Luigi Restaurant Website

Talking about good food, good news is that my little brother finally finished the website of our weekend restaurant and you can view it at http://www.cycle-soft.com/~luigi.

Here is me and my little bro talking about the upcoming dish:


The following picture shows one of the desserts we made:


The last sample shows an example of our weekly newsletter we did of each of the week's menu summary:

Enjoy :)

50 Good Shops to Eat At(Thailand)

Sorry if this is in Thai, but I've found a very interesting chain letter in my inbox that lists some of the good eating places around town. Only valid in Thailand though :P

1. โจ๊กสามย่าน : ถามใครๆ ก็บอกว่า ทีเด็ดอยู่ที่หมูหมักก้อนกลมกล่อม ประกอบกับเปิดขายเฉพาะช่วงเช้าก่อนเข้าเรียนและช่วงเย็นประมาณหลังเลิกเรียนพอดี
เลยกลายเป็น เสบียงให้นิสิตอิ่มท้องจนเรียนจบมาแล้วนักต่อนัก

2. ข้าวราดแกงวัดเล่งเน่ยยี่ : ในซอยมังกร ข้างวัดเล่งเน่ยยี่ ถนนเจริญกรุง ขึ้นชื่อในแกงประเภทแกงกะทิ โดยเฉพาะแกง[^_^]เนื้อ..มาขายตั้งแต่ประมาณ 16.00น. เป็นต้นไป

3. โจ๊กหม้อดิน ซอยมหาดไทย : ใช้หม้อดินมาตั้งแต่รุ่นคุณพ่อ เพราะหม้อดินเป็นภาชนะธรรมชาติปลอดสารพิษเวลาโดนความร้อน แถมเก็บความร้อนไว้ได้นาน เนื้อหมูใช้หมูที่ ไม่มีมัน ส่วนข้าวก็ใช้ข้าวหอมมะลิ ปัจจุบันเปิดขายแฟรนไชส์ แบ่งปันกำไรและความอร่อยกันให้ทั่วๆ สนใจติดต่อที่ โทร
934-3995

4. ข้าวขาหมูสีลม : อยู่ในซอยตรงข้างโรงพยาบางเลิดสิน คนแถวนั้นรู้จักในนามขาหมูโกโก้ ใครอยากมาลองต้องรีบมาช่วงเที่ยงหลังบ่ายโมงไม่รับประกัน เพราะจะขายหมดเร็วมาก

5. ข้าวมันไก่ตอนประตูน้ำ : นอกจากข้าวและไก่จะมีรสดีได้มาตรฐานแล้ว ที่ใครๆ ออกปากเห็นจะเป็นน้ำซุปร้อนๆ หอมและหวานน้ำต้มกระดูกไก่

6. ข้าวหมูแดงสีมรกต : ไม่ต้องสงสัยว่าข้าวหมูแดงทำไมเป็นสีเขียว..จริงๆ แล้วคือนามสกุลเจ้าของร้าน มีทีเด็ดตรงที่ทุกอย่างล้วนผ่านกรรมวิธีการย่าง ย่างมาตลอดสี่สิบกว่าปี ร้านอยู่ในตรอกโรงหมู ตรงข้ามวัดไตรมิตร ขายเวลา 11.30น.-22.00น

7. ข้าวขาหมูเหม่งจ๋าย : จากแยกเหม่งจ๋ายมุ่งหน้ามาทางที่จะทะลุถนนเลียบทางด่วน จะเห็นร้านอาหารหลายร้านอยู่ด้านขวามือ ข้าวขาหมูร้านที่ว่าเป็นที่ชื่นชอบของคนรัก เครื่องในและหมูกรอบ

8. ข้าวผัดปู : อาหารจีนชนิดอื่นๆ ทั้งกระเพาะปลา รังนก กระทั่งหูฉลาม ทั้งหมดราคาย่อมเยาและรสชาติสมเป็นอาหารจีนแท้ๆ โดยไม่ต้องขึ้นเหลา มีผัดหมี่หยังโจวกับข้าวผัดปูเป็นเมนูหลัก ร้านเปิดขายประมาณ 18.00 น. เป็นต้นไป ที่ห้าแยก ณ ระนอง ตรงข้ามสโมสรการท่าเรือ

9. ก๋วยเตี๋ยวหลอดเยาวราช : ร้านแรกเป็นรถเข็น อยู่ต้นถนนเยาวราชฝั่งขวา ก่อนแยกเข้าถนนผดุงด้าว สังเกตได้จากปริมาณคลื่นคนที่อออยู่หน้าร้าน ลูกค้าบอกว่ามีดีที่เครื่อง เยอะและรสชาติเข้มข้นหรือถ้าอยากชิมก๋วยเตี๋ยวหลอดแบบที่ยังคงความเป็นหลอดไว้ ก็ต้องเดินเลยมาอีกนิด อยู่ฝั่งซ้ายมือ ปากซอยที่มีร้าน 7-11 อยู่ด้านใน เด็ด..เช่นกัน

10. ก๋วยเตี๋ยวลูกชิ้นน้ำใสศรีย่าน : ตู้ใส่เส้นและลูกชิ้นค่อนข้างเก่า เนื่องจากทำมาหลายสิบปี แต่ก็ยังคงความอร่อยของลูกชิ้นไว้เช่นเดิม อยู่บริเวณตลาดศรีย่าน

11. ก๋วยเตี๋ยวลูกชิ้นปลาเด้งได้ : เป็นร้านพี่น้องอยู่ใกล้ๆ กัน บริเวณท่าน้ำราชวงศ์ กระซิบว่าเจ้าของร้านไม่ค่อยอยากให้ลง แต่เพราะความอร่อยของลูกชิ้นและเส้นที่เหนียวนุ่ม เราจึงจำเป็นต้องแนะนำ ใครจะแวะไปชิม กรุณาอย่าบอกว่าอ่านเจอจากที่นี่..ขอบพระคุณ

12. หมี่กรอบจีนหลี สมัย ร.5 : เรื่องมีอยู่ว่า คุณทวดของเจ้าของร้านอพยพมาจากเมืองจีนมาทำหมี่กรอบ ขายอยู่ บริเวณท่าน้ำตลาดพลู ซึ่งเป็นย่านที่มีขุนนางอาศัยอยู่เยอะ วัน หนึ่งพระพุทธเจ้าหลวงปลอมพระองค์เสด็จฯ ตรวจราชการ แล้วทรงได้กลิ่นหมี่ใกล้สุก เมื่อเสด็จฯ ครั้งต่อๆ มาจึงแวะเสวยและมีพระราชดำรัสให้ไปผัดใน วัง ปัจจุบันหมี่กรอบจีนหลียังตั้งอยู่ที่เดิม ขายสิบโมงเช้าถึงสี่ทุ่ม

13. ก๋วยเตี๋ยวสุโขทัย สมทรงโภชนา : เจ้าของสูตรซึ่งเป็นชาวสวรรคโลกแท้ๆ เพิ่มเสียชีวิตได้ไม่นาน พี่วรรณลูกสาว จึงรับหน้าที่ปรุงรสก๋วยเตี๋ยวให้ได้ครบรส เดิมตั้งอยู่ใน ซอยวัดสังเวช ถนนท่าพระอาทิตย์ เดี๋ยวนี้ขยับขยายขึ้นไปอยู่บนศูนย์อาหารเซ็นทรัลพลาซา ลาดพร้าว

14. ก๋วยเตี๋ยวลูกชิ้นปลาโบราณ จันทบุรี : ร้านตั้งอยู่เลยวัดตรีทศเทพ เลี้ยวซ้ายไปเล็กน้อย เป็นลูกชิ้นปลาทำเองจากเจ้าของร้าน กิตติศัพท์เรื่องรสชาติมีมาก พอๆ กับการไม่ง้อ ลูกค้า คนเรื่องมากต้องระวังจะถูกเชิญให้ไปรับประทานร้านอื่น

15. ก๋วยเตี๋ยวไหหลำ : แปลกกว่าก๋วยเตี๋ยวธรรมดาตรงเส้นที่คล้ายเส้นเกี้ยมอี๋ แต่ยาวกว่า ใส่ผักกาดดองตามสูตรไหหลำ เนื้อหมูและวัวเลือกมาอย่างดี อยู่ตรงสะพานขาว ถนนลูก หลวง ใกล้โรงหนังแอมบาสเดอร์เก่า

16. เย็นตาโฟวัดแขก ถนนสีลม : ใครเคยไปบริเวณวัดแขก จะเห็นว่าทุกร้านล้วนขึ้นป้ายว่าเย็นตาโฟวัดแขกเจ้าเก่า แนะนำได้เพียงว่า ร้านดั้งเดิมคือร้านที่อยู่ใกล้กับวัดแขกมากที่ สุด แต่เรื่องรสชาติต้องลองชิมดูเองว่าร้านไหนจะถูกปากใครมากกว่า จานเด่นจานเด็ด

