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Traditional values featured in Pattaya’s April 13 Songkran parade and festival

Château visit in Bordeaux

Indian delegation visits Pattaya to savor the sights of fun city

Sheraton Grande Sunday Menu: Buffet Lunch and Jazz A La Carte

Traditional values featured in Pattaya’s April 13 Songkran parade and festival

Horse drawn floral floats, Thai costumes, dancing and decorations from all 4 regions of Thailand highlighted the parade.

April 13 was the official national Songkran holiday in Thailand and throughout the Southeast Asian region. It has long been considered the unofficial Thai New Year (it was for a time the official Thai New Year), and Family Day. And although everywhere else the celebrations end on April 15, in Pattaya they last throughout the week, culminating in total water throwing madness on April 19.

Mayor Pairat Suthithamrongsawat arrived at the festivities by horse drawn carriage.

This year, the City of Pattaya joined the rest of the Kingdom in trying to calm things down whilst attempting to bring back traditional Thai values during the celebrations. Talcum powder, ice water and high-powered water guns, including modified PVC pumps, were officially banned, and police warned that violations could result in up to 2000 baht fines. People were, are still are, being asked to respect the rights of others, many of whom, despite the holiday, must still try to make a living and get to work.

Pattaya’s Songkran Festival featured stage performances, games and plays.

The intended spirit of the ancient festival is one of gentleness and thankfulness, paying respect to elders and showing appreciation for the gift of life-giving water.

To help promote these traditional values, the city organized a parade and festival on the extended Walking Street along Beach Road from Central to South Pattaya.

Devout Buddhist poured water over statues of Buddha.

The festivities began early in the day. Starting at 6 a.m., alms were given to 90 monks, who then blessed the faithful by sprinkling holy water onto them using a their sacred wisp.

Later in the day, beginning at 3 p.m., a parade was held, featuring horse drawn carriages, long drums, traditional Thai costumes and decorations from all four parts of Thailand.

After the parade, Mayor Pairat and friends paid respect to their elders in the traditional way.

Following the parade, people paid respect to the town’s elderly, gently pouring small amounts of water over their hands from silver cups. Many also observed the tradition of pouring water over Buddha statues.

Indigenous Thai instruments were featured during the parade.

The theme behind this year’s much smaller version of Pattaya’s Songkran Festival was to show Thai and foreign tourists how to uphold the traditional ways of celebrating Songkran. Traditional games were played, ancient stage plays were performed, and beautiful maidens in traditional costumes performed Thai dances.

There was still the small army of beer-filled farangs and service girls who chose to ignore traditional Thai values and soak everyone in sight. However, this year by doing so they just might contribute to the filling of police coffers, as there has been a 2000 baht fine announced for using PVC pipes (like the ones shown here), ice water and talcum powder.


Château visit in Bordeaux

By Ranjith Chandrasiri

Bordeaux region has over 9,000 wineries, sixty cooperative cellars and four hundred wine shippers according to the statistics available from the official trade organization - the CIVB (Conseil Interprofessionnel du Vin de Bordeaux). There are more than 13,000 growers harvesting grapes each year, and about 5,000 châteaux bottle their own wines. However, it’s the top 100 or so superstar châteaux of the region that attract the world’s attention.

Ranjith and Chitra Chandrasiri with Bruno Sainson barrel tasting the Chโteau Laroque Grand Cru vintage 2000 in the main cellar.

At the very top end of the market are the heavyweights such as Margaux, Latour, Mouton-Rothschild, Lafite Rothschild, Haut-Brion, P้trus, Cheval-Blanc and Ausone with the greatest demand and highest-priced wines. In recent years, a number of small-producers from St.-Emilion and Pomerol have challenged the market leadership, and they have become highly sought after by Bordeaux wine collectors. Their wines are often sold for higher prices than the traditional leaders. Among these newcomers are Château Le Pin, L’Église Clinet, La Mondotte and Valandraud. Each year a surprising number of small new producers, often called “vins de garage” (garage wines) since their production is so small and the wines are made in small wineries in the size of a “garage”, suddenly become superstars in the world of wine. Collectors and speculators are invariably on the lookout for top quality, limited productions, especially from St.-Emilion and Pomerol for their future potential. It’s a star search for the next Château P้trus, Le Pin or Valandraud.

This doesn’t mean that the most expensive wines are always the best. Particularly in a top vintage, “lesser” producers may make equally outstanding wines. For instance, one of the top wines made in the legendary vintage of 1990 was Sociando-Mallet, a low-ranked château (with an official rating of cru bourgeois) that consistently makes some of the best wines of the region.

