MangoZeen

In 1989 SLORC or the military junta of Thailand’s neighbor changed the name of their nation from Burma to Myanmar an appellation dating back to the 13th Century. This renaming of the country has done little to alleviate the suffering of its citizens. Chronic starvation and repression are day-to-day realities for the Burmese, so when Cyclone Nargis hit the delta area of the Irrawaddy River and Rangoon no one was prepared to deal with a disaster of that magnitude and especially not SLORC.

They first denied humanitarian groups access to the stricken areas and now have been accused of stealing emergency supplies from the United Nations. Aid workers are being turned away at the airport and the military said they are the only people capable of handlign the relief efforts to the nearly 1.5 million people affected by the massive flooding.

Horse paddy.

This resistance to the outside world’s charity is simply another weapon to suppress their captive population and earns SLORC #1 worst government in the world.

For #2 Robert Mugabe has to win the silver.

The field for the bronze is wide open.

Pattaya’s new mayor enjoyed a landslide advantage in the recent election outscoring her nearest oppponent by 17,000, however considering the city’s growth in the last years, the 50% turnout for the mayoral election should have come up with more than 28,000 voters.

Where is everyone else?

Ten years ago Pattaya’s population was roughly 90,000. Wikpedia lists the 2007 number of registered Thai residents as 100,000, although it is widely suspected that another 200,000 to 400,000 inhabitants crowd the coastal city. They don’t really count, being Thais listed in other provinces or even less important long-time western visitors.

Basically 3 of the 4 people you see in Pattaya don’t exist to the city officials, which is why municipal authorities claim there is enough water for the populace and ignore the traffic congestion.

The people simply aren’t there.

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Thais like to think that prostituttion didn[’t exist within their borders until its introduction by the Chinese, however the country since time immemorial has fiercely upheld the tradition of mia yai / mia noi or big wife / small wife. This form of bigamy is widely accepted in all levels of society from kings to tuk-tuk drivers, but not even a Thai tycoon can compete with the multiple wives held by the Mormon communities of southern Utah.

I’ve driven through Colarado City, Arizona twice. Route 389 bisects the isolated community without a single 7/11 or gas station in sight to entice the traveler to stop for gas, potato chips, or information. This town has turned its back on the world to avoid curiosity seekers interested in the biggest polygamy sect in the USA, The Church of Jesus Christ Of Latter Day Saints.

Town demographics list that there are an equal number of men and women, but not that only a few men are married to most of the females and they also have families in other polygamist conclaves. One man has over 20 wives in Colorado City and another 21 in the recently-raided Texas commune.

Mia Nois galore, except a large percentage of their wives are under age and this means some FLDS husbands will be facing serious jail time in the near future, despite the multi-lotharios stating that polygamy is not the problem. “Human judgment is.”

Federal authorities are contemplating a raid on this town, but have no idea what such an endeavor will reap and the FLDS members are slowly fleeing to more secluded locales to avoid the dismemberment of their sect, although those funny dresses are a dead giveway.

I’m related to Joseph Smith on my father’s side.

And I’m no bigamist, but I do believe in many mia nois.

Only one of them.

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http://www.mangozeen.com/marriage-ala-pattaya-2.htm

The airbases fo Issan are relatively quiet now. A few flights a day from bangkok, but during the Viet-Nam War these runways were scorched by US fighters and bombers flying missions over Hanoi and more secretively Laos. This supposed secret war was run out of a small complex on the Udon Thani air strip basically by 2 CIA agents vividly portrayed in SHOOTING AT THE MOON a non-fiction account of the clandestine conflict by Roger Warner also author of Haing Ngor: CAMBODIAN ODYSSEY.

Laos in the 1960s was a bucolic sideshow to Vietnam with the various factions locked in a determined stalemate. The Pathet Lao and the Lao Royalist Force Armee Royale or ‘fast army running’ as the units were known to the CIA insiders, had no intentions of fighting each other. Their leaders were related by royal blood and combat consisted of shuffling strategic positions according the the weather, until Washington decided to arm the Hmong tribespeople to stiffen the resolve of the lowland anti-communist troops.

The entire operation was run by Bill Lair who picked Vang Po to lead his tribesmen against the enemy. The Hmong were a superstious people who fire guns during lunar eclipses to sacere the celestial frog from swallowing the moon, but they could effectively harass the Pathet Lao. Unfortunately they never had the numbers to destroy those forces, especailly once they were reinforced by North Vietnamese regulars protecting the threatened Ho Chi Minh Trail. Mr Lair promised the Hmong a refuge to the west should all hell break loose and SHOOTING AT THE MOON records the unfolding tragedy, as CIA higher-ups raise the ante in Laos with deadly results, most culpably station chief Theodore Shackeley and CIA Director William Colby. As one agent said, “It doesn’t matter how horrible you are, as long as you take care of your people.”

And no one took care of Laos, which was bombed more ehavily than germany in WWII,

Mr. Warner purports that this war was a success as long as it was small, a theory of soft force Pentagon planners should research for their present quagmires in Afghanistan and Iraq, but those who don’t know history are doomed to repeat it and usually more than once

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This friday Tiffany Show World on Pattaya’s 2nd Road hosts the annual Miss Tiffany Universe pageant for women of the 2nd category from all over the world. The event is viewed by millions of Thais and hosted by the reigning Miss Thailand Universe, who is naturally feminine while the beauty of her ka-toey sisters are aided by breast operations and hormonal treatments, still some of the most beautiful women I have seen in Thailand are not women at all. Not that I’m fooled for a minute. A few seconds and maybe longer if the lights are dim and none of my friends are in the bar.