17. ไก่ย่างแม่วันเพ็ญ : ไก่ย่างและไก่ย่างทอดร้อนๆ ทอดจนกรอบ แล้วโรยเครื่องเทศให้หอม เข้าได้ทั้งจากซอยอาภาภิรมย์ ข้างกรมการค้าส่งออก ถนนรัชโยธิน หรือจากซอย โชคชัย 4 ถนนลาดพร้าวก็ได้ ผู้ไม่คุ้นทางสามารถโทรศัพท์สอบถามได้ที่ 0 1818 2608

18. กระเพาะปลาน้ำแดง : ใช้เวลาเตรียมแต่เช้ามืดเพื่อเปิดขายตอนประมาณสี่โมงเย็นถึงสี่ทุ่มเพราะต้องเคี่ยวกระดูกไก่นาน 4 ชั่วโมง ผสมกับเครื่องปรุงอย่างดี ทำให้ได้น้ำ หอมหวาน แต่เดิมขายในรถ เดี๋ยวนี้กลายเป็นแผงอยู่หน้าที่จอดรถตลาดสวนหลวง ใกล้สนามกีฬาแห่งชาติ

19. อาหารไทย ร้านครัวอรรถรส ซอยเสือใหญ่อุทิศ : มีทั้งก๋วยเตี๋ยวสุโขทัย ส้มตำผลไม้ ขนมจีนน้ำเงี้ยว ฯลฯ รวมไว้ในร้านเดียวกัน เจ้าของรวบรวมอาหารอร่อยจากที่ต่างๆ มา พัฒนารสชาติ ปรับส่วนที่เข้มข้นเกินไปให้อร่อยลงตัวไปอีกแบบ หาร้านไม่เจอ โทรศัพท์ถามได้ที่ 0 2541 7043

20. ส้มตำจตุจักร : ฝั่งตรงข้ามตลาด อ.ต.ก. ผ่านซุ้มหนังสือเก่าเลี้ยวขวา จะเจอร้านส้มตำฝุ่นตลบซึ่งมีอาหารอีกหลายอย่างให้เลือก อาทิ ไก่ทอด หมูยอ ก๋วยจั๊บญวน ที่อร่อย อาจเป็นเพราะรอนานจนหิวก็เป็นได้

21. ปลาหมึกย่างสยามสแควร์ : คุณป้าใช้ปลาหมึกสดๆ จิ้มน้ำจิ้มรสเด็ด ราคาอาจสูงไปนิด แต่ก็สมเหตุสมผลกับค่าทำเล และคุณภาพอาหาร อยู่ในสยามสแควร์ ซอย 4

22. ไก่ทอด 7 กระทะ : ไก่ทอดจนกรอบเกรียม รวมกับกระเทียมเจียวร้อนๆ ทำให้มีลูกค้ามากมายมายืนรอ เมื่อไม่ทันใจจึงต้องใช้กระทะถึง 7 ใบ จากแยกรัชดา-สุทธิสาร มุ่ง หน้าเข้าแยกที่จะลัดออกสู่ลาดพร้าว อยู่ทางซ้ายมือ

23. ไก่ทอดเจ๊กี : บางคนเรียกไก่ทอดโปโล เพราะตั้งอยู่ในซอยโปโล ตรงข้ามสวนลุมพินี เป็นร้านเก่าร้านแก่ตั้งแต่รุ่นเจ๊กี คือคุณแม่ คิดสูตรไก่ทอดโรยกระเทียมเจียวหอม พร้อม อาหารประเภทส้มตำน้ำตก เปิดบริการตั้งแต่เจ็ดโมงเช้า มีบริการจัดส่งบริเวณใกล้เคียง โทรศัพท์สั่งได้ที่ 0 2655 8489

24. เป็ดย่างพูลสิน : เลยวัดตรีทศเทพมาเล็กน้อย เป็ดย่างสุกกำลังเหมาะจนหนังกรอบ เนื้อนุ่ม ไม่เหนียว

25. ห่านพะโล้ฉั่วคิมเฮง : ตรงมาจากถนนเพชรบุรีตัดใหม่ ข้ามแยกคลองตันมาถนนพัฒนาการ จะเห็นร้านใหญ่ซ้ายมือ ร้านดั้งเดิมปัจจุบันยังอยู่ท่าดินแดง ชื่อฉั่วกิมฮวด เก่าแก่ จนได้รับฉายาว่าเป็นห่านสามชั่วคน
26. ไก่ย่างจิรพันธ์ : ร้านขายอาหารอิสลามล้วนๆ นอกจากไก่ย่างยังมีเนื้อสะเต๊ะ ข้าวหมกไก่ แถมด้วย ข้าวหมกแพะ จากถนนรามคำแหงเลี้ยวซ้ายที่แยกพระราม 9 มุ่งหน้าไป ทางมอเตอร์เวย์ จะอยู่ทางซ้ายมือ เลยปั๊มเชลล์ไปประมาณ 500 เมตร

28. สะอาด : ขายเสต๊กที่ผ่านการดัดแปลงรสชาติให้เข้ากับคอคนจีนได้เป็นอย่างดี ในร้านยังมีก๋วยเตี๋ยวลูกชิ้นน้ำใส เป็นเมนูเด็ดประจำร้าน อยู่บนถนนอิสรภาพ ใกล้สี่แยกบ้าน แขก

29. ห่านพะโล้สะพานเหลือง : ผ่านการต้มมาอย่างดีจนเนื้อไม่เหนียวและไม่คาวเหมือนห่านพะโล้ทั่วๆไป อยู่ย่านสะพานเหลือง ริมถนนพระราม 4 ถ้ามุ่งหน้าหัวลำโพงจะอยู่ ด้านซ้ายมือ ก่อนถึงแยกบรรทัดทอง?อาหารว่างและของหวา?

30. กาแฟโบราณเอี๊ยะแซ : โบราณสมชื่อ เพราะเปิดมาแล้วเจ็ดสิบกว่าปี ใช้เมล็ดกาแฟจากไร่ประจำ นำมาคั่วทำให้ได้รสกาแฟแท้ดั้งเดิม เปิดรับคนตื่นเช้าตั้งแต่ตีสี่ครึ่งไปจนถึง สี่ทุ่ม ที่ร้านบนถนนเยาวราช-พาดสาย ตรงข้ามเท็กซัสสุกี้ นอกจากนี้ยังหาดื่มได้ตามศูนย์อาหารทั่วกรุงเทพฯ และเซ็นเตอร์พ้อยท์ เอาใจคอกาแฟรุ่นใหม่

31. ขนมเบื้องวังเดิม : สังเกตเห็นได้ง่าย เนื่องจากมีขนาดใหญ่กว่าขนมเบื้องธรรมดา ใช้แป้งถั่วเขียวละเลงเป็นแผ่น เพราะหอมกว่าแป้งสาลีแล้วเคลือบด้วยไข่ มีให้เลือกทั้งไส้ หวาน และไส้เค็มชื่อวังเดิมเพราะร้านเก่าอยู่แถววังเดิม เดี๋ยวนี้อยู่ลานอาหารไทย ดิโอลด์สยามพลาซ่า

32. ไอศกรีมทิพรส : ไอศกรีมกะทิหลากชนิด มีให้เลือกทั้งกะทิโบราณ กะทิรวมมิตร และกะทิทรงเครื่อง มีบริการแพ็คกลับบ้านได้ ราคาไม่แพง อยู่บริเวณสี่แยกเตาปูน มุ่งหน้า ไปทางตลาดเตาปูน

33. ร้านขนมไทยหวานดำรงค์ : ร้านปัจจุบันเปิดมาตั้งแต่ปี 2508 ได้มรดกทางฝีมือการทำขนมมาจากคุณแม่ ซึ่งเจ้าของร้านถ่อมตัวว่าไม่ได้มาจากวังไหน แต่คุณหญิงหลายๆ ท่านก็มาสั่งทำขนมชั้นขนาดใหญ่ตะโก้ และขนมเปียกปูน อยู่เสมอๆ ร้านเปิดเจ็ดโมงเช้า ถึงหนึ่งทุ่ม หยุดวันอาทิตย์ อยู่ในตลาดเจริญ
ผล ใกล้สี่แยกเจริญผล หรือจะโทรศัพท์สั่งก็ย่อมได้ ที่ 0 215 2345

34. ถั่วแปบ ซอยละลายทรัพย์ : เดิมขายสาคูและข้าวเกรียบปากหม้อ แล้วมาทำถั่วแปบเสริม แต่ด้วยความที่ถั่วแปบเจ้านี้แป้งนิ่มกำลังดี ลูกค้าหันมาซื้อกันมากจนทำไม่ทัน จึงต้อง หันมาขายเฉพาะถั่วแปบเป็นหลัก ที่ซอยละลายทรัพย์ ถนนสีลม

35. ปอเปี๊ยะ/ มะตะบะ ท่าพระจันทร์ : กรรมวิธีการทอดต่างจากร้านอื่น ตรงทอดแป้งเป็นแผ่นบางโรยด้วยไส้ นำมาซ้อนกัน 3 ชั้น ห่อด้วยแป้งแล้วจึงทอดอีกครั้ง วิธีนี้จะทำให้ มีความกรอบและนุ่มพอดิบพอดี ร้านใกล้ๆ กันขายปอเปี้ยะทอดที่ใส่เครื่องกุ้งและหมูสับเต็มๆ คำ รสดีด้วยเครื่องเทศและความกรอบใหม่

