Showing 41 - 49 of 49
Another year to remember, or maybe forget
News, Roger Crutchley, Published on 28/12/2014
» Well, we've just about scraped through another 12 months, although at times things did look a bit on the shaky side. At least all the whistle-blowing has abated. Here are a few reminders of events and characters that graced the year 2014, although some you may prefer to forget.
Did you hear the one about the fat badger?
News, Roger Crutchley, Published on 24/08/2014
» The news has been so depressing this week we are desperately in need of some light relief. What better than to check out the jokes which were voted the funniest at this year's Edinburgh Festival Fringe which concludes this weekend in Scotland.
Is everybody happy? You bet your life we are!
News, Roger Crutchley, Published on 27/07/2014
» I hope we have all been enjoying the official “Happiness Week” in Bangkok and trust everyone is wallowing in contentment and experiencing nirvana, or at least a general sense of well-being, if not absolute bliss.
Hello Dolly ... back where you belong
News, Roger Crutchley, Published on 06/07/2014
» It was good to see Dolly Parton receive such an enthusiastic reception from the 150,000-strong crowd at the muddy Glastonbury festival last weekend. I am not a huge fan of country music, but have always appreciated Dolly as an entertainer and songwriter. I much preferred her own low-key version of I Will Always Love You, which she wrote, to Whitney Houston’s massive hit.
The festival that doesn’t know when to stop
News, Roger Crutchley, Published on 20/04/2014
» The Songkran Festival seems to have gone on forever this year. There are definitely an awful lot of city people who slipped away for a “long weekend” about 10 days ago who haven’t been heard of since.
When it comes to jokes, you can't beat the old ones
News, Roger Crutchley, Published on 25/08/2013
» There's an old saying that ''He who laughs last ... doesn't get the joke,'' and I felt a bit that way early last week.
Still searching for the sound of silence
News, Roger Crutchley, Published on 28/04/2013
» Last Wednesday was International Noise Awareness Day, although if you live in Bangkok you could be forgiven for being blissfully unaware of this momentous occasion. It's hardly a revelation, but it's desperately difficult to escape noise in Thailand. You can't go to a department store or supermarket these days without being assaulted by an incessant babble of sales pitches from ladies with microphones, promoting anything from skin whitening creams to absurd looking lingerie.
To make it popular, ban it
News, Roger Crutchley, Published on 20/05/2012
» One would have thought that by now the authorities would have realised that if you ban something it will become popular, or at least more widely known. That will probably be the case of the film Shakespeare Must Die, a Thai adaptation of Macbeth. It was originally banned in April and an appeal by the film-makers was rejected last week. The authorities seem to think that the Thai public is incapable of making up its own mind whether a film is any good. Of course, the publicity created by the ban means that the news has gone around the world _ not exactly what the moral guardians responsible for the ban had in mind.
The festival that never seems to end
News, Roger Crutchley, Published on 15/04/2012
» Songkran appears to have been going on for even longer than usual this year. There's an awful lot of city folks who disappeared a week ago for a ''long weekend'' and haven't been seen since. They probably won't be spotted again until the end of the week, which no doubt will be just in time for another long weekend.