Crepe in Thai style

repes in Thailand are made on the street or in the mall. The process is simple enough, but they tend to add a little Thai style to the creation. When I have had a rough morning, I love to treat myself to a tasty Crepe. This girl works on our campus and she works 12 hour days 6 days a week. Her estimated pay is about 5,000 baht a month or roughly $125 dollars. But she is always smiling and friendly. What is our cost to buy one of these snacks? 25 baht or about 75 cents in US money. Far too cheap considering the heat she has to work in.

Loss of a hero

Kwai Chang Caine's passing would have been difficult enough, but to think that his murder took place right here in the city of Bangkok has made this even worse. Bangkok is a very metropolitan city and has incredible wealth, so at times it is easy to forget that it is still in the 3rd world where hired guns are cheap. I can not speculate on why David Carradine was murdered, but I would like to express why I think it was such a horrible loss.

Kung Fu was an American TV sensation in the 70's. It was still a media world where Asian faces were not really allowed to be leading rolls. Carradine was not Chinese, and yet almost everything American's knew about Eastern philosophy and especially Kung Fu, comes from his portrayal of Kwai Chang Caine, the benevolent drifter who upheld the honorable antics of a great knight. He showed us in the west that the Chinese culture had a lot to offer and a lot to be respected for. It was this show that first inspired me to begin wondering about the far East and now some 30 plus years later I find myself living here. 

Young people know him for his roll in the Kill Bill movies, and this was a wonderful exploration of his martial arts experience and his stage presence. Even in his early 70's he could still produce the kind of acting work that inspired the young and old a like. 

He will be greatly missed by my generation. We loved Bruce Lee, and because David got the Kung Fu roll instead of him there are some people who hold a slight and silly grudge about that. But Bruce Lee was on a different path, a film path, that TV might have killed. David was perfect for the roll even if his martial arts wasn't as spectacular as Bruce Lee, his acting skills were spectacular and moving. 

It is sad when our heroes die and even more sad when they die ugly. I hope the USA uses their influence to spur along Thai authorities and some leads are generated in his murder. 

Siminoe dot com loves FREE RICE

The free rice people are all about feeding the hungry. This sight is awesome! Huge financial sponsors have made an offer to donate rice for every vocabulary word that English learners get correct on their quiz. I spend hours on there trying to keep my vocabulary sharp, or at least a word or two ahead of my students, and helping to feed the WORLD! Come on check the site out by clicking on the TITLE. 

Coloring my World

"Let's just paint the living room," Speedy said, as his eyes bounced from corner to corner of my dingy down stairs. 

"It really needs it. I think this white paint might have been the original paint," I admitted. "But won't it be a lot of work?"

"We'll knock this room out in about 6 hours. Three hours for the first cote and then three hours for a second cote. Good little Saturday really. You buy the beers and let's do it."

I hadn't painted anything since I was in high school and I believe I painted a barn for some summer money. It wasn't exactly like painting the living room of my home. I was hesitant, but the place certainly needed a new color and fresh paint.

"Let's do it!"

As fate would have it the Nuggets were playing the Lakers and our newest teacher at Satit Kaset Dameon was looking for a place to watch the game. "Dameon, I have a 93 inch screen at my house, would you like to come watch the game."

Dameon made the classic mistake of a new friend, "SURE."

"And oh we might paint one room of my house after the game, no big deal, but wear something for painting," I threw in as if I had forgotten the milk.

"Oh, well, yeah, okay."

Little did he know my front room is like some kind of cathedral with beams to be cut in and ceilings too high to be reached without a circus act on the wobbly ladder. But luckily, Dameon did come to watch the game and he did stay to paint. Even with three of us it took 8 hours. But man did it look better with a splash of color!

