Darrel

Presumably this is to sort out the huge flooding that occurs in Soi 5 every time it rains. To do the job properly they will also have to dig up 2nd Rd in front of the market and put in a culvert from the far side of the road across to the sewers at the top of Soi 5.

In relation to 2nd Rd some study of the words "cant" and "camber" might be helpful also. The Romans knew all about that 2000 years ago.

I thought this was going to be a fred about some little thai child asking where his farang dad is...?

I tried to put "PAPPA" in the topic title but the stupid forum software alters the case automatically.

Maybe one of the myriad underemployed php developers here would like to have a go at the parsing code?

.... reports of them being empty are simply not true.

My reports of it being empty on the two occasions when I passed by and could be bothered to look were 100% true on the day. I have no reason to make such things up. Obviously I have no idea what the occupancy has been like at all other times.

whats the place to go and get a good stake, at a good price....

I recommend this place but of course it's mail order.

GBP had a spike in January 1998

That was the famous crash.

Some relics in the form of largely derelict condo buildings and commercial centres are still highly visible in the Jomtien area, and indeed down towards Rayong.

In my building there is a service elevator specifically intended for smelly/dirty people/things.

Sadly not everyone realises that they should be in it.

"The two dogs responsible for the death of the child remain at the location and are still walking freely around the area."

This seems unbelievable.

The highest official international rate over the last 10 years was just under 77B, but it could well have been slightly higher inside the country for cash.

That must be very recent, because i drive past twice daily and it looked "open" the other week...

Check when you next go past. It really was totally empty on Thursday. Not even a dustbin in the corner. And no sign of any people either, "credible and reassuring" or not.

"I think about to open a money brookers account ?

Is it cheaper then Paypal?"

On top of the small transfer fee, both charge a hefty exchange rate weighting (several %), and PayPal have a nasty fee for cross-border payments also, for those who think they can outsmart them by sending and receiving in the same currency.

However, for small payments there is not much better to be had, unless you can use a credit/debit card with no exchange rate weighting.

When the money arrives here,someone from Kasikorn Bank calls me and we negotiate an exchange rate acceptable for both.

That never happened to me. They used the TT rate, without any question or comment, and I only knew about it when it was done and dusted.

On the other hand, TMB did call me before doing the exchange.

TMB: "We will give you the TT rate, is that OK?"

Me: "What happens if I dont want that rate?"

TMB: "We send the money back."

"To my surprise he got an exchange rate about 2 - 3 baht lower per dollar than I would get at Bangkok bank. I went to the bank with my wife in tow to see why there was such a low exchange rate. The manager was at a loss to tell me why it was so low. I also asked him if he could trace the transaction back through the system to see if a fee has been taken out when the transfer has reached the bank. He told me there is no way to do that. Doubt that very much in these times of high technology."

It sounds to me as though you are confusing the rate and the charges. For the charges you will have paid at least a sending and a receiving fee, plus perhaps a domestic transfer fee and maybe an intermediary fee. But the rate will be the standard TT rate of the day.

Kbank will give you a full breakdown of all the costs and rates, including the actual amount of FX they received (which indicates whether there was an intermediary charge). Just ask for the FEC document at the branch where your account is held. The transfer office will fax it to them.

Dont assume that just because this is 2012 there is no such thing as intermediary banks any more; there are loads of them, they all charge as much as possible for doing nothing and the banks deliberately retain this antiquated system in order to steal more fee money from you. The answer, of course, is to do your research beforehand and find out which foreign bank has a direct link to whichever local bank you use, and then act accordingly.

Wandered past the PAPPA office at the Threprasit night market the other evening and noticed that the entire place seems to have been cleaned out; not a chair or table to be seen, and not even a note on the window.

Have they just ceased to exist following the recent events?

Why is a guy with 400,000Bt riding the bus and staying at the Sawadee I wonder?

Intending to spend the money on more rewarding things than long-distance taxis and expensive rooms?

Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear. Words fail me.

A good start to the day.

If you'd ever been to Tehran you'd know that parts of it are quite beautiful ...

I have travelled extensively in many places in the middle East. Some of them are indeed beautiful and if it wasn't for the prevailing culture and the people they would indeed probably make very nice places to live. The same applies to most countries in the world, of course.

Just a quick word a friend of mine came back form the USA with one and it works perfectly. He had to upgrade his 3BB to 9mb. The only problem he says, between 8pm and 9pm the films tend to freeze owing to other people using the Internet on 3BB, not by him.

My connection from here to the US is very good nearly all the time. My connection to Europe (and especially the UK) is quite poor most of the time. There is no way on earth that I could watch streamed video from the UK here, but it works fine from the US.

Worth pointing out that in the UK one can make electronic transfers from just about any bank account to just about any bank account, for any sum from 1 GB penny up to 10,000 GB Pounds, These often arrive instantly and even the very worst banks manage to do it within 24 hours. This is totally free of charge.

....a clerk had mistakenly added an extra "0" to the $100 USD Invoice.

You don't check every bill, twice, everywhere in the world before you pay? I do, including western supermarket till receipts, and as a result I have noticed many hundreds of "mistakes" over the years. Not always to my detriment but more often than not.

Your painting way too rosy a picture of minority sexual rights in Iran.

Let's not forget the bigger picture.

It doesn't matter whether you are a woman or man, gay or straight, white or black, or any combination of the above; Iran and all the neighbouring countries, and all the neighbouring countries of those neighbouring countries, are the last places on earth in which anyone is his/her right mind would choose to live. Complete sh*t-holes devoid of any merit.

Edit: I wanted to quote the rest of the report but Tropo beat me to it.

yes they all do, which would not be a problem if some school actually employed REAL teachers, as in someone with teaching degree

It's a problem as far as I'm concerned, regardless of how good the teacher is.

Having paid for 60 minutes I expect to get exactly 60 minutes. Just like if I buy a beer or a bus ticket; I expect the whole thing and not a partially-empty glass or to be chucked out 10 km from my destination.

If the teacher cares to call a break between each 60 minute lesson, that's fine with me. But the total time of a 2-hour lesson should be 120 minutes plus whatever the break is. Anything less is theft.

I went into this Jomtien school and picked up a price list.

What intrigued me most about it was that a student purchases a certain number of hours (30, 90, 180 etc.) for courses that run for 1hr50 minutes, which is counted as 2 hours. In fact in the small print it says that one lesson equals 50 minutes, so presumably that means that the 1hr50 two-lesson period also includes a 10-minute break half-way through. And presumably the student is expected to pay for this break, which of course amounts to a 16% increase per hour on the price paid.

To me this sounds like a total rip-off (in Pattaya? fancy that!) and I wonder if all other schools follow the same sharp practice? Given the prevalence of cartel pricing here I suspect that they do, and I will be doing some more research next week to clarify this.

At one time Manhattans used to advertise extensively on local TV. Never seem to see any of their ads these days though.

I have certainly eaten dog adobo and bat adobo (bony) in the RP. Dont think I ever had rat or cat but as you say I probably would have been unaware of it.