HEADLINES [click on headline to view story]:

Midnight closing? Don’t you believe it

Roundabouts aren’t to blame

Will someone please do something about the market?

Soi 1 gutters need help

Changing travel habits

Many degrees of how to tell the truth

Whose baht turned Thailand into an international tourist destination?

Closing times creating a lot of un-necessary hassles

Midnight closing? Don’t you believe it

Editor;
I am sorry to take all of the air out of your big news story about the threatened midnight closings of bars in Pattaya, but let’s be serious: We are in Thailand, where no law is enforced unless face or profit is benefited.

We Westerners cringe at the thought that this law ... an official dictum ... a punishable offense ... a carved-in-stone proclamation ... is being enacted. That’s because we are Westerners: We believe in laws and accept their sovereignty over us. Thai people don’t have the burden of such belief. To them, a law is like a campaign promise, a New Year’s resolution. It is a convenience or an inconvenience that those who enforce the laws can accept or reject as conditions warrant.

As blind as we like to think the Thai government may be for creating this law, we are mistaken. This “law” is as toothless as every other law, be it of traffic, immigration, littering, prostitution, graft or pollution, be it from Thai Rak Thai or the local wat. Legal and illegal are not determined by written law in this country, but by economics and face.

This law, that is economically damaging and detrimental to Pattaya’s reputation as “the funnest city”, will NOT be enforced. All the evidence you need for this is a walk down Walking Street at 4:00 a.m. The current 2:00 closing time is already being totally ignored by police, patrons and proprietors alike because it is a stupid, damaging law that embarrasses Pattaya’s raison d’etre. Do you really think that a stupider, more damaging law will be more readily embraced by anyone?

Nobody, most of all the Thais, are going to allow something as flimsy as a law come between them and their profit margin ... and that doesn’t just refer to bar owners, but to the entire population of Pattaya to whom the bounty of the nightlife flows.

Remember it: In Thailand, passing a law, enforcing a law, and submitting to the law are all vastly different things that have absolutely no relationship to one another.
Gillian in Pattaya

Roundabouts aren’t to blame

Editor;
Khai Khem’s commentary in Vol XII No7, was quite interesting. I agree with many points, but he seems to feel that the “old British-style roundabouts” are in some way to blame for traffic congestion. I would suggest he look to the USA where in Florida, in some of the more congested beach areas they are removing traffic lights and installing ... yep, “old British-style roundabouts”.

It seems that several studies have shown that traffic gets less congested when using roundabouts than intersections with traffic lights. So could it be that the problem is not with the roundabouts, but rather with the people who do not respect basic traffic laws and the highway code?
Regards,
Freddie Clark

Will someone please do something about the market?

Editor;
Over the years many people have in many places, including city hall and the Pattaya TV station, complained about the situation at the market in Nern Plub Wan Road next to the railway tracks as far as dirt, noise, smell, congestion of the street, sale of things illegal etc. are concerned.

I’ve heard that about 3 or 4 years ago, after the complaints reached a high level person, the mayor one fine day came to distribute aprons. I was told that never ever did somebody from the Pattaya Health Dept. come to have a look around. It seems obvious that one of the so-called influential figures is running this market. I think it’s high time someone at city hall had another look at this object (and it’s background).

The road mentioned has many problems. Problems of a criminal nature. Much of this stems from the situation at the market which attracts the undesirables by the nature of it. This is my personal concern as my house was broken into twice in the last 2 years - and I blame it on the market and some of the scum found there.

I’ve stayed in Thailand now on and off for 12 years and since the beginning at the above mentioned road, when at this time it was known as Soi Formosa by everyone (and when one could walk down the street at 2 o’clock in the morning with a 10 baht gold chain around his neck without fear).

I hope that our beloved mayor will do something about the problem or pass it on to his successor.
Fred

Soi 1 gutters need help

Dear Editor;
In the past few weeks you’ve published several letters about various problems with gutters. Well here’s another. Several years ago, Pattaya city resurfaced all the sois leading to Beach Road. At the same time, they installed storm drains and gutters along the sides of each soi.

The project started with a big mistake. On Soi 1, the gutters and the drains were not matched up. Some sharp-eyed city employee must have noticed this mismatch, because all the rest of the sois were done properly.

Now, several years later, we are still waiting for a correction to the mismatch problem on Soi 1. It is a problem because every time it rains, the drain section acts like a dam for the gutter section and water remains in the gutters for several days. Mosquitoes must love it, but no one else does.

