Racy Book on Bangkok Pulled from Shelves as Official Suffers Attack of Prudery
By Simon Montlake

A glossy coffee-table book on Bangkok has been pulled from bookstores after a government official objected to its depiction of the city's infamous go-go bars and other "negative subjects".

The book, Bangkok Inside Out, was published last year to critical acclaim and had sold briskly. But in the past two weeks, Thai bookstores have been clearing copies from their shelves after reportedly being warned they could be prosecuted for selling them.

The skirmish over the book, published by Jakarta-based Equinox Publishing, is the latest sign of intolerance by officials of critical reporting and appears to flout the press freedoms guaranteed by the nation's 1997 constitution.

Ladda Tangsuphachai, director of cultural monitoring at the Ministry of Culture, ordered the clampdown and has asked police to consider legal action against the authors, Guy Sharett, an Israeli national, and Daniel Ziv, a Canadian writer based in Jakarta.

Ms Ladda complained to a Thai-language newspaper that the book had focused too much on "fake goods, gambling and gay performances", as well as nightclub zones such as Patpong and Nana.

In particular, she objected to a photo of a foreigner with a bare-breasted bar girl on his lap in one section of the book.

"According to the constitution, the press has the freedom to publish. So all we can do is to take the problematic books off the shelves," she said.

The book's authors have denied trying to besmirch Thailand or Thai culture. They insist they wanted to show Bangkok's unvarnished truths in a playful manner and avoid guidebook clichés."What mystifies us is that bookshops are packed with publications devoted in their entirety to bar girls and prostitution," the authors said.

The Ministry of Culture has raised controversy in recent years over its objections to Thai women wearing skimpy tops and frank portrayals of sexual matters in television and movies.

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Taken from South China Morning Post

Bangkok Guidebook 'Giving Wrong Signals'
Culture ministry says depiction of bars and touts makes city look bad
By Nirmal Ghosh
Thailand correspondent

Bangkok - A popular, widely-acclaimed city guidebook has run into trouble with Thailand's Ministry of Culture, which has objected to some of its content and has unofficially banned it.

The ministry's position has alarmed other writers. Lonely Planet guidebook author Joe Cummings told the daily Thai Day: 'It (the move) certainly could make people more timid.'

The colourful, 175-page medium-format book titled Bangkok Inside Out was widely acclaimed at its release 10 months ago.

The Nation said it had a 'strikingly original approach' and 'the two writers are obviously in love with the city'.

But late last month, director for cultural monitoring Ladda Tangsuphachai said it tainted the image of Bangkok and its people by referring to go-go bars, pirated music and DVDs, touts and scams.

Ms Ladda said she had asked the police to investigate whether the authors, Jakarta-based Canadian Daniel Ziv and Bangkok-based Israeli journalist Guy Sharett, had violated any laws.

Her remarks were picked up by Thai daily Kom Chad Luek, which ran a series of articles on the book. No other daily reported the issue, but it was mentioned in some TV reports. Bookstores promptly withdrew the publication which had, until then, sold around 4,000 copies.

Those who sell the copies now do so less publicly. The books are kept under the counters and sold only if customers ask for them.

Ms Ladda made specific reference to a picture of a Patpong bar girl with her breasts partially exposed, sitting on a foreigner's lap.

She told The Straits Times : 'Right now the book is not officially banned. But because it is under a process of law the bookstores don't want to sell it because they might also be guilty if the book really taints the image of Thailand and its people.'

She said she did not have the authority to accept an apology offered by the authors until the legal process set in motion to determine whether the book 'will cause damage to internal security' had been concluded.

Countering charges by critics of the ministry, that attacking the book amounted to shooting the messenger, she said whether the police took action against go-go bars and piracy and touts or not was not her concern.

'The point is they wrote the book so they have to be responsible for their actions.'

The Culture Ministry, resurrected by Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, has regularly stirred controversies. Last year, it objected to some lyrics in a hit song by pop superstar Tata Young and tried to have it banned.

The ministry also objected to catwalk fashion shows where models wore clothes that showed their nipples under the material.

That drew a sharp response from a top model who said Thailand could not hope to become an international fashion hub if such objections were raised.

This year, on the eve of the annual Songkhran water festival, the ministry unsuccessfully cautioned young women against wearing tops with spaghetti straps because it risked inviting sexual harassment.

In Bangkok Inside Out , the short passage with the 'offending' picture of the bar girl says, among other things: 'Patpong is today one of Bangkok's least exciting nightspots.'

The authors have rejected the ministry's objection, saying the book 'depicts Bangkok as a hip, trendy place that has shed much of its seedier side'.

Taken from Straits Times

Taste: Flying Off the Shelves in Thailand
By Ron Gluckman

Bangkok -- The disappearance of a lively guidebook from Thai bookstores is giving journalists here yet another reason to worry about the growing erosion of press freedom under Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra.

Two weeks ago, Thailand's major book chains bowed to government pressure and pulled Bangkok Inside Out   (Equinox, $20, 175 pages) off local shelves, according to authors Daniel Ziv and Guy Sharett. The book, part of a small, quirky travel series, apparently caught the attention of the government-run Cultural Surveillance Center, which deemed it mocking in tone -- and unsuitable for sale.

"This book does not give the right image to outsiders," opined Ladda Thangsupachai, the center's director. "Noted were negative depictions of the selling of fake goods, gambling, gay performances and places such as Patpong (a local red-light district)." Particularly offensive, she added, was a photograph of a half-naked girl on the lap of a foreigner.

An outright book ban isn't allowed by the Thai constitution, which guarantees freedom of the press. Instead, Ms. Ladda delegated the matter to police, who informed book stores to remove the offensive title or face fines and possible legal action. And overnight, it vanished.

