Xircal

I was just reading an article about problems qualified teachers are experiencing finding work, so it may be of interest to you as well: http://www.ajarn.com/ajarn-street/articles/tossed-on-the-tefl-scrapheap/

Well, since Thailand is considered to be a haven for foreign criminals according to the head of the Royal Thai Police, General Pumpanmuang, it's hardly surprising: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Also, you've only got to look at the salaries the boys on the beat earn which is around 6,500 Baht a month and then compare that with their lifestyles to realize that without frequent backhanders, they could never maintain that style of living.

Some suggestions here

I'm guessing this is the big news that the NSA has been 'bracing for' recently.

It is big news, in fact this is massive. Gemalto products are used everywhere.

Yes, indeed. And it looks this morning like Thailand is also one of the victims: http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/feb/19/nsa-gchq-sim-card-billions-cellphones-hacking

I wonder is the good PM was a target.

Does it really matter what the law says? The military can do pretty much whatever it wants—in the national interest of course. I am just glad that we have such great people protecting us.

What makes you think you're being protected?

As long as you don't rock the boat, you'll probably be safe.

But if the boat springs a leak, don't go looking for a lifebelt because there probably won't be any.

This has been going on since the Kingdom of Siam conquered the region in 1785. An upsurge in the insurgency took place in 2001 and has been escalating ever since.

Will Thailand relent and give up the land it conquered four centuries ago? I doubt it somehow, so expect more of the same for probably decades to come.

Top secret documents provided by Edward Snowdon reveal that GCHQ and the NSA hacked into the internal computer network of Gemalto, a Dutch multinational reputed to be the largest manufacturer of SIM cards in the world and stole secret encryption keys so that global communications can be monitored according to 'The Intercept': https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2015/02/19/great-sim-heist/

Gemalto also provides chips for bank cards such as American Express, Mastercard and VISA as well as those used in electronic passports, hardware tokens for securing buildings and offices as well as mobile payment systems, and those used in luxury cars such as Audi and BMW. All these systems have also allegedly been hacked.

Having the wrong SIM card can also make you the unwitting target of a drone strike apparently: https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2014/02/10/the-nsas-secret-role/

I looked at the FCO.UK site for info which you'll find here: https://www.gov.uk/general-visit-visa

But under the heading, 3. "Documents you must provide", there's no mention of an insurance requirement.

This would seem to differ from the rules pertaining to a Schengen visa: http://www.vfsglobal.com/austria/uk/schengenvisa_docreq.html

Probably your best bet would be to either phone, or email the Embassy in Bangkok and clarify the position with them: https://www.gov.uk/government/world/organisations/british-embassy-bangkok/office/british-embassy-bangkok

So what will the average weekly pay be? No good saying it will be 'reasonable'.

And the working hours? Dawn till dusk?

2.00am until midnight according to Wiki: http://www.wikigender.org/index.php/Thai_Women_Labor_in_The_Countries_of_Scandinavia#Working_conditions:_Harvesting_the_wild_berries._.28Mid_of_July_until_the_end_of_September.29

Hardly a walk in the park and pay at between 80 cents and €1,30 per Kg seems abysmal.

So they work 22 hours a day?

According to the site I linked to, yes.

This site says they work 15 hours a day seven days a week which is still pretty harsh: http://humantraffickingcenter.org/posts-by-htc-associates/trapped-to-pick-berries-in-finland-the-many-forms-of-labour-trafficking/

You should look at Cathay Pacific as well, can normally get a return around 10K and at least you'd be travelling in the right direction the whole way, KL is a bit of a detour.

Thanks! ....and...we are afraid of any airline related with Malaysia !!!! Look at what happened in 2014!!!

Malaysia Airlines is a good airline and you need have no worries about flying with them. If you delve into each airline's history, you'll come across some piece of information which you might find disturbing, but that doesn't mean that the whole business is suspect.

I've been flying Malaysia Airlines for years and will be doing so again in a couple of months time.

However, Hong Kong Airlines would seem to be the cheapest at the moment at £210 return according to http://www.ebookers.com

Also, you have to be a little bit careful when booking flights because Shanghai has two international airports called respectively, Shanghai Pudong International Airport (PVG) and Shanghai Hongqiao International (SHA).

So check any special flight offers carefully if you want to be certain of departing from the same airport you arrive in before putting money on the table.

Cheap, but one way only. Return flight is about three times the price.

