Sarawudt

Myself and my hubby have lived in Spain for 5 years but have recently come back due to very bad education in the private schools for our 8 year old. I have travelled around Thailand nearly 15 years ago so am abit rusty on the areas, but wondered if anyone can give me some advice.We have been accepted to move to South Africa but when i was last there(2 months ago)the violence stilled worried me alittle. What is the violence like in Thailand and are the schools any good.Is it an easy place to relocate to or is it quite difficult for brits. And finally what are the job prospects like and do we need to speak thai?( it took me long enough to speak Spanish)... Thanks in advance to any replies ta Rotygirl

Unfortunately Khun Kevin is right, every Thai who can afford it will not send their children to a Thai school. The overall quality is improving but still too low as compared to for instance Japan. The quality of life for children is also lower than in Europe, forget about taking the bicycle on sukhumvit. Forget about walking to friends, playing football in the evening.

If I were you I'd make a change for the better, not for the worse.

Malaysia also has an interesting retirement scheme, Singapore just launched a new visa program that welcomes entrepreneurs based on ideas, businessplans and not on money in the bank. Both countries actually make people feel welcome.

I was sincerely looking forward to meet the wine drinker moderator of this forum but he didn't post anything in this thread so I guess I will be dissapointed with his no show....

I lived in a (Tibetan) monastery and my best friends were monks and nuns.

Well, you didn't have much choice for your best friends huh? I guess your worst friends were also monks and nuns?

interesting moderation, removing a low class post while leaving a thread without topic.

Just a Thai view...

Has anyone else had any trouble getting a Thaivisa T shirt?

It's statiscally proven that if you don't try to get a Thaivisa shirt, you won't have any trouble getting it.

I'll stick to that.

Samosir Isalnd in Sumatra used to be my fave place outside Los , haven't been in over 8 years though...

Lake Toba is very nice, I've met many farang there spending years in retirement. The same problem as in Thailand applies however, one has to leave the country every ninety days. Lake Toba is nice, cool climate, very cheap, friendly people. I've met a German who spent 4000 euro there per year. Lakeview resort rooms can be rented from one dollar up. Don't think it won't be good for that price... there are too many resorts, hotels and no tourists since years.

Sarawudt

Absolutely , still the cheapest place I have visited on this earth , the Batak are amongst the friendliest also , did some great fishing in Lake Toba.

I met a nice girl in Parapat who worked in the Hotel Niagara , that's a different story.

Jetman was another character on Samosir , I'll go back one day......

Lake Toba is also my cheapest place on earth, it's apart from being cheap just wonderful. I ate a lot of magic mushroom pancakes, I saw the grass growing faster than a dog could run.

It comes closest to heaven on earth than anything else I know,

however,

don't fool around with the ladies. A friend of mine who slept with two ladies was forced to marry one of them after her brother found out. They won't let you go off the island before getting married.

Yep, land prices have gone a bit silly, afaics out of all proportion to the actual tourism levels. I know loads of people round here running accommodation who aren't making anywhere near enough to get by. In Krabi town itself, we have plenty of prime business sites that have been unoccupied for several months, simply because the rent is ridiculous, the sort of money where you'll make a little in the high season, then lose hand over fist from March onwards. Loads of new construction going on all the time.

Another classic bubble, methinks.

How's the Europa restaurant doing by the way? Is it good business?

What rent levels do you find ridiculous?

I have an MP3 Jukebox running on a Win2K server. Once in a while a couple of MP3's will becmoe inaccesible by the system - these are files that I was able to listen to before. At first I thought it was a permissions issue with the directory but that turned up nothing as I get the "inaccesible by system error" when I am logged in with a user with Full privs to the directory and even when I'm Administrator. Also, I have no problems accessing some files in the same directory. I am now wondering if I am experiencing some corrupted MP3 files. Can anyone recommend a good utility to scan for and fix corrupted MP3 files?

thanks

Are you talking about corrupted MP3s or about corrupted MPs? In the latter case I'm afraid there's nothing one can do about it, 'fixing' is also no option.

Samosir Isalnd in Sumatra used to be my fave place outside Los , haven't been in over 8 years though...

Lake Toba is very nice, I've met many farang there spending years in retirement. The same problem as in Thailand applies however, one has to leave the country every ninety days. Lake Toba is nice, cool climate, very cheap, friendly people. I've met a German who spent 4000 euro there per year. Lakeview resort rooms can be rented from one dollar up. Don't think it won't be good for that price... there are too many resorts, hotels and no tourists since years.

Sarawudt