Jeepney Adventures in Manila

Jeepney by Carl Parkes

The so-called MetBlogs now cover over 30 cities around the world, including Bangkok and Manila as the sole reps for Southeast Asia. Each MetBlog is written by a team of about 10 volunteers who must agree to make a few posts each week, though some writers seem to immediately fall off the map and rarely make any contributions. Quality is also fairly low, since college students seem attracted to these blogs and few have much talent in the writing department.

However, a recent post at the Manila MetBlog about the perils of riding jeepneys is worth a read and far superior to most of the other posts, which range from banal to boring.

It's the second jeep I'm going to take to get home -- luckily I've got Karen, my daily commuter buddy with me to deaden the pain. We wait at the side of the road for a jeep to pass by, like hookers waiting for the jackpot. Since it's rush hour, there's a crowd to contend with and it's always good to keep in mind that everyone is your enemy and there is no such thing as mercy.

Finally, a jeep with just enough space to seat two people slows down before us. A vicious fight ensues as people rush towards the jeep like rabid wolves towards a particularly tasty treat. For some particular reason, God smiles upon a specific pair of students and helps them shove their way into the jeep.

Elbows fly, ribs are bruised, toes are stepped on. Egos of those who lost the fight are crushed, but keeping true to the Filipino way, the losers brush it off and gird themselves for the battle when the next jeep stops.

The vehicle then releases a loud belch of terrifyingly black smoke, which for some reason exactly fits the image I have of the locust plague descending upon the Egyptians' crops.

To further celebrate the destruction of our environment, the driver decides to pop in one of those horrible tapes jeepney drivers seem to be given upon taking the "So You Want To Be a Jeepney Driver" Cosmo test. He cranks up the volume to ear-shattering proportions and I find myself slightly hypnotized by the awful Chimpmunks rendition of Missy Elliot's Gossip Folks.

Read the Rest

Filipino Events in the Bay Area

Bontoc

Here's a good link for current and upcoming events in the Bay Area for Filipino events, sponsored by an organization over in Berkeley.

Filipino Events in the San Francisco Bay Area

Nias Island in Southeast Asia Handbook

Orangutan Attacks!

Just for fun, I thought I would post my short Nias chapter from my Southeast Asia Handbook on the blog, along with the HTML codes required of all Moon Publications authors, to help the design guy do his layout via Quark. Yes, this must be done by authors to designate all bolds, italics, headings, chapter settings, etc. A real pain in the ass, but then I also drew all the maps and typed out all the map listings. Basically, I did everything but print the damn book.

Update: Leaving in all the old Quark embeds doesn't work, since those HTML codes somehow migrate from the individual post into my entire blog, making everything either italics or bold. Actually, it looks very cool to see my blog with a new dress, but I also need to have some control over the typeface and so must get rid of the Quark code in the lower post. Nice try, Parkes, but no go.

NIAS ISLAND

With its famous megalithic stone altars and furniture, spectacular traditional architecture, and complex religious rites, a trip to this fascinating island, 125 km southwest of Sibolga, is a journey into the past. About the size of Bali, Nias boasts a magnificent megalithic heroic culture which flourished well into the 20th century; headhunting and human sacrifice were still practiced as late as 1935.

Nias today is known for its traditional culture--which remains largely intact despite a century of contact with the outside world--as well as its thick jungle, near-impassable roads, and beaches blessed with some of the finest surf between Australia and India.

Transportation
Gunung Sitoli, on the northern tip, is Nias's largest town, but most travelers head directly to Teluk Dalam at the southern tip of the island, where most of the megalithic monuments and surfing beaches are located.

Air: Until an airport is constructed in the south, Nias's only air connection is on SMAC, which flies daily between Medan and Gunung Sitoli for about US$60. SMAC also flies between Padang and Gunung Sitoli on Wednesdays for US$50.

Bus: The road which connects Gunung Sitoli with Teluk Dalam via the central mountains is now paved but remains barely passable in the wet season when mudslides and washed out bridges bring public transport to a halt. The less scenic but more tolerable road which skirts the east coast is now being improved and will soon replace the central road as the main
conduit.

Boat: Ferries leave nightly at 2000 from Sibolga to Gunung Sitoli and Teluk Dalam, and take 10-12 hours to make the crossing.

Gunung Sitoli

The former Dutch administrative center and base for early German missionaries lacks charm but offers good walks to nearby villages with older homes. Traditional rumah adat with curious oval floor-plans still stand outside town in Hiliana and Hilimbawedesolo, 13 km south of Gunung Sitoli.

Gunung Sitoli has a small tourist office near the parade grounds, two banks which exchange traveler's checks at reasonable rates, and a Telekom office near the post office where you can make Home Country Direct phone calls.

Organized tours and treks can be arranged through the tourist office and Nias Megalithic Adventures at Miga Beach Bungalows.

Accommodations: Local losmen in town are nothing special but better places are five km south of town. Hotel Wisata, just opposite the pier, has fairly clean fan-cooled and a/c rooms for US$5-15. Hotel Gomo, one block south of the pier, has rooms in the same price range.

Most travelers head five km south of town to Wisma Soliga, where clean and spacious rooms cost US$6-15. The manager here can help with onward transportation and treks to nearby villages.

Miga Beach Bungalows one km south of Wisma Soliga is another option but somewhat more expensive at US$10-20. Both places can be reached by oplet or becak from city center.

Transportation: Buses to Teluk Dalam take four hours and leave from the bus terminal at the south end of town.

Teluk Dalam

Teluk Dalam, second-largest town on Nias, chiefly serves as the access point for Lagundri Beach, 12 km west. Lagundri can be reached with a bemo or hired motorcycle for US$1.

Traveler's checks can be exchanged at the bank on Jalan Ahmad Yani. Teluk Dalam has a Telekom office on Jalan Pancasila and travel agents on Jalan Ahmad Yani which sell ferry tickets to Sibolga.

Accommodations: Nobody stays here, but if you need to overnight, Wisma Jamburae on the waterfront has simple rooms from US$4, while Hotel Ampera has larger rooms from US$10.

Lagundri Beach

Lagundri Bay served as the primary port of south Nias until the Krakatau eruption of 1883 wiped it out and the port was moved to Teluk Dalam (which means "Port of Peace"), leaving Lagundri to sleep on until is was discovered by Australian and American surfers in the mid-1970s.

Today this horseshoe-shaped bay consists of two fishing villages, which together form the Kuta and Legian of Nias. The surf at nearby Sorake Beach is almost legendary; much better than at Kuta, with waves breaking over three meters in hypnotically rhythmic patterns--an unreal world, like a dream. Surfing conditions are best from June to October while the remainder of the year brings in small waves perfect for beginners. A stage of the World Qualifying Series is held annually in June and July.

Accommodations:

Over 40 losmen and a handful of upscale resorts flank the bay between the surfing spots on the west side and the less congested beaches in the east. Most charge a few dollars per room but expect guests to eat in their cafes to compensate for the bargain rates.

Places on Sorake Beach include the budget-priced Olayama, Sun Beach, and westerly Damai Beach Inn where simple huts cost US$2-5, and the somewhat upscale Sea Breeze Inn where larger bungalows go for US$5-10. Sorake Beach Resort around the headlands is geared to group tours with luxurious bungalows from US$50-100.

Bungalows closer to Lagundri attract non-surfers who prefer the better swimming conditions in the placid waters. Among the low-priced favorites are Risky, Magdalena, and Hassan's, while Lantana Inn captures the mid-level market with spacious bungalows priced from US$15-30.

Transportation: Ferries from Sibolga to Teluk Dalam are greeted by the standard assortment of motorcycle taxis, bemos, and trucks which depart immediately for Lagundri Beach. Travelers coming down from Gunung Sitoli should get off the bus at the crossroads midway between Teluk Dalam and Lagundri, where motorcycles take passengers six km west to Lagundri.

Bawomataluo

The most important village architecturally in south Nias is renowned for its ancient homes festooned with superb carvings, high-roofed gables, and megalithic furniture scattered around the village courtyard. Top draw is the reconstructed omo sebua owned by the royal family but now converted into a museum raised on gigantic pillars and covered with exquisite wall carvings. Massive megaliths carved with great symbolism complete the scene.

Touristy to the extreme (don't even ask about stone jumping), Bawomataluo remains the singular attraction of south Nias. You can also hike down a stone staircase to the nearby village of Orihili.

Bawomataluo, 15 km from Teluk Dalam, can be reached with public bus for about US$1.

Hilisimaetano

Sixteen km inland from Teluk Dalam on a good asphalt road is another traditional village with over 140 adat omes flanked by megaliths which line both sides of the broad stone-paved courtyard. Less popular than Bawomataluo; stone jumping is performed for tour groups on Saturday afternoons.

Bawomataluo-Hilisimaetano Hike

An outstanding one-day walk via a back path which passes through a number of traditional villages still filled with stone seats, memorial benches, and stairs of honor.

Orahill is the nicest town because of the relative absence of "Allo Turi!" Bawomataluo is best for tribal houses. Siwalawa is rather run-down. Onohondo is friendly, plus it has an inexpensive losmen for trekkers. Hilinawalo is the most traditional village, over 100 years old. Bawogosali is a pleasant and picturesque village, but Hilisimaetano is the worst for rascally kids. Just follow the stone path which connects all the villages on this 15-km walk.

Nick at Bali Blog Visits Nias Island

Nick at Bali Blog

Nick at Bali Blog visited Nias Island about a decade ago, and today posts some of his experiences, including the frightening overnight boat ride from Sibolga and his time at the surfing camp at the southern end of the island.

I remember an overnight ferry ride from the port of Sibolga through a storm. At one point I went up to the wheelhouse to see what was going on only to find about 30 locals all crammed in giving the guy who was steering this vessel advice as to direction. To my surprise I saw it was actually a wooden wheel the captain was using to steer and there appeared to be no electrical devices or any kind of navigational / communication equipment. When you read the news and it says Indonesian ferry sinks its really not surprising.

Many of the ferries are actually cargo vessels with the captain selling tickets to passengers for extra cash. The same is true for passenger vessels, tons of cargo get loaded on raising the waterline dangerously. A British tourist once recalled the captain running up and down the boat yelling at the passengers Go to the left, now go to the right, as the overloaded, boat tipped from side to side in the strong waves. It eventually sank.

Getting to Nias takes some work, its an overnight trip on a local boat from Sibolga north of Padang and Bukittinggi, to Telukdalam on the south of the island and is out of the way so that is why is did not have size of some of the locations in Thailand. In 1993 Lagundi Bay was fringed with 1 and 2-storey guest houses, maybe 30-40. Locals would rent these very cheap expecting to make their money on meals and drinks. I remember my friend and I paid the equivalent of 25 cents a day for a small place with twin beds.

Nick Visits Nias

Jakarta Blok M Nightlife Update

Bugils Cafe Invitation

After all those high-minded posts about tsunamis, earthquakes, and Good Friday in the Philippines, it's almost a relief to move the bar and post some links to the naughty nightlife in Jakarta, down south in Blok M where the Westerners gather to enjoy themselves in some half dozen nightclubs and discos.

March has been yet another good month down the Blok. The Reveller's only regret is that because of the Work Schedule From Hell his nocturnal sorties have been savagely curtailed over the last few weeks. However, all bad things must come to an end, and now he's back on the rampage.

The shift in bar popularity that had a seismic effect on Jalan Pelatehan in January and February seems to have subsided, and there's a clearly discernible new pecking order. My Bar is the undisputed cock of the street with Top Gun firmly entrenched in second place. D's Place and Everest continue to hold their own and are loyally supported by their regular customers, but the commonly expressed view is that they're second division relegation candidates.

Oscars is the dark horse of the street, and could yet make the big time - it all depends on how popular the newly-refurbished upstairs bar becomes. Sportsmans is the street's Teflon bar - others come and go, have their ups and downs, but Sporties just keeps rolling along in its time-honoured ways. The street needs - and thrives on - variety, which means guys supporting all the bars and not just their regular haunts. So come on chaps, do your bit for Blok M. It's a tough job, but someone's got to do it!

