COLUMNS
HEADLINES [click on headline to view story]:

Money matters

Snap Shots

Modern Medicine

Heart to Heart with Hillary

Learn to Live to Learn

DOC ENGLISH Teaching your kids how to learn English

Let’s go to the movies

tech tips with Mr.Tech Savvy


Money matters:   Graham Macdonald MBMG International Ltd.

The Writing is on the Wall (St) part 3

One notable side-effect of Meyer’s success was that the performance-related compensations for Meyer and his team significantly exceeded those paid to either endowment managers at other universities or to faculty staff at Harvard and which were widely reported in various Massachusetts publications. The end result of which was that Meyer and a number of key team members relinquished their posts in 2005, although Meyer’s skills have been retained as an external consultant at the same market prices, but somehow paying amounts to a consultant is different in the eyes of Harvard’s faculty staff and creates less difficulties.
Meyer, along with his counterpart David Swensen at Yale, had shown how to successfully integrate hedge fund, private equity, and real asset holdings into their portfolios, thereby increasing returns, reducing risk and enhancing overall efficiency. A good barometer of this was the downturn of 2000-02, when the super-endowments massively outperformed the free-falling markets, despite having also generated better than average returns under the preceding favourable market conditions.
This made uncomfortable reading for many pension plans and as Michael C Litt has pointed out in his excellent writings, the more sophisticated ones decided to more closely examine the Harvard and Yale models. Many decided and even publicised their views that “alpha is a zero-sum game”. They said the rest of the investment world pays for the additional returns generated by the super endowments and that only a very, very few pension funds and a limited number of investment managers, such as MitonOptimal, knew what they were doing. This is because operating within SEC frameworks doesn’t permit the flexibility to generate alpha in the same way that super endowments or offshore funds can as both fall under different regulatory regimes.
So, in one sense the super endowments are a happy accident of fate - because they don’t have to follow the anachronistic SEC rules pertaining to portfolio management. They can profit from the opportunities that SEC regulated funds have to forego. Mind you, the space that the SEC rules has created is huge and so far only a small handful have exploited that, from Alfred Jones to Jack Meyer to David Swensen to Sam Liddle, Martin Gray and Scott Campbell at MitonOptimal. But it is not just these people, the team at Frontier have been achieving good results as well. By the use of the multi-asset class approach they have done well whilst not exposing their clients to too much volatility. This is done by:
• Exposure to eight asset classes: traditional and alternative.
• Asset allocation inspired by the large US University Endowment Funds.
• Diversification across asset classes generates different risk adjusted returns.
• Six assets classes accessed through low cost index replication.
• Disciplined and systematic rebalancing.
• Three funds offering different levels of exposure using leverage.
The proof of the pudding is in the eating and all of the above cannot be wrong.
One of the least understood aspects of the global economy over the last few years has been the way that central banks ensured that liquidity was pumped feverishly into all markets creating equity, private equity and property bubbles, while at the same time talking in severe tones about inflation and hiking interest rates. This may not be quite smoke and mirrors but certainly a case of doing one thing while pretending to do the opposite.
Policy makers are now committed to at least giving the impression of cutting interest rates but are faced by the dearth of liquidity in the credit markets. Three-month LIBOR rates hit a 20-year high recently. The falling asking price for swaps shows that there is an expectation that rates will gradually fall over the next 5 years.
In the third quarter of 2007, in the aftermath of sub prime, the following happened:
* Morgan Stanley announced write-offs much higher than Wall Street expected.
* UBS has reported a CHF 4,000,000,000 loss on its fixed income division, taking the entire bank into the red, heralding a management restructuring that has cost 1500 jobs and warning that the outlook would be difficult for the Swiss behemoth if credit markets don’t improve.
* Chuck Prince, chief executive of Citigroup, has faced calls for his removal since the bank revealed it suffered US$6bn of write-downs and losses in the third quarter after turmoil in the credit markets.
* Deutsche Bank’s results saw a write down of US$ 2,200,000,000 and a profit warning (along with UBS, CitiGroup and Credit Suisse).
* Merrill Lynch have taken a US$5,000,000,000 write down, dismissed many senior executives and are expected to suffer the consequences of their exposures for some time to come. Their CEO, Stan O’Neal, did issue this gem of an understatement: “While market conditions were extremely difficult and the degree of sustained dislocation unprecedented, we are disappointed in our performance in structured finance and mortgages. We can do a better job in managing this risk.”
The toll of big bank losses from the credit squeeze has already topped $20,000,000,000! These people are going to want their money back. We all know who is going to pay for that!
All in all a lot of red faces on Wall Street ... and these are among the best known names when it comes to managing other people’s money.
What this implies to us is that debt is at a premium now - borrowing is difficult and this is likely to impact the real economy whatever the central banks do. This will be one of the catalysts for the imminent severe market downturn which will see borrowing costs forced lower as liquidity gradually returns to a stagnant market. It’s looking as though things won’t pick up for a couple of years. That’s not just our opinion - it’s what the credit markets are telling us based on money supply.

