Hey Chris...
Ever hear this little ditty?

And here's to you, Mrs. Robinson
Jesus loves you more than you will know (Wo, wo, wo)
God bless you please, Mrs. Robinson
Heaven holds a place for those who pray
(Hey, hey, hey...hey, hey, hey)

We'd like to know a little bit about you for our files
We'd like to help you learn to help yourself
Look around you, all you see are sympathetic eyes
Stroll the Lock Keeper's Inn until you feel at home

And here's to you, Mrs. Robinson
Jesus loves you more than you will know (Wo, wo, wo)
God bless you please, Mrs. Robinson
Heaven holds a place for those who pray
(Hey, hey, hey...hey, hey, hey)

Hide the money in a hiding place where no one ever goes
Put it in your pantry with your cupcakes
It's a little secret, just the Robinsons' affair
Most of all, you've got to hide it from Peter

Coo, coo, ca-choo, Mrs Robinson
Jesus loves you more than you will know (Wo, wo, wo)
God bless you please, Mrs. Robinson
Heaven holds a place for those who pray
(Hey, hey, hey...hey, hey, hey)

Sitting on a sofa on a Sunday afternoon
Going to the Sinn Féin debate
Laugh about it, shout about it
When you've got to choose
Ev'ry way you look at it, you lose

Where have you gone, Kirk McCambley
A nation turns its lonely eyes to you (Woo, woo, woo)
What's that you say, Mrs. Robinson
Kickin' Kirk has left and gone away
(Hey, hey, hey...hey, hey, hey)

via -Jeeem-
heh, heh...

Mam and I arrived at school yesterday and noticed a large group of adults gathering around the front gate to the primary building. Mam was with me since we had to go to the main office and tell them I was leaving for my 90-day immigration check in Hat Yai that morning.

After having chatted with a couple people in the park across from the school, Mam asked me, “Do you know why all these parents are here?”

“No, I don’t. Why?”

“They want their children to go to Patong School. If they are late today, they will not be able to sign their children up for the school.”

“Ah…wow! There sure are a lot of them!”

And there were…hundreds actually.

Within just a few minutes the park across the street from the school was filled with people, most of them pressing forward and crossing the street, blocking traffic, and heading towards the front gate of the primary building.

When Mam and I approached the front gate, one of the guards had to physically push the people back to let us into the school. Thai’s were everywhere, surrounding me and giving me incredulous looks, since I was not wearing my school badge around my neck.

When Mam and I finished our business at the main office and left the school, we waded through the massive throng outside the gate and drove over to route four to park our motorcycle at the store where Mam's friend, the proprietor, lives. Then we crossed the street to hitch a ride on a Songtheaw to Hat Yai.

Route four runs from Northern Malaysia straight into Hat Yai, the largest city in Songkhla province.

Once Mam and I were on the Songtheaw and settled, I easily drifted into deep thought about yet another generation of Thai kids getting ready to perpetuate the dull, lifeless future that exists for so many in Thailand.

These new students will face Thai teachers who are so burned out by excessive paperwork and long hours including weekend work and overtime that isn’t paid, that they quite literally fall asleep in their (or my) classroom if they’re not actively teaching.

If not standing outside their classroom gabbing on their ever-present cell phones, these teachers only exist to repeatedly regurgitate material out of a textbook, often in a boring monotone, or write long Thai sentences on the black board for the students to copy into their notebooks. Very little, if any, attention is paid to teaching proper hygiene, etiquette, manners, the dangers of alcohol and drugs, sex education, or simply how to respect your elders.

School material in our primary building is terribly outdated, useless garbage belched out at the children day after day, month after boring month, year after year. Nothing much has changed in the paltry six years I’ve been teaching at Patong; except it’s obvious to me things are actually getting worse.

Voranai Vanijaka is a well known and highly respected journalist for the Bangkok Post. He writes a column in the Sunday Forum section, which is controversial to say the least since he’s Thai and often writes damaging articles regarding Thailand’s substandard educational system. Something you don’t see very often, as Thai’s rarely vilify their own way of doing things.