36. โรตีกรอบ หน้าเพาะช่าง : พัฒนามาจากโรตีแผ่นกลมธรรมดา มาเป็นโรตีแผ่นสี่เหลี่ยมทอดจนกรอบ ใส่กล่องหรือใส่จาน แนะนำให้ทานร้อนๆ จะอร่อยเป็นทวีคูณ

37. เซ็งซิมอี๊ : อี๊ หมายถึงแป้งที่ปั้นเป็นรูปร่างต่างๆ ส่วนเซ็งซิม หมายถึงชื่นใจ เซ็งซิมอี๊ ร้านที่ว่าเป็นร้านสะท้านโลกันต์ อยู่บริเวณตลาดสวนหลวงเช่นกัน ขายช่วงเย็นๆ ไปจน ค่อนคืน

38. ลอดช่องสิงคโปร์ : ชื่อร้านประโยชน์ อยู่ระหว่างสามแยกกับวงเวียน 22 เป็นร้านเล็กๆ แต่รสชาติไม่เล็กเหมือนร้าน

39. ไอศกรีมไข่แข็ง : โดยการใส่ไข่แดงล้วนๆ ลงในไอศกรีมกะทิ ความเย็นจะกลบกลิ่นคาว กลายเป็นรสชาติหอมมันแทน ร้านอยู่ถัดจากเซ็งซิมอี๊ที่ตลาดสวนหลวงไปประมาณ 2-3 ห้อง

40. ซ่าหริ่มชูถิ่น : บอกชื่อไป ไม่มีใครไม่รู้จัก ขายทั้งซ่าหริ่มและขนมไทยอีกหลายชนิด คนชอบทำขนมหลายคนดีอกดีใจที่ร้านนี้มีแป้งทำขนมขายพร้อมวิธีทำบอกเสร็จสรรพ แต่จริงๆ แล้วร้านเขาขายแป้งมาแต่เดิมต่างหาก

41. มนต์ นมสด : ชื่อร้านคือชื่อเจ้าของร้าน คุณมนต์ช่วยคุณพ่อทำร้านนม-กาแฟ มาตั้งแต่ 10 ขวบเริ่มตั้งแต่เป็นรถเข็น ย้ายที่แล้วที่เล่าจนมาได้ที่ปัจจุบันอยู่ตรงข้ามศาลาว่าการกรุงเทพฯ เปิดขายตั้งแต่14.00น.

42. ราดหน้า 4 สี : คือสีของเส้น รวมกับสีน้ำตาลของหมูหมัก สีเหลืองของไข่ดาว และสีน้ำตาลเข้มของหมูแฮม ซึ่งจริงๆ แล้วคือหมูทอดกระเทียม แต่ลูกค้าเห็นว่าอยู่คู่กับไข่ดาว ก็เลยพากันเรียกหมูแฮมจนติดปาก ร้านชิ้งกี่ เคยมีโอกาสรับเสด็จสมเด็จพระเทพฯ รวมทั้งคนใหญ่คนโตหลายๆ ท่านมาแล้ว อยู่
ใกล้สวนรมณีย์นาถ ถัดจาก ซอยร้านหวายนายเหมือนไปหนึ่งซอย

43. ผัดไทยสำราญราษฎร์ : ผัดไทยร้านนี้เป็นผัดไทยกุ้งสดเจ้าแรกของเมืองไทย ตั้งอยู่ตรงข้ามประตูผัดวัดสระเกศ ใกล้ๆ กันมีผัดไทยทิพย์สมัยให้เลือกชิมได้อีกที่ ในบริเวณ เดียวกันจะมีอาหารอร่อยหลายร้าน แต่ขอให้ระวังสอบถามราคาก่อน เพราะอาหารบางร้านก็ราคาแพงอย่างไม่น่าเชื่อ

44. เย็นตาโฟประตูผี : เลยร้านผัดไทยมาจะเห็นร้านตี๋เย็นตาโฟ อยู่ตรงหัวมุมแยกสำราญราษฎร์ ตั้งโต๊ะขายช่วงกลางคืนเต็มพื้นที่ และคนก็มากพอๆ กับจำนวนโต๊ะ สอบถามได้ ความว่าลูกชิ้นมีหลากหลายและน้ำซุปก็อร่อยเกินหน้าเกินตาเย็นตาโฟร้านอื่น

45. ก๋วยเตี๋ยวคั่วไก่ : ร้านที่แนะนำนี้ทำทั้งก๋วยเตี๋ยวคั่วไก่ และก๋วยเตี๋ยวอบไก่ สูตรแรกจะคั่วเส้นกับไข่จนหอมแห้ง อีกสูตรใส่ไข่แล้วปิดฝาหม้อให้กลิ่นอบอยู่ข้างใน อยู่ซอยตรง ข้ามโรงพยาบาลกลาง

46. ก๋วยเตี๋ยวคั่วทะเล : ร้านนี้ขายทั้งคั่วทะเลและคั่วไก่ แต่ที่ขึ้นชื่อจะเป็นคั่วทะเล เพราะใส่ทั้งกุ้งและปลาหมึกให้ด้วย อยู่ในซอยข้างตลาดวรจักร หาไม่ยาก แต่ทางวังเวงเล็ก น้อย สาวๆ อยากลองควรหาใครไปเป็นเพื่อนสักคนสองคน

47. ข้าวมันไก่เจ๊ยี : ตรงข้ามวัดสระเกศ ขึ้นชื่อเรื่องข้าวมันแสนนุ่ม และไก่ต้มยุ่ยกำลังดี ขายช่วงสายๆ จนถึงกลางวัน ต้องรีบไปเช่นกัน เพราะช้าหมดจะอดชิม

48. ข้าวต้มปลา 5 แยก : บริเวณ 5 แยกพลับพลาไชย ความอร่อยอยู่ที่ความสดของเนื้อปลากะพงปลาหมึก กุ้ง และหอยนางรมตัวโต เมื่อปรุงกับข้าวต้มร้อนๆ น้ำจะออกมาจาก

49. ก๋วยเตี๋ยวหลอด : ก๋วยเตี๋ยวหลอดในซอยข้างสถานีตำรวจพลับพลาพไชย ก็มีข้อดีที่เส้นนุ่มกำลังดีไม่เหนียวเกินไป ไม่เละเกินไป และไม่มันเกินไป ทานอร่อยได้ไม่แพ้ ก๋วยเตี๋ยวหลอดทรงเครื่อง

50. ก๋วยจั๊บเผ็ด : เนื่องจากตำเม็ดพริกไทยใส่ลงไปตอนทำน้ำต้มกระดูกแถมโรยพริกไทยในชามอีกครั้ง เพื่อให้รสชาติเข้มข้นถึงใจ มีสาขาอีกร้านเป็นญาติกัน เปิดร้านใหญ่อยู่ ตลาดเยาวราช แต่ความเข้มข้นอาจจะไม่เท่าเพราะที่นี่อาซิ่มท้าว่า คนเป็นหวัดมากิน. หวัดหายกันมาแล้วทุกราย ร้านนี้ตั้งอยู่ในซอยโรงเลี้ยงเด็ก แต่เจ้าของบอกว่าอยู่ในซอยนาคบำรุงต่างหาก ตัวเนื้อ ทำให้ข้าวต้มหอมและหวาน

Personal Belated Notes

I decided just to post a few random notes here - not of much relevance:

1) Congratulations to Pui on his wedding.
2) Belated hello to Sandy - Bic's relative, I went over to have lunch also with Bic and Ple. I was in a rather foul mood that day, and I apologize if the karma that day was a little below the number.
3) Gah!!!! I can't find my battery charger that I hid too well, and I shouldn't have shouted like a lunatic the last few hours.
4) Saw the Guru which was a very stupid movie. Wondered why I watched it :?
5) Grumbles about the notes I've kept for my latest political post - which is still half written. I just tripped over a TV scene that I really hated and would like to rant here - but its unfinished unfortunately!

Trip to the BookStore

Last Saturday, I had to wait a few hours at Emporium, so I decided to spend my time purging Kinokuniya (A Bookstore) to find interesting books to extend by book collection. After going through the whole library, I decided to pick 2 books from the library.

The first book I got was War and Peace, a literary masterpiece written by Leo Tolstoy. I have heard that many people considered it to be the greatest novel ever written, so I decided to take the time to go through this book - in one of the classics that I haven't read yet.

The second book I got was Machivelli's Prince - which is another literary masterpiece. I've read the excerpts from the Prince for a while, but I never had the chance to get the entire book. Since I was naturally interested in many of the theory there, I decided to get the copy of the book and analyze it in detail once I have free time :)

Recommended Manga - Tensai Yanagisawa Kyoju No Seikafu

Recommended Manga - Tensai Yanagisawa Kyoju No Seikafu - In this post I decided to recommend a manga that I feel is a very interesting alternative style of manga. In this recommendation, especially on the 19th-20th compilation of the manga, the story takes on a very interesting issue - on the issue of how education affects our children of the future. The discussion talks on the differences between the approaches in the traditional rote methodology and the more modern child-centered learning methodology and some of the interesting issues between them. I highly recommend this for aspiring teachers/lecturers to read this edition of the manga as there are many issues that would be helpful to ponder upon.

