Clean Up Time, Hurray?!?

The flood peak has come and gone.  A number of people sighed with relief.  I’m one among this lucky group to have escaped the direct flood both at home and at work.  So, my Great Flood experience has been limited to anticipation, comprehension and helplessly witnessed the whole saga from the news media- very closely.

Of course, a lot of people are not as fortunate.  Those in Bangkok who are affected are, right now, assessing the damage and start up process, or waiting for the little water left to come down.  On the Facebook yesterday, there was a call for volunteer to help the clean up at one of the public venue, which I thought was a great idea.  News on volunteering on a community service like this always brings positive sentiment to the public.  It reminds us that we Thais are in this together, suggesting unity- a rare commodity in this nation nowadays.  It also connotes hope, a new chapter to a nightmare, etc., etc.   

Then I read one comment that stopped me cold.  One guy wrote that perhaps we shouldn’t publicize the clean-up activities just yet, as others are still sunk in water.  Suddenly, I saw his point and fully appreciate it.  Bangkok is the last stop as the flood water came from the north and trying to go to the sea in the Gulf of Thailand.  Provinces north of Bangkok started experiencing the flood a month or two before us, and even the north of Bangkok, Pathumthani, the flooded started a month ago.  The flood in those areas is more severe and lasts longer.  Many may be not see their homes completely dry until the year end. 

Bangkok has the smallest impact from the flood and gets over the soonest, but we made the loudest noise, being who we are.  Trying to save the capital, the government and the BMA even intentionally delayed the flowing of water through Bangkok, keeping other areas in flood condition longer than otherwise.  Although I do not oppose those measures, understanding that damage to Bangkok will make the country economic disaster even worse.  But somehow, it must be hard to for those upcountry folks to watch Bangkok getting dried and cleaned while their homes are still deep in water.  The disparity between Bangkok and grassroot folks are far apart enough already.  We don’t need this to make it larger.  If I were one of them, my questions would be:  And they say we are in this together!  Where’s justice in this country?  Those city folks with money always get it easy, etc., etc.

So, be relieved, be hopeful, but just don’t gloat about it.  There are others who have sacrificed, so we get dry this soon.  Perhaps we should send them more help and a big thank you campaign?

Robbery of the Year

If you are a robber or a member of a robbing gang, where will you hit?  If you have any sense, you’d go where you are bloody sure the money is, wouldn’t you?  And that’s where one group of robbers did last week and walked out with 200 million in cash.

Assuming you have not followed recent news closely, you’d wonder where these robbers went to: a bank headquarter, a jewelry store, the printer of bank notes, a billionaire’s residence?  The answers will be all wrong, because the correct answer is the home of the Permanent Secretary of Transport!  Hah?  A home of a high-rank government officer, whose pay will run up to a few million bahts a year (my guess of course).

According to the original news, the owner reported the robbery that cash and valuables of 700,000 bt was missing.  Apparently, six were involved in this incident when the owners are not home; two maids were tied up and locked in an upstairs bathroom though.  When I first read the piece, I was not particularly interested, though 0.7 million stuck me as rather high on cash and valuables kept at home.  I simply assumed that the misses probably keeps diamonds around, etc. 

The - - - - hits the roof when two robbers were arrested and confessed.  And who ever heard of robbers got arrested and leave alone confessed with left over cash in possession.  At the press conference yesterday, the two robbers said that the robbery was planned months ahead of time, and that there were more than a billion baht in the house.  They managed only to take 200 million out, for shortage of sacks brought with them I think.  The interesting part is the way they split the cash.  The robber chief, still at large, takes 30%, with 20% shared among the five in the team.  The other 50% is to be handed over to the chief’s boss, a government officer, reported the robber under the police custody.

I believe you all are wondering the same things:

1)    How would an honest government officer, however high ranks he has, come up with such fortune?

2)    Why the hell does he keep it at home instead of some safer places like commercial banks or safety deposit boxes (cabinets)?  I presume a billion of bahts takes up a lot of space, I wouldn’t know for sure of course.

3)    Obviously, somebody else is aware of this fortune being kept at this home and managed to get it robbed.  Who can this guy be?  His enemy, his subordinate?  A guy from the opposite political party?

4)    How come the police is so efficient this time?  Is this an attempt to discredit someone, or a threat that if some party does not cooperate, the same fate will follow?  Keep your cash well, otherwise we’ll get to it and expose you?

