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Thais have shown their generous spirit in flood aid efforts, but the trucks rolling around submerged sois bearing banners seem to be filling the sewers with something else entirely

Day 28 of the flood. It seems the infested waters are bringing with them disease, crocodiles, poisonous snakes and politicians.

Another truck rumbled past me last Wednesday on Vibhavadi Rangsit Road, full of supplies for flood victims _ and another missed photo opportunity for your columnist.

How I wanted to take its picture to include in this column! Alas, my iPhone 4S was rigged up to my car stereo and despite driving at a moderate 110km per hour, there was no time to wrench it out of the stereo and flip it into camera mode.

I wanted the picture as evidence. That truck was full to the brim with bottled water and boxes, but that wasn't what caught my eye.

It was the big white canvas draped over one side of the truck with giant red lettering: DONATED ITEMS COURTESY OF POLITICIAN KARUN HOSAKUL.

Karun Hosakul? The guy who attacked the Democrat MP in the parliament cafeteria a few years ago? Goodness, hasn't he turned over a new leaf! If only all our politicians could have such an epiphany during times of national disaster.

Not a few hours after that _ and how's this for a coincidence _ I am coming back the other way along Vibhavadi Rangsit and there is another truck with red letters on white canvas. Only this time it wasn't Mr Karun being generous: A GIFT FROM POLICE GENERAL THAKSIN SHINAWATRA.

My reaction was immediate. I let out a sigh of relief with the knowledge our intermittently beloved former prime minister was still alive and kicking.

Seeing that sign was the first I'd heard of him in weeks. Since the start of the floods he's been quieter than a Nana Plaza go-go bar on Makha Bucha Day. But just when I thought he'd been swallowed up into the black hole of Montenegro or something, here was a truck bearing gifts.

It certainly reminded me of the good old days when Thaksin would sweep through the impoverished countryside, tossing wads of 1,000 baht notes with the flick of a hand to his beloved followers, who would fall to the ground and scoop them up with undying gratitude.

That is being flippant, I know. At least he is sending out trucks of gifts, despite my mother teaching me to be wary of strangers bearing such things.

But to say I'm a little hurt is an understatement. Isn't a truck or two of bottled water a case of too little too late? I mean, whenever the Cambodians have troubles he's quick to fly in and help them out, like when they had economic woes last year. He dashed over there with ideas so great that Hun Sen even appointed him economic adviser.

Well we're having a few economic troubles of our own at the moment, but we're getting no advice whatsoever from him. And if anybody needs advice, it's his own flesh and blood.

When I didn't get the opportunity to snap a pic of Mr Karun's truck, or Thaksin's, I went online to find a picture in the hope of passing it off as one of my own. And that is where I discovered a raging torrent of an entirely different kind.

It seems that up until last week these trucks with canvas-draped signs were leaving Don Mueang airport with alarming regularity.

Even I can see that's a little odd. Don Mueang was the centre for donations from generous Thais all over the country. The trucks are leaving Don Meuang. Surely Mr Karun and his mates aren't draping his canvas over my donations!

Well that explains why a mountain of donated goods were left behind at Don Mueang when the Flood Relief Operations Command (Froc) decided to get the Froc out of Don Mueang _ and quickly. In their hurry to vacate, they forgot about all those donated goods. That mountain is now underwater, but not before Channel 3 news reporters filmed it last Saturday night for the country to see.

Well of course it's going to be covered in water. Those floodwaters were rising rapidly, and it takes time to a) load a truck and then b) drape a big canvas sign with your name over the sides of that truck. Plus a good sign writer needs time and energy to do his job properly.

And so, on the same day hundreds of Saphan Mai locals milled around the back of a truck, stretching their frantic hands out for donations of food and water, such supplies were being swallowed up by the dirty waters of Don Mueang. One newspaper printed these two images side by side on its front page last Monday without the need to add an explanatory word.

(Faced with growing public resentment, last Tuesday cabinet announced that the Don Mueang pic was ''old'' by way of excusing it. As in, a month? No, it was three days old, not the day before as reported. So that makes it OK. Please, dear readers _ no nasty emails to me about that. They said it, not me.)

The online Thai community is very unhappy about this situation. There is now a Facebook page with dozens of pictures of trucks bearing canvas signs. Other pics show donated goods with stickers featuring politicians' names slapped on them. Now many people want to slap the politicians right back.

I don't bristle at politicians who see great PR ops in our flooded despair. After all, if the skytrain can interrupt my silence with blaring TV ads inside carriages, why can't Thai politicians blare out their names from the sides of trucks as the nation sinks? It's something to keep in mind next time you're at the polling booth, however.

In fact I'm not bitter about almost anything during these floods. Look at the positives; the donations that went underwater this week were a ''mountain'', straight from the hearts of average Thais. This is a country of people with extraordinarily big hearts in times of crisis.

And look at the army. If you have been anywhere near a flood-stricken area you will have seen them in action, hauling people and belongings into boats, through mud and poisonous torrents. They work non-stop amid cries from angry and afraid locals who are going under. You might like to pass that off as a PR exercise also, but not until you too have stood in that dirty chemically infested water. It's certainly much easier to paint red letters on white.

So I remain positive. We are over the manic buy-everything-off-the-supermarket-shelf phase we were in this time last week, and thank goodness for that. We got a little crazy there, hoarding water and instant noodles with the same zeal our politicians were hoarding canvas and red paint.

And when the flood waters recede, don't for a minute think it's over. The clean-up begins. Other than my labour, I am going to be very hesitant in donating anything. Because there is one thing worse than my donations being covered in water and sludge _ and that is canvas.