Ajaan

I've been using a US-bank Visa debit card (from a little-nowhere credit union) to successfully buy tickets online from AirAsia for years. Here are the things you need to take into account:

-I have NOT been successful on AA with my US-based (PayPal) Mastercard debit card, only with my Visa

-if available to you, you should avail yourself of the "verified by Visa" online service suggested by earlier posters; it pretty much guarantees your card will be accepted on any website once you enter the additional password

-AA is tricky, both in terms of buying a seat without all the sleazy, sneaky extra charges they try to slip in "by default" on their website AND in terms of correctly (according to them) entering your location and billing info...pay careful attention to make sure you're filling in all the forms correctly.

Yes, "khrap" (and to a lesser extent, "khaa") is very often used in a joking, sarcastic fashion. One way to relate this to English is, imagine you're talking to your friend and you say something your friend considers to be a bit pompous, or bossy, or maybe condescending...they then stiffen their posture and give you a military salute, maybe adding "yes SIR!" That's exactly how "khrap" is used sarcastically.

Let's not forget--and I think this helps to maybe understand all these "specialized uses of khrap" [teaching children how to be "good Thais," responding to others' sarcastically, often to deflate their hyper-seriousness, etc.]--that "khrap" and "khaa" are both fairly recent additions to the Thai language (1930-40s) and that they were basically forced down people's throats in social engineering campaigns designs to create "modern," "civilized" Thais.

Unlike many government language engineering efforts, this one pretty much *worked*...but it shouldn't be surprising that some remnants of resistance/mocking of the terms has carried over into sarcastic usage today, nor should it be surprising that many of the "good modern Thais" brainwashed/created by these social engineering programs now see it as their duty to carry on the "civilizing mission" by daily making efforts to teach children how to be "good modern Thais"...

She said the carrier will re-open its counter when the government attracts more riders to use the Makkasan Station service, which may be positively affected by providing added convenience in travelling, and building a department store within the compound.

Building a department store within the compound? <deleted>... how will this attract more travellers to use the AIRPORT RAIL LINK.

When I am on my way to the airport, luggage in tow, the last thing I am thinking of doing is going to a department store to shop.

More stupid thinking from the Thai elite.

The "compound" is the whole area around the station that is currently empty. There are plans for hotels, apartments, shops etc on this land.

What Makkasan station needs is better taxi access. At the moment, there is only access to Asoke/Ratchada Rd ... and only in one direction. If they had access to Petchaburi near Suk Soi 3, the station would be useful to a lot more people.

It also needs better PEDESTRIAN access...or how about an actual link (underground, preferably) with Petchburi subway station?!

Unless you have a ton of baggage, as the earlier poster suggested, the Airport Rail Link is a no-brainer. Very convenient and cheap.

Such a tragic shame that this is happening in Surin, where 70% of the population is made up of the ancient Khmers residing on land the Thais colonized...

The police were usless aganist the Red Shirts why did they think they would be any better aganist the Yellows.

Wrong! The police destroyed the Red Shirts and shot them dead. However, the police did NOTHING and the government did NOTHING to the yellows when they took over the airport.

destroyed the red shirts?

i wish.

if they had done so there would not have been 30,000 of them protesting this weekend.........

Wow, no shortage of right-wing haters of the peasantry here, ey? If you were in Wisconsin you would be on the wrong side too, no doubt, calling for the imprisonment, beating, whatever of the people as they stand up to government oppression.

It really sickens me when farangs throw their lot in the with opressive, racist Thai elite and give their blessings to oppression of the poor in Thailand. Goody for you, you're an agent against change in the world.

The larger question (to the OP) is, "what gave you the idea that Thai male sex workers are NOT 'jaded'??" On what size "sample," over how many years experience/research, are you basing this assertion?

You're still very young, and thus your metabolism is fast and responsive.

Bite the bullet, stop drinking for a set period: let's say, 6 weeks.

During those 6 weeks, do some REGULAR routine of moderate exercise. I recommend walking 4 miles a day at a healthy pace.

I guarantee (unless you're eating cheeseburgers everyday...for chrissakes, eat THAI food, you're in Thailand!!) that at the end of that six weeks you will have lost 20-35 pounds. End of story.

Don't pooh-pooh queries on this. This is not just a case of impatient farang newbies. This is REAL.

I've been coming to Thailand since 1999, and I have NEVER seen the kinds of loooooong departure queues that I saw on my last trip (December/January 2010/2011).

Something qualitatively CHANGED. I have no idea what that was, but it's undeniable.

She's Thai. Hopefully you knew this when you married her.

Try the Bangkok forum?

I don't visit Patpong, it's revolting.

Oh well, aren't we the holier-than-thou farang in the house?