The above data and research was compiled from sources believed to be reliable. However, neither MBMG International Ltd nor its officers can accept any liability for any errors or omissions in the above article nor bear any responsibility for any losses achieved as a result of any actions taken or not taken as a consequence of reading the above article. For more information please contact Graham Macdonald on [email protected]@mbmg-international.com.com



Snap Shots: by Harry Flashman

Wall Art with Wow!

When you take any shot, you should be hoping that the end result will make people go “Wow! How did you get that effect?” Most of those photographs are difficult to do, and the end result often a case of trial and error. However, this week I will show you how to get a Wow image, and you do not need any special equipment at all - other than an ‘old’ film camera.
This week’s column refers very much to wall “art”. When you hang something on the wall, you want an image with ‘Wow factor’ that has an immediate effect on people. This trick will give you that image with Wow. The end result will be such that people will say for years, “How in heck did you take that? Was it a special kind of filter?”
Well, the good news is that you do not need to know anything about filters, let alone use one. The next piece of good news is that you also do not need to know anything about f stops, shutter speeds, zoom lenses, reciprocity failure or the like. Any film camera will do – even a cheap point and shooter!
The first step is to pop down to the photoshop and buy some slide film. Don’t worry if you haven’t got a projector, never used slide film before or any other of the excuses. If you normally use 100 ASA print film then get some 100 ASA slide film. Do not get the Kodachrome type that you have to send away for processing, just get ordinary slide film that can be processed here.
OK, load the camera with the slide film (it’s just the same to load as print film - for most cameras, put in the cassette, pull the tail across and shut the back of the camera!)
The final result looks best with landscapes - include some sky, or seascapes where you include a yacht or similar close up, or a river scene, and finish the roll of film.
Now take the film back to the shop for processing and here is an important part. You ask for E6 slide processing, but do not mount the slides! Leave the slides either as a roll or cut into strips of six and put in sleeves like your usual print film negatives. Impress this on the girl behind the counter. You do not want them mounted. Repeat the instructions!
When you get the slide films back, just hold them up to the light and select any one shot that you like the look of. You can choose the image in the shop even. You don’t have to be super-selective.
Now talk to the girl behind the counter, saying, “I want you to print number X as if this is a negative. I know it is slide film, but I want you to print a picture, using this slide as the negative.” It will probably take quite some repeating before the technician will reluctantly take the job on, with much warnings about it will not look right, etc. Ignore all warnings, just have faith. While you are at it, tell them that you do not want the usual small size, but get an enlargement done straight off. 10” x 8” is sufficient and costs less than 100 baht. The photoshops generally call this size 8R. Repeat your instructions, tell them you know the color will be wrong and leave them to it.
You see, what happens with color prints is that the processing machine recognizes certain colors in the normal negative and converts that to green for grass, blue for skies, etc., in a photochemical way. By giving the autoprocessor grass that is already green and skies already blue totally confuses its auto brain (and the girl in the shop usually) and it will produce a print with the wildest psychedelic colors you will ever see. Expect orange trees and yellow skies - you can get anything! It is almost impossible to predict, but the end result will certainly have that Wow I promised you. Try it this weekend. You will not be disappointed.


Modern Medicine: by Dr. Iain Corness, Consultant

Is caffeine a killer?