Jakarta Blok M Nightlife Update

Photo Gallery from Blok M

Sumatra Earthquake March 2005

Earthquake March 2005

The early morning earthquake off the northwestern coast of Sumatra has been upgraded from 8.3 to 8.7 by the U.S. Geological Survey, who also report that this is an original earthquake epicenter and not an aftershock from the earthquake of Dec. 2004. No tsumanis reported but earthquake induced damage reported from Sibolga and Nias to the south.

Magnitude 8.7 - NORTHERN SUMATRA, INDONESIA
2005 March 28 16:09:36 UTC
Preliminary Earthquake Report
U.S. Geological Survey, National Earthquake Information Center
World Data Center for Seismology, Denver

A great earthquake occurred at 16:09:36 (UTC) on Monday, March 28, 2005. The magnitude 8.7 event has been located in NORTHERN SUMATRA, INDONESIA. (This event has been reviewed by a seismologist.)

Magnitude 8.7
Date-Time Monday, March 28, 2005 at 16:09:36 (UTC)
= Coordinated Universal Time
Monday, March 28, 2005 at 11:09:36 PM
= local time at epicenter
Time of Earthquake in other Time Zones
Location 2.076°N, 97.013°E
Depth 30 km (18.6 miles) set by location program
Region NORTHERN SUMATRA, INDONESIA
Distances
205 km (125 miles) WNW of Sibolga, Sumatra, Indonesia
245 km (155 miles) SW of Medan, Sumatra, Indonesia
535 km (330 miles) WSW of KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia
1410 km (880 miles) NW of JAKARTA, Java, Indonesia

Location Uncertainty horizontal +/- 4.8 km (3.0 miles); depth fixed by location program
Parameters Nst=135, Nph=135, Dmin=537.4 km, Rmss=0.79 sec, Gp= 43°,
M-type=moment magnitude (Mw), Version=7
Source USGS NEIC (WDCS-D)

Event ID usweax

USGS Report on Sumatra Earthquake March 28 2005

Google News Reports on Earthquake

Good Friday Procession in the Philippines

Good Friday in Manila

Sassy Lawyer in the Philippines has just posted an outstanding series of photos of a Good Friday procession in a suburb of Manila, and it's well worth the time to download and view these memorable images of religious iconography in the Philippines.

In most parishes all over the Philippines, Lent is highlighted by a prusisyon (a procession of religious images on brightly lighted floats) on the evening of Good Friday. The prusisyon begins and ends in the parish church. But not in the parish of San Roque in Marikina City, however. According to the locals, three or so years ago, a new parish priest arrived. This new parish priest, a certain Monsignor Perez, did not approve of the practice of having the prusisyon on Good Friday. The correct practice, according to him, was to hold it at dawn on Easter Sunday. The residents objected. They would not let this stranger change a tradition that had been observed for as long as anyone could remember. Since most of the imahes (religious images) were owned not by the church but by private citizens, the residents decided that they would hold the prusisyon on Good Friday even without the blessing of the church. They have been doing just that for the past few years.

Good Friday Procession by Sassy Lawyer

Tsunami Links from Chrenkoff

Banda Aceh Aftermath

Good god, here we go again. You've probably already heard the news, but there was an 8.3 earthquake this morning off the coast of northwestern Sumatra, and tsunamis are a possibility in Banda Aceh and Sibolga, which largely escaped the devastation of last December. Communications are spotty, but a CNN reporter on the scene in Banda Aceh does not report on a tsunami, but the local population is pretty freaked out.

Arthur Chrenkoff is an Australian blogger known for his outstanding collections of links to world events, and his ongoing series about "Good News from Iraq," which I consider hopelessly overoptimistic, but probably a good antidote to the relentless depressing reports from Juan Cole. A few days ago, Chrenkoff rounded up some great tsunami links to memorialize the three-month anniversary of the horrible event.

On December 26, the largest natural disaster in living memory struck South Asia. The waves of tsunami have receded a long time, as has the world's interest, moving back to the Middle East and other more exciting hot-spots. Three months on, it's a good time to revisit the ravaged areas and see what has been happening with the region out of the media spotlight (I hate to be picky, but there is no such thing as "three month anniversary" - the Latin "anno" root in anniversary signifies an elapse of a period of a year).

The toll: Click here for a useful summary of the what's happening in each of the affected countries: the toll, the money received, the aid effort.

The latest figures on death toll stand at 273,000 with almost 110,000 still missing and therefore presumed dead. The exact number and the fate of individuals might never be known: "More than 300,000 people are dead or missing in 11 Indian Ocean countries, but the count is hobbled by confusion, politics and the magnitude of the disaster. Thousands are believed to have been washed out to sea or bulldozed into mass graves." There are at least 24 mass graves in Aceh, and an unknown number of other "unofficial" burial sites.

Tsunami Links from Chrenkoff

James Wolcott Blog

James Wolcott

Have you been reading the blog of James Wolcott, journalist with the monthly column at Vanity Fair? Well, why not? Sick and tired of the ridiculous and dangerous antics of the Republican party? So am I. James not only skewers the religious fanatics which now rule in Washington, he also does it with humor and great writing skills.

James Wolcott Blog

Conservatives enjoy railing against the "Oprahization" politics and culture, the sentimentalizing of difficult issues by liberals and other softies. Rush Limbaugh often says that the difference between conservatives and liberals is that conservatives argue from reason, liberals from emotion. Which is another way of saying conservatives are from Mars, liberals from sissy Venus.

But it's the conservatives who've been Oprahified, which would okay if only they'd admit and quit trying to act so manly and butch. The hug at the State of the Union address between the Iraqi woman whose father was killed by Hussein and the mother of a slain; the purple finger of Democracy on magazine cover after magazine cover (you would have thought from the coverage no Iraqi men voted); and now the Terri Schiavo super soap opera, which threatens to reduce Peggy Noonan and NRO's K'Lo to a pool of salty tears and melted sugar.

Charles Krauthammer, who prides himself on the sardonic cut of his superior mind and drips with so much distaste that he requires an oil change every 50,000 words, is the latest to get into the act.

Not even waiting until Terri Schiavo is dead, he proposes Terri's Law to prevent future tugs of war over no-hope cases.

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Here's something the cable news outfits could do that would rilly rilly rilly be useful, given that they got all those cameras down there in Florida and all.

Just for the kooky hell of it, why don't they provide us with one wide shot or overview of the protestors and vigil-holders in Pinellas Park just so we can see how big the gathering is? Is it a big, swelling group, or is it like the jubilant Iraqis surrounding Hussein's razed statue, a seeming mass revealed in long wideout as a motley get-together? And what is the ratio of Schiavo deathwatchers to media deathwatchers? Are there as many reporters there as sign-holders, or what?

Because whenever there's a ground-level view of the vigil, it seems to be the same scraggly-looking characters and showboating Franciscan friars moving back and forth across the screen, clogging the view.

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Have an airsick bag handy should you embark upon Adam Nagourney's lipsmacking love letter to Jeb Bush on page one of today's NY Times. Nagourney, who once boasted on Charlie Rose that he had more charisma than poor John Kerry (a claim that one glimpse of Nagourney in action or repose would refute), has found a load of charisma he can look up to and fetch slippers for.

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It would have been bad enough if the Times had run this slop under the rubric "Political Notes" or "Reporter's Notebook," but it's splashed on page one as a straight political story.

Any blogger who uses the phrase "the liberal New York Times" without irony should be returned to the pet store as a dead parrot.

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Two prominent neurologists who have asked to remain anonymous have examined CNN behind closed doors and determined that the network is irreversibly brain-dead, as flooded with cerebral fluid as the hull of the S.S. Poseidon. It still retains some primitive reflexes and signs of animation, but a brain-scan revealed the sort of minimal activity usually associated with punch-drunk prizefighters condemned to a flophouse cot, or a broken toaster. "CNN barely has two brain cells left to rub together," one doctor said, lacing up his tennis shoes for a quick getaway.

Tiger Temple Thailand

Young Monk and Tiger



Monk with Tigers



Tigers on a Stroll



Better than a Zoo



And No Poachers Here

Last week I received a message from Donna in Thailand asking my opinion about the Tiger Temple, a Buddhist temple and animal sanctuary three hours west of Bangkok near Kanchanaburi, site of the famous Bridge Over the River Kwai. She pointed out that the tigers appeared to receive sedatives in their meals and wondered about the morality of the whole affair.

Donna has worked in Thailand for over five years with an Australian adventure travel company, and recently moved on to another company in the same field, but she also requested the remain anonymous. All the above photos were taken by Donna, plus two others with the lady actually hugging the tigers. Really amazing stuff.

Should wild tigers be kept captive in Buddhist temples? What are the dangers? Are these tigers being given sedatives and if so, is this wrong? Should the tigers be released to the wild, or placed in national parks, or donated to zoos? Or should they remain in this temple, along with the hundreds of other animals taken in by the monks?

Hi Carl

I just stumbled across your blog when I was searching for info about the Tiger Temple in Kanchanaburi.

I have been living in Thailand for the past five and a half years, and until just a few weeks back I was working as a tour leader for an Australian company. (Yep. I have LOTS of stories).

I have been to Wat Pha Luang Ta Bua on many occasions, and every time I leave I have more questions than when I came.

I understand that releasing Tigers into the wild is
not practical in this day and age (Unless they were
taken out to, say Khao Yai National Park, or to Khao
Sok in the South of Thailand) but there seems to be a
breeding program at the temple. Does it make sense to
breed these animals when the only option for them is
to be kept in captivity? Or is it better to have them
there, keeping the species alive, than letting them go
in the jungle and risk being shot?

Now, I know that tigers are a relatively sedate
animal, but there are rumours in Thailand among the
expat community that the tigers are drugged in order
to sedate them for the tourists. One expat even went
so far to tell a story where he went to the temple,
and was questioning the safety because he was thinking
of bringing his daughter to see the animals.

Apparently the monk told him "no problem. Tiger eat
medicine. Make him sleepy". He went on to say that
he saw the bottle of medicine (forget the name) and
that the 'milk' tablets that are given to the tigers
when you have your photo taken with them are actually
part of the drug program.

Now, do I believe this guy and not go to the temple
again, or do I disbelieve him and go to the temple,
thus encouraging the monks and caretakers to keep this
practice up.

The tigers are kept in concrete pens for most of the
day and come out in the afternoon when the tourists
come. So, the only exercise is for an hour or so in
the afternoon.

Carl, I am asking you for an opinion about this
temple. As you have been travel writing for so long,
I am sure you will know where I am coming from. The
moral issue, or the practical one? Which way to go?

I am currently working as a product development
manager for a Thai tour company and am considering
offering my small groups of people a side trip here.
Whilst I understand that the temple needs the money to
feed the animals (not just tigers - there are hundreds
of other animals in the temple), I am torn as to
whether we should encourage it.

What is your opinion on this? Any help you can give
me with this would be greatly appreciated.

More Tiger Temple Links at FriskoDude

Sassy Lawyer Fireworks

Sassy

Sassy Lawyer in the Philippines is unquestionably the most prolific and controversial blogger in the country, and she loves to mix it up with posts about religion, politics, and whatever else crosses her legal mind. A few days ago, Sassy posted a short opinion piece about the treatment of a government official (the wife of Estrada) upon her arrival in the United States.

After a few comments concerning the issue, a Filipino living in the U.S. voiced his disappointment at his mother country and stated that he no longer identifies with his Filipino heritage. Wow. A firestorm broke out in the comments section, with nuclear missles being launched in all directions. Sassy loves it, and so do I. Blogging at its best.

I'll just quote the start of Sassy's post, but do click the link and read through the fiery comments.

Loi's sad experience

Upon her arrival in San Francisco three days ago, Senator Loi Ejercito was met by US Homeland Security personnel, detained in a cubicle and questioned for an hour ("interrogated", according to reports) on “various subjects, including if she believed her husband would be convicted of plunder". I don’t know what the “various subjects” were but according to Senate President Franklin Drilon, they had nothing to do with immigration. Since no one seems to be talking about what the “various subjects” were, we really can’t tell if they were unrelated to immigration, can we?