God bless Aung San Suu Kyi

Aung San Suu Kyi is on trial for a bogus charge in her home nation of Myanmar. As the world watches, groans and mumbles, a court will gather and find her guilty of breaking the conditions of her house arrest. An arrest that never had a trial. She will be found guilty because her house arrest is set to end in about a month from now. So these charges will put her back in her place so that the military government can keep her from running against them in their "free" elections. Since her party won its land slide victory way back in 1990, she has been in and out of house arrest and her victory completely ignored by the ruling junta. A Nobel peace prize should have shamed this military into giving this great leader her freedom, but it merely hardened their convictions that she would forever be a threat to their rule. She is a symbol of hope for a nation that is no closer to freedom and democracy now as it was 19 years ago when Aung San Suu Kyi' party won the right to run the nation.

The situation in the country is so bad, so murderous and oppressive, that reporters who can sneak in and out of the country struggle to report the horrors they have witnessed. It is the worst outside the main cities in the rural areas where minority groups are being persacuted without mercy. 

I have no idea how to help or what can be done, but I guess I just hope God will bless Aung San Suu Kyi and her troubled nation. 

Nature in the north of Thailand

Well my summer is over and I'm back to work. So I thought I would put up a little video I shot while up in Chiang Dao in the north of Thailand. My summer was very uneventful, but it was relaxing and I must say that down time is always good time. 

Coffee and Black

Well during April I ventured away from my blog. Just not in the mood to share, but I did do a lot of traveling and enjoyed some great day trips around Thailand. I will be putting these images up soon. But first I'd like to introduce my newest housemates, Coffee and Black. Nan and I found them in the church where we were married and so we thought they would be very good luck for us. Besides, we live in Bangkok where Rats thrive on lots of trash and Buddhist traditions don't allow them to kill them. Of course these two little guys have a way to go before they are killing any rats. For now they are just babies. 

Nan is holding Coffee and I am holding Black. Yes they are twins, but Coffee has a thin line of white, like cream, so we decided he would be coffee and Black is pure Black so he gets the most obvious of names. 

Yao Ming NBA's Most Popular

The entire Asian region gave out a collective sigh of defeat when the news of Yao Ming's injury came out this morning. Is everyone in Asia Houston Rockets fans or something? No. But there is more than a BILLION Yao Ming fans in China who were getting very excited about their hero taking on America's Late Show the LA Lakers. When Yao pushed back trainers in game one and forced his way back onto the court to finish the game, scoring 6 of Houston's last 10 point, everyone began to believe this 7 foot 6 giant could bring down the giant Lakers franchise. Now, all over the Asian region, people are putting away their Rocket's banners and shirts for another year.  It was obvious in game 3 that Yao was not himself and was not going to be able to finish the series. Without Yao or even a true backup center, Houston is finished.

Yao Ming is the WORLDS most popular player. You can argue all you want to about James or Bryant, but these two are the best players but far from the most popular. Kobe was cleared of a rape case a few years back that tarnished his very clean image until that point. No one believed he raped the gold digger he slept with, but does it really matter to his wife? And despite James having no serious drama so far, he also has no serious personality to back up his amazing talent. 

Yao is a proud warrior on the floor. He is not the most talented, but he is one of the most amazing players in the NBA. He works hard and keeps his head up. Can you imagine being Yao and having a billion people watching, listening, and talking about you. In the US he is probably the most recognizable player anywhere he goes. In China he is an icon. Did they even have basketball rims in the nation before he arrived?

So it is a sad day for the NBA, Asia, and of course for YAO. Let's hope he can recover and return next year. 

The Red Mob in Bangkok

I’ve gotten a lot of emails lately about the current problems in Thailand and so I’m going to do my best to explain what I believe to be going on. Now I am putting together 3 local news paper articles, one TV panel discussion translated to me from Thai by Nan, and the word on the street from 3 of my better informed Thai friends. So this is a simplification at best because I myself have little interest in politics, but living in the middle of this turmoil these last few years I’ve been exposed to a lot and will do my best to give a simplistic look at the problem.

