Xircal

If PM Prayut Chan-o-cha is serious about tackling corruption in Thailand this would be a good place to start.

Jumping the gun a bit aren't they? It's still only September and a lot can happen before Christmas.

13 hours ago, sahibji said:

i think there is no mention of any reward given by the tourist to the taxi driver. if that is the case, it is sad because the kindness of the driver must be rewarded.

I don't wish to be negative, but how come the driver didn't check the vehicle after the passenger got out to see if she'd left anything behind?

If you look at the photo, you can see it's the type of over the shoulder bag which should have been noticeable if it had been left on the back seat or even on the floor. I'm sure it wasn't the first time that someone had left something behind in his vehicle and that should have prompted the driver to check the vehicle before leaving.

16 hours ago, OnTheRun said:

 

I think they use it on short haul initially to give pilots more landing / take off experience faster, for example BA used 777's on the London - Paris route when they received initial delivery back in the mid 90's.

Yes, I suppose that could be the case. Didn't get off to a good start then.

I know LINE is very popular in SE Asia and most of my Thai friends use it. But looking at the terms it looks as if users will get inundated with ads after installing it. I get pestered by some of them to install it and figured I'll have to accept the crap that goes with free apps these days.

Does anyone have any experience of how much advertising appears when you use it. Are they full screen ads which remain on screen for 30 seconds like they do on Skype for Android?

Is there a premium plan available by which one pays an annual fee to skip ads?

On 9/22/2016 at 5:21 PM, Jiu-Jitsu said:

SIM costs 49 to 69 baht, not 100.

 

Don't buy Tourist SIMs.

 

 

I don't have that choice unfortunately. All tourists can only buy the type of SIM which enables tracking these days: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/thailand-plans-to-track-tourists-phones-using-special-sim-cards-a7182921.html

But thanks for the tips about costs.

1 hour ago, Old Croc said:

The Dutch have long been at the forefront of passenger processing and detection of document fraud.  I'm sure they use scanners for all passengers. You may be confusing the  basic reading of passenger details in the machine readable zone at the bottom of (virtually) all passports, with the more modern computer chip technology. 

I've been through Schiphol as a non EU passenger, without experiencing any noticeable holdups.

 

I would be extremely surprised to find that the Thais were using any sort of match up procedures with photos taken on departure.

You presumably have never arrived early morning when most flights from SE Asia land at Schiphol. These are 300+ seaters and several of them arrive within minutes of each other. Believe me, there are long, long queues at immigration.

The scanners I'm referring to are similar to those that Thailand uses where you place your passport face down in the scanner while airport staff examine your boarding pass. The difference at Schiphol is that the machine also compares your photograph with your face so you need to be looking at the screen while your passport is being scanned.

Dutch passports also contain the holder's fingerprints which are embedded in the chip so that in the event that there's a discrepancy with an arriving or departing passport holder, a passenger's fingerprints will be taken and a comparison made with those which have been stored in the database.

But Thai immigration compares your photograph with the one which is already in the database when you depart. That's why they have you look at the camera.

12 hours ago, DiamondKing said:

I really dont get you guys these Guys WERE ATTACKED yet you bitch about them defending themselves and winning guess youlike to read about victims instead of stories where the potential victims fought back and won.

 

3 on 1 is never good but there were more than 3 thais at the start 

Show us the evidence where it can be seen that the bikers were attacked by a couple of Thai kids.

Come along now, don't be shy.

1 hour ago, DiamondKing said:

The stupidity of the members here and the lack of actually looking at the evidence and seeing that these guys car was attacked with bats and golf clubs and smashed up to the tune of 100,000 plus baht belies belief.

 

I really have to conclude most are lacking in the mental department here on TV because if guys were smashing my car up with bats and Golf clubs i would pray i had some mates in the car with me else it could of been a very different story.

 

 

Eh? Where on earth in the video do you see any evidence of these bikers vehicle being attacked with baseball bats and golf clubs? That's a downright lie and you know it.

