mrfill

"she was confident the driver was not drink-driving or under the influence of drugs at the time of the crash because this would be against company policy."

Presumably other companies recommend their drivers to be drunk and high....

And I wonder also if it is company policy to smash into motorcycles. Mrs Mouthpiece did not say it was against company policy or have one word of sympathy or regret for the poor sod on the bike.

300km in 3 hours on a bus?

Thats an average of over 60mph. Pretty fast for a bus.

The real figure is 10 hours by VIP bus and 11 for the non-VIP......

"i.e. If people make a nuisance of themselves impose strict and inflexible penalties for antisocial behaviour."

Like, you WILL pay 100Bt for driving while drunk or else.....

Why not do the beheading now and if the claimed deal turns out not to be true, a simple apology can be made later?

It is not about democratically and undemocratically . It is check and balance. The court has also told all the Thai people that to have check and balance, 50% must be "selected", while 50% can, if so wish, be "elected".

Precisely. These demonstrators want another undemocratically selected minority,since they are incapable of winning a democratic election. It is one thing to demonstrate for a particular issue - it is quite another to actively interfere with the daily operations of a democratically elected government. Clearly the Yellow Shirts in charge are hoping to provoke a violent reaction from the authorities - which they would get in any Western country I can think of for tresspassing on government property, etc etc.

Thus far, the government has fortunately not taken the bait. However, there are limits, and the Yellow Shirts have shown in the past that they are always ready to up the ante, no matter how much it costs the country- who can forget when they actually seized Thailand's international airport?

Bottom line is that this is mob rule, and fundamentally undemocratic. The Yellow Shirts must learn to accept the power of the ballot box and figure out a way to win elections. Indeed, it is ironic that the apparent leader of these demonstrations was a leader of the so-called Democrat party!

Let us hope there is a peaceful end to these demonstrations before anyone gets hurt.

What happens if the Administration decides to call an election? Simple, PTP win again. What the protestors want is another coup.

It is quite clear someone here does not know what democracy means.

In the original democracy, the politicians were selected by lottery, much in the same way as jury selection is done in the UK.

One day you get a note saying from next week you would be a politician. This keeps all the 'career' politicians out the way.

Every year the politicians had to face their electorate and explain the good work they had done. If the crowd liked it, you got the job for next year - if not, you were out.

Most countries are now plutocracies rather than democracies - i.e. ruled by the rich - and yet most people incorrectly call them democracies.

On TV twitter it says "Protests cause number of foreign tourists to drop by 300,000:"

So where are the cheap tickets that should be available for all these newly vacant plane seats?

A decent smart phone with removable memory card can eliminate one piece of equipment to carry around.

32Gb can accommodate a lot of music.....

Also, you can get some bluetooth speakers and have your own room stereo at home.

I'm fairly sure "recorded to phone" should be "copied". English as a foreign language...

Not at all. Copied implies that a duplicate was made. This was made by a phone camera, recording the analogue image from a monitor onto a digital storage device.

If you took a photo of someone's face, you would not say you copied the face but I can appreciate it may be difficult for someone with English as a foreign/second language.

More truths exposed! Not a land of smiles!

What's interesting to me about this story is that I've witnessed far more physical abuse by Thai women on men than the reverse, and while there may be no reason to doubt that stats that are presented in this story, I'd like to see a pole of abuse from the point of view of the men.

Saw a lady at work today who looks like she went a couple rounds with mike Tyson in his prime. All she could do is look down while walking and fiddle with her hair with her hands covering her face trying to hide two black eyes and lumps, bumps and bruises all over. She took a real beating, but showed up for work.

Was this in Thailand or somewhere else? It's not clear, but just goes to show that this happens in all countries.

And as for the pole of abuse - a lot of men have one of those and often it contains their brain.

My god. For a country that does very little to acknowledge or at least protect tourists (aka foreigners), you can't see ANY discussion of Thailand's macro economy without significant mention of tourism.

Surely tourism accounts for a larger percentage than they would have us believe?

Tourism only represents 6% of GDP in Thailand. It is highly visible and probably has a larger effect on the poor than industries such as manufacturing (44% approx of the economy) because of its labor intensity and fluidity.

There are reasons why tourism seems to appear in economic discussions a lot more than other sectors, such as manufacturing. It is because some of the features of tourism (sensitivity to security, unrest, exchange rates, transport) are precisely those that also affect foreign direct investment.

Given that tourism only represents 6% of the economy, we should be thankful that the country has a police force devoted to tourists (few other countries have bothered to do that).

Admittedly without data to the contrary, I find the 6% figure difficult to believe given 1) how much attention the topic gets from very senior political and business leadership and 2) the fact that those figures cannot possibly account for the huge underground (grey/black) economy in Thailand which includes the sums contributed to the economy through various forms of the sextrade.

