Full Moon Celebrations

During my recent trip to Thailand which was to relax and not discover new conspiracy theories I made it over to the island next to Koh Samui called Koh Phangan. This is a smaller island than Koh Samui. It has a very different feel to Koh Samui. It is less main stream and less commerically developed. It seems that nature has been given more of a chance to flourish in Koh Phangan than in Koh Samui. It is not the nature, however, that Koh Phangan is famous for. It’s the Full Moon Party on Haad Rin Sunrise Beach.

I had originally planned to spend one night in Haad Rin, but on looking for full moon accommodation I quickly realized two things. Firstly, the place gets fully booked during the time of the full moon; and, secondly, all the bungalows, resorts and hotels in Haad Rin have a minimum stay requirement of at least 5 nights when there’s a party going on. So instead I took the Haad Rin Queen over in the morning and then took it back to Koh Samui the following day.

Haad Rin is a pleasant town. There’s plenty of bars and restaurants to choose from. I liked the fact that I could walk around Haad Rin. Places like Lamai and Chaweng in Koh Samui were too big for my liking.

As the evening of the full moon approached the atmosphere of Haad Rin changed. People started appearing covered in fluorescent body paint. Haad Rin quickly developed a carnival atmosphere with everyoe out to have a good time. Lots of the bars in Haad Rin held warm-up parties. People were not holding back – they were necking the alcohol.

At 10pm I went down to the beach, the main party venue. It is a long beach lined with bars. Each place has its own powerful sound system playing 1 type of music. The Cactus and the Drop In were playing chart and RnB. Paradise Bungalows played electro and trance. Vinyl Club and Zoom Bar played psy-trance and Orchid played drum abnd Bass. I started out at Orchid since liked their music the best. I soon fell in with a group of people.

The beach was really busy. Lots of people were danicng at all of the venues. Between the bars were small shacks selling ’buckets’. This is a lethal combination of Thai whiskey, coke and Red Bull. I stuck to the beer.

Later on we went to Mellow Mountain. It’s at the northern end of the beach. It’s a great spot from which to see the party. They had some cool seating and played some mellow music.

My new found friends partied all night. I struggled to keep up with them. In the morning we said goodbye. I went to Haad Rin pier; they went to the Backyard Pub for an after party.

Great times. I really recommend going to the Full Moon Party in Koh Phangan at least once.

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Art and Technology Converge

Mostly if you think about technology, you’d probably start thinking about computers, laptops, perhaps smartphones or something like that.  You certainly wouldn’t think about great works of art, pictures, paintings or sculptures.  However throughout the ages new technology has played a crucial part in the development of art primarily by providing the art world with new tools and mediums for expression.

In fact nowadays, technology and art are undeniably linked, although there are still some people who sit steadfastly in one or the other camps.  For the majority of people the lines are blurred and some of the most respected works of art are technology based.  Artists like Eval Gever is a prime example – he creates 3d scupltures by using the very latest 3D printers.  The creative process is not in a traditional sense from a studio but at the keyboard of a computer.

It’s understandable really, art mirrors our lives and technology influences our life probably more heavily than any time in history.  The technologies like the internet, digital creation, nanotechnology and a host of other reality modifying devices have completely changed our existences.  Artists are using this technology to push back the boundaries of traditional art.  

Many artists are using technology in addition to traditional methods to augment their work.  Take for example the iPad and the various art applications available on that – see this post.   The tablet has become an accepted medium as much as the traditional methods.  Using these modern mediums also affects how the art can be delivered to the public – in many senses it has become much more accessible.  From my iPad for example I can view some of the latest works of digital artists all across the world.  Unfortunately sometimes I need to connect via my iPAd VPN in order to bypass licensing blocks and country restrictions but that’s fairly unusual. 

The point is the time when an artist would complete his or her work of art and then trundle down to the gallery to try and get it sold are disappearing fast.  For a start many works of art are better distributed by other methods.  Video and digital art is better displayed on the internet, a virtual gallery makes much more sense for certain pieces.  The beauty of course is that suddenly art become much more accessible, open to the sort of people who won’t go down to the gallery or visit the museum!

