• Amazing Chiang Mai
Just caught the tail end of a segment on CNN this morning on human sex traffic, pedophiles in Chiang Mai….Raid on a Swiss guy’s home full of little boys half naked, etc. I’m sure the segment will play several times. Also mentioned a monk who received 20 years for this stuff.
Great for Chiang Mai tourism!
Best Regards,
Charlie Thompson
• Cracked Rose Tinted Glasses
Again, I must give you credit for saying aloud those things about Thai politics and society that people either ignore or speak of in hushed tones.
You speak the truth and your most recent editorial in Citylife proves it.
It will be four years this October that we expatriated from America. We didn’t just move.. we left America because it no longer represented those intrinsic American values that we were taught as children: dignity, honesty and respect for the individual. We chose Thailand because it seemed so much gentler and welcoming. We came wearing rose coloured glasses. Slowly, week by week, those values that we held dear about the Thai psyche are slowly being eroded away and the “what lies beneath the surface” has become more evident. The metaphorical under belly of Thai politics and the actions taken by people in the name of saving face are as grotesquely skewed as any hypocrisy in America.
Therefore, my hope is reanimated when I read an editorial like yours. By speaking your mind you are also speaking for me. Though I may not be a Thai national, I still hope for the betterment of this country and its people.
Sincerely,
Concerned Chris
• Hot Topic
Congratulations on Jane Whit- combe The Music is Over article, which has generated much heated debates in bars and forums such as ThaiVisa. This is exactly the type of article I look forward to when picking up Citylife each month, something easy to read, balanced in view point and covering a controversial enough topic to engender conversation. Bravo.
A now-retired farang musician
• Timely
Taking the wife and kids to Vietnam in a week, the IndoChina issue was very timely and informative. I look forward to dining out in HCM city’s lesser known district.
S. Smith
• Twenty Long Years
I was appalled to read in your last issue that the magazine will be celebrating its 20th anniversary next month. Am I really that old?!? I remember picking up one of the first copies of the Chiang Mai Newsletter when I first moved here to teach at Chiang Mai University. I didn’t think a huge deal of it but was grateful for it nonetheless. It was good to feel that we had something that linked the community, a resource, an outlet for our previously silent voices, and some interesting tidbits of news and culture and history to read monthly. I have a copy of one of the early newsletters if you want to have it, twenty years, it is almost a museum piece!
Nostalgic old man
• Defacing Politicians
I am greatly distressed to see the number of defaced election posters belonging to the Democrat party. While I am a foreigner and new here, and therefore have very little knowledge of Thai politics, I don’t see how defacing another party’s poster is in any way beneficial towards the party you yourself support. I am told that it is pretty obvious which party’s supporters are doing this and find it very sad.
Newbie