Did you have a cup of coffee this morning? If you did, and you are pregnant, then one more cup in the next 24 hours is dangerous, according to some researchers. However, if you are not pregnant, you may be reducing your risk of ovarian cancer, one of the top six killer cancers! And where does ‘decaff’ fit into all this?
Every week in the lay press you are bombarded with horror stories of what dangers we all face. These horror stories come from reports done by legitimate researchers, picked up by the media and away it goes from there.
On the surface, it all seems very probable. Take the two cups of caffeine and be ready to miscarry item. Dr De-Kun Li of Kaiser Permanente Division of Research, whose study appears in the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology said, “Women who are pregnant or are actively seeking to become pregnant should stop drinking coffee for three months or hopefully throughout pregnancy.”
Dr Li and colleagues study involved 1063 pregnant women who were members of the Kaiser Permanente health plan in San Francisco from October 1996 through October 1998. Women in the group never changed their caffeine consumption during pregnancy.
What they found was women who consumed the equivalent of two or more cups of regular coffee or five 340ml cans of caffeinated soft drink - were twice as likely to miscarry as pregnant women who avoided caffeine.
This risk appeared to be related to the caffeine, rather than other chemicals in coffee, because they also saw an increased risk when the caffeine was consumed in soft drink, tea, or hot chocolate.
Hold on a second! Now we have expanded to study to cover hot chocolate as well? The study of 1063 pregnant women in the two years from 1996-1998 is also a very small percentage of women world-wide who drink coffee while they are pregnant. What other commonalities were there in the 1063 women, that maybe they didn’t look for or ask about? Just being in San Francisco might be enough, perhaps?
However, two days after the shock-horror miscarriage item hit the world media, there was another report. Researchers now claim the much-demonized substance may fight cancer.
After studying more than 80,000 women, US and Australian experts found foods containing caffeine - such as coffee, tea, cola and chocolate - may reduce the risk of ovarian cancer, the sixth-most common cause of cancer deaths among Australian women.
According to Assistant Professor Shelley Tworoger of Harvard University in Boston and her colleagues - including medical epidemiologist Associate Professor Dorota Gertig of the University of Melbourne and Victorian Cytology Service - caffeine was beneficial, but decaffeinated coffee showed no health benefit at all.
For reasons they cannot yet explain, the group also found the beneficial effect of caffeine was strongest for women who had never used oral contraceptives or postmenopausal replacement hormone therapy.
The researchers analyzed data from the Nurses’ Health Study, an ongoing assessment of the well-being of 212,701 female registered nurses that began in 1976 when the nurses were aged 30-35.
Every two years, researchers at Boston’s Brigham and Women’s Hospital checked up on the surviving women. After studying the nurses’ history, Professor Tworoger and Professor Gertig’s group found only a very small association between smoking and mucinous tumours, a rare form of ovarian cancer. They also found no connection between alcohol consumption and ovarian cancer.
Oncologist Ian Olver, head of Cancer Council Australia, said the finding was interesting and based on a very comprehensive study. “It’s well worth looking into further,” Professor Olver said.
In the meantime, Professor Olver said coffee and chocolate couldn’t hurt and might even help. “My standard advice is everything in moderation,” he said.
The whole research really hangs on Professor Olver’s statement, “It’s well worth looking into further.” And research salaries and equipment costs money, and where does it come from? Make the biggest claims with the greatest amount of shock-horror and funding will be forthcoming. Mark my words, the chocolate manufacturers will jump on this like blowflies on a dead cow.
Now I must go and have a cup of coffee. I don’t have to worry, I’m male!


