Thailand - Monday April 9, 2007

Thailand is the only southeast Asian country never been taken over by any European country.

The Kingdom of Thailand is presently governed by an interim government lead by Prime Minister General (Ret) Surayud Chulanont. The military coup during last September aborted even the constitution and a proper one is yet to be announced. There were/are so many theories about why that coup occurred during September 2006. But these days, leading politicians and activists expressed disappointment with the interim government and some even asked PM’s resignation. Anyway, as a person, many of these critics are of the opinion that the PM is an honest man. What they want is some ‘immediate action’ as he did not deliver what he promised. News papers reported of the rumours of a fresh coup.

Thai language is a Tonal language just like Chinese and believed to be originated in southern china. But its scripts are Indic and hence looked a lil familiar to me coz of its Sanskrit connection.

Learning Thai will be easy for those who are already familiar with any other Tonal and Anlytical language. For people like me, its bit difficult and still cant say ‘Sawatdee Khrap’ in the same way like native Thai people do. Pronunciation has different length patterns for every word. They wont understand it if spoken in a different length. For example ‘Taxi’ is ‘Taxeee.’ ; Plaza is ‘plazaaa’…. Even English words are spoken in Thai way with tone. English is the language of the elite here and hence English education is expensive. But read somewhere that many schools started teaching English.

Today I just went for a 45 minutes walk around my hotel area in the morning and had a ‘South Indian meal’ as lunch. It tasted just like the food at home.

If anybody has the opinion that Bangkok is not for vegetarians, they are absolutely wrong. There are even exclusive vegetarian restaurants, though run by Thai people. And Thai food also includes some vegetarian dish.

Here in Thailand, people wear Yellow shirts/T-shirts on Monday. This is to honour the King. Some people wear it on other days too.

Looking at the roads and other facilities in the malls, I thought the government is doing an excellent job compared to India. But there came a news in The Nation that some politicians accepted Bt500 million as bribe in purchasing fire fighting trucks (for Bangkok) from Singapore.

I had dinner from the next door Indian restaurant called ‘India Gate’, but I chose the Thai style fried rice.