I have no love for the Ejercitos including those who go by the name of Estrada. I have no love for the U.S. government either especially the Bush administration which has become adept at dipping their hands in other people’s pies. I agree that Loi Estrada should be accorded respect, just as any legitimate visitor to the U.S. does. But I do NOT agree with the proposition that she deserved preferential treatment because she is a Philippine senator. Politicians, from whatever country, are not special.

Nonetheless, is Loi Ejercito’s experience truly a mere incident of harassment or has it something to do with the properties allegedly amassed by her family which may be stashed in American soil in the form of real properties and bank accounts? If it is the latter, then, the intervention of U.S. government officials may not at all be unwarranted.

Read the Post and Comments

Mr. Brown Hits a Home Run

Lezbos in Singapore?

Mr. Brown hits one out of the park as he discusses the sexual politics of Singapore.

No excuse to not know you have AIDS

I read that there are plans to legislate to curb the Aids epidemic. In the proposed change in legislation, any HIV-positive person who has unprotected sex, or intends to have unprotected sex with someone, would have committed a criminal offence — even if he did not know of his own condition.

I say go all the way, man. Get these HIV-infected people to wear a badge, or at least a T-shirt, that proclaims their promiscuous and risky lifestyle to everyone, so we know to avoid them. Better yet, tattoo everyone who is HIV-positive.

I think we need to also clarify what “intends to have unprotected sex with someone” means. I think we need to be strict about this. If you have HIV, even if you didn’t know it, and you so much as look at a woman (or a man, depending what you like) with lust in your eyes, the Sex Police will arrest you.

I mean, you die your business lah. Don’t spread your immoral lifestyle to others who are living clean mah.

In fact, I heard that a charity concert by gay pop duo Jason and deMarco was not approved by the MDA, because “alternative lifestyles are against the public interest” and "these singers use their musical performance and their own example of being a couple to celebrate and promote a gay lifestyle”.

While I am not familiar with the gay music scene, not being of this persuasion myself, I am curious as to what this duo performs on stage that is so appalling. Do they take their clothes off in mid-song to engage in acts that contravene Singapore Penal code 377?

Maybe we should ban all concerts by performers with dubious and risky lifestyles. At least only admit performers who declare on their Customs form that they never have risky sex, or are not HIV positive. That will help society.

We will only have respectable classical music concerts, the kind where the patrons do not feel like going off and have unprotected sex with strangers after the performance.

Read the Rest including the Comments

Blog Advice from Cowboy Celeb

Cowboy Celeb

Cowboy Celeb is a Singapore blogger who offers some blogging tips for novices and pros, and though shorter than the tips provided below by Tony Pierce, there's some good advice on the importance of RSS feeds. Be sure to read the comments.

RSS is your friend

Forget your pretty blog design. If you have an RSS feed, which is offered by most modern blogging systems, then you should max it out. Most bloggers use an RSS aggregator to read your RSS feed instead of visiting your blogsite. This means that they dont have to see your red text on black background anymore. If your RSS feed is not a complete feed, they will have to visit your site to read the whole post (they won’t, too much hassle). Make sure your RSS feed shows the full text instead of a summary - this option is available in most blogging tools. This way you can be sure that bloggers are reading your entire post.

Don’t make your readers jump through hoops to comment

Nothing is more annoying then a blog that requires readers to enter their email (wordpress, pMachine) or login (livejournal, blogger, MT) when they want to post a comment. Isnt it enough that they have already read your entire post and feel like giving you feedback? What you’re doing isnt helping you to score brownie points. Switch things like this off. Use modern comment-spam catching techniques instead of passing on the pain to your readers.

Start a meme or participate in spreading one

Memes are great ways to make yourself visible. If you participate in a meme started by a more popular blogger like SexyBlogger then you’re giving a chance for other bloggers to discover you. And that’s how we discovered the previously-unknown-cute-like-hell Lynn

Be consistent in your content

When Bubblemunche burst onto the scene, he was one sad sack of virgin shite. Many episodes later, he’s still the same. Life has not improved for him. But his blogging audience sure has improved by leaps and bounds. Do you see the moral of the story here?

Use images to reinforce your message.

Sometimes just text alone doesnt cut it. Images can paint a thousand words and make your content more real. With Flickr image hosting, you can now have pretty photos on your blog for free. Just make sure the size is consistent (refer to point 4).

Comment on other blogs

Don’t just lurk. Post a few comments from time-to-time. Comments that consist of short phrases like “Hi, nice blog” reek of shameless self-promotion. Try to post intelligent comments that reflect the fact that you actually read the whole post thus infering that you give a shit about it thereby indebting the author to return the favor (some day).

Read the Rest

Blog Advice from Tony Pierce

Tony Pierce

Tony Pierce is one of the more popular bloggers around, and his collection of blog tips rings funny, true, and useful. Apparently, he's also written a book on the subject.

how to blog by tony pierce, 110

1. write every day.

2. if you think youre a good writer, write twice a day.

3. dont be afraid to do anything. infact if youre afraid of something, do it. then do it again. and again.

4. cuss like a sailor.

5. dont tell your mom, your work, your friends, the people you want to date, or the people you want to work for about your blog. if they find out and you'd rather they didnt read it, ask them nicely to grant you your privacy.

6. have comments. dont be upset if no one writes in your comments for a long time. eventually they'll write in there. if people start acting mean in your comments, ask them to stop, they probably will.

7. have an email address clearly displayed on your blog. sometimes people want to tell you that you rock in private.

8. dont worry very much about the design of your blog. image is a fakeout.

9. use Blogger. it's easy, it's free; and because they are owned by Google, your blog will get spidered better, you will show up in more search results, and more people will end up at your blog. besides, all the other blogging software & alternatives pretty much suck.

10. use spellcheck unless youre completely totally keeping it real. but even then you might want to use it if you think you wrote something really good.

11. say exactly what you want to say no matter what it looks like on the screen. then say something else. then keep going. and when youre done, re-read it, and edit it and hit publish and forget about it.

12. link like crazy. link anyone who links you, link your favorites, link your friends. dont be a prude. linking is what seperates bloggers from apes. and especially link if you're trying to prove a point and someone else said it first. it lends credibility even if youre full of shit.

13. if you havent written about sex, religion, and politics in a week youre probably playing it too safe, which means you probably fucked up on #5, in which case start a second blog and keep your big mouth shut about it this time.

14. remember: nobody cares which N*Sync member you are, what State you are, which Party of Five kid you are, or which Weezer song you are. the second you put one of those things on your blog you need to delete your blog and try out for the marching band. similarilly, nobody gives a shit what the weather is like in your town, nobody wants you to change their cursor into a butterfly, nobody wants to vote on whether your blog is hot or not, and nobody gives a rat ass what song youre listening to. write something Real for you, about you, every day.

15. dont be afraid if you think something has been said before. it has. and better. big whoop. say it anyway using your own words as honestly as you can. just let it out.

16. get Site Meter and make it available for everyone to see. if you're embarrassed that not a lot of people are clicking over to your page, dont be embarrassed by the number, be embarrassed that you actually give a crap about hits to your gay blog. it really is just a blog. and hits really dont mean anything. you want Site Meter, though, to see who is linking you so you can thank them and so you can link them back. similarilly, use Technorati, but dont obsess. write.

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Another Chinese Record

World's Record?

Just for your amusement.

Dai Yueqin shows her 4.2-meter-long (about 15 feet) hair in Tongxiang, east China's Zhejiang Province Thursday, March 24, 2005. Dai has kept her hair uncut for 26 years since she was 14 years old. (AP Photo / Xinhua, Pan Lianggan)

Flores Hobbit Vandalized

The Hobbit of Flores

Remember the miniature human skeleton discovered last year in a Flores cave by a joint Indonesian-Australian paleontology team? The world was astounded at the discovery, which ranks among the most sensational of modern times. After preliminary work on the delicate remains, the skeleton was moved to Jakarta for further study, then inexplicable stolen by an Indonesian paleontologist who moved it south to Yogyakarta. For his private studies.

The shocking outcome of this debacle recently came to light, and it doesn't look good for the reputation of Indonesia's leading paleontologist, who is apparently responsible for the crime and serious damage to the remains: a broken jaw, smashed bones, and rubber cement used to repair the shoddy work.

Come on, Indonesia. This isn't Michael Jackson, it's the freakin' Flores Hobbit.

Fresh scandal over old bones
By Dan Vergano, USA TODAY

Inside Liang Bua cave on the Indonesian island of Flores, the bones of the hobbit rested undisturbed for 18,000 years.

But no longer.

In what is being called a true case of scientific skullduggery, the remains of the newly discovered human species have suffered irreparable damage since entering the care of paleontologists. The damage to the bones of this diminutive being — named Homo floresiensis and nicknamed hobbit by scientists — is so extensive that it will limit scholarly research on the species, say members of the Indonesian Center for Archaeology-based discovery team.

Considered the most important discovery in human origins in five decades, the remains are marred by broken jaws and smashed bones. "The equivalent in the world of art would be somebody slashing the Mona Lisa and then trying to fix it with chewing gum," says paleontologist Tim White of the University of California-Berkeley, who was not on the discovery team.

Reported in October's Nature magazine by a team of Australian and Indonesian researchers, the discovery of Homo floresiensis shocked paleontologists. The beings lived on Flores from at least 94,000 to 13,000 years ago, making them the only human species besides Neanderthals that lived alongside modern man, Homo sapiens, in ancient times.

Despite having chimp-sized brains and standing about 3 feet tall, they hunted pygmy elephants and Komodo dragons using complex stone blades and axes like those then wielded by modern humans. A reconstruction of the hobbit's face is on the cover of April's National Geographic, and the National Geographic Channel's Search for the Ultimate Survivor (April 1, 8 p.m. ET) highlights hobbit links to pre-human species.

In November, the research took a bizarre turn into the politics of paleontology. Teuku Jacob of Gadjah Mada University, an Indonesian scientist unaffiliated with the discovery team, took the partly fossilized bones to his lab in Yogyakarta, Indonesia, 275 miles away from their repository in Jakarta.

What followed was a standoff that set an older generation of Indonesian and Australian paleontologists against younger scientists. Jacob, 75, is considered Indonesia's most prominent paleontologist, a role with added status in a country that reveres age and seniority.

On the other side is the team of scientists that is based at the Indonesian Center for Archaeology but whose work is funded by the Australian Research Council. Aside from four leg bones that remain in Jacob's custody, the fossils were returned on Feb. 23. The team charges the remains were severely damaged by rubber molds made at Jacob's lab:

• Much of the detail at the base of the skull was pulled off.

• The left outer eye socket and two teeth were broken off and glued back. Bits of molded rubber still adhere to some sections.

• Long, deep cuts mark the lower edge of the hobbit's jaw on both sides, left by a blade used to cut away molded rubber.

• The chin of a second hobbit jaw was snapped off, losing bone. It was glued back together misaligned and at an incorrect angle.

• The pelvis was smashed, perhaps in transit, destroying details that reveal body shape, gait and evolutionary history.

"We have a big dispute with Professor Jacob," says Tony Djubiantono, chief of the archaeology center and co-leader of the team. "We didn't give him permission to do any of these things."

Hobbit Bones Damaged in Indonesia

Music Karma

Birthday Hit Machine

The New Yorker website has an amusing post that speculates your entire life, karma, direction, and meaning has been determined by the No. 1 hit song on the day of your birth. Probably not very scientific, but it's often strange, shocking, or downright bizarre to discover the awful truth behind your miserable life.

This Day in Music

Executioners and Floggers Get Raise

Visit Beautiful Malaysia

Malaysia has a problem with too few professional floggers and executioners, and an oversupply of illegal Indonesians who refuse to go home. But they've found a logical solution: give the floggers and executioners a hefty pay raise and speed up the process of riding their scenic country of their pesky neighbors.