I’ve been reading the Bangkok Post voraciously for at least six years now, and Voranai's articles are among my favorite since he speaks the truth about the Ministry of Education and the Teacher’s Council of Thailand.

One of Mr. Vanijaka's past articles dealt with the very subject I was just mentioning, regarding Thai teaching methods. He has shed light on the glaring fact that Thai teachers are often…too often…lazy, over-worked, and under-educated. They often pay more attention to a student’s uniform and hair length, than to more important things like…well, education.

Mr. Vanijaka has simply reinforced the things I already knew about, but never opened my mouth about until now.

I’d like to begin this piece with Thai boys and wrap up with comparison to Thai girls.

“Snips and snails and puppy dog tails…”

What little boys are made of dates all the way back to the 19^th century. Nothing much has changed since then either. Most Thai boys are naughty little explorers with short attention spans for the mundane and all the attention in the world for the sublime (such as online video games). Thai boys in particular are a lazy bunch, with dwindling respect for their teachers and elders. They go from fairly innocent little twerps, to astonishingly rude, pseudo-know-it-all's in the short span of just a couple of years. They hold anyone and everyone in contempt who dares challenge their self-delusion of authority.

Thai boys have very little sense of responsibility, which can be measured in the classroom by forever forgetting their notebooks or not even bothering to bring them to class, not bothering to complete their homework, lack of attention, full-blown disrespect for the teacher who is trying desperately to teach a class, extremely poor grades, and the list goes on…

Any foreigner who has lived in Thailand for a while and has taught English, will tell you that Thai male offspring are routinely elevated to an extremely high level of importance in the Thai family structure. Many of them know they can get away with murder, and often do just that.

To fully understand this male dominance is to take a peek at the fathers.

This is not a cookie-cutter type situation. Some Thai men or fathers are different than my example. However, it is my opinion, for what it's worth, that the lot of them, the majority if you will, easily fit into this description.

Arise early in the morning in Southern Thailand and look around you. You’ll see Thai men slowly coming out of the woodwork, a good majority of them terribly hung-over from the day and / or night before.

They speed along the Soi’s and back roads on their ill-maintained motorcycles, blue smoke belching out from the exhaust, one hand on the throttle, and the other holding their birdcage.

Yes, I said BIRDCAGE.

These cages range from plain to elaborate. The most elaborate are fashioned from carefully tooled bamboo or iron, into highly fanciful works of art, practically all of them housing the red-bearded bulbul.

The Red Bearded Bulbul or Red Whiskered Bulbul is the favorite among Thai men because of its song. It’s not so much that Thai men are naturalists who appreciate wildlife, it’s all about opportunity. These opportunists are setting out to make money in songbird competitions. They are all traveling with their birds to some large communal area where other Thai men gather to sip (or guzzle) Thai whiskey as early as six o’clock in the morning, and discuss their bird’s abilities.

As you travel around a neighborhood, you’ll see what you would normally regard as pipe’s set up as a convoluted clothesline, but they are not used for drying clothes as much as they are used to hang birdcages in full view of gathering crowds of men.

A lot of talking goes on before the actual event begins. This discussion is most likely about odds and money, a complicated procedure I don’t fully understand. But, it’s interesting to watch.

Suddenly the bird owners will stand up and begin going through varied contortions, making kissing noises, waving their arms, and taunting their bird or bird's to sing. Many theories abound, regarding techniques that work, succeeding in a bird that breaks out in beautiful money song.

Ultimately a winner is decided upon and currency quickly changes hands, almost imperceptibly, causing me to get the drift this activity may be somewhat illicit.

Come mid-morning the birds are put away and out come the fishing poles and nets.

I’d like to point out that these waterborne activities are all easily accomplished while drinking Thai whiskey and the sheer amounts of this favorite beverage of Thai men country-wide, which are consumed in a day, are absolutely astounding.

Thai men gather at a river bank, stream, pond, or lake, and cast their nets or lines out into the water.

Fresh water shrimp and a wide variety of fish are either brought home for dinner, or sold at the markets for cash. The cash, in turn, is often used to purchase another bottle or two of Thai whiskey.

