Daily Archives: June 28, 2005

There is a beautiful song by Julio Iglesias that runs, “Nostalgie, tu es tendre, moi aussi. Nostalgie is indeed tender and we revisit the places through our memory. I came back to bangkok in 2002 after 1989, and immediately after landing there was a desire to see the old places. Taking a taxi from CAT building in Chaengwattana road , I went to Siam Jusco at Laksi. The shopping complex has an excellent facade with lot of parking space in the front. Over the years it has become crowded inside and the Kroissant tea shop is no more there. On the right, the eye wear shop is also missing. But it still is beautiful.

Yesterday, I missed my bus at 6am because I stayed up too late the night before (because somebody was feeling bad and needed some comfort :p). I quickly had my breakfast and left my home sweet home. I walked fast to find a taxi motorcycle in order to get to the top of my soi and catch a bus after that. While I was walking, one “black” cat emerged on the wall so close to my left shoulder – -“. I was shocked of course but still, I didn’t think it would bring any bad luck for me so I just kept walking.

When I got on the motorcycle, I didn’t know why we had to be there behind the big lorry emitting tons of polluted smoke ~ ~”. And when I could catch a bus, there were no seats left..”Ah man, Samutprakarn to Bkk isn’t that near” but I sort of believed in myself so I stood confidently. I did that in virtue of some too self-confident reasons like I’m pretty tough, I always get the highest scores in P.E. class and I’m a sports lover. After passing some stops, the bus’ spaces started to be filled with heaps of people.. I began to see how it wasn’t my day clearly.

Finally, the bus could be on the express way, “Yeah, BoW! You’re arriving soon!!” but I felt more and more like I had no more spaces to stand on. I almost had to stand on the tip of my toes! A while later, my lips were dried, my throath was sore, my sight was full of lots of green and orange colors, people kept sighing like they had too much air to breathe, my knees were weak..weaker and weaker then “ZAP!!” I fell onto the floor.

Right, I fainted. I, myself, was the fainted commuter. Luckily, the girl in the seat next to me helped me up. The guy standing behind me held my school bags for me. That girl gave me some kind of liquid camphor and offered me a lemon toffy. She also shared a half of her seat with me 🙂 I was glad that I wasn’t neglected and I could be better and able to breathe properly again at last.

I arrived at school late that day and I kinda suffered from some more irritating things..Guess it was a real bad day then hehe.

I remember I used to offer my seat to some fainted lady on the bus around a year ago, too. I think I was relieved yesterday because of deeds I did.

Well, like what Thai people believe, deeds do affect.

Gambling is one of the most popular things Thai people like to do. One of gambling’s kind is to bet. Though, it is still illegal to bet in Thailand. It is one of the things I have a great interest on. As sport crazy myself, I love to learn how the betting system work. Not because I would use for my own benefit but I believe it is one thing that a society should have but not to be encouraged. In Thailand, I see most of my friends lose a huge amount of money because they did not know their limit.

In England, when you want to bet on whatever it is you want to bet. You would just walk into a betting shop. Pay the amount you want to bet and receive a betting slip. There are many betting shops in England. The famous ones would be Ladbrokes, William Hills, Coral etc. You would choose the one that you think, has the best odds. As one of my friends works at Ladbrokes, he always told me about how the English betting system work. It is very simple. An odd is created by the fluctuation of bet like the fluctuations of stocks. The more money put into to the expected winning side, the lower the win back price would be. This system is called “Tote”. Nowadays, many betting agents have more than just football betting. Betting these days has various kinds of sports to choose from.

Most people in Thailand envy that fact that other neighboring countries have legal rights to bet. So, every year, Thai citizen spends a huge sum of money abroad in places like Macau in HK, Malaysia or even Cambodia. Some Thai people are so desperate in wanting to play casino, they drive out to the Cambodian boarder and played casino there. I was surprised myself in the fact that Ladbrokes has a Thai language version for their web site when most people in Thailand cannot bet.

The Thai government tried encouraged Thai people not to bet by abandoning and arresting those who perform illegal bettings. Also on the internet, I tried to enter William Hills and Bet365 websites but it ended up not allowing me to enter it. I wasn’t entering it because I wanted to bet but wanted to use the website to view odds and sport events. However, most people here cannot bet anyway. So, what’s the point of having these sites blocked?

I happen to know how the “underground” betting system in Thailand works. They use the “book keeping” system where there are many little betting tables. For example, a table might have 100 clients. The flaw which is hidden is when you actually bet. If you call the table up and bet before a football game. Your bet gets recorded into a book. The odds are chosen by the table. Usually, they follow the English betting agents. You do not have to pay your bet up front. So, if you win something, you’ll receive the difference between the invested money and the amount of money you win. If you win nothing you’ll have to pay it afterwards. This creates debts for the betters. Thai people usually do not think about how much money they have and usually spend over their limit. They think when they’re in debt; they’ll have to play even more to win it all back. Usually, this does not work because they keep losing and losing money.

When a client does not pay their debt, they’ll have to be responsible for paying it. So, a clearing squad is created to enter these clients’ houses and threading them to seize their belongings. Some cases are severe when clients are in a huge debt and he/she has to be shot dead or beaten to death by the betting table. I see no reason why this should continue when the demand is high. Why not make betting legal and end the money spent abroad? Why not secure these betters’ lives by regulating the rules? In England, anyone who bets has to be at least 18 years old. I believe that gambling is something a society should have but should not be encouraged like I said before.