THAILAND AND YouTube: A RECAP

I hadn't really been following the most recent (since April 3) blocking of YouTube by the government of Thailand but I found the following excellent recap on Global Voices Online:

Friday, May 18th, 2007 @ 13:04 UTC
YouTube vs. Thailand: The Latest Round
by Preetham Rai

YouTube’s latest round of trouble with Thailand started in April when some YouTube user uploaded a video mocking the Thai King Bhumibol Adulyadej.  The Ministry of Information and Communication Technology (MICT) tried to get YouTube to take down the clips.  YouTube and its parent company Google ignored the call.  MICT decided to block out YouTube.  The ban fueled more copycat videos to appear on YouTube.

The king is highly revered in Thailand, not just because of his status but also due to his involvement in development projects.  People openly show their respect and affection for the king.  Thai blogger Mr. Pavee explains:

If any of the video uploaders have been out here in Thailand (though I strongly doubt they have), they’d notice how the king is loved by everybody here.  Many shops hang his photos up on the walls and yellow flags (yellow represents the monarchy here) can be seen hung from many houses.  The nation is filled with people wearing yellow shirts showing respect to the king.  If a photo of the king’s face graffiti’ed on was hung up on the streets, someone will go and tear it down within a few seconds, let alone minutes.  Once last year, hundreds of thousands of people wearing yellow shirts gathered to listen to his speech, the crowd was literally a kilometer long.  That’s how much people love him here.

The king was born on a Monday.  Many people wear yellow on Mondays to honor the king.

Long time Thailand resident Andrew Biggs feels that blocking YouTube only helped encourage the miscreants.

I don’t care how offensive the video clip in question is.  The truth is, the power of the love and devotion the Thais feel towards their King is so strong, it can never be hurt or destroyed by one stupid video clip.   But the government has banned You Tube, and in doing so, they have drawn the attention of the whole world to this situation.  Now every obnoxious person in the world who has access to the internet (and believe me, that’s a LOT of people) is now busily making his/her own anti-King videos.

Early in May, MICT decided to sue Google under Thailand’s lèse majesté law.  Thai blogger drewkam called the legal action an “absurd” move.  Drewkam reiterated the affection that the Thai people have for the king but felt the action would only end up bringing more negative publicity to Thailand.  The blogger urged the MICT to get on with

other things much more important (like making my DSL connection faster!).

On May 11th, Google backed down and agreed to take down the clips.

Lost Boy wrote

It looks like Thailand won’t be suing Google after all.  “We have called that off,” said Sitthichai.  Google VP Kent Walker apologized to Thailand in an official letter.  All defamatory clips of HMtK will be removed and soon we will all be able to watch videos of cats falling off TVs again.  Will it be happily ever after?  Perhaps, although I’m surprised that Google buckled to Sitthichai’s bullying tactics.

Sitthichai Pokai-udom is Thailand’s minister for Information and Communications Technology.  A week has passed since that news and YouTube is still inaccessible.

Wonder what is taking the MICT so long?

A comment by Hew on New Mandala might offer some clues.

In the report I read, Google had said that half the clips had already been removed by their original posters.  Of the remainder, several would be removed as offensive to HMK.  The remainder on the government’s ‘offensive’ list were judged by google to be political criticisms of the government and nothing to do with lèse majesté.  These would not be removed.

That's it in a nutshell.  I certainly hope that the two sides can come to some sort of resolution in the near future...

CENSORSHIP, THAI-STYLE

Yesterday, I repeatedly tried to login to my YouTube account in order to upload some video footage I shot of Alex dancing along to a Marillion song ("Accidental Man" from the new Bootleg Butlins DVD).  However, I kept getting re-directed to the Thai Ministry Of Information and Communication Technology site and couldn't figure out why.  When I asked my wife she told me it said that I was trying to access a website that "was bad for Thailand."  I realized the last time I'd encountered the MICT re-direct was last year when I tried to access the Yale University Press page for The King Never Smiles: A Biography of Thailand's Bhumibol Adulyadej by Paul M. Handley (back then, the censorship page was a stylized eye — I much prefer the picture of their Royal Highnesses the King and Queen).

At least I wasn't the only person the Thai government was censoring from the "evils" of YouTube this weekend (I certainly haven't uploaded any naughty or politically-incorrect videos).  2Bangkok reported on the blocking and mentioned that in the past if controversy about a site censorship becomes too great the Ministry removes the block and denies it ever restricted access.  Both the BoingBoing directory and Global Voices Online discussed it and the latter speculated the censorship could be due to the recent interviews former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra gave to CNN which were banned in Thailand but available on YouTube.

