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Published on March 14, 2008

He also shared the information that two years ago, he and his wife walked along Sukhumvit Soi 71, from one end to the other, to take a count of phone booths. There were 264. He also noticed that most other roads in Bangkok had a similar density.

"Have you any idea of the reason for this? It might be worth an article!"

In Thailand, this is not strange.

Bangkok is the capital, but unlike big cities in developed countries,

it is the centre of everything, not only telephone booths.

I bet that people know Sydney or Melbourne better than Canberra, the capital city of Australia. While Sydney boasts the world-famous Opera House and Melbourne hosts the grand-slam Australian Open tennis, Canberra is simply the home of government agencies. New York appears in movies much more frequently than Washington DC, the US capital.

But in Thailand, Bangkok is the home of everything.

More than half of all companies in the country are registered in the capital for convenience in contacting government agencies. This huge percentage agitates the provinces, which have only recently been allowed to collect local taxes on companies operating in their area. Some firms have opened offices in the provinces, but all the profits go to the head office in Bangkok. As such, the provinces cannot charge the local offices and all profits, despite the rapid consumption of provincial natural resources, go to the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration.

Although Thailand has 120 universities, more than half of the most popular - judging from the number of applications at the annual entrance exam - are located in Bangkok. These include Chulalongkorn, Thammasat, Mahidol, Kasetsart, Srinakarinwirot (Prasarnmitr) and Silapakorn.

In the provinces, the most popular are Chiang Mai University, Khon Kaen University, Prince of Songkhla University and Naresuan University.

At present, although there are many tuition centres in major provincial cities, rich kids still believe that the ones in Bangkok are the best. And they are diligent enough to leave their homes on weekends for Bangkok. (Also, they may want to enjoy the fantastic and dusty views of the capital.)

Here's another sign: more than half of the fast-food outlets are located in Bangkok, with the rest spread out among major provincial cities.

It is not surprising, then, that the number of phone booths on a 3-kilometre strip like Sukhumvit Soi 71 surpass the number of booths in the provinces, particularly small ones like Nakhon Phanom.

Achara Deboonme

achara_d@nationgroup.com

The Nation