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Artistic Dieting with Raw Food

There are plenty of quirky ways to lose some of your excess weight through your diet and there are many commercial plans available that take advantage of the way some foods react with our digestive systems and physiology. One such idea that has been gaining a lot of popularity is including lots of raw food in your diet to increase metabolism and thus increase the rate of weight loss you can attain.

The idea is perfectly sound in that when you eat even a moderate amount of uncooked foods each day, your digestive system has to work that much harder to digest them which means the body uses more energy. The extra calories the body uses up as part of that process makes the effectiveness of the combination of a raw food diet (as can be sourced here: rawfooddiettruth.com for example) and weight loss hard to ignore. But it goes even further than that. There is the additional health side of things to consider as well.

It has been known for a long time that cooking food, especially vegetables robs them of a good deal of their nutritional goodness. Boiling is probably the worse thing you can do to most vegetables as they become soft, mushy and tasteless while most of the goodness is poured away in the boiling water. Nutrients break down with high temperatures, especially vitamins and that leads to a meal that contains only a fraction of the goodness that the same meal with the vegetables served raw would have.

It makes good sense that eating a more healthy meal is better for the body as it provides more of what it needs with less waste. Not only that, but you will feel fuller, sooner when you eat vegetables raw rather than cooked. Here is a major dieter’s bonus because if they fill up on raw vegetables first, they will not feel so tempted to add things like bread, pasta or rice to their meals. This means less bulk and a straight replacement of vegetable born low glycemic carbs for the unwanted high glycemic carbs found in refined white flour products and white rice, to lose weight at the right pace.

So if you haven’t tried it yet, eating raw veggies with a meal might be just the thing you need to boost your own health and fitness. The best part is you can also be losing any excess weight naturally without the need for any other special dieting program.

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Art and Your IPad

Slowly the IPad is becoming a recognised too for real artists, not just people like me who muck about with apps and cool drawing tools.  In fact with the thousands of apps becoming available every month it won’t be long before you can ditch that laptop or PC forever. I actually left mine at home last month and just took the Ipad after discovering a way to get an American IP address on the thing as well, which meant I could connect back to my favorite TV shows and such like.

Anyway here’s a few of the latest and well regarded art apps you can get currently.

Procreate

Using this app, you primarily work in copies and layers.  Create a simple apple and then duplicate the images and transform to make a professional looking still life.  It’s meant to be used with other art apps to help achieve specific effects and images.  It also is designed to work well with Photoshop and you can actually keep all the composites in place when exporting or importing from Photoshop.

Zen Brush

If you don’t want a super complicated and clunky interface then this could be for you.  It’s pretty powerful but the menus are very straight forward and similar to paint. It’s ideal for producing very quick, simple sketches with it’s accurate black pen.

Sketchbook Ink 

This is an autodesk application which will help you import your art from the small screen.  Great for manipulating images and modifying their files sizes into more manageable amounts.  

ArtRage

If you are happier working in traditional methods and media, then this app might be for you.  You can splash big waves of colour across the screen and then use the palette knife too to modify and blend it together.  The pressure of the brush or knife can be controlled.  You can also change how much paint goes on your virtual brush and it’s much cleaner obviously.  You can paint in watercolours or oil paints and the paper takes the colours in a very natural way.

Well there are obviously just a small selection but it’s enough to get you started on your IPad hopefull.

 

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A Rare Matisse Returns to Swedish Museum

A painting by Matisse which was valued at over half a million pounds has been located and is to be returned to the gallery it was stolen from.  The painting is called  the Garden and was recovered after being missing for over 25 years.  It will  now be returned to it’s rightful owners the Museum of Modern Art in Stockholm.

The man behind this recovery is art detective Chris Marinello who is responsible for recovering about 160 million pounds worth of stoen art over his 20 year career.    It’s not actually that surprising considering it is estimated that the worldwide black market in stolen art is worth over £4 billion.  Chris still has a few outstanding cases to work on as it is estimated in the United Kingdom alone there are still over 50,000 pieces still missing or stolen.  This figure is reported on the Lost Arts register based in London.

