Ottawa, Ontario, May 18, 2017

I arrived home at 02;00 on Tuesday, after 30 hours of travel. The flights were late both out of Hongkong, and Toronto. Hongkong is often fogged in, so all flights are given times to start engines, before taxiing out. In our case, we sat in the plane for almost an hour, due heavy inbound traffic. After that, the flight to Toronto, almost direct, south of Japan, Vancouver, Winnipeg, etc was 14 and one half hours. We were given dinner about two hours after departure, then, with all window blinds shut, were in the dark until they let us open blinds two hours out of Toronto, about seven P.M. on Tuesday. I am not complaining because Cathay Pacific Airlines offered a good service, but, I found it very hard to get excited about a breakfast, or dinner, whatever you wanted to call it, of either 24 hour old scrambled eggs and partly (in my view), cooked bacon, or, Mud Carp Congee at seven in the evening!.
I had a grand time in Thailand, as I always do. The only problem I had was the lack of good internet service. The military took over three years ago, walk in to the Prime Ministers office, told her to go home, and, with 721 officers and thousands of men, took charge. (That could not happen in Canada, as the army would never be able to find our prime minister, or anyone else in charge.) A personal view here). The rainy season was arriving as I departed Bangkok, but we only had two days with afternoon showers while I was there.
Now regarding the internet. The Army took over Google Thailand, and controls the speed of the internet, so much so that they can slow it down so one just gives up waiting to get on. I understand they know which are foreign computers by the Internet Protocol address, and many times, I got the notation,"Google Thailand wants to know your location". There were two boxes...Release, and Refuse. If I had refused, I would not get on...at any time. They have, as of this week, taken over Facebook, also because they do not want Thai or anyone else there to say bad things about the government...army. Generals do not like that!!!.
To me, it is sad to see all the fast food chains that are moving into Thailand, and selling products made from wheat. Many streets have bakeries selling bread, cakes and such, even donut shops. The fact is these places are replacing local family outlets which once sold native foods like rice dishes. I noticed that local people do not patronize the fast foods, probably because of the North American pricing. They just cannot afford to shop there.
  I will do another page before the weekend is over. This gets my sarcasm out of the way.