Mr. Thaksin is not known for his openness to criticism. But while Bangkok Inside Out may not be your typical guidebook, it's hardly political. This zany tome offers small, snapshot segments on offbeat topics like amulets, the tiny pink napkins at hole-in-the-wall diners and street dogs. The guide won widespread praise but only modest sales of 4,000 copies since its release last November.

"We don't even understand the reason," Mr. Ziv told me. The 35-year-old Canadian calls it a "de-facto ban," since no official action has been announced. "We only found out about it when we read about it in a local paper," adds Israeli-born Mr. Sharett, Mr. Ziv's 35-year-old co-writer.

For the authors, it could be the death-knoll for the spunky travel series launched in Jakarta, where Mr. Ziv has lived for the past six years. After writing Jakarta Inside Out in 2002 for Jakarta publisher Equinox, he teamed up with Mr. Sharett, a Thailand-based foreign correspondent.

"If they prevent us from selling this book in Thailand, than this entire project is dead," laments Mr. Ziv, who says 80% of sales are in Thailand. The authors argue that the Thai authorities are missing the point. The book "oozes enthusiasm for Bangkok and Thailand," notes Mr. Ziv.

Especially irksome to observers and the authors alike is the arbitrary nature of the ban. This week, the Foreign Correspondent's Club of Thailand registered its concern in a letter to the Ministry of Culture. "We mainly want to get clarification," said FCC board member Dominic Faulder. "If laws have been broken, we want to know what laws they are."

The tempest comes at a volatile time. Bangkok has been gripped by an explosive feud between media magnate Sondhi Limthongkul and Mr. Thaksin. Mr. Sondhi, who owns print publications and one of Thailand's top-viewed Web sites, is a staunch critic of Mr. Thaksin. Many here fear a showdown on Dec. 9, when Mr. Sondhi has called for half a million Thais to join him in a downtown park to protest the government.

The disappearance of Bangkok Inside Out has shocked a community of journalists that is already worried about censorship. "It definitely sends a message," says Joe Cummings, who has authored various Lonely Planet guides -- including the award-winning Thailand edition -- for 15 years. The Foreign Correspondent Club's Mr. Faulder adds: "This affects us all, anyone who reports on Thailand. If the justification is 'negative to Thailand,' that could apply to any of us."

Mr. Gluckman is a Bangkok-based writer.

Taken from The Asian Wall Street Journal

Sensitive Material
A book is banned as foreign and Thai perspectives collide
By Nicholas Grossman

For the past year, Bangkok Inside Out, a photo-heavy book of irreverent essays on Thailand, sat prominently on the bookshelves of Asia Books, Bookazine and other independent booksellers throughout the country. When it was released, it was widely praised by reviewers. In The Nation, longtime expat and author James Eckhardt wrote: "[Bangkok Inside Out is] a strikingly original approach to this bewildering behemoth of a city and the two young writers pull it off brilliantly...the two writers are obviously in love with the city."

Then, three weeks ago, the book was featured in a front-page special report by a team of writers and editors at Khom Chat Luek, a Thai-language paper owned by The Nation Group. The editorial team sent the book to Ladda Tangsuphachai, director of the monitoring department at the Culture Ministry, for comment. She replied, "They write about Thailand but condemn Thai people, which is like biting the hand that feeds you. This is not right."

A few days later, the book was taken off the shelves by both Asia Books and Bookazine . Why the sudden reversal of fortune? The answer exposes clashing perspectives, not just on a book, but on a country, its image and who has the right to comment.

They are farangs, but Daniel Ziv and Guy Sharett are no tourists. Both men are experienced journalists and both have degrees in Southeast Asian studies. Sharett, a foreign correspondent, is fluent in spoken and written Thai and has lived here for many years. Ziv, who wrote the original Inside Out guide to Jakarta, has visited Thailand more than 30 times.

Their book on Bangkok, which has so far sold about 4,000 copies, was based on a year-and-a-half worth of research. Describing the experience in the foreword, they write: "We've tried our best to understand Bangkok from the point of view of Bangkokians...we hung out with people from all walks of life, listened to their stories and perspectives, and tried to make sense of it all." They were, judging by the reviews in the English-language dailies (reviews written by farangs), very successful in their mission. The Bangkok Post (in a review that I wrote), The Nation and The Asian Wall Street Journal all applauded the spirit of the book.

But the writers and editors at Khom Chat Luek had a different reaction. They were offended by Bangkok Inside Out . Their article ran under the headline, "Farang book ruins Thailand's face" and stated that most of the content of the book focused on "negative subjects such as fake goods, gambling, gay performances, touts, scams, places such as Patpong, Nana, and Khao San Road." (Ziv says that neither he nor Sharett were contacted for the original Khom Chat Luek story.)

How did two groups of journalists come to entirely different conclusions?

An editor interviewed at Khom Chat Luek explains that a fellow editor had noticed Bangkok Inside Out in a bookstore and that they had also received critical letters from the paper's readers. When they reviewed the book, they found the content unsuitable for publication. In particular, they took issue with a picture of a farang in a Patpong go-go bar holding the breasts of a bar girl as she sat on his lap. "This book focuses only on one side of Thailand or Bangkok and it is sold around the world," says the editor. "How about the foreigners who don't know anything about Thailand? Will they get only one-sided information like this?"

The Khom Chat Luek team decided to send the book to Ladda for comment. In their article, Ladda agreed that the book was a problem. "There are a great deal of books written by foreign authors that insult Thai people...we cannot control the publishers or prohibit them from printing this and that because, according to the Constitution, the press has freedom to publish. So all we can do is take the problematic books off the shelves," she said.