The tactic that works best for Mr Marinello is simply waiting.  He states that stolen art is essentially worthless, the criminals at some point have to try and sell them.  When they end up going onto the marketplace even after 20 years like the Matisse painting is when they pounce.

Art theft is definitely on the increase and it makes it difficult for galleries and museums who hold some of the most valuable pieces. Last year a Rotterdam museum was targeted with slightly lax security and works by Picasso, Gaugin, Matisse and Monet were stolen certainly worth many tens of millions.

There is even another side to art crime that of copying existing works and selling the items off fraudlently.  There was an interesting undercover operation on British TV which demonstrated this practice.   Again the market was worth hundreds of millions of pound, the documentary is probably still available on the BBC website.  If you need to get access to the BBC Iplayer abroad – then this site may help – http://www.proxyusa.com/bbciplayerabroad2012.

The great news for art lover is that ’The Garden’ by Matisse is being returned this month and an exhibition to show it to  the public is being scheduled for the Spring.

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An Image of Health

No matter where you are or what you are doing, there is a very good chance that you are considering doing something positive to improve the way you are living and the state of your health. It’s the same for the very artistic person as it is for the more logically minded person. Their health is affected by the same environmental issues and personal choices as everyone else.

So what is the best way to make these improvements without compromising the aspects of life that are desirable, convenient and comfortable? After all, while we all want a better standard of life, we don’t want to sacrifice the things that make it as good as it already is!

One of the most effective ways of raising the bar on the way we view our life is to hold a healthy mental image of what we want it to be like and then to hold onto that image. Visualization is a powerful process not only in artistic areas, but in all areas where ideas, creativity and realization comes to the forefront.

The workings of the mind, while still far from clear are getting better understood. It is apparent that when we use our imagination to visualize something that we earnestly desire from life, as long as we believe we can achieve it, the chances are we are likely to realize that desire.

So to put this revelation into a practical situation, by visualizing perfect health and a happy, enjoyable lifestyle we should be able to realize these things. Recent personal development books such as “The Secret” do explain this, but the way the movie of the book was put across, a lot of people thought that all they needed to do was imagine the thing they desired and it would magically appear before them!

The truth about this phenomenon is that more is required to bring a thought, idea or desire into the physical realm, we need to focus on it constantly, all the while expecting it to manifest in our lives. But still nothing will happen until we take physical action to help those desires become manifest.

If its good health we desire, then imagining and visualizing it is necessary to create ideas in our minds of how we can help ourselves to best bring that about. Then we have to act on those ideas.

It may mean a change of diet or an increase in the kinds of activities we are doing. Or it may mean making some lifestyle changes. Learning how to change for the better and improve the health image that we hold in our minds is the first step in a long process that we need to work on to realize the improvements we desire. But by working with our minds and physical abilities, it is amazing what can be achieved.

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Artistic Expression – Only if Approved

We all know that the big companies who specialise in the exploitation of fossil fuels make a great deal of money.  It will also be know surprise to learn that these wealthy oil and gas companies spend a small fortune on political lobbying in order to get their point across.  In the US it was estimated that the energy companies spend well over $150 million just on TV advertising – their focus to promote more mining and drilling and also criticising ’clean energy’ alternatives.

However would you expect companies to be able to influence artistic expression?  Most people would think that they have minimal influence in this sector although primarly only because they have little interest.  But take a controverisal piece of art like Chris Dury’s sculpture called Carbon Sink

This eye catching piece of art depicts a spiral of logs (beetle killed) twisting into a centre of charred logs, interspersed with big lumps of Wyoming coal.  Exactly the sort of statement on Global warming that art is able to do.  Thought provoking yet still interesting to look at, what could be wrong with this art?

The problem was that this piece of art was installed at the University of Wyoming and some of it’s major donors were not too keen on the work.  The executive director of the Wyoming Mining Association described the work as disappointing, whilst drawing attention to the fact  that they were major donors to the University,

Then one day the work just disappeared, removed from display. Initially the story was that it had been water damaged.   However an investigation from a local radio show uncovered the truth that it was removed due to the controversy and pressure it was receiving.

So the energy companies didn’t like a piece of art criticising them, so it’s removed – money certainly talks in these times of recession.  The example might seem a little extreme but in reality it’s not completely isolated.  The big Oil and gas companies are huge sponsors of the arts in many countries and can directly affect decisions on an artistic level if they wish to do so.