Heart to Heart with Hillary

Dear Hillary,
I am a single, mature English lady who has lived in Pattaya for 3 months, why is it that you don’t see white ladies out with young Thai men? There are lots of old and young white men out with their Thai ladies or Thai men for the evening, but not the other way round.
I know you can visit male go-go bars and get a handsome man for the evening but where do white ladies take their handsome Thai men? Is it because Thai men don’t like to be seen out with white ladies? I would love to take a handsome Thai man out for a meal, a drink and dancing, and I’m sure there must be plenty of ladies like myself who would love to do this also. So how do I address the balance, any suggestions?
Perplexed
Dear Perplexed (of Pattaya),
Goodness me, my Petal, just where in England are you from? Some strange little village where the height of excitement is the Maypole dances, and that’s only once a year? What is stopping you taking your handsome Thai man anywhere? It certainly is not “because Thai men don’t like to be seen out with white ladies.” On the contrary, Ms Perplexed, in some areas a white English lady would be looked upon as a bit of a prize, just like the trophy wives the English males like to get. I think you have some sort of psychological hang-up, and it is you who is afraid to be seen with a Thai man, not the other way round. As you say, there are plenty of male go-go’s and you don’t even have to go out of that locale to find a nice place to eat. Be brave, and let me know what happened after you took the public plunge! I am quite sure nobody will have thrown nasturtiums, or even aspersions.

Dear Hillary,
I am always on time for appointments as I think nobody should have to wait for me. My girlfriend is always late for appointments and says she is Thai so it doesn’t matter because everyone in Thailand is always late. Am I right or has she got it wrong?
Punctual Pete
Dear Punctual Pete,
Whilst I applaud your sense of timing, it won’t do much for you in Thailand, other than give you ulcers, Petal. You see, in Thailand, since your girlfriend fully expects to come back again, why hurry through this life? Enjoy it a pace that is easy to maintain. Everything will still be there tomorrow. The Thai people understand Thai time. However, if it is appointments with foreigners, then both sides expect you to be on time, so in that case, leave your girlfriend at home. Either that or secretly wind her watch forward by about an hour.

Dear Hillary,
With all the controversy about the smoking ban in pubs and restaurants and everyone up in arms about it, what do you think? Or are you some kind of reformed evangelical anti-smoker as well? Where do you stand?
Sam
Dear Sam,
And I presume that should be Sam the Smoker, judging by the tone of your letter, so where do I stand? Well, Petal it all depends what time of day. Early in the morning I stand over the sink and brush my teeth (or more correctly, tooth). Later in the day I stand beside my desk and read my mail from lovely people like you. However, to be serious, I am certainly no evangelist, though I am a non-smoker. So I am pleased about the bans because I don’t come home from my favorite pub with my hair smelling of tobacco smoke. That’s a plus for me. The old phrase “There’s no smoke without fire” should be changed these days to “There’s no smoke without a fiery disgruntled smoker!” I think you have to swallow the fact that world opinion isn’t with you, Sam, so you are going to have to alter your habits somewhat. By the way, I do not believe that the commercial world is going to grind to a halt because of a smoking ban. The shopping centers have been non-smoking areas for some years and they are still raking in profits. Pubs and restaurants will survive and the customers will still want to eat and drink, despite the doom and gloomsters. You go to restaurants because of the food, not to sniff the atmosphere.

Dear Hillary,
Last year I came over to Thailand for a holiday, and despite all the warnings, I purchased a condominium for a girl and each month I would send her money so she didn’t have to go back to the bar. Last month I decided to surprise my lady by flying in for a couple of days. I found a supposed friend of mine from the UK staying in the condo with her. He was paying her too it turned out. Hillary, is it always like this?
Depressed
Dear Depressed,
It takes two to tango, and while you are bitter about your girlfriend, Hillary would be more annoyed with your “friend” who betrayed you. I think it’s high time you selected both your men friends and your girlfriends more carefully. The local girls who work in bars do not have the security of rich families or MBA’s. They live by their wits. Don’t forget that, Petal.


Learn to Live to Learn: with Andrew Watson

Does anything ever really change?