You're just making things up as you go along to support your warped view of the incident. One might even ask if you were one of these thugs the way you seem to be defending them.

14 hours ago, DiamondKing said:

Looks to me like 2 guys jumped off the bike and ran towards the Bikers WE ALL KNOW the usual story but I guess these guys did not realize the car would be full of burly bikers 

 

 

If you read the report it states that two Thai boys were eating in the Soi when a black vehicle drove past colliding with one of the Thai boy's motorbike and knocking it over but didn't stop. The two boys ran after it intending to do whatever, but were confronted by the Hells Angels bikers who beat them up.

The Thai boys probably didn't realize the danger they were putting themselves in considering that Hells Angels bikers aren't exactly renowned for being amiable types. You can see that at least one of them was a Hells Angels because his vest has their logo printed on the back of it. It's visible at 1:06 in the video.

13 hours ago, merijn said:

Planes are not blown off a runway.

Pilots that don't control their plane correctly are blown off.

This is classed as a runway overshoot and is considered a serious incident. (not a minor one)

It's classed as a runway excursion actually: http://www.faa.gov/airports/runway_safety/excursion/

Why on earth would Thai use an A350-900 long haul aircraft on such a short trip? It's no wonder they're in financial straits if that's an example of how they propose to utilise this type of aircraft.

It'll be interesting to see what the CVR and FDR reveal once they're published.

What I find disturbing is the lack of convictions of any police officers in cases where a man or woman has been shot dead.

For example, in Minnesota no police officer has been convicted since 2000 even though there 148 people have been killed by the police: http://www.startribune.com/no-charges-for-minnesota-officers-in-police-involved-deaths-since-2000/373981961/

In one of those cases, Minneapolis paid $2.19 million to the family of a black man who in spite of being unarmed was shot dead by police: http://www.startribune.com/minneapolis-to-pay-2-2-million-to-family-of-man-shot-by-police/124108234/

That total doesn't include the shooting death of Philando Castile the aftermath of which was streamed live to Facebook by his girlfriend Diamond Reynolds. Looks like the cop who shot him returned to duty for a short while which is amazing considering what happened: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/officer-shot-killed-philando-castile-back-leave-article-1.2766272

On 9/19/2016 at 6:45 PM, wpcoe said:

And now, hissing iPhone 7s.   

Help! There's a snake inside my phone!

15 hours ago, bubba said:

 

 

Wouldn't that be the case for doing anything with a touch screen phone?

Not necessarily: http://www.phonearena.com/news/10-smartphones-of-2014-you-can-use-with-your-gloves-on-in-the-cold-winter-season_id63405

14 hours ago, halloween said:

Can anybody explain why a winch is needed on a city fire-truck?

Well if they can't put the fire out they can always tow the building away.

12 hours ago, Old Croc said:

(Adding to the delays, however, are long immigration queues taking travellers up to an hour to clear outbound immigration desks.

One immigration officer, who also asked not to named, said that the long lines to clear immigration at Phuket Airport was not unusual.

“Most of the delay here is not because our system is slow,” he said. “The process has to be thorough. A photograph of each passenger must be taken and our officers must record the correct information of each passenger passing through.”)

 

Several questions arise:

If there were enough officers to clear outwards in the old terminal why cant they do the same in the new one?

Why are they taking photos of outwards passengers?

Why are they imputing passenger details by hand?   Machine readers record such information more accurately with a single swipe of the passport? 

To be fair, we have machine readers at Amsterdam Schiphol airport, but they're only for use by EU nationals. Everyone else arriving at immigration has to take their place in the queue and those can be quite long at times with international flights arriving every two or three minutes. 

As for the photos, I think that's because they take one when pax arrive. So when they depart immigration wants to be sure that it's the same passenger who's leaving and not someone trying the leave on a stolen passport.

11 hours ago, oilinki said:

 

They have these signs when going to the new terminal. They also should add what is Terminal 1 and Terminal 2 etc signs as those are sometimes marked to the tickets. 

