Thai Life
Discover the latest regional stories and happenings in Thailand with The Thaiger, your source of credible, informative, and reliable updates. Stay informed about important local events, political happenings, social issues, cultural highlights, and entertainment stories, all curated to ensure you never miss out on what’s happening in the Land of Smiles. Our journalists will keep you informed with all the essential Thai life updates and allows you to connect with the community and experience Thailand like a local.
-
Sponsored Do foreigners get free healthcare in Thailand?
Thailand’s healthcare system is well-regarded across Southeast Asia, with options ranging from public hospitals to world-class private facilities. But when it comes to foreign residents or tourists, healthcare access isn’t as straightforward. So, do foreigners get free healthcare in Thailand?...
-
Phuket Books: Heartbreak’s hardest road
PHUKET: Recently I reviewed a pair of books – The Lifeboat and The Starboard Sea – by a pair of first-time female novelists that were competent enough in terms of prose and plot but sorely lacking in characterization. In a word, they lacked heart. Scott O’Connor’s Untouchable (Tyrus Books, Blue Ash, Oklahoma, 2011, 381pp) is chock full of heart: that…
-
Phuket Gardening: The last of the red brigade
PHUKET: It is always exciting to discover a new plant. I recently chanced on a shrub with fine, arching, broom-like leaves, and masses of tiny but brilliant red tubular flowers. Its name? Russelia equisetiformis. Despite the tongue-twisting botanical label, this is not a shrub that draws attention to itself and, in any case, it is not common in Phuket. Maybe…
-
Phuket Life: Given the chance of his young life
PHUKET: Imagine that you are thirteen years old and school just isn’t your thing. Your mother lives with her new boyfriend in another province and you’ve been in trouble quite a bit lately – understandably so. Now imagine that amidst this unstable period of your early life, someone offers you the chance that many poor Thai boys dream of –…
-
Phuket Health: The truth about dengue fever
PHUKET: A prominent Phuket doctor has warned residents to protect themselves from dengue fever, also known as “break-bone fever”, by removing all sources of stagnant water from around their homes and minimizing exposure to mosquito bites. According to the US Center for Disease Control (CDC), dengue (pronounced den’ gee) is caused by any one of four closely related dengue viruses.…
-
Phuket Gardening: Changing from red to amber
PHUKET: The light has changed to amber. Time to stop dawdling, to drive on, and seek shrubs of a different hue. But since there are red plants aplenty that have escaped our scrutiny, here are some we should have noticed on our travels. The most stupendous scarlet bloomer of all is the flame tree (delonix regia). Right now, one is…
-
Phuket Lifestyle: Going, going, gone
PHUKET: World Environmental Day, which was on June 5, has a special meaning for Phuket-based photographer Chusak Uthaipanumas. Twenty years ago, on this day, he received an accolade at the quadrennial photo contest on the environment organized by United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP). The photographer traveled to Rio de Janeiro in Brazil, to attend the UNEP award ceremony. It was…
-
Phuket Life: Operating Phuket’s new incinerator
PHUKET: After a long wait, with a few false starts, the second trash incinerator at the Saphan Hin waste management facility became fully operational recently. The incinerator, which was expected to be fully operational during May, encountered technical problems during its trial run and repairs needed to be carried out. The timing was unfortunate. At the same time, the older…
-
Phuket Lifestyle: C’mon light my fire
PHUKET: The smell of gasoline lingers on your hands after the flames have been extinguished, and the performance is over. But the smell itself is a little addictive, like a woman’s perfume on the pillow of an empty bed – a reminder of a past flame. A very talented busker (street performer) once took me aside and gave me a…
-
Phuket Dining: Tempting tastes of the Cape
PHUKET: Few things can tell someone about another culture or country like its food. Italian food is full of flavor and body. American food comes in large quantities and fills you up. Thai food is spicy with intricate details and layers. If food is indeed anything to go by to get a sense of culture, then the South African Food…
