Post Apocalypse - Ron's blog

Published on: 20 May 2026

The Scamming Era

The word 'scam' has only been used since the 1960s.

I suspect that in the not-too-distant future, when aliens pick over the bones of our failed civilisation, trying to find out what went wrong, they will tag the 2020s as The Scamming Era. Although scamming has been around for a long time, in the form of confidence tricksters, swindlers and fraudsters, etymonline.com tells me that the words ‘scam’ and ‘scammer’ have only been in use since the 1960s.

Indeed, when I was growing up in the 1950s and 1960s, I never heard the word used, nor knew of anyone who had been scammed. Apparently, it may be derived from the British slang word ‘scamp’, which I remember my parents using in an affectionate way to describe a mischievous child, as in “you little scamp”.

I’m not saying that my childhood was a golden age of people behaving well, though it might be tagged The Decent Era by contrast. It’s just that nowadays it seems perfectly acceptable, even praiseworthy, to be a successful scammer. This involves exploiting common characteristics such as vanity, gullibility, opportunism, greed and naivety.

Like most humans, I possess these characteristics in some measure and have been subject to potential scams that have almost sucked me in. And though I feel I now know the signs to look out for (unusual email addresses, too-good-to-be-true offers and praise for my ability, especially as a writer), the only way that scammers can succeed is by staying one step ahead of their victim.

The result is that scams are becoming ever more sophisticated and difficult to identify, in the same way that it’s increasingly difficult to tell fake news from real news. Recently I received emails supposedly from commissioning editors of big publishing companies offering representation, which turned out to be impersonations of real editors, the only clue being unusual email addresses. When I did a little research on the topic, I found a website called writersbeware.blog that is flooded with complaints from other writers about similar scams.

I live in Thailand, which has entire scam cities perched on all its borders—with Myanmar, Laos and Cambodia. Thousands of victims of scams are drawn to and entrapped in these places and then forced to scam others around the world into romantic or financial disaster.

I don’t consider myself a moralist, but I do feel that for a species to survive and thrive, it needs to show compassion and empathy for others rather than selfishness and lack of consideration. The Buddhist notion of ‘right livelihood’ seems appropriate here, which means earning a living in a way that does not harm oneself or others.

Of course, an era by definition is a finite period of time, and one day The Scamming Era will end. So, what comes next? Let’s second-guess those aliens and predict that the 2030s, which already many see as the deadline for environmental apocalypse, will be tagged The Self-Destruct Era.

Published on: 29 March 2025

Homage to Uncle Ho

Portrait of Ho Chi Minh

30 April 2025 is a huge day in the history of Vietnam, as it marks the 50th anniversary of the end of the American War (or American War to the Vietnamese), when tanks of the People's Army of Vietnam from the north smashed through the gates of the Presidential Palace in Saigon.

The man who was largely responsible for the reunification of his country was Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam's national hero, who died in 1969 and thus never lived to see his dream realised in 1975.

To mark this occasion, I've changed the story posted on my Searching for Shangri-La page, which now recounts a visit to see Uncle Ho in his mausoleum in Hanoi. Quite a moving experience.

Published on: 30 April 2024

Still searching...

My first self-published book was Searching for Shangri-La, a collection of a dozen travelogues that are more about myself than the locations they describe. Occasionally I have changed the story that features on my website, and now it’s time for another change. Since we’re deep into the smog season in Chiang Mai, when the city frequently ranks as the most polluted on Earth, I thought it would be a good time to share the title story. There’s an audio version too, so to read about or listen to a lifetime of Searching for Shangri-La in just 15 minutes, just go here.

Published on: 8 June 2023

Lessons (we never learn)

Reflections on Ian McEwan's novel, Lessons

Way back in the 1970s, when I was in my 20s, I chanced upon a book that affected me profoundly. Here at last, I thought, is a writer who lives in my world, with all its weirdness and complexity, and can convey it beautifully in prose.

The book was First Love, Last Rites, a collection of short stories by a guy called Ian McEwan, and I became an instant fan. Since then, I’ve read most, though not all, of his work – most recently his longest novel of all, Lessons.

