Caravan of families goes on a night safari

A caravan of 50 families had the exciting experience of witnessing the behavior of real wildlife after dark. What’s more, they were able to see these wild animal’s nocturnal behavior in the animals’ natural habitat.

Pattaya Mayor Pairat Suttithamrongsawat releases the caravan of cars on their way to a night safari at Khao Kheow Open Zoo.

On 25 September, 50 families took part in the “Parent & Children Bonding” program, organized by the Tourism Authority of Thailand to celebrate world vacation day. The families’ vehicles were all equipped with flags announcing the program as they went on a night safari through the Khao Kheow Open Zoo.

The caravan included Pattaya Mayor Pairat Suttithamrongsawat and Pattaya’s TAT Director Sedthaphan Bhuthani, both of whom helped build family ties as they led the families through the zoo.

The “Night Safari” is a tourist program organized by the Zoo to bring visitors closer to nature. It begins as the sun sets in the distant mountains, eventually leaving the safari in the dark forest, far from any settlements.

Fifty families went on a special night safari as part of the TAT’s “Parent & Children Bonding” program to celebrate world vacation day.

Afterwards, the aspiring Dr. Livingstones board an “Auto Train”, which takes them along a twisting and curving three kilometer trip through the forest, using spotlights to view the surroundings in the dark. Frequent stops are made to get a closer look at various animals, such as deer, barking deer, hog deer, spotted deer, bears, porcupines, civets, sloths, zebras, giraffes, and rare monkeys, as well as many other animals.

Khao Kheow Open Zoo was built on 5,000 rai of land in one of Thailand’s most natural forests. Over 100 different types of animals live there in their natural habitat. The zoo is only a 45 minute drive from Pattaya and is 130 kilometers from Bangkok. In addition to the zoo, there are animal rides, bicycling, children’s education centers and the zoo’s favorite attractions, twin elephants Jum and Jim.

The Night Safari is a daily attraction starting at 6:00 p.m. It is held in a segment of the zoo where various types of tigers may appear and be observed in safety.

Elephants on parade!

In honor of His Majesty King Bhumibol Adulyadej’s 72nd birthday in December, Pattaya and the city’s “Elephant Committee” plans to put 72 elephants on parade at the end of November.

The idea for the parade was discussed at a meeting between Pattaya Mayor Pairat Suttithamrongsawat and the Chairman of the Pattaya City Elephant Committee, Suan Phonwatanakul, which took place at the “One Million Year Old Stone Park and Crocodile Farm”. Suan and his committee wanted to plan ways to involve the elephant community in raising funds for charitable causes in honor of the King’s 72nd birthday.

This year is considered to be an auspicious one and all over Thailand people are preparing activities honoring His Majesty King Bhumibol Adulyadej’s completion of His Sixth Cycle in Life. Many such activities have already been initiated in Pattaya City.

The elephant parade will be a merit making opportunity with a definitely Thai twist. On 26-28 November, 72 elephants, one for each year, will proceed through town from Banglamung School, down Pattaya-Naklua Road and through to Pattaya Beach Road, covering a distance of 10 kilometers.

Tents will be set up in various areas along the way to sell merchandise, and food for the elephants will be sold throughout the area as a way of making merit. The proceeds of sales will be presented to His Majesty the King for use in future charitable activities.

Pattaya to host unique festival

According to Southern Thai custom, a special festival is held in the 10th month of the year to appease the spirits of forgotten souls. The Chairman of the Southern Thai Community in Pattaya, Suphod Phajonnetrakhom announced that this traditional custom will be performed at the Tai Hee Temple in Central Pattaya on 9 October.

Pattaya residents, originally from the southern region, will keep their tradition alive by first gathering at the temple in the morning to present alms and pay homage to the monks. Afterwards, ceremonies will be performed honoring those relatives, friends and loved ones who have passed away.

Pattaya’s Southern Thai Community plans to make this year’s activity bigger than previous years and has given it the title of “The Southern Thai Traditional 10th Month Festival”. Cultural entertainment will be provided throughout the day along with food and beverages, all free of charge and supported by the Southern Thai Community. Visitors are invited to observe the activities going on or partake in the merit making throughout the day.

