Asian Foreign Girl, Looking for Cure to Rice Fever, Thailand.

I read a lot of newspapers, from home in Australia, America, Britain and of course Thailand. Some times you read a ‘header’ that you just have to click on to investigate what the story is about. This was one such header from a Thai newspaper.

Forget the swine flu _ we need a cure repellent for farang with 'Rice Fever'

The article is written by a lady called Rikke Bjerge Johansen a (Luk Krung) as known in Thailand, a half cast. She was born in South Korea but adopted out and raised in Denmark.

I had to read the article because of the derogatory of “farang” but also the ‘cure repellent’ and “Rice Fever.”

Now most will know farang is a foreigner and if you can read then you know “rice Fever” is the apparent addiction to Asian women by farangs.

I don’t care about the term farang as it isn’t derogatory if used in certain ways. What interested me in the article was the apparent need for a cure to rice fever.

Rikke leads off with this:

I can only imagine how Thai women must feel in Thailand, but I do have some insight, and it doesn't seem pretty. Since I arrived in the Land of Smiles 20 months ago, I have had my share of men coming up to me.

Straight away from this I knew where this was going, down a very old road that has been written about so many times before.

She goes on to say:

I am approached by strangers on an almost daily basis, mainly farang, but some Thais as well. Yes, we are talking about Rice Fever, aka Yellow Fever in less politically correct times. This strange virus seems to strike everywhere in Bangkok _ in shopping malls, cafes and on buses and trains.

Why Rikke uses the term ‘farang’ here, I am a little bewildered. She is a ‘farang’ being Korean, I wouldn’t call her a Bucket Head, Chosenjin, DAK, Dog Breath, Jug Head, Kimchee and so forth which are all terrible terms to use for Korean people. I am not racist but trying to make a point. Why didn’t she simply write foreigner?

She goes on to say that she is virtually pestered on a daily basis because of her Aisan looks. She is approached in many places, up market places by foreigners trying to make her acquaintance.

She states, ‘What makes a 60-something-year-old man come up to me and even think he has a chance of getting some action.’

I agree that many tourists to Thailand sadly have this view of all Thai women; No sorry Asian looking women are for sale. Many believe that all the women have a price and I do agree that this is so wrong.

The sad part of this is Thailand have themselves to blame for this. Sex tourism is a huge money earner for Thailand, many foreigners travel to Thailand for sex. They arrive in Bangkok, maybe travel to Pattaya (The home of the sex trade) and then return home saying they have seen Thailand. Sadly they haven’t seen shit. They haven’t seen anything of the real Thailand. All they have seen is the westernized side of Thailand.

For so long, before I could walk Thailand’s image was a place for sex, cheap clothes and a cheap holiday, many still see it like this. I wish I could make all the visitors to Thailand realize that not every girl in Bangkok and Pattaya are prostitutes. Not all of them can be bought for a princely sum of money.

I wish I could make many of the visitors that shout loudly to friends and laugh loudly while walking about with their shirt off is really rude, also holding hands, cuddling and all sorts of public affection, be it with a Thai girl or your foreign girlfriend is frowned upon. But I can’t. Who am I to warn them.

Rikke’s boyfriend adds some interesting points.

''It's hard to have an Asian-looking girlfriend in Thailand because most of the guys living in Asia seem to have 'Yellow Fever', so my girlfriend gets hit on a lot. However, sometimes it is very good. When shopping, for example, we pay local rates, and we get better tables at restaurants. But I don't like it when people think of me as just another loser farang with a cute Asian girlfriend.''

I see Rikke’s boyfriend's points, Asian girls are approached a lot if they are pretty, not just by foreigners but also Thai men looking for fun or even a Mia Noi or small wife. The sad part of being in Bangkok is having your girlfriend approached, Bangkok is a red light city, there are so many bars, massage palours, karaoke bars, gentlemen’s’ clubs and so forth that this is bound to happen.

I have read this a lot where people talk about the stereotype of “a farang loser with his Thai bar girl,” I never think this. I have had people ask me, “Did you meet Miss Noot in a bar?”

Now this doesn’t make me angry because they asked this, this is a common question as so many foreigners do meet their girls in bars. I tell them the truth on how I met Miss Noot and if they believe it or not, I don’t give a rat’s ass.

I look at it like this, I know my girl inside out, I don’t give two shits what a person might be thinking, let them think all they want. I could never live like this. This would do my head in. I look at Miss Noot and I like a normal couple, like the guy who has a bar girl, good luck to him if he is happy.

Anyway, that is my take on this “yellow fever’ or “rice fever” shit, the typecast will always be there as foreigners do see Asian women as exotic, they tiny frames and amazing smiles and more importantly their very sweet mouths. When an older foreign man hears, ‘you are good man, not like Thai man, you handsome and strong, and all the other sorts of things that comes out of their mouths, many of these guys fall for it.