The censorship and filtering is slowly extending across the internet too. Access to many sites and online work is often restricted based on commercial considerations.  In essence if you want free, unfettered access to the internet now you need some way of bypassing these blocks like this site - http://www.theninjaproxy.org/tv/how-to-use-a-bbc-iplayer-proxy/, which demonstrates how to use a proxy to access the BBC Iplayers blocks abroad.

 

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Home is Where the Art Is

We all need a place to live that provides us with adequate shelter, protection from the elements and enables us to live in conformity with the social precepts of the civilization that we happen to be a part of. The size, location and design of our humble and in some cases not so humble abodes differ as greatly as our need to occupy every nook and cranny of the country that we call home.

Many homes are what are best described as fitting in with the norm. They are comfortable, averagely well furnished and decorated and fulfil their main function as a “roof over the head” and a place for a family to live, grow up and eventually leave. That’s fine if all a person needs in life are the basics to make that life as bearable as needs be.

Sprucing Things Up

But there are some of us that need more than just the basics of life in order to round out and make more interesting our own particular little corner of the world. For us, an average looking house or apartment is bland and uninviting as it is boring and lacking in the zest for life that we desire and appreciate.

Adding personal touches of imagination, color and style is what transforms our homes from the mundane into the amazing. Artistic design of interiors, selection and placement of furnishings and creating a certain ambience in our homes is what sets them apart from the madding crowd.

Creativity

Maybe it’s a given that not everyone is so creative or even wants to live in the kind of home that has this artistic flare throughout its every room and passageway. But for those if us that need it to grow not only spiritually but also to inspire us to greater heights of physical health and well being, a more creative and healthier house (see: www.healthierhouse.com) is the only way.

For us, a home that exudes an up-beat personality, a sense of calm creativity and an atmosphere of welcoming, happy and healthy wellbeing is a truly attractive place to live and thrive in all areas. From the obvious increase to health from living in a place that makes us happy, it also inspires the creative senses and imagination to instigate new and fresh ideas and plans for a better future.

While this way of living is not to everyone’s tastes, to the artistic person who thrives on creative surroundings for inspiration and the development of inspired ideas, a home that is anything but normal is the order of the day. Neatness and order may be the desire of the mainstream, but strategic mess and chaos are the fuels that feed the creative mind!

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The Truth About Health Care

When did our personal health become the responsibility of outside organizations and governmental bodies?  At what point did we lose the ability to make our own decisions about our personal health and wellness and decide those decisions are better off made by someone else?

Perhaps the greatest conspiracy of all is the idea that organizations like the FDA or WHO have our own best interests at heart.  So often I hear people say, “But the government is here to protect us!”  Many of the articles on this site prove otherwise, so why do people continue to believe this science fiction?

The truth about health care is that we are personally responsible for our own health, and no doctor, hospital, or outside organization is going to give us all of the answers.  We must learn how to process information about health and use it to better our own lives.  Whether it’s a man trying to decide if he should take high cholesterol medication or a woman wanting to know how to grow your hair longer, everyone needs to do their own research.  Stop relying on the “experts” and start learning how to research and use information for your own benefit.  The truth really will set you free.

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Conspiracy and Reality

For those not prone to question the motives of politicians and the people in charge there is a strong distrust of the word ’conspiracy’. It is a word often with very negative connotations. A conspiracy theory is often regarded as a deluded and paranoid vision of the world where evil forces are plotting sinisterly to undermine democracy, take over the world, hide the truth of alien contact etc. The usual response to conspiracy theories is silence from the authorities – they deign to neither comment nor refute. Thus, there are several conspiracy theories concerning the connection between the upper eschelons of world society and the New World Order. The Queen of England does nothing to refute her importance in the Free Mason Circle. Former presidents of America do nothing to deny rumors regarding the perverse initiation ceromonies of the Skull and Bones Society.

This is a warped view of conspiracies. There have been plenty of conspiracies that were actually proven and are on record. These should give pause for thought to all those immediate distrusters of conspiracy theorists.