Another festival is also planned closer to the year’s end including a football tournament for the Prime Minister and the Minister of the Interior’s Trophy and a concert to raise funds for public charities in the southern region.

The Southern Thai Traditional 10th Month Festival is a custom performed but once a year and should not be missed by those interested in Thai culture.

Rotary District Governor visits Pattaya

Many would come to believe that having the position of District Governor in one of the 528 districts in the Rotary world is a glamorous job. Little do they realise that to become a district governor he must go through a gruelling test throughout his Rotary life. He has to learn more, so that he can convey his knowledge on to Rotarians both young and old. He must sacrifice a lot of his precious time and own needs.

Daranee Chiaranaipanit presents President Bancha with a laptop computer to be donated to a needy school for the furtherance of education for the underprivileged children.

A District Governor must be a most loyal person to the Rotary ideals. He must be a good leader, father, son, brother and most important, an excellent teacher. The Governor has a responsibility to travel to all the Rotary clubs in his district to guide, instruct and assist in all Rotary matters.

District Governor Somchai Chiaranaipanit of District 3340 in Thailand is one of those staunch loyalists. Last week he paid an official visit to the Rotary Club of Jomtien-Pattaya. With him was his staunchest supporter, his wife Daranee, and more importantly he brought along his knowledge and his encouragement and caring to all Rotarians to forge ahead with the ideals of service.

President Bancha Mungchana and members of the Rotary Club of Jomtien-Pattaya attended this very important meeting. District Governor Somchai advised Rotarians on techniques to unite Rotarians from all over the world to pool their resources so that more could be done to serve the needy. In these days of economic crisis it was the only way to accomplish these noble projects. He stressed the importance of enlightening the community that Rotary’s main aim is to serve.

President Bancha Mungchana of the Rotary Club of Jomtien-Pattaya presents a bouquet of flowers to Daranee Chiaranaipanit as District Governor Somchai looks on.

Rotarians number more than 1,193,461 members in 29,728 clubs in 161 countries in the world. They are all bonded together in fellowship and work for the same goal. The goal is to alleviate as much as possible the suffering of the underprivileged, needy and downtrodden in all corners of the world.

DG Somchai went on to say, “I tried so hard not to become a Rotarian, because I had never seen the value of this organisation before. Then in 1990, at the invitation of Boolua Paibool-pornpong and with the unmitigated support of my wife Daranee, I decided to join the Rotary Club of Kaenkoon in Khonkaen.

“The abundance of fellowship and compassion in my club, the opportunity to be involved in projects to help the needy made me very happy. I was charmed by Rotary and my love and dedication to this great organisation became very strong.

“Every time we helped the needy, I saw tears of gratitude in the eyes of those who received our love and our care. And on those very occasions I could never hold back my emotions and silently and discreetly wiped off my own tears.

“I am sure this has not only happened to me but has also touched the sentiments of millions of Rotarians in the last 94 years.

“I chanced upon the writings by PDG Kovit Suwanasingh in the Thai Rotarian magazine published by the Rotary Centre of Thailand that read, ‘Happiness is a strange phenomenon. Even if you share it with others, happiness never diminishes. On the contrary the more happiness you give, the happier you become.’

“This must be it. This must be the true Charm of Rotary.”

PILC October Bazaar was held in great style

by Elfi

The PILC did it again! The October Holiday Bazaar ’99 at the Royal Cliff Beach Resort was another great and successful event in Pattaya’s International Ladies’ Club history.

The event started at 9:00 a.m. when Atchara Patchimnan, wife of the Governor of Chonburi, assisted by Panga Vathanakul, Managing Director of the Royal Cliff and Arlette Cykman, PILC’s director of Fundraising & Special Events and the soul of this Fair, declared the Bazaar officially open.

Khun Atchara Patchimnan cuts the ribbon to open the fair, assisted by Ms. Arlette Cykman.

