mogoso

I have been told that Kunming is the "City Of Eternal Spring"

Hope it all goes well for you

TP

Kunming's an interesting visit. Kinda like Chiang Mai in the sense of many different hill tribe like people abide in the area with own style of dress, an ok pizza place. The Stone Forest a train ride away, a zoo with a tiny aquarium that has a couple of girls swimming by in a mermaid show. Buses to take you everywhere and for the ladies dress shops just everywhere

I have this platonic friend who is a Thai Lady, here in California.

Lately she has begun telling me about Thailand, by way of these little stories, I wonder if any of you have heard them. If not, perhaps I can persuade her to try to write them down in her limited but adequate English.

The following are thumbnail sketches of a couple of them:

One has to do with the difference in America and Thailand, and why Americans have too much stress. It seems it has something to do with Thailand having many banana, and, significantly, the Thai word for banana also happens to mean "easy". Americans need to eat more bananas, so that they will take things "easy" and have less stress.

Another one is that Thai people have a little saying, which has to do with the four things that are needed for a happy life. In English, they roughly translate as "Eat, 'poop', sex, travel". In Thai, the words seem to be short, like one syllable, and so the four things can be said very quickly (remember "easy" is important). I don't remember the Thai words for these, how about you?

I don't recall reading about either of these on ThaiVisa before. (Maybe she is just making them up, but I doubt it.)

There is another one, that back in times past, there were beautiful female ghosts who live under one type of tree, can you guess what it was? It was the banana tree, and at night they would lure men to them and then I think they would bite them or something. Nowadays however, there are not so many of them around because of the lighting that is so prevalent. (I interpret this as a symbolic and cautionary tale for men to beware of certain types of women.)

Anybody heard these particular stories before?

In other news: She knows why my house here in California never gets robbed, though I leave the doors unlocked. (I think it is because I don't keep anything particularly valuable here). She had a dream that there is a man who lives under a tree in the front of my house, he is very old, but looks very good, like a prince. He protects my house.

Thanks!

A story I've heard in Issan concerns miniature elephants that conjugate near pools of water in the forrest. Supposedly they bring good luck if you see them

Been a while since I've been to Thailand, and most inconviently they've gone and built a new airport that from what I understand isn't up to building codes and international arrives in one airport and national works out of another, at least that has been my impression. I need to scoot up to Chiang Mai for a few days of in-law visiting and a visit to Grace Dental Clinic.

Do the airlines provide shuttle buses? or are you left on your own to grab whatever transportation is availible? Recommendations please.

Also I remember that the U.S. Embassy is a skip, hop, and a jump from the Nana area. Nothing against the hotels there, but is there a lodging that is very close to the Embassy that isn't in Nana.? I've a 7 am appointment at the embassy and would like a bit of rest before going, and I may have my mother-in law and my sons fiance in tow as well as my stepson.

As I've not had any reason to enter the U.S. Bangkok Embassy before any advice will be appreciated.

There are flights from Suvanaphumi Airport to Chiengmai. Plaza Athenee Hotel Bangkok is the nearest to the US Embassy.

Thank you Irene and Tayto for you informative replies, much appreciated

F-22 Raptor Fly away unit cost is about US$ 120m

And only close NATO allies (plus possibly Japan and Australia) would ever be allowed those.

There are really large fighters also. I watch the fly outta Lockheed where they are being built, and they always fly with an escort jet. The escort jet (F-16) looks to be half the size of the F-22 (which is a delta wing configuration) Really large fighter jet, must carry alot of firepower.

Been a while since I've been to Thailand, and most inconviently they've gone and built a new airport that from what I understand isn't up to building codes and international arrives in one airport and national works out of another, at least that has been my impression. I need to scoot up to Chiang Mai for a few days of in-law visiting and a visit to Grace Dental Clinic.

Do the airlines provide shuttle buses? or are you left on your own to grab whatever transportation is availible? Recommendations please.

Also I remember that the U.S. Embassy is a skip, hop, and a jump from the Nana area. Nothing against the hotels there, but is there a lodging that is very close to the Embassy that isn't in Nana.? I've a 7 am appointment at the embassy and would like a bit of rest before going, and I may have my mother-in law and my sons fiance in tow as well as my stepson.

As I've not had any reason to enter the U.S. Bangkok Embassy before any advice will be appreciated.