Château Laroque, a Grand Cru Class้ of St.-Emilion is one of my picks for an outstanding wine that is still affordable compared to some of the astonishingly priced wines in the appellation. Among many other factors, uncompromising quality control, dedication and the skills of the wine maker are the most important human factors for making high quality wines. In 1982, when Bruno Sainson became the estate manager of Château Laroque, he launched a quality policy that has been rigorously and enthusiastically maintained in the past two decades under his leadership. Vineyard management was carefully integrated with a large-scale investment project as part of a long-term development plan. The best vineyard plots were carefully replanted while the winemaking and ageing methods were upgraded. Years of hard work and dedication finally paid off when Château Laroque was awarded the Grand Cru Class้ status in the 1996 St.-Emilion classification review. This award means recognition for Chโteau Laroque, but is not the “be all and end all”; its pursuit of quality remains unwavering, justifying its position among the leading wines of the appellation.

Properties in St.-Emilion and Pemerol are generally small, family run affairs with an absence of a grandiose chโteau. You will be quite surprised to see even the great Château P้trus is actually no more than a couple of buildings in which the wines are made and matured with no grand château in sight. In this aspect, Château Laroque is unique compared to its famous superstar neighbours. It boasts a magnificent chโteau, a glorious example of Louis XIV architecture with finely crafted wrought iron work, wide straight garden walks decorated with statues and balusters in the foreground of the grand building with pale stone fa็ade and large ornate windows. Its elegant white silhouette stands gracefully overlooking the Dordogne River Valley, rising above the tiny rolling hills embedded in a lush green quilt of vineyards. Restoration of the old château is on the cards in the long term development plan, but for Bruno, the most important priority for now is perfecting his wine.

The estate dates back to the distant era of Anglo-Norman invasion. All that remains of that feudal past is an imposing tower that had been left standing when the château was built in the seventeenth century. The vineyard had also been planted around that time and had been under the ownership of the Marquis de Rochefort-Lavie family. Revival of the estate began in 1935, when the Beaumartin family started redeveloping the vineyard, replanting 40 hectares with new vines, which had continued until the early 1960s.

Today it is the largest wine estate in St.-Emilion, with a total of 83 hectares in one block including 58 under vine. Château Laroque has the advantage of the diversity of different soil types and exposure to sun in its large estate, which spreads over several hills and slopes in this sought after region. Bruno strongly believes that the wine must reflect the true character of the terrior and the grape variety. 87% of the vineyard is planted with Merlot which expresses its full character on clay-limestone soil, 11% Cabernet Franc and 2% Cabernet Sauvignon which draw their elegance from stonier slopes.

Bruno places great emphasis on selection of the best grapes from the oldest vines for the Château Laroque wine. Grapes are hand picked from different plots and fermented separately in batches corresponding to the precise area of the vineyard they come from. Yields are deliberately repressed to achieve the concentration required for a great wine. When I inquired about the under utilized production capacity in the large winery, Bruno’s answer was simple, “Our goal is to produce quality wines, not large quantities”.

Wine is aged in oak barrels (50% new) in the carefully guarded shelter of the two large cellars. Samples from each barrel are tasted several times a year and are subjected to graded tastings before selecting the best to make the Grand Cru Class้ wine. This strict quality control is fully justified by the remarkable character of Château Laroque and its promotion to Grand Cru Class้ status.

Ranjith Chandrasiri is the resident manager of the Royal Cliff Grand, Royal Cliff Beach Resort, Pattaya. Email: [email protected] or [email protected]


Indian delegation visits Pattaya to savor the sights of fun city

Air India launches its maiden flight from Gauhati to Bangkok

Air-India commenced international flights from Lokpriya Gopinath Bordoloi International Airport, Gauhati (sometimes aka Guwahati) North East India to Bangkok on April 4, with the maiden flight including a delegation of Indian government ministers, journalists and travel agents. Among them was Syed Shahnawaz Hussain, Union Minister of Civil Aviation, who along with colleagues and family visited Pattaya and the surrounding region.

On their visit to Pattaya, the delegates stopped by the Thai Garden Resort for a buffet dinner and chat with Ashley Moneiro (far left), MD of Pathfinders Travel Co., Ltd., who organizes tours in Thailand for Indian tourists, Anil Rai (2nd left), manager - destination management services, Cox & Kings, India’s oldest and biggest travel agency, Pattaya Mail’s Sue Malhotra (3rd left), Thai Garden Resort GM Rene Pisters (back center), Union Minister of Civil Aviation Syed Shahnawaz Hussain (center right), guest relations manager of the Thai Garden Resort Elfi Seitz (2nd from right), and Rajeev Kale (far right), general manager of contracting for Leisure, Cox & Kings.

The Air India route has opened a new gateway for Assam and other North Eastern states of India - Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Sikkim and Tripura, providing increased activity throughout the region, by promoting tourism in more or less unexplored tourist destinations in the Indian North Eastern region.