Ladda's pronouncements often make news. She didn't like the title of Tata Young's song, "Sexy, Naughty, Bitchy"; after the 2003 Elle fashion show, she said the Ministry would find ways under Thai law to stop runway models from showing their nipples. She worried that a couple's escapades on the Thai version of TV show Big Brother were inappropriate for audiences; and she also proposed banning women from wearing spaghetti-strap tops during the Songkran celebrations.

But her words aren't merely sensational news items. She also has clout.

According to Ziv, after the Khom Chat Luek story appeared, he and Sharett were contacted by both Asia Books and Bookazine and told that their book would be pulled until further notice as a result of the negative press, as well as the possibility that police would fine the companies for selling the book or seek charges.

"It amounts to a de facto ban, but we don't know if there is any 'official' ban. Until now we haven't heard anything official from authorities," Ziv says. "We would appreciate a more transparent process. It feels unfair. We don't know what we're up against."

The distributors also never received "official" notice, but they chose to remove the books. David Johnson, managing director of Asia Books , chooses his words carefully. "The Ministry of Culture indicated to us that Bangkok Inside Out should be removed from our shelves due to inappropriate content that damaged Thai culture, or we would face the possibility of legal action. As a result we have temporarily removed the book from our shelves and have sought clarification and guidelines from the ministry." He says Asia Books has never received complaints from customers about the book.

"If we were asked to take other books off the shelves by the Culture Ministry, we would. And we would seek clarification," Johnson says.

Bookazine, like Asia Books , never received formal notice from the ministry. The management team heard that a Thai daily had run a story on the book and that the police might visit their shops. Thus Bookazine decided to pull the book until things quieted down.

But this past weekend, Bookazine changed its mind and put the book back on its shelves.

Many foreign writers contacted for this story were reluctant to speak. It's not that they don't consider it their fight. They just don't want the fight. Philip Cornwel-Smith, whose book Very Thai has been a best-seller in local bookstores, refused to comment on the record.

Cameron Cooper, executive editor of Untamed Travel , however, did express concern. "As an English-language publisher, I find it disturbing. There don't seem to be any clear guidelines of what's acceptable and what's not. You don't know what the rules are, if indeed there are any."

"You can take the book off the shelves but it won't change the perception," he says. "You can't stop farangs from being tongue and cheek."

Thailand's image is a sensitive subject, especially when journalists poke holes in it. The prime minister has repeatedly raised the issue in press conferences, and it's a particularly sticky issue for any non-Thai writer whose visa or work permit is granted at the discretion of the government.

Ziv and Sharett say they wrote the book for an international audience - tourists and expats. They were also clearly aware of the sensitive territory they were in. In the foreword, they write: "It is always problematic when writers comment on a place or a people not their own...No matter how much one feels a part of the scene, a foreign lens can distort impressions and, consequently, interpretations."

Ladda and the Khom Chat Luek team say that's exactly the book's problem. "The content is damaging to the country's reputation," Ladda said in an interview with ThaiDay . "For example, the writers put a picture of an unsmiling man with 'the land of smiles' caption, [which] is apparently meant to tarnish the image of the country."

For Ladda, free speech has limits. When asked if it's fair to ban a book under the current constitution, she replies: "Is it fair for somebody outside the country who might not understand Thai culture enough to destroy our reputation? Do they know as much as we do? Everyone is free to write or speak, but everything has a limit. It has to [conform to] Thai law."

Ladda has forwarded the book to the police, who will now make a decision on whether to prosecute the authors for obscenity.

Are other books next?

"The [monitoring department] is like a watch center that has to look after the country and its culture," Ladda says. "All types of media including books, CDs and websites are regularly checked. Along with Bangkok Inside Out, other magazines and websites have also been warned. Cosmo, the Thai version, has been warned for its obscene content."

But in Ladda's view, what is said is as important as who's saying it. "If the writers wanted to [provide] in-depth information on a city, they should have done it in their country because they would be the ones who know best about it. Just don't do it with our country."

Even though the authors feel mistreated, they want to compromise. "There's obviously a question of freedom of expression here," Ziv says. "But we're not using that as a shield to be insensitive to Thai culture...we don't want to offend people. We want a dialogue."

To that end, they met with Ladda at the Culture Ministry and asked her to point out what she didn't like. The authors explained that they would make changes in the next edition.

"We were very conciliatory. We offered to take out the offensive elements. Her reaction seemed to imply that her problem is with the whole book. She took offense to the fact that we talked about traffic jams, pollution and ladyboys. We can't retract that."

Ziv does worry about a double standard. "If the mere image of a Thai bargirl on a foreigner's lap, if that is so offensive and so unusual, why is it that far sleazier spectacles, like touts openly handing out nude photos with Thai girls in front of hotels - why aren't they worried about that?" He stands by his book and argues that it is good for Thailand's image.

"I challenge anyone to bring us the book who has read it and doesn't have more interest in Bangkok after reading it. Bangkok is a truly fun, rich, multilayered place. Our book points out dozens of attractions that the TAT doesn't think of promoting. The modern tourist likes contrasts, they like nuances. We've created a credible portrait of the city."

While Ziv says he doesn't want to turn this into a free speech issue, he points out that "a country can't control everything that's said about the country. That's a scary notion."

Additional reporting by Sirinya Wattanasukchai and Nujaree Sriwanayos

Taken from ThaiDay

Banned Wagon
The authors say they love the city, so why has their book been taken off the shelves? Jason Gagliardi examines the curious case of the guide that's been gutted Asia specific
By Jason Gagliardi

Walk into almost any bookshop in Bangkok, and you'll find an entire section devoted to the country's seedy nightlife - lurid works that chronicle the nocturnal netherworld and its haggard habitués. Until recently, you'd also have found an incisive, funny and well-written book that takes a warts-and-all look at the splendours and oddities of the City of Angels, entitled Bangkok Inside Out .

