green toilet?

claims to save 150,000 litres of water per year

(it does not say "up to")
i find that hard to believe,

that's almost 500 liters per day

20 liters per hour (and i doubt the airport operates 24/7)

and there are three of these urinals in this unit alone

there just weren't many people using the toilets

sounds like the airport authorities bought the manufacturer's blurb

AND posted it in two languages

oh well, gives us something to read (and some maths to think about) while attending to matters at hand

fish of the day

best bargain at Bangkok airport
Bt35 for a tom yam fish noodle soup

(head to the basement, near the bus stops, don't eat in the airport restaurants upstairs)

living in the future

Just before leaving Thailand,
I've noticed that many people's watches are set forward about five minutes
(as many people do everywhere,
and as, indeed, i do myself)
but once i noticed it seemed that many Thai people do it
so i conducted a quick survey,
and EVERYONE does it
seriously, i didn't see one watch set at the correct time
they were all around 5-10 minutes fast,
with the "winner", Mr. Nitikorn with whom i played golf yesterday, having his watch set around 20 minutes fast

congratulations Thailand
land of smiles and, perhaps, punctual people

last image on leaving Thailand

a last look at the sunset across the Chao Phraya River
(or does Chao or Phraya mean "river"?)

fish of the day

go tell it to the Horse('s mouth)

good stuff from John Tkacik on the San Francisco Treaty and Treaty of Taipei in today's letter "All were clear on treaty"

President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) seems to be laboring in a bit of confusion as he ponders the 1952 Treaty of Taipei ... There was no such confusion among the signatories of the San Francisco Treaty ... Nor was the Republic of China’s (ROC) foreign minister George Kung-chao Yeh (葉公超) confused. At the San Francisco Treaty, US delegate John Foster Dulles admitted it “would have been neater” if the treaty specified precisely “the ultimate disposition of each of the ex-Japanese territories” but cautioned that to do so “would have raised questions as to which there are now no agreed answers.”

The British delegate stated: “The treaty provides for Japan to renounce its sovereignty over Formosa and the Pescadores Islands. The treaty itself does not determine the future of these islands.”

The Soviet delegate was indignant that “this draft grossly violates the indisputable rights of China to the return of integral parts of Chinese territory: Taiwan, the Pescadores, the Paracel and other islands … The draft contains only a reference to the renunciation by Japan of its rights to these territories but intentionally omits any mention of the further fate of these territories.”

read the rest of it
learn it by heart
and get ready to recite it to any KMTer you meet on the bus

Taiwan's aborigines, duh

The Taipei Times has a reasonable article Help for Aborigines lacking, group says, which not only manages to upper case "Aborigines" but also goes on to point out a number of anti-Aboriginal polices of the current KMT administration.

Unfortunately it ends with:
In related news, the group also voiced their support for the Pingpu — or plains — Aboriginal campaign to regain their official Aboriginal status.

The Pingpu campaign suffered a setback recently, with the government refusing to allow them to register as Aborigines, saying they had voluntarily given up their status in the 1950s and 1960s when they failed to register with the government at the time.

“You [the government] have explained well the official procedure for declaring Aboriginal status 40 or 50 years ago. However, you have failed to answer the key question: Are they Aborigines?” said Wang Ming-hui (汪明輝), chairman of the Taiwan Aboriginal Society and a co-founder of Aboriginal Policy Watch. “It's ridiculous to deny someone his or her ethnic identity because of some administrative process,” Wang said.

which comes close to making the usual Han mistake of thinking their is an Aboriginal group called the "Pingpu", rather than the dozens that actually existed, or exist.

Which reminds me of a conversation with an official (quite high up as i remember) of the Tourism Bureau who, when i asked which Aboriginal language the words "Naruwan"--that was starting to appear in TB propaganda--derived from, said "Taiwan's aboriginal [i swear he used the lower case] language, duh"