Malaysia's floggers get pay rise
By Jonathan Kent
BBC News, Kuala Lumpur

It will cost the government more to deal with illegal migrants. Malaysia's 50 executioners and floggers are to get a pay rise. Specially selected prison staff will see their bonuses for each stroke they inflict rise by over 300%.

Hangmen will get a 60% rise to reflect the difficult nature of their job - receiving 500 ringgit ($131) instead of the current 300 ringgit. With threats to flog an estimated half a million illegal migrants thought to be hiding in Malaysia, prison officers could be in for a major windfall. Foreigners caught and convicted of immigration offences can be whipped up to six times.

Previously, officers only received only three ringgit ($0.80) for each blow they struck using a rotan, a heavy bamboo rod. But now they will get 10 ringgit ($2.60).

Executioners will also enjoy a pay rise in a country which has hanged some 358 people over the last 24 years. According to the prison service, few officers applied to be executioners and the country is experiencing a shortage. However, flogging jobs are hotly contested, with only one in five applicants being accepted.

The service says only hardened staff are suitable. But the government has stressed that illegal migrants will be flogged gently in comparison with those sentenced for violent crimes.

BBC Reports

Thai Farang Relationships

Pattaya Snaps Back Cover

Steve has worked as an English teacher in Thailand for 10 years, and is presently living in a somewhat unusual location, Suphanburi, a decent-sized town midway on the back road between Ayuthaya and Kanchanaburi. Suphan is a rather unremarkable town aside from its obvious prosperity; it's home to a former prime minister and that's enough to guarantee fine roads and superior infrastructure. A few days ago, Steve offered up advice for Thai women regarding their Western boyfriends. I'll post some of the content, but be sure to click the link and read the comments from both Thai and Western women.

For all you cute little Thai girls out there fancying the idea of having a Farang boyfriend take note of the following, you could be in for more than you bargained for.

Do exercise lots before your first date, he enjoys walking everywhere at 15km an hour.

Do get rid of that whitening lotion, he loves you dark and crispy.

Do teach him about Thai traditions before you take him to meet your family, you don't need to look silly too.

Do fondle him and tell him you love him 50 times day, he loves to be smooched.

Do get used to his bargaining power, he hates feeling as if he got ripped off.

Do pretend you enjoy riding a tuk-tuk, he loves the thrills and spills.

Do get suspicious of his weekend trips to Pattaya with his buddies, you don't need him picking up any nasty diseases.

Do check up if he spends more time in his home country than with you, you don't need to find out later he has been deceiving two girls.

Do keep up with the news, he fancies his girl to have a bitta brains

Do get out your purse at times, you don't want him thinking you only like him for his bank book.

But, do, if you want a new handbag out of him, just tell him how handsome he his.

And, do,if you want anything whatsoever out of him, just tell him how superior he is to all Thai guys, he enjoys living in a world of his own.

DON'TS

Don't bother teaching him Thai, you don't want him running off with the pretty young girl next door.

Don't go sticking food in his mouth for him, he wants you to know he has hands of his own.

Don't even bother arguing with him, he can argue with a dentist about the state of his grimey teeth.

Don't complain about his lack of showering, he has enjoyed his twice-a-week bath since he was a baby.

Don't go eating any smelly fruits or fish when he is around, you don't need the poor guy standing outside in the rain.

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Political Film in Singapore?

Not Chee Soon Juan

Oh, those wild and wacky guys who get to censor the magazines, newspapers, and movies shown in the Lion City.....hear me roar! It's bad enough that the Singapore government treats it's citizens like mindless babies who need to be protected from gratuitous sex (see photo above), but now they are sinking their fangs into political films produced in Singapore. It's not like Chee Soon Juan is an unknown character in the country; he's the most famous political dissident for over two decades. But, God forbid you make a documentary about the guy.

Thanks to Steven McDermott at Singabloodypore for the link.

Singapore film-maker pulls political movie
The Guardian
Staff and agencies
Tuesday March 22, 2005

A film-maker has withdrawn his documentary about Singapore's leading opposition figure from the city-state's annual film festival, after the government warned him its political content could land him in jail.

Martyn See's short film focuses on Chee Soon Juan, a frequent government critic who was ordered to pay S$500,000 (£160,875) to Singapore's first prime minister, Lee Kuan Yew, and former leader Goh Chok Tong for defamation during the 2001 elections.

See decided to pull his movie from the Singapore international film festival after the country's censorship board warned him he could be jailed for up to two years or fined if his 26-minute film was screened.

Singapore's the Straits Times reports that the board had also advised festival organisers to remove See's documentary because it was a "party political film." Under Singaporean law, local films that "contain wholly or partly either partisan or biased references to or comments on any political matter" are banned, the paper added.

Despite its strictly controlled media, Singapore has been seeking to promote itself as a centre of Asian arts, with the international film festival one of its cultural highlights. Still, Singapore regularly bans movies, on the grounds that it needs to maintain ethnic and religious harmony in the south-east Asian country of four million.

The Guardian Reports on Singapore

New Jersey, Japan and China

Mao Fashion

What do New Jersey, Japan and China have in common? A young university graduate from New Jersey packs his bags and, since he's taken a bit of Japanese in school, heads over to Japan where he teaches English for three years in small town on Shikoku. Bored and stifled by Japanese culture, he then moves on to China where he continues to teach English in a large southern city. A few months ago, he put together an essay/graph comparing life in New Jersey, Japan, and China -- it's a hoot!

Hat tip to Sinosplice for the link:

New Jersey, Japan, and China

Shanghai Maglev

Shanghai

Henry Blodget is a former securities anaylst from New York who found himself in hot water a few years ago and was stripped of his securities credentials, then somehow worked his way over to Slate where he regularly contributes his well written articles. His latest venture is a look at China, and today he rides the Maglev train from Pudong into Shanghai, and provides some insight into the amazing experience, but also brings up some serious questions about the route and the economic viability of this advanced technology from Germany.

For gawkers and other one-time users, the maglev is the equivalent of an adult theme-park ride: cheap, thrilling, and fodder for cocktail parties. For those who just want to get to or from the airport, however, it leaves much to be desired.

First, there's the problem that the maglev doesn't really run from Pudong to Shanghai, but from Pudong to the end of one of Shanghai's subway lines, aka the burbs. So, to get to Shanghai proper, you have to schlep your bags again, either into the subway or into a taxi like the one you could have grabbed at the airport.

Then, there's cost. Thanks to China's polarized pricing system—one price for goods and services sold to foreigners and other rich folks, and another for everything else—the $6 one-way ticket is not a deal. When you throw in the added schlepping at both ends, the maglev loses in cost, convenience, and possibly even time.

Losing money at the speed of sound

These are two of the reasons the train is running at less than half of capacity, and, probably, hemorrhaging money. The maglev cost $1.2 billion or more to build, which means the system chews through north of $60 million a year in capital costs alone. Assuming 12,000 passengers per day (my estimate), the maglev generates about $27 million of revenue per year, or less than half its capital costs, much less its total costs. It is not clear who is absorbing these losses, China or Transrapid, but, either way, someone's taking a bath.

Henry Rides the Train

Thailand Journal

Ayuthaya Elephant Kraal

Here's a fascinating account written by a young American who served in the Air Force for three years in Thailand in the early 1970s, at airbases at Utapao, Korat and Ubon Ratchathani.

Three Years in the Life

My name is John Ellis. In February of 1971 I began a 26 year career in the United States Air Force. Needless to say, I had many experiences throughout those years; some were bad - but most were good. I often wish I had kept some sort of a journal, which would make it so much easier to recall the good times, but as it is, like most people after so many years I'm forced to extract my memories from my gray matter. Following are some of the memories I have of the nearly three years I spent in Thailand. I've written them here, many years later, in an attempt to preserve them for myself, but also to share with others this truly exciting time in my life.

Three Years in Thailand

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dan

Zhang Ziyi with Dan Washburn!

Dan Washburn goes to Shanghai party/nightclub and scores with Ziyi Zhang, providing a glimmer of hope for all the rest of the Western Male Civilization.

We got to the House of Blues and Jazz, and it was packed … on a Wednesday. No way we were going to find a table — but we did. Ahem, tuxedo anyone? We settled in and ordered drinks. And then I felt something on my shoulder. It was the waiter. He was wiping me off with a napkin. I thought perhaps he had spilled something. It was possible — there was a group of crazy Scandanavians dancing behind me. But no, he was simply wiping the rainwater off my jacket, my t-u-x-e-d-o jacket.

Dannie Boy Celebrates Irish Day in Shanghai

Treasure Theft in Thailand

Ayuthaya Treasures

Guarding the Gods
Bangkok Post
March 20, 2005

Monks at several temples in Ayutthaya are no longer willing to rely on the authorities and have resorted to various other methods to protect their artifacts rather than placing their priceless, revered Buddha statues on temple altars.

Wat Khoke in Ayutthaya's Bang Pahan district sits next to a vast ricefield near a quiet, friendly peasant community. Luang Por Naag, a 1,000-year-old pillar of faith for locals, sits in a vault made of two layers of safety glass equipped with an anti-theft alarm. The vault is built on a thick, concrete platform and also has its door secured by an iron gate.

Phra Baidika Kaew Orano, the abbot of Wat Khoke, said the statue had been stolen on three occasions, but it should never happen again. The monk said Luang Por Naag arrived at Wat Khoke in 1747, during the late Ayutthaya period, and has since become the object of undying faith since farmers believed the statue could summon rain for them. About 20 years ago, Luang Por Naag was stolen on two occasions, but miraculously the thieves abandoned the statue in a ricefield, the abbot said.

Luang Por Naag was then enclosed within iron bars in order to keep thieves out. Nevertheless, the statue was stolen again in May 2003, and this time the temple and local people had to wait for four months until another miracle took place _ Bangkok metropolitan police arrested the gang that stole it and recovered the statue.

Phra Baidika Kaew said that even though Luang Por Naag was kept securely behind safety glass, he sometimes dreamt that the image had been removed again. "I don't know if we could save the statue if a gang of thieves came along. Police do not come around here much," he said. The monk said the Fine Arts Department often does "too little, too late" in its efforts to protect antiquities, while always blaming budget constraints.

Ayutthaya has around 800 temples, but about 300 of them are deserted, making them vulnerable to looters. But not all the temples have the resources to provide their treasures with adequate security. Wat Tongpu, for instance, had to lift Luang Phor Sila, a life-sized Buddha image, using a pulley and place it on a beam under the roof of the temple.

Phra Khru Suwithan Pariyatkit, the temple's abbot, said thieves had made off with the temple's valuables on several occasions and the police had not provided much help. "I do not have the funds to ensure the statue is safe. I have given up with the police. They came when I reported the break-in, but nothing happened," Phra Khru Suwithan said.

Although the thieves had been seen on several occasions at various antique markets in Ayutthaya, nobody had caught them yet, Phra Khru Suwithan said. Some thieves, he said, had even asked if they could purchase certain objects, but when told they were not for sale, the audacious crooks threatened to come back and steal them.

"We planned to put iron bars around those items, but it was too late. They were all stolen. The thieves kept coming back and our monks gave up the fight in despair," he said. Phra Khru Suwithan said the thieves had even made death threats to the monks in the temple. He said he wanted the Fine Arts Department and provincial and tambon administration organisations to pay more attention to protecting national treasures.

Wat Klang Klong Sabua, in Phra Nakhon Si Ayutthaya district, began taking its own initiatives by installing security grilles on all the windows of its boht (chapel) where three Buddha images, aged between 250-500 years, are kept. The temple's abbot, Phra Athikarn Thawatchai Kutathammo, also had to sleep in the boht every night to safeguard the statues. The monk said four Buddha images were once stolen but were later found.

So, in 1970 the then abbot left four of six ancient images of the temple in the care of Chao Samphraya National Museum. The other two were kept at the temple for worshippers. The temple has already taken one of the four images back from the museum and plans to bring the other three back this year as villagers thought the chapel was the right place to keep them.

"They said the statues should not be kept in a room in a museum. They thought that made the images meaningless. They said they were not dolls," Phra Athikarn Thawatchai said. The temple would employ three security guards once all the statues were under the same roof and he would sleep in the boht as usual.

