Today was press conference day as the company in conjunction with the Ministry of Health launched the latest spa collection. It would be my first time meeting the minister in charge(whom we'll call 'PJ'), but he caused an uproar with some very insensitive comments.
He was talking about the abundance of flowers available in Thailand to be used as an ingredient for various spa products and after that commented "We also have many 'gold flowers' around". I shall explain. When we translate 'gold flower' or Dok Thong, literally means a slut. It may not sound as vulgar in english, but believe you me, it is frowned upon in Thai society. 'PJ' chose to score an own goal in front of the media people and us. I could see many female reporters extremely disgusted with his comments while his deputies tried to play it down by forcibly laughing. While he congratulated our company, our CFO and I were left disappointed by such a classless act. Personally, I think he doesn't know how to do his job. He doesn't know one bit about the health sector, but he merely knows where to 'dip his fingers into'.
I did what anybody would do - Keep my comments to myself. Our paths will cross again, so for the moment I'll just keep my cards close to my chest. I just hope for the sake of the country's health sector, 'PJ' doesn't stay too long in this portfolio. I certainly hope not....
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