BLOGGERS IN THAILAND

Thai English-language newspaper The Nation recently published the following article about blogging in Thailand:

BLOGGERS — A CYBER COMMUNITY
It's work, and serious, for some, and a hobby and fun for many others, but the idea of an online diary is a rage the world over
Today, almost one in five Internet users in Thailand reads and writes blogs, or Web logs.

"It's an easy, fast and personal way [to communicate]," says Duangruthai Asanasatang, who runs a-wild-sheep-chase.bloggang.com.

"WeBlog - some read We Blog while others may read Web Log — or blog for short, is a digital personal journal posted on websites [for the general public to read, make comments or criticise], covering all kinds of topics from music and the arts to politics," says Katika Saisenee of www.keng.com.

According to a Microsoft survey, the country has 8.4 million surfers, of whom 1.76 million are bloggers.

And their reasons for keeping an online diary or using the many other functions run the spectrum, from personal to professional.

"It's like talking face-to-face to your friends. I also use it to chat with interesting girls," admits Montri Boonsat of event26th.wordpress.com.

Salinee Achavananthakul of fringer.org, said maintaining a blog helps improve her writing in Thai.  She spent eight years studying abroad.

"I enjoy practising my Thai-language skills [by posting articles on the Web] as I wish to write some good business books in Thai," said Salinee, who used to work in banking.

Professor Vijarn Panich, director of the Knowledge Management Institute and special adviser to the Thailand Research Fund, also writes a blog as a medium to discuss complex issues with colleagues and academics.

"I also use it to practise writing, to publish my ideas and make personal statements as well as to try to create an online community.

"So far so good, as I've learned a lot from my cyber friends. I can also discuss with upcountry researchers in real time.  This saves a lot of time and resources," he said.

Vijarn updates his blog everyday.  His poor typing doesn't present a problem as he jots his ideas down on a piece of paper for a secretary to type into his blog.

Duangruthai, an editor at "Between the line" Publishing House, reads and writes her blog for both work and fun.

"I read blogs to find interesting books written on the Web for my publishing house.  For leisure, I like to write about my favourite music, films, travel, and so on.  I also help readers and writers to exchange books," she said.

Her blog was voted by the best in "content" last year.  Earlier, she won the best "book" blog of the year.

"I didn't expect such popularity, but it felt great.  We're like a community of friends and family members online.  We occasionally see our cyber friends in the real world for dinner, drinks or concerts and films, as we share the same tastes," she added.

Vijarn, a medical doctor, says blogging can be good for enthusiasts in other ways.

"I believe by reading or writing positive messages, we can make a positive chemical change in our body.  Research has confirmed this hypothesis."

According to Microsoft's Windows Lives Report, six out of 10 bloggers here are women.  About 57 per cent of bloggers are under 25, while 24 per cent are 25-34 and the remainder are over 35.

Family and friends are the two main incentives for Thais to become bloggers.  They also use it as a channel to communicate and send large photos to friends and family members.

Half of the bloggers also use their blogs for entertainment.

The four most popular topics are technology, travel, education and news.

However, the Microsoft report also found that 49 per cent of blogs are not updated regularly, while 36 per cent have boring content and 46 per cent are badly written.

"Quality of content is a problem, while many bloggers don't write themselves but put other people's stories into their blogs.  Good blogs should reflect the characteristics of the blog owner," Salinee said, describing herself as "a 30-something woman who's in between the Thai and Western cultures".

Duangruthai says blogs can be revealing, depending on the writer.

"You can choose the level of your self-exposure, telling everything about yourself or just part of it, but sincerity is the most important thing in cyber relationships."

Cyber relationships can also make money.

"More and more businesses have turned to using blogs as a PR and marketing tool, as some bloggers are paid to introduce new products or give positive comments," she said.

"Some customers believe that information from bloggers is more trustworthy than what comes directly from companies."

She also uses blogs to introduce her favourite books, including those from her publishing house.

Globally, an average of 175,000 new blogs are created everyday so the total number — about 1.6 billion updated blogs around the world today — will double every six months, Katika said.

Salinee says she's worried about the flood of junk blogs and the lack of maturity of blog visitors.

"More junk blogs are expected and all readers must be told that not all online information is reliable.  We need skills to screen out bad ones.  I hope this will be done by better software that would be able to screen junk blogs.

"Like other tools, blogs are a double-edged sword.  Now, you still sort of embrace blogs at your own risk.  The maturity of our society determines how best we can benefit from blogs," she said.

