Talk:Thailand

For future reference the Wikitravel:CIA World Factbook 2002 import can be found at Talk:Thailand/CIA World Factbook 2002 import.

Regions

So, who's ready to tackle splitting up Thailand into regions? --Evan 12:23, 4 Feb 2004 (EST)

Maybe I can get somebody local to do it?--ted 18:35, 5 Feb 2004 (JST)

I went ahead and did it. Basically I followed the layout of the weather maps in the local newspapers. There seems to be some question about whether or not they are really needed. I won't be bothered either way. Regions? Yes, or no?

I think that we currently have too many regions. The Toursim Authority Thailand splits Thailand into only 5 regions. North, North-East, Central, East, South. I think that this is more reasonable. Splitting up the south into more regions may be reasonable for a weather forecast, since the weather tends to differ quite much, but is not needed for a tourist guide IMHO. -- Fido 19:25, 15 Sep 2004 (GMT+6)

Agreed and implemented (this had been on my to-do list anyway). Jpatokal 09:44, 15 Sep 2004 (EDT)

Should we change the name of South coast and Islands to South and Islands? I think that's reasonable because the region does not only consist of a coast and islands. Fido 10:47, 16 Sep 2004 (GMT+6)

Done. Jpatokal 04:06, 16 Sep 2004 (EDT)

Thanks for fixing my links Maj. I guess I still need to work on my mark up a bit. -- Ted 00:36, 25 Feb 2004 (EST)

Energy drinks

Red Bull actually is an original Thai drink (Krating Daeng is actually "red water buffalo" and the logo is exactly the same). In 1987 an Austrian businessman named Dietrich Mateschitz made a deal to introduce the product worldwide, and tweaked the formula (taste and carbonation). The original Thai company owns 52% of the new Red Bull which is based in Austria.

Correct on all counts, except that krating is an 'ordinary' bull, not a water buffalo (which would be kwai). And thanks to the deal, the guy who owns the Thai company in question is listed in the Forbes billionaires list... Jpatokal 20:51, 10 Jul 2005 (EDT)

In the section on Energy drinks. It says that red-bull is thailand, an Austrian I met in Singapore told me that it is Austrian and the red-bull website seems to confirm this ([1]). Does anyone have any evidence to counter this? Suggesting that red-bull isn't from thailand to a thai, seems to offend them. --211.30.93.57 00:56, 20 Apr 2005 (EDT)

As the Red Bull site states, the Austrian guy came across the original Krating Daeng in Thailand and remarketed it as Red Bull. The company is joint-owned by Austrian and Thai concerns.

The article also says Thailand is the original home of energy drinks, but I would bet Japan had them much earlier. -- Paul Richter 01:09, 20 Apr 2005 (EDT)

A few years ago I was on the receiving end of a phone survey about energy drinks. Apparently any drink with sugar and caffeine in it (e.g. Coca-cola or coffee if you take it with sugar) counted as an "energy drink". So I guess it depends on your definition of energy drink. WikiPedia:Energy drink --Ewlyahoocom 23:04, 1 May 2005 (EDT)

Introduction of energy drink to Thailand,was done by Osotsapha Co.,who manufactured Lipovitan-D under license from Japan. Then the market grew, with local Thai Brands coming into the scene, Osotsapha's brand was MAGNUM, TC Pharmaceutical was Red Bull. As for the Austrian guy, biz rumors has it that, actually, the guy went ahead and copied and marketted it in Austria, with the logo and brandname intact, as Red Bull, without licensing it from the brand owner in Thailand. Following the unexpected worldwide success of Red Bull, the Thai owner started suing the company in Austria on brand infringement. The Austrian company must have checked with lawyers and find that they could lose it all, so they negotiated with the Thai owner and gave part of the Austrian company shares to Thai owner, and after that, they also divided market segments. Thai owners would be selling in S.E.Asia and Central Asia, while Red Bull Austria would market to the rest of the world. -- 4 May 2006

I've lived in Thailand throughout the 1980's and know that Kratingdaeng was widely sold long before Westerners became familiar with it. Lipovitan D was the first of those kind of drinks. Then came Kratingdaeng, and then there were big advertising wars between Kratingdaeng and Magnum, with each brand trashing one another in "redneck" television commercials. Magnum took a blow when one of their chief endorsers, champion boxer KhaoKor, fainted in the ring during a fight with a Korean. Although these "stamina" drinks originated in Japan (and possibly the Japanese got the idea from somewhere else), Kratingdaeng, literally "bull that is red" and the famous charging bulls logo is absolutely Thai in origin. I have drank it in the early 1980's, definitely before the formation of any Austrian Redbull company. All these kinds of drinks were typically working class drinks. Truck drivers, taxi drivers, factory workers, etc. all imbibed them in prodigious quantities. The upper classes of Thailand would avoid these drinks, looking down on them as "redneck" beverages.