Other Thai men either not equipped for fishing or not interested in standing around in the blistering sun for a day, wander about in their run-down trucks, or on their motorcycles equipped with sidecars, scrabbling through trash bins for recyclable materials such as plastic, cardboard, steel or glass. These items are collected throughout the day and turned in at the local recycling center on the main road, for cash.

The more industrious Thai men will set out looking for small jobs. Construction, painting, gardening, anything they can manage to find, often attained in conversation during their bird competitions or while fishing.

These men are dark skinned, sinewy fellows who work hard, holding off the booze until they are off the clock, then drinking a good majority of their profits away. All this while their children show up at school in old, ill-fitting, tattered uniforms or hand-me-downs since Daddy can’t afford a new uniform or shoes for them as it would interfere too much with his drinking money.

Many a student of mine has come into my class with their head lowered, trying to hide their blackened eyes or bruised face after surviving a night when their father went "Bah," (Thai for 'Crazy')... blind drunk on Thai whiskey and Chang seltzer water, and looking for a punching bag.

Sometimes the same scenario above includes not only Thai whiskey, but also "Ya-Bah," (The name is understandable) a dangerous Thai amphetamine drug that is widely produced and abused and which many Thai men end up going to prison for possession or use thereof.

There is more to this sordid story, but that should suffice for now.

Young Thai boys are conditioned early in life to follow in their father’s footsteps, or to follow the example of some other father-figure in their life (Por bun tam) since their birth father left the scene when they were but flailing fetuses, or shortly after their birth. Another example of the irresponsible traits of Thai men, in a third-world country that does not, by any stretch of the imagination, hold a Thai father accountable when they abandon their wife and children.

Young Thai girls, in contrast, are almost exactly the opposite.

"Sugar and spice and everything nice…"

The majority of Thai girls are good students who remember to bring their notebooks to class, study hard, pay attention in class, and get good grades. Very, very few are naughty, and those that are naughty are typically tom-boys.

When not in school, it’s not so much that they are responsible (they’re kids for crissake!) as they don’t really have a choice.

While their brothers laze around or are out in the street playing takraw or football (soccer), gathering up frogs, playing in mud, swimming, or generally trying hard to get into some sort of trouble, the girls are busy…very, very busy.

Busy doing the laundry, washing the dishes, taking care of the babies in the family, heading out to the market to purchase vegetables and sundries, cleaning the house, folding, pressing, ironing, toiling, and after all that, they settle down to do their homework. For some young girls in the household, there is scant time or opportunity for play.

Asian culture leans towards its male offspring, some women actually feeling disgust if they give birth to a girl rather than a boy.

While girls are wonderful students, they too fall prey to the substandard educational system in Thailand. If they graduate, (many drop out in order to ‘help’ the family, and never finish high school or attend college), they are vomited out into society to work, usually for peanuts. Even if they do end up attending and finally graduating from college, their salaries are never equal to their male counterparts.

So, this perpetuating situation rolls along like a giant boulder, gathering up the young kids as it rolls along...Smashing their lives, and flattening out their existence. These youngsters end up living lives exactly, if not worse, like their parents lived before them, struggling to hammer out an existence in a society that is operating in a vacuum.

The boys turn into men, who turn to Thai whiskey, gambling and illegal activity, squandering their family’s assets and living on the same old Soi where their father’s lived, carrying on the family condition. A very sad situation indeed, and one that I've witnessed now for well over six years.

I welcome your comments and thoughts on this subject.

-Jeeem-

HEADS UP!

I've included an update on TEDDY the TOILET TOAD.

Find it in the right-hand column!

-Jeeem-

I've included a new blog link entitled "Weird Plants of Thailand."

Check it out in the right column under the "Amazing Thailand" heading!

-Jeeem-

Merry Christmas

Bob
Diane
Jacques
Mike
Bruce
Jeri
Eric
Jenni
Annie
Simone
Chris

May the holiday season bring joy to all of you!


You better watch out,
You better not cry,
You better not pout,
I'm tellin' you why,
Santa Claus is tapping,
Your phone.

He's bugging your room,
He's reading your mail,
He's keeping a file,
And running a tail,
Santa Claus is tapping,
Your phone.

