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Pattani — the ‘deep’ south of Thailand

First, some advisories: A. ADVISORY: For the last few years and decades there has been an ongoing insurgency in the provinces of Pattani, Yala and Narathiwat (the 'deep south' of Thailand). An average of 600 people have been killed per year between 2004-9. The Australian government strongly urges its citizens not to visit these provinces: "do not travel". Having said this there is no blood on the streets, and life goes on normally for the vast majority of people. In comparison approximately 400 people die every year from traffic accidents in the same region. You have been advised. B. Getting there. There seems to be a scam carried out by the local tour operators to persuade travellers to take mini-buses on journeys between the towns in southern Thailand. These mini-buses cost several times as much as a normal bus. For example, I was quoted 1000 baht (~$35) between Trang and Pattani ~250kms, as compared to 200 baht for a VIP bus. A clear difference. Take the l...
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Robert Heinlein's Starship Troopers—A Critical Critique

The late science fiction author Robert Heinlein was noted for many things, and one of these is controversy. During his life he never shied away from contentious issues, rather he seems to have actively sought them out, both on and off the page. His writing was always provocative, and the most provocative example of this was his 1959 novel "Starship Troopers". The novel was written in a few weeks, prompted by left-wing lobbying for a ban on USA nuclear weapon testing. Heinlein, a strident conservative, vehemently disagreed with this proposal. While the meaning and import of the novel has been debated (it won the 1960 Hugo and is still in print), the story conveys the author's conservative anguish on the perceived flaws of contemporary political and social life. The novel depicts and praises a future government with a sharply limited voting franchise, lauds an authoritarian military, and strongly criticises popular democracy. Essentially, the novel endorses conservative,...
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A day in Yala.

The province of Yala is one more of the three ‘deep’ south provinces of Thailand, also suffering from terrorism as is Pattani. I decided to visit the capital city of this province, also named Yala (every Thai province shares its name with its capital city—it is one of the few exceptions to the rule that every rule of Thai administration has an exception), to see what I could see.  On the buses. A mix of culture ? Heading to the city. One of many checkpoints. These are difficult to photograph from the bus. A poor area, many folk live in simple wooden shacks. Rather than move myself and my gear to the landlocked Yala province, I decided to keep my base in Pattani, at the comfortable CS Pattani Hotel, and take a local bus to Yala city for the day. This consumes an hour plus in time, 25 baht in coin, and 40kms of space travelled southwards from Pattani town.  Always soldiers. In my previous blog post about Pattani I made the point that there was little...
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