XINHUA: First African carbon forum ends in Senegal

As part of my resolution to study Chinese harder, i'm going to start translating an article a day from the Xinhua news agency. It's mostly just to make myself do it, but i'll try to choose somewhat interesting ones that haven't been published on the English version of the website. My style of translation will be deliberately direct and literal - more so than real translators due to both my limited ability (i.e. dictionary use), and my belief that the original language's attitude, idioms, turns of phrase etc. should rightly be retained.

So here goes.

FIRST AFRICAN CARBON FORUM ENDS IN SENEGAL

Dakar, Xinhua, 9-5 (Journalist Hu Huo, Chen Shun): The curtain has fallen on the first African carbon forum in Dakar, the capital of Senegal in Africa's western corner. This carbon forum effectively promoted investment in an African carbon trading market, advancing the clean development mechanism project in Africa one step.

Senegal's environment minister's representative, said at the closing ceremony: "Buyers, sellers and investors are here in one room, cherishing a common objective, that is to advance carbon trading."

While the forum was taking place, the World Bank released a report that indicated there were up to 3,200 low-carbon energy projects in Africa which conform to the clean development mechanism, and that if these projects were all realised Africa's greenhouse gas emissions would be cut by 740,000,000 tons a year - more than Africa's current total carbon dioxide emissions of 680,000,000 tons.

One related achievement of the forum was the reaching of agreements on several aspects of carbon trading, for example, the Senegal Electricity Board and World Bank have undersigned Senegal's first protocol on the clean development mechanism project. Another achievement was consolidating the support of private enterprise and public institutions' for an African biofuels and renewable energy fund, and some African governments have already approved the setting up of a specialised fund, agreeing to provide US$20,000,000 in investment.

The first African carbon forum was held from the 3rd to the 5th of September, and was attended by more than 600 representatives from more than 60 countries and related international institutions.

Why should every blog post have a title?

SEPTEMBER 6: The visa shit went badly enough to bother writing down the story.

First thing Mondaay we went to Immigration. This city's so unplanned that there are at least 3 "city centres" that i've counted so far. We took a truck-taxi to the BTS (skytrain on stilts about six storeys above the city) station. We took the skytrain for 4 stops or something, then we had to change to the Metro (underground).

In an exasperating example of "letting the market decide" quackery, the Bangkok Metro and the Bangkok Skytrain are run by different companies and thus require new tickets to be purchased (though they are deceitfully marked on maps just like two lines of a subway system). So with two or more people, if you have to change trains it ends up cheaper to go by taxi. Bangkok, you deserve the world's worst traffic.

When after we got off the Metro we then had to take another bus to get to the Immigration department. After filling in all the forms etc., we approached the submit-application desk...which bore a sign saying extensions were granted for a maximum of 7 days for the sum of 1900 Baht.

I tried to weazel out of some of the overstay-fine money by stressing that we only realised on Friday afternoon, and that we had gone to Klong Tan police station at 9am on Saturday morning.
"No accept," said the woman at the desk, who then kindly informed us that we were to be fined 6,000 Baht, and that if we had wanted to save money they were open on Saturday morning and that we should have come in then.

I replied shrilly that the Immigration Department website stated very clearly that opening hours were 8.30am-4.30pm Monday-Friday.

"No accept," she said again. But the "we are poor, our money is only China money" plea evidently drew pity, and she made a valuable (and almost certainly illegal)suggestion: that we walk out, illegally overstay another day and get on next morning's bus to Cambodia, step over the border and come straight back, where the guards would welcome us with a 30-day visa - for free!

So the following day we got on the first Klong boat of the morning, which slices through a glassy Klong covered with rubbish. I wish this photo was better...


Departing for Cambodia from Khaosan, we then gained the valuable experience of travelling on a "VIP" foreigners' tour bus, where everyone else was on a package tour to the Angkor Wat. Two Aussie girls were behind us, talking, or rather shouting in bogan tones about how they didn't really sound very Australian and that country people "sound jus, like, i dunno, bogans". The subject moved on to their matching drunken tattoos of the Southern Cross ("it's, like, a set of stars that you can only see from Australia") to their drinking miscreances on this trip, then onto British girls who, we hear, are "feral! just so feral, like, they're just like, always talking about how drunk they were and it's like, muuuuuuuuh, omigod feral." Oh and one of them has Italian family but somehow she doesn't have to shave her legs. Like, how weird is that, djno? She's, like, a blond Italian who doesn't even shave her legs.

A Korean guy across the aisle (who also doesn't have to shave his legs) was getting angry at the foiling of his sleeping plans, so i taught him to say "shut your trap sheila" but the ungrateful bastard refused to say it to them.

[Edit: yeah we got the visas.]

Stupidity reported in real-time!

The events of two days ago are enough to make a man take leave of his fifth floor balcony. But something good is going to come of it: i am going to write an actual blog entry

As the four posts beneath (all posted today) may remind the insano-faithful out there who might actually wade through them, this is not really a blog but more an opt-in/opt-out group email list. As such the following is a rare occurrence.