   Everything does come back to Thaksin the former prime minister of Thailand, self-made billionaire, and now self-exiled globetrotter. He was found guilty of vote rigging or buying, conspiracy, tax evasion, and if he were to return would face a grocery list of other charges, which is why he is in no hurry to return while the current government – his rivals – are in power. They would certainly prosecute him to the utmost of their ability. So Sim, if he’s a billionaire why doesn’t he just go off and enjoy his cash? Well the Thai government has confiscated nearly 1 billion dollars of his cash and assets in the Kingdom. Simplistically put, he wants it back. He needs a government in place that would see him as a victim of a cue and of a conspiracy to take his cash rather than a criminal who was run out of town after taking far too much from the national cookie jar. When he became PM people thought here is a man above the bribery and back dealing of previous administrations because he was already so rich, but the people failed to look at the obvious oddity of this man. He was a police general in the north of Thailand, clue here being golden triangle, before somehow amassing millions of dollars, on that robust 200 dollar a month pay cops get, and buying his way into the media business until he had satellites providing services to his phone companies, TV stations, radio stations, and well to put it mildly his media empire. During his first summer in office more than 700 alleged drug dealers were killed by the police without trial and the citizens of Thailand cheered this, but some were asking the question who was choosing which drug dealers to die. Allegations were made that in general these were Thaksin’s rivals from his old days of northern POLICE WORK. A nationally sponsored vendetta massacre, well some believe so. This was the first red flag.

   Another came much later as rumors of bizarre land schemes leaked to the press. Here was how it worked, Thaksin’s plan has always been to sway the common man, the poor, and the uneducated. Thailand has an amazing amount of wealth, but as most emerging nations it is controlled by a very small group of rich elite. Of course the poor workers have nothing to lose following Thaksin, he does help them at times, but usually when it helps him more. The land deal was very crafty. They went to farm areas close to the city and offered the poor FREE LAND for having worked this land. The government provided these lands and again the people cheered this generosity. Then these new land owners were told an amount their land was worth, pennies on the dollar of course, and then select wealthy families were told that for a set amount to the Thaksin people these lands could be purchased for half their value from these poor farmers. The deal was so smooth, the poor got a lump cash payment, the rich families acquired land at a huge discount and with the means to develop it, and of course the Thaksin people got their big cut.

   This deal included too many people though and the press picked it up and ran with this story. Well the list goes on and on, but lets focus on TODAY. The power struggle is dire for the following reasons. Thaksin’s followers are not limited only to the poor and uneducated, although these minions are certainly the ones we saw dressed in communist red outfits and rioting in the streets. He also has connections back to the police and navy. These two branches still would probably lean to supporting Thaksin if he could stage a return. The Army is made up of hundreds of generals each with personal alliances and agendas. There really is too many leaders in the branches to understand the complexity of this chess game. We know this, the red shirt mob was trying very hard to pick a fight with the current government. The current government and new PM showed an amazing amount of restraint and did not fight back. The red mob spun out of control, killing 2 citizens and wounding many others. The Thai nation is now grumbling angrily about this chaotic and violent display.

   So our problem as it stands. The red mob went home, vowing they were not done, and sure enough two days later, they shot one of their rival’s political leaders in the head and as I write this, we don’t know if he will live or die. Thaksin is furiously looking for an opportunity to return. There are loyal generals to the current government, but believe me many are still loyal to Thaksin. Only action exposes which way they will swing and so it can be very difficult to know until the moment is at hand.

   We know this, that loyalty to the King has kept the peace in this Kingdom for decades and so we can only hope that this loyalty will keep the peace again today.

   Is it safe to be in Thailand? I would take my chances here over say The Bronx or South Central Las Angles, nearly every African nation, Afghanistan, Iraq, Gaza, Houston, Detroit, probably Moscow, so safe is a relative term. I feel safe, but I’m not naïve enough to think all is calm in the kingdom of smiles, big money can buy a lot of loyalty and a lot of trouble. Picture a Hollywood movie where two rival gangs were going to war over 1 billion dollars and you have makings of a blockbuster right, well there you go. Life is always crazier than fiction. But one thing is for sure, whether it is in a movie or it is a political struggle if you want to know what is going on, look for who is going to benefit, who is getting that CREAM and you’ll find the spoon that stirs the pot. (Cash Rules Everything Around Me) Most importantly, if you want to find the source of the trouble, figure out who’s going to lose their CREAM if they don’t fight. 