Koh vs Ko for islands

Wikitravel:Romanization currently states that "Koh" should be used over "Ko", but the esteemed Sir-Madam 202.47.247.130 has decided to change these back to "Ko". Please explain your reasoning; I think that "Koh" is both more common and more likely to be pronounced correctly. Jpatokal 11:42, 6 Dec 2005 (EST)

Bump. I'd really, really like to hammer this out once and for all and would even be willing to flip back once again from Koh to Ko if we can just come to a consensus. Jpatokal 03:54, 28 Dec 2005 (EST)

Instant consensus:-

• guidebooks that use "Ko"
  • DK-Eyewitness
  • Globetrotter
  • Insight-Discovery
  • Let's Go
  • Lonely Planet
  • Periplus Travelpack
  • Rough Guides

• guidebooks that use "Koh"
  •  ?

I think there's been a general shift from "Koh" to "Ko" with publications over the last few years.

• maps that use "Ko"
  • B&B
  • Collins
  • Lonely Planet
  • Nelles
  • Periplus
  • Roadway

• maps that use "Koh"
  • Groovy Map

Berlitz use "Ko" (not sure if that's for maps or books or both or what).

Thai people are more likely to write "Koh"; non-Thais are more likely to write "Ko".

"Ko" is more common in Thailand on signs, buses, boats, advertisements, in magazines, etc.

"Koh" gets more google hits (the actual ratio varies a lot between different islands - no idea why).

"Ko" is currently more common at wikitravel.org - despite the actual article names.

"Ko" and "Koh" are about equally common at thorntree.lonelyplanet.com

Neither "Ko" not nor "Koh" is likely to inspire a non-Thai to pronounce the word anything like Thais do; however "Ko" tends to produce something shorter sounding (but usually still not short enough).

If you rename the main articles, I'll take care of the links, redirects, etc.

BTW "Ko(h) Pha Ngan" is more common than "Ko(h) Phangan" or any other variation.

(Koh Kong should remain as it is, as "Koh" is pretty much universal for Cambodian islands)

OK, that's good enough for me. "Ko" it is once again then. Jpatokal 04:36, 31 Dec 2005 (EST)

Updates to links / redirects / etc now done.

The seven articles that need renaming are the seven islands listed in Thailand#Other_destinations - all Koh -> Ko, except Koh Phangan which should be changed to Ko Pha Ngan.

And finally, Ko is the RTGS spelling. −Woodstone 18:02, 15 Jan 2006 (EST)

I live in Thailand and have to say that the sound of Ko in Thai is the same sound as the UK 'got' without the t, but with a low tone, since it is a short syllable.

The closest representation would therefore be 'Ko'. 'Koh' softens the 'o', and lengthens the vowel which is much further away from the Thai. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 58.8.14.177 (talk • contribs) 20 Jan 2007

Yes, Wikitravel is now standardized on "Ko". Jpatokal 06:37, 20 January 2007 (EST)

Singapore Map?

The location map of Thailand is in fact the location of Singapore. There is a good map of Thailand on Wikipedia. I'm too busy (read: lazy) to create an account and upload it. Could someone please do that? 61.90.155.15 10:45, 18 May 2006 (EDT)

Well spotted, and now fixed. Jpatokal 10:50, 18 May 2006 (EDT)

Currency

Seems to be no real consistency in how prices are denoted throughout the Thailand articles. I have seen it as Baht 999, 999 baht, B999 and 999 THB. There are probably other examples as well. Anybody got an opinion - I don't mind so much which but we should be consistent. Hkpatv 04:09, 12 July 2006 (EDT)

As the currency has such a short friendly name, makes sense to use it as opposed to an abbreviation - so: 999 baht 125.24.4.216 05:45, 12 July 2006 (EDT)

Lower case not upper? Have seen examples of both 999 baht & 999 Baht here and elsewhere.Hkpatv 20:19, 13 July 2006 (EDT)

I prefer "baht". It's not a proper name requiring capitalisation like "Fred" or "Shropshire" or "Bay Area Transit Authority"; it's just a word, a unit of measure like "liter" or "ounce" or "cubit". - Todd VerBeek 20:28, 13 July 2006 (EDT)

Agree, lower case - "baht" ~ 58.8.10.74 23:20, 29 October 2006 (EST)

Prostitution?

