US Peso deathwatch: Thai tailors switch to advertising in Euros
James sez, "The slow decline of the US dollar as a global currency continues with the tailors of Bangkok now advertising their rates in Euros. Advertisements for tailors can be found on the free tourist maps of Bangkok. I was in Bangkok in 2005 and all of the prices were in USD. Now the advertisements are in Euros." Link (Thanks, James!)
the latest
latest episodes
I'm fascinated by "tailor tourism."
But I guess I'll have to wait until after the recession until it becomes a bargain again.
This makes sense, as about 90% of the tourists I saw last year in Thailand were either from Northern Europe or Great Britain. It was nice seeing the ugly European instead of the ugly American abroad for a change.
@2: No kidding, to see the ugly European, one used to have to visit their native environment.
the phrase "the Ugly American" doesn't refer to appearance typically. Anyway, the Europeans seem to have won the battle for hearts and minds already, the Ugly American in Chief having seen to that. They're not even interested in our bicycle-powered water pumps anymore.
now you've read the post, see the movie; or better, read the book...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ugly_American
You see plenty of Ugly Australians as well. They're the ones drinking their weight in vodka, cracking onto every remotely available-looking female and passing out in the gutter at 3am, only to do it again the following night. That and the British stag-party tourists all over Europe's historic centres.
From what I've seen, the Americans who bother to get passports and go abroad tend to be fairly thoughtful.
I am from Bangkok, and you need to know how store owners and businesses operate their advertisements. There are specific tourist seasons for different countries. Businesses change their ads depending on what season it is. For example, June through August is the US season, you will see ads targeting them with dollar prices. Its been that way for the 20 years I lived in Bangkok. I'm not sure whether the author simply saw the change and mistakenly thought that Bangkok wasnt interested in taking dollars anymore, or that he has a political axe to grind. Either way, the story is bogus.
The Ugly American now carries a gun and brings along 150,000 or more friends.
It's almost like beating a dead horse, but this horse keeps coming back from the dead, so:
George W Bush = Worst.President.Ever
I travelled all over Thailand last week including Bangkok and saw plenty of signs in US dollars. In some places I even used US dollars to buy things. This is bad reporting and adds to hysteria about the dollar's decline, which only serves to lessen confidence in the dollar even more.
BoingBoing is really doing themselves a disservice by running all of these "economic" stories. They should stick to steam punk and people dressing up as Jedis. Running these pieces just makes them look uninformed and pushing a political agenda of fear and ignorance (just like the president we all love to hate).
Agreed Deoh, there's been a rash of these 'it fits my worldview, so it must be true' stories posted of late - many of which are clearly refuted in the comments - but they just keep coming.
I was in Thailand in January, and most signs were still in dollars, many stores had signs in both dollars and euros's. (I was also in Cambodia, where the US Dollar seems to be the defacto national currency, which was weird, but is probably another story.)
If this article is factual, then it seems like a very rapid change, and the tourist season explanation offered above does seem much more plausible.
Agreed, Deoh and Bret. There seems to be a bit of glee whenever there is an opportunity to post a story about the dollar getting weaker. Why?
@12: There is a certain amount of glee for the rest of us in seeing that the United States is finally facing the consequences of making one unbelievably stupid decision after another (high deficits, unnecessary foreign wars, artificially low interest rates...) despite getting away with it for a decade due to the role of the greenback as a reserve currency.
Entrepeneurship at its best.
A much more interesting indicator is how many African merchants now know their numbers in Mandarin Chinese.
You guys do realize that Cory is a Canadian?
As a 50% Canadian, I too fell a little bit of glee every time the US dollar goes down. Not 'bus of any real anti-US sentiment, but for two other reasons:
1. I live on Vancouver Island, which actually protrudes below the US-Canadian boarder. It's quicker for me to get to the States then to get to Canada. As a consequence we get tons of tourists from the USA. Around 30% don't really grasp that they are in a whole different country, and tend to get pissed off if we don't take the US-Dollar as payment for stuff. Hell most places do, but will only give change back in Canadian, but we still get yelled at at least once a week!
Now that the US dollar is basically on-par with us, we get even more grief.
Tourist: "But I paid in American!"
Local: "Sorry Sir, but we take the US dollar at par now."
2. The main reason why I am glad the green back is loosing it's stature on the world market has nothing to do with my politics. The real reason is that the green back is GREEN. Every single denomination! Most of the worlds other near de-facto currencies are at least different colors for each amount! Hell British money is different sizes for each amount. The Euro even has brail on it!
Australian "paper" money is not even paper, it's plastic. You can go swimming with it, or put it through the wash.