For Wuttichai Kritsanaprakornkij of blogsspot.com, reading and writing his blog is a hobby.

"It's boring to spend most of my free time at the movies, in shopping malls or pubs so I turned to blogs, which also helps me to discover my new capabilities in the real world."

Kamol Sukin
The Nation

VALENTINE'S DAY IN THAILAND

From an article in the Bangkok Post:

Love Is In the Air, At Least for Some, On Day of Romance
POST REPORTERS
There was love, ambition and anger in the air on Valentine's Day yesterday. A couple in their eighties formally tied the knot, a student tried to rob a dentist to raise the money to take his sweetheart out, and a high-profile pathologist received a pestle in protest against her work.

With the aid of a cane, Grandpa Mak Charoensuk, 88, walked hand in hand with Grandma Ui, 86, to register their marriage at the Muang district office in Nakhon Ratchasima yesterday.

Grandpa kissed his bride, whose wide toothless smile lit up her face. They were among 34 couples joining a mass wedding.

In Suphan Buri's U Thong district, Sorn Poh-ngam, 68, and Nuan Unpee, 66, kicked a kerosene can to show that they are physically fit. In the Thai saying, people able to kick the kerosene can ''hard and loud'' are fit enough to have sex.

All 60 couples who converged there received free health check-ups.

In Trang, 40 couples were married 12m under the sea.

In Prachin Buri, seven pairs glided 60m down the Weluwan waterfall cliff to register their marriages.

But Bang Rak, Bangkok's ''district of love'', remained the favourite place with 665 couples choosing to formally tie the knot there.

In Nonthaburi's Muang district, an engineering student tried to rob a dentist in the morning in order to take his sweetheart out last night. But police chased and arrested Supatchai Sudglao, 26, after spotting him hitting Kamol Tangkij-ngamwong, 37, on the back of his head with a wooden stick. Supatchai was charged with attempted robbery.

To patch up differences after the dismissal of Pol Gen Kowit Wattana as national police chief on Feb 5, Supreme Commander Gen Boonsang Niampradit hosted a reunion of Class 6 of the Armed Forces Academies Preparatory School.

All Council for National Security members and their spouses went to the party at the residence of CNS leader and army chief Gen Sonthi Boonyaratkalin last night.

But for pathologist Khunying Porntip Rojanasunan, a pestle wrapped in a red ribbon and a lawsuit against her did not signify love from Noppadol Thammawattana. The head of the Central Institute of Forensic Science said after the second autopsy of his elder brother, Hangthong, that murder was the cause of death eight years ago. Mr Noppadol was charged with conspiring in the murder, before a third autopsy confirmed suicide was the cause.

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY

My wife's at work tonight (she's cooking for Papaya Pok-Pok on Rat-U-Thit in Patong) and I'm home alone.  I did put together a nice, romantic, music mix for later however...

Anyway, since this is Thailand I thought I'd share an article found via 2Bangkok.com:

Thai Cops on Alert for Underage Kissing
The Associated Press

BANGKOK, Thailand - A word of advice to young Thai lovers on Valentine's Day: No kissing in public. Bangkok police say they plan to protect underage couples from the sting of Cupid's arrow, and will crack down on what is deemed to be "inappropriate" behavior.

Patrols will start after school hours in "high-risk areas," like public parks, shopping malls and restaurants and expand in the evening to include nightclubs, bars and so-called love motels, which rent small rooms for short periods of time, said Police Lt. Vorawat Amornviwat of the Metropolitan Police Bureau.

"If we find teenagers below 18 engaged in inappropriate behavior like kissing, we will give them warnings and report to their parents so they can pick them up," he said. "Alcohol is definitely a catalyst for this kind of behavior, so we will keep an eye on underage drinking."

The Metropolitan Police force has also asked nightclub and bar owners to help by turning away underage customers.

"These places are not meant for kids," he said, adding that Valentine's Day required extra vigilance "because they seem to be more vulnerable to sexual temptations on this particular night."

The crackdown on public displays of affection is the latest effort to balance the country's look-the-other-way tolerance with Buddhist values of modesty and manners.

Over the weekend, the Culture Ministry issued what it called the "10 Commandments of Love" to encourage teens not to engage in sexual activities while celebrating Valentine's Day. The first commandment: "Love with patience, so as not to become a young parent." No. 4 urges youths to love carefully "to avoid the risk of sexually transmitted diseases."