I flicked through a copy of Newsweek from the turn of the year and read without the slightest surprise of the “Disneyland economy where nothing makes sense” of Hugo Chavez’s Venezuela. There’s a picture of the barrios (the slums) where violence, we are told, is on the increase. The 21st century socialist and self-styled people’s president recently lost a vote on constitutional reform that would have allowed him to stay in power indefinitely.
Somewhere else, there’s a huge spread of the man of the American moment, Barack Obama, riding the crest of a popular wave under the banner of a “New Dream” or some such platitude, with his words “Our time for change, has come”. America wants change; it just can’t work out what sort of change, apparently.
There’s an update on the latest abhorrent surge of extremism in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq, you name it, it’s there. Mr X is promising to do this to Mr Y and Mr A has already done that to Mrs B. Throughout the magazine, there are tales of death and glory, well executed to be sure, engaging, thought-provoking pieces which criss-cross the globe. But it’s difficult to escape the sensation that you’ve read it all before, that as Strummer said, “It’s just another story”.
Poor old Chavez is just the latest in a depressing line of aspirant leaders who sweep to power on the platform of radical change, only to fall into the same old traps as innumerable false prophets before them. Traps that might very well have been carefully laid for them, but traps nonetheless, into which they stroll like naïve children, seemingly deaf to the pied piper of history’s well rehearsed tune, tragically blind to the consequences of their ignorant disregard of history, oblivious of the well-worn path to oblivion. So Venezuela’s massive oil industry, no longer in thrall to the United States, through which Chavez promised a better life for his people, siphons unseen profits to who knows where, whilst the well-being of the majority doesn’t seem to have been greatly enhanced by the revolutionary experience.
I feel I have seen it all before. I seem to remember Mrs Thatcher doing much the same with North Sea oil, allegedly squandering reserves for personal political gain. Lula of Brazil is another who seems incapable of arresting the spin of ever decreasing spirals of decline. Fifteen years ago, the first democratically elected president of Brazil in 29 years, Fernando Collor de Mello, was the new face of new Brazil; but with sense of unrestrained farce, within in a couple of years, he was impeached on corruption charges. The Cruzeiro plunged in value. On an unpleasantly regular basis, stories would surface of the mass murder of street children at the hands of the police; it was Brazilian business as usual. Now Lula’s in power, another man rejuvenating socialism, but it all seems so much more Groucho Marx than Karl, worse still H.G. Wells. You can pick up a news article today and another from twenty years ago and find the same rather depressing tale of Amazonian destruction; all that has changed is the scale and rate of devastation. Rhetoric related to improving the situation has been gushing, but action damningly barren. Nothing has improved, in fact quite the reverse.
Does this constitute change? I don’t think so; somehow, I think by “change” I mean “change for the better”. It’s as if a great conspiracy existed whereby each new generation is told of a variety of crimes against humanity and nature as if they are new phenomena and that somehow becoming aware of an increasingly desperate global situation is itself enough to satiate and satisfy conscience. Occasionally, cursory gestures are made by the few people in the world capable of effecting change, to turn otherwise empty words into something more tangible, only to reveal an appalling lack of determination or interest in pursuing moral and ethical codes to logical conclusion.
The Kyoto protocol is perhaps the most obvious failure of this kind, although I remember a United Nations sponsored Rio de Janeiro jamboree in June 1992, which attracted no fewer than 172 governments from around the world, 108 at levels of heads of state or government. There is a certain acrid irony in so many world leaders attending a “jolly” ostensibly related to “Environment and Development” in a country where applications of morality to both are recognisable only by their absence. All that we are left with are gestures without accountability. A thing of the past? I’m afraid not. Last month, more than 1,000 participants from around the world gathered in Bali, Indonesia to “build integrity on the basis of the world’s blueprint for fighting corruption - the United Nations Convention against Corruption.” The irony is un-missable.
Barack Obama has been (perhaps inevitably) likened to Martin Luther King (from whom he borrows) and more preposterously has drawn as yet unsubstantiated comparisons with Mandela and even Ghandi. Ironically, given that he is running against his missus, he might just be the next Clinton. Bill was the last “new thing”, suave, intelligent and young. He was America’s Blair and Schroeder wrapped into one. But did anything change? He might have got Arafat and Barak together at Camp David, but nothing came of it. Did US foreign policy change in any discernable way?
In retrospect it all seems like bluster, maybe bluff. However much we might yearn for a US president of greater understanding and compassion, someone less of a war-monger perhaps, whom amongst their recent leaders has demonstrated anything different from the other? The first George W. Bush administration, for example, was populated with cold war dinosaurs from the Nixon era. From Rumsfeld to Cheney, it was a rather unpleasant example of political reincarnation, with at least one predictable result; war. You might have thought that US politicians who had anything to do with disasters like either Vietnam or arming Iraq might permanently have been put out to pasture. But not in the good old US of A. A cynic might suggest that like in many other kinds of organisations, some people just get promoted to their next level of incompetence. Like I said, it appears that until people change, nothing else will.
Next week: Change Agents