Isn't there a Wikitravel policy against including "sex tourism" related topics on Wikitravel? If so, why is there a section of this article titled, "Prostitution"? EmbrunOntario 22:40, 25 July 2006 (EDT)

See Wikitravel:Sex tourism policy and its corresponding talk page. I haven't studied them, but you seem interested so I thought I'd point them out. -- Ilkirk 22:45, 25 July 2006 (EDT)

Per the policy, information that is not directly related to the prostitution aspect can remain -- for example, safety issues or mere gawking are acceptible topics. Check out the policy and see if you feel it is being applied appropriately. -- Colin 22:53, 25 July 2006 (EDT)

Foreign & Commonwealth Office Warning

Shouldn't this be noted somewhere? http://www.fco.gov.uk/servlet/Front?pagename=OpenMarket/Xcelerate/ShowPage&c=Page&cid=1007029390590&a=KCountryAdvice&aid=1013618386505

Already listed in Thailand#Civil conflict, no? Jpatokal 22:48, 15 August 2006 (EDT)

Coup Border Crossings

I'm in Maesot. The Friendship bridge to Myanmar has reopened, and I believe all other borders are as well. Can someone else confirm, so the warnings can be removed.

222.123.17.233 23:00, 3 October 2006 (EDT)

Any confirmation from Three Pagodas Pass? ~ 203.144.143.8 23:09, 3 October 2006 (EDT)

If the country has returned to normalcy can we remove the ugly warnings? — Ravikiran 09:57, 14 October 2006 (EDT)

How a bout just moving the wrning to the stay safe section and reminding travellers to stay away from demonstrations, especially while marshall law is in effect. Any Ideas? Felixboy 11:48, 31 October 2006 (EST)

Martial law was never declared, even during the coup. And staying away from demonstrations is always a good idea. ~I'm starting to think the warning could be downgraded to a line or two in "History"... Jpatokal 12:56, 31 October 2006 (EST)

Martial law was declared on September 19/20 and has not yet been lifted. The "political gatherings are limited to five people" restriction has been eased (now permitted indoors). ~ 203.144.143.9 18:37, 31 October 2006 (EST)

Oops; I stand corrected. Not very relevant to the average tourist though (unless their last name is Thaksin). Jpatokal 23:04, 31 October 2006 (EST)

Cities

Hat Yai is only a gateway, Mae Hong Son is much more important from a tourist's point of view I think. --Flip666 18:53, 10 November 2006 (EST)

Hat Yai is a major tourist destination for Malaysians, but backpackers. Mae Hong Song is not a major city (in size or tourism), but maybe it could be added under "Other destinations"? Jpatokal 03:37, 11 November 2006 (EST)

Emergency numbers

Does anyone know emergency numbers, e.g. police, ambulance, etc.? --Flip666 ^writeme! • 07:30, 3 May 2007 (EDT)

Emergency number in Thailand are 191 (Police), 199 (Fire Fighter).

Hey, great

The "hey, great beaches" bit has been there forever (I think Evan originally put it there?), and IMHO it serves to liven up what would otherwise be a really dull straight-from-the-tourism-authority intro. Jpatokal 22:13, 24 May 2007 (EDT)

Taxi meters

I've spent well over a year in Bangkok, the last time in May, and getting metered taxis is generally no problem at all. If one cabbie balks (and usually only the sleazebags outside hotels etc try to pull this), get the next one. Cabbies like to complain, but you don't have to believe them -- eg. one popular line is to complain that gasoline is really expensive now, when every cab in BKK is actually running on CNG! The airport fixed price cars are limos, not taxis. Jpatokal 12:09, 11 July 2007 (EDT)

Page locks up when printing

I don't have a problem with Phom Pehn, Bangkok, Angkor, Siem Reap, or Cambodia. This page locks up Firefox. I tried making the page shorter, but that didn't help. short page 00:00, 20 December 2007 (EST)

This is a problem with your browser, not with Wikitravel. --Peter ^Talk 00:01, 20 December 2007 (EST)

Farang

Re: removed racist reference to caucasians - it's extremely unrealistic to dismiss the term "farang" as offensive or unacceptable, and removing it from Wikitravel articles because it's racist is a mistake.