As I understand it, taxis are dropping off international passengers at the domestic departure building. That's what's causing the chaos at the moment.

What I suggested is that airport authorities places signs around the perimeter i.e. before traffic enters the terminal in order to show taxis where they should be going.

On 9/19/2016 at 6:04 AM, jonclark said:

Gentlemen, can we focus on the article and not get sidelined into the rights / wrongs of Taksin and how that translates or is interpreted as justification for action against his sister. 

 

The issue with this order is not whom it is directed at, but the nature of the order. That the government has granted itself the power judge, jury and executioner, against its enemies. (I use the term enemies as I assume the previous government wasn't removed because they were viewed positively).  

 

 By sidelining the entire legal system the government clearly has shown that this is a political witch hunt. And lets not forget the government has granted itself immunity from future prosecution as a handy little caveat. 

 

If you agree with the actions then consider if you would feel as agreeable if a future government aligned to the shinawatras old power cliche were to grant itself similar powers?  

 

In a nutshell this discussion should be able whether governments should be allowed to steamroller the legal framework of a country for their own political goals, or should the legal system (for all it misgivings and wrongs) be the framework by which all citizens are tried under? And is enshrined in all previous Thai Constitutions. You decide. 

The problem is a new constitution was presented to the people and they voted for it without understanding what it contained. I say without understanding because the opposition was forbidden to campaign against it.

The uneducated masses aren't really to blame since their lack of education works against their interests when faced with events over which they have little or no control. They play the 'follow the leader' role with the military presenting itself as the good guys who were going to tackle corruption and make Thailand a country to be proud of again.

So it seemed to them that they were betting on the favourite even though it was always going to be a one horse race. Nothing changes in Thailand. Too many people are willing to accept corruption as long as they benefit from it. It's always been that way.

10 hours ago, ourmanflint said:

If only they had some sort of system to store all that water, it might come in useful in the dry season.

They've already got a couple of dams but I guess they're either in the wrong places or overloaded.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhumibol_Dam

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sirikit_Dam

Gives me the creeps when I look all the tower blocks in Bangkok and wonder is any of those will suddenly give way without warning.

Have a look at this article which might help: http://www.ghacks.net/2016/09/14/kb3189866-stuck-at-45-or-95-install-it-manually-instead/

On 9/20/2016 at 11:36 AM, Angry Beaver said:

Great joke. 555.

By the way, I wasn't "angry" or "worked up" about it. I guess it's difficult to tell someone's tone or attitude over the internet through text, huh?

 

This ASUS has decent specs for the price, but no OS. You can always find some shop to install a copy of Windows 10 or whatever you like.

http://www.invadeit.co.th/product/notebooks-laptops/asus/k455la-wx736d-blue-intel-core-i3-5005u-4gb-ddr3-500gb-14inch-led-intel-hd-no-os-p027643/

 

 

That laptop only has 802.11bgn (+ Bluetooth) according to the specs which means it won't be able to connect to a 5Ghz network. Not a problem in Thailand since they're all 2.4Ghz, but best to check what the US networks use before putting money on the table. 

That business also sells the OS by the way: http://www.invadeit.co.th/category/operating-systems-windows/

You're presumably intending to make use of the assistive technologies option in order to get a free copy of Windows 10.

However, you might come unstuck since it doesn't apply if you have a pirate copy of Win 7 on the machine now.

As regards the virus, download the free version of Malwarebytes. That'll get rid of even the most obnoxious malware.

What the best SIM for short term use (both Internet and calls)? 

In the past I've always used AIS whenever I'm here on a visit which usually lasts 2-3 weeks at the moment due to the abysmal FX rate for the Euro. But maybe one of the others like DTAC or True are cheaper.

Also, does anyone know how much credit I need in order to keep the SIM active until the next time I come over. Maybe that's a better idea than having to pay 100 Baht each time for a new one.