Feb 18 Cruising the Sotheby’s China Sea

Finally a day of rest! Despite that we were up at 7:30, went to the gym, I had the world’s best massage, tea served at 4:00 while a string quartet played, went to the Captain’s reception (free champagne) then had the perfect meal (lobster with champagne and a decadent chocolate dessert) and finished the day entertained by a very good comedian. 

There wasn’t much to see except a few fishing boats and a number of very large oil rigs. I had seen some signs yesterday protesting the off shore drilling. I didn’t realize there is so much here.

Some impressions of Thailand. The people seem to be generally calm, peaceful (at peace within themselves). I keep wondering if that is a result of their religious beliefs. All our guides spoke of Buddhism and  meditation. It seems most people do practice meditation and follow the basic precepts of Buddhism. I wish I knew more about it. I am going to do some reading about it when we get home.

I expected a third world country and now think of it as a second world country. Of course, we did not spend much time outside of major areas. However, our tour guides came from rural areas and from their description the country has progressed a lot over the last few years. A lot of the farming is still done manually. That seems to be a matter of available cheap labour. Wages are low but so is the cost of living, things like medical care are available to all but access is dictated by location. Education is free until collage level and even then some is free and/ or very reasonably priced. Taxes are low – income tax 3% – 35% with no income tax below an income of 150,000 BHTS (about  $6,000) and the maximum of 35% at one million BHTS (about $40,000). The average wage is around $300 per month. Sales tax is about 3%. A cup of coffee on the street is $0.30.

There are 3 seasons winter – Oct to Feb, summer – March to June and rainy season July – Aug. The average temperature now is very hot eg morning around 5:00 am is 28C with 92% humidity and it gets hotter as the day goes on. 

There is evidence of extreme poverty next to large houses. We did see a few suburbs with housing similar to what we might see in Mississauga. We also saw tinned roof shacks built on top of each other, often with a number of satellite dishes.

Bangkok seems like a very safe place. I expect it would be easy to navigate as a tourist especially once you get to know the subway and air train systems. There are lots of taxis as well as buses and of course the tuk tuks. Traffic is a big problem but the drivers are very patient, the scooters have the big advantage as they don’t worry about things like traffic lanes and seem to fly past all the cars, probably why the taxi scooters are popular (don’t look very safe to me). 

We didn’t see any evidence of conflict but heard a lot about it from one of our guides. It seemed like there is still a lack of democracy and a growing underground movement to change the present system. The Red Shirts are the rebels trying to bring in free elections. The Yellow Shirts support the existing system. Not all guides would discuss it. As long as the existing king is alive I expect it will remain peaceful. He is 84 and not in good health, his son, the crown prince, is not generally like. It will be interesting to watch what happens over the next few years.

The history of the people is largely Chinese and Indian. The language and religion both have their origins there. Buddhism has its foundation in Hinduism. 

Tomorrow Vietnam.

Still having problems with pictures. It worked at home. I wonder if it has to do with the Maritime satellite service?