Bangkok

The sun, the palm trees and white beaches: both natives and tourists are experiencing first-hand that the romanticized image of Thailand promised by travel catalogues is not always true.

For the past five weeks, the country has been held in the grip of the worst floods in ten years; in some parts in 30 years. While the waters are receding and life is slowly getting back to normal in the north, now the south is being hit by flooding and heavy storms. The capital city of Bangkok is not yet over the worst of it, as my colleague Punnee reveals to me.

A particularly poverty-stricken neighbourhood on the shores of Chao Praya River has been flooded for weeks and the people are in great need. As in many other parts of the world, this is because not all of the aid is reaching the needy. “They say that a few people made off with the food rations for the entire district,” Punnee tells me of her interviews with the inhabitants as I stand to my knees in (dirty) water. The neighbourhood council chairman confirmed this.

Another problem is that for years, about 20 of the poor families have refused to give up their homes directly at the water’s edge (because the compensation the government is offering is too low), so that the planned dam cannot be built in this area. Although the flood problems in this section of Bangkok will surely not be solved any time soon, Punnee has promised that she would not wait until the end of our next tour to tell me I should look out for the water snakes and leeches that are everywhere in the Chao Praya.