Afterwards, hundreds of eager shoppers floated into the big Siam Ballroom to look for special gifts and items at the stalls of the 76 vendors who came from all corners of Thailand for this occasion to offer their goods. Beautiful home-decorations were offered by Decorum, Yes! Boutique and Vilai’s Shop, garments, Thai handicrafts by Phu Luang and Chitralada, hand made Christmas deco by Brunhilde Schultes, Russian handicrafts by Aurex Gems, Duc des Praslins chocolate by Gallothay and sold by Manneken Pis Bakery, just to mention a few. But there was also jewelry and furniture, bags, clothing, flowers, you just name it. 20 kg of genuine French cheese, flown in free of charge by Air France, was sold out within 2 hours.

Khun Panga showing interest in some handicrafts.

The flow of visitors seemed endless, not only shopping for the holiday season but also buying Millennium Raffle tickets, expecting to be amongst the lucky winners of the 50 fabulous prizes. No less than Pattaya’s own former Miss Thailand World, Cindy Burbridge, sold tickets for another draw of 70 prizes, the “Lucky dip”. All the prizes were sponsored by a long list of hotels, shops, travel offices and private people. Two door prizes were also drawn, generously donated by the Royal Cliff.

The children who accompanied their parents were not so interested in the shopping, but more in the painting competition organized for them. 6 prizes were given out for different age groups to the little winning artists.

The children truly enjoyed the painting competition.

The PILC also didn’t forget the vendors and the volunteers who really worked very hard and did a great job. 4 prizes for each group were drawn to recognize all their efforts.

Even though many tourists from Europe were amongst the shoppers, one lady did beat them all. Ms. Catherine Bond, former president of PILC, who had just left Pattaya for good one month ago to go back to her home in Texas, came back for only four days, accompanied by her sister and a friend, just to join this event.

A big thanks goes to Ms. Arlette Cykman of Yes! Boutique, the organizer of this Bazaar, who did a great job throughout the preparation and the Fair itself, as she had a heavy cold and only managed to join by getting injections first. She and PILC can be proud of the big success of this Fair, because the proceeds, including the entrance and raffle tickets, reached more than 400,000 Baht, not including the sponsorship money. All admission proceeds will be donated to local charities in and around Pattaya. Good job, ladies!

Sailing with the King

Pattaya Mail’s own Peter Cummins addressed the Rotary Club of Bangkok South at its regular Friday luncheon meeting last week at the Montien Hotel on the topic “Sailing With The King”.

Managing Director of Pattaya Mail, Pratheep Malhotra went up from Pattaya to support the young (?) fellow, who gave a most entertaining talk and transparency show which, although it focused on the ‘Golden Era’ of Pattaya when the King and members of the Royal Family were ardent sailors, included many other intimate portraits of the King and the Queen in various guises.

Peter Cummins meets Their Majesties at Klai Kangwol Palace after the day’s racing is over. Photo Royal Courtesy

Peter divided the show into four categories: The First, comprising black and white reproductions, featured the mid and late 1960s, around the then Varuna Marine Club, founded by Rotarian Walter Meyer In 1957. The King bestowed Royal Patronage on 26 April, 1965, and shortly thereafter, opened the Royal Varuna Yacht Club’s new premises at Pattaya Point.

The Second was his own, very personal experience sailing with the King off the Klai Kangwol Palace on two occasions - in June, 1985 and again in July, 1986. Peter noted that he was “most fortunate to be the only farang - the ‘farang con dio’ - on both occasions.” His camera work from the period certainly reflected this.

(L to R) Poul Weber, Peter Cummins, Rotary Club of Bangkok South President Steinar R. Paulsen and Royal Varuna Yacht Club Founder Walter Meyer at Peter Cummins presentation in Bangkok last week.

There were some delightful slides of the King, as Peter said it so well, “revelling in the freedom of the sea”.

The Third part showed the King and Queen at Klai Kangwol activities and M.C. Bhisadej’s 70th birthday celebrations in Bangkok, 20 January, 1992. It also featured a number of close-up studies of the King taken in the very informal ambience of the seaside.