February 12, 2007 11:29 PM

CHRISTMAS PHOTOS

As long as our Internet is working tonight (and I can't sleep anyway), I thought I'd post a few photos from our Christmas celebrations.  It was odd sweating as I opened gifts and the sun shone brightly despite the living room curtains being closed...

wrapping presents in the bedroom

it took Gaow a little while to understand the concept behind unwrapping presents, but once he figured it out he couldn't get enough — his usual method was to briefly glance at whatever was inside before moving to the next gift...

Tim, on the other hand, relished each gift and had to be coaxed to move on; here she displays a nice stainless steel bottle opener sent by my sister as a souvenir of Disneyland

Tim and Gaow proudly wear their Mickey Mouse ears from Disneyland

my second biggest gift to my wife was a microwave; we didn't break it in until tonight when I heated some Thai-style clam-and-mushroom chowder

Gaow really enjoyed his new Ultraman toys; wish I could say the same for our community cats who he terrorized with the noisy robots

Tim models a shirt from Lyn

my number one big gift to Tim was this gold bracelet

Tim also gave me jewelry; she bought a heavy-duty teardrop-shaped holder and chain for the Buddhist amulet she'd given me several months ago (replacing the black string that I'd previously used)


at Tim's insistence, we bought Gaow a bicycle; she talked me out of the small one and this one is almost too big for him — I worry about the new neighbors who treat our formerly quiet soi like it was a racetrack but Tim assures me that Gaow will watch out for them...

on Christmas Night, we attended a party/dinner hosted by the one of the few Christian churches on Phuket — I'd been assured that a Western-style turkey dinner was to be served with all the trimmings and it was really the only reason I attended but, alas, there was no Western food at all...

Tim did a great job trying to stay awake: much of the party consisted of ministers preaching that we needed Jesus Christ in our lives (in Thai) and very badly-organized "games" and skits

we stayed until the end simply to see if we'd be lucky in the raffle drawings (I won a couple of hand-towels); I was actually called on stage to read the last 10 or so numbers which I did in Thai to the amusement/amazement of the remaining guests (I think I was the only farang to stick around so long...

And, that was what I did on my first Christmas living in Thailand.

SINGAPORE PHOTOS (PART 2)

Sorry about the slight delay in posting these.  I do have some good news, however:  Later this week, I'm having a broadband service installed which provides the fastest Internet speeds possible on Phuket (this side of 3G, anyway).  Once that's connected, I'll no longer have a real excuse for not (finally) getting caught up with uploading photos to Photobucket and Webshots.

Tim standing on Clarke Quay with the Hill Street Building in the background.  Standing on the site of Singapore's first jail and distinctive for it's Italian-influenced facade and multicolored windows, the building currently houses the Ministry of Information and Arts.  Constructed in 1934, it served as the police headquarters since 1980.

In March 1871, His Majesty Somdech Phra Paramindr Maha Chulalongkorn (Rama V) landed at Singapore marking the first foreign country ever visited by a Siamese monarch.  This monument commemorates that event, standing outside of the old Parliament House (which now contains an arts center and, ironically, a Thai restaurant).

This statue on North Boat Quay marks the spot where Sir Stamford Raffles first set foot at Singapore on 29 January 1819.


Tim poses amongst some more public art alongside the Singapore River.

You'res truly posing in front of the Merlion, symbol of Singapore, at the head of the river.  The neighboring Fullerton Hotel is the former General Post Office which replaced Fort Fullerton in 1925.

The Esplanade — Theatres On The Bay houses a large theatre and concert hall for all sorts of cultural events.  I think it looks like a giant durian.



Bugis Street, a covered night market on Victoria Street south of the Little India and Kampong Glam areas, reminded me somewhat of Bangkok's Chatuchak Weekend Market on a much smaller scale — plenty of clothing, watches, and food to be had for (relatively) low prices.  It was just a ten-minute or so walk from our hotel (once we got our sense of direction) from our hotel and close to an MRT (subway) station so we spent quite a bit of time here.


I made a special point of visiting the Singapore Philatelic Museum on the outskirts of Fort Canning Park.  I found it to be the best stamp museum I've ever seen (although I never did get to the Royal Philatelic Museum in London) with plenty of really nice displays; the Malay Postal History section is particularly strong.  I really had to contain myself from buying anything in the excellent gift shop (in retrospect I wish I had at least bought a postcard to send to myself, receiving the special SPM postmark) but I felt Tim was worried about how expensive the city was at that point.  Indeed, the entire trip I had to resist buying souvenirs which will come as a huge shock to my family as they know I tend to return from even the shortest of trips weighted down with new t-shirts, postcards, and other assorted knick-knacks.