Would be great if to see more positive steps being taken.

Cheer up, there are biodigradeable plastic bags being put into use.

I picture myself a Brad Pitt type and the other sods Woody Allen type

All the women on TV are really Rosie O'Donnell / Roseann Barr lookalikes in the nud_e.

Either of the choices are horrorfying ! I picture the ladies looking like my granny to someone I'd stop and stare at.

Myself I am a cross between a walrus and an aging Burt Reynolds with the worst attributes of both. My moustache hangs 5 inches below my chin and is graying daily, or so it seems.

They say Kunming is very nice at this time of year...or anytime of year for that matter!!

Kunming reminds me of Chiang Mai. There are many local "hilltribes" with their own dress and dialects. They have an ok zoo and a small aquarium and you can visit the stone forest (train ride) and theres many local dressmakers, my wife enjoyed herself.

Weathers nice though

Quote bendix: Now come come qwertz. Life is not all about comparing girls or body odours, you know. We're having a grown-up debate here . . . It's hardly our fault you have the attention span of a gnat, is it? :-)

This was a most hurtful thing to say and I've had to call my therapist to talk about feeling rejected again.

And another thing, I shan't read any of your nasty posts again until you learn to be civil.

BTW, you're right about the attention span, at least today, I've burned my toast twice and forgotten to put coffee in the percolator.

And if you think dementia is funny Mr..............................oh bugger, I've forgotten.

What could be cheaper and less polluting than air? A French manufaturer will be sending the first of 8000 cars that operate on compressed air to India. I'm curious as to how well they'll operate. I believe they have a range of 125 miles per charge and 70 mph is top speed.

Honda will be sending 1200 compressed natural gas cars to New York and California as a market experiment. They can be filled at your home (if you've a filling station attached to you natural gas line, (optional equipment) ) Natural gas is basically a nonpolluter and the cost per energy equalvalent is $1.20 cents per gallon.

BTW govt's love taxes. I live in GA a non oil producing state, but if I lived in CA, an oil producing state, I'd pay almost a dollar more per gallon CA loves taxing people

I agree with natural gas but not so much with the compressed air cars. Natural gas is good but probably not too sustainable but I have to say no to the air car concept. I doubt they could ever utilize the energy they say they can and the energy to compress the air has to come from somewhere.

CA's tax is kinda justified since it's supposed to keep people from gas-guzzlers but the import tax here makes energy-efficient cars an unfeasible idea. It is, I believe somewhere around 300% for every car. Quite a bit more than a dollar a gallon.

It doesn't take alot of energy to compress air, or a lot of time. Did you ever have a scuba tank?

As for the tax in CA to prevent gas guzzlers, that seems not to deter a sizeable percentage of the population from driving their SUV's. Where I live in GA it seems to be the bigger the better for our illegal immigrants. Although US gas comsumption was up 2.5% last year, I wonder how much it'd be down without the added burden of 15 million illegal immigrants that have poured across our borders unchecked by a president aligned with big business wanting cheap labor and democrats thinking they'll gain their votes, and stay in power for the forseeable future.

Natural gas can also be a green gas recovered by various means, methane digesters, garbage produces gas that can be recovered, but the biggest potential to obtain gas will be from natural gas hydrates. Where a country such as Japan has no oil deposits, but has vast deposits of Nat Gas Hyd in their surrounding ocean

Instead of spending 40 million Baht on advertising,why not reduce the price of Gasahol,even further,then you will see the Thais,'''''''''' converting over''''''''''''.Logic eh??.

Water is one resource we all take for granted. How much water is used during the growth cycle to produce one gallon of ethanol? Doesn't gasahol pollute? Maybe a little better tha gas but we can do better.

Why didn't they donate this money to alternative fuel research? I'm sure a million dollars could help.

What about that whole thing of promoting hybrids here? Lower the <deleted> TAX!

I don't get it. Why don't they do something that wouldn't cost them a baht and would actually be progress?

What could be cheaper and less polluting than air? A French manufaturer will be sending the first of 8000 cars that operate on compressed air to India. I'm curious as to how well they'll operate. I believe they have a range of 125 miles per charge and 70 mph is top speed.