However the term "farang" (to quote Wikipedia:Farang: a foreigner of European ancestry) has been used elsewhere where "foreigner" or "traveller" or "tourist" should have been used; I'm going to amend those articles and link from the edit summaries to here. ~ 58.8.212.199 08:06, 9 January 2008 (EST)

Now done. In the process, I've switched some related mentions such a "farang food" to "Western food", simply because not everyone is familiar with the meaning of "farang". I think it's probably best to stick with "Western" for food-related information, simply to avoid unnecessary confusion. ~ 203.144.143.4 09:01, 9 January 2008 (EST)

Agreed on all counts. Gorilla Jones 18:43, 9 January 2008 (EST)

Amphoe

I would like to suggest we drop the use of amphoes in our articles. Amphoes are administrative divisions of provinces, most of which are already pretty small. Plus, many relative small provinces the size of your average American county often get divided into 15 or more amphoes, most of which have only one significant city at the most. All this naming of amphoes is fracturing our region articles and likely making them pretty confusing for the average traveler. I've traveled in Thailand quite a bit and I never knew or needed to know about them. Borndistinction has been graciously packing many province articles with great information directly licensed by the Thai tourism agency, but I think a lot of it now needs to be pushed down into city articles rather than this messy amphoe business. Texugo 02:53, 23 April 2008 (EDT)

Agreed. The Borndistinction content needs a lot of refactoring... Jpatokal 05:51, 23 April 2008 (EDT)

Clothing

Is there any stores in Thailand that sells Bathing Ape (bape) clothing there? I know there's no official store there but as a legit whore reseller do they have it there? thanks

Respect

Wai

As a foreign visitor, you are not expected to know how to wai, nor to reciprocate when wai'd to; while you're unlikely to cause offense if you do, you may well look slightly ridiculous.

Thailand is very relaxed and I want to add here that if the situation is casual, looking "slightly ridiculous" might be just right.

No, it would not be. Jpatokal 13:45, 1 November 2008 (EDT)

The King & I

Also, anything related to the stories and movies The King and I and Anna and the King is illegal to possess in Thailand. Almost all Thais, even ones in other countries, feel very strongly when it comes to any version of this story.

The second sentence above that Thais feel strongly is certainly true. My 84 year old Thai mother in law just about broke the arms of a chair in my living room when she saw Yul Bryner jumping around "like a monkey" in the King & I on TV. However, the reports that the videos are actually banned may be urban legend. I think it needs to be checked with the Thai embassy. I recall reading in the english language press in Thailand about the time when Jodi Foster version of Anna & the King came out that the daughter of the king had seen the film and was not displeased with it.

It's definitely still banned. See eg. [2]. Jpatokal 13:45, 1 November 2008 (EDT)

Medical tourism

I really feel like this section is way overblown. From what I can tell, Borndistinction copied this whole section verbatim from this article, which is fine I think, but I'd rather see this stuff in its own travel topic because it's too much detail for the main Thailand page, and I don't see districtifying it and creating a Medical tourism section on every district article just to hold the listings. Our page for Medical tourism actually has a link to an as-of-yet-uncreated Medical tourism in Thailand page. I'm thinking that's where it should go. Any opinions? Texugo 02:59, 30 October 2008 (EDT)

First of all, to clear the misunderstanding about the content, this article is copyright of TAT and this page has got content from [3] page.

The article Medical Tourism in Thailand had been created earlier but it was deleted due to the reason being not a travel topic which I think is not fair enough. Whereas, during the vote for deletion, it was discussed to be added to the Thailand page, so I've done that now. Any more suggestion? --Borndistinction 04:59, 30 October 2008 (EDT)

Yes -- you've added way too much info, 99% of which is blatant touting, and I've reverted the whole lot. There is no consensus that this level of medical info is appropriate anywhere on Wikitravel.

I've also removed all the spa stuff you added. Lists of spas should be added to the individual destination pages (Chiang Mai spas in Chiang Mai, etc), not the main article. Jpatokal 05:29, 30 October 2008 (EDT)

Cool...! Ok then, I'll adjust the content to look better (wikitravel style) :) --Borndistinction 06:38, 30 October 2008 (EDT)

Beer

I think the beer section seems quite out of date, so I propose re-writing it if people agree with my proposed changes.

I think Singha Light, Chang Draught and Chang Light all warrant a mention in the Thai beers section; and San Miguel, Asahi and Federbrau are now commonly available upmarket brands. In fact, it may be better to split the section up into "Local brews", "Upmarket Brands" and "Imported Beers", the latter including the increasingly common Belgian Beers (Duvel, Stella Artois and Hoegarden all easy to find now, especially anywhere tourists might find themselves), Beer Lao and Irish ales such as Guinness and Killkenny, also well established on the tourist trail.

