Millions of Thais fall on hard times
Stagnating economy worsens lot of the poor as obscene inequality gap widens further
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A homeless man sleeps under a bridge in Bangkok. Signs of extreme poverty are commonplace in the capital and provincial towns. (Photo: UCA News)
Siriwan Wongprasong, a Thai woman in her late 50s, has never had it particularly easy, but times are especially hard these days, she says.
Reserved and soft-spoken, Siriwan lives in an inner-city shanty town in an otherwise affluent part of Bangkok. Her husband is ailing, so she is the family’s only breadwinner and makes her living by mending clothes on a portable sewing machine she sets up daily on a sidewalk beside a five-star hotel.