briley

Cost of the ink for the refill.

Running cost is so little it is hard to notice out of the weeks money.

60 baht for petrol a week, 100 baht max for puncture (new tube- not worth having a patch as it takes too long and never works). Servicing, don't make me laugh.

Replacement of rear view mirrors when the bike falls over, 80 baht a pair. Do I have to go on?

One point is that the cable from your router to the computer has 8 cores, one pair to the router, one pair from the route and a spare set (incase they break? - actually they can carry telephone, other networks etc)

The telephone cable is one pair.

Add to that the telephone cable can carry, currently but not in Thailand, a max of about 32 Meg bits per second, and the other cable 1000 Meb bits per second,

But there are many other things to consider!

Does any of this apply to a condo vote since it is not one person one vote, but based on the area of the condo you own?

You have to know who cast what vote to work out the area voting for or against.

CM immigration accepted my photocopy of the consulate letter (re-pension) without even asking to see the original in mid January.

Pub Plaa - behind Carrefour.

Cheap outside, 140 Baht but you might like to ask for a table with a hole - unless you like sitting cross legged all night.

Inside is expensive, noisy and not so good.

Find the flying raichu version of streambox and you can download real media files instead of just listening to them - both audio and video

Didn't know you could - you live and learn.

Thanks

The nearest is dial 008 before the 44 etc for UK numbers from a landline -009 from a mobile Is it 8 baht a minute now?

The only drawback is the need to get off the bus in Mai Sai quickly and run to the window to book the bus back - is it at 1.30pm?

Then the song taw to the border post, 5 baht and an hour spare to wander the shops. Better than the visa run bus that tries to give you no time over the border.

From our own experience I believe it is law that the management must call a general meeting every year.

If they don't then the owners can call a meeting. The quorum is 30% of the owners either present or represented by a proxy.

50% of the owners must agree to sacking the old management and appointing a new management. The new management take all the papers to land commission who can accept them and make the new manager the legal manager.

NOTE that the percentages are % of the area. If one person owns 50% of the area of the condo they control the condo.

Of course the old management can challenge the new management team, then the fat hits the fire and courts etc get involved. Accounts get blocked, no money to pay wages and electricity - and if the common area electricity bill is not paid the whole condo is cut off.

Make sure you have influential Thais running the revolution.

I found the 8am VIP bus to be much more comfortable than crammed into a van.

What's the validity of the ticket? 1 month, 2 months, 6 months?

AFAIK, 10K baht for a 30 day visa excemption or 20K baht for 60 day visa entries.

Don't think the Tachilek ATM's give Baht - if they have them?

Some people say they'll let you go into Mai Sai and use an ATM to get the money.

Dustoff - ATM's can only give out a limit number of notes, normally 20-25 notes. If the machine has run out of 1,000 baht notes then it can only give you 12500 baht in 500's

The case of repeat withdrawals and minimum fees is a pain. In Indonesia the maximum withdrawal was 800,000 rupees, US$80. With my minimum withdrawal fee it was costing me about 6% each withdrawal.

I would be interested to hear from people who have made claims.

Which companies paid out efficiently, which ones cause problems?

As far as I know 25 is the maximum number of notes, but you can use a direct debit card, often the same as your ATM card, inside the bank with no apparent limit. You must have your passport.

Using a credit card is normally more expensive way of getting money as you are also getting a loan.

When I had two passports I would leave one country on one and enter the other country on the second - even on land borders when I then enter a country with a totally unstamped passport.

The only place I know that ever looks at leaving stamps to see if you've left anywhere is Thailand when looking to see if you actually entered, say, Burma on a visa run rather than just U turned on the bridge.

Either

a) find out where the e-mails are kept, they are usually in

C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Local Settings\Application Data\Identities\{7434F0BD-0FB7-458F-86A6-10E775387459}\Microsoft\Outlook Express

and are a set of files ending .dbx

Simply copy the whole folder to somewhere else, or just the sent.dbx, inbox.dbx etc files.

or

you can use 'file and settings transfer wizard' in system tools to transfer just the outlook files.

Oops - just realized this is for Outlook express, you said outlook. But it might be the same?

PS- interesting I tried to make bullet point b and got a smiley!

Rikker - I see your point, and have dug out a picture book I use for Thai children to learn English, and there I see the dot you refer to under the Sor Saalaa.

As Meadish said the problem is that many Thais appear to think the way the loan word is pronounced in Thai is the same as the way it is prounounced in English, hence use Hou when speaking English.

I think this will help me understand Thais speaking English! Thanks to you both.

Probably did not make it clear that I was not talking about a loan word, it was a food stall called Red House that then put in Thai รีก เฮาส์.

To edit - split, combine or what a video after it is on the hard drive I do like VideoReDo. It is faster, neater and easier to use than most - mainly as it doesn't have all the bells and whistles and does not re- encode every time.

It is not free but has a 30 day trial if you only want to do a few jobs.

Those having problems with their condo management might be interested in the following bits of information gained from a meeting I attended today. The information is confirmed as correct by the two lawyers present, but of course it might not be correct.

By law condo management must call a general meeting each year. If they don't then the owners can call a meeting. Provided there is 33% of the owners present then the meeting is legal. If you can get 50% of the owners to vote for a new management team then that is legal. The owners can be represented by proxy, but no one person can have more than 3 proxy votes.

If a new legal manager is voted in they can present the papers (votes, minutes etc) to land registry to install a new legal manager and oust the old one.

Note that when I say % of owners that is a percentage of the area of the condo the owners and proxies represent.

There are, of course, plenty of pitfalls so this is just to give some unhappy owners some hope.

I have been reading a few signs that are in Thai but obviously written to just sound out the English word, for example House written as เฮาส์. The first 3 letters obviously give you 'hou' but in Thai it is impossible to end the word in 's'. Using ส at the end of a syllable it sounds 'p', if not at the end then you have to add a vowel. I thought it rather clever to use the mai thanthakhat (don't sound) over the last letter to imply "sound it as if it is just an 's'". That gives you 'hou' and 's' or hous(e) - the correct sound.

But talking to a few Thais I am told that they don't sound the final ส and so read the sign as 'Hou'. Listening to Thais speaking English I now hear them say 'Hou'

Have I got this wrong or are all Thais being taught to wrongly pronounce all English words that have a sound at the end that can't be reproduced in Thai script?

On Saturday's moneybox it was said that those who overpayed voluntary contributions after the anouncement of the proposed change will get their payments back - how and when was not made clear at all.

If you made overpayments (due to the change) before the announcement - hard luck and thanks for the free money.