Christmas Cards from Thailand - Free Christmas Cracker jokes inside!

#### ### Just a quick post to wish everyone a Merry Christmas from Koh Samui in Thailand.

Yes, the photo has an enhanced background created with AI. It's not difficult to tell, as Thailand isn't actually known for its copious amounts of snow, even more so inside!

As that famous song goes;

...and there won't be snow on Koh Samui this Christmas time

It took forty minutes to get Milo to sit still and get the photo without him ditching the hat. If he stands in one tiny drop of water, he goes into full panic mode and does three high-speed laps of the house. I can only imagine what would happen if he really did get to stand in snow.

Obviously, being a predominantly Buddhist country, we don't celebrate Christmas here officially, but the number of decorations rises dramatically every year. Admittedly, there is much improvement to be made in quality, but there's certainly no shortage of effort, especially on an individual level. Oddly though, the local shopping mall's decorations were rather underwhelming this year...

... a few poorly decorated Christmas trees and a huge Mickey Mouse, which reminded me of an old joke...

Mickey and Minnie Mouse were getting a divorce and were sat in the lawyer's office. The lawyer said to Mickey, in rather an exasperated tone, "But you can't divorce Minnie just because her teeth aren't straight." To which Mickey replied, When I said she was fucking goofy, that's not quite what I meant!

I digress. Even my favourite local eatery has a tree this year....and they're Muslims!

It takes a bit of spotting, but trust me, it's there!

And the wife's gone mental on Shoppee again. To be fair, you can get a lot of fine solar-powered bargains sent over tax-free from China, although sadly, that's all about to change on January 1st when the government cancels its import duty waiver on all items below 1500Thai Baht ($40 USD, £34 GBP). The online shopping army of Thailand is not happy at all.

A 'throw' for the sofa. Bargain at under five quid! I don't even know how she manages to hunt this stuff out.

I have to be honest, though, our tree looks half-decent this year. I'm avoiding showing you the dozens of plastic, solar-lit, Santa Clauses dotted around the garden, though!

#### Talking of imported Chinese goods reminds me of another story I read somewhere in which the writer pondered why Chinese children didn't believe in Father Christmas. It was promptly pointed out that they would hardly believe in Santa, his Elves, and his toy factory in the North Pole when they already knew for a fact where all the toys really came from, and are actually quite indignant, they don't get the credit they deserve! ####  ##### Seriously, we have eight sets of these in the garden! #### And here's the thing about Christmas in the tropics: all these outside lights run on a little solar panels. The five Santas, along with a little solar panel, came in at under £3, ($4.20 USD). How do they do it? Of course, there's not much of a market in the UK, Europe or North America for these lights due to the fact that there isn't actually any sunlight at this time of year, but for us in Thailand, it's free leccy to power our LED lit plastic tat! #### Finally, it's great to see 7/11 getting into the spirit of Christmas and stocking up on Christmas essentials... ####

#### ...condoms, brandy and Ferrero Rocher. That's Christmas sorted! #### It just remains to wish all of you and your loved ones the merriest Christmas and a happy and healthy New Year.

Thank you for all your support and engagement over the past year and let's all hope Hive regains some lost ground and realises its full potential in 2026.