Word: thais
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...earned them a reputation as "the ugly Americans of Asia." He realized also that bitter memories lingered of Japanese cruelties during World War II. And he had been warned that there would be demonstrations. But nothing prepared him for the enraged outburst of the thousands of shouting and jeering Thai students who protested his visit to Thailand, traditionally one of Asia's most gentle and hospitable nations...
...turned into the hotel drive way, the students pummeled its roof and windows with their fists. Other vehicles in the motorcade were forced to a halt and the demonstrators - mainly in their teens - tried to open each car. One of those mobbed, despite his civil service uniform, was the Thai government's own Secretary-General Choosak Watanaronchai, who saved himself by shouting "I'm a Thai!" Other bands of students broke four windows in the city's most prominent Japanese department store (the Thai Daimaru) and threw a small plastique bomb at the Japanese Trade Center...
...salon of Government House, the encounter turned into a limping dialogue of mutual incomprehension. Since the students overthrew the military regime last October, they have become the most powerful political force in Thailand, overshadowing the caretaker government of Premier Sanya Dharmasakti. They complained to Tanaka that Japan was exploiting Thai labor, polluting the air and water with wastes from Japanese-owned factories, and generally turning the country into an economic satellite. Even if exaggerated, their concern was based on hard economic reality. Thailand depends on Japan for 37% of all its imports and 21% of its exports. Official statistics, acknowledged...
...military is now in such disgrace that even the Minister of Defense wears a business suit in public, rather than his general's uniform. Nonetheless, competent civilians still hesitate taking power, because they have long viewed participation in politics with distaste. In fact the Thai language uses the idiom "to play at politics" rather than "to go into politics." Thus even Sanya Dhamasakti, the popular civilian who has been temporary Prime Minister for the past three months, wants to return quickly to his job as rector of Bangkok's Thammasat University...
...several fronts. Consumers are angered by inflation; since last January, prices have risen more than 17% and rice prices alone have soared 50%. The students remain restless because they feel that the reforms have not yet gone far enough to end the corruption and injustice in the kingdom. The Thai labor movement, which has just won a boost in the minimum wage from 600 a day to 800, has flexed its new muscle by calling 142 strikes, most of which were settled quickly...