Picture: Suphot with ICT Award

Picture: Suphot with ICT Award - Here is a picture of Suphot, a close friend with the ICT Award. Suphot was the chief server side backend programmer, whereas I was the lead game designer in the runner up entry which I used to talk a little about it earlier on. Anyway, if you don't know yet, the game is called the ROX and its the first commercially viable locally produced MMOG game in Thailand :)

Picture: Thailand ICT Award Runner-up Entertainment Category Trophy

Picture: Thailand ICT Award Runner-up Entertainment Category Trophy - This is the snapshot of the award that I told that our development team at GameYuppie got a while back. We finally got the chance to take the photographs and it does look gorgeous doesn't it ;)

Crab Tales

One of the contributors at our S&T Forum posted a very interesting article about different cultures - different food that is very interesting. I'll quote directly from that article in this update:

Author: Tu-Sais-Qui
Posted: Thu Sep 23, 2004 5:54 pm
Subject: That Why They don't have Suki Coca in Europe.


I'm not sure this is the joke or not but I want to tell the story anyway.

Today I went to L'Af Library for review the lesson for the coming exam after I finished reading the topic that I planned to cover, on my way back home I went to have peaceful dinner at world trade center, after I have a seat at Coca restaurant. I saw one European girl sit beside my seat, I ordered “Tako jang” Which I intend to eat it a lot, when the “Tako jang” was served that girl grab to my table and asked me “What is this?” I answer her “It’s squids”, when I begin to eat it I have some idea that I will be the good landlord by invite her to try my favorite dish with siam smile.So that I asked her “Do you want to try?”, like she already waiting for that word, then she carry her dish and walk straight to my table I explained her everything that pop-up in mind at that time “ It is the kind of Japanese food ……”, she told me that she came from Israel, I told her that I’m Thai, but look like she feel a little wondering . After that she try to order the new dish which is “Pu-jar”(The fired pork mixed with crab in the crab cover) Since I’m very try with the reading so I decided to stay peacefully eating my Suki alone. After I called for checked bill, and planned to leave by say “good bye and have a nice day” to her, but at that moment she begin to ask me the new question “How to eat this?” , I can’t found the spoon at her table so that I decided to tell her to eating by hand because my dad used to told me that we should eat crab by hand, but unfortunately I forget to mention that she should be careful of crab’s cover because I think their should be make sense not to eat crab’s cover, but she did eat& bite it!!!, so It’ make me shocked and don’t know what to do, and she begin to look sick with crab’s cover which is make her in troubles and I can’t stop myself laughing (I’m truely not laughing at her but I laughing at my life what I already did? Did I do anything wrong? ) I try to be nice girl but end up with the word “cruel de ville”. Then I asked her “Are you ok?, I have to leave now you shouldn’t eat it’s cover, Good bye Have a nice day”.

So, what do you guy, think about this?, Did I do anything wrong?

A Cry to Religious Zealots

I want to point this quote out to all religious zealots around the world about their dangerous role in how they are making this world a less safe place to live in:

"Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction."
-- Blaise Pascal

To make it alittle more modern, I'll like to change it to: "Human never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction." as evil people come in all age, gender, religion, and races.

Rant - Lack of Concentration

Okay, this is it. I'm having serious trouble concentrating in what I'm doing, and I keep on leaving things before I finish it. Its not that I lack talent or ability, but its just that I'm finding hard to stick to what I'm on for an extended period of time. Its like being a 10 year old kid who has alot to see about the world, and wonders why they have to stay in one place.

Grumbles, or is it that I'm finding routine stuff to be boring, yet I don't look forward to do things out of the ordinary?

Strange strange old me, I'm just a complete paradox by myself O_o

Comments on this Year's Ryder Cup

The Ryder Cup just ended on TV, and the Europeans won it by a blowout - that was surprising considering how the top players on the world are stacked on the US side. Strangely enough, alot of the US national team choke on the big stage, and a good example of it was the US Basketball team on the Athens Olympic that was very disappointing. There was a number of fundamental and tactical problems with the US Basketball team, that made them lose in many embarassing games with lower profile teams without a star-studded cast. A huge explanation was the lack of some of the bigger superstars who were absent - but this argument wasn't strong considering that most of the players - individually were better players than the rest of the world players. Somehow it didn't work.

Strangely enough something went wrong with the US Ryder cup team this year, and when you got the collection of the world's best golf player and you could lose a golf tournament - something is wrong. I don't know what it is, maybe it's got to do with the outrageous design of the US golfing team that distracted their own attention and made them lose? I don't know, somehow something was missing... and this was probably one of the most boring Ryder Cup contest in the last few rounds.

Talking about the Ryder Cup, I happen to stumble upon an satirical article about the Ryder Cup which I'll just post here (Original Link)

It's time for a change
By Jason Sobel
ESPN.com

BLOOMFIELD TOWNSHIP, Mich. -- Break up the Europeans.



No, seriously, break them up. Scrap the Spaniards. Junk the Germans. Filet the Frenchmen.

Thanks for visiting, fellas, but we've had about enough of your laughing and high-fiving on our home turf. You've been beating our golfers and stealing our women (that means you, Bernhard) for too long.

It's time to get back to the good ol' days when Europeans were from Great Britain and Ireland -- and nowhere else.

Retro is in anyway. Can't we disco our way back to the 1970s when Jacklin and Oosterhuis had to round up a few blokes named Clive just to make a full squad? Those were some fun Ryder Cups. Scores like 21-11, 19-13 -- all won by the Red, White and Blue, of course.

Really, is the current format even fair? A continent that's been golfing since the Paleozoic Era taking on poor, little United States of America. We've only been independent for 228 years -- sometimes it takes us that long just to find one of Mickelson's tee shots.

Sure, it was Jack Nicklaus' idea to invite all of Europe, but it's a safe bet he never thought he'd see Sergio Garcia smiling his way to 3½ points in two days before he even hit puberty. Or Miguel Angel Jimenez's diabolical ponytail-and-cigar routine, a cross between Britney Spears and Groucho Marx with Nick Faldo's swing plane. Or Thomas Levet's, umm, actually he's lost twice so far, so we don't mind if he stays on the team.

And good riddence to German captain Bernhard Langer, who was racing so quickly up the fairways to congratulate his players, he must have thought it was the Autobahn. Shouldn't he really be captaining our team anyway? The guy lives in Florida, is married to a southern belle and plays golf as slow as most guys in our regular foursome.

The point is, if Europe wants to make this a fair fight, then let's do it. Starting now, we'll take Fiji, Canada and Australia. That's right -- Vijay Singh, Mike Weir, Adam Scott, you guys are on the new, improved team of "America-plus".

With initiation onto this select squad comes plenty of perks: Chants of U-S-A-Plus will follow you around the course; Chris DiMarco will pump his fist after every putt you make, just so you don't hurt yourself; and we promise not to make you wear Ben Crenshaw's ill-fated snapshot shirt. Ever.

Phil Mickelson's even got a new set of Callaways he won't be using once you join us, so you're welcome to them!

Europe, you're up. For now. And it's not like this is a one-time thing. A win on Sunday would be your fourth in the last five matches. C'mon, you already beat our Olympic basketball team and claimed David Hasselhoff as one of your own. What's next? Stealing our record for eating Cheetos while lying on the couch?

So Bernhard, Miguel, Sergio, you can have the Ryder Cup for now.

Just don't expect a ride to the airport.

And no, you can't have Elin back, either.

Jason Sobel is ESPN.com's golf editor. He can be reached at Jason.Sobel@espn3.com.

Reading through the comments, talking about the format change, I do have my own proposals too. Bring in Asia and Australia in the competition as a Third Team. Allow USA to recruit players from the whole American Continent - Yes that includes both North and South America. Make it a 3 way Ryder Cup competition and let me get behind our Asian and Australian golfers ;)

Question about Toilet Paper

I got this strange message in the forum I manage for my students. I have trouble answering this question posted by a foreign student, so I thought maybe I might want to see how some peeps may answer this for him - so I could compare it to my sweeping summary of the state of toilets in Thailand (with its complete lack of toilet paper and lack of general sanitation rules).

There is a very sensitive and difficult issue to state out is the story about Toilet paper!
After 5 months studying in [University Name Edited], I realized that at least 50% Public Toilet for Students don't have Toilet paper, (because I've never been to another 50% of Woman Toilet, so I can not say about it).
Sometimes some1 wants to do his BiG business, how can he manage it ?

Good Evening, Heartache

I feel sorry, I feel angry,
I feel down, and I feel drown,
I feel hopeless, I feel stressed
I feel pested, and I feel distressed
In that Little Heart in my Soul,
But tommorrow the pain might grow -
For who knows what fortune I might rake,
But tonight, Good Evening, Heartache.....

An old poem I wrote many years ago... Kind of describes my mood today, generally in a down mood.

Which Tarot Card are You?