DOC ENGLISH Teaching your kids how to learn English:

Frequently asked questions

‘Just how do children learn a new language?’ ‘What’s the best time to learn a new language’ and ‘How quickly can you expect results?’ Parents tend to ask me these questions all the time. Generally I say that it depends on the individual child, how much exposure to English they have had, how competent they are in their native language, how motivated they are, how much support we as teachers can give them, etc. Actually I don’t usually know the answers as there are so many factors at play. However, I do know that parents can have a major influence over how quickly their child can acquire a new language through supporting their child at home.
If your child is learning Thai and you want them to learn English, what is the best age for you to introduce your child to the second language? Most language research has shown that to become truly fluent it helps if your child is exposed to both languages simultaneously, preferably in infancy and in natural situations (not formal lessons). I do feel that younger children appear to make incredible progress in English compared with later years, as they are not shy and they learn quickly through play. They are not embarrassed about asking a million questions and they need the answers right now! Research has shown that the early years are perhaps the best time to acquire a new language (there are cognitive reasons relating to the development of the brain and social reasons also - children being less inhibited at this stage and parents and carers perhaps being more willing to listen and help the younger children).
If your child first learns Thai and then English at a later stage, there is a chance that there will be ‘language interference’ affecting your child’s ability to learn the second language (English). Language interference is common in Thailand as most Thais learn English at a stage later than infancy. This is why some Thais insert a vowel into a word that has two adjacent consonants (“I go sa-wim”) and ignore the end consonant sound in words like ‘like’ and ‘out’ (because they are applying Thai pronunciation rules to English words - quite logical really).
Often children learning two languages simultaneously may be slow to start speaking for the first time. This is because they have to listen to more language input than the average child. Be patient with them, if you live in a house where more than one language is spoken, then this apparent reluctance to speak is natural.
Children who are introduced to a second language in pre-school may stop speaking their first language for a period of time (known as the ‘silent period’). If your child is starting at an international kindergarten, expect them to be a little confused over which language to speak and when. They may speak in sentences that mix the two languages together. This is an effective strategy and should be encouraged during the early stages of learning a language. Don’t worry; your child will learn to differentiate between the two languages at a later stage.
Often in an international school environment, children starting late in the educational system do not get enough support in their native first language (such as Thai) and this can cause academic failure as they are not strong in either language. Research has shown that children who are strong in their first language make better second language speakers, so encourage your child to study hard in both English and Thai. Amazingly, children who are fluent in more than one language also do better in other subjects such as Maths or Science. It’s as if learning more languages helps them improve cognitively. It also helps them socially because they can make friends from countries other than their own!
I generally find that children starting school for the first time with little or no English have a really tough time. They are generally silent for the first few weeks as they are unable to communicate and join in with lessons without a great deal of support. They find listening for long periods very tedious and frustrating so short, fun easy tasks are best at first and teachers employ lots of different methods (using gesture, picture clues, and translation) to help students understand.
Children need lots of encouragement to keep them buoyant and tasks that are pitched at their level. It’s important to be aware of their motivational levels during the first few weeks. If your child is starting at an international or bilingual school for the first time you should talk to them daily about what they have studied and try to set some time aside to talk and practice English with them. Show interest in what they are doing in school and encourage them to invite new friends round. Buy them books to encourage them to read in English and new stationery to help them study in class.
So how long does it take to learn a language? Experts say that most children (with non-native English speaking parents) can learn basic interpersonal communication skills within 2-3 years, but it really depends on the daily opportunities they have to speak and practice English. The ability to join in and study all lessons in English and use English as a ‘working language’ make take another 3-5 years. For students studying English for only a few hours a week, the process may be much longer. This is assuming that English is not generally spoken at home.
There is a need for increasing numbers of bilingual speakers in our continually shrinking global economy, so encourage your child to take up a new language. Having failed to master Thai I have taken up Chinese, so I may be ‘biting off more than I can chew’. However, learning a new language helps me emphasize and understand what my students may be going through, so perhaps you could try it too. There are plenty of language schools around Pattaya and many of the classes offered are not expensive, so go ahead and learn a new language yourself!
That’s all for this week. As always, if you have any queries about English education you can mail me at: doceng [email protected]. Enjoy spending time with your child.