It started last Monday, when i noted aloud that our Thai visas would be expiring in 2 days. This declaration i made without checking, and i was wrong. It would actually expire the following day, Tuesday.

And on Friday afternoon, 4.37pm, i remembered.

First thing, after a cathartic and near-diastrous 5 minutes of throwing stuff, screeching and denouncing our rank stupidity, i called Thai Immigration. 4.30pm happens to be the time that all Thai government agencies down tools. No answer, of course, at any of the dozen or so offices across the country that i called.

Next was the internet, to wilfully subject myself to the horror stories of those who had gone before. Sure enough...Thai jail awaits if any officer of the law happens to demand either of our passports this weekend.

Also, some of you may be aware of the box and guce's financial predicament. I needn't go into it, suffice to say with only spluttering payments of Chinese Yuan coming through, we're not the kind of people to take 500 baht a day in fines well. 3,000 baht is about 75% of the monthly rent of this apartment.

And Friday 4.30pm is in fact Monday as far as fines calculations are concerned, so the fine is actually going to be 5,000 baht, or 120% of the monthly rent...

What to do about it? I called the tourist police, whose words were, "We don't want to know about your visa."

(Until we have you in a squeezable position.)

So yesterday morning we headed for the local pigpen. The dictionary did its best as an interpreter, but the best it could do was: "visa no time - write note?"

The officers on duty had clearly never come across this situation before. Their answer, of course, was long-winded and completely indecipherable, and meant "no".

Remembering, from 2006, my so-called lawyer's "this is a very scared young man" plea, i looked up 'arrest'.

"Police arrest! Police arrest! Because need note we come here."

More indecipherable, negative responses but i caught the English word 'immigration'.

"Monday immigration," the english thai dictionary replied, "today tomorrow police arrest!"

More cops appeared, cruised past, then left. We were getting nowhere, and body language seemed to be indicating we were not free to leave, when suddenly we were waved over to another table, where our passports were handed to another cop who proceeded to begin copying our names out, taking special interest in the preponderance of fancy Chinese visas - i assume it was because Thai visas (in our experience) are nothing more than a small stamp, but of course at such times your imagination wanders.

He asked if we were tourists, and i rattled off all the places i've heard of. One of those places was Chiang Mai. The captain sidled up and announced that was where he was from. Shit...what do i say?? Ahhhhh, the gabbled English reply - praises be to those who built the Tower of Babel!

He asked if we liked Chiang Mai. I replied (in Thai again) "I...uhh...love Thailand", and hastily added that we still hadn't been to "Koh Samui or Phuket...very good, very good." Some of these lies, i imagine, must have contributed to the 2/3 of a page letter in Thai that the officer gave us a carbon copy of and bade us farewell.

Home and dry, i thought. But as we were leaving the captain said something to us, something about something on Monday, and the last word was "angry". I looked in the dictionary, but it was already too late. In hindsight, with that paper in my hand, I should have nodded as though i understood perfectly, smiled and walked out the door....

Instead, as we were about to do just that, the captain pointed at the carbon copy i was carrying. He took it and retreated with another officer into a back room somewhere. We waited.

About 5 minutes later he came back, and through facial expression asked why we were waiting. I almost launched into the whole spiel again, when he cut me off with a "handcuffed" charade. More charades and his message started to shape as something along the lines of, "We should have put you in jail when you showed up, so if my superiors see that letter they'll throw me in jail."

From what i can gather, Thai immigration law requires overstayers to "submit to the law", and showing up at the airport counts, so i doubt what he said was true. Pretty sure people like us would only get thrown in jail in places like Australia.

FUCK!

A picture for each word of "Bangkok"...

The full name of Bangkok, known in Thai as "Krung Thep", is: Krung Thep Maha Nakhon Amon Rattanakosin Mahinthara Ayutthaya Mahadilok Phop Noppharat Ratchathani Burirom Udom Ratchaniwet Mahasathan Amon Phiman Awatan Sathit Sakkathattiya Witsanu Kamprasit.

That's กรุงเทพมหานคร อมรรัตนโกสินทร์ มหินทราอยุธยามหาดิลก ภพนพรัตน์ ราชธานีบุรีรมย์ อุดมราชนิเวศน์ มหาสถาน อมรพิมาน อวตารสถิต สักกะทัตติยะ วิษณุกรรมประสิทธิ์ if you prefer, just by the way. You can apparently listen to it if you're curious. Apparently because i don't know what an "ogg" file is.

Pictures of it. Hold the mouse over if u care to know why terrible_photo X or Y is included here...

From the guest house window (heartily suggest clicking to open it up properly - panoramatown, way better big):



THE WATERY CENTRAL BIT

BUDDHA












THE FOREIGN CONCESSION: KHAOSAN
















CHINATOWN:












THE OUTSKIRTS...










NOIT










That's a lot of pictures. Your reward for making it this far is the English translation of the city's name: "The city of angels, the great city, the eternal jewel city, the impregnable city of God Indra, the grand capital of the world endowed with nine precious gems, the happy city, abounding in an enormous Royal Palace that resembles the heavenly abode where reigns the reincarnated god, a city given by Indra and built by Vishnukam."