Finally, the biggest anomaly that should definitely be corrected if nothing else is the mention of Kloster - a beer which has been discontinued in Thailand for many months now.

Thoughts? Dantilley 10:30, 28 January 2009 (EST)

Plunge forward! I don't think we need to go into too much detail though, especially re: Western/imported beers. Jpatokal 10:34, 28 January 2009 (EST)

OK, has been done. I added a small section about Alcopops also. Dantilley 00:04, 31 January 2009 (EST)

Thailand is the gay friendliest country in Asia.

According to Wikipedia. --Dark Paladin X 15:45, 6 February 2009 (EST)

There should also be some mentino of the lady boys as there are alot of them about, especially in Bangkok. They can be a bit unnerving at first, if you aren't aware.

TOC

Any thoughts on why the table of contents gets messed up starting with "do"? – cacahuate ^talk 20:10, 7 June 2009 (EDT)

Excellent article

I've spent over a year in Thailand and would like to say this is a really excellent article that really explains Thailand and Thai culture very well. One thing though, I think some of the prices are a bit outdated now... 800 baht for a day's site-seeing... 200 baht for a room... that's going to be hard to do anywhere that tourists are likely to be staying. Apart from that, spot on. :)

Please use your experience to update the article and make it even better! --inas 19:48, 12 July 2009 (EDT)

Breadcrumb Trail for Thai Articles

Breadcrumb trail seems a bit messed up. I will try to sort it. Also with the state of the regional articles, I don't think this article is anywhere near guide status and I will knock it back to usable. --Burmesedays 12:23, 4 October 2009 (EDT)

Problem with the breadcrumb seems to be changed names for the main regions and the re-directs in place.... a lot of fiddly work required from the top all the way down. --Burmesedays 12:38, 4 October 2009 (EDT)

Sorted down through regions and provinces. I think the cities take care of themselves. --Burmesedays 10:29, 6 October 2009 (EDT)

Thailand is thoroughly messed up, we had a huge dump from the Tourist Authority, which seems to be more or less discouraging users from editing, since it's so chaotic. --Stefan (sertmann) ^Talk 10:38, 6 October 2009 (EDT)

Ah. That would explain the general state of disarray. At least the breadcrumb trail is now fixed though so the overall structure of articles makes sense. --Burmesedays 20:33, 6 October 2009 (EDT)

Getting rid of provinces

Why do we use the provinces here? They are way too small to be proper regions. For exmaple, and this happens all over Thailand, there's an article Lampang (province) that has Lampang City as its only listed city. I think this is completely unnecessary and we should merge the region article into the city. The provinces subregions don't make for good travel-regions. What do others think? globe-trotter 14:04, 29 December 2009 (EST)

I'm trying to get a new scheme of regions up without provinces (as most of them aren't filled with enough information). What do you think of the following scheme (already grouped on the regional pages):

Central Plains:

• Bangkok Metropolitan Area
• Sub-Central Thailand
• Western Thailand

Eastern Thailand:

• Eastern Gulf Coast
• Trat Province
• Inner Eastern Thailand

Southern Thailand:

• Andaman Coast
• Southern Gulf Coast
• Deep Southern Thailand

Northern Thailand:

• Far Northern Thailand (exotic part, minorities, trekkings)
• Inner Northern Thailand (ancient center around Sukhothai)

Isaan:

• Northern Isaan (Mekong Valley-Phu Phan Range)
• Central Isaan (Chi River Basin)
• Southern Isaan (Mun River Basin)

Some of these regions could use subdivisions in them, most notably the Andaman Coast. I'm not really happy with the Northern Thailand subdivision, so maybe someone knows a better one. Also, maybe Isaan needs 4 regions as it's quite a vast area. But I don't know a sensible way to split up the Mekong Valley (though we could always call then Northwest Isaan and Northeast Isaan). As last, I don't really know a name of the inner part of Eastern Thailand (away from the coast), many people use it to travel to Cambodia, so please give your ideas on these things=) globe-trotter 23:28, 3 January 2010 (EST)

Great work to get the ball rolling with this discussion GT. I have long thought Thailand to be an absolute WT mess, right from the overly complex regional structure down to almost every important article being ruined by that horrible data dump from the tourist board. I do know Thailand quite well and will try to help with some insights later today.

