The anti-smoking campaign is another area where Thais have enjoyed great success. If you want to buy a pack of smokes, you need to look for a sign reading "Cigarettes Available Here". By law, the packs themselves cannot be visible to customers; they're usually kept behind a cardboard or metal sheet. You need to say exactly what you want, because they can't show you what brands they have. Once you succeed in ferreting out your brand, this is your reward:
This is one of twelve warning graphics in rotation here; file this one under "mild". And guess what? The anti-smoking effort has been very effective. You see far fewer smokers here than you'd expect for an Asian country. The combination of graphic warning boxes, strict sales regulations, and um, death, seems to work: the Thai smoking rate continues to decline. Philip Morris has been trying to quash the regulations since they were first proposed four years ago, but thankfully without much to show for their efforts.
A flick of the Sardonic cigarette lighter to the Thai Ministry of Public Health!
