Article Category - Community in Phuket

IF you were to judge western fashion by what you see while holidaying in Asia, you would have to believe that hair beads, flip flops with socks, and Red Bull tank tops are all the rage on the runways of Milan, Paris and New York. You’d think that showing dirty bra straps, that the navel was the acceptable point at which to stop buttoning shirts, and that shapeless fisherman’s pants were the height of chic.

The hardest part about perfecting a good golf swing is the grip. Have a good look at Ernie’s or Tiger’s grip and you will see what you have to do if you’re remotely serious about playing this game well. For a golfer, looking at a great grip is a bit like looking at a fine piece of art. It is so wonderful to see hands that look like they were made to hold a golf club.

SPIKE Wilson took up parachuting just after his eighteenth birthday. He jumped twice and was looking forward to the adrenalin rush as the light aircraft took him, two instructors, and a cameraman, skyward for his third jump. After climbing to 10,000 feet the signal was given to jump.

THE bright orange building stands out from its neighbours in the line of shops in Kathu. But it’s not the colour which makes Holland House special, it’s the dozens of children who welcome you with their shouts of ‘farang, farang’. Holland House is a small orphanage set up by Child watch Phuket to care for 20 orphans and kids who, for many reasons, can’t be cared for at home.

Guinea pig request upsets the Kremlin A 13-year-old girl who asked Russian president Dmitry Medvedev for a new pet guinea pig, has been forced to write a letter of apology for daring to waste the leader’s time on such petty matters.

ARTISTS Soup and his wife, Yupa, are red hot. “We are like chilis,” said Soup. “We are very small, but we have a lot of fire. “And we always leave a lasting impression.”

YOU’VE seen them on the street stalls, wondered how anybody could possibly eat them, and, depending on how many drinks you’ve had, you have probably even considered biting into one. In Thailand, the locals eat all sorts of bugs, including locusts, silkworms, beetles, termites, ants and even scorpions and spiders.

IF you really want to impress your dinner guests, learn to cook Thai food. I went along to Pat’s Thai Cookery class in Chalong to learn how to cook Thai food at home. Pat’s Thai house is off the main road, so it’s quiet, and she has a small garden area where you can time out from your cooking lesson to catch your breath and relax.

THERE are two things about Thailand that are totally incomprehensible to westerners: Buddhism and road rules. The two are inextricably linked, and by understanding one, you gain insight into the other. Western religions are burdened with the concept of opposites such as good and evil, heaven and hell, and light and dark.

AS far as buskers go, Tiger is one of the best. Whenever the 50-year-old illusionist performs in Soi Bangla, a crowd quickly gathers to watch him perform his repertoire of seemingly impossible tricks. His trademark leather cowboy suit, complete with hat and six-guns, and his calls of ‘welcome to Thailand’ and ‘yeeha’ have attracted hundreds of thousands of tourists to his impromptu peformances.

THERE’S something magic about David Paul Jones. He can make his wife disappear whenever he wants to, he can pull live doves out of nowhere, and he can make them disappear again. But then again, David is a stage magician and such amazing feats are all part of his act. David is passionate about his magic, and spends long hours practicing to perfect even the simplest tricks.

THEY appear at dusk every night, eerily illuminated along the curbs, only inches from the speeding pick-up trucks and motorbikes. Gleaming bottles of ruby and amber are neatly lined up on little wooden tables so that harassed hubbies can grab a bottle on their way home. The reds look like a new world Pinot Noir, and the ambers are possibly a fruity Chardonnay, or an austere Retsina.

IRISH Consul, Helene Fallon-Wood, grew up as the only black kid in a small fishing village in Greystones in County Wicklow, on the coast of Ireland. Her father was Nigerian and her mother was Irish although she never knew either of them, and Helene was adopted into a very close family along with six other children. “It was an interesting being the only black kid in town,” she said.

IT’S hot, it’s sexy, it’s salsa, and it’s here. The Latin American dance craze has swept into Phuket in a flurry of swirling skirts and swivel-hipped Lotharios. There is something about salsa music which awakens the dormant dancer inside us all. The evocative beat of the congo drums and the sensual rhythms of Spanish guitar, caught in the passionate embrace of the rich dance culture of Latin America, is just too seductive a combination to resist.

ROBERT J Falls’ journey from Huntington Beach in California to Phuket started with a stint as a waiter while he studied for a degree in business administration. He dabbled in the theatre and starred in a number of amateur theatrical productions, and set his sights on career as a movie actor. When he was 25, he moved to Los Angeles and joined the local army of out-of -work thespians.

A BRITISH couple have set up a foundation to ‘rescue’ Patong’s bargirls by teaching them new skills. In only two years, they have already ‘saved’ more than 30 women from a life of prostitution. “Many of these women are caught in the poverty trap and they have no alternative but to continue working the bars,” said Mark Biddell.

JOHN Gray is a man on a mission. He wants to clean up Phuket’s waterways. For the past 20 years, the self-styled eco-warrior and his team of tour guides have been taking tourists out on their SeaCanoes to paddle through Phang Nga Bay, while he tells them about the geological history and about the wildlife on the bay’s 42 islands. And every time he goes out in his kayak, Mr Gray collects any rubbish and litter he sees along the way.

HUSBAND and wife painters Jay-da and Watcharin Rodnit have taken their art into Phuket’s youth prison where they are helping to make life a little easier for the young prisoners. They run regular art classes for the kids and are helping them to turn their lives around. When they are not ‘behind bars’, Jay-da and Watcharin run an art studio in Yaowarat Road in Phuket Town. Wacharin says he was born to be an artist and holds a masters degree in Fine Arts from Silpakorn University. As a boy, he spent many weeks meditating in the forests around Surat Thani where he grew up.