5)    Is this high-ranking guy, the home owner I mean, really involved, or he’s simply a scapegoat.  I’ve been around long enough to suspect that things are not normally what it appears.

6)    How is this all going to end?  Or will it just disappear from the news all of a sudden, when some behind-the-scene negotiation or threat is accomplished.

Stay tuned for further news, or not.

Note to readers: Please, I’m not making any of this up.  You can read for yourself, from the following link- if you can read Thai that is.  If not, I’m sure the English papers will have this covered I’m sure. 

http://www.manager.co.th/Crime/ViewNews.aspx?NewsID=9540000146944

The water is receding, what now?

After weeks, the flood in Thailand has passed its peak and the water receding.  All in all, it’s no child’s play, but not as severe as some scenarios painted for us.
 
OK, it’s easy for me to say, as we have not been the flood victims ourselves, so far.  I have gone through the inconvenience but not the pain and the horror.  But I did go through the whole process though.  We anticipated, went through the anguish, took precautions and worried sick, just like anyone else in the city waiting for the water to show up.  After weeks in that mode, we are ready for anything.

It's time to renovate things

In fact, I even went to stay upcountry for 4 days during the so-called peak, but nothing happened.  As both entrances to our development get flooded in normal years, we decided moving into town with sister at her condo would be a good idea.  My two adult children are having a ball, getting much closer to their drinking holes.  It would be hard to drag them back after the flood.  They may just let me move back home alone.

Mentally, we all are now used to the flood of being flooded ourselves.  Life goes on.  Now, we get back to our pre-flood routines, like watching movies on the cable again- instead of glued to news channels 24/7.  It’s funny to think back on how hundred hours I spent monitoring flood movements on TV and the internet.  You may say I succeeded in scaring myself sick.  Looking back, not a very smart thing to do.  I’ll remember that next time.

So, eventually the water will be gone down the sea and it’s clean up time!  This is something none is looking forward to.  All the flooded households, of a few million people, have to go through this cleaning up and fixing their homes, large or small.  The government is giving out 5,000 bt for each house; not much but better than none.
 
My poor sister, with her various properties including the condo we are staying, has two houses flooded- her main residence and a country home.  I’ll share with you the experience in a few months to come.  One thing for sure, it’s going to be costly.  We all will be so broken, from these unexpected events, that I believe our spending patterns in the flood-affected areas may change somewhat- even for a short while like the next six months.

You’d think the economy will go down with the water, right?  But, according to the CP boss, the economy will be heated up from the restructuring fund spent by the government on the various projects- building highways, fixing airports and all the damages.  In fact, he foresaw a sizable economic expansion like 7% GDP increase next year, instead of a depression.

Photo: Pichet Suksai

That’ encouraging, considering who made that statement.  This guy, not only is one of the richest in Thailand, but he is very smart.  He was right several times in the past when he came out to say something just the opposite of the popular thinking at that time.  I hope he’s right this time too.
 
Thailand is entitled to a nice break, in my opinion, after a series of outrageous incidents, some natural and many man-made.  Right off my head, we can count many in a row: tsunami, bird’s flu, a military coup, a few years of street protests, last year city firework and the flood this year.  It’s amazing that our tourism still exists at all, no pun intended.

After a storm, the sky is usually the most beautiful.  Man, am I ready!!!

The funny-looking thing called EM Ball!

If you have followed any news on flood in the past few weeks, we’d have heard about EM Balls or seen photos of people gathering around making funny-looking things that look like huge clay marbles.  These, made up of sand, saw dust, molass, and some EM liquid, supposedly with growing microbes. 

The name EM is commercial name of this stuff called Effective Microorganism.  This good, wholesome microbes in this ball, when thrown in bad water, are supposed to go out and eat bad microbes in the stinking water, fested with garbage, rotting things, man and animals wastes, etc.  That sounds good, huh.

We have Superman conquering bad guys, and we have EM Balls killing bad, smelly stuff in the water- turning the dark, murky water into clear, clean water you don’t mind wading in- too much.  The concept was generally accepted and supported by one of the credible microbiology department of a graduate school in Thailand. 

It started from a bit folk remedy into a national project, when do-gooding folks get together at shopping centers trying to make, by hand, 100,000 balls to conquer the bad water around Bangkok.  We have to give these gentle people credit for the community spirit.  From the news, and photos, I can imagine the mood is very good and positive.  After all, everyone is so sick and tired of the bad news, the anticipation of the flood we have watched on TV for weeks, and we can do absolutely nothing to prevent it from happening.  We could prepare our homes, but we have no idea if and when we’d be hit, and how badly, if at all.