The article is in full by clicking the link below, there is one funny bit from a girl who refers to herself being seen as a banana, yellow on the outside but white on the inside.

You can read the entire article and what some other Asian girls have said about farang men approaching them here if you want to.

Brunty

Strolling and Feeding Fish in the Nong Bua Park, Thailand.

If you are a regular reader of this blog, you will know the above girl is my niece Nong Ja. She is Miss Noot’s older sister’s baby and we get to look after her a lot.

We have had the privilege of babysitting or even raising Nong Ja to an extent over the early 13 months of her life. If you are a regular to Thailand you know that Thais and the raising of children aren’t like that back in the western society. Many young mothers leave kids with their parents, grandparents or relatives to raise while they go to work to earn money for the family.

I never agreed with this as I didn’t like the parents of the baby neglecting the duty of parenting but overtime I have come to accept this. Nong Ja’s parents, Jack and Joom work odd hours and often early into the morning.

Miss Noot doesn’t have to go back to University until the end of October so she has been looking after Nong Ja every day. This is obviously something she loves to do but has also been a real eye opener. Usually we will have her 3 or 4 nights, so a few breaks in between. The last 3 to 4 weeks we have had her every day and Miss Noot is now realizing how much work a small baby can be.

Thankfully Nong Ja is a great baby, she sleeps well, eats anything. She eats any vegetable you cook for her, I am often surprised when I give her something new and she just chomps it down. I tell Miss Noot how lucky we are that she is like this.

Anyway, we try to get Ja out of the house as much as we can, she loves going on ‘tour’ as we call it. This means the shopping centre, market, in the garden or to the park. Here the 3 girls of my life, Ben, Ja and Miss Noot are strolling in my local park Nong Bua.

The local park is a minute away from our house and the lake is full as we have been getting plenty of rain of late. This causes a few problems at the park as it floods the walking/running track in places.

This is a common sight after a lot of rain, dead fish. Often I see small fish dead and thought the water must be polluted but there is an abundant life of fish in this lake as you will see.

And Nong Ja was running towards the area where we feed the really big fish, the first time I saw these fish I was a little shocked at the size of them.

And the fish start to come to the top of the water as soon as they see or sense your presence, these are the little guys.

The fish feeding started.

And it wasn’t long before the big fellas started to pop their heads out of the water.

Then the numbers started to grow and they started to jostle over the food.

There are some large orange coloured carp, they get released by people who are making merit and have grown over the years.

Some the real big guys, we didn’t see today, I would say that they would be pushing the 15kg plus mark and are great to see up close. Maybe they were full already.

The sun started to go down slowly and this is when many people come out.

This is very popular, aerobics. There are two areas where aerobics takes place each evening in the park.

Basketball is another popular sport as well.

This is Sepak Trakaw and very popular in Asian countries. I have video footage of this game and you can watch it here if you like.

And many families, couples and also students love to do this, painting the 20 Baht canvasses.

This is the other aerobics area in the park.

Here two girls are happily sitting and painting the cares away.

What every girl loves, Doraemon the super robotic cat.

It wasn’t a bad way to spend an hour or so in the afternoon.

Brunty

Journalism Has Gone to the Dogs, Herald Sun Australia.

Wendy Big Mouth Fool Hargreaves is a so called journalist who writes for the Herald Sun Newspaper that is printed in Melbourne. I have read articles by this woman before and many of them are just tripe, some amusing but she always tries to stir shit.

If you look at her twitter account she actually says this.

twitter account Journo and general shit stirrer.

She just had an article printed in the paper and I cannot believe it was allowed for print. Her views are what I would expect from an uneducated Neanderthal, not from a veteran so called reporter.

We are all entitled to our views and that is the beauty of freedom of speech but what she has written is a complete toss.

Here is some of the article.

ARROGANT road hogs, neon nuff nuffs, lycra losers, poncey prats, complete tossers - cycling warriors are all of these things and much, much more.

It's not that I hate them. How could I hate somebody that stupid?
(See what I mean, this lead in is a disgrace)

Only a tried-and-true idiot would willingly prance around in skin-tight lycra with padded bottoms offset by a veranda gut.
(This woman just lets the shit fall out of her mouth and sadly onto paper)

And it gets worse. These mad bike guerillas go beyond moronic by plastering their aforementioned baggy butts with lurid sponsorship logos.
(Nicks save your ass you tart, maybe for you it would save the seat from being gobbled up)

Think about it fellas. You're not Lance Armstrong. You're not even an athlete. You're a dolt.
(Wow, she is an offensive foulmouthed whore. A ‘dolt’, so people using Wilson tennis racquets, the brand Roger Federer uses, they are also dolts. I have seen many tennis players that sucked sporting the whole tennis kits.