1) Plan for a military coup in America. A group of leading business men including Senator Prescott Bush planned to overthrow FDR and install a facist military dictatorship in 1933. The major they approached was a staunch supporter of Franklin Delano Roosevelt and he reported them. Although the conspirators were never punished, the conspiracy is on record as it was mentioned in a congressional committee.

2) Soviet Death Ray. In the 1940s two Russian scientists were experimenting with high voltage electrical sparks to create a ’death ray’ machine. We know this because their discoveries led to the development of electrical discharge machining that is an industry standard today for cutting hard metals and alloys using electrical sparks given off between two electrodes normally made of graphite.

3) Removal of Iranian Leader by Oil interests. Those who are sceptical that America and Britain would use underhand methods to further their business interests should think again. In 1951 a democratically elected President was voted into power in Iran. He nationalized the oil industry and thus ended the lucrative AIOC (the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company) that had been making Britain very rich. The British persuaded the Americans to organize a coup in Iran that ousted the moderate Shah. That worked successfully, but he was replaced by the present Muslim clerical system that is staunchly anti-Western. Britian never got its dirty hands back on the lucrative rights to drill the Iranian oil fields.

These are just 3 examples of conspiracies that did happen, and that are on record. They attest to the immorality of world leaders and the extent they are willing to go to gain power and money.

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The Great One-Sided Mattress Conspiracy

I love a good conspiracy as much as the next man, but not all conspiracies involve governments, aliens, or the Moon landing. In my opinion, many of the most important conspiracies we face, and need to confront in the 21st century, are ones involving big corporations trying to hoodwink us. The latest one to come to my attention is the debate over the one-sided mattress!

You might not see this as a biggie on the same scale as nine eleven or indeed the aforementioned Moon landing, but these large companies are slowly syphoning billions of dollars each year from the pockets of the average American simply because they rely on our apathy to allow them to get away with things.

It wasn’t too many years ago that virtually every mattress on the market had a top side and a bottom. Manufacturers encouraged us to turn and flip the mattress regularly in order to prolong its life. But with a one-sided mattress, all the wear is suffered by the top side of the mattress, which has the effect of halving the life-span of any mattress you buy – something that is easily confirmed by reading some of the many mattress reviews that are found online.

If the mattresses life-span is halved, the manufacturers sell twice as many over a given period of time and add hundreds of millions to their bottom line. The major brands will tell you that this isn’t the case because new materials and improved manufacturing techniques make a modern-day mattress last much longer, but from what their customers say, it would seem they don’t always agree.

Mattresses are just the tip of the iceberg, and we need to make a stand against big business in these cases. The only thing they seem to understand is consumer boycott, just look at what happened when Netflix changed its pricing structure – it’s profits tanked. Social media gives the average Joe more power today today than he has ever had. If you love a company you’ll tell all your friends & followers how great it is – so if you see an injustice perpetrated by big business, reach out to the world and shout as loud as you can.

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How does Everyone Not See the Truth?

Everywhere I turn I see lies. Plain as day. But somehow conspiracy theorists are crazy.  We’re a fringe only relegated to the section of society for ridicule.  Frankly, it drives me nuts.  Sometimes I think I need a heart rate monitor to make sure I don’t get too excited.

Let’s go over a few of the past conspiracy theories which turned out to be true:

1) Operation Mockingbird:  This one took place in the 1970’s.  It was finally exposed in 1975 as the truth.  At the time, it was dispelled as a simple conspiracy theory.  How could the government, the CIA in this case, pay newspapers and magazines to publish false propaganda?  Nobody believed it but it turned out to be true.   

2)  Manhattan Project:  We all know this was the codename for the project that created the first atom bomb. Did you know that more than 130,000 were eventually employed to conduct this secret project?  Towns were built.  Over 25 research facilities were built.  In fact, it’s one of the biggest conspiracy theories ever.  At first the government denied it.  Now we know.

3) 1919 World Series Conspiracy:  There are countless conspiracies about fixing games of all types.  Baseball, basketball, football, soccer- you name it.  But the conspiracy to throw the 1919 World Series is the most famous of them all.  In the end, the 8 Chicago White Sox players were banned from baseball after this conspiracy was discovered.

