Mind your own 'Affairs'
Expats living in Thailand have, this week, been crying into their beers. The ever popular ’Farang Affairs’ publication that was bundled with The Nation newspaper each week has been dropped from the paper.
“Farang Affairs ... dropped from the paper”
’Farang Affairs’ was an irreverent look at the politics and culture of Bangkok and Thailand at large. Often witty and frequently sarcastic, it offered a well valued piece of farang literature for regular consumption.
Fortunately the publication is still available via the internet, from its own website www.FarangAffairs.com. Aside from writings, the weekly tongue in cheek look at Thai life often included photos with the appropriately humorous captions. It has often been reminiscent of ’Have I got News for You’ in its style.
Farang Affairs
Fortunately the publication is still available via the internet, from its own website www.FarangAffairs.com. Aside from writings, the weekly tongue in cheek look at Thai life often included photos with the appropriately humorous captions. It has often been reminiscent of ’Have I got News for You’ in its style.
Beyond the comedy, there was sometimes a more serious note to be found, with Farang Affairs seeking to shed a little light on subjects that otherwise had been ignored by the controlled Thai media. Most recently, before it’s withdrawal, it had published a piece on the suspicious suicide of a farang in Pattaya.
“there are those who say good riddance”
There are those who say ’good riddance’ to the ’Fairs, appealing to previous times when The Nation has proven that it is controlled by no one and any such decision is likely to have been an editorially valid one. Perhaps this kind of comedy has no business being in a respectable daily paper?
Rumours abound in Bangkok as to the future of the column. I have heard from a good source within the paper that the drop was only the result of a editorial dispute between two big—wigs, and yet another less reliable report that they are actually planning to release the Expat Pages as a separate publication. Only time will tell.
The author of the Affairs has made public his disappointment at the drop, but has remained optimistic that a mutually beneficial outcome can be achieved. Watch this space...
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