Lessons is basically a biography of Roland Baines, who has much in common with McEwan – same age, same upbringing, same boarding school education – though presumably McEwan was never tutored at the piano as is Roland, with a complete sex education thrown in.

The wonder of Roland, a ‘serial monogamist’, is that he’s not a superhero, just an average guy who muddles his way through life, reacting to situations such as being abandoned by his wife and left with their tiny baby while she goes off to become a famous writer. In a way, Roland is summed up by his part-time professions – tennis coach for the elderly, greeting-card writer and piano player of ‘munch music’ in fancy London hotels; a jack of all trades but master of none.

Yet Roland’s a likeable guy, and we tend to root for him as he tries to lose his virginity at the age of 14 before the Cuban missile crisis destroys the world because he doesn’t want to die a virgin. He also smuggles books and records into East Germany before the Wall comes down, avoids using the London Underground after terrorist bombs go off and sits out several lockdowns due to the Covid pandemic.

It’s a strange feeling when you’re reading about a fictional character and suddenly think “The author’s writing about me!” So it was as I read about Roland near the end of Lessons: “He was plausible within the digital age, like a man in a cunning disguise, but he remained a citizen of the analogue world.”

The epic scale of this novel brings to mind the marvellous Any Human Heart by William Boyd, which follows the life of a writer against a similar backdrop of world events during the 20th century. These references to shared problems of the past help us as readers to sympathize with the protagonist’s inability to steer a comfortable course through his existence.

As for the ‘Lessons’ of the title, like the rest of us Roland doesn’t seem to learn from his experiences, whether they be joyful or painful, though he does revisit the most powerful emotional connections from his past, namely the piano tutor and his estranged wife, for poignant end-of-life reunions.

On another level, I wonder whether McEwan is hinting that we humans should learn lessons from the tragic world events that chart the course of this book. Towards the end, his concerns are with the unchecked future of Artificial Intelligence and the fact that we are now beyond preventing a 1.5-degree temperature rise that many say will signal the end of our species.

I can’t help but think that McEwan wanted to publish this work before it is too late and we are expelled from Planet Earth for not learning our lessons.

Published on: 21 October 2022

UK Government Chaos!

Photo by Paul Silvan on Unsplash

I've been watching heated arguments recently in the UK Houses of Parliament that remind me of kids squabbling over sweets in a school playground, and I'm thinking "These are the people that run my country!"

I'm reminded of a passage in a novel I'm re-reading at the moment – News from Nowhere by William Morris. Written in 1890, it's about a man named William Guest who falls asleep and wakes up in the 21st century to find the grimy, stinky, noisy London of the Victorian era transformed into a peaceful, friendly, unpolluted utopia, where society is so enlightened and advanced that there is no need for money, policemen, prisons, or – get this – government!

As Guest is walking around with Dick, his companion from the future, he says "Why, there are the Houses of Parliament! Do you still use them?" Dick answers, "Use them? Well, yes, they are used for a sort of subsidiary market, and a storage place for manure. "

Let's hope that the recent antics in this hallowed building are an indicator that we're well on the way to Morris' utopia, and that eventually this building will serve its rightful purpose – for storing manure.

Published on: 9 May 2020

Before the Deluge

A review of the novel Bangkok Wakes to Rain

Everybody knows that Bangkok will drown one day. It sits a precarious 1.5 metres above sea level, which continues to rise steadily due to climate change, while the city is sinking under the weight of its concrete jungle by a few centimetres each year. Some give it ten years, others fifteen. For the city’s 10 million or so inhabitants, this is a cause for concern, and the government’s efforts to stave off the inevitable with multi-million dollar flood barriers have all the pathos of a madman trying to hold back the tide.

The scenario is ripe for a dystopian novel, which Pitchaya Sudbanthad has provided in the form of Bangkok Wakes to Rain. This wildly ambitious debut novel jumps back and forth through the city’s history from the mid-19th to the mid-21st century, and by the end all that remains of the former capital are the tops of the tallest skyscrapers, with floodwaters splashing at their windows.