So we’re not crazy. Conspiracy theories are true. I can let my heart rate settle down now.

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Freezer Cooking – An Integral Part Of Survival Planning

The world is a dangerous place, with the threat of hyper-inflation, dollar depreciation and economic collapse constantly looming!  Enemies both foreign and domestic threaten our liberties, and all we can do is to try and prepare for what will befall us is the other shoe should eventually drop.

In my rural retreat, safely away from the dangers of heavily populated cities, I adopt many survival friendly strategies designed to protect myself and my family in times of turmoil.  One great habit my wife and I practice is freezer cooking, the art and proactive of preparing food in bulk for future use.

For survival purposes, freezer cooking requires a very large freezer that is powered independently of the electric grid.  Our home is not connected to the grid, so we have a very large propane tank installed – capable of powering the freezer for months at a time!  This means that if things go bad, we will be able to raid the freezer for our precooked meals for a significant amount of time, hopefully long enough for the worst to be over.

While some folks prefer to purchase MRE for survival food, freezer cooking is a lot cheaper.  I would recommend, however, the addition of specialist survival foods to your stocks even if you do have a very large freezer full of food.  It is unwise to be solely dependent on one food supply in your survival preparations!

 

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Thailand, Conspiracy and a Holiday

Even people like me who spend a lot of their time trying to uncover evidence of conspiracies sometimes go on holiday. All work and no play after all makes jack a dull boy. I recently decided to go to Thailand for a holiday. The allure of hot weather, white sand beaches, delicious food and cheap prices was too much to resist. I’m always a little nervous about going through passport control as it is a moment when you place yourself under the scrutiny and at the mercy of the authorities. You never know what information will be flagged up when they run your passport number through their computers. On a couple of previous occasions I’ve been taken to one side by plain clothes agents who never identified themselves. They always ask you the same questions about where you are going and your purpose of traveling. Anyway, I digress. I got to Thailand without any problem except for getting a stiff neck on the plane.

I transferred to another plane heading to Koh Samui Airport. An hour and a half later I was on the tropical island. It was the smallest and most relaxed airport I have ever been to. It set the tone for a very relaxing holiday.

I hadn’t booked any accommodation in advance so I asked a taxi driver to take me to a quiet beach away from the crowds that was still not too far away from the main tourist centers. The driver thought for a moment and then suggested Ban Tai in Koh Samui. He then named a price for the journey. It seemed reasonable so off we went.

People say it is a mistake to trust taxi drivers but in this case mine did me proud. The journey took about 20 minutes. We arrived at a smart resort called Koh Samui Resort. It was a small boutique style place that had only 20 bungalows for rent. It was perfect. My bungalow had TV, air-con, hot water and best of all free wi fi. It cost about $100 a night. A bit on the expensive side, but worth it for the privacy, the nice communal swimming pool and the other facilities the resort had to offer.

The beach at Ban Tai was just how imagined a Thai beach. It had soft white sand and the ocean was divided into 2 different colors. The sea was warm and great for swimming. Near by there were areas with corals. I spent several happy hours snorkeling around the corals watching the colorful fish.

While relaxing I spent a bit of time on the internet researching Thailand. It made fascinating reading. I never knew that the history of Thailand is littered with coups by the army. There is plenty of possible conspiracy theories that can be found by looking at Thai history. For example the father of the present king was assassinated. The culprits were never found. Many believe it to have been the army. In the most recent coup in 2006 the army held power for over a year and re-wrote the constitution to indemnify itself against prosecution. They have done a lot to try and smother freedom movements resisting the last coup. The links on the Wikipedia article about the 2006 coup have been made into viruses. This is a crude attempt to re-write history.

Talking to a few Thais I met about this topic I quickly got the impression that they have a very cynical opinion about government in Thailand. They see it rife with corruption and prefer to lead lives as independent as possible from the central control of Bangkok. Southerners in general resent the intereference from the capital that does things like pass laws forcing bars to shut down at 1am. Thailand is the land of the free, and I have to agree that having a drink at 1.30am does not seem to warrant any state penalties, especially if it is a quiet drink on a quiet beach!

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