Part Four was about the King and Maha Chakri Sirindhorn at the United Nations over the past decade: specifically the openings of the UN Secretariat Building in October, 1975 and the UN Conference Centre, with the then Secretary-General of the United Nations, Boutros Boutros-Ghali, in April, 1993 - auspiciously on the ninth day.

Peter also pointed out that, on His 60th Birthday, 5 December, 1987, His Majesty was awarded the Insignia of the Olympic Order by unanimous vote of the then International Olympic Committee. This was given in recognition of the King’s enormous contributions to the advancement and development of sports in the Kingdom, the Region and the world, as well as His own prowess as a gold-medal dinghy sailor.

His Majesty thus joined only eleven others who have received such distinction and He is the only reigning monarch to be so honoured.

Furthermore, the Sydney Olympic Organizing Committee has invited The King to attend the Sydney Olympiad next year.

As many of our readers are aware, Peter is preparing and writing a special supplement to be published and distributed by the “Pattaya Mail” with our King’s Birthday edition of Friday, 3 December, 1999, dedicated to His Majesty as a tribute to His 72nd Birthday on the 5th of December.

This insert into the “Mail”, in fact, is to be the fore-runner of a top-class commemorative book to be distributed early next year.

Both these publications will feature many of the images which Peter presented to Rotary Bangkok South and will also show to our Jomtien-Pattaya Rotary in the near future. A few are reproduced here and we include some of the captions from the Bangkok showing.

PEACH enters final phase

The official handover of the Pattaya Exhibition and Convention Hall (PEACH), from the construction engineers to the owners, will take place next week, with the multi million dollar facility being made ready for its first conference (AdAsia) on the 17th of next month.

The exterior of PEACH exudes space age design.

The enormity of PEACH is not quite so evident until you step inside. The auditorium on the top floor is a vast clear-span cavern with 12 metre high ceilings. This area can seat 5,800 registrants and still give everyone elbow room. To cater for all types of expositions, there are essential services piped through the floor, including water, gas, telephone, compressed air and electricity. Room dividers are hung on huge tracks in the ceiling, each bi-fold panel 9 metres high and weighing 500 kg and when not required they slide into special recesses in the walls. Carpet rolls cover the floor, with each section numbered to ensure correct placement when being laid.

The huge convention hall can comfortably seat up to 5,800 conventions goers.

The logistics in a project of this size are staggering. For example, how do you feed 5,800 people? It certainly is not a case of ducking down the road for some take-away sandwiches! Incorporated in the construction are huge kitchens, with cold room capacity stretching across the entire width of the massive building. Even such basics as toilet facilities necessitate enormous rows of porcelain pedestals. You have to think on a “grand” scale.

On the lower floors, the polished granite walkways lead through to registration stations and “break-out” rooms for smaller groups. A full business centre is incorporated in the design with all electronic media input designed into the area.

Every part of the Pattaya Exhibition and Convention Hall (PEACH) has been built to a grand scale.

The excavations of a year ago have been turned into under cover car parking for 450 vehicles. All this is included within the shell of the building itself.

The concept of PEACH has been to produce a world class all-inclusive facility. It has had the advantage of being able to incorporate the latest of cutting edge technology in the design. The end result is just phenomenal. We can be rightly proud of this new addition to the attractions being offered by Pattaya, PEACH being undoubtedly the jewel in the crown of the Royal Cliff Beach Resort.

Difficulty with Staff Motivation... It Could be a Linkage Problem!

Thought for the week

by Richard Townsend, Corporate Learning
Consultant

Expectancy Theory proposes that an individual will act in a certain way based on the expectation that the act will be followed by a given outcome and on the attractiveness of that outcome to that individual. The theory therefore focus’s on three relationships:

Effort = Performance linkage (How hard will I have to work?)
Performance = Reward linkage (What is the reward?)
Reward = Attractiveness (How attractive is the reward?)

Expectancy theory offers one of many insights into why many people are not motivated in their jobs.

Looking at proposition one, if employees do not perceive themselves as competent they may believe that no matter how much effort they exert they will not receive recognition as a top performer. In addition, most appraisal systems take account of other factors such as loyalty, initiative, courage, third party perceptions on ability to be promoted and general presentation.