While I am at it, why the HELL do you guys refuse to use dollar coins? Having eight one dollar bills really throws me off. That feels like at least $40 bucks in my pocket to me :)
And I know you have dollar coins, Ecuador uses the US dollar as it's national currency, and there are tons of US minted(Susan B. Anthony?) one dollar coins floating around. Plus they even make their own Ecuadorian one dollar coin as well.
So the next time some US tourist asks me in a joking tone how I like my "Monopoly Money", I'll just ask him how he likes the exchange rate.
A common practice of "blog warriors" i.e. those hired to wage battle against the vast Islamoliberalfascist conspiracy, is to sweep in and talk among themselves. This gives the illusion that there exists a consensus for the view they were hired to push.
"Hey Joe, I'm really concerned about this. Something not quite right here."
"Yeah Moe, I hear ya. I'm awfully concerned too. I sure wish this blog was fair and balanced like Fox News is.
"Guys, I just want to point out how much I appreciate your intelligent concerns. Thanks!"
Blogs are ideological battlegrounds.
'hired to push'?
Wow, you've probably got as much back-up support for making that statement as Cory did for claiming that these adverts are no longer in US$ because of its declining value.
Its not a conspiracy Noen, its a disagreement. And your resorting to attacks on the motives of those raising questions rather than making any attempt to support the original argument makes me think you have no interest in the accuracy of posts.
Thanks, Noen. There seems to be more of that going on lately.
Or they could all be the same lonely teenager.
Brett, Deoh, you sound about as realistic as dime-store plastic flowers.
Antinous, I can see the hypothesis that it's one person, but lonely teenagers tend to say more interesting things.
Don't forget Bret, boingboing being the absolute center of the universe is the most important place to 'push' our propaganda ever! It's just inconceivable that more than one person might disagree with the hard science being posted here without us all being being part of a conservative conspiracy. I laugh for two reasons, first the absolute egomania of the suggestion that people would care enough to hire someone to subvert opinions on boingboing and second that for the first time ever I've been told I'm not a die hard liberal.
Noen, thank you for posting, it has really humbled me. I often think that I'm on the highly educated wise side of an issue and I post snarky correlation tables and graphs that demonstrate a positive relationship between years of education and propensity to disagree with US foreign policy. You have reminded me that my graphs always have those outliers of people who are still against US foreign policy but the other half of the correlation isn't upheld... Thanks.
> George W Bush = Worst.President.Ever
+1, but really, if it's a democracy, it's the voting population that needs to own the blame.
@ #21
> It's just inconceivable that more than one person might disagree with the hard science being posted here without us all being being part of a conservative conspiracy.
Hard science? All I see is an article making an observation.
Oh, and as long as long as we're all speaking our minds about the issue, I do think the post is a tad overassumptive. Not trying to smack anyone down, it's just my opinion.
The solution is not to bother posting if you disagree with the party line of the site, and just keep watching for the stories you would like to see. It's not hard to figure the political angle of the site and it's posters/moderators, and thus it is not hard to ignore them. If you post anyways, expect vilification, as there are many people who DO agree with the site and are more than willing to defend it.
Conversely, Teresa and Noen, just because someone might disagree with you doesn't mean they are unrealistic astroturfers: that sort of thinking is more often expressed by those on the losing side of an argument and makes you look extremely bad to those who are not already supporters of your view. Especially to Noen, one could express your sentiment to apply to the actual bloggers of BoingBoing and other sites themselves - but of course if it was in YOUR favor it would be a brigade for positive change and not a small minority clamoring for attention, right? ;)
As far as the actual post is concerned: I don't have too much of an opinion, as I haven't had the opportunity to travel. I'm inclined to believe Lilricky's explanation about seasonal advertisements, but I wouldn't actually know unless I went. Due to classes and the requisite finances and time constraints, I can't up and travel. That's probably a good thing too - no matter my efforts, I'd just get shuffled off as the ugly American and looked down upon by elitist foreigners who would like nothing more than to spit upon the ground I walk on. Or is that a stereotype that doesn't hold true all the time as well? Sometimes on the Internet, it's hard to tell :D
just because someone might disagree with you doesn't mean they are unrealistic astroturfers
Noen and Teresa's (and my) comments had nothing to do with agreeing or disagreeing with the post or the commenters. It had to do with them sounding like snotty little toerags.
#15 THELASTSPOT
While I am at it, why the HELL do you guys refuse to use dollar coins?
What do you take us for, loonies? ;-p Chalk it up to more "American Exceptionalism" and our proud monochrome fraud-enabling currency traditions.
Your proof
Courtesy winningcampaigns.org
The following is from July of '07. You can no longer find this info, fortunately I took a screen grab.
Rent a Troll
Text
Their President is Doug Guetzloe.
You were saying?
I don't make idle claims. If I know something to be true I say so. If not then I say "I believe" or "I think".
