Here at WoWasis, we’d guess that the collective United States military never got around to reading Mao Tse-Tung’s 73 page Yu Chi Chan, an expert treatise on the art of guerilla war, before it got hopelessly bogged down in the quagmire called Vietnam. Translated brilliantly by Brigadier General Samuel B. Griffith, USMC (Ret.) as Mao […]
Read the rest of this entry »Archive for the 'Culture & History' Category
WoWasis book review: The Tragedy of Sri Lanka: William McGowan’s ‘Only Man Is Vile’
Sri Lanka has stabilized, to the extent that the country is now charging for tourist visas, instead of for years practically begging people to come. Here at WoWasis, we’re going there next month to investigate. So what were the Civil War years, from 1983-2009 really all about. As journalist William McGowan so cogently describes in […]
Read the rest of this entry »WoWasis book review: ‘Kempei Tai: Japanese Secret Service’ by Richard Deacon
Veteran espionage historian Richard Deacon really seems to love the Kempei Tai, Japan’s pre-Cold War military police-based intelligence agency. His Kempei Tai: A History of the Japanese Secret Service (1983, ISBN 0-8253-0131-9) is replete with personal histories of its founders and leaders, stories of intrigue, and arcane espionage factoids. The author emphasizes intelligence-gathering as practically […]
Read the rest of this entry »PC Air’s ladyboy flight attendants now flying in Thailand
As WoWasis reported earlier this year, Bangkok’s PC Air began to interview ladyboys as flight attendants. Now, they’re flying! This month, as reported by MailOnline, PC Air President Peter Chan has hired four ladyboys as flight attendants, Chayathisa Nakmai, Dissanai Chitpraphachin, Nathatai Sukkaset and Phuntakarn Sringern, after receiving more than 100 applications. The airline noted […]
Read the rest of this entry »WoWasis book review: ‘Chinese Eunuchs: The Structure of Intimate Politics’
Although the last of the remaining Chinese court eunuchs died in the early 20th century, the world continues to be fascinated by them. Kyoto University scholar Taisuke Mitamura’s Chinese Eunuchs: The Structure of Intimate Politics (1963, 1970 English translation by Charles A. Pomeroy) is an informative, readable monograph on the history of the individuals and […]
Read the rest of this entry »WoWasis book review: Frances FitzGerald’s ‘Fire in the Lake: The Vietnamese and the Americans in Vietnam’
What would Frances FitzGerald say today? Her Pulitzer Prize/National Book Award/Bancroft Prize for History-winning book Fire in the Lake: The Vietnamese and the Americans in Vietnam (1972, ISBN 0-679-72394-3) was published in 1972. The U.S. still maintained a military presence there, and Nixon was still in power. Today’s visitors to Saigon/Ho Chi Minh City are […]
Read the rest of this entry »WoWasis book review: ‘Big Business in Thailand’… unveiling the mystery of Thailand’s business families
So you’re a Westerner who wants to open a large business in Thailand. You don’t really know the lay of the land, but you find that things keep getting in the way. Could be bureaucratic red tape, “tea money,” or even worse, you’re stalled and you don’t know why. Could you have run afoul of […]
Read the rest of this entry »Bachelor in Bangkok: Khun Lee on the class structure of Thai women
One mistake many foreigners make when dealing with the gals in Thailand is not recognizing what class the lass comes from. Many western countries do not have a definite class structure so it is understandable that guys often make this simple but fatal error. Thailand, as most of you know already, has a very specific class […]
Read the rest of this entry »WoWasis book review: Jay Taylor’s ‘The Generalissimo’s Son: Chiang Ching-kuo and the Revolutions in China and Taiwan’
In this book, The Generalissimo’s Son: Chiang Ching-kuo and the Revolutions in China and Taiwan (2000, ISBN 0-674-00287-3), Jay Taylor provides a fascinating history of the man who presided over much of the political modernization of Taiwan. Ching-kuo was, at one point, a communist student in the Soviet Union, and maintained ties there throughout his […]
Read the rest of this entry »Did that Thai girl bewitch me with love magic?
The Good Manner: Advice on Thailand from WoWasis’ Pa Farang Today’s question: Did that Thai girl bewitch me with love magic? Dear Pa Farang, A little over a year ago I entered into a relationship with a beautiful lady from Isaan, during a visit a few days before leaving to go back to Afghanistan she […]
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