Chiang Mai On The WWW

[right]This colume is to keep you abreast of the latest websites which Citylife has produced, introducing you to the ever-increasing presence of Chiang Mai online.[/right] Holiday Garden Hotel and Resort http://www.holidaygardenhotelandresort.com Citylife designed the web site for this charming Huay Kaew hotel and resort last year and featured their site in the October 2007 edition of this magazin … Continued

Kiddie Ideas

Community Services

The Mission House is a Christian Organisation offering a genuine service in both English and Thai to Chiang Mai. Their focus is on helping foreigners settle into Chiang Mai and offer many wonderful homes to rent. The Mission House supports, and works in partnership with a number of Christian Organisations and Churches within Chiang Mai & Chiang Rai. Contact; Janta, The Mission House: jantawint … Continued

Surfin’ Lessons

For starters, to go surfing you need a decent board, or in this case broad…er broadband that is, and it might sound a little obvious but here in Chiang Mai you get broadband and band aids. The suburban internet services do leave a lot to be desired and their reliability is woeful. City dwellers are a little luckier but those of you out in the moo baan no doubt have a frustrating time, so here’s a … Continued

City Talk

City Vibes

Artist: AC/DC Album: Black Ice Rating: AC/DC has been smashing guitars since 1973 and has sold over 200 million records. ‘Black Ice’ arrives eight years after their last release and heralds a reinvigoration of their classic sound and the thumping hedonism of the 1980 classic ‘Back in Black’. The distinctive vocal rasp of front-man Brian Johnson channels a furious energy into the band’s songs and l … Continued

What’s Happening?

Now – 6th January DAD & ME @ Pongnoi Art Space 053 329 305 info@trickthink.com, artspace.trickthink.com Art exhibition by Monrudee Thiensart Tuesdays – Fridays 1 – 6 p.m. and Saturdays – Sundays 11 a.m. – 5 p.m. Now – 28th February WOVEN WISDOM @ The Patricia Cheesman Collection Gallery www.studio-naenna.com Come see a collection of masterpieces from the Studio Naenna Archives 5 – 7 p.m. until … Continued

Ten Years Ago January 2009

Citylife (which changed its name from the Chiang Mai Newsletter in 2002) has been in publication for over seventeen years. Let’s look back at what we wrote 10 years ago.   January 1999: The Chiang Mai Newsletter bar is now officially open to anyone who may be interested to pop in to meet us or other business people in Chiang Mai. We are open every Friday after work for a few hours and finish … Continued

Editorial

I remember the exact moment when the 1997 Asian financial crash hit me. I was in Israel, still trying to get a job a year after graduation and still relying on the largess of my parents to survive. The cheque always arrived regularly in the mail and I wasn’t particularly desperate to earn a living, never having done so before. Then one day in early 1998 I received a phone call from my father to in … Continued

City Events

City Buzz

  This elegant modern coffee shop serves great baked goods during the day and morphs into a hip pub during the night. With comfy furniture and a relaxing atmosphere, this is a great place for time out. Their private garden and free WIFI make it the ideal place during the day to sit back with a book or a notebook. We love how the lights are dimmed at 7 p.m. and baguettes and coffee cups swiped … Continued

Niue . . . Unbelievable

January, 2009 This tropical island of Niue, a 3.5 hour flight northeast from Auckland, population of approximately 1,500, is the fourth smallest independent country in the world and sits in the centre of a triangle bounded by the Cook Islands, Tonga, and the Samoas, sitting smack in the middle of the South Pacific Ocean. There are no shopping malls, cinemas, karaoke bars, casinos, or mass tourism. … Continued

Where to go for Children’s Day

Children’s Day is on the 10th of January, and is taken very seriously by Thailand’s children who get to go to their favourite destinations, stuff their faces with ice creams and candies and generally rule the roost for one day of the year. So if you are scratching your head with indecision about where to take your children, here are some popular spots for Chiang Mai’s little ones. 01 Mae Sa Valley … Continued

Prisoner: Cell Block Latte

January, 2009 I wasn’t at all sure how well I would cope with my time in prison. Thai prisons have a dreadful reputation for not being very pleasant at all; and I found myself being sent to one on some trumped up charge of being able to write. I felt scared and alone. I had heard the stories of overcrowding -something like 250 people crammed into a six-foot by four-foot cell with no beds and just … Continued

New Year Resolutions 2009

January, 2009 Save money, lose weight, get fit, eat healthy, work harder, work fewer hours, be happier, love more, read more, travel lighter…whoever we are, we always seem to need to be better. For most of us much of these self imposed disciplines are gratuitously mumbled and soon forgotten. Perhaps once a year, traditionally, we make a list, fuel our determination, and spend a few days…weeks, or … Continued

Photo of the Year

  Citylife organised our first Photo of the Year competition in 2008. We received over 280 submissions from over 80photographers. Thank you for all of your interest, and support and a huge thanks to our sponsors for the great prizes. 2009’s competition will be open to submissions in February when we will announce the year’s theme. [right][/right] First prize: 10,000 baht cash Photographer: Ch … Continued

The Art of Being Alive

The Greeks had an idea that all people could be identified by one of four humours, or what we’d now define as temperaments. After imbibing the knowledge of his cerebral forefathers, Plato and Aristotle, a philosopher called Galen came up with this idea: we humans will always fall into one of these categories: Choleric; Melancholic; Sanguine; Phlegmatic. Don’t reach for your dictionary, here’s the … Continued

Slip of the Tongue

January, 2009 “The People Power Party was disillusioned (dissolution)!” I recently announced with glee to a group of friends who promptly burst into hysterics. It took a minute or two to realise that I had, once again, committed my most reticent (persistent) and embellishing (embarrassing) of linguistic sins – Malapropism. For those who have never encountered Mrs. Malaprop, she is the wonderful ch … Continued

Office Politics

In the beginning, when PAD stood for the termination of Thaksin’s government through peaceful means, I would have proudly worn a yellow shirt (had it not clashed with my skin tone). I admired their dogged digging of the government’s wrong doings and their startling exposés of the depths of depravity of the then administration. We were up against something so insidious and so far reaching that I fe … Continued

Ten Feet Under

January, 2009 The 600 million baht Chiang Mai Zoo Aquarium, conceived during the days of Thaksin Shinawatra, is a joint venture between the Thai government and the Australian firm MarineScape. Boasting all sorts of ‘…in the world’ claims including the longest fresh water tunnel in the world at 66.5 metres, the longest underwater tunnel in the world at 113 metres (though rather deceptive as it is a … Continued

Tii Naa