The North East also boasts of several places of historical interest, including magnificent palaces. The religious minded can visit the splendid temples, Buddhist monasteries or churches and it is that which Syed Shahnawaz Hussain wished to emphasize on his visit to Thailand. Hussain said, “This is the biggest news. The northeastern area is where Buddhism began and we want to promote this through Buddhist countries. It is similar to Mecca and Medina for the Muslim population of the world. We plan to have an ‘Open Sky’ policy where everyone can visit the region.”

The Indian government has spent over 1,120 million rupees (1.05 billion baht) in upgrading the airport and the surrounding infrastructure to support the project.

“We also want to promote eco-tourism in the northeast and within the next few months, we (the Indian government and civil aviation) will open another international airport in Gaiya,” Hussain said.

The Northeast of India is a veritable melting pot of culture and modern flavors, with exotic wildlife, exquisite textiles, tribal shawls which are available in a variety of colors and designs, cane and bamboo artifacts, and other unusual souvenirs, as well lush green tea gardens and numerous golf courses to play on, many of which have air strips nearby. The capital, Assam is considered an important commercial hub of the region, representing the spirit of modern India, the gateway to the north east, with Gauhati straddling the banks of the Brahmaputra River.

During his brief visit to Pattaya, Hussain and the delegates visited a number of tourist destinations such as Alcazar and Koh Larn. He said that he was very impressed with Thailand and its people.

Syed Shahnawaz Hussain is India’s youngest ever cabinet minister and at 32, he has already held five senior government positions, making him one of the more experienced members of Indian Parliament. He is being described by many as one of the most dynamic and politically aggressive leaders on the sub-continent. He also sits on the board of Air India.

Air-India will be undertaking an aggressive marketing campaign to promote services to suit travelers with varied budgets from Gauhati to the Far East. Air-India will organize familiarization tours for journalists from the Far East to this picturesque region, which has so much to offer to the discerning traveler.


Sheraton Grande Sunday Menu: Buffet Lunch and Jazz A La Carte

Story and photos by Peter Cummins

Everyone has a birthday and, for the fortunate, it is a day of celebrations, fun - and, even - a dinner with wine, as we become adults. The Sheraton Grande Sukhumvit recently had a birthday - and it was a splendid affair. It was actually the first anniversary of the Sheraton’s now-famous “Jazzy Brunch”. This most popular Sunday buffet lunch, which extends well into the afternoon, features an absolutely sumptuous spread of food from the ‘four corners of the world”, liberally placed around amongst salads, oysters, deserts; in fact, it would be hard to imagine anything missing from the huge lay-out. But why “Jazzy”? I thought it meant the term often used to indicate something modern, up-market - even hip, if you wish - such as, “That’s a ‘jazzy’ tie you are wearing!”

Richard Chapman and Sheraton Grande staff celebrate the first birthday. At left is radio/television star, Jennifer Su.

Although certainly in a linguistic sense it does mean up-market, hip etc., in this case it means REAL JAZZ (which, of course, also relates to those other meanings) and there, to honour the Sheraton’s first birthday celebrations and entertain the capacity crowd, were two award-winning jazz musicians, the “Two for Brazil” duo, Paulinho Garcia and Greg Fishman, recently awarded the coveted title of the “Best Jazz Entertainer(s) of 2001” at the Twenty-first Annual Chicago Music Awards”. In fact, it seemed that half of Bangkok was also having birthdays that day: more than six times during the show the “Two for Brazil” veered away from the Latin flavour to break into a rousing “Happy Birthday” for someone at one of the tables. Even this Pattaya Mail special correspondent entered the “Birthday Stakes”.

Sheraton general manager Richard Chapman, with Denis Thouvard, director of Sheraton Food and Beverage and a bevy of beautiful staff members standing by cut the ceremonial ribbon across the entrance of Rossini’s, to usher in the second year of Bangkok’s favourite social rendezvous - especially on Sundays. Anyone who is anyone around the metropolis was there, including well-known television and radio personality Jennifer Su, sporting her trademark hat for the occasion.

The “Two for Brazil”, Paulinho Garcia (L) and Greg Fishman go Latin, with a few ‘happy birthdays’ in between.

The Sheraton, which excelled in the numerous categories of excellence cited in current listings of the annual Metro Awards for Food and Nightlife, literally ‘ran away’ with the Metro award for the “Best Brunch Buffet”.

At under 1,000 baht per adult (half for children), with the superior service which is the hallmark of this great hotel, a smiling and friendly staff and, undoubtedly, the best food in a city renowned for great food, next time you stay in Bangkok on Sunday, you owe it to yourself to spend a few hours at the “Jazzy Brunch”. Of course the “Two for Brazil” will not be playing but, for sure, there will be an equally talented group there, while you enjoy the superb ambience for a few delightful hours.

The only problem is that when you return outside to the streets of Bangkok, you will have forgotten that you were actually in Bangkok and not in Paris or Rio.

Bon Appetit!


The Rotary Club
of Jomtien-Pattaya

Skal International

Pattaya Fun City
By The Sea

www.pattayarotary.org