Meanwhile, Ayutthaya police chief Pol Maj-Gen Wanchai Thanadkij admitted that preventing theft was difficult because police were not immediately made aware of temple break-ins and the police budget was insufficient. However, Pol Maj-Gen Wanchai said police would soon help officials from the Fine Arts Department take pictures and register Buddha images and antiquities at all temples in Ayutthaya, which would help in tracking them down if stolen.

Death of the Mekong

Chinese Poster

Superb background story today in the New York Times, about the Chinese plan to construct a half-dozen dams on the Mekong and thereby seize almost complete control of the most important waterway in Southeast Asia. The economic, environmental, and political consequences on Laos, Thailand, and Cambodia will be monumental, but no country seems to have the will to stand up to Chinese hegemony.

New York Times
March 19, 2005
Jane Perlez

The reason is China. China's ravenous appetite for hydroelectric power at home and its thrust southward into Southeast Asia in search of trade is changing the very character of the Mekong. This is true not only in China itself, but also for the five nations and 60 million rural people downstream for whom the great river serves as their life's blood.

Several hundred miles upstream from Sri Sumwantha's simple home, China has completed two dams. It is pushing ahead with three more and has three others on the drawing board. Just about 70 miles away from here, China has blasted reefs and rocks at the border of Laos and Myanmar to clear the way for its trading vessels to reach new markets deep into Laos.

The effects of the river projects that serve China's colossal upstream ambitions have been visible for several years, but are growing more worrying, say conservationists and those who live on the river.

Read the Rest

Richard at Thai-Blogs.com

Wat Arun by Carl Parkes

It always surprises me when I find a great site about Thailand, after all the time I spend looking at websites and blogs about the country, but this Bangkok blog looks like a real winner. The blog itself is actually a collection of blogs from several Thais and farangs in Thailand, including this guy named Richard. The name struck a bell, but it took a moment to remember about Richard and his once-great Thailand blog, which he shut down about a year ago.

Richard is an English teacher and computer consultant who works at a large English language school in Samut Prakan, about an hour south of Bangkok. He closed down his non-profit blog to concentrate on his work at the school, and maintain a blog about teaching English in Thailand, which he was able to successfully fill with advertising. He just didn't have enough time to do all the work, so the freebie blog had to go, but I've long wondered whatever happened to all his excellent background information and advice about the Kingdom.

In any event, it's great to see Richard once again active with a blog, plus he has an excellent eye for photography, and can help understand more about the sometimes mysterious ways of Thailand. Here's a short example and link:

At times, Thai people can be very superstitious. Not only do they wait for auspicious times to do things, but they also rely heavily on spirits to help protect them. I guess the longer I stay in Thailand, the more in-touch I become with Thai culture and start to become assimilated. This morning, I finally bought myself a statue of Nang Kwak. This spirit is supposed to bring wealth to the household and is particularly popular with shopkeepers. The spirit is dressed in traditional Thai dress. In her left hand is a money bag and her right hand is beckoning Thai style - palm down. She is either beckoning customers to come into the store or asking for wealth to come her way. Either way, hopefully it will bring good luck to our own book store.

This spirit is known throughout Asia, though she manifests in a different form. In the same shop where I bought this statue of Nang Kwak, there was another version though this one was a beckoning cat! To me, it looked too much like Hello Kitty so I decided to stick with a more traditional image. Now all I have to do is fix up an alter and make sure I give her some offerings of things like a glass of water and maybe some peeled fruit.

Richard at Thai-Blogs.com

Idle Days on Da Vinci Code

Dinner at Da Vinci's

Please forgive the lack of new posts this week, but despite all the time I spend wandering around the Asian blogosphere, sometimes nothing new or unique pops up and I'd rather not bore everyone with useless links. But just to keep you interested and coming back for more, here's a very good post from Idle Days in Singapore with his impressions of the Da Vinci Code. Nothing to do with Asia (or photography or travel), but it's a very well written article with his personal observations and plenty of useful links. This must have taken him a helluva long time to research and write.......

I have just completed reading The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown, probably the biggest household name by now (thanks to the letter b for the donation).

I must admit that I am both intrigued and repulsed by the author’s idea of the Holy Grail; that Jesus was totally human, took Mary Magdalene as wife and actually had children; that the whole of the Christian faith is essentially a lie.

Of course we all know that people dispute the Holy Bible all the time and I’m not even arguing against the fact that perhaps the Christian doctrine may pose flaws, as with all religions. However, Dan Brown has tried to screw the entire faith upside down and while, I think I’m fairly open-minded about religion and God in general, I simply cannot accept a lot of the stuff he says about the sacred feminine and ideas about the aftermath of Christ’s crucifixion.

If you take the novel at face value, I’d say that it is a very interesting read indeed. If you do not include your views on the Christian faith, it is technically a good story. The writing isn’t fantastic and that is where I appreciate it because it is easy to understand and you don’t have to consult the dictionary as much or at all. There are a few unexpected twists and even the biggest critic would admit that it is hard to keep the book down. It is one of those books which merits a movie, which incidentally will be made into one, starring one of my favourite actors, Tom Hanks.

Idle Days on The Da Vinci Code

Mr. Brown Meets Nick Leeson

Nick Leeson with Red Umbrella

It's not great secret that wonderful Nick Leeson has returned to Boat Quay and has been hanging out with the futures boys at One Boat Quay, but less known is that Mr. Brown is now on vacation in Bangkok and refuses the "extra" services offered by friendly massage ladies. Do I really believe this? Not a chance.

More Bed Supperclub
Ok, I am sad to report that, White Men can't dance.

Neither can the fat Asian dudes next door too, for that matter.

Tiffany, the kids are at home, well taken care of by grandpa and grandma, and maid. Thanks for asking. In fact, they were at Disney on Ice on Sunday, where Isaac fell asleep halfway through the show, and Faith got frightened by the loud music at first. My mom said she got over it in time to enjoy the second half of the show.

We call them every night, to make sure they're ok. And also so that Mommy gets to hear their voices.

Linda, the wives are at their spa thing. Chillin' out in a different way.

Bubblemunche, it was really clean lah. Except I felt dirty listening to Mr "Grunt, that's good, yeah, groan" in the next room.

And yeah, the chilli here can be vicious. The other thing about Thai food is that they seem to whack sugar in everything, even savoury dishes.

Ok, back to laughing at the bad dancers. Before the unusually early 1am curfew kicks in and we all have to go home.

Mr. Brown Does Bangkok

Nick at Bali Blog

Balinese Dancer by Carl Parkes

This has absolutely nothing to do with Southeast Asia, Bali or anything else with this blog, but I still find it amusing that Nick at Bali Blog would post such a silly IQ test.

The following short quiz consists of 4 questions and tells whether you are qualified to be a professional. Scroll down for each answer. (The questions are not that difficult.)

1. How do you put a giraffe into a refrigerator?

Correct answer: Open the refrigerator, put in the giraffe and close the door.

This question tests whether you tend to do simple things in an overly complicated way.

2. How do you put an elephant into a refrigerator?

Wrong Answer: Open the refrigerator, put in the elephant and close the refrigerator.

Correct Answer: Open the refrigerator, take out the giraffe, put in the elephant and close the door.

This tests your ability to think through the repercussions of your actions.

3.The Lion King is hosting an animal conference. All the animals attend except one. Which animal does not attend?

Correct Answer: The Elephant. The Elephant is in the refrigerator.

This tests your memory.

OK, even if you did not answer the first three questions correctly, you still have one more chance to show your abilities.

4. There is a river you must cross, but it is inhabited by crocodiles. How do you manage it?

Correct Answer: You swim across. All the crocodiles are attending the Animal Meeting.

This tests whether you learn quickly from your mistakes.

Ika actually got 2 right, which is 2 more than I got.

By Nick | March 14, 2005

Bali Blog by Nick in Seminyak

Chris Myrick Explores China

Chris Leads the Revolution

Chris Myrick recently left the safe confines of Singapore to explore the wild ways of China from his cocoon of Shanghai, to find the about Chinese beer, with other thoughts.

Five thousand years of culture would last for another day, but most ales are best served fresh.

To my great regret, the brewery had either ceased to exist or moved. Upon arrival at the Beijing Asia Hotel, none of the staff, including the concierge, had heard of the place. It was supposed to have been in the West Wing of the building. Disheartened, I set up the road for Sanlitun, a well-known street of bars.

On the way there I was hit upon by a couple of beggars. They were children. In both cases adult minders were standing nearby while the kids chased after me. I hoped the 'minders' were their parents. While it's horrible that a parent would use a child to beg, there are worse things.

Chris in China

Asia Bloggers Quit

Blogger from Rangoon

I'm not sure exactly what is going on with bloggers in Asia, but it's obvious that they are quitting. Several blogs geared towards the "single life" in Asia have voluntarily shut down in recent months for obvious reasons, such as spam and trolls. Sorry about that guys, but sex Asia sites often have short shelf.

But then the shutdown rate has moved on to better sites including Jodi at Asia Pages, who has claimed she quit her blog due to some racist comments in her open comments page. I don't think that is likely. Jodi is an American and she knows how to fight, but she gives up? Nah. Gotta be something else.

And today, one of the most important, erudite bloggers about Asia has thrown in the towel. This is disturbing news, since few people cover the gritty world of Asia as ESWN.

I can only wonder: why?

Dear Friend: You were probably trying to reach a page on the EastSouthWestNorth blog. As of March 12, 2005, that blog and all its archived materials have been removed from the server. There are a number of reasons why the blogger made that decision, including:

First, the blogger has a full-time job as well as a full-fledged commercial website of his own. The blog was meant to be a collection of bookmarks and thoughts in his attempt to understand the world around him. Unfortunately, he has found that the blog was turning into a full-time occupation dealing with bandwidth theft, hate mail and the rest of it. This was not his plan.

Second, the blog traffic has shot up to a point where there are significant financial considerations involved. The blog draws zero income, and the blogger makes it a point of honor to pay the operational costs out of his own pocket. The blogger has no intention of seeking revenue, either through contributions, advertisements or sponsorships. While the blogger thinks that he can can afford the bandwidth charges (note: the 'worst' day last month had 3.6 million hits and 102 gigabytes of data transfer), he weighs two options: either give the money to Doctors Without Borders or spend it on bandwidth usage. There was no doubt in his mind that his preference would be where some actual good can be done.

This does not mean that the blog is defunct for good. For now, the blog will operate in a bandwidth-conserving text mode and then it will be re-launched in April. Some archived materials will be brought back, but most of the 400 megabytes of content will be gone. For example, you can see below what will be saved for the month of March so far. In the future, the blog contents will be more focused on media, culture and politics in Greater China and the Americas. There will be fewer posts; the posts will be focused and analytical; and the longer pieces will be hosted on external sites. ¡Hasta luego!

ESNW Says Goodbye

Bangkok Bikers

Helicat Confederate

Finally, somebody has something to say about the motorcycles and motocyclist taxis in Bangkok, that have taken over the sidewalks.

Bangkok's motorcycle trails.

Few cities in the world have taken care to ensure the safety and well being of motorcycles as Bangkok. Virtually every named road in Bangkok has a motorcycle trail. They are easy to find. They are located between the road and the buildings. They can vary in width from several meters to perhaps just one meter. Taking care to ensure the safety of motorcycles is obviously a high priority for the city.

After all, having to deal with buses, taxies, trucks, tuktuks, and cars when driving on the main road can easily put the motorcycle in harm's way. The city has even provided a separate convenient invisible lane near the curb that motorcycles can travel the opposite direction on one way streets. The invisible lane is only visible from the seat of a motorcycle. Because of that, buses may accidentally drop off pedestrians directly in front of motorcycles on the invisible lane causing a collision that could injure the motorcycle operator.

