from folks wishing to come here to help, and I've urged them to do so. Now I fear that if they followed my recommendation they could be facing jail time and fines if they're caught working illegally. Like I said, hard to believe -- but as the (in)famous Bernard Trink would undoubtedly remark: TIT (This is Thailand). [Friday, February 11, 2005] * * * * * * * * * * I have been reluctant to write about this because I have not personally experienced it and because my contact at Immigration says he doesn't know anything about it, but I've had so many reports of a new Arrival Card I feel compelled to mention it. Reportedly, there is a new Arrival Card, the most controversial part of which is a requirement to put down one's income -- an intrusive question, at best. It is not at all unreasonable for any government to try to make sure a visitor has enough cash on hand not to become a ward of the state -- but to want to know his/her income? -- that is highly intrusive and nosey. Now, let me add a proviso to this report: the first time I heard it some weeks ago I happened to meet a couple that night who had arrived 2 hours before, and they showed me their arrival cards -- which were exactly the same as the ones I've always filled out, one of which is stapled into my passport now from my last exit from the Kingdom. I don't want to identify any of my sources reporting this, but I will say that those I know personally have always been reliable in the past, so I'm at something of a loss to know what to believe until I myself exit the Kingdom again. If you're planning to come here, you might ask a consular official just what the story is if this is an issue for you. [Friday, February 11, 2005] * * * * * * * * * * Enough for one go . . . Until next time -- Mekhong Kurt * * * * * * * * * * E-mail Change Notification Sign-up Sign-up here for e-mail notification when I add or change something on the site. Just go to the sign-up page. * * * * * * * * * * Where Is *Your* Name??? So you've been a slacker and still haven't signed up for the free BangkokAtoZ.com Updates Mailing List??? ;-) Well, get with the program and sign up right now to be notified via e-mail whenever we add something to the site -- that way, you don't even have to visit the Updates Page to see if there's anything new -- we'll let you know by e-mail. If you want to sign up, just go to the sign-up page. I'm pleased to say that more and more of you are signing up, and I urge all of you not to hesitate! * * * * * * * * * * Where is *Your* "Traveler's Tale"???
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Copyright © 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, and 2007 by Kurt T. Francis, except as noted otherwise. Materials by Christopher G. Moore, Dean Barrett, Richard K. Diran, Sonia Pressman Fuentes, and Hardy Stockmann are copyrighted © by those respective authors. All rights reserved. Please see the Copyright Notice for further information. Click here for our Privacy Statement Please direct all inquiries to mekhongkurt at bangkokatoz.com |
