Word: thailander
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...millenniums, China hardly touched the mighty Mekong, content to let its raging headwaters flow unimpeded from the Tibetan plateau down through Laos, Burma, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam. But over the past few years, the emergent superpower has begun turning the world's 12th-longest river into a highway for regional commerce and a source of hydroelectric power. For many Indochinese entrepreneurs, increased China trade and investment has allowed a backward region to participate in their upstream neighbor's remarkable economic expansion. Southeast Asian governments hope China will share the electricity it will harness after a series of massive dams...
...Mekong is not so unyielding these days. In 2001, Chinese crews, brought in by Southeast Asian governments eager to increase traffic and trade, began blasting and dredging a stretch of the river running from Burma and Laos to Thailand, clearing away islands, reefs and rapids that once blocked the passage of ships. Since then, sleepy Southeast Asian river ports have morphed into boomtowns, with boats from China disgorging cheap electronics, fruits, vegetables and every kind of plastic gadget imaginable. River traffic runs both ways: in December 2006, the first shipment of refined oil chugged up the Mekong bound for energy...
...TIFF prides itself on catering to different local constituencies. "If there's a commitment to a specific cinema from the city and its audiences, we try to address it," says Cowan. "There's been a huge rise in interest for East Asian films - not just China but Korea, Japan, Thailand." The festival is also expanding its coverage of Bollywood directors. "In the last five years," he notes, "they've been seeking a wider international audience, so they've been toning down their more risible cultural specificities." (Translation: fewer wet-sari production numbers.) This year Rituparno Ghosh's The Last Lear...
...million to make, according to a Variety source, but made just over half of that at the box office. One way to cut down on costs is to decamp to Asia, where a large labor force with technical skills will work for less. More American filmmakers are flying to Thailand, Indonesia, and even China - where government guidelines are still a hindrance - to shoot films they might once have shot in California or Toronto...
...Hmong that remain in Laos. Persecuted because of their pro-American, anti-communist stance during the war, many Hmong retreated to remote mountain jungles to avoid further government reprisals. Clashes between government troops and ragtag Hmong forces continue to this day, and refugees have poured into neighboring Thailand. This month, U.S. lawmakers petitioned the Thai King to halt the deportations of 8,000 Hmong living in makeshift settlements along the Thai-Laos border. Many of the refugees claim they are descendants of soldiers who fought for Vang Pao's CIA-funded army, and say they will be forced into labor...