He hears you in the bedroom,
Surveills you out of doors,
And if that doesn't get the goods,
Then he'll use provocateurs.
So you mustn't assume,
That you are secure,
On Christmas Eve,
He'll kick in your door,
Santa Claus is tapping,
Your phone

-Jeeem-

Well, well, well....

Very, very interesting to read all the comments online and hear all the buzz about the newest Tiger trash.

If you've been here on the site and read my previous posting about over-paid sport's stars, endorsements included, then you may have noticed that my posting was well before any of this news about Tiger Woods and his beautiful wife Elin surfaced.

How appropriate to see the story unfolding so soon after my last post.

Personally, I've never cared for this guy, simply because of what I call his "attitude" both on and off the course. Having read many of his comments online captured by astute journalists, he often came across as a patronizing know-it-all to me.

But, what I think we forget some times, especially when the subject is a major celebrity or sport's star, is they are simply human like the rest of us.

"Let those who have never sinned cast the first stone.." or something to that effect, I remember from my younger days when my family tried cramming religion down my throat. But hey, that little saying is true. Nobody can effectively argue with that statement.

Another is, "Walk a mile in a man's shoes before you judge him..." yet another that makes me stop and think.

Wood's problem is he is a golf superstar.

He's a handsome racial minority who rose through adversity and became a self-made man.

Beautiful wife, darling kids, perfect teeth, dresses well, toned muscles, tendency for privacy that many could easily understand...what a smoke screen huh? Oh well, not in my book to criticize the guy who's done nothing more than many of us have done, myself included.

I've always said that sports, as an entertainment entity, pays it's participants too much. Bring those salaries (and endorsements) down to earth, funnel the money into much more needed areas like the homeless, cancer research, AIDS and STD prevention, and most likely you'll see less bong hitting, pit bull fighting, and other vices that come with astronomical salaries...but you probably won't see a reduction in spousal fidelity because that's as old as the worlds oldest profession....

Very sad that a guy like him could have come so far, and just about have it all, and trash it like he did.

Privacy? As a super star? Come on, tiger cub...get real!

-Jeeem-

It’s about time I post this…almost a month late.

I took the video posted above, with my Canon digital IXUS 950 IS the early morning of our flood.

The events leading up to all this began with a freak accident in center Thung Lung, around 4 or 5:00 late Thursday afternoon, where a huge, ancient Tamarind tree suddenly succumbed to high winds and driving rain, falling into the street at our small traffic circle.

A very unfortunate young man from Surat Thani province (สุราษฎร์ธานี), who was working and training as a novice teacher at nearby Patongpatankiriwat School, was killed immediately when he was unlucky enough to be at the wrong place at the right time, driving by on his motorcycle when the huge Tamarind tree fell on him.

This sort of news put Thung Lung on the radar screen with the local media, and it was a surprise to Mam and I both to hear Thung Lung mentioned on the 5:00 news.

It took local city workers over two hours to free his body and transfer him to Mor Orr hospital.

The tree, well over a hundred years old according to a resident living on the circle, took several power lines and poles with it when it fell, sending parts of Ban Thung Lung and surrounding villages into a brown out. It also knocked out our ADSL Internet connection.

As the day progressed into early evening, the rains only increased in intensity and we began to hear about local flooding in the nearby villages of Ban Phrue, Phang La, Tha Pho, Thung Mo, and Khlong Hoi Khong.

“It’s coming! I yelled to Mam.”

It’s early Friday morning, November 6, 2009 in Southern Thailand. Late Thursday evening in most areas of the U.S…

It’s been raining consistently every afternoon, between three and four o’clock, for the last week or two.

Beginning Wednesday the rains increased. Very heavy rains in the afternoon and continuing into the night, with almost continuous rain Thursday, beginning in the morning and continuing on into the night and early morning with only short periods of reprieve.

The meteorologists are calling it the "Northeast monsoon."

Why the Northeast, when it’s stuck over Southern Thailand, I’ll never know…never understood or trusted weather forecasters anyway.

The Tong River in our small village was engorged Thursday morning, coming to within six inches or so of the bridge on our main road...