One small glitch on this community activity.  One retired sanitary engineering professor from another credible university just came out and claim that the concept is not sound.  The concept, originated in Japan, was to increase microbe in over-fertilized land, using the EM liquid.  That works well.  To extrapolate the affect from the fermented solution into balls to treat waste water has no scientific basis, according to him.  As far as he’s concerned, you may as well use lime which is cheaper and proved to be effective.  Well, lime is so ordinary, not organic, not wholesome looking.  Unlike throwing the hand-made EM balls, pouring lime into the water is so unemotional, not something you want to do with your family.

And I thought this professor is so unkind that he has to come out and kill one of the few fun and hopeful activities we have at this moment.  Right afterwards, I ran into an news article in Naewna in April 2009 reporting that according to a field trials in putting PM Balls into various klongs in Bangkok, the balls not only didn’t improve the water but lower the oxygen content in the water, causing it to rot and smell even worse.

To make the whole thing more ironic, the website of www.environment.in.th which I found the news posted on belongs to the Department of Environmental Promotion, Ministry of Natural Resource and Environment.

Well, well, well…  This government agency, with their main mission to promote the environment, knows full well that this stuff does not work, and yet has let the trend going viral without saying one word.  Turning crisis into opportunity, as they say, just for this year I propose instead of celebrating Loy Krathong, we can switch to throwing EM Balls festival.  We have to use the 100,000 balls being hand made by thousands somehow, you know.  

We can add a few sub activities into this: throwing ball contest- the farthest, the best looking swings; ball making contest- the prettiest maker, the biggest ball, the roundest ball, the smallest ball; for example.

I even modified the song for you.  

วันเพ็ญเดือนสิบสอง น้ำนองเต็มตลิ่ง
เราทั้งหลายชายหญิง สนุกกันจริง วันโยนอีเอม
โยน โยนอีเอม   โยน โยนอีเอม   
โยนอีเอม กันแล้ว  ขอเชิญน้องแก้ว มาโยนอีเอม   
โยน โยนอีเอม   โยน โยนอีเอม

If we can’t wind them, might as well join them. Have fun, and this is Thailand for you.  

Water, water everywhere - Part II

Hold on to your seats, it’s coming!

The much anticipated huge volume of water is really here in town.  It’s fascinating to see photos of river-like highways, runways, water-covered houses, stores, factories, temple…  It really doesn’t discriminate the victims, you can give it credit for that.  The expensive estates, the PM and ministers’ homes, the water expert’s house, the princess’s palace, temples, shacks are all flooded at this point.

Try our best to get through water
Photo: Pichet Suksai

After weeks of anticipation and preparation, the chaos still shakes us all up.  The netizens (those who can’t live without the internet) tend to be most well informed on what to do and what not to do.  I said they are informed, I didn’t say they practice the precaution.  It’s just hard for some to believe that such misfortune will happen to them too.  You can call it denial syndrome, like in any life mishaps. 

Nothing is like waking up with knee-deep water in your home to snap you out of this illusion.

I have asked myself what impact has the flood has on me, and here are my answers:

As a Bangkok resident:

1) I pay more attention to the TV news, the media which I rarely watched- monitoring for breaking news, etc.  I found this informative but also nerve wrecking after a week.  I watched after announcers and commentators go over again and again the so many million cubic meter of water coming passing such and such places (most of which I have not heard of in my life), the water height is so many centimeters from the sea level (so what?) and the flow is at such and such rate.  The analyses are done by experts from various institutes and offices presenting such and such models.  These reports are bad enough to make anyone crazy, but when I start watching announcements by the top guys, FROC heads, BMA governor and, last and also worst, our lady PM, my anxiety turns into full-blown panic.

It’s not the situation they describe or contents of their talks, it’s the realization that they have no idea what’s going on and keep contradicting each other.  For goodness sake, they don’t even work together in unison and yes, no one is really in charge of this whole bloody flood thing in Thailand.  We are on our own, folks.  If you don’t already figure that out, let me tell you here and now.

2) I’m more involved in the social media since the beginning of this flood.  This I can do it on my own time- particularly convenient with my iPad in bed.  This gives me insomnia, as anyone sensible may expect, particularly when I wake up at 2:30 am. Instead of going back to sleep, I turning on my iPad, and start checking news and chatting away on facebook.  Addiction phase one, I’m afraid.