Thailand is an absolute mess, and as the most visited country in Southeast Asia, I think it deserves a lot better coverage on Wikitravel. Just getting the hierarchy structure in order is going to take an amazing amount of time, but I hope we can do it. The tourist boards works with the provinces, that's why they also applies the provinces scheme here, but I think most provinces don't have enough content (many of the provinces just have their capital under the "cities" list). I really hope we could improve it. Maybe then regular travellers will also enjoy contributing, as I think many now are discouraged because of this mess. globe-trotter 17:20, 4 January 2010 (EST)

You might want to read the discussion at Talk:Eastern Cambodia GT. No provinces there :) A similar rationale to Thailand really. I will get around to giving Thailand some serious thought tomorrow. --Burmesedays 11:35, 5 January 2010 (EST)

Had a good look at this now and I think what GT is proposing is well thought out and smart. A few very minor comments:

• Can we get rid of all brackets in the region names? They lead to very confusing article names.
• Sub-central Thailand I would just call Central Thailand.
• Loose Koh Chang Peninsula and just call it Trat.
• For the north I would go for Far North Thailand and Inner North Thailand. Not very elegant but I cannot think of better.
• I think you are OK with 3 Isaan divisions.
• The inner east is really 3 mountain ranges and none have very easy names. Maybe stick with Inner East.--Burmesedays 11:42, 8 January 2010 (EST)

Some replies from my side:

• I also don't like the brackets, so they should be avoided. The problem with "Gulf Coast" is that it is confusing, as there is a part of it in the South and in the East. I propose we rename them Eastern Gulf Coast and Southern Gulf Coast. Big problem is the Deep South, as apparently there already is a Deep South in the United States. That's why I used the brackets there. I tried naming it Deep Southern Thailand, but I'm not sure if that sounds nice.
• I think Sub-Central Thailand is better, as the Central Plains are pretty much similar to Central Thailand. That is confusing I think. Maybe we could come up with something different...
• I agree with calling it Trat, but the city also has the name Trat, so we should call it Trat Province.
• Agree with the north, sounds good. Also agree with the notes about Isaan and Eastern Thailand.

I already made some changes to the regional division list above :) --globe-trotter 13:59, 10 January 2010 (EST)

Maybe Lower Northern Thailand and Upper Northern Thailand sounds better? I saw Wikipedia use "Lower Northern Thailand" once, that's how I got to that idea. --globe-trotter 20:17, 10 January 2010 (EST)

Cities and other destinations

I removed Surat Thani, because the cities had 10 listed instead of 9. I also trimmed the Other Destinations list to nine (and moved the others to their respective regions). globe-trotter 18:21, 3 January 2010 (EST)

I'm still doubting whether Surat Thani should be removed or Hat Yai? I mean, Hat Yai is the third largest city in Thailand and the largest city of Southern Thailand. But Surat Thani is often used as a stop-over for Ko Samui, so might be more important for travellers? --globe-trotter 11:18, 5 January 2010 (EST)

For the general traveller I would say Surat Thani is more important. Hat Yai is (inexplicably as it is horrible!) popular with Malaysian visitors. Hat Yai has very little to offer other than shopping. --Burmesedays 11:37, 5 January 2010 (EST)

OK, I agree, so I changed to Surat Thani. Just a bit weird now that the second, third and fourth largest cities of Thailand aren't listed now (Nonthaburi, Pak Kret and Hat Yai). But well, they are not really travel destinations, so it's fine. --globe-trotter 14:35, 9 January 2010 (EST)

Thailand Moving Task List

A list of tasks on which province articles should be moved with which city articles. What do we exactly have to do here? We get rid of the Province pages, so we have to move the content to the relevant city pages (later we will clean them up too). Do not simply move content to the city articles though, as that would mess up those pages too much. Do the following:

• Try to integrate the info in the Understand, Get In and Get Around sections of the Province into the same sections of the cities.
• The See, Do, Learn, Buy and Sleep sections have a different approach. These listings are not useful for travellers, they are just a dump from the Thai tourist agency (TAT). To not mess up the current articles, it's best to move them to the Talk page for future reference.

First start a new topic on the Talk Page of the relevant city, and call it "TAT Listings". Then add a sentence like "I placed a lot of TAT listings from the Province page at Talk:Pattaya/Listings for future reference.", and press Save. Click on the red Talk-link you just created, paste the linkdump in there and Save. Some provinces are a bit harder, as content has to be moved to several cities. See the table while clicking on this link: Talk:Thailand/Regions

Please modify the table (at that link) while working on it. --globe-trotter 19:39, 11 January 2010 (EST)

Great stuff GT. This will be invaluable when the collaboration really gets going next month. I would suggest starting a Talk:Thailand/regions sub page and moving this there. --Burmesedays 11:16, 18 January 2010 (EST)

OK, I moved the table to Talk:Thailand/Regions :) --globe-trotter 15:33, 2 February 2010 (EST)

More Thailand Region Discussion

I like the regional scheme I presented, but two regions seem to need further subdivisions as they have plenty of content: Far Northern Thailand and the Andaman Coast. Subdividing these units is quite a challenge though, as small specific areas are filled with content, while usually the areas around it are empty. This is also a problem in Southern Gulf Coast, as for example Ko Pha Ngan is already in practice functioning as a region. Not sure what to do with that.