Let’s go to the movies: by Mark Gernpy

Now playing in Pattaya
Mist: US Horror – The Stephen King novella transferred to the screen by Frank Darabont (screenplay and director), who did the same for King’s The Green Mile and The Shawshank Redemption. There seems to be a wide divergence of opinion on this film, from those who love it to those who hate it. In this story, a group of terrified townspeople are trapped in a grocery store by a strange, otherworldly mist, and there are “things” lurking in the mist. Rated R in the US for violence, terror, and gore. Mixed or average reviews.
Charlie Wilson’s War: US Drama – Directed by Mike Nichols. Starring Tom Hanks, Julia Roberts, and Phillip Seymour Hoffman. It’s about how an unlikely trio of influential and colorful characters conspired to generate covert financial and weapons support for the Afghan Mujahideen to defeat the Russians in the 1980s – and armed America’s future enemies in the process. The film is snappy, amusing, and ruefully ironic, with a startling performance by Hoffman – but after yet another viewing, I find the tone all wrong. See if you don’t agree that the point of view is conflicting and confusing. But entertaining, yes, as long as it lasts; it’s just that for me everything evaporates after I leave the theater. Rated R in the US for strong language, nudity/sexual content. Generally favorable reviews.
Jumper: US Adventure/Sci-Fi – Boy, is this a bad movie! I mean, really bad! I try very hard not to be negative, so here goes: If you check all your brains at the door, you might enjoy the mindless action without worrying about the truly stupid script. And for sure you will enjoy the scenic places he “jumps” to. Generally negative reviews.
Kod (Handle Me With Care): Thai Romance/Drama – A three-armed man from Lampang worries he might be considered a freak, and decides to remove one of his two left arms, but his new girlfriend (likewise a freak: she has huge boobs) likes him just the way he is. Some nice scenery and photography, but I found it very slow and dull. Let’s see who can come up with a limerick with the first line: “A three-armed man from Lampang . . . “
Kung Fu Dunk: Hong Kong/Taiwan Sports/Comedy – With superstar Jay Chou as an orphan turned Shaolin martial artist who somehow ends up playing basketball using his Shaolin skills. Thai dubbed only.
27 Dresses: US Comedy/Romance – Katherine Heigl is immensely appealing in what is essentially a mildly pleasant chick-flick. If the very idea of weddings makes you dewy-eyed, this is for you. Mixed or average reviews.
Chocolate: Thai Action – A superior Thai action film that is a huge hit in Thailand, with a new martial arts star, who is really amazing. Within the conventions of a martial arts movie, it’s quite inventive. If you’re going to see any Thai martial arts film this year, make it this one – it’s got everything.
CJ7: Hong Kong Comedy – Delightful! Stephen Chow finds a toy for his young son which is actually a sort of Chinese E.T. It’s dubbed in Thai, but you may find it with English subtitles. I thought the movie marvelously odd and quirky. The kid is great, and Stephen Chow is amusingly droll. A lot of fun for kids and adults.
Death Note: L: Change the World: Japan Thriller – This film is being shown in Bangkok with the original Japanese soundtrack and with Thai and English subtitles. Here it’s shown only in a Thai-dubbed version, with no English subtitles! It deserves better treatment, to be seen by a wider audience. (Despite that, I’ve now seen the film four times.)
It’s mythic storytelling of the best kind, and the character “L” who is the focus of this movie is simply fascinating. Though a teenager, he is the world’s best detective, and as he hunkers in a chair with his arms draped to either side like broken wings, with his gaunt look and caved-in chest, he looks for all the world like a vulture, calmly surveying the scene.
Valentine: Thai Romance/Comedy – It’s your typical Thai low comedy with several love stories. Fairly unremarkable, except that here a “tom” lesbian and a transvestite switch bodies after a traffic accident in Phuket, and get to like their new bodies.
Ghost-in-Law: Thai Comedy/Horror – The usual Thai combination of horror with slapstick comedy, and the usual Thai stars.
Scheduled to open Thu. Mar. 6
10,000 B.C.:
US Adventure/Drama – Not content merely to destroy our planet, Hollywood’s disaster master Roland Emmerich is now using his special effects time machine to obliterate our past. Emmerich, who is best known for directing effects-heavy, script-light modern day disaster movies like The Day After Tomorrow and Independence Day, has turned his attention to early man. This prehistoric epic follows a young mammoth hunter’s journey through uncharted territory to secure the future of his tribe.