3) I rarely read print newspaper any more, as it only comes once a day.  So, by the time it reaches me, it is be old news- particularly with the new delivery guy in our neighborhood.  I check out the news on the paper websites a few times a day, and am very happy with that.  In fact, I cancelled my two print daily subscriptions.  Actually, I’m a bit guilty about this, since we are also a print magazine publisher.  And I have to admit, at crisis like this, print is no match to online. But I still miss my daily comics and puzzles, which I can find online, but I do like to work on it on my couch over coffee.  Ah, the good old days…

4) Roads are less crowded.  This is partly because schools are off and more importantly, cars are parked and stored away from the flood in any conceivable high places.  These include parking lots in condos, shopping centers and even on highways and express ways.  The last two make me a bit nervous.  In case of emergency, we may all be stuck in Bangkok for months because the roads are flooded and the express ways are all blocked by parked cars.  In a way, it is not too different from get stuck in a house with iron bars on windows in the case of fire.  We’d be stuck on streets with water coming in a huge traffic because we can’t use highways- which are all blocked by parked cars.  OK, maybe I have watched too many Hollywood movies, but it’s still a dangerous practice to me- not unlike storing things on fire stairs.

5) Like most people at this stage, I look for stuffs I rarely buy when I shop.  These include bottled water, garbage bags (we normally reuse grocery store white plastic bags for garbage), instant noodles- trying to follow instructions we learn from all sources on TV or the net.  I even bought boots!!!  However, we instead end up buying dozens of peanuts, potato chips and all the munchies and boil our own filtered water for drinking.  (I don’t trust the water supply of the drinking water producers either.)  I was going stock up with beer but changed my mind.  I hate to look drunk while evacuating in case of emergency.  You can drown in knee-deep water you know, if you are drunk enough.  Besides, we are too tensed up to enjoy drinking at this stage.  That will be a waste of good beer, don’t you think?

Daily activity of people in Bangkok and Suburbs
Photo: Pichet Suksai

What will this flood turn me into, I wonder?  It sure will have a lasting impact on me, like anyone else who experience it, I’m quite certain.  Since it’s not over, we can’t really tell now.  But six months from now, I’ll write about the effect on me and the ones I see around me.  That will be interesting.

One thing for sure, we’ll all be very broke.  And, last but not least, I bet we’ll look at working toilets in our homes in a way we can’t image even now.

View Part I

Breast cancer, should we be afraid?

October is the breast cancer month. Every year there will be events to raise fund and create awareness, pink ribbons given out, seminars, TV programs, etc.  If you are ever involved, you will know that it’s seasoning.

I am a breast cancer survival.  I had mine 10 years ago, and it was pretty scary.  I meant to write a series of articles for newspaper from the patient’s point of view, I never finished it.  In fact, I wrote about 3 pieces already and need another two for the set.  Maybe I’ll do that this year and publish it next October.

I think reading from another patient’s experience can help patients cope with their problems.  In fact, when my oncologist (cancer doctor) learned that I can speak, he asked me to talk in several events over the years.  In fact, I once had a job candidate asked me during interview about my cancer, which startled me.  It turned out to do her homework for the interview, she searched my name in the Google, and found pages of my reference to do with cancer.  You see, they made me the president of the Thai Breast Friends Club, a support group for breast cancer.  

 

It’s not that I’m most qualified for dedicated, farthest from the truth, but it’s because they couldn’t find anyone who would accept it.  So I have had the title since they started the club until now.  I really should resign, as I have done hardly anything for them in the past few years.  (So this is my confession.)

Should we be afraid?  Yes and no.  Until I had it, I didn’t realize that it’s widely affected people.  It used to be the number one cancer for women in the US, and for Thailand, it’s either the number one or two next to pelvic cancer.  After people know that I had it, people stop to talk to me all the time, which is great.  I still get calls from patients who either read an article I wrote or got referred to by my friends, doctors, staffs, etc.  If you know of someone who can use some counseling on breast cancer, send her or him this way.  It can be the patients or relatives.  People usually feel better after talking to me.  The fact that I had a bad case (stage 2B with Her2 positive), and still around kicking normally gives them incentive to continue fighting. 

I advise women over 40 to take mammography test yearly for early detection.  Yes, we all should be aware, but we should not be afraid.  As I said, breast cancer is so common that research in this field is probably the most advanced among all cancers.  I usually joke with patients that if you have to have cancer, breast cancer is the best.  You get medicine for it and it happens on an organ that you can live without (vs brain, lung, pancreas, etc.).  Definitely, breast cancer can be cured- particularly with early detection.