Also, with the gutters close to the walls it makes it difficult to walk to the outside when there is traffic. If someone at city hall reads this perhaps they could have a look and come up with a solution.

Please sign me,
“All for positive change”

Changing travel habits

Editor;
Much has been said about the changing of the entertainment closing times in the Land of Smiles. The change is really in internal decision for the Thai people and I can respect that.

I for one have my concerns, but would never say if the change is permanent, I would not go to the LOS, as I still have my friends, and people who have become my family there.

I may not be Thai, but I feel my heart is.

My only change would be instead of the 8 weeks I normally spend in the LOS, I would spend maybe 2 weeks to visit everyone and the other 6 weeks would be to visit surrounding Asian countries. I love Thailand, but my vacation time is for me to unwind and have fun and I feel that can be better achieved in other Asian countries.

F. Augustine,
USA

Many degrees of how to tell the truth

Editor;
I have lived in Thailand for 1 year now, having travelled to many different countries before deciding to settle here in this wondrous land!

Blurb on Thailand: “Known as Siam until 1949 the Southeast Asian kingdom of Thailand is one of the world’s most fascinating countries. With an eight hundred-year history as a nation it is one of the few countries in the Far East never to have been colonised. It has a distinctive language, culture and cuisine, and can truly be described as the land of sunshine and smiles.” All true!

Thai language, culture and cuisine all seem straightforward compared to the Thai minds, and I was having a hard time trying to comprehend the latter!

Then a friend gave me a cop of Time magazine, in it was a quote which enabled me to put the pieces of the jigsaw together!

“There are many degrees of how to tell the truth. That is why we don’t speak straightforwardly, because we read minds and we speak what the other side wants to hear.” Jakrapobo Penkair, spokesman for the government of Thailand responding to accusations the government had covered up the country’s avian-flu crisis.

So now I know, what a relief!
Richard Walton

Whose baht turned Thailand into an international tourist destination?

Dear Editor,
In reply to the letter from ‘Derek’ last week, I would like to point out that he is one of the very small minority in favour of these Draconian laws being introduced by Thaksin.

I, for one, do not wish to have my evening meal at 3.00 p.m. so that I can then enjoy a relaxing few hours having a drink with friends. Most normal farangs tend to have their evening meal a few hours later, and in all other countries worldwide there is the opportunity to wind down in a drinking establishment without being told to go to bed at midnight.

I have been to Pattaya over 20 times, and find that most holidaymakers wish to have the facility of a drink after midnight, even if they do not take advantage of it.

With regards to your pathetic labelling of all other farangs as the ‘Sad Brigade’, I ask you two questions.

1 - Whose billions of baht has helped get Thailand in the position it is within the tourist industry? Your 45 baht bottle of Singha at 8.00 p.m. before retiring to bed, or the tens of thousands of baht spent by most holidaymakers, whilst enjoying the vibrant social scene on offer in Pattaya and the rest of Thailand?

2 - What attracted you to Thailand in the first place? Because I am sure that when you first visited the Land of Smiles, like myself, it was a booming 24 hour city which is why, up to now, it has been so popular with people from all over the globe.

Sleep tight,
Duncan.
Liverpool U.K.

Closing times creating a lot of un-necessary hassles

Editor:
I read with interest and a heavy heart the tourism leaders “Acknowledge that there MIGHT be some negative repercussions from the new early closing rules.”

I kow when farangs land here they leave their brains behind at the airport, seems the same maxim could apply here to every apparently sane person when they get into any sort of official or semi-official position.

The rest of the world is relaxing opening hours, to the point of being non-existent in some countries.

It couldn’t be that it’s a ploy to increase, “Police take home money” without it costing the government any extra money, could it? No, no, no, no...

The proposed “curfew on the under 18” unless accompanied by a parent smacks of Big Brother, as do many other petty regulations made by petty minded officials.

This is a truly wonderful country, the culture, the food, the religious beliefs, the weather, truly the land of sunshine and smiles.

I, as a farang, have no right to criticise anything here, if I was not happy I could leave. I could live anywhere in the world, but why would I want to do that when here is so great!

But there are a lot of dafties around who are creating a lot of un-necessary hassles for farangs and Thais alike!

Could they collectively be given some sort of “Be sensible injection”?

Come to that, we could all benefit from one, but please don’t make it too expensive! Can I volunteer to be the first recipient, don’t mind if it’s in the experimental stages, I think I need a double dose!
Richard Walton

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