Bangkok's intercourt apartments, and the pride of England

AUGUST 25, 2008: We've moved into a short-stay apartment out in the suburbs in a complex named "Intercourt" apartments. Ha ha. Apparently they don't rent them by the hour though, only by the month, rendering it a disappointing misnomer. Photos

I was surprised by what we got for the price, about $120 a month. It's on the fifth floor of a tower surrounded by high-walled mansion compounds. On our street each high wall links up with the next, giving it the appearance of a back-alley, thought it's actually quite the opposite: the cars and motorbikes absolutely hoon. It's about 10 minutes walk to the nearest food outlets, about 5 minutes of which involves walking on the side of this road. I wonder how many Thai drivers actually speed up when they see a foreigner trapped between the two high walls, flirting with the idea of rampage.

Really, i can barely stand being here in a country where i know so little of the language, and where foreigners are disliked by a large number of people with good reason.

For one thing, besides being the destination of choice for sex and child-sex tourists, the quality of expats I've met here is artificially low. Such characters include the one-eared northern teacher, pictured above, with a penchant for frothy-mouthed, vein-popping, table slamming apoplexy about Hitler and the Japs between the hours of 3 and 4am in response to a group of buttersoft Australians suggesting Australia was not invadable - i'm gonna upload it soon, trust me, check back for when the link works, you won't regret it. In the meanitime, this is 'im:


An this iz 'ow 'e sez "FOOK":


Or how about the toothless wonder (do all scum-dozen poms have some body part missing?) recently released from Indonesian prison and looking for . . . yep, teaching work. Thailand is basically the woven reed vessel of choice for the rich world's basket cases, and i think the locals know it.

The multiple daily food runs down the tunnel leads to some rather interesting awkwardni (that's pronounced "awkward-nai") concerning eye contact and acknowledging people in the street. Now, of course on a crowded city sidewalk it's easy to simply stare ahead or look around. And when you're passing 1 person every 5 minutes you'll probably acknowledge them. But along this tunnel-like road with high walls on both sides you pass roughly 1 person or group per minute and the passing manoeuvre's temperature depends a lot on age. In general you get a scowls and shiftily averted gazes from 'the youth', while a broad beam will often break out on an old person's face in response to a simple nod. Actually, our 55 year-old driver, Mr Patrick, the other day told us solemnly how he knew about Obama and that he thought that hi running for president was "ok, but i prefer the white man."

Of course the sidewalks China are the opposite - there's rarely any awkwardness for me. I know everyone's staring at me so i can openly stare at almost anyone or anything i want. My theory is a lot of China expats get addicted to that. Even if the quality of Thailand's foreigners isn't significantly worse than China's, which i think it is, it's not exactly surprising that they don't get the China treatment: the people in China have been instructed that foreigners help the economy and are therefore good for China. This appears to be taken at face value, and sometimes even reduced to "foreigners good".

A sample of the local scenery:

Klongboats ahoy

The best thing about Bangkok for me so far is the insane klong (canal) boats, and not just because of the way they race across town unimpeded by the hopeless traffic, glimpsing it just often enough for the passengers to be reminded why they're putting up with the stench of raw sewage. And occasional sprays of it . . .

Most of the time the pilots of these public transport long boats will go flat out full speed (definitely pilots), creating massive chop that bounces from wall to wall in the klong, which is not at all wide. When they pass another boat going the opposite way (there's only one type of boat) they don't slow down, but rather accelerate headlong into the other's waves so as to stay on course and avoid being washed into this bridge pylon, or that house on stilts. The engine roars deafeningly, and being long boats they pitch only slightly but roll side-to-side alarmingly.

The skilfulness of the pilots is most amazing - the chop i'm referring to is bigger than the ocean on a stormy night, they never slow down for bridges, obstructions or corners, letting the tail slide round the corners, and their skill at docking is so extreme that when you reach your station the boat stops for literally less than 6 seconds (see the video if you doubt).

As alluded to above, the klongs are unbelievably filthy. Keith, with whom we rode these one afternoon wondered aloud how long the survivors of a sinking would have in the water before the canal's filth killed them. Turns out a famous Thai actor once tested this: he crashed his car into a klong and was rescued, only to die shortly after from a brain infection.


On Klong San Saap the waves from the boats have eroded the concrete walls, meaning opportunity for the poor people who quickly construct stilted houses on the swamp that forms outside the breached wall. Plumbing is, well, let's call it 'easy'. As a result of this each of the boats is equipped with tarpaulins, raised or lowered by ropes. So it becomes the responsibility of people sitting in certain critical seats to hold the rope. If they fail to do their duty, their fellow-passengers are liable to cop misty showers of poo water.

Apparently Bangkok used to be known as the "Venice of the East" because of its vast network of canals, but most have been made into roads for vehicles to make traffic jams on. There are several canals in the central Bangkok area, but crazily, while there used to be a network of boat routes, now only Klong San Saap has boats.