The people with Nike Golf clubs because Tiger Woods uses them are also dolts, I suppose Wendy. You are a cretin woman)

You're paying hundreds of bucks to wear sausage-tight advertising, like blobby mobile signage. You may think you look cool in hot pink as you huff and puff to your favourite cafe for a massive pile of bacon and eggs, but you don't. You just look silly.
(I know she is targeting the same people I don’t call cyclists, people who go for a 20klm ride aren’t cyclists. But her rants are plain terrible)

But it's the proudly corpulent middle-aged warriors who need the real spanking. You know who I'm talking about. They sit on their well-fed butts all week, raking in cash to buy their next $10,000 carbon fibre Italian import, then squeeze into hideously tight lycra every weekend for some male bonding on bitumen.
(So fuc#en what! Are you jealous of not being paid a decent wage? I don’t know what the Herald pays you lady, but if you couldn’t afford a 10K bike you are in the wrong job. People, who continually be critical of how others spend their money pisses me off. It is their money, so let them spend it how they want to.)

By mid-morning, they're clomping around in their ridiculous shoes ordering lattes and scoffing brunch.
(These are cleats dear, and they are needed by real cyclists)

I know I run the risk of being mowed down by a pack of cycle warriors for writing this, but somebody has to tell them.
(Couldn’t be so lucky and I would much prefer it to be a bus. Then it would be sure you wouldn’t return to write such tripe)

Anyway if you want to read this article in full you can here and if you Google her name you can also read a lot of other pigheaded articles she has written.

Look I used to get pissed off with the guys who she is actually having a go at. But they do what they do. They go for a peddle, have breakfast, talk shit and go home, usually pretty harmless.

We would ride for a few hours or more on our expensive bikes with running gear that people would fall off their chair if they new the cost of a cog, set of handlebars and so forth. But that was us and we weren’t hurting anyone.

She has opened a can of worms attacking people because of what they wear. Anyone who is a gimp and plays a sport but has all the gear should be labeled a dolt according to Wendy.

This lady has probably never played a sport in her life.

So Wendy, this is my take on your shit. Just my opinion I would love to hear yours on me.

Brunty

Making Merit, Feeding Fish at Wat Sa Prasan Suk.

The other day Miss Noot, Nong Ja and I ventured to a temple we try and visit once a month. I have posted about Wat Sa Prasan Suk before and there are lots of pictures here and here if you want to see more of it.

Here Nong Ja is standing on what looks like a huge boat. We have come to feed the fish. The lake is full of fish that people have released over years in a way of making merit. We had come to feed them and this too is a way of making merit.

We bought a bag of fish food and a loaf of bread to feed the fish.

Nong Ja was funny as she was so excited to see the fish feeding that she would throw the fish food backwards when she threw her hands up in excitement. The pigeons that were hanging around were happy though.

There was a good size school of fish gathered in front of the two girls in my life.

The fish are pretty thick, most are carp and catfish.




Nong Ja wasn’t sure if she should throw the bread or eat it. We would count to three and she would go through the motions of throwing it, but she just wouldn’t let go.

It was a good way to spend an hour out of our day.

Brunty

Thai Dancers, Simply Stunning. Thailand.

I have written about Mother’s Day, and the ceremonies that go with here in Thailand in three previous posts, Happy Birthday to HM the Queen, Buddhist Ceremony, and then the school ceremony.

Well this is part 4 and is about the grace and beauty of Thai dancers. The girls wear the most stunning and elaborate silks that always make me marvel at the beauty of them.

Usually any ceremony in Thailand will have a form of dance or show. I really enjoy the intricacies of Thai dance. The perfection of having fingers curved and head movements, how graceful the dancers move or glide across the floor.

The girls from our school train hard, they spend many extra hours practicing before, during and after school to perfect their art. I would say 99% of Thai girls know how to dance traditionally, they are taught from such a young age.

Anyway, below are pictures of the girls preparing to dance for the Mother’s Day ceremony. I hope you enjoy.














Brunty

Capital Punishment Resumes in Thailand.

Capital punishment has resumed in Thailand after a 6 year absence, Two drug traffickers were arrested on March 29, 2001 for possessing 114,219 methamphetamine pills. They were given death terms after being convicted of drug trafficking. They were put to death on Monday.

They are only the second set of convicts to be given lethal injections since this form of execution replaced firing squads six years ago. Thailand used to behead people sentenced to death. Then in 1934 they used a firing squad, well just one gun. A sub machine gun loaded with 15 bullets but usually only 8 would be fired. The last firing squad execution took place on December 11th 2002.