As they say, there’s nothing to fear but fear itself.  This also applies for cancer treatment.  Those who can’t be cured can also live with it.  I tell people that my cancer is gone, but it can always come back.  If and when it does, I’ll go through the treatment again. 

One thing about having cancer is that it gives you perspective in life.  It’s hard for me to break my back on business any more (or maybe I’m just getting old?).  I enjoy my friends and loved ones more, and make time for them than I used to. 

You can say having cancer is a wake up call.  It’s better to have one than not- the wake-up call I mean. 

Water, water everywhere

So, if you have been in Thailand the past month or so, even for a day, you’d feel the frenzy we have over this current flood situation.  What is so unique about it?  After all, Thailand and floods do exist side by side for generations.

 

First of all, it’s HUGE.  People on the street can quote you the exact volume of water, because we all have been watching news like reality shows- for months now.  But I think the thing that hit us most, the flood hits Bangkok.

Cars parked on bridges to avoid flood
Photo: Pichet Suksai

We folks in Bangkok prefer watching disaster on TV.  When the South had it, we sent donation and goods to help them.  We talked about it, read it in the papers and we felt for them.  When the Northeast had it, we did the same.  Now, when it’s our turn, we react differently; we lost our cool.  After all this is Bangkok.  We are used to flash floods that stop traffic for a few hours, those we can deal with.  But 1-3 meters of water, are you crazy?  Who would have imagined?  Surely the government will never let this happen right here in downtown Bangkok.

By the way, the government, just two months ago elected into the office by votes outside Bangkok, are now stuck with tasks way above their heads.  The big-talk MP’s are nowhere to be seen.  Our first female PM, clone of you-know-who, is in command, and she probably just learned how to read weather/ flood maps a few weeks ago.

To make the story more complicated, the fact that the government and the BMA are from opposite political parties can’t be any worse.  This is not to include that the Government does not entirely trust the military either.  And we can’t blame them either, because it was the army who last time conducted a coup, toppled you-know-who.  In that case, calling an emergency decree is out of the question.  That will put too much power in the hand of the military.

Roadways submerge
Photo: Pichet Suksai

You can say that this is a political as well as natural disaster.  The parties suffer the most are not the political parties, mind you, but Thai folks like you and me, business owners, workers and just about everyone.  Financial figures for the damage have been quoted, but I suspect that it will take years even a decade to recoup this.

Will we Thais ever learn?  I’m afraid not.  We get what we pay for.  If we are paid for our votes, what do we expect of the quality of our administrators, our vote buyers that is?  We are paying for the price now and will continue to do so in years to come.

Happy democracy, everyone….

More on Part II

To Blog or not to blog?

I was asked to start keeping a blog by my editorial staff for quite a while.  I was given some good answers as to why I should, but already forgot what they were.  I don’t think they are the real reasons though.

You see, we have agreed that to attract traffic to our various websites, our web team insists that we need interesting blogs.  And how can we get even an interesting blog, someone has to write it.  They all point to me although I don’t think that I can create more entertaining contents than them.  It’s just that somebody has to do it, it might as well be you, boss.  Of course, they don’t quite come out and say it, but as the Thais say, I have taken showers before them.  I know it sounds stupid in English, but it means I have been around longer, so I know what they are after.  (I never figure out this expression as to why someone should get smarter by having taken more showers.)

Anyway, here I am with my first blog.  I have no clue on how to do it right, but know that I need to crank it out at least once a week, or else….  They say it’s like keeping a personal journal or a diary, which I never did.  As a child when it was fashionable to keep diary, I never figured out an incentive to do so.  First, it looks like work.  Second, if you keep secret there, then it will no longer be secret when someone else reads it.  If you keep it for you to read yourself, I think it’s rather funny.  I’d rather forget and do something else fun.

Back to our blog, my editor also said that I can comment on what I see, news I follow, people I meet or issues that I follow.  OK, that sounds interesting.  I can do that, as I LOVE to comment- many times uninvited.  Good, this way I can do it in private and in writing, because chances that people will come to read it is very slight.  (Don’t tell my editors this.)

So, from now on I will write about things, life and how I see the world.  If you are so lucky to run into or even follow this blog, you’ll get to see my point of view.  I can’t promise that you’ll learn anything from it, more than likely not, but I think I will.

My next blog will be on the hottest topic around here, the Flood.  Stay tuned.