(See pictures of last years flooding by clicking on “THE FLOOD” in the right margin). Even after all-day rains, the bridge remained clear, but with the water wavering just below the lip of the bridge.

I knew a flood was imminent, as I was sure the rains would continue on through the night, but by “Flood,” I meant the bridge would soon be covered with water and impassable as the pictures on my blog link “THE FLOOD” will show.

Mam and I have lived here in Ban Klong Tong Nûea for the past four years and have always been high and dry…until today.

Shortly after falling asleep last night I was awakened by a violent thunderstorm and heavy rains pounding our corrugated metal roof. The sound was deafening. I turned to Mam and said to her, “We’re definitely not going to have school tomorrow because Thung Lung (The village where my school is located) will be flooded.

“Ung..Um,” was all I got before she drifted off again.

Around three in the morning I awoke once again and heard people out on the road talking. Shaking off the sleepiness, I got up to have a look, as people outside talking at three in the morning was a sure sign people were rousing due to rising flood waters.

I wasn’t quite prepared for what I saw when I peeked out our bedroom window though.

First I noticed a large puddle on the path to our house, but other than that I couldn’t see much else around our house.

Flashlights ('Torches to you Chris, I suppose') and headlights were busily interrupting the blackness of the early morning, as across the street from us some of the locals were moving their vehicles and motorcycles to higher ground.

Curious, I went into our adjoining upstairs room where the computer desk is located and glanced out the window looking out on our side yard (The side closest to the Tong River) and all I saw was water.

“Uh oh!” I uttered, rousing Mam from her slumber.

“What? What’s wrong Jeeem?” (Nothing like an Uh oh! to immediately rouse Mam from her sleep, she's a mother you know...).

“Remember when I said I wished we’d have a flood? Well, I got my wish, only it’s a little worse than what I wished for!”

"Uowweee! Mai yak chuah!" (Uowweee! I can't believe it!).

Within minutes we were roaming around the house, wading through ankle deep water downstairs as the flood waters bubbled up through cracks and holes in our concrete floor.

Mam and I had been in a flood before, while living on Soi three in Thung Lung village, so we pretty much knew what to do.

Both of us still groggy with sleep, we quickly got busy carrying things upstairs and setting things up higher so they wouldn’t get damaged by the water. It really sucks doing something like that at three in the morning, but hey, you do what ya gotta do, you know?

Within an hour, we were comfortably nestled upstairs, dry and cozy, Mam watching the flood waters rise from our upstairs vantage point, while I prepared myself another coffee from our mini-kitchen setup Mam had fashioned into a corner of our bedroom.

Mam has this uncanny ability to make any situation comfortable, and this was no exception. She had quickly set up all our downstairs facilities, upstairs...and in a relatively small space, had made things really cozy and neat. That's only one of the many things I love about her.

Thank goodness we still had electricity.

The old Shaman woman across the street told Mam she hadn’t seen a flood this bad in the village for at least twenty years. Then, I suddenly pointed out to Mam that the water in our fore yard was flowing towards the Tong River and not away from it.

When Mam mentioned that to the old woman, she was told the flood waters were coming from the mountain to our south, and not so much from our local Tong river.

As I write this, (I wrote most of this as the actual flood was happening...much to the consternation of my wife) the flood waters are beginning to recede just a bit, most likely due to somebody opening a dam in Hat Yai, because the rains, if anything, have not stopped, and are actually increasing.

Once the T.V. channels woke up, Mam and I learned we were wicked lucky, as other villages were totally inundated. Thung Lung was paralyzed. Phone lines were down and even the cell towers weren't working correctly. We couldn't get a good signal on our mobile phones. At Took's store, Mam learned the water was waist deep in homes along Soi's two, three, and four, as well as behind the local wet market, a low lying area.

All this excitement got me thinking (I do that from time to time…)...

All the times I watched T.V. while living in the states or abroad, I’d see news broadcasts about floods, and think to myself…"Wow, too bad."

I’ve always been a bit morbid when it comes to things like that, wanting to be able to experience the same thing.

To just be there, you know?

Well, possibly you don’t know. Maybe I’m just some sort of weirdo (No comments from the peanut gallery Annie!).