To any casual observer, it would seem obvious that the former books paint a skewed and sleazy picture of places such as Bangkok and Pattaya, whereas Bangkok Inside Out takes a balanced, realistic and affectionate look at the capital.

But not to Thailand's Director of Cultural Monitoring, Ladda Tangsuphachai, who featured recently on the front page of a local newspaper lambasting the book as "too realistic" in its descriptions of vice, warning stores to stop selling it and calling on police to "look into the matter".

The book's authors, Guy Sharett and Daniel Ziv, say they're bemused and hurt by the ban, and are seeking clarification from the Thai government.

The first they heard of any problem was when they saw the front-page article in Kom Chad Luek, in which Ladda criticised the book for discussing "negative subjects such as fake goods, gambling, gay performances, touts and scams". She also voiced concerns about sections on the fleshpots of Patpong and Nana, a photo of a bar girl sitting on a foreigner's lap, and a section on the backpacker haven of Khao San Road.

"According to the constitution, the press has the freedom to publish," Ladda said. "So all we can do is take the problematic books off the shelf."

Most bookshops have since removed Bangkok Inside Out - which had sold more than 4,000 copies since its launch just over a year ago.

Sharett, speaking from Jerusalem, said he'd left Thailand because he was concerned he could be targeted by police, and because he'd been getting hate mail.

"I have to take the threats seriously, even though it seems ridiculous anyone would be offended by our book," he says. "Until now, we've heard nothing further from the Thai government. I really don't know how to feel, because this isn't a transparent process. There's no panel of experts who consider the serious matter of banning a book - it's just one woman making an arbitrary decision.

"We met Ms Ladda and showed her the book and tried to explain that it's not sleazy, but that we couldn't ignore things that obviously go on in Bangkok," he says. "She told us farangs [foreigners] should only write good things to help promote Thailand. As a journalist, obviously I can't accept that. Things aren't always black and white.

"When you ban a book, you're telling readers that they can't think for themselves. That's hard for me to accept. I also mentioned the books that are genuinely sleazy, and she said, 'We will get them as well'. I think it's all very sad for freedom of expression in Thailand."

Ziv, who is based in Jakarta, says he's not convinced there's an official ban. "It's a knee-jerk reaction," he says. "No one has told us we've broken any law. The book isn't pornographic. But we're the ones getting the short end of the stick, because bookshops won't sell it. The hypocrisy is astounding - if the government is really concerned about the racy nightlife they should close it down.

"They should crack down on the touts outside five-star hotels with hard-core porn leaflets, not ban our book. [This] book is genuinely debunking the sleaziness, poking fun at it and pointing out how that isn't the real Bangkok at all. Once the state decides it has a monopoly on reality, it's quite frightening."

A spokesman for Ladda's office said the director had nothing more to say about the ban "for the moment" and refused to rule out other books being banned. She also refused to say under what law the book had been banned.

In the Kom Chad Luek article, Ladda said Sharett and Ziv were "biting the hand that feeds you. This is not right. There are a great deal of books written by farangs which insult Thai people."

Bangkok Inside Out was well-received on its launch. "It's a strikingly original approach to this bewildering behemoth of a city," said Thai English-language newspaper The Nation .

In a statement responding to the ban, Sharett and Ziv say the book "has clearly been misunderstood. It oozes enthusiasm for Bangkok and Thailand, and repeatedly encourages readers to visit and explore the city. It depicts Bangkok as a hip, trendy place that has shed much of its seedier side and become far more attractive and cosmopolitan than most other travel books suggest.

"What mystifies us is that bookshops in Thailand are packed with publications devoted in their entirety to bar girls and prostitution. Our book - for all its humour and playful banter - is consistently respectful and thoughtful towards the Thai people and their culture, and written out of almost unconditional admiration."
One best-selling western author based in Bangkok, who asked not to be named, says the ban is bizarre and scary. "When you look at the tone of the article, it's like some kind of anti-foreigner witch-hunt. A more apt article might have been one questioning the authority of one middle-ranking civil servant to arbitrarily banish books from the shelves."

Taken from South China Morning Post

Unseen Bangkok
BANGOK INSIDE OUT
A refreshing look at the City of Angels
By James Eckhardt

Oh no, you think, not another guidebook to Bangkok. But the authors disabuse you of that notion in the very first words of their introduction:

"This book isn’t really a ‘guide’ to Bangkok. There’s no map or sections on where to stay and how to get around. Instead, it’s a street-level snapshot of a 21st century Southeast Asian city bursting at the seams but inching courageously forward; a snapshot of ordinary people in their urban landscape; of culture and pop culture. Our approach is raw and cheeky and irreverent at times, but we think of it as honest and real.”

What they present are 60 topics arranged alphabetically – amulets, beauty contests, Chinatown, durian, gambling, Khao San Road, Klong Toei, Lumpini Park, MBK, muay Thai, Phra Athit, Skytrain, soi dogs, street food, traffic, urban elephants, yaa baa – and illustrated by striking colour photos, a few by the authors but most by Croatian photographer Sasa Kralj.

It’s a strikingly original approach to this bewildering behemoth of a city and the two young writers pull it off brilliantly. Their short takes are an irresistible mixture of humour, insight and pathos.

In “Chao Isaan”, the authors profile two sisters from the Northeast, construction workers who earn just Bt160 per day:

"One of the sisters, Lung, says it’s common to see people in their migrant community crying at night, missing their kids and homes. Indeed, a favourite phrase in Isaan folk songs is kit tueng baan (‘to miss home’) – like a giant pall of yearning rising out from taxis, food stalls, hotels and brothels, looming over this alien city before drifting slowly toward the Northeast.”

