thaiedward

Scott, on Today, 14:54 , said:

Bottom line: English is the defacto language of world business and international commerce.

If you are not competent in English, you will be out of luck in the greater job market. While someone fluent in English, Thai and Chinese will be in great demand the next 10 years or more.
If they also have Maths/Accounting, Computer and Legal/Business Admin skills, with the 3 languages, they will be in a sellers market for high paying jobs. Add to that a respect and understanding of cultural differences, then they can become a star in the business world.

Used to be a teacher at a University, on my first day in class one of the girls started asking questions as soon as I walked in the door, I thought hey this class are gonna be good, but I found out this was not going to be the case, she used the questions she had been taught at the door of a club getting punters to go inside.

Also at the same University, they have stopped teaching 3rd and 4th year students English, as it is not required. I had to laugh...........

And the denigration of proper English Teaching in the schools has made this even worse.

When the teachers are too embarrassed to really learn the subject, because that means they must admit they don't know it, and the administration backs that up, is it any wonder that the students can't speak proper English?

Of course the best through simply adequate English speakers, are put under increasing strictures about teaching English here, for both face saving and Nationalist/Jingosit reasons. Visa requirements are made more difficult, teachers jobs and paperwork being made more difficult to accomodate.

People who have succesfully taught english here for years,
are now removed because they don't possess a certificate of level,
that the people removing them could NOT attain themselves.

And no there exists coherent national standard of English standards put in place by native English speakers of any flavor. How can someone write a standard with minimal knowledge of the subject?

When people with little or marginal actual skills at a language are the ones to sign off on localized standards and would lose face by consulting a Native Speaker, is it any wonder the students 2-3 levels down the food chain have fear of using the language?

A sad state, when bar girls speak better English from daily osmosis with customers and the occasional 1 month course, than University Grads with a passing grade in english.

hellodolly, on 2012-05-12 12:10:32, said:

Of course it is bad for the ecology. But there are priorities....
Instead of spraying with chemicals that kill every insect there is a virus that infects the larvals and it multiply itself till all larvals are dead.
Works very well, but I never saw it in Thailand, only in Europe, and I don't hope that this government get any good ideas.

Yes he was a parasite, and unlike HSBC bank, he'll be deported, while HSBC can continue front-running interest and confounding Republic of Philippines natives with extraordinary rates, and extraordinary fees.  HSBC will even taunt people into re-financing and then only allow partial financing so that when eventually the creditor lapses behind in payments, the fees are doubled.

Then, of course there is Goldman Sachs who set up Greece with loans that they knew would fail, all the while selling the portfolio to those who would benefit.  Or JP Morgan, who "lost" 6.5 billion US$ worth of Sino Gold shares when they were trustee for Eldorado Gold... Oh yes, "we lost 6.5 billion dollars worth of shares for many, many weeks..."

Imagine what you can make simply writing covered puts/calls on EGO (Eldorado Gold)

There is no honesty anymore, no markets, simply manipulation.

Still, 120%/year is ludicrous.  Don't export the fella, incarcerate him and make him make restitution by painting floral scenes on hand-made fans.  Then all will benefit, except him.

The remarkable thing about kids is that they are human beings too, who  happen to be more dramatic in expressing their emotions. They haven't  grown up enough to know to conceal their true feelings and resort to  cunning and trickery. So, reading about these kids behavior is a good  indicator of the social undercurrent going on, but that the kids have  not learned to conceal yet.

Thailand's problem solving process goes like this; fight or flight.

When they fight, it is no holds barred and no quarter asked for or given.

When  they make flight, there is no possibility to get them to return to the  issue or location to talk rationally. They have no rationale. This is  how they get programmed through their childhood. No human is born with  Intel Pentium inside, and a host of software to know how to cope with  life. It has to get programmed in as the human grows up. Clearly, the  evidence surrounding us is a strong indicator of what type of  programming is going on. Animal from the start, and human being by  programming that brings out our better nature; otherwise, our animal  nature will rule.

These days in Western countries, if a father  administers tough love and corrects his children with a swat to the bum,  he goes to jail, gets a restraining order, goes through mandatory anger  management class, etc. The old days are gone, and the new Western world  will see the affects of children who do not respect each other due to  the inability to understand and respect each individual's boundaries.