The flood Mam and I experienced on Soi three in Thung Lung village (circa 2006), never entered our house, only coming into the car port, as the house we were renting was built very high off the ground.

But now that we’ve actually been in a severe flood, I’ve noted there are many things you don’t think about while sitting in the comfort of your home watching a flood somewhere else on T.V., the village people all wading around in waist deep (or deeper) water, with broad smiles on their faces…the kids happily splashing about and having the time of their lives.

"Kids..." what it would be like to be a kid again without a care in the world, except where my next candy bar was coming from...

I mean there’s really nothing much you can do about it, except move things about and to higher ground, so why get all bummed out about it…right?

First off, there’s the smell.

The flood waters cover everything on the ground, and with that, they pick up oils, gasoline, kerosene, and other chemicals from inundated garages and junk yards.

Sewers and honey wells back up, animal excrement floats about, and after a few days, bloated carcasses of dead animals float around, eventually getting stuck somewhere in brush…hopefully not near your house.

Secondly there is the issue of water.

Quite often dug wells become contaminated by flood waters, turning what was fairly decent drinking water into cloudy bacterial infestations. Ground water often becomes undrinkable after being contaminated by oils, fuels and solvents. And if your well isn't a gravity feed and you have a well pump, whether your well is contaminated or not, the electricity is usually shut off so you cannot get water from your well.

All it takes is just a few hours without water to begin to understand what an important commodity it is.

Thirdly is the electrical situation.

As the flood waters rise, the electric company (EGAT, the Thailand monopoly) shuts off service to protect people from electrical shock or damage.

Like the water situation, it only takes a few hours to begin to fully appreciate how much we rely on this important utility.

Fourth and last (there’s more, but this posting is lengthy enough) is the clean-up.

One word: Filth!

Cleaning up after a flood is not something for someone with a weak stomach, especially if the flood water has hung around for a few days or weeks.

Then, there is the issue of residual odor. Things smell stale and musty for days or weeks.

Concrete (what the lower floor of our cottage consists of) is like a big sponge. It soaks up the water and takes weeks to dry out…months if the rains continue.

Mam was upset by my incessant cleaning saying it wasn’t necessary, as I first hosed everything down until the water ran clear, then I washed the floor and walls with a cherry scented cleaner, then I followed up with a half-strength solution of Detol® and water, a fairly strong, pine smelling, anti-bacterial.

All I said to her was, “What would you do if your neighbor came over here and pooh-poohed on our floor? Would you just wipe it up with a piece of newspaper?”

It’s been approximately three weeks since our flood, and the concrete floor still hasn’t thoroughly dried, but the musty smell has finally left us.

The meteorologists say the Northeast monsoon has stalled over the insurgent Deep South, including Yala, Pattani, and Narathiwat…all of which aren’t really all that far from us.

STAY TUNED!!!

-Jeeem-

This is a funny Bizzaro© cartoon I found in Bangkok Post's Sunday edition last Sunday.  

It's so true and clever.  That's exactly how Aussie's sound!


-Jeeem-

November 2, 2009… It’s that time of year again here in Thailand, with the celebration of the favored holiday, Loi Krathong.

(My apologies since I’m late in posting this, but Blogger.com had a glitch preventing me from uploading photos)

I’ve posted about Loi Krathong before, but thought I’d do it again simply since it’s a big deal to my wife Mam, who really gets into this stuff…being Thai and all.

Mam approached me at my computer desk yesterday afternoon and presented her Krathong for my approval. I always think they are a work of art, but she’s very critical of her work and really wants to know what I think, so I put on a show of looking at it for a long time with that “critical” look on my face as if I was really scrutinizing it carefully.

“Well…

(I said at last, with an exasperated tone for effect)

“I think it is truly one of your best.”

Then I went on to explain why.

Well, she didn’t fall for it, since she remembered the one from last year, which she stated had much more detail, and according to her, was far superior to this year’s creation.

Ah well, I’m busted.

“Well, I really do love it!” I said. To which she added, “You always say that.”

Ah well…

So what was different this time?