How many countries anywhere in the world go on so frequently RE tourism? I've lived all over the world, and I've not seen it to such a degree anywhere else.

As for the police force "devoted" to tourists, I'm guessing you are trying to get a laugh or perhaps you are being serious and meant "How many countries have 'needed' to do that"?

Spain - 2007 most visited country in the world, 2010 4th most visited. (34m tourists)

Tourism represents 6.4% of GDP there - so the figure for Thailand is comparable - and they have their Tourist Police....

Statistics show that at least 40-50% of injuries in accidents occur from not wearing a seat belt.

Am I mistaken? cause what I see is the driver eating, drinking talking on cellphone, sleeping, drunk, while driving.

Well that's ok then, so long as he's wearing a seat belt (statistics prove that).

So what about us from other countries in Europe, or from other parts of the world for that matter...

If it exists a new deal for only these 7 countries, good for them, but try to take one step back and think about it for a second.

Are the citizens of these countries looked at as some kind of elite? Why not just go back to the old rulings from before 2008, where almost everyone were treated equally?

I will once again say, amazing Thailand.

This is exactly the same as before 2008. Almost everyone is treated equally.

In this case I am treated more equally than you but less equal than residents of some other countries.

A while ago New Zealand residents used to get 90 day visa exempt on arrival. They were obviously even more equal....

Well, at least by confessing to taking 'some drugs' (unspecified) it will make the highly informed point and say it was all his fault because he was on drugs (unspecified) and thus deflect attention away from any faults the boat or the operating company may have meaning no loss of face..

Promotion for him and a nice bonus when he gets released

BTW, If anyone has information on where to buy (True / MBK / wherever), please let us know. Tnx!

Well, it's branded as Google so perhaps www.google.com/nexus/5 might help

$349 for the 16gb version, $399 for 32gb

The government’s plan to collect Bt500 from foreign tourists staying in Thailand more than three days will severely affect the local tourism business

Classy tourists whose budgets are so tight that Bt500 affects them, possibly.

At present, airline prices include such things as arrival tax, departure tax, special invented taxes etc. Mostly these are contrived ways for governments to grab some money but people pay them with barely a whimper.

Now, all of a sudden, they will be outraged at having to pay 500 Bt and will never visit Thailand again.

I don't think so

This is really unbelievable, if I read this right: a van DIDN'T cause the accident. What is going on here?

Perhaps it was reported for that very reason. Unusual stories sell news.

Superbikes are pretty expensive. A new Honda Fireblade CBR1000RR will set you back 800K, a VFR1200 is 900K.

Top of the range Ducati is just under 2m and a BMW R S or K model will be over 1m.

Bearing in mind the state of the roads and the mindset of the drivers, you'll be lucky to survive 2 months on something like that.

A much more modest bike like an ER6 Kawasaki can be had for 200K plus you will need some luggage, which is not cheap.

That's the easy bit.

Crossing borders and all the import/export carry on is likely to be a huge nightmare and, with an expensive bike you may well be viewed as an easy target for additional 'fees' etc. Insurance is also likely to be complicated.

If you still want to do it, plan ahead. Its not something you can do on a whim.

I expect the amnesty will also include drugged up Ferrari-driving relatives in the interest if fairness....

Doubt bars or clubs make their own. Not that easy to get anything like the quality right.

You only have to taste what the legit distileries produce.

I know it goes on up in Isaan and they will drink anything. Sometimes with fatal results.

Proof?

Probably about 40 for an imported whisky before opening.

About 30 by the time the water has been added.....

Horrible. A simple Google search can teach you that consuming an excessive quantity of water can be lethal. RIP.

Indeed. Check the case of Leah Betts from the UK. She had taken some ecstacy and collapsed at a party. Her parents, who were both involved in drug prevention, fed her a huge amount of water, as their education and expert opinion had taught them this was the correct thing to do. This caused her death (which, of course was attributed to the ecstacy) as excessive water causes the brain to swell until it can cope no more. Needless to say, her parents were not charged with manslaughter.

What about the bridges that conect the airport to the carpark? Are they going to put glass screens there too??

No, you will be free to jump there and can even smoke while jumping.

This is not inside the airport building so will not tarnish the image. Do please

remember to ensure you land on a designated landing area or you will be liable to a fine of Bt150

Real tea drinkers don't tolerate tea bags. It has to be in a pot with loose leaf tea (Personal pref Sri Lankan BOPF or Viet Thai Nguyen) and no milk or sugar.

If pushed, the Tesco red box tea bags are as good as any of the name brands - except Liptons whose yellow label muck is tasteless world-wide. The Tesco ones also score high as they are reasonably easy to get hold of.

Much of the loose Thai green tea is tolerable when pot made.