Please give your comments about the sub-divisions underneath, and also some ideas what to do with the Southern Gulf Coast.

Anyway, here are the proposals from my side, please give your comments to improve it:

Far Northern Thailand:

This seems the easiest one of the three, most backpackers start around Chiang Mai, some of them take the Mae Hong Son loop, and most do a trekking around Chiang Rai. Thats why a division into these three areas seems most logical to me, though I don't yet know any good names for them:

• Chiang Mai Area - including the provinces Chiang Mai, Lampang, Phrae
• Chiang Rai Area - including the provinces Chiang Rai, Phayao, Nan
• Mae Hong Son Area - including the province Mae Hong Son and the part of Chiang Mai Province that has the road to it

Maybe anyone has a better idea?

Andaman Coast:

This is what I got now:

• Phuket - including Phuket Island and Phang Nga islands (its already like this)
• Krabi Province - same as now
• Northern Andaman Coast - including the provinces Phang Nga and Ranong and parts of Surat Thani Province (notably Khao Sok National Park), excludes Phang Nga islands

I moved Trang Province to Deep Southern Thailand for convienience, as otherwise it'd have to be it's own almost empty region. I also moved Phatthalung Province from Southern Gulf Coast to Deep Southern Thailand, otherwise it would look weird. --globe-trotter 20:22, 11 January 2010 (EST)

Southern Thailand Regions

The regional structure of most areas are quite straightforward, but Southern Thailand has so much content, it's definitely an exception. How shall we divide this region? The Gulf Coast and Andaman Coast are logical subdivisions, but then both would still have way too much content.

I suggest the subdivision as shown on the map. I quite like it, the only part I'm not so happy with is the "Northern Gulf Coast". Surat Thani Province could easily do with its own region article, as it also has all the islands. But then we'd be left with just Chumphon and there is not much to do around there. We could "fix" this by adding Prachuap Khiri Khan Province to it (which have Hua Hin and Cha-am), but I am not sure if we want to go into that direction. --globe-trotter 15:05, 16 January 2010 (EST)

Liking that and think you have thought it through well. I was unsure about Phuket being its own region until checking to find it has more than 20 sub-articles! Amazed by that and suspect some of them are very thin or over-lapping. All good and I think we should go with it as is.--Burmesedays 11:14, 18 January 2010 (EST)

Liking that, the only thing i'm not entirely happy about is the name for "Nothern Golf Coast", I think it's best when we can work out names that doesn't only work in regional context, and there is plenty of golf coast up north. Although I can see where you are coming from, as I have trouble thinking up a suitable name too.

I know it's not entirely accurate, but how about Bandon Bay instead? best I can come up with. --Stefan (sertmann) ^talk 11:23, 18 January 2010 (EST)

I have really never heard of Bandon Bay before, it's obviously correct, but I'm not sure if it is recognizable to travellers. I agree that it is a better name than "Northern Gulf Coast" though. I actually wanted to make a separate region called Surat Thani Province, and then include the whole Gulf Coast north (including Hua Hin and Cha-am) into "Northern Gulf Coast" (and then maybe we could call that region Kra Isthmus). But the problem is that we included that area in Central Thailand now. --globe-trotter 11:45, 18 January 2010 (EST)

I also suggest we change Deep Southern Thailand into Pattani Region [4]. --globe-trotter 12:20, 18 January 2010 (EST)

That could almost be taken as a political statement... I think "Deep South" is the most common term and certainly easily understood, while "Pattani region" could easily be confused with the province. Jpatokal 23:15, 18 January 2010 (EST)

I would be very wary of using Pattani as a regional name for the Deep South. Apart from being geographically controversial, there is a Pattani separatist movement. I suspect many would dispute the objectivity of that referenced Wikipedia article. On Bandon Bay, I have never come across that name before and am not sure it will mean anything? Sounds like it should be in Australia :) --Burmesedays 23:26, 18 January 2010 (EST)

OK, we can just leave it at Deep Southern Thailand. --globe-trotter 11:39, 19 January 2010 (EST)

it's all in the pronunciation, BANdon and it's aussie, banDON and it's Thai :), anyway, how about we just KISS and call it Central Gulf Coast? --Stefan (sertmann) ^talk 11:54, 19 January 2010 (EST)

Movie Recommendations

Hi - let's have a section on recommending the best 5 or so movies to watch to understand Thailand. They often do that kind of thing in Lonely Planet guides and I find it very useful. Also Books too.

