Any of this sound familiar?

The PAD taking to the streets to represent a minority but a significant minority's opposition? The government facing frequent accusations of legal manipulation to further their own ends? The name of "Thaksin" being thrown about everywhere? A young man being persecuted for something he said in English by people who really should know better and, in many cases, can't speak English? (And of course, there was no promoting from any ex military mean to do this) An unpredictable economy hitting some people hard and causing others to fear how they will manage to survive? Military generals making promises of non intervention, that seem to cause more whispers of the "c" word each time it happens?

I'm sorry to say that certain people are eyeing another opportunity to play upon uncertainty, confusion and people's need to feel "national security". I do not like Samak or PPP at all, but it gives me no pleasure to predict that we won't make it into 2009 with this government.

You couldn't make this stuff up!

This is why I love Thailand........



Democrat MPs staged a walkout during their friendly football match against government politicians Tuesday when controversial MP Karun Hosakul showed up.


Hope they remembered to take their ball with them!



Karun got loud cheers from his supporters during the match. And he showed to them an "I love you" symbol in sign language. In the locker room, he also challenged the opposition to begin its impeachment proceedings against him, according to a Democrat.



Before riding home on his bicycle for tea.


(As explained in the article, Karun - who has a history of dubious behaviour - aimed a kick at a Democrat MP inside Parliament building a few weeks back.) Rumour has it some Dems were waiting by the Parliament gates to get Karun at home time, but their plot was foiled when his mum picked him up by car.

Training with the Thai Tourist Police

With a Police Lieutenant Colonel

So, six months after handing in my application to join the Thai Tourist Police Volunteers, I finally received my invitation to a training seminar.

What should I expect? Well the initial application stage was fairly impressive. The staff checked my background with the embassy and the Immigration department. I know this because my interviewer said: "Oh you work at [name of my employer] my uncle is a director there". That seemed to go down well. Heck, I wasn't even recruited yet and already the nepotism was kicking in!

So with a 5am alarm call, I set off to Sukhumvit soi 5, wondering what I would learn from the boys in brown. The hotel venue itself was very decent, if nothing special. I was ushered into a large conference hall and presented with an information pack. Amongst leaflets and tourists guides there was a booklet that explained how to make a police report. The information itself was solid, but the translation was poor. I wondered how the Tourist Police could produce something like this, but I was about to discover things would get worse before they got better.



The event kicked off with a senior sergeant welcoming everybody and declaring the training session open. Suddenly some music began to blast and we all had to stand up and salute. The expression of the commander in front of me stopped me from smiling.

We then began a lecture on the role of tourism in Thailand. There was just one problem - it was all in Thai. There were about one hundred volunteers at the seminar. Less than ten of us were farang, the others were Burmese, Japanese or Chinese. Very few could understand what was being said.

Suddenly, a strikingly attractive young woman stood up and said something to a commander at the front. She then walked to the stage and was introduced as both "Miss Chicago" and "Miss Songkran", who would translate for us. And so she did, though I think some of the volunteers were a little distracted from the topic at hand.

After a coffee break, the next lecture was on "national security" and was presented by a lady called Porpharas. Khun Pornpharas was obviously a highly educated lady from an upper class family. Her speech was intelligent and articulate but the topics she addressed covered issues such as economics and the politics of immigration. For me it was interesting, but the body language of those around me told me they knew this was not exactly relevant for police volunteers.


After lunch we had a new officer and a new topic. We were treated to a slideshow of foreign criminals believed to be located in Thailand. It was interesting stuff and I was ready to blast Bob Marley's "Bad Boys" track on my iPod and hunt these guys down, but sadly our beauty queen had gone home and the talk was only in Thai. It was becoming clear now, the senior command in the Thai Tourist Police may be great people and great policemen, but they couldn't speak English.

Still, the overall feel of day one was good. This was largely down to a man call Senior Segeant Major Peter, who was almost a one man police force by himself. Throughout the day he had exchanged jokes, wise cracks, banter and pranks with both his fellow Thais and the volunteers. He had broken down the culture barrier and explained why Thailand needed foreign volunteers and how grateful the police were.

With "Peter"

Day two began on an interesting note as I was attacked while eating a sandwich at 'Subway' on Sukhumvit by a drunken prostitute who was upset that I wouldn't hand her my sandwich. Sadly, I had not yet received any training that would actually help me deal with the situation. Would today be different?

Luckily, the answer was yes. Our first lecture was in English and "Peter" explained to us the different codes that could be used on a police radio. He also threw in a few very helpful names and contact numbers that we could use when dealing with police in general.

The next talk was an exercise in incident reporting. This introduced me to Pierre, the TTP translator who explained how the reporting system should work.

After being given some more training booklets, it was time for the "awards" ceremony and some general mingling. I managed to talk with a few senior officers who seemed genuinely friendly, grateful and good natured. I also spoke with a long serving English volunteer who explained how I could receive further training and move "up the ladder" (yes, the volunteers also have a ranking system) starting with the Lions Club convention in Bangkok next month.

So after a few snapshots, receipt of my uniform and a few goodbyes, it was over.

The "awards" ceremony

The training was interesting. I got to meet some new people from around the world and make some friends in the Thai police. I do feel ready to start, but that is more down to my chance encounter with the long serving Englishman than any of the training I received.

But that seems to be Thailand through and through. There is far more focus on friendliness and welcomes than there is on actual skills training. That might suffice in most professions, but when you doing a job such as police support, you would want something a bit more efficient.