Many employees see proposition two, the performance reward linkage, as being very weak. This particularly occurs when the organization completes a performance appraisal then does something stupid like give an across the board, 5% salary increase to everyone.

In the last relationship the individual’s personal judgments and personal goals come strongly into play. If you offer a promotion to someone who is looking for more intellectually challenging technical problems to solve, the reward offered will be ineffective. More money may not be attractive to someone who craves more personal time to be with his or her family.

The key message this theory offers for effective leader/managers is that it demonstrates the need for leaders to have a sound understanding of an individual’s goals and aspirations and their perceived linkage between effort and performance, performance and rewards and finally rewards and individual goal satisfaction.

The old ‘Lets have an employee of the month and hand out some recognition’ just does not work.

Worth a thought?

Riots mar Indonesian Travel Mart

by Imtiaz Muqbil,
Executive Editor,
Travel Impact Newswire

Hours after the Indonesian Tourism Minister urged participants at a Jakarta travel show to see how safe his country was, riots erupted right next to the show venue.

When Feisol Hashim, Vice Chairman of the Indonesian Tourism Promotion Board, opened the first seminar at the Tourism Indonesia Mart and Expo on 21 September, he told a gathering of global tour operators, travel agents and media, ‘’The ITPB seeks your indulgence to investigate the truth during your visit here and to other destinations. When you visit all these destinations, if there is a trouble spot, say it. If it is congested with demonstrations, say it and if it is peaceful, say it too. Don’t keep quiet. Let the product speak for itself. For the world of politics is maliciously sensational as we all know.’’

He got more than he bargained for.

Exactly two days later, on 23rd September 1999, just hours after the opening ceremony of TIME ’99, the conflict in Indonesia turned up right at the doorstep of the Jakarta Convention Centre, the show venue. In what the Asian Wall Street Journal later called the worst flare-up since November 1998, thousands of university students vented their fury against a state security bill that is said to give too much power to the military in a blossoming democracy. The centre, built to host the non-aligned summit in 1992, is located just down the road from Parliament House.

Soon enough, out came the water cannons and tear gas canisters. Some injured students were picked up and carried to safety right through the centre’s side door, forcing organisers to ask that all delegates move to another assembly hall where they could be better protected in case things got out of hand.

Travel journalists trying to reach the glass side-door through which the rally could be clearly seen were blocked by the centre’s general manager Friedrich Kurze who said he would ‘’not allow’’ them to go and have a look, purportedly for their own safety. When he left to inspect security at the back door, the journalists ignored him and went up to watch, albeit maintaining a safe distance.

A ‘’barricade’’ of tables was placed across their path, and the side-door was locked, but not before another injured student had been carried through right before their eyes. The security people eventually had to unlock the door to let in angry students who were carrying yet another of their injured friends, and banging on the door hard enough to risk smashing it down.

Clad in jeans and T-shirts, wearing bandannas to ward off the tear gas, the students harmed no-one at the convention centre. The appointment schedule, however, was disrupted, as were the shuttle buses back to the hotels. One Italian journalist who, in a characteristic show of bravado, had gone out for a closer look, came rushing back to the centre frantically trying to fan away the fumes with his hand.

Order was restored later when the students moved on but the shots and firing could be heard in the distance well into the night. Indeed, the protests continued over the next two days, casting a pall over the show.

About three hours before the rioting broke out, show organisers had persuaded Tom Mintier, the CNN correspondent, to stop by and see the tourism industry doing business in earnest. He graced the show by his presence but the story that ran on CNN that night was not about tourism.

I had to return to Bangkok the following morning (September 24) and do not know what happened at TIME the next day. Nevertheless, the damage to Indonesia’s tourism credibility was substantial. At the opening ceremony, participants had heard rousing speeches about how safe Indonesia is as a tourism in destination and how badly it needed tourism to help rebuild its economy.

