Word: kingdoms
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...guilty about it on those rare occasions when you don't, in fact, have a headache." With the dramatic, surprise trip by U.S. envoy Christopher Hill to Pyongyang after the regime's promise about nuclear inspection - all part of a recent slew of backing-and-forthing between the Hermit Kingdom and the rest of the world - there is a lot of head-banging nowadays among that small band of masochists...
Kesri Singh, the "thakur" of the erstwhile kingdom of Mandawa, looks like an old-fashioned Indian maharajah. Over six feet tall, with a barrel chest and imperious paunch, he wears the upturned bristly gray moustache that his father and grandfather sported in their own time to mark their nobility. That much is clear from the oil paintings that loom behind Singh on a hot early morning on the verandah of his 71-room hotel, the Castle Mandawa, in the northwestern Indian region of Rajasthan...
Having dubbed itself the land of Smiles, Thailand tends to go out of its way to avoid confrontation. The capital's infamous traffic jams, for instance, rarely lead to the kind of road rage that strikes other cities. Yet this past week, the Southeast Asian kingdom showed the world a rather less peaceful visage. Protests against Thailand's ruling junta spilled onto Bangkok streets last weekend, with an estimated 13,000 demonstrators calling for the resignation of the generals who masterminded a bloodless coup against Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra last September. The marches, which sometimes erupted in clashes with...
...Sonthi Boonyaratglin and junta-appointed Prime Minister Surayud Chulanont. While the bulk of the protesters came from within Thaksin's followers, they also included a wide range of other interest groups, a worrisome sign for a government already under scrutiny from overseas investors and businessmen worried about the kingdom's stability. The fear is that the tensions between civilian protesters and the military government could explode in violence and even further damage Thailand's image and prosperity...
Thailand loves a good fight: Thais flock to watch kick-boxing, Olympic boxing (the first sport in which the Kingdom struck gold at the Games) and even transvestite boxing - one of the country's biggest celebrities is champion pugilist Parinya Charoenphol, who fought like a man to earn enough money to become a woman. Now, Thais have a new champion to celebrate: In April, a pint-sized woman named Siriporn Taweesuk, a.k.a. the Black Rose, did her homeland proud by pummeling her feisty Japanese opponent to capture the World Boxing Council light-flyweight title. The only catch? Siriporn is currently...