If you want to you can read two great reviews of a book titled, The Last Executioner. Richard Barrow who is a wealth of knowledge on Thailand and has many top class sites where you can find all sorts of information relating to Thailand. He wrote two reviews here and here if you would like to read them.

The two men, once told that a royal pardon had been denied had 2 hours before they met their fate, they were offered a last meal but couldn’t eat. They made wills called family and then monks gave them a final sermon. They paid respect at a shrine and three sacred Bodhi trees in front of the execution zone.

They were shackled inside the injection chamber, laid down on beds covered with white cloth; arms were stretched out, with three syringes beside each man. They contained a soporific drug, the second had a muscle relaxant drug, while the third contained an apparent "heart stopper". The injection process took about 25 minutes.

Of course these executions have brought condemnation from all sorts of human rights groups. Apparently executing criminals is ‘a transgression of the most basic of all human rights.’

And this, the Union for Civil Liberty said that the executions were wrong as they went against the majority vote of the United Nations General Assembly in December 2007 and again in December 2008 in favour of a universal moratorium on the death penalty.

Also, executions contravened the interpretation of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights by the UN Human Rights Committee on July 28, 2003, that drug offences do not constitute a crime subject to capital punishment within the terms of the covenant ratified.

This is my view on capital punishment.

I don’t agree at all. I believe in capital punishment for serious drug offenders, more countries need to follow suit. Drugs kill so many young people, create crime, and they have no place in any society.

How do you face a mother of a child who has been killed by a drug infected driver, a family whose son, brother has overdosed on bad drugs.

Drugs simply kill people. They kill people in so many ways.

Sadly the real kingpins of drug rings, usually the rich and powerful, seem untouchable. They pay corrupt officials to turn a blind eye to the plague they are spreading through society.

Usually the smaller dealers, couriers and of course consumers are caught. But if these people didn’t buy drugs, courier drugs or consume drugs then the kingpins wouldn’t have a business. But this is the real world.

I am sorry to say, but these people need to be made examples of. If an execution of a prisoner makes one person turn away from drugs I consider this a success.

The death penalty in Thailand is well known about. I cannot and do not believe any person who says they didn’t know that this law existed after the fact of being caught. Mostly foreigners try and plead to this, claiming naivety.

Usually any ‘smart’ person travelling to a foreign country will look up what are the dos and don’ts are, in the way of culture and especially laws.

All the human right groups, civil libertarians need to butt out, these laws are clearly stated and people who break the laws of Thailand face the maximum penalty, that being death.

I consider the other horrible human atrocities going on across the world far more concerning than criminals being executed. The mutilation of young girls, female circumcision, countries that allow girls to be married off when they are not even the age of ten, completely disgusting. Children being forced to work in sweat shops to pay back family debts are just a few things I consider more serious than a person who made a choice, they had control of their life. They could have said, ‘yes’ or ‘no’. Most know the ultimate risk if being caught, but they still choose to dabble in drugs. These people don’t need our sympathy.

These are my views; the beauty of this world is we all have different views. Currently, there are 832 convicts on death row in Thailand. Some 127 of them have had their final court ruling, meaning there is no further avenue for appeal. Their last and final chance is a royal pardon.

What do you think about the death penalty for drugs?

Brunty.

Mother's Day Ceremony, Thailand Part 3 2009

Way back on the 11th of August we celebrated Mother’s Day at our school one day earlier than the real day as it is a holiday on the 12th. I posted two other articles on the lead up to the ceremony here or the Buddhist merit making in the morning with monks here, if you would like to read them first.

Anyway the time had finally come for the ceremony for the mums to start, well nearly time. Here are some mums in their very best Thai outfits with two teachers.

A statue of Mother Mary was on the stage.

HM Queen Sirikit of Thailand, and the shrine set up to pay respect to her for her birthday and also mother’s day.

What Thais love to do, have their pictures taken.

But the day is about the mums, the following pictures and mums and their children.









Finally the school song was played and this meant the start of the ceremony. All stood to attention in the grand hall of Sunee Grand Hotel and Convention Centre.

We had a visiting Brother, taking the service as our two resident Brothers were in Bangkok on school duties.

The Brother then offered words of wisdom to the students, mums and guests.



The time came to lay roses at the feet of Mother Mary. Students, parents, teachers and anyone else who wanted to participate could do so.

I thought this was close to the end of the ceremony, maybe some dancing left and just the students to pay respect to their mothers. I made my way back to the school. A few hours later the kids arrived back.

I asked one of the teachers who had stayed on, “what took so long?” He told me a story that I am glad I missed.

I still have some more pictures to post of Mother’s Day but that will be in the near future.

Brunty