We spent much of the first half of our last full day in Singapore walking around Fort Canning Park, center of the 14th century Malay kingdom of Temasek and site of Singapore's first Christian cemetery.  In the early 19th century, a fort was built on the summit of the hill here and an bombproof bunker serving as headquarters of the Malay Peninsular military command was constructed underneath in the late 1930's.  It was here that the British surrendered to the Japanese forces in February 1942.  The entire park is filled with historic sites including the above Fort Canning Centre, built in 1926 as British army barracks and now used as performance space for local arts companies and as a culinary school.  Tim is seen climbing to the roof of Fort Gate, part of the few remaining structures of the original fort constructed in 1861.





Our long day of sightseeing ended with a visit to the historic Raffles Hotel, originally opened in 1886.  I made a pilgrimage to the Writers Bar which had been frequented by such wordsmiths as Joseph Conrad, Somerset Maugham, and Noel Coward.  Unfortunately, the Long Bar — where the Singapore Sling was created in 1915 — was closed.  During our visit, it began to pour (the skies had been threatening rain since our arrival in Singapore) so we more or less were trapped inside the hotel for a couple of hours which allowed me to check out the very impressive museum on the third floor and purchase a few (rather expensive) items in the gift shop, including a nice polo shirt and a souvenir Singapore Sling glass (which comes with the recipe so we can make our own).  We actually thought about eating at the Raffles Grill, probably Southeast Asia's most prestigious, exquisite, and upmarket restaurants looking out on the Palm Court but in the end the rain stopped and we walked the final two blocks to our own little hotel.


We checked out of the Oxford at noon on Thursday.  Since Tim was a little tired from our previous two days of sightseeing we took a taxi (the fare in Singapore are VERY reasonable) back to Changi Airport and settled in for a long wait — our flight wasn't scheduled until 9:30 in the evening.  We spent most of the time in the impressive Terminal One, checking out some of the shops and eating way too much food (including desserts at Swenson's).  In the early evening, we took the free bus over to the barebones Budget Terminal and finally made our flight (although our boarding passes listed the wrong gate and we almost went to Krabi!).  Upon arriving back in Phuket we took a taxi to our home, having to pass all of the mafia limo guys at the airport in order to get to the metered taxi stand (a new addition to Phuket as they are trying to eliminate the price-gouging of tourists).  However, we had a problem when I paid the driver when he dropped us off.  He tried to charge me an extra 200 baht in addition to the 320 showing on the meter.  He kept insisting I pay his "service fee" and I kept insisting that I wasn't some dumb tourist who was willing to be fleeced.  It wasn't until I threated to call the Tourist Police — a special English-speaking unit who work at solving such "misunderstandings" — that the driver backed down.  It left a sour taste in my mouth; "Welcome to Thailand," indeed.
My next photo post will be of some of the pics I took at the various local festivals last week...

AN ACTIVE WEEKEND

Tim and I managed to have a very full weekend, despite a slow start on Friday.  I'll write a quick update this morning (I need to jump in the shower and get ready for school) and then post a more detailed account (with photos) later today or tomorrow.

Our short "holiday" actually began Thursday afternoon.  After our class let out at four, several of us gathered at Pop Thai Restaurant for an early dinner before the evening class.  Michael bought Tim a couple of beers so she was a little tipsy before returning to the school!  Gary from Las Vegas was teaching the class; Adrian and I sat in and much hilarity ensued partly because of Tim's tipsiness and partly because of Gary's teaching "style."  Afterwards, Tim, Jiab, Nadee, Joe, and I spent several hours having a picnic of sorts in front of the school.  Tim was a little worse for the wear and she spent much of Friday sleeping and I was just generally lazy.  We missed quite a night-on-the-town with the other TEFL students as our laziness stretched into the evening.

We made up for it on Saturday, however, as we joined "the gang" in Patong and spent the afternoon going on an elephant trek (the second half of which I got to "drive" the elephant), playing with gibbons, having dinner at Los Amigos Cantina, and returning to Patong for a night partying on Bangla Road.  Following a middle-of-night breakfast at an open-air market, Tim and I returned home just after six a.m. and went right to bed.  Later that day (Sunday), Jiab called saying she was coming to pick us up — she had a second day on her car rental and wanted to take Adrian and us sightseeing.  We spent a nice afternoon driving down Laem Panwa and checking out the Kao-Khad View Tower (marvelous views overlooking much of southeastern Phuket).  We wrapped up the day with a dinner at a new prawn BBQ-style restaurant that recently opened between Big C and Central Festival.  It wasn't as great as other people made it out to be but it was okay.

