Saturday 18 July 2026

Good morning Bangkok. Happy Saturday.

🌡️ Weather: 26-37°C (79-99°F). Wide temperature range. Hot through the afternoon with scattered showers possible. Morning is the cooler window.

🌫️ AQI: 89-138 (Moderate to Unhealthy for Sensitive Groups). Elevated again. Morning remains the cleaner window.

The Board of Investment approved 640 foreign business applications worth a combined 187.61 billion baht in the first six months of the year. The investment is concentrated in the sectors that are defining the next decade of the global economy: electric vehicles, artificial intelligence, data centers and advanced manufacturing. Thailand's positioning as a regional manufacturing hub for EVs has accelerated rapidly, with BYD, Great Wall Motor and multiple Japanese automakers expanding production capacity in the Eastern Economic Corridor.

For Bangkok-based expats and business owners, the number tells a clear story about where the country is heading. Thailand is not just attracting tourism and retirement money. It is attracting the kind of capital-intensive, technology-driven investment that creates high-value jobs, builds infrastructure and raises the economic baseline. The ฿187.61 billion sits alongside a stack of positive signals from 2026: the Foreign Business Act reform moving through Cabinet, the Visa Destinations programme launching nationally, the ฿45 unified rail fare starting January 1, two cities in Travel + Leisure's global top 10, and the "Best Welcome" award in Madrid. The narrative that Vietnam and the Philippines are catching up is real. The counter-narrative, that Thailand is responding with structural investment rather than just marketing, is also real.

Bottom Line: ฿187.61 billion in foreign business investment in six months. 640 companies. EV, AI, data centers and advanced manufacturing. Thailand is not standing still while its neighbors climb. Whether the reforms and investment translate into the kind of economy that keeps the best talent and businesses here depends on execution. But the capital is flowing, and the direction is clear.

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Cyber Crime Investigation Bureau officers arrested a Thai woman and three Chinese nationals in connection with the operation. The gang posed as police officers and contacted the teenager, identified only as Mick, convincing him that his mother was under investigation for serious financial crimes. They manipulated him into believing that removing cash and valuables from the family home was necessary to "protect" the assets from being seized. He took nearly 11 million baht in cash and valuables from his own mother and handed them to the scammers. The victim, his mother, only discovered what had happened after the money and valuables were gone.

The sophistication of the manipulation is what makes this case different from a typical phone scam. The gang did not target the mother directly. They targeted her son, a 19-year-old, and spent enough time building a false narrative that he genuinely believed he was helping his family. He was not greedy. He was not careless. He was systematically deceived by people who understood exactly how to exploit trust, fear of authority and the instinct to protect a parent. For any expat with teenage or young adult children in Bangkok, the story is a reminder that scam networks are not just targeting elderly victims or technologically naive people. They are targeting young people who can be emotionally manipulated into acting against their own family's interests.

Bottom Line: Talk to your kids about scam calls. The conversation is simple: real police do not call you on the phone and ask you to move money. No legitimate authority will ever tell you to steal from your own family to "protect" them. If someone calls claiming to be police, hang up and call 191 directly. The 19-year-old in this story was not stupid. He was manipulated. The difference matters.

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Luscious Creamery at One Bangkok is a 4.9-star ice cream shop with 1,161 Google reviews, and at that volume that score means almost nobody walks away unsatisfied. The shop sits on the ground floor of the Parade building at One Bangkok, Witthayu Road, inside one of the city's newest and most ambitious mixed-use developments. The ice cream is handmade, small-batch and built around flavors that go beyond vanilla and chocolate into genuinely creative territory: Kyoto Express, Roasty Genmaicha, Thai tea, seasonal fruit combinations and rotating specials that reward repeat visits.

What reviewers keep coming back to is the texture. "Luscious and rich mouth feel" is a phrase that appears in multiple reviews, alongside "imaginative and full of flavor without being too sweet." The sweetness is dialed back enough that each flavor has room to breathe, which is what separates artisan ice cream from the sugary industrial versions. Waffle cones are made fresh. Double scoops let you try two flavors without committing. The seating area is comfortable enough to sit and savor rather than eat and leave. On a Saturday afternoon when the temperature hits 37°C and you need something cold, creative and genuinely well-made, Luscious Creamery is the stop.

TIP: Try the Kyoto Express or the Roasty Genmaicha if you like matcha and tea-based flavors. Ask the staff what is rotating this week. I’d suggest going for the Double scoop in a waffle cone.

📍 One Bangkok, Parade Building, 1F, Witthayu Road, Lumphini, Pathum Wan, Bangkok 10330
📞 061 080 1418
🕐 Open daily, closes 10PM
⭐ 4.9 stars (1,161 Google reviews)

Always check opening times before heading out.

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Have a wonderful Saturday, and see you tomorrow morning.

— Patrick