Soi 10 Beer Bars are no more

[rovineye]

The owners may get money in the end. The working people (BGs, cooks, cleaners etc) will never even get the wages owed them from the last month.

[Guest]

Wow, that's a new definition to 'devastation' if I've ever seen one. To my reckoning 'devastation' means simply to 'lay waste; destroy'.

 

And Really, come on now! Who said we were talking about things on a world scale? and relative comparisons??? give me a break!! I think you were the one comparing its importance in relation to NEP weren't you?

 

If I'm not wrong your original post's main contention was that it was an insignificant event and BKK nightlife will survive, no?? Well, my only point (if you'd missed it before) was that it has a lot more relevence beyond where else there is to go for sanuk beyond this 'little bar area', especially for some of the people that had businesses there.

 

Thank you

FF

[PhordPhan]

When I called back and gave her the info (1200 baht) she cried even harder. Said she never thought I would be her saviour.

I have spent a ton of money in LOS, and given a ton to charities everywhere. NONE make me happier than what I just did. NONE!

---

 

Good for you! I applaud you for this. There is, indeed, nothing quite so satisfying as helping someone who truly needs it. It's so much better to see the effect of one's donations "up close" as opposed to simply making donations to an organization.

 

PhordPhan

 

[Guest]

"...or say public domain."

 

I would like to point out that when land is taken for public domain, the owners are paid fair market value. I mean, it's not just yanked from them and out in the cold. And I don't think public domain is used for Wal-Marts and such, that's just sneaky private business practices. I know one person in the U.S. who had his house declared public domain because he was on the corner of a major thoroughfare that needed widening, but he was quite happy with what the government paid him.

 

Anyhoo, I was prepared to make a flippant remark about perhaps this being possibly a reaction to the 500-baht BFs, in order to inject a lighter note into what is a pretty ugly situation, but I don't think I will. Sure, people dying of TB, malaria, etc., that's catastrophic, I don't think anyone here is suggesting otherwise. I doubt the scores or hundreds of uninsured people who lost their means of making a living, not to mention valuable goods, passports, documents, etc., will feel better about their problems being just a drop in the ocean; this is just as catatstrophic to those immediately involved in the worst way.

 

I never cared for that area, but Damn! I certainly would not have wished this on them. :onfire:

[Guest]

Thank you KohchaiBKK for echoing my sentiments so eloquently.

 

[Guest]

Several of the posters are correct that, in the context of greater world problems, this is a minor event, no matter how deeply this has devastated the lives of several of my friends and, worse yet, people I know casually and may never link up with again. I think the important issue here is what this means for Thailand?s emerging system of legal rights under the new constitution.

 

Thailand has been, in the last several years, giving a painful,and by no means certain, birth to civil rights, the rule of law and property rights. If Thailand allows this action to be successful, without sanction to those responsible, then how will this impact the newly discovered civil rights, legal equity and property rights of the 78,000,000 Thai citizens?

 

Whether or not the outside world focuses on this is important, as always. But most important is whether the the constitution will stand as a monument to protect the rights of Thai citizens or merely a tool of the rich and powerful.

 

This situation bears watching.

 

 

[Guest]

The Thai Rath article (including picture) is online here.

[Straycat]

First of all, let me say that I'm deeply disturbed by the events at Sukhumvit Square. I personally know two store/bar owners in the area and I know that they've suffered a tremendous, if not devastating, loss.

 

Personally, I have hard time to understand the evil and total lack of respect from the property owner.

 

However, unless the whole thing was directed by some government office (or a government official in THAT capacity) this is NOT a constitutional matter. A states constitution deal with the relation:

 

Government <--> People, and not

People <---> People

 

Ok, I know this is nitpicking. That is not to say that I don't agree with you on that it'll be interesting to see how the police, and possibly other government authorities, will react to the situation at hand. Unfortunately, as I think you agree with, most of the time "money talks and bullshit walks" in Thailand.

 

Meanwhile, I'm afraid we've not seen the last yet in this line of events.

 

[Guest]

Agree TC.

 

On the overall event

 

" The Lord Bhudda said that life is suffering"

Well he got that part right.

 

For those who feel that this is not an event worth world attention..you are probably right.

 

But, I cannot, as an individual, save or change the world. Nor even a country, nor a town or perhaps even a village. But, as an individua,l I CAN change the life of an individual and their family. Whether they be bargirl, stall worker, cleaner or small shop owner with pregnant wife.

 

This is not about karma, nor about religion, nor whether this one or that one is a"good" person or a "bad" person. Nor is it about having a "conscience" or a "moral obligation". This goes to the base of human being. Without helping each other, mankind would have never gotten down out of the trees, slayed mammoth, or keep a firepit going for hundreds of uears. 5000 years ago Chinese philosophers said that in the forest a man would instictively know good and help his fellow man. Only when gov't was watching would he subvert his inate knowlege.

 

So...any of you that are there, and have ever eaten, drank or whored there, who have used the internet or had a piss in a washroom...........you KNOW what to do. Forget the agencies and do-gooders....you go do it. Don't get involved, don't make it a crusade......simply find a individual, give them money to live for their family until they can reorganize, a smile to remind them that we humans do give a shit about each other, then give them the freedom to go back to their own lives, in their own ways.

 

PS..posting about it here is like buying a pew in the church to get your name engraved on the plaque. Just do it, you will know you did ..... and more importantly, so will they.

 

Beside if enough farangs do this then a least a few more will see that we are not all shitheads here.

 

"saving the world is done ONE individual at a time"

 

 

[Guest]

Not to get into a cat fight (Topcat and straycat...heh heh) it is a constitutional issue. The constitution in a democracy (actually a republic when the people elect representatives to represent them) defines the rights of the people and how they elect represntatives to protect and interpret these rights. And this issue is about the property rights and due legal process as guarenteed by the constitution.

 

The thing I like about Thailand is that the longer I live here the more surprised I get at what develops. No matter what I expet to happen, something always comes out of left field and I am left saying "Where the hell did that come from?"

 

In that vein. Thai TV has just announced that Prime Minister Thaksin is now aware of this and quite concerned as to how the legal system could have been circumvented. He is, apparently, headed, as I type, to soi 10 to view the damage himself. A friend of mine at soi 10 reports that there are now a very large number of police, including some very very senior police in attendance awaiting an important personage. Also a lot of Television cameras. "Now where the hell did that come from?"

 

I am surprised but it does make sense. If, as Thaksin wants, Thailand is to free itself from dependence on foreign capital, essentially pulling itself up by its own flip-flops then wealthy Thais must be able to rely on a system of property rights to protect their investments and lure their personal money and entrpeneurial efforts from foreign countries where their investments are more secure than Thailand.

 

This is gonna get interesting. Or not.