You can rent one at Standard Chartered Bank: https://www.sc.com/th/en/ways-to-bank/inperson-safe-deposit.html

How about one of these? http://pantip.com/topic/31594635

You're presumably talking about photographing a burglar who breaks into your appartment, or house and have the software email images of what's happening to you I guess. Google can help you there: https://www.google.co.uk/webhp?complete=0&hl=en/search?q=#complete=0&q=webcams+which+can+email+images

But you might be better off installing something like Prey: https://preyproject.com/ or maybe Predator: http://www.predator-usb.com/predator/en/index.php

I use Zenmate which is both free and secure.

In the light of revelations that Lenovo has been injecting adware into its latest laptops, it might be wise to ignore Lenovo phones as I suggested earlier: http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/topic/801781-lenovo-found-guilty-of-shipping-new-pcs-with-superfish-adware/

That this could actually be a issue for some? Maybe not a big issue for you, but do you enter passwords 50+ times a day?

I do

I must admit using a Keepass which is a password manager resolves that problem for me because I can just copy/paste them now.

An alternative would be to use the Firefox Password Manager whereby you just use a master password for everything which securely records individual passwords for each site.

if you are using keepass & use chrome\firefox , you may want to checkout ChromeIpass.. automatically populate username and password for websites that you configure.

it saves much time

Firefox's builtin password manager is crackable..

I use Keepass only, but was suggesting Firefox Password Manager for the benefit of Vento.

But please provide the link to the site which demonstrates how to crack it because I'm not aware that that is indeed the case.

According to the Dutch Press, it's a little more serious than just adware. The SSL certificate can be hijacked and used to redirect users to a malware site.

A security researcher by the name of Erik Loman demonstrated that fact on his Twitter account because at the time, it was thought that only Google Chrome and Internet Explorer were vulnerable, but not Firefox. As can be seen from his tweet, the Dutch bank site ING.nl shows Superfish as the Certificate Authority instead of Symantec: https://twitter.com/erikloman/status/568421667330002944

If the adware is installed on your laptop, you should be able to see it in Windows Task Manager in the Processes list. It's called visualdiscovery.exe

More details here: http://systemexplorer.net/file-database/file/visualdiscovery-exe

I woud expect that Mozilla will blacklist the Superfish certificate sometime within the next 24 hours. They're usually pretty quick at safeguarding users as soon as they become aware of a vulnerability, unlike Microsoft who probably won't address the issue until the next Patch Tuesday.

The Russian aircraft, a Boeing 767-300 with 254 passengers onboard was forced to abandon takeoff from Phuket International after a cockpit warning indicted a problem with flaps. http://avherald.com/h?article=481fbc7e

Flying Boeing or any Western built aircraft is going to be a bit dodgy for Russian airlines now because sanctions block the sale of spare parts to Russia as part of the ongoing Ukranian crisis.

This particular aircraft was built in 1996 and started life with LTU Airlines. It was subsequently acquired by Hawaiian Airlines and reregistered as N581LF until being sold to Blue Panorama Airlines in 2002 and reregistered once more as EI-CXO.

The aircraft sustained damage when in skidded off the runway in Havana in 2003. http://www.airframes.org/reg/eicxo

Ikar Airlines, the current operator acquired the aircraft in 2013 and reregistered it at VP-BOZ.

That this could actually be a issue for some? Maybe not a big issue for you, but do you enter passwords 50+ times a day?

I do

I must admit using a Keepass which is a password manager resolves that problem for me because I can just copy/paste them now.

An alternative would be to use the Firefox Password Manager whereby you just use a master password for everything which securely records individual passwords for each site.

Keyboard LEDs

Thanks for the tip. Do you use it yourself?

Just disable it (like I have) or re-map it to something useful.

http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/windows-vista/disable-caps-lock-key-in-windows-vista/ (works with Win 7, 8 etc too)

Thanks, I'll take a look at that later.

Mac's still have backlit keyboards and caps lock LED

I think the true solution is, look at the screen rather than the keyboard when typing though - force yourself to do it - it might take you a few days to become accustomed to it, but you won't regret it.

I used to actually donkey's years ago.

But laptops have an Fn key which is used in combination with the top row of F-keys. Also, not all laptops have a numerical keypad. So there are those kind of headaches to contend with as well.

Their logo looks like the tail fin of an aircraft which has plunged into the sea.

Let's hope Thai Airways doesn't change their paint scheme again to the same colour green.

So let me get this straight. Tourists are forbidden to smoke or eat on the beach right?

But beach vendors are allowed to sell them food and drinks.

So who in their right mind is going to bother buying beverages and food if they aren't allowed to consume it while they're on the beach?