They comically describe the Thai addiction to comic books, many translated versions from the Japanese but others locally produced.

"One original Thai creation is ‘Taleung’ (Cheeky), a series peppered with sexual innuendoes and puns in succinct Bangkokian lingo... We won’t comment on the size of women’s breasts (okay – they are huge), but they speak volumes about men and wishful thinking. That’s all right, though – in frenetic Bangkok, comics serve as magic capsules that whisk people from a hot bus ride in a huge traffic jam to a world where anything is possible.”

The authors also delve into corners of the Thai psyche to discuss such phenomena as sanuk, tam boon, chic, retro, hi-so/lo-so, farang, look-krueng, gay and katoey.

Of sanuk they write: “Conventional sanuk activities in Bangkok include wandering aimlessly for hours around Siam Square, watching a film (during the boring parts you chat loudly with our friends on your mobile phone), drinking with close mates, slurping noodles at 3am on the way home from a huge dinner and sending cute text messages to giggling friends...

"Above all, sanuk is something that massages the collective senses and leaves everyone with a nice, light, smiley feeling. This is why heavy things, like Wim Wender films, can never be sanuk. ‘Legally Blonde’, or anything starring Jim Carrey, are.”

Their section on the sounds of Bangkok is practically a prose poem, moving from the sounds of the Chao Phya express boats to Thai boxing bouts to look thung music wafting out of taxis. “In central Bangkok, blind musicians chant slow, haunting sounds that crackle from a tenuously rigged amplifier... At street level, food stall commotion provides its own distinctive soundtrack: deep-fried locusts crackling in a wok; a hawker frantically pounding chilli paste in a mortar; the noisy chatter of diners; and the mad clatter of dirty dishes being washed. This could only be Bangkok.”

The two writers are obviously in love with the city. While they appreciate “the danger of over-romanticising the subject, or worse, being condescending”, they succeed in striking a happy balance in their honest enthusiasm for the myriad people and places that make up the City of Angels.

The nearly 100 photos in Bangkok Inside Out are striking and unusual, beautifully complementing the quirky text. The cover shows a break-dancing Thai kid spinning on his head. The front page is a more traditional shot of kids jumping into the muddy Chao Phraya.

Then there are fat lady beauty contestants, lounging couples in the Bed Supper Club, a gimlet-eyed trainer with his fighting cock, katoey cabaret dancers being made up backstage, Khao San Road hair braiders, a bleeding Thai boxer, Africans on Soi Nana, a weary tuk-tuk driver, a retro movie poster of Mitr and Petchara, a suitably scrofulous soi dog, blind street musicians and a downtrodden Dumbo.

"Bangkok is a chaotic place, and this book probably reflects a bit of that madness,” the authors conclude.

"But lately it’s also a city that’s constantly bettering itself. It’s bouncing back from recession, basic services have improved, and it’s becoming an increasingly cosmopolitan place – full of enthusiasm and creative energy. So for all the quips, satires and dirt we dish out on these pages, we hope our love for this amazing city still shines through.”

It certainly does. This is the perfect book to give to first-time visitors to Bangkok, but also to long-time residents. There’s plenty of stuff in here that I never knew.

Taken from The Nation

Glittering Golden Temples
Charming floating markets.
Graceful doe-eyed dancers.
By Jason Gagliardi

Glittering golden temples. Charming floating markets. Graceful doe-eyed dancers. Teeming streetscapes. White sand beaches. Chattering tuk-tuks. Colourful and spice-laden food. Swaying palm trees. Lumbering pachyderms. Riotous fleshy nightlife.

Such is the stuff of dozens of guidebooks that shriek from sagging shelves, content to serve warmed-over helpings of "Amazing Thailand", feeding befuddled tourists the cliches they expect, and perpetuating a consensual hallucination that isn't Thailand.

Salvation, however, is at hand for those who feel they'd like to get under the skin of the Land of Smiles a little more, and it comes in the form of two not-quite-guidebooks recently released, coincidentally, within a week of each other, each offering a panoply of insights and epiphanies about Thailand as it really exists.

Very Thai, by long-time Bangkok resident Phil Cornwel-Smith, is the first in-depth examination of Thai popular culture, and its day-glo cover, replete with images of everything from Ultraman tyre tubes to shiny motorcycle jackets to plastic Buddhas to beauty contestants, hints at the wild ride inside.

Bangkok Inside Out, by Daniel Ziv and Guy Sharett, concentrates solely on the capital, offering an A-to-Z of urban oddities, complemented by Croatian lensman Sasa Kralj's gritty, grainy photos that reveal the City of Angels' underbelly.

According to Bangkok Inside Out's blurb: "Bangkok has long been subjected to endless clichés and over-exoticised imagery. [We] make sense of all the madness, leading readers on a humorous, no-holds-barred journey through the real Bangkok." The book largely makes good on its promise, with entertaining vignettes on everything from soi (stray) dogs to street food, lotteries to ladyboys, traffic to tabloids, and gambling to gem scams.

Briton Cornwel-Smith casts his net wider, and takes a more scholarly approach, with a collection of elegant essays that reveal his insatiable curiosity about his adopted home. The photography in this book, by both Cornwel-Smith and John Goss, is the moody studies.

If you've ever wondered why street food tables have uselessly small pink napkins thereon, why bright-jacketed chaps lounge on bikes at the mouths of lanes, why fluorescent lights end up as decorations strung from trees, or why Thais have a seemingly quenchless passion for neo-classical architecture, this is for you.

"Unselfconscious consumers rarely consider street life as culture," writes Cornwel-Smith in his introduction. "Modernising Thailand often treats anything 'street' as lowbrow. Public and official comments tend to gloss over the reality of local lifestyles, especially when they touch on taboos like sex or gambling {hellip} fortunately, Thailand rewards the 'flaneur' - the wandering seeker of experiences, open to impressions."