Wow. You should submit the screen grab to BB. It would make a good post.
Oh, and for the reading and comprehension impaired.
"Conversely, Teresa and Noen, just because someone might disagree with you doesn't mean they are unrealistic astroturfers:"
I absolutely agree with you. That is why I was careful to make no claims about any poster here what so ever. I simply made a general observation that such things as concern trolls do exist, full stop.
This should hardly be news to anyone. As the Tibet violence threads show, there are people who have an interest in pushing opinion on a major blog like BB in one direction or another. I myself have my own views and therefore have my own unique point of view. I try to be objective, occasionally I may even succeed.
Irrelevant to the comment thread, but relevant to the damn post: If you happen to be in Thailand can you really get three suits, three blouses, three skirts, a dress, and three silk scarves custom-made for two hundred bucks? Or do I misunderstand the ads?
Kostia (30): I believe you can. I'm not sure whether that includes fabric costs, but either way it's a bargain.
Zekesulastin (24): Golly, but you're smart. I am in awe. When I contemplate the vast and dizzying extent of the intellectihoodulosity that is you, it makes me want to roll around on the beach and wave my flippers in the air. Viz.:
Which is a remarkable feat, seeing as how there isn't anything even vaguely like a party line.This is something I don't think I'll ever understand: how readers like you can follow the threads in Boing Boing without ever noticing that people disagree with me and the boingers and each other all the time, but never get disemvowelled or suspended for it. Then, the minute I come down on someone (usually while making some extremely hard-to-interpret statement like "Knock that off, Ferdy -- you're acting like a jerk"), you conclude that I must be oppressing Ferdy for failing to toe the Boing Boing party line.
Tell me, Zekesulastin: what was it that did this to you? Did your mum repeatedly drop you on your head when you were a baby? Did you teach yourself to speak English using Babelfish in place of a dictionary and grammar? Something else entirely?
Go ahead and tell us. We promise we'll feel sorry for you.
I daresay it's not hard. Nothing is, if you don't care whether it works or not. In truth, you have no idea what our personal political beliefs are.Except you're not managing to do it.I'm sure it's a very nice high horse, but it doesn't make you look all that heroic. I'm likewise sure you feel like you're picked on, or at least anticipate feeling that way. I'm sorry, but I fear I must decline the offer to appear in your soap opera.I'm not here to enforce some kind of weird-ass party line. My job is to help make this a good place for good conversation, and to keep the boingers and their readers from being harassed by jerks and idiots.
Figuring out that that's what's going on? Not rocket science. Do try it sometime.
I am officially in favor of whatever a "weird-ass party line" is. I'm not sure if it sounds more like a drunken conga line, or like a sexy telephone game. Just as long as it's not the new slang for that blow that smells like nail polish.
The dollar is in trouble for sure, but I I wouldn't make too much of this particular anecdote. There are far more European tourists in Southeast Asia than there are Americans, so it makes good business sense to advertise in Euros (when I worked in Southeast Asia a couple of years ago, advertising in Euros was pretty common).
Zuzu, "weird-ass party line" is a conservative thing. Like when a closeted evangelical preacher does a line of coke off a gay hookers ass.
Kostia @ 30
There are some pretty good deals on tailoring in Thailand, but many of the ads are very deceptive, especially in Bangkok. For instance, while you will probably be measured for your dresses in the tailor shop, by a professional seeming tailor, almost all of the actual tailoring work in Bangkok is conducted in sweatshop style factories. Many of the fabrics are misleadingly labelled. You also have to be very very resistant to (often valueless) upsells, or what you thought was going to be a $200 purchase can end up at many multiples of that.
Then there are the places that ask for money up front ("just a small percentage"), then either vanish, or simply seem to have never heard of you the next day.
If you want to take advantage of tailor-tourism in Thailand (not a good enough reason to visit, but it's a fantastic country for tourism otherwise, so there's plenty of other reasons to go) I recommend looking for a tailor in Chiang Mai, or in one of the other regional capitals, or even in a smaller town, rather than trying to sort the genuine from the conniving in Bangkok.
@Deoh
"Don't forget Bret, boingboing being the absolute center of the universe is the most important place to 'push' our propaganda ever!"
Settle down, sweetheart. You act like corporations don't pay unscrupulous individuals to make multiple accounts at top sites to spew whatever PR-talk they want (see: "astroturf"). Happens every day.
Companies have been caught hiring people to write fake reviews for products or create fake "buzz" online (nVidia, Walmart, Blockbuster, BestBuy, etc.)
Whatever. Those three comments have the nasty smell of having been paid for, or at the very least acting like trolls. (see: "troll post is troll!")
Don't like what you see here? Simple, GTFO; nobody likes people who troll threads.