Amazon.com: Thailand 3: The Rough Guide, 3rd edition (Rough Guide Thailand): Paul Gray, Lucy Ridout: Books

Book Description
INTRODUCTION

With over nine million foreigners flying into the country each year, Thailand has become Asia’s primary holiday destination. Yet despite this vast influx of tourists and their cash, Thailand’s cultural integrity remains largely undamaged – a country that adroitly avoided colonization has been able to absorb Western influences without wholly succumbing to them. Though the high-rises and neon lights occupy the foreground of the tourist picture, the typical Thai community is still the traditional farming village. Over fifty percent of Thais earn their living from the land, based around the staple, rice, which forms the foundation of the country’s unique and famously sophisticated cuisine.

Tourism has been just one factor in the country’s development which, once the deep-seated regional uncertainties surrounding the Vietnam War had faded, was free to proceed at an almost death-defying pace. Indeed Thailand enjoyed the fastest-expanding economy in the world, at an average of nine percent growth a year, until it overstretched itself in 1997, sparking a regional financial crisis – but already, with remarkable resilience, the economy’s growing again. Politics in Thailand, however, has not been able to keep pace. Coup d’étâts, which used to be the commonest method of changing government, seem to be a thing of the past, but despite a recently revised constitution and robust criticism from students, grass-roots activists and parts of the press, the malnourished democratic system is characterized by corruption and cronyism.

Through all the changes of the last half-century, the much-revered constitutional monarch, King Bhumibol, who sits at the pinnacle of an elaborate hierarchical system of deference covering the whole of Thai society, has lent a large measure of stability. Furthermore, over ninety percent of the population are still practising Theravada Buddhists, a unifying faith which colours all aspects of daily life – from the tiered temple rooftops that dominate every skyline, to the omnipresent saffron-robed monks and the packed calendar of festivals; it is still the norm for a Thai man to spend three months as a monk at some period during his life. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Excerpted from Rough Guide Thailand (3rd Edition) by Paul Gray, Rough Guides, Lucy Ridout. Copyright © 1998. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved
When to go The climate of most of Thailand is governed by three seasons: rainy (roughly June to October), caused by the southwest monsoon dumping moisture gathered from the Andaman Sea and the Gulf of Thailand; cool (November to February); and hot (March to May). The rainy season is the least predictable of the three, varying in length and intensity from year to year, but usually it gathers force between June and August, coming to a peak in September and October, when unpaved roads are reduced to mud troughs and whole districts of Bangkok are flooded. The cool season is the pleasantest time to visit, although temperatures can still reach a broiling 30C in the middle of the day. In the hot season, when temperatures rise to 40C, the best thing to do is to hit the beach. Within this scheme, slight variations are found from region to region. The less humid north experiences the greatest range of temperatures: at night in the cool season the thermometer occasionally approaches zero on the higher slopes, and this region is often hotter than the central plains between March and May. It's the northeast which gets the very worst of the hot season, with clouds of dust gathering above the parched fields, and humid air too. In southern Thailand, temperatures are more consistent throughout the year, with less variation the closer you get to the equator. The rainy season hits the Andaman coast of the southern peninsula harder than anywhere else in the country - heavy rainfall usually starts in May and persists at the same level until October. One area of the country, the Gulf coast of the southern peninsula, lies outside this general pattern - because it faces east, this coast and its offshore islands feel the effects of the northeast monsoon, which brings rain between October and January. This area also suffers less from the southwest monsoon, getting a relatively small amount of rain between June and September. Overall, the cool season is generally the best time to come to Thailand: as well as having more manageable temperatures and less rain, it offers waterfalls in full spate and the best of the upland flowers in bloom. Bear in mind, however, that it's also the busiest season, so forward planning is essential.

Thailand 3: The Rough Guide, 3rd edition (Rough Guide Thailand) (Paperback)

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