government – Tom Vater

Thailand has cannabis fever, in Eco-Business

May 20, 2022May 20, 2022tom

… but how green will the kingdom’s ganja trade be? In July, Thailand is set to remove cannabis and hemp from the country’s narcotics list. Eco-Business explores the likely environmental and social impacts of the cannabis trade in the first Southeast Asian country to legalise weed. Thailand’s high-end hotels serve cannabis cocktails, spas work with cannabis […]

Will cleaning up Thailand’s most famous party street improve it, or kill its soul? – in The Daily Telegraph

July 29, 2019July 29, 2019tomLeave a Comment

Leonardo Di Caprio has been here. As have countless young backpackers from the West. Over the past forty years, Khao San Road, once a quiet residential street on the fringes of Bangkok’s historic centre, has morphed into the world’s best-known backpacker hub. Loud, inexpensive, garish and in your face, the 400 meter long strip has […]

The Death of Bangkok’s Amazing Streetfood in The Daily Telegraph

April 18, 2017tomLeave a Comment

My thoughts on the imminent demise of Bangkok’s incredibly varied, often delicious and pretty cheap streetfood in today’s Daily Telegraph. “Since the May 2014 military coup, Bangkok has been gradually changing from a chaotic, bustling happy-go-lucky south-east Asian capital with a hedonistic bent into an increasingly drab and orderly bargain basement version of Singapore,” said […]

Pictures of Sittwe – Home of the Rohingya

September 13, 2012September 13, 2012tomLeave a Comment

I was in Sittwe, Rakhine State in Burma recently, the site of serious communal riots between Rakhine people and Muslim Rohingya who have been living in the state for generations and are currently the victims of a hate campaign instigated by politicians, ordinary people, Buddhist monks and government officials. I spent three weeks in Burma […]