In perhaps the most anti-climactic comments of the show, outgoing Tourism Minister Marzuki Usman said, “For you who come to Indonesia, you have first hand contact with our people and I hope you will convey to your friends and clients that except for some trouble spots, Indonesia is stable and safe, that the tourism product is still intact, and the people are still hospitable.’’

Just the previous day, Gerritt Slot, product group manager of Dutch tour operator Oad Reizen had said in a speech, ‘’Travellers are neither deaf nor blind. They are also intensive media consumers and will draw their own conclusions about safety in and sympathy for a destination.’’ While some problems affecting other countries are quickly replaced in the headlines, he said, ‘’The ongoing presence in the media of Indonesia for such a long period in relation to violence is eroding the positive feelings and attitudes of our mutual clients towards holidays in this beautiful country.’’

At press conference after press conference, officials had emphasised how safe Indonesia was and launched into the all-too-familiar attacks on the media. Indeed, the emphasis was on Indonesia’s titanically slow turn towards democracy and how that will be good both for the country and tourism. The tourism industry is preparing for the years of change to come. A full-scale industry restructuring is underway, led by the overhaul in the national carrier Garuda and the second designated airline, Merpati. The process of political decentralisation will yield decision-making autonomy to the country’s 20 provinces and 300 districts, giving local officials much greater say over licensing of hotels and tourism ventures.

However, the East Timor and the so-called Bali-gate problems are still simmering. In October, Parliament will convene to elect a president and vice-president. That, too, could ignite some fires. A cabinet may not be formed until November at the earliest. Meanwhile, the flames of separatism are being fanned in Aceh, Ambon and Irian Jaya. Said Toto Sudharto, General Manager, Hotel Santika Jakarta, ‘’The next three months will be hectic. The country’s reform agenda will be carried out and the ground for further recovery is expected to strengthen.’’

The tourism industry, for all its efforts at ‘’internal’’ housekeeping and positive thinking, is totally at the mercy of the ‘’external’’ thrashings of this would-be democracy. The multiple tasks of preventing the dismemberment of Indonesia, rebuilding the economy, protecting the environment, providing social safety nets, constructing infrastructure, and supplying health and education services are going to clearly prove too much for the government for years to come. That does not even begin to include repayments to the IMF or the vast amounts that are going to be lost in plain, old-fashioned corruption.

In her keynote speech at TIME, former Philippines Tourism Secretary Narzalina Lim said it took the Philippines six years to recover fully under the Cory Aquino government that replaced the dictator Ferdinand Marcos. The period 1986-92 was marked by six military coups, one major earthquake, the worst volcanic eruption in the 20th century, and the booting out of the Americans from the naval bases. “It was not a good time to be tourism secretary.’’ Nevertheless, she exhorted the Indonesians to keep their chin up and stay on the course of democracy.

Thailand’s name came up in several instances, mainly in the context of the competitive threat the country poses as it continues to gain diversionary business from Indonesia’s problems. There is much hand-wringing about how difficult and indeed expensive it will be to regain that business if and when the situation stabilises. Said Mr Dharma Tirtawisata, chief operating officer of Panorama Leisure Group, ‘’Should the traditional overseas tour operators withdraw from a Bali presence or reduce the feature pages in their brochure - which many of them did by increasing offers in Phuket - it would take them two or three years to claw their way back.’’

Several delegates also cited rising concern about deteriorating Indonesian relations with Australia, the country’s fourth largest source of visitors in 1998, as highly-charged emotions over the Australian role in the East Timor peace-keeping force leads to sabre-rattling on both sides. Officials of Garuda Indonesia said they had been affected by airport union boycotts in Melbourne and other cities but claimed that the situation had improved of late. Two Australian specialists in adventure travel who had been scheduled to speak at accompanying seminars both cancelled, one of them claiming to organisers that external pressure had been applied.

Copyright 1999 Pattaya Mail Publishing Co.Ltd.
370/7-8 Pattaya Second Road, Pattaya City, Chonburi 20260, Thailand 
Tel.66-38 411 240-1, 413 240-1, Fax:66-38 427 596; e-mail: [email protected]
Updated by Boonsiri Suansuk.