Honda will be sending 1200 compressed natural gas cars to New York and California as a market experiment. They can be filled at your home (if you've a filling station attached to you natural gas line, (optional equipment) ) Natural gas is basically a nonpolluter and the cost per energy equalvalent is $1.20 cents per gallon.

BTW govt's love taxes. I live in GA a non oil producing state, but if I lived in CA, an oil producing state, I'd pay almost a dollar more per gallon CA loves taxing people

Somehow I do believe it'll all go up in smoke, but I don't think it'll all go into the furnance. Too much profit to be made.

Also, partly because I am tired of being so hot all the time, I run an air conditioner most of the time in the room I am in. Usually only one (out of eight) is running because my wife doesn't need it but even with only one running our electric bill here averages 12,000 baht per month and has been as high as 17,000 during hot months. I had a large home in a one of the hottest places in the U.S. before moving here and it had central air which meant I was cooling the entire house 24/7 and I never had a bill above $250 (about 8500 baht) so electricity is much more expensive here than in the states (I don't know about the UK). So be careful, depending on your needs and lifestyle, you can spend as much here as you can anywhere else.

The other bad thing about living here, and it is really bad in Hua Hin, is dishonnest farangs that have come here to prey on other farangs. I have lost count of the stories of people being duped out of their life savings by unscrupulous builders and real-estate companies. My wife is amazed by it all. She is always asking me "why do falangs cheat other falangs so much?" I tell her it's greed and that it is always bad in a boom town like Hua Hin is at the moment.

Good luck!

As you built your home, how much insulation did you use, I guess I'm asking what "R" factor did you obtain? Double or single pane glass? How is your roof vented? Any window awnings? Basically did you plan for energy use before building or allow the builder to decide? I'm still in the US but when I moved into my home so many years back, I doubled my attic insulation and increased my roof vents. I pay half of what my neighbors pay for electricity. I've a line of pine trees next to the lake that take care of the afternoon sun to help keep the house cool. We added to my MIL in Chiang Mai home and told her brother who was our contractor to build to our specifications. He liked some of our suggestions so well that he used them in his own home, a couple of years later.

Good advice about farangs, not all of them but enough of factor to put your guard up. hel_l never put you guard down on anyone, but a few people in your life.

The need to introduce legislation to curb any bad, unhealthy habits/practices, is made necessary by the actions of irresponsible and arrogant people....such as smokers, the majority of whom couldn't care less about the comforts/needs of others around them.

It's not just the smoke that makes life miserable for others, it's also the holes in clothing that occur when a drunken smoker brushes the tip of his/her cigarette against another person.

I've had a very expensive wool sweater ruined by burn hole caused by a smoker who walked through a crowded room not being mindful of the lit cigarette in his hand.

Smoking indoors will soon be banned in Australia as well. It can't come soon enough as far as I'm concerned.

Many of our beaches also have a smoking ban. Again, necessary from irresponsible smokers stubbing out and leaving their butts in the sand.

Smokers were dumb enough to take up the habit in the first place and are still too dumb to realize what damage to the environment can be caused by discarded cigarette butts entering storm water facilities that flow into the sea.

Smokers claiming to enjoy a cigarette are usually the ones who are too weak to kick the habit.

Feed your cravings inside your own homes if you must but not in public places....and don't make your own young children victims of your toxic fumes within their home environment.

Here he comes to save the day! It looks like Mighty Mouse is on the way. Seriously I heartily concur with you.

If someone wants to smoke, go ahead its your life, but smoking where it gets into my lungs, screws with my life, and therein lies the problem. As mentioned smokers seem to feel the world is their ashtray. Oh I know all readers that are smokers of thai visa are responsible smokers, and don't smoke around children, and nonsmokers. Don't throw their butts on the ground, er cigarette butts that is, and dispose of packaging matter properly, not like other smokers do.

But many smokers are just louts, with only their enjoyment taken into mind. I'd like to a nightclub and catch some live music, but cannot or rather will not enter a premise where smoking takes place.

I haven't seen close friends for many years play, as I just find smoke filled venues odious.

So go ahead smoke away from others, I support your right to smoke, but you have no moral right to harm or inconvience others.

I am a collector of Thai amulets and is very fond of it. Not into business at all, but purely for interest.

Any one here is also a collector and wishes to share with me his/her knowledges.

I am only interested in old and genuine pieces.