It also worried me that there was literally zero physical based training in the entire seminar. Other than a few questions on the application form about health, physical details and martial arts training, there was no defence involved at all.

However, it was clear that all applicants were carefully screened for their own backgrounds and paperwork. This was applied to everybody which I thought was good, though it was clear the Burmese contingent were being given the closest attention.

Still, I learned something, met some new people, made some friends and in time I will be able to do a lot to help visitors to Thailand. It was time well spent.

The flag

From The Nation:

Foreign Minister Noppadon Pattama said Tuesday he would contact Manchester City Football Club to investigate how a Thai national flag bearing the name "Thaksin" was displayed at the club's stadium.

I'm no fan of Thaksin (maybe you heard?) but this should not be made into something it is not. It's a long standing football tradition for fans to put up flags as banners. Often that will be an English flag (the cross of Saint George) or a Union Jack or the national flag of the player or hero in question.

Fans like to express their allegiances. At England games, the fan flags will often have the name of the fan's local team written across the middle. This is particularly popular with supporters of smaller teams.

Otherwise the name of the team's star player will be written across the flag. Sometime fans go further with their merchandise. For example, during the nineties when Uwe Rosler was a star striker at Manchester City, City fans had T-shirts bearing the slogan "Uwe's grandparents bombed Old Trafford".

The three banded Thai flag (nation, religion, King) would certainly not be disrespected by City fans and surely expatriate Thais would be well aware of the consequences of such an action. It pains me to say it, but I think Noppadon is correct in saying this is the actions of westerners who simply did not realise there was a big cultural issue at stake.

Rape and responsibility

It's nearly midnight and I was preparing to go to bed and contemplate life in League One for Southampton FC, when The Nation's article about three boys aged "between" (from?) eight to twelve years old raping an eight year old girl jumped out at me.

It goes without saying that this news is utterly tragic. After reading it, I couldn't help but recall recent discussions about responsibility that have taken place on TN's blog site. Certainly, this article raises huge, huge questions of responsibility.

What do the parents of the three boys have to say for themselves? Did they know where their boys were? Did they know the company they were keeping?

Did the owners of the Internet cafe see the older boys watching pornography? Did they see the younger boys watching too? If - as I suspect they will tell the police - they didn't see it , then are they the worst business owners in the world?

Were the boys doing this when they should have been at school? Did the school make any effort to trace them?

At such a difficult and tragic time it would be totally unfair to ask prejudiced parents of the parents. Still, I think it will be important for the police to ascertain how it came to be that three boys had the opportunity to lure this girl away without anyone noticing.

Where did the boys learn to behave like this? They may have seen a video, and I am far from naive, but still I find it hard to believe that an eight year old boy who has been well parented would think it was OK to do this, or even to fail to realise it was downright wrong.


Let's not be lazy and simply say that people don't take responsibility. Let's look a bit deeper and ask ourselves: where does responsibility start? Who should take responsibility in this case and how much? What can we do to prevent things like this happening again? Is it more likely to happen in Thailand than other countries? If so, why? What can we do to change that?

A young girl has been mentally scarred for life. I hope that the authorities won't treat this as just another case.

Nepotism

I'm at a loss for words for this one, so I will simply let the reports speak for themselves.

Bangkok Post:

Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej said on Tuesday he has signed permission for Duang Yubamrung to return to the army, less than seven years after he was cashiered over accusations he was involved in the night club murder of a policeman.

"I do not know which office he will return to, but I already signed the approval," Mr Samak told reporters Tuesday. "It is effective now."

Duang, formerly known as Duangchalerm, is the son of Interior Minister Chalerm Yubamrung. He was dismissed from the army in October, 2001, after the murder of a policeman inside a Ratchadaphisek night club.

He was removed from his post and stripped of his rank after he failed to report for work within 15 days.

He fled to Malaysia to avoid murder charges. After almost a year on the run, he surrendered for trial. He was acquitted of the murder charge by the Criminal Court.

After his acquital, police did not seek another suspect, and there have been no other arrests. Several witnesses who testified said they had received threatening telephone calls to warn them not to tell what they had seen, and no direct testimony ever was admitted.

"He was a soldier. Now his (criminal) case is over so there is no problem for him to return to the army," Mr Samak said.

Duang's brother Wan, previously known as Wanchalerm, also got permission from Mr Samak to take a posotion in the new government, where his father is a minister. Public Health Minister Chaiya Saosomsab promoted him to be Mr Happy Toilet, to teach Bangkokians how to use the loo.

Together, during the 1990s, the Yubamrung brothers were well known to, and openly reviled by Bangkok society for a series of violent confrontations in night clubs. Cases brought to trial always wound up with lack of witnesses.

And from The Nation:

Supatra Rodwimut, wife of murdered Sergeant Suwichai Rodwimut, said she was shocked. "I have no words to describe how I feel. I'm just an ordinary woman. I have no power to fight. I hope one day the sin he committed will catch up with him."

Supreme Commander General Boonsrang Niampradit declined to comment, saying he has yet to be informed.

There is more about the history of the saga here (H/T Bangkok Pundit).

Lese majeste

Before any movie in any Thai cinema, the national anthem is played and people stand up.

I remember reading about a case last year when a Thai man and his friend did not stand up for the national anthem. In the past they had had popcorn thrown at them and received abuse. While this time he man was actually physically attacked. He quite rightly threatened legal action.

Can you guess what his assailant threatened to do? You guessed it, lese majeste. And that's exactly what happened.

Chotisak Oonsoong received formal charges today. Please read more about the case here and - if you wish - sign the petition here.