You are the the Hierophant card. The Hierophant, called The Pope in some decks, is the preserver of cultural traditions. After entering The Emperor's society, The Hierophant teaches us its wisdom. The Hierophant learns and teaches our cultural traditions. The discoveries our ancestors have made influence the present. Without forces such as The Hierophant who are able to interpret and communicate traditional lore, each generation would have to begin to learn anew. As a force that is concentrated on our past and our culture, The Hierophant can sometimes be stubborn and set in his ways. This is a negative trait he shares with his zodiac sign, Taurus. But like Taurus he is productive. His traditional lore can provide a source of inspiration for the creatively inclined, and his knowledge provides an excellent foundation for those who come into their own in the business world.

Do the Quiz Here

Number of in Poverty Increases by nearly 4 Million in Thailand

This is a very powerful article, though unfortunately in Thai which lists out a few interesting points. First I'll point to the article:
http://www.matichon.co.th/matichon/matichon.php?s_tag=01p0105160947&show=1§ionid=0101&day=2004/09/16

Other than that I'll list a few quick points of interest before I got to quickly run to work:
1) 1 million baht fund per vilage has been a complete failure as it only brought increase buying/spending by villagers who became more reliant on easy credit that has been touted by this government.
2) After increasing the poverty line in line with inflation rates, the actual figure of people under the poverty line is up to 8.8 or up from 6 million since the start of the tenure. The poverty line is 1163 baht per annual per person.
3) There was government pressure to intervene with the GDP and other economic figure values to make the government in good light.
4) There were numerous reshuffles in the agencies involved - that might be influenced with part 3.

Oh well, if you can read Thai, go ahead, and read the link. Its certainly better than a quick 5 minute summary ;)

Chuwit’s TV-show dreams thwarted

I found this at http://www.nationmultimedia.com/page.news.php3?clid=5&id=120945&usrsess=1

Chuwit’s TV-show dreams thwarted

Published on Sep 16, 2004


Three weeks after securing more than 300,000 votes in the Bangkok gubernatorial election, Chuwit Kamolvisit yesterday had another surprise when his dream of becoming a television host was scrapped a day before the first show was to be recorded.

Chuwit said he was yesterday notified by Channel 7 executive Surang Prempree that his role as a co-host on new news-talk show “Kui Phao Khon” (At Close Range) had been canned after the programme was ditched.

The show was scheduled to make its premiere on Saturday.

The programme would have been the message-parlour-tycoon-turned-politician’s first shot as a TV host since he expressed a desire to host a news-talk show as a way of complementing his political career.

Chuwit said Surang, who offered him the job two weeks ago, had told him the cancellation was prompted by business reasons.

He was to have co-hosted the show with Channel 7 anchor Phitsanu Nilklad.

Channel 7 executives and the show’s producer, Dara VDO Co Ltd, could not be reached yesterday for comment.

Chuwit said another company had asked him to host a TV show named “Daily Exposure”.

In the whole text, I want to focus on the following:
Quote: Business Reasons

Regarding the All-Season's Place canceling Khun Ekkayuth's press release, suspiciously the Government is hosting an forum on which would be chaired by the PM in the same conveniently a few weeks time from now at the same venue. Sounds sound business reason to me. Notice the analogy :)

Interesting Irrelevant Stats in the Life of Pisal

I just got bored so I decided to post a few things here - mostly irrelevant stats that I took of myself just for the heck of it :P

Average Distance Traveled on Foot in a Working Day: ~6.5 Km
Distance from Home to Workplace: 10.5 Km
Distance I Walked In a Typical Buffet: 900m
Total Hits in my Diary Site: 1500 Hit Total (Boo hoo...)
Total Posts Written in my Diary Site at this moment: 150 Posts
Total Words Written in my Diary Site at this moment: ~30k Words
Total Hits in my Cycle-soft Website: 8000 (for the month of August alone)
Favorite Phrase: Boring... Shouldn't Have Come. Should have stayed home.
Reading Speed (Typical Novel): 85 pages an hour
Favorite SoftDrink: Lipton IceTea (Peach Favor)
Favorite Radio Channel: FM 105 (for old people)
Favorite TV Channel: History Channel/Excite UBC37
Longest Time Game Playing Stretch: 72 hours (Only break to toilet or food)
Height: 175 cm
Weight: 70 Kg
Gender: Male
Favorite Video Game: Metal Gear Solid (PS)
Favorite Movie: ... I don't know ...
Last Movie in Theatre: Lords of the Ring - Two Towers

LOL, I wonder this post is about :P

Sharp Quotes from the Clergy

It seems that yesterday, there was a huge reshuffle in the government officials ranks. As usual, these reshuffle seems of cronyism and corruption, but in today's post,I wanted to mention a few things that I've heard on the radio regarding comments on one of the reshuffle.

In one of the departments that deal with clerical duties of the Buddhist movement, a doctor - who happened to be the son of a very influential person has taken over the head of the department. That specific candidate pipped one of the favorite candidates - a police general, who had been earlier campaigning to win over the trust of the skeptical clergy.

A reporter asked one of the spokesperson of the clergic movement about how do they feel about these political maneouvering and why did the favorite did not get the position, he quoted the following:

It seems that the "Police General" was spending too much time garnering support from the monks, that he forgot to garner support from the PM where it mattered.

The department heads seems to be the son of an influential person, very young and a doctor, but it doesn't mean that we won't support him. In fact we will. Its just that if he doesn't do his job in the way he should in a few months, we'll just have to ask him out to get in a more capable person.

Just the right degree of skepticism that I like ;)

Some Interesing Figures from 1989

I found this article in an old New York Times of some survey they did in 1989. Quite interesting so I decided to leech it here :)

World Hunger

Number of people worldwide who will die of starvation this year: 60 million
Number of people who could be adequately fed with the grain saved if Americans reduced their intake of meat by 10%: 60 million
Human beings in America: 243 million
Number of people who could be fed with grain and soybeans now eaten by U.S. livestock: 1.3 billion
Percentage of corn grown in the U.S. eaten by people: 20
Percentage of corn grown in the U.S. eaten by livestock: 80
Percentage of oats grown in the U.S. eaten by livestock: 95
Percentage of protein wasted by cycling grain through livestock: 99
How frequently a child starves to death: every 2 seconds
Pounds of potatoes that can be grown on an acre: 20,000
Pounds of beef produced on an acre: 165
Percentage of U.S. farmland devoted to beef production: 56
Pounds of grain and soybeans needed to produce a pound of beef: 16

Environment

Cause of global warming: greenhouse effect
Primary cause of greenhouse effect: carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels
Fossil fuels needed to produce a meat-centered diet vs. a meat free diet: 50 times more.
Percentage of U.S. topsoil lost to date: 75
Percentage of U.S. topsoil loss directly related to livestock raising: 85
Number of acres of U.S. forest cleared for cropland to produce meat-centered diet: 260 million
Amount of meat U.S. imports annually from Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Panama: 200 million pounds.
Average per capita meat consumption in Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Panama: less than eaten by average U.S. house cat.
Area of tropical rainforest consumed in every quarter-pound hamburger: 55 sq ft.
Current rate of species extinction due to destruction of tropical rainforests for meat grazing and other uses: 1,000 per year.
Also cattle contribute to global warming by being one of the biggest sources of carbon dioxide and methane gases.

Cancer

Increased risk of breast cancer for women who eat meat 4 times a week vs. less than once a week: 4 times.
For women who eat eggs daily vs. less than once a week: 3 times
Increased risk of fatal ovarian cancer for women who eat eggs 3 or more times a week vs. less than once a week: 3 times.
Increased risk of fatal prostate cancer for men who eat meat daily vs. sparingly or not at all: 3.6 times.

Natural Resources

Use of more than half of all water used for all purposes in the U.S.: Livestock portion
Amount of water used in production of the average steer: sufficient to float a destroyer.
Gallons to produce a pound of wheat: 25
Gallons to produce a pound of meat: 2,500
Cost of common hamburger if water used by meat industry not subsidized by the U.S. taxpayer: $35 a pound.
Current cost of pound of protein from beefsteak if water was no longer subsidized: $89
Years the world's known oil reserves would last if every human ate a meat-centered diet: 13
Years they would last if human beings no longer ate meat: 260.
Barrels of oil imported into the U.S. daily: 6.8 million.
Percentage of fossil fuel returned as food energy by most efficient factory farming of meat: 34.5
Percentage from least efficient plant food: 32.8
Percentage of raw materials consumed by U.S. to produce present meat-centered diet: 33

Cholesterol

Number of U.S. medical schools: 125
Number requiring a course in nutrition: 30
Nutrition training received by average U.S. physician during four years in medical school: 25 hours
Most common cause of death in U.S.: heart attack
How frequently a heart attack kills in U.S.: every 45 seconds.
Average U.S. man's risk of death from heart attack: 50%
Risk for average U.S. man who avoids the meat-centered diet: 15%
Meat industry claims you should not be concerned about your blood cholesterol if it is: "normal"
Your risk of dying of a disease caused by clogged arteries if your blood cholesterol is "normal": 50%

Antibiotics

Percentage of U.S. antibiotics fed to livestock: 55
Percentage of staphylococci infections resistant to penicillin in 1960: 13
Percentage resistant in 1988: 91
Response of European Economic Community to routine feeding of antibiotics to livestock: ban
Response of U.S. meat and pharmaceutical industries to routine feeding of antibiotics to livestock: full and complete support

Pesticides

Percentage of pesticide residues in the U.S. diet supplied by grains: 1
Percentage of pesticide residues in the U.S. diet supplied by fruits: 4
Percentage of pesticide residues in the U.S. diet supplied by dairy products: 23
Percentage of pesticide residues in the U.S. diet supplied by meat: 55
Pesticide contamination of breast milk from meat-eating mothers vs. non-meat eating: 35 times higher
What USDA tells us: meat is inspected
Percentage of slaughtered animals inspected for residues of toxins and chemicals including dioxin and DDT: less than 0.00004

Ethical

Number of animals killed for meat per hour in the U.S.: 500,000
Occupation with highest turnover rate in U.S.: slaughterhouse worker
Occupation with the highest rate of on-the-job injury in the U.S.: slaughterhouse worker
Cost to render animal unconscious with "captive bolt pistol" before slaughter: 1 cent
Reason given by meat industry for not using "captive bolt pistol": too expensive.