He divides his book into four sections: "Street" dwells on public space; "Personal" on the private domains of body, home and identity; "Ritual" explores beliefs and luck; and "Sanuk", that essential Thai concept of fun, looks at entertainment and how Thais socialise.

Flick through Very Thai, and pages will open that reveal mysteries such as Drink in a Bag, Insect Treats, Blue Pipes and Hanging Wires, Taxi Altars, Ghost Stories, Whisky Mixer Tables, Soap Operas. Do the same with Bangkok Inside Out, and prepare to encounter Amulets, Chinatown, Karaoke, 7-Eleven, and Yaa Baa (methamphetamines, or literally "crazy medicine"). The books complement each other more than they compete; the latter offering bite-sized snacks, the former a sumptuously prepared banquet.

Cornwel-Smith spent eight years editing Metro, the city's first and best listings magazine, and so found himself knee-deep in popular culture from his first weeks in Bangkok. He also edited the Time Out Bangkok guide, which he is about to update. "I'm trying to trace the roots of where these pop cultural things came from, whether indigenous or adopted from abroad, fused with something else and warped over time."

He spent as much time pounding the pavement as he did in libraries, and travelled extensively around the country. "I found that some things don't vary much," he says. "For instance, village home décor - whichever part of the country you go to, it's all the same. You'll find they've all got a huge picture of a waterfall, the King's portrait is always on a calendar, there's always a graduation photograph, they've always put together a jigsaw and framed it and put it on the wall.

"Thailand seems to be a very chaotic place at times, but actually what comes through is how standardised and consistent the whole place is."

He rejects any assertion that, as a foreigner with a tenuous grasp of the Thai language, he's ill-equipped to write with authority on the subject of popular culture. "Just the opposite," he says. "I don't think it's a credibility problem not being Thai - much of the best writing on Thailand has been done by foreigners. Sometimes you need that detachment, to be able to step outside the culture to really see it."

Ziv lived in Jakarta for six years, during which time he wrote Jakarta Inside Out, a similar treatment of the Indonesian capital, while founding and editing Djakarta! - The City Life Magazine. Both he and Sharett are graduates of London's School of Oriental and African Studies. Sharett contributes to BBC World Service radio and Israel's Channel 10 television.

Ziv says that, although light-hearted in tone, his book represents "a very modern and serious way, an alternate way, of looking at urban landscapes in Asia."

That much is obvious from the Bangkok book's cover, which depicts a young breakdancer in mid-head spin on a Skytrain concourse. "We chose that image because it represents Bangkok as being a fresh, young city that goes well beyond the normal stereotypes," he says. "Young Thais do see themselves as living in a very cool, hip city."

Adds Sharett: "We're taking a wider view of what culture means. People think culture is museums, temples, traditional dance, but culture is also 7-Elevens. It's treated lightly in the book, but it's also serious."

Ziv says: "We were very interested in talking about what makes the city tick. For instance, Chao Isaan, [migrants from the poor north-eastern provinces collectively known as Isaan] who live and work in Bangkok, are ignored by other guidebooks, but they are the engine that makes the city move."

What do they love most about Bangkok? "For me, it's sitting on a ferry on the Chao Phraya river at dusk and just being, basically," says Sharett. "Café yen [iced coffee] in a plastic bag on my soi, buses and transportation, in general. I also love the fact that it's safe here, in such a big city."

Says Ziv: "I love the idea that this city is so vast, has so many levels and layers to it. I've spent literally thousands of hours pacing the streets, both for the book and just generally exploring, and I still discover new things.
"What I don't like so much is the threat to the whole sense of Thainess, of being unique, of being true to their culture. We're seeing such a commoditisation of society here, a Starbuck-isation, a transition to shopping malls and concrete and skytrains and technology. I worry at some level that Thai society is replacing some of its traditions, what makes it unique. I'd hate to see Bangkok get malled out and end up a sterile Singapore kind of city."

Cornwel-Smith says he's found there's a "very Thai'' way of thinking that explains a lot about how things work, things that often baffle foreigners. "Overridingly, the bottom line is how everything relates to personal relationships, the social hierarchy. A curious thing I found about aphrodisiacs, for instance, is that in Thailand they're all about exciting the other person, trying to get them to like you. Again, it's the relationship thing. It's too much of a social face loss to pursue someone else, so you want to engineer it so they pursue you because the person who makes the approach is the lower person in the relationship."

His favourite piece is his study of the Hi-So, or high society, phenomenon, a world of khunyings (dames) with lacquered helmets of hair. "The committed hi-so," he notes, "fills their Mont Blanc diary with 'lunch at Emporium', a 'launch at Gaysorn', 'hair at Chalachol', 'tea at The Oriental', 'cocktails at the Dusit Thani ballroom', 'dinner at The Face', and 'drinks at Met Bar' {hellip} not so different from any world city, some may say, only there's a degree of spectacle in Bangkok that puts St Tropez in the shade.''

Cornwel-Smith's book concludes with a chapter on indy, the growing movement that eschews the materialistic, pampered, designer-clad world of the sons and daughters of Thailand's army of nouveau riche. "Formerly, elders were always right, tradition dictated taste, and fashions filtered down from above. Now much of mainstream culture rises up from below and from the young {hellip} In a land revering elders, that's a paradigm shift. This reversal of seniority plays out in magazines, products, advertising, websites, clothing and thoughts."

Taken from South China Morning Post

Bangkok Inside Out
By Nick Grossman

If Very Thai is a work of serious pondering, Bangkok Inside Out is its more irreverent counterpart, a well-written book that offers readers a visceral and informative tour through the City of Angels.