Sure, I'd say plunge forward and add some movies you think are interesting! I suggest we could list Ong Bak, Tom-Yum-Goong and Suriyothai. Many Thai movies seem to be about sentimental romance, kickboxing, katoey and ghosts ^^ --globe-trotter 13:10, 28 January 2010 (EST)

Northern Thailand Regions

I like the region Lower Northern Thailand (though maybe it could actually be a part of the Central Plains), but Far Northern Thailand has way too much content. I suggest a regional scheme as shown on the image at the right side. What do you think? I still wonder whether we should keep "Far Northern Thailand". Maybe we can just make the provinces an immediate sub-region of Northern Thailand. But it is true that many travellers visit Far Northern Thailand as one region -- hopping from Chiang Mai to Chiang Rai or to the Mae Hong Song loop, never visiting Sukhothai. Also historically they are different, Far North being associated with Lanna, while Lower North is associated with Sukhothai and Ayutthaya. --globe-trotter 09:39, 4 February 2010 (EST)

I would be in favour of Northern Thailand as a top level region then the five sub-regions - i.e. exactly as drawn. Avoid installing another layer.--Burmesedays 03:52, 8 February 2010 (EST)

Yes agreed, I already did it this way. --globe-trotter 11:19, 8 February 2010 (EST)

Huge city template for islands?

Many islands in Thailand feature different districts: just look at Ko Samui, Ko Pha Ngan and Phuket. What do we do with these destinations? Ko Chang places all the listings in that article, while the other islands are heavily districtified. As the discussion started here [5], I suggest we use the huge city template for them. I noticed some edits where users thought places like Samui South Coast were actually regions instead of districts, so to avoid confusion I think the huge city template is an improvement. Or are there other suggestions we could do? --globe-trotter 11:10, 15 March 2010 (EDT)

Warning box

When did it appear and why are we discouraging travel in Thailand? A few protests? What's new? Even the ever over-reacting British FCO is only advising "extreme caution" --Burmesedays 05:52, 16 March 2010 (EDT)

Yes it's definitely unnecessary and overtly cautious. Avoiding protest areas could be advised, but avoiding travel to all of Thailand is ridiculous. --globe-trotter 06:55, 16 March 2010 (EDT)

Animal abuse

Taken from the Bangkok page under the "stay safe" banner(I have modified it to suit the entire country) this information might be good on the Thailand page as well?

Elephants are a large part of Thailand's tourist business, and the smuggling and mistreatment of elephants for tourist attractions is a widespread practice. Be aware that elephants are often separated from their mothers at a young age to be cruelly trained under captivity for the rest of their lives. If you must go on an elephant ride, purchase an elephant painting or use elephants for other activities please take their mistreatment into account.

A depressingly common sight on the congested streets of Bangkok and other tourist centers is elephant begging. During night hours, mahouts (trainers) with lumbering elephants approach tourists to feed the creatures bananas or take a photo with them for a fee. The elephants are brought to the city to beg in this way because they are out of work and are mistreated and visibly distressed under the conditions of the city. Please avoid supporting this cruelty by rejecting the mahouts as they offer you bananas to feed the elephants.

Due to its location, lax laws, and resources, many illegal animal products come through Bangkok. Rare and endangered species are often sold at markets for pets (especially at Chatuchak), and many other animal products are sold as luxury items. Avoid buying rare pets, leather, ivory, talons, dried sea creatures (such as starfish), fur, feathers, teeth, wool, and other products since they are most likely the result of illegal poaching, and buying them contributes greatly to animal endangerment and abuse.

Drugged animals such as lizard's and birds are somtimes used by touts as photo subjects. These touts are often seen on the main tourist beaches of thailand. The tout will take a photo with you and the doped up animal for a fee.

What do you think? Also what area would it come under? Sam 22b 04:00, 10 July 2011 (EDT)

I have added it in under the "respect" headline. Please feel free to make any changes to make the section more understandable. I beleive this subject should be listed on this page because it is a concern for alot of travelers and it is mentioned in all the guide books. Sam 22b 20:24, 5 August 2011 (EDT)