Survival

Athlete to win Ironman Triathlon more than twice: Dave Scott (6 time winner)
Food choices of Dave Scott: Vegetarian
Largest meat eater that ever lived: Tyrannosaurus Rex
Last sighting of T-Rex: 100,000,000 B.C.

PM's View on The Need for More Libraries

Many readers of this blog, may think that I'm completely anti-Thaksin. However I do want to point that I'm not a one-sided bastard, but I then to take things and reanalyze it in my own twisted way >:) Anyway, today's blog deals alittle with what I saw yesterday. Yesterday there was a meeting that I attended in which I was treated with a short documentary about a conceptual library in the planning - which was produced by a few friends in our group and Panorama Company (the documentary company).

During the middle of the documentary, I had heard a few words from the PM that I'll translate and transcribe here:

Some people ask me, would it be better to create libraries and hope the people will come to read books there, or should we create the love for reading before creating a library? The question is like what comes first - the egg or the chicken. I want to mention that question is irrelevant as there would be no answer. What I stress is that we should push forward in building the library regardlessly to build good infrastructure for the love of reading for our future generation.

I'll leave my comments out of this quote. I like it, and I just don't want to describe the harsh reality that followed this part. The reality is much harsher than the ideal world.

"There is no Interference" and Questions of "Double Standards" still Persist

Today I've just decided to update alittle more on the Ekkayuth vs the PM issue. As mentioned earlier, AMLO has targeted Ekkayuth and close associates on numerous charges. This brings up questions if the AMLO is guilty of having double-standards and whether there was political interferrence that brought numerous rule changes in that neutral organization that made it rather pro-government.

This brings to another interesting development today, in which Khun Ekkayuth claimed that he was denied permission to hold a press conference at All-Season's Place (where he initially held his first press conference), for unspecified reasons from the hotel management. A number of other hotel establishment also denied Ekkayuth's request, which makes it rather suspicious. This brings back questions if there was certain type of "outside influence" in these latest episode?

Strangely enough, I do remember we just had a anti-dark influence crusade initiated by the Government a few years ago, and somehow it just seems the dark-influence is back. Is it just my imagination or is it just there was absolutely no malice or darker intentions in these latest developments? I think I am in a fish market at this moment.

On a related point, Our PM yesterday when hard pressed with these questions, blew off his lid again. Coupled with the the Democrat Party proclaiming they are using the wave of anti-Thaksin with the latest book critical of the Thaksin regime, our PM grew aggrevated and mentioned that the people who wrote the book or the academia is misleading everyone. A short translation would be put as "Academia are stupid, and the people who know how good the government are the good citizens of the country". In this quote, I just have to say that our PM has put his foot in his mouth again. The academia are supposed to be the peeps that are the most educated and well informed of the masses and should serve as a guiding light for the masses, but not the other word around. At this moment, the academia are serving as the conscience, that is sadly unheaded. Due to that its only fitting that the conscience would have to find other means in showing their viewpoint.

Review: Scorpions - 100 Unbreakable Friendship Concert in BKK Thailand (August 10, 2004)

Review: Scorpions - 100 Unbreakable Friendship Concert in BKK Thailand (August 10, 2004)

I have to admit a few things, I want to confess how much I know about Scorpions. First of all, I know they are an old rock group from Germany. The second confession I had to make is that I only can distinctively remember one of their songs - Wind of Change which is their most famous song. The last point I have to admit, is that I hardly know anyone in the band - even how the band members looked like! I hardly know anything else about them, nor do I own their album, but due to some strange reason, my brothers and I decided to go to the concert - Scorpions - 100 Unbreakable Friendship Concert. In the beginning, we thought it was like their greatest hints album, but only when we did get to the concert venue, we did found out that the concert was a promotion concert for their latest album - Unbreakable and the 100 Friendships part was actually the name that was given by their biggest sponsor of the Thai tour - which is 100 Pipers which is a type of whiskey.

Anyway, no matter what it was, it didn't dampen our spirit, as we went there alittle early, to get our reserved tickets at Muang Thong Thanni.

The concert started alittle late about 5 minutes - which was not that bad considering the habitual lateness of Thais, and the stadium was pretty filled by the time the show started.

The show started out in high octave, as the Scorpions, though rather old at the present, went on the Rock the house with high tempo rock songs that seemed to fit more of young and rebellious rock stars than performances that are their advanced age. Though I hardly know any of their songs especially the first few songs - that were numbers from their new album, their stage experience showed as the band members were going completely nuts on stage. Nuts doesn't mean crazy, but means like they really packed much energy in the performance, it makes me want to go jumping around the stands - but to my chargin, my seats is cramped, and if I make a small slip, I could fall 20 meters to the floor, which is quite a dangerous thing to do :P

Since I don't know the early songs that well, I'll just skip the first part and forward to the drum solo which served as a mini intermission for the band. The solo drummist was interesting. Though personally I don't really like drum solos that much - as I find them to be rather primitive, the part that stands out in this concert is the lighting, in which the stage designers did very well. They made it seem like the drummer emits an aura out by flashing light from him at regular intervals based on the drum solo, which is a pleasant eye candy, and off-course ended up in a really entertaining solo coupled with alot of interactive from the audience who really enjoyed the crazy act ;)

The guitarist came to solo after the drummist, though his act was less well received as it was rather hard to follow along. Anyway, shortly afterwards, the guitarist then reverted to rhythm mode, as the band reassembled to play alot of older rock hits - and some numbers I just remember the refrains so well like - Rock Like a Hurricane! Later the show somewhat abruptly paused for an encore, before they started to play their most known song in the last part of the show - in this time, the whole crowd followed along their melodies - especially with Wind of Change. The show ended alittle after that, and most of the peeps were completely exhausted at the end of the 2 hour rock show.

After reaching home, it makes me wonder a few things. What I saw on stage today was a rock legend, and they deserve the title. Though the concert was an intense 2 hour concert, the whole band managed to handle it seemlessly with ease, whereas the audience had trouble keeping up with the energy of the 50s gang of rockstars. I'm particularly impressed with the lead singer, whose vocal cords seem to never waver in the concert. Its somewhat strange to know that a old rockband managed to keep the level of intensity unlike many newer pop stars that usually lip-sync in concerts. Those days, musicians were musicians and stage performers, but these days, my own observation, it just seems the newer artist seem to be more focused on image and dancing instead of the actual music and performance O_o

p.s. Sorry for no pictures. In the last few concerts, the security guards check the wallets for cameras and other dangerous stuff. Since I'm not in the mood for a brush with the guards, I just didn't think it would be worth the trouble to get my camera in. Too bad I don't have those nifty mobile phone with built-in cameras :P

Khun Nai at Supermarket

Today, on my way to work, I decided to pick up some grocers at Foodland which is one of Thailands best food supermarket - specializing in meat, poultry, cooking ingrediants, and cheese. Foodland is very popular among the foreigners here in Thailand as they offer 24 hours service and offer very good selection of fresh food.

I happen to drop because I was planning to host another pizza party this weekend, and I decided to get some salami, ham, bacon, sausage, flour, and cheese for my pizza. When I happen to check out, I happen to find a old (in the 50s) fat lady in green sleeping clothes complaining near the checkout with another bald man. The bald man seems to be the manager of the supermarket. As I couldn't pay in that counter as she was completely blocking the path, and appeared to be extremely bitchy, I decided to enter the next checkout counter a few blocks down from where that lady was.

When I was putting the stuff for the cashier to pay I've overheard a lot of commotion from the fat lady, in which I had been extremely interested what she was complaining about. Though I hardly heard anything from the managers, the obnoxious fat lady was shouting hysterically in which I'll translate the following below:

What type of service you have here in your supermarket? It completely stinks! Don't you know any manners?

Your cashier has so bad manners. Did you go to the Mall down the soi? Their cashier are very responsive. They always WAI (traditional greeting) every customer before they come to the checkout counter. Why won't she wai? And I have trouble carrying the stuff, why won't someone help me carry it? And when I buy newspaper, seperate them in different bags? Why are you stingy with the bags? Get me more bags! This service stinks!