   Examples, gun lobbyists, cigarette lobbyists, fossil fuel lobbyists, and the list goes on. If change might take away your $$$$ not to many people will accept this without a fight.

Doi Inthanon Thailand's Highest Point

Well Easter for us was spent up in the north of Thailand. Doi Inthanon was a new adventure for me. It is located in Chiang Mai province, but is a bit further from the city of Chiang Mai so the crowds were much less than Doi Setep which is on the edge of town. 

I really love the north. The air is cleaner, the hills are green and full of waterfalls and wildlife, and the people are amazingly friendly. Bangkok is a city of diversity and it is teeming with nearly 10 million people. In Chiang Dao, a district just north of Chiang Mai, there are only 88,000 people in an area about the same size as Bangkok proper. It's so quiet at night the breeze coming through the trees and the sounds of night bugs hum you to sleep. Since my wife's family home is up there it has become our solace from the hustle and chaos of Bangkok.

Enjoy our video of Doi Inthanon!

AMERICAN SALE on SIMINOE BOOKS

Some of you have asked how you can get copies of my books. They are pretty available on line at Amazon and my website, but expensive because they are shipped from THAILAND. NOW, special for American residents only I can gladly offer ECHO POOL for $10 and THOSE WHO HEAR for $8.

This sale is possible because of my good friend KELLEY who smuggled 20 of my books in his suitcase back to the USA. Without massive shipping, the books are not so expensive! 

SEND A CHECK to:

Elaine Siminoe

107 Cedar Street

Kearney, Nebraska 68845

Tell her which book you want and give her your return address. THIS OFFER ENDS WHEN THE 20 BOOKS ARE SOLD!

ECHO POOL is an adult novel about my life in Thailand, Nebraska, Colorado, and my father.

THOSE WHO HEAR is a bit of fantasy which takes place all over the world, but begins in Denver.

The Wall of Love

On Thailand's highest mountain there is a set of pagodas that tower above beautiful gardens. I visited there last week and found one very interesting wall which I called the Pimp Wall. Most of the wall art was about religion, but this wall seemed strangely out of place and extremely interesting. Take a look!

Protests Turn UGLY in Thailand

I am very fortunate to be in the far northern village of Chiang Dao for the week celebrating Chiang Dao's 100th year as a separate district, Easter, and Sangkran.  Here things are wonderfully undisturbed, joyously ruckus with water fighting everywhere, pageants, contests, a fair, and more smiles than you can imagine. But the news from Pattaya and Bangkok is very grave. At least 2 people have been murdered by the red mob simply trying to protect their businesses. Government troops acted well, but they were way behind the curve. The red mob has seriously damaged relations with all of the Asean nations as the military did not act to protect their diplomats who were visiting for the Asean summit in Pattaya. I do not believe in any way that the red mob wanted to hurt these foreign diplomats although it does seem a part of their focus to drive out all non-Thais. They are a mix of communists, poor, and uneducated who are opposed to the current government and apparently the monarchy. I myself am loyal to the King. His spiritual leadership has kept this nation in peace during an era on the planet filled with war. I can not believe that the red mobs philosophy of distributing the wealth could possibly be coming from the Taksin they are following. He was always Thailand's richest man, well at least once he had a few years to rule the nation, strangely his fortune TRIPLED while he was in office. 

From the news this appears Taksin's desperation to be back in power mixed with a communist group that has been ignored for decades of financial success here in the Kingdom. In general the red shirts are taxi drivers, farmers, and poor folks who are being given a little cash to make trouble, but this is very dangerous. The yellow mob was noticeably different in its makeup as it was made up of middle age ladies, college professors, students, and were peaceful for hundreds of days in a row. They gave lectures and talked about their complaints with the government. These Reds are blowing up stores, throwing fire bombs and killing Thai merchants who just want to go to work the next day. This group is wrong!