Thai transvestites start taking hormones as early as the age of 12 and some even undergo castration in their mid-teens to prevent further masculination of their bodies. Beauty doesn’t come cheap either, but it’s the dream of every ladyboy to compete in this contest. Not for the money, but the glory.

Well, also for the money.

I think it’s almost a million baht this year.

Hell, if I was pretty I’d give it a try.

“I feel pretty. Oh so Pretty. Oh so pretty and witty and gay.”

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i don’t have the time to go to the scores of go-go bars in Pattaya.

Mostly I frequent What’s Up on Soi 15 and Heaven Above.

For a good review of the bars check out this URL

http://www.pattayagogos.com/nllatest.htm#High_Bar_Fines

From Thai Anxiety

I’m too lazy or drunk to do it.

I love Pattaya. I love the girls. If only for the fact they are the least trustworthy females on the planet and that takes some doing considering that with a 4th grade education in a rice field school they can bilk billions of baht from highly-intelligent western men with such lines as “I need to see sick buffalo in vllage.” or “I don’t have a Thai boyfriend.” or “Someone steal my gold.” or “My brother is sick in hospital.”

For a further list of these scams click on this URL

http://www.scams-in-pattaya.com/

But the flow of betrayal is not all one-way for the other day at the Welkom Inn a young girl came into the bar aglow with success. She was a millionaire. After ordering a round for the bar she explained that a client had given her about 50 million Turkish Lira.

Turkish Lira.

“Those bills are old. Have you tried to cash them?” Fabo asked with a Heiniken in his hand.

“No, but they are very big. Same dollar.”

“Actually you didn’t do to badly. 1000,000 Old Turkish Lira is about 25 baht. So 25 times 50 is_______”

“I know what it is.” the irate girl shut up Fabo’s calculation, not wanting to let her friends know her bonanza was the same price as a short-time visit to the Welkom Inn’s back rooms. Even worse she would find out that almost no banks will cash these bills. maybe in bangkok, but not pattaya, so they were basically worthless.

Touche for the sick buffalo.

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Once more in the News.

The Thai and USA governments have been partners ever since the War in Laos, where over 15,000 Thai soldiers served as para-military support units for anti-communist Hmong fighters. despite that losing effort the USA respects the Thai’s effort in the cause of freedom to go so far as to having honored Thailand with its very own rendition camp to hold Islamic fascist terrorist suspects for questioning under the GW Bush rules of human rights.

The exact location of this detention camp has been an unknown to two detainees, who claimed to have been jailed in the Land of Smiles according to the Washington Post, although most experts agree that the probably site was the old Udon Thani airbase from which the USA conducted its bombing campaign against the Pathet Lao and NVA during the Viet-Nam War.

No elephant rides or trips to go-go bars for these boys.

Strictly business as taught at the School of Americas in Newport, Rhode Island, where they get information the old fashioned way. By beating it out of you. Unfortunately for Thailand a former PM adopted these techniques to deal with insurgents in the restive south with the unexpected result of stirring up even more violence.

The CIA supposedly closed these secret camps in 2006 and we know we can ebleive anything they say, because we don’t have any other choice.

For more information click on this URL

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/southeast_asia/ja25ae01.html

The war against terrorism TWAT keeps chugging on.

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http://www.mangozeen.com/im-not-into-sm-gw-bush.htm

The word silk or pra pai is nearly synonymous with Thailand, however legend holds that the Chinese Empress Si Ling Chi discovered the mythic material while sipping tea underneath a royal mulberry tree. A cocoon fell into her cup and the empress became enthralled by her unraveling of the fine thread, thus creating China’s famed silk industry. How the silkworms came to Thailand is a mystery, since the Chinese banned the smuggling of silkworm eggs, cocoons, and mulberry seeds under punishment of death, although some historians say that a Chinese princess promised to a Thai prince concealed silkworm eggs in her hair as part of her dowry. Silk threads dating back some 3000 years have been found in the ruins of Baan Chiang, lending credence to the agelessness of this myth.

Few people understand the process of transforming silkworm cocoons into silk. Cultivators feed hordes of caterpillars on mulberry leaves through four shredding of their skin before they actually begin to weave the valued cocoons in thousands of triangular-shaped figure eights from the liquid silk filling their bodies in a 4-5 days process. Afterwards the cocoons are placed in a vat of boiling water and the Isaan silk farmers love their part of the procedure as they find the broiled pupa especially tasty, saying it tastes like corn.

Continue reading » The Magic of Thai Silk

I’ve taken to walking down the Beach Road for exercise. The shaded promenade provided good cover against the sun and the distance allows you to work up a moderate sweat, while surveying the various vignettes of street life occurring in various locales. The free-lancers working the beach are mostly old as is their clientele of classic Cheap Charlies. The younger girls are really young and possibly jail bait. The ka-toeys are not so deceptive, but can be pushy with their invitations for a happy ending. None of these people pose a danger in the daylight. That task is left to the countless survey-takers for real estate concerns.

“Are you from here?” The girl smiles with a clipboard in her hand. She seems friendly enough. Most of them are pretty and you feel a little pity, when they tell you each survey earns them 20 baht. Soft-hearted men take the time 10-15 minutes to fill out the papers and think that’s that, however these girls are shills for rapacious land agents seeking for you to invest in a time-share.

These land sharks will call to announce that you have won a prize of a two-week vacation.

“Please come down to the office to pick up the tickets.”

Continue reading » Pattaya Beach Scam