Don't think that I dress like this, I'm just anyone else. I'm a Khun Nai (that means someone of high heritage), and I expect service here! Just because today I don't dress in my full dress, you can expect to be slack! You people need to be educated! You need to have better educated and better serviced people here! I'm sure your shop will be bankrupt if you don't. Don't think I'm no one, I'm a Khun Nai and you need to service me well!

This is an episode where I want to point one of the nasty sides of Thai society. In our society, where there are rigid traditions and relevance for hi-society peeps - for what their heritage are, but not for what they really are , has given some people the impression that people of higher social standings can readily take advantage or expect different treatment from people of lower social standings - just because of the choice of job or social class.

On a personal perspective, the service in Foodland was adequate. As Foodland has been more of a supermarket that caters for foreigners, there are certain customs in this supermarket that are different from other supermarkets. One of the things that I noticed is that cashiers do not usually WAI their customers like in other supermarkets or superstores. As I do feel I think more like a farang than a Thai, I find the wai to be a somewhat awkward moment between the customer and the cashier - and I personally don't think the wai would be important as long as the cashier is smiling, and offers good assistance. I have been to Carrefour where the cashier wai me, but had a really frowning face. When she made a mistake with the calcuations (which I spotted), she was cursing which wasn't a pretty sight. So much for a Wai and bad service. The main point is I expect the cashier to be fast, efficient, accurate, and just a tad smiling. The wai introduces an awkward situation which I personally don't know what to do. Should I 1) ignore 2) acknowledge by nodding 3) wai back or 4) smile? As you noticed the act of WAI is a real awkward situation especially for people who don't know each other and I do find for a supermarket with lots of foreigners, its not a bad idea to exclude it. The service was pretty helpful when I was there. The cashier was on the cheery side (though alittle worried about that fat obnoxious lady), and the helper volunteered to help me pick up the grocers from the cart. I do find the service to be good.

However as I proceeded out of the supermarket, I noticed that fat obnoxious lady was still complaining. I'm not a Christian, but let me quote - God created all humans to be equal, and I wonder what special treatment did that Khun Nai expected? What ever it was, I didn't care.

Picture: How to Get Printouts When Your Printer is Dead

Picture: How to Get Printouts When Your Printer is Dead - This picture is a joke I've received that is really funny. If your printer is broken and you need to get a printout desperately, you could try this ;)

My Updates and Viewpoint on Ekkayuth vs PM War

A few days after I've first wrote about the Ekkayuth vs PM war, I would like to add some more of my viewpoint on that issue. As I'm not a big fan of both, I do say that I don't trust any of these two tycoons, but I do want to comment on some of the issues that has happened since the initial storm. Details are here.

After the initial interview of Khun Ekkayuth that was conducted on Channel 5, I've heard news that the news reporter were ordered to take a extended leave. If you didn't notice, Channel 5 is run by the army, in which is run by the PM's proxy. The act of taking a reporter out for interviewing a person who has critical viewpoints of the PM closely brings back memories of how the ITV case was handled - in which a number of reporters who were critical of the current regime were fired.

During the next few days, our PM stepped up his war of words with Khun Ekkayuth, with lately using the SEC, AMLO, and CIB commissions to probe more into Ekkayuth's shady past. In an address to a high-level judicial seminar in which our PM open, he was also referring to the judicial process of taking aggressive action against an unnamed person - which we all know who he mentioned. In summary, our PM's action at the present, is a this-for-that jerk knee reaction that is common in most business/political circles. Thaksin, instead of answering or clarifying the allegations leveled against him, decided to go on the offensive and decided to draw the attention away and on the accuser. I find this to be distasteful as one of the academia masses. If Thaksin is indeed clean, he should place high priority to rebutt all the charges against him and then proceed to prosecute Ekkayuth for a number of different charges that he has done at this moment. By using government agencies, that is controlled by proxies to the PM, to prosecute Ekkayuth just to draw attention away from the charges is a slap in the face for all people who wants to know the truth about the charges of mismanagement and cronysism, that I just feel that by the rate this is going, will never see the light.

Pentagon Strike Conspiracy Theory?

This page contains a very interesting flash animation explaining the ratioinale why they think the pentagon strike is a conspiracy theory:
http://www.ebaumsworld.com/pentagon.html

When viewing it, its a good idea to look on both the sides of the story.

Ekkayuth opens a Can of Worm and then PM declares war on Ekkayuth

A few weeks ago, there was a huge news broadcast in which they said an anonymous donator was willing to add 1 billion baht to the warchest funds of the Democrat party which was sagging and losing both in popularity and momentary resources to the ruling Thai Rak Thai party. Surprisingly the Democrat party turned the offer down, but the repercussion that this anonymous donator was felt, as a lot of the people were asking who was this "big business" that was willing to invest a significant amount sum just to make sure the Thai Rak Thai party stays in check.

It was that a few days ago, we found out that the big business we are talking about was Ekkayuth who was a Thai tycoon based in Britian. His past was rather shady as quoted from the Nation this morning:

Ekkayuth fled abroad in 1984 following charges that he had run the high profile Charter fund scheme a year earlier. At that time, the government seized his personal assets and the assets of his Charter Investment Co Ltd.

More details on Ekkayuth:http://www.nationmultimedia.com/page.news.php3?clid=1&theme=A&usrsess=1&id=120487

About 2 days ago, Ekkayuth claimed that the Thaksin administration has been giving insider information to a number of close associates so that they can speculate on stocks and earn big money to help finance their election campaign that is coming up next year - which was on the expense of the smaller stock investors in which lost a significant amount of money. He pointed out to a number of stocks that mainly include SCIB (Siam City Bank), and said that two prominent politicians with initials of S and another with P close to Thaksin had been speculating on that stock. The unnamed politicians, which I speculate he was referring to was Prayuth Mahakitsiri (Deputy TRT leader and President of the Nestle Group Thailand) and Suriya Jungrungreangkit (Interior Minister) - both local tycoons with close relationship with the ruling party.

When I heard this news I can say, I have no love for any of these blickering tycoons. I don't trust the Thaksin administration a single bit since day 1, and I will reiterate this fact in this blog. Though I would commend Ekkayuth for coming back with guns blazing on his come-back trial, I have enough reason to suspect his motives. I think he is only trying to do what Thaksin has done. As many business during the Thaksin era has been forced into join or be exterminated - I do feel that due to this pressure a lot of businessmen who aren't close to the PM has a secret desire to push the PM out. Also due to Thaksin successful marriage of new age politics - using Government to serve the capitalistic business need, I do think there are increased political ambition by successful business people to emulate Thaksin's success on this area.

Talking about the stock speculation, I did talk a lot about a lot of my suspicion leading up to "this incident", in which I told many peeps I know that there is something horribly amiss with this administration. The point that I highlighted then was summed up by the immense media blitz that tried to get more smaller investors into the stock market which was high endorsed by the government. During the drive, it was indirectly highlighting that the stock market was an easy way to earn a quick bang for the buck - and comparing it to the meagre interest given by depositing money in the bank. With such theme, we can see a lot of new investors have been investing heavily on the stock market - which is a non-productive and speculative occupation. After the heavy leadup to this, there has been a number of strange occurrence that happened, which made me suspect the reason behind all of this.

I have a reason to suspect that the old style corruption is not in place, but I do suspect that the government may be trying to earn money by using its clout to influence the market factors - which is a worse form of insider trading - as it is the person that makes the market decision is the one who speculates on the stock market! I have suspicions that the take-over of ITV by the Shin Cooperation is one incident where something shady that cannot be proven has taken place behind the government house rooms (notice I did not say boiler room).

Before the lead up to this the takeover, the price of ITV was in the dumps as the TV channel was suffering heavy debts.

ITV at that moment is the only TV channel without government interference. However as Shin bought it, there was increased fear about government interference with the media which was against the lines of the constitution. However Shin executives claim that they have "no links" with the government, they are also considered to be independent agencies and have all the constitutional rights to take over ITV. Their first move was to fire a number of critical anti-government reporters, and proceeded to dumb down the contents of the channel from a highly investigative news channel to a typical variety channel. More details here:http://www.nationmultimedia.com/page.arcview.php3?clid=11&id=370&usrsess=1

During the time quickly after the takeover, there was a flurry of news that happened in quick succession on the news that drove the price of ITV up to the ceiling. The news that happened was the appointment of one of Thailand's most known TV personality - Khun Thraiphop as one of the executive boards of ITV in charge of revolutionizing the whole TV lineup of ITV, and the second about the government annoucing that it was willing to lower concessions for ITV along with pay penalty for overcharging ITV for the past few years. Notice that was floated only after the takeover of ITV by SHIN was completed. Noticed the bloody coincidence? Noticed the market price of ITV shares and the volume of trading during this saga? Though there isn't proof that I can put on the table, but I do want to point out a few things. This smells like the government has found a new way to earn easy money to feed its hungry mouth. Instead of old school corruption that the politicians ask for a percentage of the fee in mega projects - we can observe that new age politics use government decisions to influence market factors of the stock market so that it would be ripe for speculation. The ITV is just one of the "questionable" episodes in a number of different cases that has passed, but I'm very sure this won't be the last case we will see.