The  West is a good example of how wrong it is for governments to involve  themselves in matters far better left to responsible, caring, and loving  parents. Mommy is the nurturer, and Daddy is "The Line". Don't step  over the line. But the West has systematically removed Daddy from the  home, which is now run by the remainder of the family unit. I hope  Thailand's government does not intervene as the West has. I hope they  begin putting the yoke of responsibility back onto the Father and  Mother.

But one problem here with the Thai fathers is one that bring s a saying to mind: "I am my father's son". The governments of the West had to make laws to get the father out of the home. The irony here is that Thailand needs to make laws to get the fathers back into the the home. There never was any need to get the fathers out of the home because the culture here does not seem to cultivate a patriarchal responsibility in a society that is known to be matriarchal. Hence the mom making a statement, and leaving me asking, "where the heck is dad?".

On a side note, I find it interesting that of all the  children in orphanages in Thailand, over 60% have parents who have not  yet signed a waiver of release for their kids to be in an orphanage.  Hence they cannot get adopted. Is this another facet of an issue where  Thai parents simply do not want to be involved with their children after  they get past that cute and cuddly age? If the beast is not programmed  to be a human of better nature, then it will grow into an adult beast,  with all the facade of simulating a normal adult. But when you look at  the track record, the diagnosis is clear.

What makes a person  stop-check their self before stepping across the line? Clearly, Thailand  has not found an answer to that, nor a deterrent to those who do. I  think the reason for this is that tugging at any one strand of this  social structure will cause the entire web to tremble.

To the  people who abhor any form of physical correction towards children, then I  wonder if they are also against having a strong military presence to  protect their right to abhor violence. After all, isn't a military  supposed to be prepared to punch the enemy in the snout and make them  think twice about stepping across the line?

Idealists seem to  hide behind the ankles of the realists when the doo-doo hits the fan.  But when everything is peaceful and serene, they come out from under  their rocks and condemn violence in all forms, regardless of the  necessity in life to administer it at certain times, and to certain  individuals, as a deterrent to far worse behavior - to get that beast  back on the track to becoming a human of better nature.

Let's  corral the idealists together and put them in the same neighborhood  where these unruly animals live. I wonder if they will start a  neighborhood charity and spend time with these not fully matured, feral humans, and mentor them onto the path of becoming human beings of a better nature. I  am quite certain it will not be long before they cry for someone other  than themselves to "get tough" on these kids.

You will never find an idealist in a fox-hole, and negotiating with children is the height of folly!

To my knowledge the classic Mahayana/Vajrayana Buddhist text on the transition from this life to the next is the Bardo Thodol, or Tibetan Book of the Dead, or The Liberation Through Hearing During the Intermediate State.

There's also a fair amount on the Bardo transition in Sogyal Rinpoche's The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying, and Matthieu Ricard has some discussion of it in The Quantum and the Lotus.  There seem to be commonalities to near-death experiences across cultures, though the personages and contexts are culturally determined.  I'm not sure what a near-death experience for, say, Richard Dawkins might be like.

My wife tells of a close friend in Laos when she was a teenager who was pronounced dead and returned to life on the third day of the mourning ceremonies (i.e. the day the cremation was to be held). While she was "dead", she met with people who came to take her to a village where she was to live in her new home.  But then they were told that there had been a mistake and she was to be returned, which she duly was, much to the consternation of the mourners and guests.

Wikipedia has this to say in its article on the Bardo Thodol:

One can perhaps attempt to compare the descriptions of the Liberation Through Hearing During the Intermediate State with accounts of certain "out of the body" near-death experiences described by people who have nearly died in accidents or on the operating table. These accounts sometimes mention a "white light", and helpful figures corresponding to that person's religious tradition. According to the Buddhist teachings, there are four different steps and the "white light" is most probably the last of them; then Mahaparinirvana eternal bliss. The divine beings are Buddhas and dakinis that people see as respective figures of their culture or religious belief.

The George Ritchie story is very interesting and exemplifies some of the commonalities and culturally specific visions that are to be found in near-death experiences across cultures.  

Plus, not allowing unqualified students to buy their way in...and to buy a "diploma".  Same thing happens in China, which is why when students graduate, they don't get good jobs...and don't perform well in them.  My wife's best friend graduated here with a degree in computer science and she is selling clothes in a mall...but making fairly decent money with commissions...

Spoken like someone who does not have a clue - Thailand already has one.  The National Education Act of 1999 was actually a very forward thinking agenda, that is still being implemented in many respects.  What Thailand needs, is more funding to repair schools, and more teacher ongoing education .