Here too, the substance is modern Thailand and the goal is to move beyond the stereotypes of the popular (or Western) imagination and present Bangkok society as the dynamic entity it is.

Two local journalists, Daniel Ziv and Guy Sharett, have achieved this by writing short essays about the capital’s striking locations, icons, and cultural markers, all ordered from A to Z. “Massage”, “MBK”, “Mobile phones” and “Monarchy” are just some examples from the letter M, each topic featuring a stunning colour photograph to complement the essay.

The voice of Inside Out tends to be more subjective than academic, featuring a healthy dose of humour that makes it highly readable. The authors don’t hesitate to let their own quirky personalities shine through. In an essay about 7-Eleven, for example, they analyse the musical scales of its famous doorbell; or in the essay “Hi-So/Lo-So”, the writers provide a clever list of “How to Shock Hi-So Bangkokian friends”.

But Inside Out isn’t just cheeky fun. Like those shaded boxes found in travel guides Lonely Planet and Rough Guide, the essays in Inside Out shed light on cultural quirks and traditions, thus bringing the larger picture in focus.

Inside Out also contain a sensitive voice, highlighting the typical lives of taxi drivers, Chao Isaan and other more marginalized groups who comprise the city.
Perhaps the book’s greatest strength is its photography. Shot from unusual angles, full of movement, and painted in sharp colours, these pictures jump off the page, capturing the dynamic spirit of modern Bangkok that’s beyond the reach of any prose.

Taken from Bangkok Post

Bangkok Inside Out

The problem with writing about a city is always one of objectivity. While the Theroux’s and Bryson’s of this world are generally reliable and entertainingly insouciant travelistes, bookstores are crammed with cack handed and irretrievably smug tributes to places scarcely literate expats have called home. And heaven knows Thailand has enough of them. Usually self published and given a cringeworthy title like “I Love You Long Time – a user’s guide to Loi Kroh” or “Jai Yen Yen – getting by in Thailand”, these abominations are aimed squarely at the Bar Beer stool warmer who is still whingeing about Bernard Trink’s column being axed.

Bangkok Inside Out, thankfully, is a different beast altogether. Put simply, it’s an A-Z of life in the City of Angels with outstanding photographs and (mostly) witty, knowledgeable text that is probably aimed more at people who have already visited the city than prospective tourists. Authors Ziv and Sharett (pictured in a kind of bargain basement GAP advert pose on the back cover) are the kind of jack-of-all-trades journos/media types who simultaneously display enough affection for their subject – Bangkok - to endear themselves and enough cynical detachment to avoid sycophancy. As they say in the introduction, “No matter how much one feels part of the scene, a foreign lens can distort impressions and, consequently, interpretations. And there is the danger of over-romanticizing the subject, or worse, being condescending.”

To this end, the authors have produced a book that captures Bangkok not as they would like it to be seen, but as they themselves actually understand the place. Ziv and Sharett are thankfully aware that there is already a mountain of books out there that deal with the Royal Palace and day trips to floating markets, but a distinct lack of material covering, for example, scabby soi dogs. The contents page alone is a killer, running from amulets to ya ba by way of durian, mobile phones and beauty pageants. You can just imagine the guys hunkered down on a roadside bar, swigging a Sangsom and coke and deciding what to include - “ooh, karaoke! We’ve got to have karaoke!” “Absolutely! And uniforms. Thais love uniforms. They’re a must.”

Highlights include a chapter on the hi-so phenomenon (featuring a guide on how to impress hi-so friends “have lots of teddy bears in your car, with aristocratic names like Arthur, Leopold and Henrietta”) and a paean to 7-Elevens in which the welcome “ding dong” of different branches’ doors are analysed and the stores are quite rightly described as being “the only Bangkok institution possibly as ubiquitous as the Buddhist temple.”

The writing is fresh, informal and personal, and while at times running the risk of descending into the kind laddish platitudes favoured by men’s magazines with undressed soap stars on the cover, it is consistently entertaining. The photographs are also outstanding. Mostly provided by Sasa Krajl, the shots are rich in hue and character and really do seem to provide an honest record Bangkok’s rather unique spirit and energy.

Occupying a kind of middle ground between presentation coffee table book and irreverent travelogue, Bangkok Inside Out is a breath of fresh air in a traditionally stale genre. Hurrah!

Taken from Chiang Mai News

Culture & Thought -- Culture Clash:
Pop Goes Thai Culture --- Two Odes to the Unsung Aspects of the 'Land of Smiles'
By Jennifer Gampell

What gives Thailand its groove -- and will continue to do so despite the recent tsunami devastation -- is never obvious from the photos of glittery temples and palm-treed beaches endemic to tourist brochures and coffee-table books. Nor does the sleazy bargirl lens through which the expatriate hack novelists perceive the country reflect a true image. Between these two mythic extremes lie all the fascinating quirks of everyday Thai life; the disparate yet omnipresent phenomena like street vendors, beauty pageants and 7-11 stores that are virtually invisible to guidebook writers.

This longstanding literary void was filled this month with the release of Bangkok Inside Out (Equinox, $20, 175 pages) and Very Thai (River Books, $25, 256 pages), two unusual takes on Thailand that will have booksellers worldwide scratching their heads over how to classify them.

Focusing more on the "What Is" rather than the "How To" of life in Thailand, both celebrate the pulsating human aspects of the country, rather than its inert monuments. While their content overlaps in places, these refreshingly original volumes differ as much from each other as they do from every other travel- and culture-related offering on the market.

Like its cover shot of a teenage break dancer spinning upside down on a Skytrain walkway, Bangkok Inside Out turns the traditional guidebook genre on its head. The soft-cover book by Guy Sharett and Daniel Ziv is a zany compilation of in-your-face visual/verbal snapshots of life in the chaotic Thai capital. Since Bangkok is the nation's melting pot, many topics necessarily transcend the city limits.