The only remaining problem the motorcycles have is the pedestrians that walk on the motorcycle trails. This happens very frequently because the motorcycle trails are very similar in appearance to sidewalks. It’s easy for the pedestrian to get confused and accidentally walk onto the trail. That poses a risk that the motorcycle may become damaged when colliding with a pedestrian. Fortunately for the city, few if any legal cases have been brought to court by motorcycle operators. Certainly they could successfully seek in court financial restitution from the city for allowing pedestrians on the motorcycle trails. I am sure judges can clearly see and would rule for the motorcycle.

The judge could easily rule that the city is negligent in ensuring the safety of motorcycles on the trails by repeatedly allowing pedestrians on them. So for the sake of the motorcycles and the bank account of the city, Bangkok probably should make a more direct effort to keep the pedestrians off the trails. I am sure they could easily divert manpower from the police that are actively putting pressure on some adult venues that attract tourists by early closings.

I understand the logic behind this indirect approach. Because tourists visit several types of venues, restaurants and stores, by eliminating one the others would also feel the same pressure by reduced numbers of tourists wanting to come to Bangkok. This is similar to clipping a few feathers on a bird wing. Just clip a few and the bird can’t fly, you don’t need to clip them all. Personally I feel that is the wrong approach. Simply because not all the pedestrians in Bangkok are tourists, and would only reduce the number of pedestrians on the motorcycle trails and not eliminate them.

Motorcycle Mania From Stickman Bangkok

Internet in China

Perfect Internet

I'm going to paste in some comments from Sinosplice below having to do with internet problems in China, but first an explanation about my service here in San Francisco.

I have 56K connection and my service provider is called PCMagic (www.pcmagic.net), and it costs $89 per year and is unlimited. I get up around 7am each morning, make coffee, walk downstairs, newspaper, check on whether my motorcycle has been stolen (common), return to recliner. After Chron, coffee, and cigar (Antonio and Cleopatra Grenadier Dark), I turn on computer and log pcmagic. That's it; I'm ready to go.

I then leave my internet connection going until about 5 pm, when I disconnect and move on to other things. I've never downloaded a music file. No, that's a lie. I did once. It was a song from Joni Mitchell called Blue. Took 20 minutes. Sheesh.

Seems like folks have problems with internet connections in China, and can't figure out whether it's just lousy service or some sneaky government conspiracy. Here are comments via the always informative SinoSplice:

******************************

If it is being blocked, it must be local. I'm getting in no problem in Guangxi.

A-OK in Xi'an, but what about the frequent use of the word "bitch" on the March 8 post?

Fine from Beijing, for what it's worth. Which ain't much.

Ohhh, give me a break, it ain't the "bitch" word that's causing problems. I know one thing: all those people who bitched about Hank's paranoia are eating their words now.

A few comments:

- The internets are definitely misbehaving at the moment, but it is hard to tell if it's the Nanny's malevolent doing, or just technical problems. I have been having a lot of mail problems lately too.

- Today, Sinosplice took an age to load (in Beijing). It eventually showed up on the browser, but it took almost ten minutes. The same thing often happens with Google News.

- English swear words don't seem to be a problem. I regularly use the word "f*ck" on Danwei (spelled in full without the '*') and that never seems to generate problems.

- At the rate people are signing up for DSL connections alll over China, there must be many problems which are merely technical.

- And finally, some words of wisdom from Intel founder Andy Grove: "Only the paranoid survive."

One more thing, about that email problem:

I have often had a problem in the last few weeks where I can't download my email from the POP server. When I try to use webmail, I get "document contains no data".

If I restart my computer or use a different computer with a different IP address, I can get on the webmail interface, and delete certain emails. After that, I can once again download from the POP server.

It usually seems to be spam email (Viagra, mortgages etc.) that causes the problem. Sometimes it seems to be emails with attachments (Word documents, whatever).

The annoying and sometimes paranoia-inducing thing about it, is that people using the same POP server as me do not seem to be having problems.

Does anyone have any technical knowledge to explain this problem?

I suppose one should not discount government action, but the growth in usage is exceeding the increase in physical installation and there is a significant strain on the system, especially in Shanghai-Suzhou-Wuxi corridor.

Some thoughts about Andy Grove's comment. If you are doing business here in Asia, one should always calculate why this guy said this and why he did not say that. One should always know what faction this guy and that guy are associated with. If you are not of Asian ethnecity, Asians will assume you do not know what is going on (with sound statistical reasoning). So if you have the capability of knowing what is going on, you can manipulate the factions to your advantage without ever being fingered as the villain. It is a big advantage.

Well, at least now I know it isn't just me. I've had the recent errors and email issues recently. And my DSL connection here in Shanghai is at times excruciatingly slow. For the site and email problems I have always blamed my hosting company. For the speed issues, I've always blamed the fact that I live in an old building.

I think from now on I will blame who I blame for most of life's problems -- the Boston Red Sox.

A suggestion for those who are experiencing trouble accessing their mail or websites - start using encrypted connections. Many POP servers will accept SSL connections, easy to set up in outlook - similarly, Gmail and many other sites can be accessed at https:\\sitename over a ssl connection. You could even set up your blog to serve over https as well as an open connection for those behind a keyword filtering system.

Eventually the netnanny might start blocking SSH and SSL connections - but for now they are a great way to effectively get around any keyword filtering setup.

Jeremy and Dan, thanks very much for sharing your own experiences.

Donald, that's very useful information, and I'll see if there's any way I can implement it. Thanks.

SinoSplice for News about China

Christopher Walken Stalks Chiang Mai

Air America Actor

Need an actor, singer, or guitarist for your upcoming epic filmed in Chiang Mai? Joe Cummings might just be your man!

Joe Cummings -- Actor, Guitarist, Guidebook Writer

Bangkok Post Letters

Bangkok Post Postbag

The Letters to the Editor (Postbag) section of the Bangkok Post is always worth a read if only to marvel at the oddball Westerners who write in with their pet peeves about the kingdom, or push their wacky agendas.

There's Eric down in Chonburi who feels compelled to weekly remind the world that he's a vegetarian and that anyone who eats meat is destroying the planet. The so-called Italian doctor who uses such complicated and meaningless English that nobody has any idea what he is writing about. And the Westerner out in Issan who has an overwhelming urge to remind us on a regular basis that Bush is the devil incarnate and the all the world's problems are the fault of Amerika.

Today, however, three decent letters worth your consideration:


Forget marketing Phuket for a while

So the chairman of Orient Thai Airlines is frustrated because all attempts to lure tourists back to Phuket are unsuccessful and he wants the government to subsidize airlines flying to the island.

Perhaps a lack of credibility among Thai government officials is partly to blame. We all remember the government saying there was no Sars in Thailand, no bird flu in Thailand and no terrorists in Thailand. Why should tourists now believe Tourist Authority of Thailand pronouncements that Phuket is back to normal?

As of three days ago (March 8), when I drove the entire length of Beach road in Patong, the area still looked like a war zone. Even an official stated last week that tour agents were reluctant to recommend Phuket as a destination since Patong looked like "one large construction site".

Is it really in Phuket's interest to lure tourists here and then have them find out that much of the most visited area on the island is still in a shambles? I think not.

Instead, the millions of baht being spent on what amounts to false advertising should be used to expeditiously rebuild the damaged areas of the island.

STEVE RUBENSTEIN
Phuket


A transfer is no punishment for rape

Think about it: A young girl is raped, reports the rape to the police, and then is raped by the police. Unbelievable!

Rape is one of the worst crimes perpetrated against a woman/girl, and the punishment must fit the horrendous nature of the crime.

In the latest case, the accused police officers, no matter their rank, should never be released on bail. It will just end again in "transfers" as our government/justice system does most of the time.

How can the public ever have faith in such a system, where the police force stinks of corruption and, depending on their financial/social status, the culprits are never punished fully for their crimes.

I feel for the girl involved in the recent case and would like to thank the Pavena foundation for rendering assistance.

RAWEEWAN


Is this crown worth the effort and expense?

Although, legally speaking, a US museum owns the Ayutthaya crown, Thais have the legitimate right to try to recover it if it is proved to be of Thai origin.

As the headpiece was purchased in the past, it is only fair to the present owner that the Thai government should pay for it. But it will cost the government millions if it is up for sale. So, let's consider if it is really worth the effort, time and money.

We should take all factors into account. The foreign curators/owners have not handled the piece with disdain. Perhaps some kind-hearted, well-heeled Thai corporation could do the nation a favour by forking out most of the money.

We Thais should learn from this incident to value national treasures and avoid their theft and smuggling abroad.

SID TERASON

Shanghai Diaries Visits Pumpkin Head

The Many Faces of Mao

The always amusing Dan Washburn recently escorted two of his American friends around the highlights of China, including a short visit to Beijing, where they dutifully visited the mausoleum of Chairman Mao. Dave hilariously speculates on the true state of the corpse, then provides some amazing background and recommends his travel agent in Shanghai.

The rest happens rather quickly. Turn a corner and there he is, several feet away, wearing an army green uniform, lying on his back, covered by a large rectangular glass case. His face, rather orange and rather plastic, looks -- how do I put this? -- like a pumpkin. A glowing jack-o-lantern. I remember its striking color -- radiant -- but little else as far as details go. We were ushered through. Never stopped moving. No time to pause. No time to reflect. No time to inspect.

It was a very short visit to a rather large building. (What occupies the rest of the place?) But I did it. I saw Mao's body.

Or did I?

"Do you think it is real?" my friend Ji Xiao Ming asked later that night at dinner.

"Do you?" I asked.

"Maybe it is not," he said. "Maybe it is a wax figure."

Shanghai Diaries

Korea Blogger Quits

North Korea Loves Blogs

I'm not sure where this cycle will end, if ever, but bloggers in Asia are quitting their hobbies in droves. A few days ago, it was Hank, the English language teacher in China, who quit. He has issues with his Chinese school where he teaches, after they discovered his postings about his somewhat unfavorable impressions of the country, and he wants to keep his job.

Fair enough. Good luck, Hank, and thanks for all your great postings.

Now, it's Jodi in Korea with her blog called Asia Pages. There's a link on this page over on the right where I've rounded up some of the best bloggers in Asia. Just look under Korea.

Jodi claims to have quit her blog due to bad comments in her comment file. I've read most of her comments in all of her posts, and they are mostly very intelligent thoughts about her life in Korea as a Korean American, and all the obvious problems that might bring to the equasion. People are critical, but perspective, and most everybody has been fairly polite. No reason to censor any of those posts.

But Jodi quit.

OK, let's speculate. The comments reason is not valid, in my humble opinion, and there must be other reasons: Jodi is an American working for a Korean corporation to promote an industrial project in Busan. Korean society wants her to somehow work with an American attitude but at the same time be somehow conservative and traditional Korean. She's got a Korean boyfriend. She has revealed too much in her previous posts about her workplace and people she has been involved with, and somebody made threats.

What do I think? Somebody upstairs told her to quit, and she just found the easiest excuse.

Thursday, March 10, 2005

I Quit

After reading through the hateful comments The Asia Pages has generated, I have come to the quick and easy decision that yours truly officially quits blogging. I am now handing over The Asia Pages to someone else as frankly, I'm finished subjecting myself to the HATE that seems to run through these readers.

The Asia Pages used to attract insightful, intelligent readers but now I see it has suddenly attracted people who do not take the time to think, who are not willing to communicate on an intelligent level about issues that aren't as simple and 2-dimensional as some people's brains are and those who are simply looking to create conflict and not a platform for any meaningful discussion.

That is the problem with blogging. People read selectively. You can state all the facts for them up front but they will choose to read what they want. As Bluejives said before, the reading comprehension skills of many the readers here is quite embarrassing.

What used to be a pleasure for me has now turned into a waste of time. I posted for the readers and as it seems the majority of readers have turned very aggressive and cannot effectively communicate their opinions in a respectful way, I'm just going to quit, simple as that. The decision was sadly, an easy one to make.

But I leave you in good hands and I think The Asia Pages can continue successfully without me.

In the meantime, it has overall been fun, I will miss the more intelligent readers out there and the interesting people I have met, but for the time being, I'm calling it quits as I don't have the patience to deal with the majority of you. (And those reasonable readers out there know who they are as I'm sure it's obvious who the idiots in this case are.)

