Filed under: Expat life, Travel, People | Tags: Amphawa, anti-government protests, Ayutthaya, backpackers, Bang Saray, Bangkok, Chinese language, conmen, corruption, English, English language, hotels, Isaan, Isaan language, Khao San Road, Krabi, Lao language, Laos, lorry drivers, Malay language, Malaysia, malls, Mandarin, Nightlife, Pattaya, politics, public transport, Rayong, Rungsan Chintanawong, shopping, sightseeing, Suvarnabhumi, Suvarnabhumi airport, taxi drivers, taxis, Thai language, Thailand, tourism, tourists, transport, Trat
Rungsan and Jamie
“Hey, where you go?” “How much you pay?” “Meter not work.” Phrases that are all-too familiar for anybody who has been to Bangkok, beginning as soon as you leave the arrivals area of the airport and following you all along downtown, around the visitor attractions and surrounding your hotel. Yes, it’s the hawking call of the notorious Bangkok taxi driver.
There are an estimated 60,000 of them in the city, and to be fair, the majority of them are reasonable enough. It’s just the majority of them do not congregate at the airport, the tourist traps, the nightspots, the malls and the big hotels. It is the unscrupulous few who dominate these places, who can spot a freshly arrived holidaymaker at a hundred paces, who can speak enough English to negotiate a con, and who foster the negative image many visitors take home of the corrupt cabbie.
Filed under: News, Thai news, Travel | Tags: Bangkok, Bangkok Post, Beer, bitter, Britain, bus travel, buses, developing countries, G8, government, Great Britain, Hua Hin, industrial action, London, Marmite, News, newspaper, nostalgia, privatisation, public transport, rail travel, railways, SRT, State, State Railway of Thailand, strikes, Surat Thani, Thai news, Third World, trains, UK, United Kingdom
Half and half
Ah, a taste of home. And no, I don’t mean a jar of Marmite or a pint of bitter. I mean a newspaper headline that will be all-too familiar to anyone who is from or has lived in Britain. “4,000 stranded in rail chaos” was splashed on the front page of today’s Bangkok Post.
Rail chaos. Words that are so familiar to the Brit, they’re almost like the lyrics from a favourite childhood song. Nostalgic, even.
The story is that strike action forced the cancellation of the majority of services in, to and from the southern province of Surat Thani, with passengers left stranded or to find alternative means of transport.