Mr. Ziv, a self-described global wanderer with a M.A. in Southeast Asian studies from the School of Oriental & African Studies in London pioneered the format in 2002 with the popular Jakarta Inside Out. Another SOAS graduate, Mr. Sharett is a Bangkok-based journalist for Israeli media and a linguist fluent in Thai and six other languages.

Bangkok Inside Out consists of 60 two-page "chapters" covering an alphabetized list of such ubiquitous -- and often unfamiliar to outsiders -- local customs as amulets (talismen that protect, heal, boost sexual charm or bring good luck), "DIY Dining" (do-it-yourself restaurants) and pha yen (cold cloths wrapped in plastic used to freshen up before meals or whenever). Each two-page spread includes a half-page column of around 350 fast-paced words and a single large atmospheric image, most by Croatian photojournalist Sasa Kralj.

It's no mean feat to introduce and encapsulate a pop phenomenon in so few words and be funny at the same time. Take for example the first sentence about fortune tellers: "If fortune telling is any sort of barometer, Bangkok must be the quintessential City of the Future." Or the one about whiskey, coke and ice: "The art of sharing cheap Thai whiskey at a loud Bangkok pub has all the ritualistic fidgeting of an elaborate Japanese tea ceremony, but little of the elegance or flair."

Among the 17 small photos on the cover of Very Thai are contemporary interpretations of traditional folk customs like Buddha images (in plastic), wooden bracelets (with painted Hello Kitty faces) and monk basket offerings (miniaturized). They hint at the scope of this book which, as author Philip Cornwel-Smith explains in his introduction, "celebrates the miscellany of Thai life, whether folk or formal, pop or ethnic, homegrown or imported."

Longtime Bangkok resident Mr. Cornwel-Smith covers each of his 65 topics in an exhaustively researched 800-1,500 words. "I wanted to get to the root of things rather than just write observations and anecdotes," explains the British-born author, who from 1994 to 2002 edited the capital's first listings magazine Bangkok Metro before moving on to edit Time Out's hugely successful Bangkok city guide.

Very Thai rewards the conscientious reader with astonishing detail on an eclectic range of subjects like pink napkins, soap operas, ghost stories, modern shrines and truck & bus art, to name a few. Each chapter is its own minicourse on Thai history, sociology, anthropology and politics.

"The West drinks Red Bull to play harder; the Thai drink it to work harder" begins the chapter on the country's best-selling energy drink. Mr. Cornwel-Smith goes on to describe the ingredients, why Thai men drink it (because they often need to stay awake to work two jobs), its origins, competing brands and their marketing strategies (such as getting famous singers to promote them). Sprinkled throughout are ancillary tidbits about Thai sleeping habits, patriotism, notions of celebrity and recent governmental controls on traditional folk remedies.

Very Thai is peppered with interviews and quotes from a daunting variety of sources. For readers whose minutia quotient remains unsatisfied, an extensive bibliography and index provides useful reference material. (Bring out your magnifying glass!) Complementing the 100,000-plus words are 500 colorful photos by Mr. Cornwel-Smith and John Goss, another longtime resident.

If Bangkok Inside Out is the easy-to-read hors d'oeuvre that whets readers' appetites about Thai pop culture, Very Thai dishes up the substantial main course. My only criticism is that both have a tendency to overdo what they do best. At times the former verges on being too cute, while the latter gets wordy and overly academic. None of this, however, significantly detracts from what should become required reading for visitors, longtime residents and anyone anywhere interested in what makes Thailand tick.

Taken from The Asian Wall Street Journal

Book Review: Bangkok Inside Out
by Lang Reid

Bangkok Inside Out was co-authored by Daniel Ziv (a seasoned peripatetic) and Guy Sharett who has managed to sit still long enough to put down some roots in Bangkok. It was released in 2005 (Equinox Publishing, ISBN 979-97964-6-6) and printed in Thailand.

It is a collection of illustrated essays, arranged alphabetically like a guide book, and that is about as close as it gets to the usual tourist oriented guide to Bangkok. The authors state in their Introduction and Rules of Engagement that “This book isn’t really a guide to Bangkok. There’s no map in here or sections on where to stay and how to get around. Instead, it’s a street level snapshot of a twenty-first century Southeast Asian city bursting at the seams. Our approach is raw and cheeky and irreverent at times, but we think of it as honest and real.”

The bulk of the photography in the book is through the lens of Croatian Sasa Kralj who manages to impart the urgency that is part of Bangkok. A still photography ‘cinema verite’ that I found particularly appealing.

The Contents include such subjects that do make up Thailand and Bangkok, but ignored by the mainstream guidebooks. Comics, Fakes, Fortune tellers, Gambling, Hi-So/Lo-So, Krating Daeng (Red Bull), Motosai, Pollution, 7-Eleven, Soi dogs and even Yaa Baa are featured.

At the back of the book there is an amusing episode called My Grace Hotel Weekend, and whilst it is a humorous interlude, I would have preferred more subjects being dealt with by the authors. Mind you, it is difficult to imagine just what subjects were not covered by the energetic pair of writers!

I was initially a little wary of this book, as the back cover proclaimed, “Bangkok Inside Out is an illuminating pop culture exploration of life in Thailand’s frenzied capital.” Being old enough that the closest I can now get to “pop” culture is being called “Pops” by young Americans (crass creatures), I was prepared to dislike this publication. After only a couple of pages I was looking forward to turning to the next topic, the writing infectiously carrying the reader through one amusing vignette to the next. If this is “pop culture” I am ready to join!

It is probably the most authentic Bangkok book that you will see on the shelves. It is a paperback you can send overseas that will try and