Well, i also occasionally collect them. I don't know that much about them because i would have to be able not only to speak Thai, but also read. Especially difficult are the old ones, the amount of knowledge one needs to separate genuine pieces from fakes and imitations is enormous. And genuine old pieces are mostly above what i can afford.

I want to start though collecting more, mostly newer pieces though, and mostly for artistic reasons. Some i have recently got are beautifully painted amulets, and i want to learn more about them, and collect them more systematically.

I don't care what anybody says, collecting nice things takes the mind off the constant troubles, especially now.

The first two I recieved were gifts from my wife, that had belonged to her father. I had no idea of value until I took them to a gold shop to be encased. One had been wrapped with a copper wire to make a hook to allow it to be strung and hung from neck, and the jeweler pointed out quite pointedly that a small chip was there before he started to cut off the wire. It got me to thinking why the fuss. When he brought out the amulets in their new cases I asked them if there was any value to them. He told me the chipped one was worth at least 50,000 baht and the other had a greater value or so he thought. The others I have have been given to me by my mother in law over the years along with metallic coins of mostly the King(s)

I bought a Thai magazine 8-9 years back showing many types of amulets and their pricing.

She wont appreciate 9ct or 18ct gold, it's so yellow her mates will think it's fake. It would have to be a really impressive diamond to overcome that. I'm sure she'd appreciate a Thai one better but dont go to buy it yourself otherwise you are very likely to be ripped off for the jewel.

I would differ in the opinion that she wouldn't appreciate the setting. My wife understands the reasoning why you can't use 24k for a ring that has a setting. My wife's only stated presents that she wants contains the word "diamond(s)" It makes gift buying easy for me and I appreciate that. Only my bank account doesn't

Thanks for the info. I did think of letting her choose herself if i bought in Thailand.

If your in Chiang Mai area there was a great jewelery store heading out to Bo Sang. It billed itself as the worlds largest jewelery store. You'll not save any money in comparision to prices in the US its about the same. My jeweler here looked at my wifes ring and said he would sell it for a few dollars more than we paid for it. No its not 24 k as it won't hold the stone. The service is great they had a free bar to keep you occupied while they size the ring to your ladies finger. Theres a mess of people making settings you can watch through windows. The selection really stuns you it was a big place.

The investigation team has collected all the finger prints as evidence and the forensic confirms that the Dane did not die by natural cause. But the body needs to be examined in more details to determine if he was murdered or died by hitting the floor.

Wait a minute, theres hair and blood found on a walking stick, he falls and hits his head on the floor as a result of being bludgeoned, yet theres a question of whether or not he was murdered?

Probably go down as another suicide, there wasn't a balconey to fall off of, but conviently the floor was hard.

RIP and condolances to his family.

can some one go over the positives of getting "involved" with poor thai village girl.

I had a neighbor who became a dear friend; he had married a poor Thai village girl. They lived a quite life, neither financially rich nor financially poor, they had one daughter together and a lot of friends. They were genuinely respected and liked within the community. Both always on hand when or if a favor was needed, both seemingly blessed with an even temperament and a sense of humor.

He died of cancer, after a long and painful illness. His wife always by his side, cheerful and caring, reserving the pain she herself was going through for when she looked the other way.

I knew the moment he died, I was in our back garden, I heard her low, deep sob as they parted and then her weeping, muttering last words to her husband.

Barely literate with nothing to bring to their marriage but her self; she had kept her promise, ‘in sickness and in death’.

Their daughter, now grown, graduated from a British university and is working for the same company I do. Her father used to often tell me how lucky I was, nothing it seems his daughter could not have.

Who ever had more than he had?

Nice post.

Enjoyable

Do all Thais really just suffer in silence.

I think the Thai wives and girlfriends of many Farangs suffer in silence.

Maybe your Thai wife will suffer in silence, (oh don't I wish ) mine makes her point to those whom dare cross her path. She will be soft spoken and polite, but she does not suffer fools gladly, and will make her point. It's ok with me unless I'm the target

thanks to careless people like you (guess majority of the world), we'll all be sending our sons and daughters and their children into a lot of trouble. Great let's continue all like this, wait until the problem hit's our face.

This is exactly what we should try to teach ourselves and especially the Thai people. Let's start thinking ahead and stop being stupid!

