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Dutch Ambassador visits Rotary
Rotarians and guests welcome Ms.
Laetitia van den Assum, the Ambassador to Thailand (4th from right).
The Rotary Club of Jomtien-Pattaya was recently honored by a
visit from Ms. Laetitia van den Assum, the Ambassador to Thailand from the
Netherlands. She spoke about the Rotary Youth Exchange Program, in which she
participated as a student. This program enables students to spend a school year
in another country, in her case: the United States. This sparked her interest in
other people and other cultures, leading to many years of service for the United
Nations, the Dutch Foreign Ministry, and ultimately to her posting as an
ambassador to Thailand, Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar.
She admires Rotarians as “agents of change” and praised their charity programs,
many of which are for children. During her work for UNICEF in Africa, she
particularly appreciated Rotary’s world-wide PolioPlus project which aims to
eradicate polio by the year 2005, exactly 100 years after the foundation of
Rotary.
Speaking about her current job, the ambassador referred to her home country as
the most densely populated country in the world (with the same population
density, Thailand would have over 175 million people!). Many large and small
Dutch companies have operations here, and are ever expanding.
Trade contracts with Thailand date back 400 years. Dutch annals from that time
are being translated as a gift Thai from the Netherlands to King Rama IX for the
50th anniversary of his reign.
President Kees Peperkamp, a native Dutchman, presented the ambassador with a
“ton” of deep frozen Dutch delicacies prepared by a local (Dutch) chef, and with
“Touch the Dragon”, an award winning book by Rotary Youth Exchange student Karen
Connelly about her school year in Denchai, North Thailand.
Rotarians and guests, among whom many are of Dutch origin, were served typical
“bitterballs” and “orange bitter”, the latter a special tribute to the Dutch
Royal Family: the House of Orange.
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Dutch modem producer
opens factory in Ban Chang
Haarlem, in the West of the Netherlands, is the centre of
a prosperous tulip trade. Many Dutch people in this region either choose
this traditional trade to earn their livelihood or become seafarers, but
there are some individualists who opt for a different vocation. One of those
self-styled persons is Rob van Cutsem. If you mention him or his company
“Tornado” in Holland, it has the same impression on computer users as naming
Bill Gates at a computer show in America.
 Rob
van Cutsem,
President of Tornado
Rob opened a computer shop in Amsterdam in 1987 and imported products from
Taiwan. Due to the lack of quality and his exceptional business sense he saw
the potential for a lucrative market in building his own computer
accessories, specialising in fax modems.
Rob is now the President of Tornado which has branches all over the world,
producing fax modems of the finest.
He and his wife Aree, a Thai national, came here to the Eastern Seaboard to
open their new factory in Ban Chang, the first of it’s sort in Thailand. The
new branch in Ban Chang employs more than 100 workers and will produce 2
million modems per year.
Rob’s newest products are 55,600 bps modems and ISDN modems, which allow you
to log on to your server or other computers over the phone-line much faster
than usual modems.
Rob is very optimistic about his new company. “Even though we had problems
finding qualified engineers, I’m very optimistic as all the employees show
great interest in their new assignment. In return for their loyalty I pay
higher salaries - I don’t believe in sweatshops and exploiting employees”,
explains the hobby pilot and ex-American football player.
“Education and Training is the key”. These words he turned into action by
producing a modem adapter for Sega games to give children the chance to
explore the World Wide Web through their game stations. This is the first
step towards enabling Internet availability without the use of a PC. “We
have a long way to go, the WWW will be inevitable in the daily use of a
household of every family by the next century,” predicts Rob.
During his stay here in Pattaya Rob joined and sponsored a charity soccer
match with top Dutch football stars to raise funds for homeless children in
Thailand. “Because we are here in Thailand, we have to help the people in
whatever way we can.”
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SHOPPING-SPREE
Beauty and Fashion Shopping Tips and Information
by Ayrada
Any woman is a bit crazy. She can receive 100 compliments about
her good looks and take it for granted, but as soon as another
woman tells her that she looks tired, a bit chubby or that she’s
got charming wrinkles around her eyes when she smiles, she just
cannot bear it.
 Jeanette
Iversen (left), Marketing Manager of Nuluk International, the
agency for the CACI, looks on during a demonstration of the
beauty machine at the grand opening of Jack Holt Beauty Salon.
Well, it happened to me one day. One of my girlfriends (a Thai)
asked me why I have never had a facelift. It would be so cheap
in Bangkok. I replied very coolly that I did not think it would
be necessary yet, but as soon as I went home I looked in the
mirror and thought to myself that I really should do something
about my looks. One problem occurred - I am very afraid of a
facelift. Nobody can promise that you will look as good as
before, just without wrinkles.
Well, lucky me. I know one of the owners, Mr. Roland Gobert, of
the newly opened Jack Holt Beauty Salon. He offered me a real
bargain to try out; CACI. What’s CACI?, I asked. CACI stands
for: Computer Aided Cosmetology Instrument and it’s a box of
magic tricks powered by micro-current, which again is a special
set of low power electrical waves that were originally used as a
physiotherapy aid. These are applied to the face via
cotton-tipped probes which has the effect of lengthening or
shortening the facial muscles to restore tone and firmness. In
one sentence: It’s a non-surgical face lift.
After learning well-known persons like Princess Diana, Cliff
Richards, Lynsey de Paul and Sue Nicholls went through this kind
of treatment, my fear of being the guinea-pig disappeared and I
appeared in person to get those treatments.
Laying relaxed on one of the cosmetic-beds, I felt the
cosmeti-cian working busily on my face. First, she cleansed and
softened my face, and after that used the cotton-tipped probes.
Waiting for what I thought would be an electric-shock, my
jaw-muscles cramped a bit. But, besides a metallic taste in my
mouth during the first few minutes, nothing happened to me.
Actually, after a while I was sound asleep, for the whole
procedure was so relaxing. The next time I watched more
carefully and found out the girl “electrocuted” my face three
times, twice with a bit of water only, the third time with pure
Collagen-Cream.
After the first treatment, I already had the feeling my skin was
much softer and more shiny. The first real results showed after
5 treatments. People kept asking me if I just came back from a
long vacation. Others asked me if I had a face lift (which I, of
course, denied), for I looked 10 years younger. Wow! Tell me one
woman who wouldn’t like to hear that!
To get the right results, one has to undergo at least 10
treatments, and I can tell you: IT’S WORTH IT. All small
wrinkles disappear, the skin is much tighter than before the
treatment, the tint reflects a soft, healthy glowing. The
features seem to be lifted, though very deep wrinkles won’t
disappear completely. But the effect of a much younger
appearance is a fact.
This treatment is not very cheap. The price of one session is
Baht 2,500 (I still think its much cheaper here than in Europe).
Still, compared to a “bloody”, a surgical facelift (price-range
between 60,000 and 120,000 Baht) its well worth the effort.
Jack Holt Beauty Salon is located on Second Road in front of VC
Hotel.
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