This time I pulled her aside and asked her…

“Mam, I want to put something about Loi Krathong on my blog. Can you tell me simply, what Loi Krathong is all about?”

“Huh?”

I wasn’t sure if this was a language issue, or she just didn’t get it, so I got more specific.

“If I do a search online for ‘Loi Krathong’ it comes up with about three hundred twenty-nine thousand, nine hundred and forty two possible websites that have something to do with the subject Loi Krathong and most of it is just a complicated mish mash of Buddhist stuff that I don’t want to bother with posting on my blog.”

Can you simplify it?”

“Well, Loi Krathong about…you know…’Wai’ (hands held together in front of face in prayer gesture) for water. Uh, like pray to water for being good to us [sic].”

“Ah…okay. So it’s like you are praying…or giving homage (alms of a sort) to the water god or something like that.”

“Yes, but also to let go all bad things about you.”

“What? I don’t understand.”

“You remember last year I clip your toenails, fingernails and clip hairs from your chest?”

“Yes.”

“That for water god to take away bad things about you.”

“Oh, I get it. Like cleansing (cleaning) yourself of problems?”

“Yes, like that.”

“Ok. Thank you Mam. You’ve really helped.”

The thing here, dear readers, is my exact point. You can ask several Thai’s the same question and get many different answers. It means many different things to many different people. Like many ancient celebrations or events (regarding anything…hum…Christmas comes to mind…in any part of the world), things have gotten a bit distorted over the centuries.

So, I’ll leave it up to you to do some research on your own (if you so choose). For a start, you can go HERE to the Wikipedia site, which tends to be a bit confusing, but supposedly is fairly accurate.

Me? I’ve done the research, and have found that after you read one website that spouts on and on about Buddhist history (which is a tad confusing in and of itself), you’ll end up reading another that says absolutely nothing about the Buddhist religion and only touts extensive information about water worship, forgiveness, and letting go of deceit.

Like much of life, things just get watered down after a couple decades or so…

To many foreigners living or vacationing here in Thailand, it’s a fun time to enjoy learning how to make a Krathong, taking their Krathong on Loi Krathong day to a river or some body of water, making some sort of wish similar to the falling star thingy, lighting the candle and incense, and placing your Krathong in the water, watching as it sails away.

Naturally, this has been going on for a long, long time here in Thailand, but of late there has been a big push to fashion your Krathong out of some sort of organic material that won’t end up harming the environment.

The base of the Krathong is typically made of a sliced section of banana trunk. Then you just build upon that, wrapping it in banana leaf an adding folded sections of leaf for effect, kinda like how they fold napkins in fancy hotels. Many things are used to hold everything together, but Mam usually uses either the thorns off our sour orange tree, or toothpicks. Add some flowers, a couple candles, some incense sticks and you’re good to go!

Once your Krathong is in the water and your wishes are headed toward the God of Water, if you take a little jaunt down stream a bit, you’ll undoubtedly see a large group of Thai kids who have formed some sort of dam in the river and are rummaging through the Krathong, looking for money and the like. Many people place coins or paper money on their Krathong as part of the “offering,” however this practice appears to be waning lately, probably because people don’t want to contribute to some kid’s candy money.

After the floating off of your Krathong, it is then unofficially part of the celebration to proceed in drinking loads of beer, shooting off massive amounts of fireworks, eating hoards of Thai food, and ending up at some party singing Karaoke until the wee hours of the morning.

I wonder…How much of that stuff occurred centuries ago?

Probably a lot is my guess.

Every year, my classes are skimpy after Loi Krathong since many of the kids who do show up are brain dead the next day since they stayed awake all night listening to their parents drunkenly sing to some Karaoke teleprompter.

-Jeeem-

I’ve never been one addicted to sports. 

I have early memories of my father sitting in front of the T.V. for hours at a time screaming at the top of his lungs over a baseball or football game.  I just was never that interested in sports.   

In school I played sports like everyone else, but was never good at much of anything until I picked up a tennis racket one summer, somewhere around 1973.

In my junior year of high school my coach placed me on the varsity tennis team after I had participated in a tennis camp the previous summer.  I quickly rose in the ranks until I had beaten the top sixth seed on the team, quite an accomplishment for me, one who had never excelled at sports. 

