Thai Life
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Phuket Pads: Winter birds looking to cash in on Phuket property market
PHUKET: More and more resorts and hotels in Phuket are offering excellent guaranteed rental returns for properties that buyers are looking to use themselves for only a short period each year. The rest of the year, the property is expected to generate rental income for its owners. This week’s property offers exactly that. Priced at 52 million baht, this one…
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Fresh food, antique decor at Phuket’s Chicroom Cafe
PHUKET: As you are driving down Phuket Road toward the Surin Circle clock tower in town, you may have noticed on the right-hand side a beautiful, modern looking building called the Chicroom Cafe. This cafe doubles as a gallery of all things eccentric and antique. The decor resembles a fancy secondhand store with all the treasures that you always wanted…
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Phuket’s secondary property sector drifts into autopilot mode
PHUKET: A familiar term for anyone with children is, ‘Where do we go from here?’ Those inquisitive, blank, questioning looks that penetrate deep into the heart of the seemingly innocent question about what’s next? Lately, the topic seems to have shifted to adults in the island’s real-estate trade. It’s been nearly a decade since the dining tables shifted from a…
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Books: At Last – Melrose finds his place
PHUKET: Edward St Aubyn’s At Last (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, New York, 2012, 266pp) is the highly satisfying finale to his Patrick Melrose series of five novels. This is a towering achievement in fiction, psychologically intense, philosophically deep, screamingly funny. Introduced at the age of five in the first novel, Patrick Melrose grows up to be a highly educated heroin-and-cocaine…
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On your mind: Ban on “underboob selfies’ will do little to deter youth culture
PHUKET: By now you’ve probably heard that the government has warned women against posting online ‘underboob selfies’ – selfie photos of the lower half of their breasts – saying their actions could violate the country’s computer crime laws. Offenders could face up to five years in jail. Internet responses have been predictable, generally suggesting that the government might better involve…
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Up in the air: DCA woes continue
PHUKET: Fallout from the miserable results of the recent audit of Thailand’s Department of Civil Aviation (DCA) by the UN’s International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) is having direct effects both on Phuket’s tourism and general aviation industries. Well-publicized action to ban any new Thai flights imposed by the governments of Japan, South Korea and China have already affected several Thai…
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By the book: Demand for Phuket rentals outpaces supply
PHUKET: The rental market in Phuket in recent years has been very strong, with rental prices increasing across the island, giving owners very attractive returns on their investment. This surge in strength in the rental market has coincided with increasing tourist arrivals, which has led to demand for rental properties outpacing supply. Good rental properties have become more scarce as…
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Gardening: A garden “full of beans’
PHUKET: Language is chameleon-like. Expressions frequently change their meanings according to time or context. Take the phrase ‘full of beans’. I have always assumed it means full of energy and enthusiasm, but Americans use it as a derogatory term to signify full of hot air – or something less printable. Personally, I prefer the older connotation (I would, wouldn’t I?).…
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Gardening: Aristocratic aquatics
PHUKET: Hydrophytes are plants that can grow only in water or in soil that is permanently saturated. Some simple souls merely float on the surface and dangle their roots below, but the majority are rooted to the bottom or to the muddy margins of lakes, marshes or rivers. A few can actually survive in brackish or saline conditions, but for…
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Sansiri says “Now or Never’ with latest Phuket campaign
PHUKET: Sansiri has launched a “Now or Never” sales campaign, which will see some of the best units available in six Phuket developments up for grabs at special prices through June. The property development company held an event launching the campaign at Central Festival Phuket that concluded on April 1. “We have a limited number of units available for the…
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Three cheers for Phuket’s Artsketeers
PHUKET: An art show displaying the talents of three British International School Phuket (BISP) students drew to a close last week, with the young artists feeling acceptance of their works and an urge to develop their art further. IB Visual Arts students Mimi Siriwangsanti, Jaratchai “JJ” Chongjaroenjai and Boram Lee, also known as the ‘Three Artsketeers’, debuted their works at…
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Books: The Johnson factor
PHUKET: On the eve of the 50th anniversary of Winston Churchill’s death appears The Churchill Factor (Johnson, Riverhead Books, New York, 2014, 390pp). I picked it not for the subject matter, having read William Manchester’s trilogy, one of several multi-volume biographies of the great man, but for the author, Boris Johnson. Someday it is conceivable that two roommates at Eton,…
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Looking Back: Mahawangsa – Kedah’s legend is born
PHUKET: The Hikayat Merong Mahawangsa is an ancient book that chronicles the legend of how the Malay state of Kedah was founded. The book tells the story of Mahawangsa, a hero who was given command of a large fleet of ships by the Emperor of Rome. His task was to set sail to the east and bring back the princess…
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Property Watch: Evolution of property – Multi-pronged approach to cashing in on Phuket market
PHUKET: There is nothing wrong with short-term goals, striking while the iron is hot and being commercially opportunistic for a profit, if this is all balanced with a long- term view. This principle also applies to the property market in Phuket. I recently saw an adviser inform a client interested in property in Thailand, that the only investment a foreigner…
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Phuket’s re-sale market shows value