I'll write a more detailed account of parts of our weekend later...

EVERYTHING "ALMOST NORMAL" IN PHUKET

There have been very few visible changes in Phuket as a result of last night's coup.  Schools, banks, and government offices were closed today and there was definitely an increased police presence as the day went on.  Between Patong and Central, Tim and I went through two police checkpoints (one was also staffed by naval troops) and another between Central and Chalong.  At Central Festival, they weren't allowing ANY motorbikes in the parking garage (they were all parked on the street outside creating a HUGE traffic jam) and we saw security officers checking car trunks (there were rumors all day about bombs in Bangla Road).  I also noticed that the loudspeakers that hang on most telephone poles throughout Phuket were broadcasting patriotic songs rather than Dharmmic chants.

Of course, the coup was all everyone was talking about and some of the businesses with satellite hookups managed to pick up BBC broadcasts.  The Thai baht has already fallen the farthest it has in over four years (good news for me as I'm getting ready to transfer money from the States into my Thai account).  Right now, all the foreign embassies in Bangkok are closed which directly affects one of my friends from school — he was planning to travel there next week to obtain the documentation needed for his legal marriage.  If this isn't squared away in the next couple of weeks, he'll have to leave the country for three months before he's allowed to return.  And I had decided last night that I would do a visa run in two weeks through the border at Ranong and save getting my Non-Immigrant (O) in Penang until next month; but one of the news updates I just received says that Burma has closed the Kawthung/Rawong border because of the coup.

Personally, I think it will all sort itself out in a couple of weeks at most.  Many people are extremely happy that the Thaskin government has been overthrown and his supporters in the government have already fled or been arrested.  The economy might be shaken up a bit and I'm sure the tourism industry will take some time to recover (it's still not fully recovered from the tsunami).  The uncertainty may cause a few difficulties in the next several days but I'm certain it will be "back to normal" fairly soon.

SETTING UP MY THAI BANK ACCOUNT

The first step towards obtaining a Non-Immigrant (O) visa is to open a Thai bank account.  I wanted a just a simple savings account so I could transfer the required 400,000 baht from my Stateside account.  Some banks require a work permit when opening these, others don't — often different branches of the same bank have different policies (and sometimes these vary from day-to-day at the same branch!).  Like everything else in Thailand, there's plenty of bureaucracy and it's difficult to find straight answers.

After reading plenty of online forum topics about opening Thai bank accounts, I finally decided that the branch of Siam Commercial Bank on Rat-U-Thit 200 Pee Road in Patong seemed to be the best bet.  Many other expats reported that they had had good experiences here.  "In and out in twenty minutes with new passbook and debit card," seemed to be the consensus.  I thought that if this bank wouldn't open an account for me, I'd just keep going until I found one that would (that section of Rat-U-Thit has several large banks).

The process was fairly straight forward, and I was glad Tim was with me since the application forms were written in Thai.  Also, it took about 30 or 40 minutes but part of that was the lady helping me was either new or had never opened an account for a farang before.  The only real document I needed was my passport; I had taken my rental lease and a couple of utility bills for proof-of-address but she just looked at my business card and used that.  She did ask Tim a few questions although I was just opening an individual account, not a joint one.  It turned out that Tim agreed for me to purchase some sort of accident insurance the bank was selling — kind of an unnecessary expense if you ask me but it worked out to around USD $40 total for one year so I guess I can't complain too much.  It also took a bit longer because I wanted Internet banking.

I did walk out of the bank with a savings passbook and a MasterCard/Electron debit card ("For Electronic Use Only").  They have separate cash machines for withdrawals (a "normal" ATM machine), for deposits (you don't put the money in an envelope — just feed it into a large enclosure and somehow it counts it up without the cash getting stuck), and one that you feed your passbook into and it prints the transaction and new balace right into the book.  It's kind of cool and all but eliminates having to go inside the bank.

Now, I have to set up some way to transfer my cash from my Stateside accounts into the Thai one.  My bank in New Mexico won't do SWIFT or wire transfers unless I sign the transaction form in person.  I've emailed Customer Service for both HSBC and EmigrantDirect but haven't yet received a response.  A few people on one of the better Thai expat forums suggested establishing an account with E*Trade as they handle overseas transfers all the time without any hassles.  I'm still waiting for approval on this one but it looks pretty good.