Category: Misc.

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Misc.

David Thompson at the World Gourmet Festival

With Thai food expert David Thomspon

Yesterday I was fortunate enough to attend a lunchtime cooking demonstration by acclaimed Thai food expert David Thompson. Thompson wrote the well-known English-language cookbook Thai Food. And his London restaurant, Nahm, was the first Thai restaurant to receive a Michelin star. He’s in Bangkok as a featured chef at the 10th Annual World Gourmet Festival, held at the Four Seasons.

In the image above, which was snapped by Bangkok’s own foodie photog Austin Bush, I was helping Thompson prepare — and enthusiastically sampling — a chili paste to use in a khanom jeen noodle dish.

You can find more images, the recipe, and a thorough description of the event at this post on Austin’s site. ((By the way, Austin’s attending all of the WGF events and is food-blogging up a storm. Don’t miss this post, about last night’s dinner, which was prepared by Graham Elliot Bowles. Sadly, I didn’t attend that session.))

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Misc.

Anniversary of Oct. 6, 1976 massacre

Today is the 33rd anniversary of the Oct. 6, 1976 massacre, in which military and police fired on student protesters at Bangkok’s Thammasat University, killing nearly 50 people.

More info is at 2Bangkok. Here’s a 2006 piece from the Nation, and here’s an article in an academic journal from 1997. And finally, here’s an AP/NYT story about former Thai Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej’s revisionist remarks in 2008 about the massacre.

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Misc.

A Drudge Report for Thailand?

TheThaiReport.com, a new Thailand news aggregation site, aims to be a sort of Drudge Report ((So far the site hasn’t been updated since yesterday, so today’s news about the train derailment in Hua Hin is absent.)) for the Kingdom. ((TTR is modeled on Drudge’s famously bare bones design. So far no sign of the dreaded Drudge siren, however…))

(Via Bangkok Pundit.)

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Misc.

Does Sydney have better Thai food than Thailand?

From the Sydney Morning Herald:

Wake up, Sydney, and smell the lemongrass. Do you know what’s under your collective nose? Anyone who has lived away from this city for any time suffers withdrawal symptoms for Thai chicken curry, deep-fried snapper with sweet chilli sauce, pad thai noodles or Thai beef salad, whether from Longrain, Chat Thai, Spice I Am, Sailor’s Thai or (insert your favourite local Thai here). Even Sydneysiders who have moved to Thailand suffer post-Sydney-Thai-fabulousness syndrome.

That’s because there is nothing in the world like Sydney Thai food. Europe can’t do it and neither can America. London certainly can’t, with one honourable exception (David Thompson’s Nahm), and neither can Bangkok, because only Sydney has the mix of climate, produce, attitude and style – and those last two are as important as the first two.

(Emphasis mine.)

Link via this New Mandala post, where you’ll find some reactions to the story. And here’s more, um, hard-hitting feedback from Stomachs on Legs.

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Misc.

TIME magazine on Thai PM Abhisit

Just wanted to point out that the current TIME magazine has a story about PM Abhisit. The headline, appropriately enough, is “Man in the Middle,” and the piece describes the current state of the Thai political crisis and Abhisit’s place in it.

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Misc.

Australian dust storm in the WSJ, IHT, and Bangkok Post

Australia dust storm in today's papers

Interesting sight this morning: All three of the newspapers we receive featured front page images of yesterday’s remarkable dust storm in Australia.

An AP story about the storm is here, Wikipedia has some info here, and you can find more images from the always-excellent Big Picture photo blog here.

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Misc.

Thailand sports news: Robson in, Rafa out

Just wanted to draw your attention to two Thailand sports stories:

  1. A conclusion to the Peter Reid saga: Ex-Manchester United midfielder Bryan Robson is the next coach of the Thailand national soccer team. BBC has the details, and here’s more from the Nation and the Bangkok Post.
  2. Tennis news: Rafael Nadal has pulled out of the Thailand Open due to an abdominal injury. The AP has more in this short item.
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Misc.

Images and videos from Saturday’s Red Shirts protest

Here are a few images I snapped at Saturday’s red shirt protest here in Bangkok. (Back story is here and here.)

Red shirts protest

Red shirts protest

Red shirts protest

Red shirts protest

Red shirts protest

Red shirts protest

There are a few more in the full set on Flickr.

And below are two short videos. I shot these on my Nokia E71 cell phone amid the pouring rain, with a clouded lens, so please excuse the image quality. The videos should give you a sense of the atmosphere at the rally, however.

Video one (embedded below): protesters listen to a speech in the rain.

Video two: a motorbike procession:

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Misc.

Reds and yellows protest in Thailand

Yesterday’s red shirt protest here in Bangkok attracted some 30,000 demonstrators. Despite concerns about the potential for violence, the rally was peaceful. CNN.com has details here.

Meanwhile, on the Thailand-Cambodia border, yellow shirt demonstrators fought with local residents near the Preah Vihear temple. Here’s a BBC News report with video of the clashes.

I spent a few hours at the red shirt rally and will be writing more about that soon.

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Misc.

Explaining today’s red shirt rally

The Bangkok Post has details on today’s planned red shirt rally here in the Thai capital.

For a big picture look at why the anti-government demonstrators are gathering, I suggest this CSM story: “Briefing: Why Thai protesters are taking to the streets again.”