GMail - A First Impression

I've just got my GMail invite yesterday and just managed to login and play around with it. If you haven't heard about it GMail is Google's latest offering in which they allow 1 GB limit Email accounts that you can use to send your emails to peeps in the internet. Due to its large size, alot of people have been groveling for an account - as registration is limited to a small beta user base and also additional users are only allowed in by invitation. There are tales in which GMail accounts were auctioned off in various sites, which highlights a serious problem in the underground unscrupulous ways in which some people chose to take advantage of this beta test.

Anyway, back to the topic. I've just managed to look around GMail today, and I've noticed a number of different things with GMail that makes it rather exciting. The first and most obvious impression is the size limit in GMail account which is 1GB and a whopping size compared to other email services. My hotmail account gives me a puny 2MB, whereas my faculty email allows up to only 20MB - and as you noticed its a farcry from the GMail size.

On the login page, the GMail has been very simple - in which I like. It closely resembles google which offers a much simpler and unfuzzy interface when compared to other comparable search engines.

After logining in, the first thing I noticed in GMail which I liked alot is its rather fast loading time which has to do partly with the fact that there are no picture ads(at this moment) which plagues other free email service especially Yahoo that displays a half page ad. Coupled with simple text based links, the Gmail is a pretty simple interface that gets straight to the point. Other noticable features on the first page is a nifty tool called starred email or emails that the person deemed important can be quickly moved to this folder for later referal instead of having to wade through the email list. Another feature that caught my eye is the google toolbar at the top of the page that allows quick retreival fo search items in google and also allows the user to search into mail details. This is a very useful addition as I remember when I had to open my friend's account looking for a email I had to open everymail to scan for keywords, when it might be easier to search through it.

On further investigation, in the contact list I've noticed that it includes contact lists and also a nifty option called - frequently emailed - which lists out the people that we have frequently emailed to. This feature sounds like a good idea to implement in the email system as the majority of email we send are lumped to one group of people - and a quick referral list here could help instead of having to go through hundreds of contacts.

The setting page contains options that are pretty typical except for the shortcut keys, in which users can type single keyprints in different part of the system to be quickly moved to a new page. A good example would be pressing 'C' on the main page will forward the user into the Compose page. If used well, this tool can be a great time-saver for power users.

On a first impression, GMail has impressed me alot. However the only thing missing from GMail is POP3 or IMAG access to an external email client - which is a big drawback considering I prefer to open emails off-line at times. Hopefully someone would come up with that service soon :)

Anyway if you are interested in related news, you could read about a dude's attempt to fill up his GMail account with spam at the following url:
http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/06/14/1121209&tid=217&tid=111

Picture: GMail Setting Page - The settings page for GMail is pretty typical with all the minor details and the filters and labels. The interesting part I find about GMail is that it allow keyboard shortcuts like in Pine - an example is to press "c" and you will be directed into the compose page immediately.

Picture: GMail Starred Mail - Another useful feature is to highlight important mails in the Starred inbox allowing quick access to important mail.

Picture: GMail Contact Page - The GMail adds a nifty touch by listing the contact page with the most frequently mailed list. This is a very useful feature I do reckon considering that the majority of my email end up to a similar group of people.

Picture: GMail Main Page - This the main page of the GMail. Its a tabular form and it loads pretty fast considering that there are no picture ads. Notice the nifty command to search the mail for keywords which is a nice touch :)

Picture: GMail Login - This is the login page of GMail which is rather simplistic.

GMail

Okay, this post is rather stupid. I just got a GMail account. I haven't really tried it since I got my invite late last night, but once I'm alittle more free I'll look through it and report here alittle about this much publicized service.

Changes for the Better? Part 2

Based on the previous thread, I've decided to try to outline a few more ideas that I do feel would be good to implement, and something I would try if I was elected as the leader of a country. I don't think alot of this is possible, but as this moment, I can ramble all I want in my own blog ;)

Pour money into alternative fuel sources
I think at this moment many countries are under the mercy of fuel companies who exert their influence against many countries when they try to work with alternative fuel sources. I think its time we should make a stand and come up with more viable fuel sources.

Increase Car Taxes and Fuel Taxes
I have a feeling that our country current is putting too much emphasis on helping the automobile industry. I believe that on the contrary, its about time that we should increase Car Taxes to dissuade people from getting more cars in our already crowded roads and also increase fuel tax as another deterrant. Once we get lots of income from tax over here, we could heavily invest on public infrastructures for our city which is something long overdue in our city.

Zoning on Entertainment Industries and Malls
A latest survey told that the number of entertainment centers such as malls, movie theatres, shopping centers, pubs, discotech, and gaming centers far outstretch the amount of recreational centers such as parks, musuems, and library. Its time that we should progressive do something about that to get the children of the future to be more interested in stuff other than entertain.

All batteries should be rechargable
One of the points I do want to emphasize is a lot of large companies don't really care about the environment, and one issue that displays this well is how they sell batteries. Batteries sold are usually those disposable types which are thrown after they are used. In Thailand, we had an influx of cheap chinese batteries which is actually repackaged industrial waste. Strange fact is that we can notice rechargable batteries can last much longer if recharged and work comparable to disposable batteries - but only due to marketing reasons the big companies don't really push rechargable batteries to the market. I think its time to make a rethink.

Changes for the Better?

I thought it might be interesting if I just add a few viewpoints of what should be changed to make the country a better place. I've outlined some of my platform which is rather obscure :P

1) Seperation of State and Religion
The state should be seperated from religion. In other words the country should be tolerant of all religions operating in the country.

2) Taxing and Audit of Religious Institutes
In many countries, religious activities is exempted for tax. However I do propose there are many religious activities that do not benefit the society in which I do feel that it is not fair for all religious activities to be untaxed. I do propose that religious establishment must be taxed and audit properly like other organizations.

3) Prevent Speculative Money Making from Stocks
I've noticed alot of people invest in stocks like they invest in gambling - borrowing heavily to invest in stocks in hope of gaining. Now I do want to propose that speculative money making from stock markets should stop, and the measure I think would be great is to implement 2 new policies. The first is that cash must be used directly in buying of stocks - no credit limit allowed. The second point I do want to implement is to disallow the selling of a stock after its bought for a period of time - e.g. 6 months or more to prevent speculative stock trading. I feel that speculative business such as stocks and trading of commodity of land are non-productive industry that generate income without any real value - which isn't beneficial to the general good of the country.

4) Transfer fund from Social Security into Educational/Vocational Programs
Instead of investing heavily on social security, I do think the better investment for the government is to pour money into educational systems. That means I feel that its enough reason to put more funding from social security into educational programs. In other words I believe in the saying - Give a man a fish, you feed him for a day; give a man a fishing rod, you feed him for a lifetime.

5) Allow Gay Marriage as Long as they adopt an Orphan
I don't care about the religious argument about the morality of Gay Marriages, but I do observe that there are lots of orphans in our countries. I think there is a better way to utilize both of this, by allowing gay marriage as long as they adopt an orphan. This way we could get rid of two trouble groups in one shot ;)

6) License Required for Marriage
Since alot of argument has been raised about the validity of abortion/birth control as a source of population management, I just thought why not take a different approach and require taking a parent license before marriage or child bearing? Since alot of parents aren't prepared for parenthood, this could be a wakeup call for them to know that its not just simple screwing around that would be enough. A way to persuade peeps to do this is to allow tax benefits for parents with license, whereas with holding benefits from parents who do not have license.

What do you peeps think about these ideas?

Anti-Bush Game

This is a very interesting game that pokes fun at the Bush Administration. Though the game itself may be alittle vulgar (not recommended for minors) and somewhat satire, it is sprinkled with some hard facts and figures that shows some of the dangerous things Bush administration has done during his tenure - which is fitting for the word - Capitalist Pig.

http://www.emogame.com/bushgame.html

Automatic Picture Gallery Creation

During the last few days I've learnt a few new things. One of the stuff that my friends like to tell me is that they have problem making web album of pictures they took from their digital camera. I've told them that they can easily do it by using programs instead of having to write out their own picture gallery in HTML.

Below I've listed some good program that can help you do the following:

1) Picasa (http://www.picasa.com) - A Free Photo Management Program
2) Adobe Photoshop 7.0 (and up) - A photo editing software. You need to select File -> Automate -> Web Gallery to create a web album.

Picture: Group Picture of Attendees at the GDXCON 2004

Picture: Group Picture of Attendees at the GDXCON 2004 - This picture is the group picture of some of the 200 strong attendees of the GDXCON 2004. Since the seminar was interesting, and we had lots of discussion on various issues, it ended rather late in the evening - that a small group of people opted to go out to dinner than to take the group photo together. However we all had a great time, and enjoyed it alot :)

Picture: Rows of Coffee and Pastries

Picture: Rows of Coffee and Pastries - Taken from GDXCON2004, the rows of coffee and pastries that were prepared for our seminar guests. Well thinking about it, 200 trays is certainly an interesting site ;)