Maybe I'll be back but for the time being, I'm lying low until all this hate I feel cools down.

If I seriously offended anyone, I apologize, however, until I hear a legit argument mapped out telling me how it is I have been inappropriate, I'm not going to acknowledge doing anything wrong. Legit arguments go beyond simply calling me racist and personally attacking me. Legit arguments are of course, more intelligent than that

.
Jodi Says Farewell from Korea

Job Opportunities in the Philippines

Cebu Sinulog by Carl Parkes

Our latest series describes Pagadian City as a land of hired assassins where journalists are caught in the crossfire. Pagadian is the most dangerous place in the Philippines for journalists — four have been murdered there since 2000, making it the murder capital of the country as far as journalists are concerned.

The series traces this high murder rate to the proliferation of criminal syndicates and illegal rackets, the number of loose firearms, and the breakdown of law and order brought about by the involvement of local officials and policemen in organized crime. Journalists who expose corruption and the link between local power and criminality are gunned down, their killers able to get away because they are protected by those in office.

Written by a journalist who is a native of Zamboanga del Sur, the report attempts to look at those responsible for the killings of newsmen there. He unravels a complex story that links several politicians in the area to the crimes. The series, however, does not tag any particular politician to the murders. Instead, it looks at the culture of violence, impunity, and unaccountable power that have given rise to the killings.

News from the Philippines

Nightmare in Bali

Bali Forum

A young Australian girl goes to Bali, and is busted at the airport with a large amount of pot in her bodyboard bag. Indonesia now wants the death penalty...for pot?

An Australian woman charged with attempting to smuggle drugs into Bali will face court this week in a trial which could result in the death penalty. Gold Coast beauty school student Schapelle Corby will appear in court in Denpasar on Thursday, court officer I Made Sukarta told AAP.

Corby, 27, of Tugun, has been imprisoned since last October, when customs officers at Bali's Ngurah Rai airport found a plastic zip-lock bag containing 4.2kg of cannabis leaf and heads in her unlocked bodyboard bag. Corby has consistently maintained her innocence, claiming somebody must have planted the pillow case-sized stash in her luggage between Brisbane and Denpasar airports.

Corby has been awaiting trial in the notorious Kerobokan prison, which houses several of the Bali bombers, including the so-called smiling assassin Amrozi bin Nurhasyim, Mukhlas and mastermind Imam Samudra. Police and prosecutors have warned they will ask for the maximum penalty of death by firing squad if she is convicted.

Bali Forum Discussion

China Blogger Says Goodbye

Mao with Bloggers

Don't you just get upset with bloggers who quit their blog and give absolutely no notice? It's perfectly OK to quit your blog for all the usual reasons (too much work! too much homework! law school exams! no more ideas!), but every blogger has some responsibility to either post a final message, or send out a final email to everyone who has been following their blog.

I've quoted this blogger, Hank, in China several times, since he has great writing skills and is willing to share his inner thoughts about living in China, teaching English, married to a Chinese lady, and so it is with great regret that he has closed down his blog.

But at least he had the decency to send me a message and explain the reasons for his withdrawal from the blogging world. I understand his situation and wish him the best of luck. I posted his controversial comment about going upcountry to visit relatives several weeks ago, but he has removed that post, but it might be mirrored somewhere.

Hi! This is Hank from The Laowai Monologues:

If you're receiving this email, and it hasn't been shot into your spam box, then you should know I chose to send you this email because at one time or another, you had left a comment or several comments.

Today, ends my blogging here in China.

Without going into dramatics, or at least attempting not to, my blogging began to jeopardize my job, my marriage and my life. Let me give the final spill: it's not eloquent, but I hope that many of you will stay in contact with me, and I want you--each one of you to know--that your support and comments through the last 2 and half years of my blogging career gave me moments of lucidity, sanity, and triumphs.

Your emails brought me great satisfaction, great joy, and a real sense of connecting with humanity. Blogging was great for me; I never considered myself a real blogger; I mean, I never made daily blogs; I made lengthy missives which required I work and revise a great deal on them--some postings I thought humbly were quite
good; others, in retrospect, made me cringe.

I am ending my blog because right now the internet is filled with moles, and in the People's Republic of China, I feel that now and especially in the next few years leading to the Beijing 2008 Olympics, control and observation of websites will come under close scrutiny by the government internet police.

Now, my blog was never really political--no mentioning of 1989, or FG, or anything that could be interpreted as direct criticism of the government. It was the events of my life here: my struggle, my isolation, my stupid self-pity, my constant battle with the whole culture, and my love for my wife, my students, and my teaching,
but here in the PRC, some people are looking, yes searching for offense, something to grip their claws on and tear the expression of individual voice we all have.

Yesterday, I got word, and I won't tell how exactly, that some entries on my site were emailed to my Foreign Affairs Officer. These entries were the Madame X episode; Hail to the Chief (about the college president) and the entry on my old site about my courtship with my wife, her troubles from her peers, and our eventual marriage.

The email heading was:

Bad teacher

and the entries were preceded with:

This are you teacher; a bad danger to you.

Also, I found out that my FAO had mailed this to the Vice Dean of my department, a good friend; he was not amused by the entries.

The bottom line: I do not want to risk losing my wife, my job, and be deported if push came to shove. Maybe that's extreme; maybe I'm overreacting, but at this point, I don't want to find out what exactly the consequences are, and its best to bow out now before I do jeopardize those things I have and love. This hits too close.

I probably couldn't reach everyone who has sent me an email or made comments on my site through this long goodbye, but please feel free to mention me in passing to anyone who wonders, and you may do so on your blog if you have one.

My wife agrees with my decision; I would love to take a bravado attitude about this whole thing, and say, to hell with the people, but this is China, and brother, you better never forget it. Yeah, you bet I'm scared.

I doubt I'll be returning to blogging anytime soon.

I wish you all the best.

In closing,

China is a lonely country for foreigners; the provinces even more so; isolation and scrutiny by the masses isn't an easy thing to come to grips with. I definitely had my ups and downs, but one thing I know, as syrupy and mushy as it sounds, love is important: for your spouse or your students, and yourself and who you are, but never
forsake those parts that make you human.

Please keep in touch!

Best,
Hank
The Laowai Monologues
March 9, 2005

"And, in the isolation of the sky, at evening, casual flocks of
pigeons make ambiguous undulations as they sink downward to
darkness on extended wings."---Wallace Stevens

Ron Morris at 2Bangkok.com

www.2bangkok.com

Ron Morris at his website aptly named 2Bangkok continues to amaze me daily with his comprehensive look at events and news in Thailand, and beyond. Plus, he shares my fascination with tall buildings, amazing bridges, old trams, and oddball tidbits from around the world. This is the best website in Southeast Asia, and I only wish that somebody in Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Jakarta, Manila, or even Hong Kong would follow his template. Ron, as always, I salute you for your great work.

2Bangkok by Ron Morris

New York Public Library Digital Photographs

Yukata Disco by Carl Parkes

The good folks at the New York public libraries have taken down some of their old, dusty books from the back shelves and digitized stories and photos and put them online, which provides manna to archivists or perhaps a great reason to waste a few days while the rain comes down. The link below leads to the Asia category, which also includes the Middle East. Hopefully, they will separate the Asia regions into Southeast Asia, Northeast Asia, China, Indian Subcontinent, Middle East, etc. but in the meantime, this might be a great resource.

The section about the nats of Burma seems worthwhile. I just love nats.

The antiquities, natural history, ruins and other curiosities of Egypt, Nubia and Thebes. Exemplified in near two hundred drawings taken on the spot. By Frederic Lewis Norden.(1780)

Antiquités de la Nubie, ou, Monumens inédits des bords du Nil, situés entre la première et la seconde cataracte, dessinés et mesurés, en 1819, par F.C. Gau ... Ouvrage faisant suite au grand ouvrage (1822-27])

Bilder aus Mekka... / C. Snouck Hurgronje.(1889)
A description of some ancient monuments, with inscriptions, still existing in Lydia and Phrygia, several of which are supposed to be tombs of the early kings.(1842)

The history of Japan, giving an account of the ancient and present state and government of that empire [...] Together with a description of the kingdom of Siam. (MDCCXXVII [1727])

Japanese fairy tale series. Kokushi daijiten / [kansh¯usha Hagino Yoshiyuki ; hensansha Yashiro Kuniji, Hayakawa Junzabur¯o, Inobe Shigeo] (Meiji 41 [1908])

I monumenti dell'Egitto e della Nubia disegnati dalla spedizione scientifico-letteraria toscana in Egitto; distribuiti in ordine di materie interpretati ed illustrati dal dottore Ippolito Rosellini.(1832-44)

The monuments of Nineveh, from drawings made on the spot. By Austen Henry Layard, Esq., D.C.L. Illustrated in one hundred plates.(1849)

Pantheon egyptien : collection des personnages mythologiques de l'ancienne Egypte, d'apres les monuments, avec un texte explicatif. (1823-[1825?])

Peking the beautiful; comprising seventy photographic studies of the celebrated monuments of China's northern capital and its environs, complete with descriptive and historical notes. (1927)

Pictures of former Korean palaces. (195?)

A second series of the Monuments of Nineveh; including bas-reliefs from the palace of Sennacherib and bronzes from the ruins of Nimroud. / Austen Henry Layard, M.P. (1853)

The Sundhya or the Daily Prayers of the Brahmins. Illustrated in a series of original drawings from nature, demonstrating their attitudes and different signs and figures performed by them during the (1851)

Le temple d'Angkor Vat. Premiere partie. L'architecture du monument. (1929)

The thirty-seven nats, a phase of spirit-worship prevailing in Burma, by Sir R. C. Temple. With full-page and other illustrations. (1906)

Turris Babel, sive Archontologia qua primo priscorum post diluvium hominum vita, mores rerumque gestarum magnitudo, secundo Turris fabrica civitatumque extructio, confusio linguarum ... (1679)

La vie et les paysages en Egypte : études en héliotypies tirées d'après nature. ([ca. 1870-1875])

Voyage de l'Arabie Pétrée par Léon de Laborde et Linant. (1830)

L'Égypte et la Nubie : grand album monumental historique architectural. (1887)

New York Public Library Digital Wisdom

Sad News from Expat@Large

Expat@Large

Very sad and moving news from Expat@Large in Singapore, after receiving word that his longtime Filipino amah must leave Singapore and return home to save possession of her daughter.

Through various logistical and administrative nightmares detailed here here here and here in the archives of this blog, I was able to eventually get diminutive The Mouse from Hong Kong to Singapore to continue the arrangement. After 4 years as my amah in Hong Kong, she knows what I like, what I like to eat, how I like it cooked, where I deposit my dirty clothes (anywhere), what I need on a business trip of 3 days as opposed to one of 4 days. She is discreet enough to stay in her room when there are “special guests”…

I pay her well - the equivalent of her old HK salary - while all other Singapore domestic helpers are scraping along abut 2/3’s less. You see, she has a seven year old daughter, the doe-eyed Mousette, under the care of her grandfather (PapaMouse) back in the Philippine’s provinces, and I could not let her financial support be diminished purely because I was moving home towns, and getting a pay-rise! The Mouse has sacrificed so much so that Mousette can have a good education. Not seeing her grow up, not being there for the motherly things that both of them need. The shame of it is that in the economically crippled Philippines, a good education doesn’t necessarily make for success. Case in point: The Mouse herself - she has a Degree in Electrical Engineering and here she is ironing my clothes.

She is such a nice person, very religious, so very quiet with no outrageous social life, such a good cook, such a careful cleaner, and so freaking honest. And part of the thrill for her coming to Singapore was that her husband worked in Johor Bahru, just across the causeway in Malaysia. But whenever she offered to go up and visit him, he’d put her off and instead he would come down to Singapore to stay the night.

Read the Heartbreaking News

National Museums in Thailand?

Bangkok

The National Museums in Thailand would like to have returned to them all the treasures taken away from the country over the last few hundred years, and that is a strong sentiment, but only if the organisation entrusted to preserve and protect these national treasure has resources and competence to save these valued items. If they don't, then these items are best kept in other countries, including the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco, which is now displaying a range of works from Sukothai.