-
Phuket Diving: Camera rolling, regulator in
PHUKET: Toweled dry and eating a pile of pancakes on Andaman Ocean Safaris’ boat, my dive buddy and I head to the upper cabin with lackluster enthusiasm to watch the video from the day’s dive. I had seen these sorts of videos before. They usually came off as gimmicky and, let’s be honest, I had just been on the dive…
-
Phuket Lifestyle: Going to print
PHUKET: The hottest style of trend in pattern design this year is undoubtedly tribal. Last year saw an explosion of African-inspired prints hit runways and major stores and the trend has continued. In 2012, prints have trickled down to the masses and evolved to feature Aztec and Southwestern Native American designs.When wearing a tribal print, your look is instantly trendy.…
-
Phuket Lifestyle: From Phuket teacher to London 2012
PHUKET: English judo competitor Sophie Cox has five weeks left until her fight to become Olympic champ – seven years after retiring to Phuket to become a teacher. Sophie,30, broke the news of her Team GB selection as the under 52-kilogram competitor on Twitter recently, with her official team selection announced by the British Olympic Association on June 16. She…
-
Phuket Gardening: Scarlet symbols
PHUKET: Red flowers are often symbolic, or associated with particular events or activities. Take the red rose, England’s national symbol. In the dynastic War of the Roses, the baronial armies of the House of Lancaster wore the red rose in battle against the white rose of York. Bizarrely, that red or “damask” rose may well have been the first cultivated…
-
Phuket Lifestyle: Low season diving
PHUKET: As I watched my first rainy season blow in over the Andaman Sea in frightful gusts, I assumed it was time to pack up my dive gear and head over to Kata Beach with a longboard. However, I wasn’t ready to throw the flippers overboard completely, because unlike Khao Lak, Phuket dive companies do run low season trips daily,…
-
Phuket comedy: Laughter never rains, it pours
PHUKET: With Phuket’s wet and rainy season now truly here the Punchline Comedy team has decided to give comedy lovers a reason to rejoice with another hilarious night, planned for June 27.Three top stand-up comedians will head to the Holiday Inn Resort, Patong Beach to bring the mirth back.The event will be compered by comedian, writer and presenter Jeremy O’Donnell,…
-
Phuket gardening: What’s in a name?
PHUKET: Plants can have bizarre common names, but these names remain in use precisely because they are memorable and refer to a plant’s visible features. Clitoria ternatea (even the botanical name is – well – suggestive) is called the butterfly pea. Quesonia has a tall, triangular crown of flowers which gives it the somewhat cryptic label of pagoda plant. Other…
-
Thai Gallery – Alongkorn Poochamchote
PHUKET: In 2007 when Alongkorn ‘Kob’ Poochamchote was invited to be part of the prestigious art fair, the Florence Biannale , it was the proudest moment of his career. He was the first Thai artist ever to receive such an accolade. After all, this is where fine works of art are shown, admired and purchased. 50-year-old Alongkorn, who was born…
-
Phuket Life: In praise of the bag lady
PHUKET: Cast your mind back to any freezing night in New York or London. One of the memories that will likely haunt your conscience is the image of a pathetic human bundle of rags, covered by a frayed blanket or a flattened cardboard box, in a desperate attempt to keep out the biting cold. Her face, if you can see…
-
Phuket life: Paintographer Gerard Garson
PHUKET: Gerard Garson is a French photographer, now based in Phuket, who always wanted to be a painter and through his use of High Dynamic Range (HDR) imaging he has managed to do both. He calls himself a paintographer and signs his work ‘Gast Garger’. Gerard’s passion for photography started in1977, when he was a student working for the photographic…
-
Phuket lifestyle: In a league of their own
PHUKET: There’s a restaurant experience in Kathu that is uncannily like dining in someone’s front room; largely because it is in someone’s front room. The restaurant in question is Royale Nam Tok (RNT) hosted by Corry Ringoet and Marc De Schriyver, (a Belgian partnership) who, after having enjoyed 20 years of success operating their Antwerp restaurant, De Tafeljoncker moved lock,…
