Web site for dogs

Intelligent new uses for the Internet are being found every day. A distraught dog owner has put a tape of his lost black Labrador barking on its own personal web page. The owner hopes that the audio sequence, together with a photo of the unfortunate bonnie, will help recognition. Well informed mongrels say that the best places to look for lost soul mates in Pattaya are temple grounds.

Penang latest

The Royal Thai Consulate in Penang has gone computerized. Under new rules, you are required to hand in your passport on day one, mornings only, and collect it the following working day after 2 p.m. The revised timings do not fit the railway schedules to and from Bangkok and may necessitate an extra night in Georgetown. But the situation is said to be very fluid, so check with someone who has just returned before booking your travel tickets.

Tracy and Peter

Just arrived in Thailand is a timeless novel which looks at the loving, tender relationship between two young people against the backdrop of shopping malls, ice cream parlors and Pizza Huts. He offers her a tangerine screamer and an earthquake with extra cheese, whilst she agrees to be seduced after her third gooseberry and peach growler and the complementary jug of coke. Let’s hope there’s a girls’ rest-room handy.

Auto sex

A Pattaya farang was booked by police after he was found nude and lurking by a car at a hotel parking lot. A woman staying at the hotel said the man, wearing only socks and sandals, confronted her near her room. She added that she chased the man but he managed to escape. He is currently on remand in a police cell awaiting the return of his shorts which, he claims, are under the woman’s bed.

Customs and excise

If you are importing goods into Thailand, make sure that your foreign shipping agent gives you the name and details of the Thai company which will handle the duty problems at the port. In a recent case, an Australian sent over her grandmother’s rocking chair for sentimental reasons and was charged a small fortune. Customs officers assumed it was being brought here for re-sale as an antique item. 99% of farangs should avoid Thai bureaucracies unless there isn’t any alternative.

Sign here please

The general manager of a five star Bangkok hotel recounts the story of U.S. novelist Truman Capote, now deceased, who was breakfasting in the caf้ when an overjoyed female fan came bustling up and invited Mr. Capote to sign her breast. Before he could oblige, her furious husband insisted that he sign his penis instead. Replied the author, “I couldn’t manage a whole signature on that, but I could initial it.”

Phnom Penh crackdown

Police in Cambodia’s capital have begun a sustained closure campaign of child prostitution haunts. Most of them were in or around Monivong Avenue and were plainly short-time brothels housing girls as young as thirteen, but made up to look older. However, more salubrious hang-outs, such as the Martini Bar (popular among expats) are still up and running as is the infamous kilometer eleven, way out of town and housing mostly Vietnamese girls without passports. If in Phnom Penh, travel at night only by limousine taxi lest you bump into khaki uniforms sporting sub-machine guns. They may be for your protection but don’t count on it.

Religious instruction

The headmaster of a distinguished school was addressing 600 pupils at morning assembly. “Stand up all those who want to go to heaven,” he announced in a solemn voice. 599 youngsters all obediently rose at his command, but one 10 year old boy remained in his seat. “Don’t you want to go to heaven then?” boomed the adult voice. The lad replied, “Sure, when I die, I thought you were taking up a party this morning.”

High rise scam

Every barrel has a bad apple or two. The latest scam amongst dishonest security guards at a couple of condominium blocks in town is to demand 10 or 20 baht from strangers as the barrier is raised to pass a vehicle into the pound. You will probably be handed a “receipt” in the form of a raffle ticket or similar and told that your car will be personally guarded during your visit. Don’t fall for it.