Be your own Journalist - start a Blog

Yes, we all have heard of it. Many of us may already have one. But yet, we didn’t know it is now very easy to create one of our own.
The concept of writing a personal blog is very much an old one. The early bloggers started posting even before the Y2K craze of the year 2000. But that was the time when the online freedom of speech was only accessible to tech geeks. To have a website or a personal webpage at that time wasn’t so easy for the non-techies until recent times. For common internet users, if they wanted to have a personal website, they had to have knowledge of all that HTML, or Java or...Hoof! Let’s stay away from those for now!
Getting to the basics of what a Blog is; a blog (also called weblog, from combing the words web and log) is a personal webpage or pages which has entries or “posts” in reverse chronological order. It is more like an online personal diary for some, and a platform to communicate ideas and thoughts to the world on a particular subject for others. What’s special about a blog is that it allows interactivity between the “blogger” and his/her readers. While the blogger publishes thoughts, the readers can give feedback by commenting on the posts. Even more, a blogger can post photos, videos, music, audio or podcasts picked from around the web or even a creative work of his own.
For an idea, www.MrTechSavvy.com is a website in the form of a blog. It has weekly posts of articles that have been published in the Pattaya Mail newspaper.
There are many free and paid blogging tools provided out there, some of the common ones being WordPress.com, Blogger.com and LiveJournal.com. Take a look at all of them and get a idea of what it is all about. These websites have a simple walk-through in setting up a blog making it very easy for you. For starters, you might want to look at Blogger.com’s easy to set-up and easy to customize blogging tool.
Let’s get it started; creating a blog with Blogger.com:
1) Log on to www.Blogger.com and click on “Create Your Blog Now”.
2) You will be asked to create an account and provide some information. If you already have a Google or a Gmail account, you can use the same email as your Blogger.com account as well. Your Display Name will be the name which will be used at the end of every post or in every comment you write on someone else’s blog. Once you’re done, click Continue.
3) Next, choose a nice Blog title and an easy-to-remember Blog address. Be creative but at the same time, use short and simple keywords which say something about the subject of your blog. The Blog address will look something like http://harrythehiker.blogspot.com/. Make sure it is available for grabs.
You have an option of going advanced if you decide to host your blog on a domain name that you already own, just like www.MrTechSavvy.com. But for a starter, I suggest you go with the basic option of having your blog hosted with Blogger.com. It will be easier to manage and maintain for beginners.
Chosen your Blog address? Click Continue.
4) Now, choose a template that suits the subject of your blog. If you are going to be writing about Nature, you would want to have your blog based on green color. Again, be creative but simple. You can customize this template or switch to another template later as well. Click Continue.
5) Your Blog is now created! Clicking “Start Posting” will take you to the “Create Post” page. Creating a post is as easy as composing an email. Explore the tools available. Once you’re done with writing your first post, click “Publish Post”. Go to your Blog address and you will find your first blog post there!
6) Click on all the tabs above to get an idea of the tools available for you to enhance your blog. You can customize the template, fonts and colors in the Layout tab.
If you have questions or want advice, feel free to write to [email protected]. All feedback is welcome!

Just for Geeks
Want to be a part of saving the world’s environment? Save paper, ink, trees and of course - money. Start now with GreenPrint - www.printgreener.com

The answer to last week’s Just For Geeks – Answer and Win! question “Who created Google?” is:
Google was created by “Larry Page and Sergey Brin” - Students of Stanford University. The idea was started as a research project in the year 2006 by the two geniuses and has grown to be the biggest search engine in the world today.
The lucky winners to win an Apacer 2GB USB Flash Drive each are Ewan and Howard Bloom. Congratulations!
Till then… Tata ;-)