I remember well, the girls coming out of the woodwork to flirt with me.  They weren’t interested in me so much as they were interested in dating a sports figure.   

My glory while on the varsity tennis team didn’t last though, as I quickly lost interest and dropped in the rankings to something like number 56, eventually refusing to suit up and weeks later just not showing up for practice, spoiling my chances for lettering.

Now, at age 54, nothing much has changed except I do enjoy watching soccer on T.V. with my wife.  She goes nuts over the games, but I remain only mildly interested.   

The one thing about sports that has always managed to catch my interest is when sports figures get into trouble.  It’s typically the highly paid professional sports figures, those making astronomical dollar figures, who get nabbed doing drugs, selling drugs, getting into gang fights, investing in illegal gambling, etcetera.  Heads hung low, they exit the court room in handcuffs, sent off to prison for something that could easily have been avoided, their highly paid careers ruined. 

The news is full of announcements heralding unbelievable amounts of money being paid for a transfer to a new team with deep pockets.  Suddenly, a kid who played high school ball and whose acne hasn’t even cleared up yet, is catapulted into bankrolls reaching into the millions and multi-millions. 

Christiano Ronaldo is twenty-four years old.  He recently received one hundred thirty million dollars for his transfer to Real Madrid.  Above and beyond that, his yearly salary amounts to a cool 12.3 million, not to mention his numerous endorsements. 

Frankly…that pisses me off.   

The world is screaming “Economy!  Economy!” but the sports world doesn’t appear to be screaming anything, other than "More money!  More Money!" 

Every day I see neighborhoods wrought with poverty here in Southern Thailand, yet families living in run down housing sit around their small T.V. (If they even have a T.V.), and watch commercials featuring the likes of Christiano Ronaldo telling everyone that he uses such-and-such a product.  Quite honestly that disgusts me. 

My dad used to say, “If something bugs you son, don’t bitch about it, write about it!”

So, that’s what I’m gonna do. 

I recently googled “Highest paid American sports figures,” and clicked on the following link:

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/more/specials/fortunate50/2008/index.5.html

It was mentioned on the website that current salaries and endorsements were used (exception: 2008 for NFL), except in the case of winnings (auto racing, golf, tennis) where 2007 calendar year amounts were used. 

Attached is a breakdown of the salaries for each of the fifty players (Whose names I didn't include, but who represent auto racing, golf, tennis, the NFL and NBA, baseball, and boxing).  Click HERE to take a look at the figures or to check my math.


The total was a breath-taking…

$807,015,670

Eight hundred seven million, fifteen thousand, six hundred seventy dollars!  That is enough money to pull a small, poverty stricken country out of the hole!  And that's only fifty players. 

How many professional sports figures are there in the U.S.?

Answer:  Approximately four million.

You do the math. 

So, here's my proposal…

Order an immediate cap on all professional sports salaries.  Let’s give them...oh, say about the same salary a postal worker makes in the U.S. 

They get to keep their winnings (if applicable) but let’s put a cap on that too.  Something reasonable like say five thousand dollars or so (Sorry Tiger..).    

No millions, no hundred thousands, just five thousand. 

The only thing we don’t mess with is their endorsements.  If the ad companies want to pay them some ungodly amount of money, let them go for it.  Heck, if you look at somebody like Tom Brady of the NFL, his salary is a paltry eight million, whereas his endorsements total more than ten million. 

Then get somebody in the government, somebody good at accounting, to figure out the difference.  Then take that money and spread the wealth around.  Don’t tax it, don’t fiddle with it, no strings attached, just dole it out to those who need it, like soup kitchens, homeless shelters, volunteer agencies…let your imagination run. 

In my humble opinion, that money would be much better spent instead of being in the hands of some immature, often irresponsible ego-maniac who’s only going to end up sucking on a bong, or fighting dogs illegally, or jamming steroids up his or her butt. 

Oh, and if the players don’t like it?  Let them quit.  There will always be somebody in line behind them, just waiting for the opportunity to get a try out!

-Jeeem-