The Scientists are abandoning the man made global warming ship. A few of the more rabid and long term are French scientist DR. Claude Allegre who was sounding the claxon 20 years ago has sifted position, Canadian Dr. Bruno Wiskel Univ. of Alberta, who a few years back built a "Kyoto" home in honor of the UN accord has now authored the book "The Emporers new Climate,"Dubuking the Myth of Global Warming. Dr. Nir Shaviv a top Isreali scientist. Australian Dr. David Evans, Canadian Dr. Tad Murty, Dr. David Bellamy,a UK enviormental lecturer, Dr. Chris de Freitas, Univ of Aukland NZ, Dr Reid Bryson of the US, Dr, Zbigniew Jaworowski, UN scientist et al

Listing all the converts away from manmade warming bandwagon is a quite lengthy process needless to say. Most simply say the science is faulty and what ever the mechanism causing warming it isn't what the press and antiwestern pundits are decrying. Planck inst of Germany and top Russians scientists simply say the sun is hotter, I like that idea as it allows for the reason that Mars and a couple of other planets are getting warmer.

So while the Earth might be gaining a bit of heat, theres no reason for people to go Al Gore. Remember the warming period at the end of the Dark Ages brought us into the middle ages, allowing a longer growth period for food, allowing for more free time to expand mans knowledge, rather than scrabbling for food only.

The framers of the U.S. Constitution had so little faith in the electorate that they created the electoral college that virtually eliminates direct voting for president as demonstrated by the current president of the U.S., who did not win the popular vote, but was elected anyway. And you know what has happened since.

The electroral college was established to protect states rights. In a popular vote situation all power would lie in states with large cities, totally disregarding the people who live in smaller states, giving them no say in their gov't.

Originally the US senators were appointed by each states legislature rather than by popular vote. The senators job was to watch over to their states interest . The US representatives were elected to look out for even a smaller slice of the pie determined by the US population and look out for their states interest.

Democracy was consider mob rule or if there were three animals deciding what was for dinner and if two were wolves and one was a chicken you could guess the vote.

The electoral college simply gives power to what the US is, the United States, not a big city popular vote only for president. I belive in the 1960 presidential race Nixon had more votes than Kennedy, but Kennedy won on electoral votes. Those clamoring for popular vote today were on the other side of the fence in that election, and were very happy with that outcome.

Measures needed to prevent damage from quakes

BANGKOK: -- A leading seismologist Thursday called on the government to map out measures against damage from future earthquakes in light of Wednesday's 6.1 magnitude quake in Laos and northern Thailand.

Pennueng Wanitchai, a seismologist of the Asian Institute of Technology, said the fault line in Myanmar caused small earthquakes in the Golden Triangle areas, connecting Laos, Myanmar and Thailand before the

6.1 magnitude earthquake occurred about 700 kms from Bangkok.

The tremor was felt in the capital as it lies on soft soil, which can extend the severity of an earthquake three times, he said.

Such tremor was however not dangerous, he said, adding that he was worrisome about fault lines near the capital such as the Sakaing fault in the Andaman sea, 400 kms from Bangkok or the Three Pagoda fault zone and the Srisawat fault in Kanchanaburi, 200 kms from Bangkok.

If these fault lines trigger a powerful earthquake, it will have a massive impact on Bangkok, he said.

Although it will not happen soon, preventive measures are needed, he added. Studies on these faults must be done and ministerial regulations must be issued to enforce designing buildings to withstand major seismic events.

He said the issue has been under consideration by the Office of the Council of State for a year.

Smith Tumsaroch, advisor to Information and Communication Technology Minister, said cracks were found on the building of the Customs Department's northern office in Chiang Rai province and tiles

fell from its roof. Some cracks were also found at hospital buildings in the province.

Meanwhile, a Royal Irrigation Department spokesman said officials were inspecting any damage that might occur at dams.

It is believed that there is no damage to the dams because they were designed to resist to an earthquake, measuring at seven on the Richter scale. There have been no reports of damage so far.

Culture Minister Khunying Khaisri Sriaroon said she ordered a renovation of the 500-year old Chomkitti pagoda after Wednesday's earthquake caused damage to the top of the pagoda which broke off and fell down.

Meanwhile, the Fine Arts Department is conducting surveys at other historical sites in the North to evaluate the damage.

--TNA 2007-05-17

Get the Japanese involved, best engineering for earthquakes done by them