The PR director has a few comments:

Post misses significance of San Francisco show

The Asian Art Museum is proud to have organised the immensely important exhibition, "The Kingdom of Siam: The Art of Central Thailand, 1350-1800" _ the world's first major exhibition of art from Ayutthaya, and the first exhibition of classical art from Thailand shown in the United States in more than 30 years.

The museum worked closely with more than 15 institutions from all over the world _ including the National Museum of Thailand _ to bring the exhibition together, and we are delighted to showcase the rich cultural heritage of this important period of Thai history to a global audience. The exhibition is on view at the Asian Art Museum through May 8.

We at the museum are disappointed that the Bangkok Post's only reference to the exhibition focuses on one object, a beautiful crown whose place of origin in Thailand has not been conclusively confirmed by exhibition curators and other experts _ despite their best efforts. The crown was borrowed from the Philadelphia Museum of Art specifically for inclusion in "The Kingdom of Siam". Before being lent to the exhibition, the crown was on display in the galleries at the Philadelphia Museum of Art since 1982, and viewed by millions of visitors.

It is disheartening that Thailand's leading English newspaper makes no reference to the scholarly significance of the exhibition and its accompanying catalogue, or mentions the more than 80 other rare priceless treasures on view in the exhibition (most on view in the US for the first time, serving as unique ambassadors of Thai culture), but rather concentrates its coverage on one object that has actually been on view and accessible to the public for more than 23 years.

TIM HALLMAN
Asian Art Museum

San Francisco

Who Killed Hunter S. Thompson?

Who Killed Hunter?

This is disturbing news.

March 4, 2005 -- WAS Hunter S. Thompson's mysterious death really a suicide?

There are some serious irregularities surrounding the demise of the gonzo author, who was found shot to death in the kitchen of his Woody Creek, Colo., ranch on Feb. 20, and local cops seemed to have done a lackluster job of investigating.

Police reports obtained by the Rocky Mountain News note that cops arriving on the scene heard shots being fired, that Thompson's son, Juan, was allowed to be alone with the body, and that there was something odd about the gun Thompson supposedly used to kill himself.

Before his death, Thompson seemed in good spirits and was not known to be depressed. And considering his long-winded style, the absence of a note seems strange — he'd typed only the single word "counselor."

There were no eyewitnesses to the shooting, only an "earwitness" — Thompson's wife, Anita, who was on the phone with him at the time and who later drank scotch with the corpse. Her account of the incident is inconsistent: She alternately has said that she heard a loud, muffled noise and that she heard nothing but clicking.

The behavior of Juan, who was in the house at the time of the shooting, also was unusual. Pitkin County Deputy Sheriff John Armstrong said that when investigators arrived on the scene they heard shots, but Juan assured them he had merely been firing off a salute to his dead dad. Investigator Joseph DiSalvo also let Juan enter the kitchen alone and drape a scarf over the body.

And in his report, Deputy Ron Ryan noted the semi-automatic Smith & Wesson 645 found next to Thompson's body was in an unusual condition. There was a spent shell casing, but although there were six bullets left in the gun's clip, there was no bullet in the firing chamber, as there should have been under normal circumstances.

DiSalvo said he did not check the gun, adding, "I think a bullet from the magazine should have cycled into the chamber" unless there was a "malfunction." A spent slug was found in the stove hood behind the body. Conspiracy theorists make much of the fact that Thompson had been working on a far-fetched story about the World Trade Center attack at the time of his death.

As Canada's Globe and Mail reported, Thompson had "stumbled across what he felt was hard evidence showing the towers had been brought down not by the airplanes that flew into them but by explosive charges set off in their foundations."

New York Post Reports on the Mysterious Death of Hunter S. Thompson

New Blog from Jakarta

Jakarta Kid

I just keep promoting any new blogs from Indonesia, since they are few and far between, but they do pop up and generally die within a few months. But, The Man Who Will Not Be Named in Jakarta, keeps finding new sites, and he's just uncovered a really, really well written blog by a Brit who has been living in Jakarta for over a decade.

Let's hope this is not another blog that will get a plug, and then die, like Byron from Bandung. One good post with photos, and he quits. I'm also suspicious about this Jakarta Kid, since there is no email contact provided and all of his background content has been shoved down to the bottom. But, this guy can write.

But why did I choose Indonesia? Well, there was this edition of the National Geographic in which Indonesia looked so strangely, wildly beautiful. It was a land of erect blue volcanoes, exotic mosques, dark tropical skies and beautiful, uninhibited people; it was just the place for a not totally young, unattached chap like me who was tired of London and severely sick of some of his students.

Jakarta Kid

Another Mysterious Blog about Indonesia

Fred Burks: Traitor, Nutcase or Patriot?

Freddie and the Jets

Fred Burks is an American who many years ago went to Indonesia and lived with a family who taught him the word, while he also did volunteer work (Volunteers in Asia). He largely mastered Bahasa Indonesia, then moved to China where he somehow picked up Mandarin. Good job, Fred!

Later, he was hired by the American government to provide translation services since he was fluent in both Indonesian and Chinese, and the U.S. government was fairly short of experts in both languages.

Then he was called later into a session between the president of Indonesia and some officials of the Central Intelligence Agency, and that's when sparks started to fly:

Lost in Translation:
How Bush Interpreter
Got Through Security

He Is Fluent in Indonesian,
But He Also Testifies
For Accused Terrorist
By ANDREW HIGGINS and JAY SOLOMON
Staff Reporters of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
February 22, 2005; Page A1

JAKARTA, Indonesia -- Frederick Burks believes in UFOs, communes with dolphins, runs a Web site that promotes conspiracy theories about U.S. complicity in the 9/11 attacks and thinks Washington may have had a hand in blowing up bars on the Indonesian resort island of Bali.

And, until last October, he had the ear of the world's most powerful man: The 46-year-old California resident worked as an interpreter for George W. Bush in the president's dealings with the leader of Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation.

Now Mr. Burks has popped up in Jakarta as a star witness for the defense in the terrorism trial of a fundamentalist Islamic cleric. "He has some anger but he's a nice old man," says Mr. Burks of Abu Bakar Baasyir, the 68-year-old preacher the U.S. believes was behind the 2002 Bali bombings. The cleric is also believed by the U.S. to be the leader of a regional terrorist network linked to al Qaeda, but he strongly denies that and, in an earlier trial in 2003, an Indonesian court cleared him of directing a terrorist outfit.

Mr. Burks's testimony, delivered last month in a south Jakarta court, turned the former White House interpreter and sometime psychiatric nurse into a national celebrity here in Indonesia. He appeared on TV, spoke at universities, and was featured in magazines and newspapers. His rock-star aura had strangers stopping him on the street when he traveled here to testify from his home in Berkeley, Calif.

But he's considerably less popular these days with his former employers in the White House and the State Department, who praise his linguistic talents but are mighty upset that he has been spilling details of supposedly confidential conversations. "He's gone off some deep end," says Stephanie Van Reigersberg, his former boss. During the years that Mr. Burks was paid to whisper into the president's ear, she headed a State Department unit that provides interpreters for State, the White House and other branches of the U.S. government.

Speaking to the Jakarta court in fluent Indonesian, Mr. Burks described a secret 2002 meeting between a U.S. presidential envoy and Indonesia's then president, Megawati Sukarnoputri. He said the American had demanded that Ms. Megawati secretly detain Mr. Baasyir and then hand him over to the U.S. This demand preceded the Bali bombings and, says Mr. Burks, shows that the U.S. had it in for Mr. Baasyir even before his alleged crimes and suggests a frame-up.

Karen Brooks, who served as Mr. Bush's director for Asian Affairs on the National Security Council until last year and attended the meeting, says Mr. Burks was present as an interpreter. But she and the U.S. embassy in Jakarta deny his claims that the U.S. pressured Indonesia to hand over Mr. Baasyir. (They won't say what the meeting was about.) Ms. Megawati hasn't commented publicly but did attend a party in Jakarta to fete Mr. Burks during his recent visit.

Worried that Mr. Burks's testimony might upend Indonesia's most high-profile terrorism case, the prosecution has sought to undermine the American's credibility as a witness and grilled him in court about drug use and oddball writings rhapsodizing about a dead dolphin. (A previous attempt to prosecute the cleric fizzled: the only charge that stuck involved immigration violations.) Mr. Burks, who grew up in New Jersey and California, says he has experimented on occasion with ecstasy and peyote as part of his "spiritual journey."

"I was in disbelief that this guy was an interpreter for the president of the United States," said prosecutor Salman Maryadi after the hearing. "Considering his condition, how could he interpret for the leader of the world's sole superpower?"

The judge ruled the prosecutor's questioning about Mr. Burks's private peccadilloes irrelevant.

The U.S. government seems to have taken much the same view. For over 15 years, it used Mr. Burks's linguistic dexterity -- he also speaks excellent Chinese -- despite his refusal to sign a confidentiality agreement. Never a full-time government employee, he regularly worked on contract for the State Department, securing interpreting gigs with President Clinton, Mr. Bush and a number of lesser officials. He learned his Indonesian while living with a family on the island of Borneo in the 1980s, picked up Chinese during a teaching stint in China and, after training as a nurse in Florida, mixed interpreting and nursing.

Ms. Brooks, the former White House Indonesia expert, remembers Mr. Burks as the "most talented interpreter I've ever seen" but say she's flabbergasted that he never signed a confidentiality pledge. "You'd think we'd be vetting these people," she says. The State Department is supposed to take care of security clearances and confidentiality pledges for its staff and for contract workers if they are to have access to secret information.

Confronted with a dearth of qualified speakers of foreign languages -- frequently noted as a serious problem by officials and others since 9/11 -- the U.S. government has scrounged for talent, with few questions asked.

Mr. Burks, a former high-school math star whose friends called him "Freddy Whiz-o," says he never hid his views or enthusiasms. He says he had a mandatory, low-level security clearance, mainly a testament that he didn't have a police record, but declined to sign a confidentiality pledge. He says he also balked at filling in lengthy forms required to get secret clearance because he'd have had to confess to having twice taken ecstasy. "I couldn't lie," says Mr. Burks.

Ms. Van Reigersberg, who headed the State Department's interpreting division until last year, when she retired, says that while Mr. Burks wasn't bound by formal legal constraints, he was bound by professional ethics not to divulge what was said "by either a president or a policeman." She says she feels "mystified" and "indignant" now that he has decided to blab. Ms. Van Reigersberg remembers Mr. Burks as "very nice and very intelligent," and so good at his work that the State Department paid him to help train other interpreters. She says he was always an "interesting character" but says she never knew much about his quirky Web musings.

While working as Mr. Bush's Indonesian-language interpreter, Mr. Burks set up several Web sites, including momentoflove.org, weboflove.org and WantToKnow.info. After 9/11, he began collecting and then posting documents he believes show that parts of the U.S. government knew an attack was coming and may even have been complicit in its execution. "I'm sometimes labeled a conspiracy theorist, but I'm not," he says. "I'm someone who can handle dark energy, the really ugly things that are going on behind the scenes, without getting too upset."

When he made an illegal holiday trip to Cuba in 1999 and got hit with a $7,900 fine, he says he told the State Department he hadn't realized that Americans were barred from going to Cuba. He kept his job, and found a lawyer to fight the fine. He's still waiting for a court hearing where he can contest the penalty.

He even survived a controversial foray into last year's presidential election: He posted allegations on his Web site that Mr. Bush used a secret listening device in meetings he had attended with President Megawati and most likely had done the same in debate with Sen. John Kerry. His says he got a reprimand from his boss at the State Department. (Asked about Mr. Burks's claims, a White House official described them as "nonsense.")

Shortly after that Web posting, he left the State Department's translation service. He says he quit when a new supervisor insisted that he sign a pledge not to divulge any information obtained while interpreting.

Read the Entire Wall Street Journal Report

Thai Art Treasues

Sukothai by Carl Parkes

Should they be returned to Thailand?

San Francisco Asian Art Museum