-
Phuket lifestyle: Saving Thailand’s mangroves
PHUKET: “Conserving the mangroves may not be as sexy as saving the rainforest, but it’s arguably even more important for the environment,” says Udo Gattenlöhner, Executive Director of the Global Nature Fund (GNF). The non-profit, independent foundation is facilitating an international project designed to rehabilitate lost mangrove forests in Thailand, India, Sri Lanka and Cambodia. Funded by the German government,…
-
Andaman manta rays take flight
PHUKET: Dive companies like Sea Bees can guarantee a lot of aspects of their trips. They can guarantee a high-quality breakfast, good equipment and knowledgeable staff, but what they cannot guarantee are those precious and glorious sightings of roaming mega-fauna, like manta rays.Every diver last week may have spotted the sweeping black wings of a manta ray in the distance…
-
Phuket Lifestyle: Kata Reef’s beauty under threat
PHUKET: Geared up without letting a tank touch the pavement, four of us waddle across the hot sand of Kata Beach to take a peek at the beautiful and “at high risk” reef-system just offshore. Only a couple weeks ago Niphon Pongsuwan, a coral expert, warned Phuket that the amount of coastal development on the island would accelerate the sedimentation…
-
Phuket Health: The doctor will see you now
PHUKET: With the Phuket Health and Fitness Festival set to kick off this weekend, keynote speaker Dr John Hinwood stopped by the Phuket Gazette’s TV studios for an interview with organizer Michael Massey, a driving force behind the Rawai – Nai Harn Group who are hosting the event. Dr Hinwood says that he will focus on the mindset necessary to…
-
Phuket lifestyle: Heavy-duty gardening
PHUKET: If you think that the ‘Phuket Gazette’ is a parochial newspaper, then have a re-think. I recently received an email from Honolulu, no less, about a piece on palms. While the writer commended my observations about growing ferns and other epiphytes on palm trunks, he took me to task for writing about, “a very tired and overplanted group,” suitable…
-
Phuket Lifestyle: It’s all go for Hugo
PHUKET: It’s Saturday night at the Hard Rock Cafe in Patong and a young man steps out onto the stage armed with his trademark stetson hat, a Gibson guitar, a new band and some sultry killer tracks from his first solo album. On March 24 Hugo was back home in Thailand and performing for the first time here since 2005.…
-
Phuket Lifestyle: This year’s top trends
PHUKET: The transformation of the tuxedo into women’s apparel is a bold new take on a classic look. Fortunately, you don’t actually have to wear a tuxedo just because you’re inspired by its sophistication. Instead, try taking bits and pieces of it to establish your own style. A structured jacket or waistcoat in black velvet or cream satin can add…
-
Phuket Lifestyle: Top chefs to share a kitchen
PHUKET: The old adage of “too many cooks spoil the broth” receives a sound thrashing later this month and in fact will be given “Six of the Best” with an annual gastronomic fundraiser to help underprivileged children on Phuket. “Six of the Best” features half a dozen chefs from Phuket’s premier luxury resorts and restaurants, who will join culinary forces…
-
Phuket Lifestyle: Into the Live and Present Moment
PHUKET: The latest addition to the coffee shop scene in Kamala Beach, north of Phuket, is Live Present Moment. It stands out from the crowd with its original and charming decor and menu offering healthy Thai food, snacks, and all-day breakfast. The proprietor Noppamas ‘Ae’ Mungwiriya explains that ‘Live’, which opened its doors a year ago, was created to serve…
-
Phuket Lifestyle: Those other bikers heading to Phuket
PHUKET: With Big Bike Week just around the corner it is good to remember that Phuket also attracts the pedal- powered variety of biker thanks to Siam Bike Tours run by avid cyclist Martin Brot. Martin is a sprightly 54 year old with a healthy tan, deep smile lines at the corners of his eyes and well developed calf muscles.…
Don't forget to check out some other things to do in Thailand - get help starting a business or finding a job in Thailand, buy Thailand property, rent a yacht or book a medical procedure worldwide.