The Thai military insist on using the discredited empty plastic box and laminated cardboard sold to them as the GT200 bomb and drugs detection device for nigh on a million a pop. Their argument is that they currently have no alternative equipment and so have to use the GT200 because it is ‘better than nothing’. Or at least until the government gives them additional budget to buy replacement devices, which, they warn, will be much more expensive.

There has been much speculation as to why the Thai military insist on using the GT200 pseudo-bomb-detector, when the Ministry of Science and Technology has run a test that proved it is ineffective. The device has since been disassembled to reveal that it is no more than an empty plastic box and a telescopic car aerial, and its ‘pre-programmed cards’ are un-programmable bits of laminated paper.

Tale Number One: Germany, just over 100 years ago.

Wilhelm von Osten, a mathematics teacher and amateur horse trainer, owned a horse called Hans. And he combined his two jobs by training his horse in mathematics. And very successfully.

One of the most dispiriting things that can happen to a satirist (apart from Not the Nation posting an idea before you can think of it) is when something turns up in real life that is as funny as anything you could devise.

The revelation that PM Abhisit Vejjajiva’s father, Dr Atthasit Vejjajiva, has been contributing around 300,000 baht a month to bolster his son’s security has raised a few eyebrows. (More recent reports have suggested that this is not entirely true.)

It’s been a bad week for the scam artists.

Sorawan Sirisuntarin, who markets under the name ‘Pa Cheng’, has been charged with violating the Pharmaceuticals Act. She had been peddling a panacea called Maha Bambad at 1000 baht a wee bottle and an eye lotion called Jiaranai Petch.

It was rather naughty if the Bangkok Post to list Thailand’s initial offer of $20,000 in emergency relief to Haiti directly underneath the $50,000 that Cambodia was giving, both dwarfed by the $1 million from Indonesia. This was hitting the Foreign Ministry, who authorized the payment, right where it hurts – in their image.

So who says there is no press freedom in this country? Where else in the world could you find an op-ed article that as good as calls the government a lying law-breaker?

The introduction of full body scanners at Suvarnabhumi International Airport caused some technical problems of a perhaps predictable nature.

‘Whoa, would you get a look at this guy’s kor kor nor.’

‘Hey, we’re supposed to be checking for explosives, not admiring people’s underwe – holy bananas, what’s he got in there?’

‘Dunno, but anything that size looks suspicious to me. What do you think?’

‘OK, get him in and strip him down.’

For those who have spent the past 7 days in a frenzy of head-scratching, Googling and fears of incipient Alzheimer’s, relief is at hand. Below, find the answers to last week’s quiz. Anyone scoring more than 5 might be proud of their capacity for memorizing trivia. Anyone with a score of more than 10 should give serious consideration to a drastic change of lifestyle.

So as a dedicated Prachatai reader, you think you know what’s going on in the world. You have 7 days to answer these question before your ignorance is revealed in next week’s column. All questions have been pre-tested with Prachatai staff and any question that any of them could answer was eliminated and replaced with something even more obscure.

The Post Whingebag column of the Bangkok Post has recently contained the almost obligatory pre-Christmas brouhaha about the noises coming out of department store sound systems. And they do have a point.

‘Hello. Could I speak to Tuy, please.’

‘Who’s calling?’

‘This is Somsri. It’s about my loan.’

‘Somsri? Which Somsri?’

There has been some discussion recently as to whether the Thai constitution (2007 version) guarantees the rights of all persons, or just Thais. This is, in fact, a minor issue when compared with the special rights that some Thais have created for themselves, and which the rest of world knows nothing about.

At the end of the People’s Dalliance with Democracy rally last Sunday, a Thai People’s Declaration to the World was read out and is available in Thai, Cambodian and English on the Manager website. Like all such declarations, it went through a few drafts before emerging in its current form.

The furore, carefully stoked by The Sun tabloid, about UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s handwritten letter of condolence has revealed a shocking combination of misspelling and illegibility. Blamed on the loss of sight in one of his eyes and fading vision in the other, compounded by a natural tendency to slovenliness, the PM’s difficulties with the written word were not widely known until now.

The Thai armed forces’ plans to purchase 222 more GT200 remote sensing units for national security purposes are raising concerns. At a price of 900,000 baht per unit, there are the usual unsubstantiated rumours of kick-backs and corruption, but such stories swirl round every military purchase of any size.

The last session of the Sri Lankan Advisory Mission on dealing with the problems of Thailand’s deep south was intended as a wrap-up session to deal with any outstanding questions arising from the previous days’ specialized strategy workshops on Military Actions against Dissident Civilian Populations, Approaches to Negotiation, Treatment of Internally Displaced Persons, Squeezing Terrorist Funding, and Control and Suppression of Independent Media.

It’s hard going at the Department of Special Investigations (DSI) where the Detecting Scapegoats for Irresponsibility (DSI) Section is conducting a Detaining Suspicious Individuals (DSI) operation by the Doing Simultaneous Interrogations (DSI) process.

[Press Announcement by Harrison George on Being Awarded Numerous Prizes] In response to the signal honour of being awarded the Wurlitzer Prize for Promising Journalism (Retirement Age Category), I wish to express my humble and sincere thanks to the selection committee.