Back, and I brought a cold with me
I got back from Bangkok a couple of days ago, and brought with me a most unwanted souvenier: a case of the common cold. Fortunately, I got sick on my last day there, and I wasn't really sick until I got to Hong Kong. Also, my girlfriend took good care of me during the worst of it - bringing me food and plenty of hot water, checking up on me, booking a doctor's appointment.. what a wonderful girl. Unfortunately, she left Hong Kong today to spend Chinese New Year with her family, and she'll be gone for 2 weeks. Sigh..
As for Bangkok, I think it's a wonderful place that I'll definitely visit again. The food is cheap and tasty, the temples and palaces are stunning, and the people are friendly and attractive. I only wish I could read and speak some Thai so that I could eat a greater variety of food, find more bargains, get around town better, and of course, be able to meet and chat with more Thai people. You should definitely visit if you haven't done so already.
posted by krazykrankyken @ 11:46 p.m.
12 comments
12 Comments:
hey, this is my first post! Finally get a breather from work or whatever else occupying my time. Yea, Bangkok is a great place with cheap food and great finds if you know how to bargain. The temples are gorgeous! My immediate thought after my visit many years ago was that only if they put some of that $$ into improving the quality of life, education and health care, they can feasibly be as competitive as their southern neighbor Singapore. But again, religion has a lot to do with altering the course of a country toward one way or another, and foreigners should have no say in that country's path, which is best left to the hands of its constituents. Do you not agree?
Did you get a discout for the cold?
Take care.
Wenwei, shouldn't you be studying for your comps???
Hey Ed, I wrote a paper about Thailand's shortcomings at sustained and equitable economic development. I totally forgot what my conclusion was. Hey, are you suggesting that Thailand's brand of Buddhism has hindered economic development there?
Oh, I remember now! Unlike the "Four Tigers" and Malaysia, Thailand never followed through with a clear long-term development strategy, but instead empowered ethnic Chinese crony conglomerates and to foreign investors to lead economic growth and development. It was not in the interests of these parties to invest in physical infrastructure and human capital; their priorities were increasing export growth and shareholder values.
Wow, no matter what country you go to, there's always idiots in charge. No wonder they set off the Asian currency crash.
I don't think Singapore's leaders are idiots at all. Those guys are geniuses, man.
International hedge funds and other investors are to blame for the 1997 crisis. Their short-sighted thinking led to serious overcapacity in many sectors in Thailand, especially the real estate sector. But yeah, Thai economists should have seen the writing on the wall. Ha! Funny that the last WTO director general was a former Thai Minister of Commerce. Or was he the guy who cleaned up the mess?
I was talking about Thailand, not Singapore!
You implied that leaders everywhere are idiots. I pointed out that I disagree, and think that Singapore's leaders are pretty smart.
As nice as it would be, you CANNOT have all three of: 1)Free Capital Markets 2) Control over interest rates (monetary policy) 3)Fixed or stable exchange rate. You can, however, have 2 out of 3.
When speculators began turning on the baht because there were doubts whether Thailand could repay its foreign debt, the Thai central bank tried to keep the value of the baht up by both using up foreign reserves, and jacking up the interest rate.
With considerable market pressure pushing the baht down, the Thai central bank could no longer keep up the baht, so they gave up and let the baht "float". It was like stretching an elastic band and letting it go.
Then, what happened to other Asian countries was what we call the "tequila effect" (because of a similar phenomenon that occured in Mexico. Yes, when you think Mexico, you think tequila.). The speculators' negative outlook on the baht spread to the other Asian currencies like an epidemic, because those countries had similar characteristics to Thailand.
The only two Asian currencies that managed to crawl away unscathed was the Hong Kong dollar (at great depletion of foreign reserves), and the Chinese RMB (because it's not freely convertible. Oops, I accidentally took home some Mao money last time I went to China.).
Man, I'm glad I took that international finance course!
Well, you're entitled to your own opinion about the Singapore government. Mine is based on a not-so-philanthropic part of me.
Wow Vince, I wish I had an MBA too. Thanks for the interesting lesson. Really, I sometimes wish I could read this stuff and get tested on it rather than read SOME OF this stuff in newspapers and magazines, only to forget it over and over again.
I do agree with Mahathir that developing countries are often screwed by foreign institutional investors, but I never really considered that developed countries must work under the same constraints. Oops, have I learned nothing from Thomas L. Friedman? Golden Straitjacket. Damn! Must.. not.. popularize.. buzzwords..
Well that's the most good this MBA has done so far. I'd be more satisfied with my degree if it gets me a fucking job!
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