Just look at how artful and ingenious we sometimes have to be just in dealing with people in our everyday lives. How diplomatic we must be in trying to appease our fussy neighbour so we can all live happily ever after, side by side. We all must use diplomacy of a sort in our daily lives.

However, the conduct of diplomacy to nurture international relations is immensely more complicated. As long as sovereign nations exist, they have to deal with one another, and it is too simplistic to expect them to behave in ways that always make everyone happy.

To attain ultimately friendly international relations and advance national interests and prestige, the pursuit of foreign policy is never-ending. It is a process that, unlike in the bottom-line-dominated world of business, may not always yield immediate and concrete results.

As part of the process, a brief, high-level visit made at short notice, like Thaksin's "surprise" and low-profile (but for the unfortunate accident) visit to Burma, is thus hardly unusual.

Nor is it such a surprise if a prime minister or foreign minister decides to exercise flexibility to pursue quiet, informal diplomacy in tandem with a formal, protocol-laden approach.

After all, how much do Thais really know about the subtle diplomatic manoeuvres of yesteryear, which advanced our foreign policy interests and kept our sovereignty intact amidst external threats posed by colonialism or communism?

Amidst the current political preoccupations, letting frustration over a political figure influence our assessment of the government's foreign policy achievements and direction will not do any service to the advancement of national interests.

A diplomat aspirant

Bangkok

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Xenophobia is hampering education reform

The major obstacles to education reform are: the "bureaucrosaurs" of the Education Department; the systemic corruption that affects all of Thai society today; and xenophobic, pseudo-nationalistic social attitudes that mask the short-sighted, exploitative nature of politicians, bureaucrats and the country's schools.

Further, this xenophobia and pseudo-nationalism are spawned by a kind of intellectual corruption that rejects any change beyond window-dressing. This xenophobia and pseudo-nationalism are the real threat to Thai education.

From this point of view, farang teachers are seen as people who must be tolerated in order to attract more parents and students - and therefore more money - to schools.

But farangs are the only people in Thailand that can actually deliver world-standard education and help to draw up feasible curricula, eliminating all the inefficiencies of the existing curricula.

Nevertheless, their contributions to most schools are kept as minimal as possible, subordinated to the contractual and managerial quirks of the school administration, the uncertain tolerance of their Thai colleagues and the arbitrary whims and opinions of their students - most of whom consider farang teachers a joke.

This leads to fast turnover of farang staff in most schools - a half-year in some cases, which is the surest indicator of rotten administration - and thus to the detriment of education.

A key point - of which politicians, the ministries of education and labour and schools everywhere are surely aware - is that many current school regulations violate two articles of the Constitution: Article 42, protecting academic freedom, and Art 30, prohibiting discrimination on various grounds such as origin and age. Farang teachers are generally encouraged to retire by the age of 60, while Thai teachers stay in the classroom for many decades more.

It is no surprise that this year the average IQ average among Thai students has dropped to 85 - the level of morons.

Krabong Kuverakorn

Bangkok

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What do Australians get in exchange for embassy fees?

One thing seems constant at the Australian Embassy: the quality of their services deteriorates while their fees increase by quantum leaps. Their security system is increasingly tightened - not against potential attacks from terrorists but now against their own expatriates.

To be fair, one may not fault the embassy staff for these problems, as they have to abide by the instructions of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) in Canberra.

The current level of rip-offs - sorry, I mean fees - under the specious users-pay system makes one think that the DFAT fat cats think they have discovered an extra gold mine in the 1,000,000-strong Australian diaspora.

They should not ignore the fact that one of their primary duties is to assist and serve their own citizens abroad.

Loki Ragnaroekssen

Australia

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Another weak attempt to link homosexuality and genes

Re: "Alcoholics try to hide behind science to explain away faults", Letters, August 12.

Here we go again. Neanderthal ideas led to homosexuals being described as "queer" and their sexuality being grouped along with an assortment of sins - sexual perversion, drug addiction, prostitution and, worst of all, treatable diseases.

Nowadays, in our more enlightened times, some modern thinkers seem to have upgraded homosexuality to a "major people issue" and have contrived to blend it into a supposed discussion of the genetics of alcoholism and obesity, going so far as to suggest that it is a drain on health resources.

I refer to Ken Albertsen's comments on the genetic basis of alcoholism. Ken, you obviously find human genetics a straightforward, black-and-white field with obvious conclusions and no need to do any further research.

But I would like you to know that I don't know or care if my homosexuality is genetically inherited. All I know is that I can't help it - it is unavoidable - even though it has exposed me to enormous social prejudice.

However, what I do care about is that my particular "major people issue" has not led me to be a drain on public finances.

Nor does it have any link to obesity or alcoholism. Nor has it led me to complain about that fact that during most of my life, the taxes I paid in the United Kingdom were spent on generous government housing, married persons' tax relief, child support, maternity care and widows' benefits to which I have no entitlement.

Peter Moseley

Bangkok

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Drinking alcohol is always a matter of will power

Re: "Alcoholics try to hide behind science to explain away faults", Letters, August 12.

Ken Albertsen's letter is spot on in knocking down John Bligh's citing of genetics as a cause of alcoholism.

I have yet to see an addiction run in the family. It is a self-inflicted habit that is caused by social environment.

Being a one-glass-per-day of wine or beer man myself (a recommended way to reduce cholesterol), I still feel a little sense of craving when there is no drink available at the dinner table. However, thanks to an effective TV spot urging the public to stop drinking during Lent, I stopped drinking for a few months last year to detoxify my body.

Now I am certain that I will never become an alcoholic so long as I follow this principle yearly.

Songdej Praditsmanont

Bangkok

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Notes from a volunteer evacuated from Lebanon

Israel must open its ears to the voice of the people - people around the world who abhor its actions, the escalation of a war that should never have begun, who weep for the continuing humanitarian crisis - surely Israelis hear this universal cry?

I was there - for one week in Beirut, feeling the fear, the sonic booms, the bombs, the Israeli promise to shut off all exits from the country - sheer torture with no let up. It showed in the eyes of us all who were united by events.

Not just in the eyes of Lebanese who had been through it too many times before but in those of Palestinian refugees in the camps, fellow human beings with no hope, no place to go.

Remember, war in Lebanon is only half the story. What about the forgotten Palestinian women, men and children, the 410,000 forced to live in 11 refugee camps throughout Lebanon for the past 58 years in appalling conditions, temporary housing, their homeland occupied by Israelis, with no rights, no opportunity, no hope?

And their fellow 1.4 million Palestinians in Gaza, now cut off from supplies, food, water, medicines, not forgetting the thousands of Palestinians, both male and female, detained in Israel.

When you live and work alongside Palestinian people in the refugee camps, or alongside those with disabilities in Lebanon as I did, you become as one, one family.

Did you know that Israeli warning leaflets reading "abandon your homes" were dropped from the sky on all these innocent civilians in 1996, 1982, 1978, 1967 and 1948 - little has changed, the year is 2006 and the leaflets continue.

Did you know that on August 6 in Qana, of the 37 children who were killed, 15 could not run, 15 beautiful innocent children with disabilities?

Why? " ... tell us why, if humans are supposed to be the superior and civilised species, children are being killed maimed and detained in the Middle East, another generation of hatred born?"

Think about this.

Kerry Wills

Bangkok