Opinion
The Thaiger Opinion Columns
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Sponsored How to reduce out-of-pocket medical expenses in Thailand?
Managing medical expenses in Thailand is important as healthcare costs continue to rise. The country’s healthcare system includes both public and private options, but even with the Universal Coverage Scheme (UCS) for citizens, many still face high out-of-pocket medical expenses....
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Keep the Phuket cleanup ball rolling, take down jet-skis next
PHUKET: As the rains of the southwest monsoon fall and low-season tourism arrival figures plummet, there could not be a better time for the National Council for Peace and Order to be carrying out the long-overdue crackdown on the many illegal businesses that have tarnished the island’s reputation for too many years. The removal of illegal taxi stands along the…
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Phuket driving test: forget about the parking
PHUKET: Someone I know recently applied for a driver’s license and failed the parallel-parking test. “You hit the pole,” announced the proctor from her little booth. And I began to wonder: in the nation which has the third-highest road fatality rate in the world, does it really matter how well you parallel park? Being third globally (according to the World…
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Protecting Phuket’s image, day and night
Sopon Keamkan, 43, a native of Trang, is Acting Chief of Phuket’s Public Relations Department. He has a master’s degree in Political Science from Ramkhamheang University and has worked in the island’s PR Dept for more than 15 years. During that time, he and his colleagues have received numerous national-level awards for their work. Here, he talks about how he…
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Phuket rainy day must-do: people watching
PHUKET: Let me set the scene for you: it is Sunday afternoon and a sizable rainstorm has just swooped in and killed the power at Central Festival. The only sources of light are provided by the gray sky and the fluorescent glow emanating from laptop screens, tablets and smartphones. I am sitting in front of my Mac at a table…
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Phuket benefits from NCPO’s no-nonsense measures
PHUKET: Following the unprecedented crackdown on the island’s notorious transport syndicates in recent weeks, it is becoming clear that few provinces in Thailand are benefitting more from the no-nonsense measures ordered by the National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO) than Phuket. Now the cleanup, aimed at ending illegal businesses in Phuket, has targeted another scourge that has increasingly tarnished…
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Military Rule in Phuket: I’m thinking Maldives
PHUKET: Ask anyone, and their first impression of the Maldives is the iconic Indian Ocean archipelago with possibly the most beautiful beaches in the world. Everyone has heard of them, and most have wanted to visit them. What most people do not know about this collection of 1,192 islands is that it has developed its reputation as one of the…
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Best news: Notorious transport syndicates shut down
PHUKET: It may have taken military action, but the long-overdue purge against some of the island’s most notorious transport syndicates is, hands down, the best news the island has had in decades. While the Phuket Gazette remains cautiously optimistic – and staunchly secular – we cannot help but join our readers in rejoicing that something is finally being done about…
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Relative psychology in Phuket: coup, curfew, news
Patrick Mattimore, now retired, was an Adjunct Professor of Legal Reasoning and Case Briefing: Tsinghua/Temple Law School LLM Program in Beijing, teaching psychology to students there. He has also been an online columnist for Gazette partner newspaper the China Daily, covering a variety of topics from why rumors spread panic to selfies among the tuhao. Here, he takes a look…
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Turning others’ bad reputations into profit
Manop Pukpaya, 46, has been working as a Phuket taxi driver since 1997. He has a certificate in sales marketing from Dusit Commercial College Bangkok and for the past three years has run his own taxi service.Here, he talks about how the bad reputation of taxi drivers in Phuket and a good online review helped him expand his business, and…
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Crying out for a fair shakedown
PHUKET: Few Phuket Gazette news reports have generated more comment and debate in the social media than our recent article about vendors of pirated goods in Patong banding together to stage a protest against alleged extortion by government officials (story here). Scores of officers from a variety of government agencies, the protesters claimed, had been demanding too much in bribes…
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