PHUKET: Most re-sale properties in Phuket are priced lower than comparable new developments, a trend clearly highlighted in the data accumulated in Siam Real Estate’s 2014 Phuket Residential Market Report. In Phuket and the rest of Thailand, most buyers prefer brand-new properties. There are many reasons for this: new properties have never been lived in; they offer the latest in…
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Gardening: Horses for water courses
PHUKET: Each and every landscaper worth his salt should incorporate a water feature – if only a modest fish pond – in his garden designs. And even apartment dwellers, with only a concrete balcony to link them to the open air, can think of focal points such as waterproof ceramic pots on plinths, decorated with water lilies or lotuses. Such…
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Hua Hin offers lessons for Phuket’s developing property market
PHUKET: For Thais, there is little doubt that Hua Hin remains a keen object of desire, be it for a holiday, or a property purchase. Call it legacy, or location, but the magnetic draw of the beach town continues to be a key driver of demand. A few weeks ago I visited the destination and found the extreme makeover movement…
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Environment: Dealing with DDT – Nature’s greatest enemy
PHUKET: Almost all of us can point to what James Joyce called ” epiphanies”, moments or experiences in our lives that ineradicably changed us or our world view for ever. Such events may have been seared in our memories by pain or fear, others may have been moments of insight or ecstasy. One such experience for me came from reading…
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Property: Self-centered Patong lures seven new hotels
PHUKET: Patong remains Phuket’s epicenter of development, as it attracts seven new hotels to its shores. Hoteliers investing in Patong see the non-seasonal beach as establishing a stable market, while some believe that other beaches such as Kata and Nai Thon are perceived by visitors as being more seasonal, explained Bill Barnett, managing director of C9 Hotelworks and Gazette columnist.…
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Balance Matters: Autism isn’t misbehaving
PHUKET: Robert, a 7-year-old boy, had been anxious about his upcoming trip for weeks. His mother’s job involved an overseas relocation and the family had to take both him and his older sister on a plane journey to visit new potential schools and houses, check out locations and all the usual rigmarole involved in moving countries. Robert’s family had prepared…
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Gardening: Tales of the understory
PHUKET: A few weeks ago two men, Tommy Caldwell and Kevin Jorgeson, free-climbed El Capitan (The Chief), a sheer rock face in Yosemite Park, California. Nothing special about that, you might say. But consider the circumstances. The rock is composed of granite and is 3,000-feet high. Climbing the monolith has been likened to scaling three Empire State Buildings while gripping…
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Phuket Pads: Take to the hills for stunning views
PHUKET: Aside from the wishful thinkers who request beachfront properties, the majority of inquiries for properties in Phuket are for those with a sea view. Thankfully, as the island boasts 70 per cent hillside coverage, there are many properties on the island that fit this criteria. It all really depends on how close of a view you wish to have.…
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Diving: All aglow down below
PHUKET: Most divers remember taking a crash course in the color spectrum and light waves from their advanced diving course. Notably, that we see short wavelength colors, such as red, yellow and orange, quickly disappear as we descend on a dive. The lesson is usually combined with a color-comparisons activity on our first deep dive to about 30* meters. There…
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Video Report: Phuket Airpark event a flying success
PHUKET: THE successful Phuket Air Show & Fly’n event at the Phuket Airpark on February 28 is just the first in a number of similar activities planned at Phuket’s only private airfield, with another fun event scheduled to take place in mid-May. Pat James, head of the Phuket Aviation Club, told Up In The Air: “The airshow on March 28…
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Pricing Phuket Plots: The attractive north
PHUKET: If one single fact has become evident in Siam Real Estate’s Residential Market Report 2014, it is that since the tragic tsunami on Boxing Day 2004, land prices in Phuket have tripled in value. The surge in prices has been led by land prices on the west coast, most notably in the traditional and well-established tourist destinations of Patong,…
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Across the land: Harvesting monsoon bounty
PHUKET: Those of us who have lived in a tropical country nearly all our lives tend to take rain for granted. We regularly forget that it’s the rain that keeps the plants a lush green, while also providing for our everyday water-usage needs. My grandmother used to collect rainwater in big Chinese urns in the garden. She would use the…
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Excuse Buster: Overtraining and the stress bucket
PHUKET: Believe it or not, training can increase the amount of stress in your life, and stress accumulates over time. I work closely with many Thai boxing gyms in Phuket and I get asked a lot about overtraining. These guys punish their bodies for six to eight hours every day – that is a ton of stress on the body.…
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Books: Scoring big in Africa
PHUKET: Denis Johnson published his first of three books of poetry at the age of 19. His meticulous attention to words is evident in his 11 books of fiction, which tend to be slim and terse, but intensely descriptive. I’ve read his second novel, Fiskadoro, a post-nuclear apocalypse set in Key West, and his eighth, The Tree of Smoke, an…
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BISP’s “Three Artsketeers’ put artwork on display
PHUKET: For most, art is just a break, a temporary escape from the daily routine, but three British International School Phuket (BISP) IB Visual Arts students want to make it the theme of their lives. In fact, thanks to their own determination and the support of their school, they are already on the right path with the upcoming BISP 2015…
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Phuket Pads: Kathu – A golfer’s paradise
PHUKET: Kathu, in the center of Phuket, has a number of advantages over other locations on the island when it comes to residential property. Its central location means that it’s as easy to get to Patong on the west coast, as it is to visit Central Festival shopping mall, or Phuket Town on the east side. It’s also within easy…
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