Patpong is not revolting; it's a piece of Thailand history. It has several fascinating establishments (which are hardly sleazy in the least, which I assume is your implication with your simplistic "revolting" epithet), including the above-mentioned Madrid: longest-operating bar restaurant on Patpong, pretty much decorated as it was in the 1960s when it opened, and still serving what I (and many others) deem the best pizza available in Thailand. So there you have it.

People study for YEARS to be able to translate between languages as different as English and Thai. And you're looking for freebies on this website?? Do you try to get plumbers to fix a toilet overflow in your bathroom for free?? 'Nuff said.

"

Shortly after I entered the depature area around 5:40a.m., a Chinese woman around age 55 wearing good make-up asked me if I was Chinese and if I had some time and I answered yes. She asked if I could help her. She said she was trying to change her flight schedule with Kenya Airlines, but the Airlines required a few hundred Baht, which she didn't have..."

The conversation should have ended there. Any "request for help" from a stranger that mentions money in the first (or second, or third) sentence should elicit the same response from the saavy traveler: walking forward with no acknowledgment of the would-be scammer.

Ha! You'll get no sympathy from me. I'm 6'4" (close to 2 meters). Do what I do, suck it up and arrive 4 hours before your flight time. I (knock on wood) almost *always* get my coveted bulkhead seat (on a Boeing 777).

Someone posted a similar question in one of the English language newspapers...Bangkok Post or Nation...about 8-9 years ago. The response from the newspaper was very instructive: something to the effect of, "if you complain about them, be careful...they are, after all, a bar, and thus no doubt have mafia connections, you may get beat up or have limbs broken as a result..." haha. Sad, but very true.

The criticism of the walkways is misguided...I think it's a great idea, and I for one would totally utilize it...especially in the winter months, I would love being able to walk from Mo Chit to Siam Square on a walkway!! Who knows, it might make some progress in fighting growing obesity among Thais from all that KFC, haha.

And, c'mon, "spend it on sidewalks"?! Why? As an earlier poster pointed out, so motorcycles can have a smoother ride as they terrorize pedestrians? Or so even more vendors can clog the sidewalks? (actually, the ubiquitous vendors is something I *love* about Bangkok, and miss when I'm in the West...but it would be nice to have covered, elevated vendor-free walkways...)

A VERY misleading thread title! Sounds as though someone's planted explosives.

Haha...อย่าคิดมากน่ะ! That interpretation of the thread title didn't occur to me at all...??

The price of food is my main complaint, 350 baht for fast food meals which cost 120 outside. Also find it a chore battling through the myriad touts and scammers and distinguishing the legit services from those.

Apart from that it's fine, works like any other airport.

Whingers will whinge.

Actually, one aspect of the old Don Meuang was definitely *unlike* most other airports: the great food court near the walkway between the domestic and international terminals (on the int'l side), prices (and food) just like any unpretentious little food court in any older Thai mall...plus, you could cross over the highway and be in an actual Bangkok neighborhood, and get food, a massage, etc., and almost-local prices, sigh. Though of course, airports in the middle of cities are a fast-disappearing thing, with a few exceptions left like Midway in Chicago and LaGuardia in NYC in the States...

I must say i hate the long, long walk from plane to pick up my bags - what genius thought of that one? and signage is terrible

Yes, it felt like a kilometer from the plane to Immigration when I arrived last month, seriously.

Easily! Especially if you arrive on one of the "poorer" airlines who can only afford the far-away terminals/bus doors...

I think there are three main areas one needs to address in order to remove (or lessen) one's "farang accent" when speaking Thai:

1. vowels. pay attention to the Thai vowels and dipthongs which do not exist in your native language; work on improving your accuracy at these vowels one at a time

2. consonants. pay particular attention to differentiating between aspirated, novoiced initial consonants in Thai (which, for example, we do not have in English) and aspirated initial consonants (which English does have, in spades). also make sure your final stop consonants are UNreleased when speaking Thai.

3. tones. in my experience, the rising and falling tones in Thai are not that difficult to "nail" for those whose native language is non-tonal. what IS hard, and what is the most frequent source of Thais not understanding your pronunciation of an otherwise well-rendered (vowel and consonant-wise) Thai word, is getting the following tones correct, in ascending order of importance/difficulty: 1) mid ("neutral") tone, 2) high tone (remember, it's not just high, it also rises a bit!) and 3) low tone. I cannot count the number of times when, as I was initially learning Thai, I tried to say the common term for bottled water (น้ำเปล่า), and, even though in every instance I was POINTING to said bottled water, I was greeted by completely blank looks by vendors. This is a great one to practice on, by the way, as it's a compound in which you have to nail a high tone followed directly by a low tone. When you can successfully pronounce this compound (without pointing to the water bottles!) and end up with the vendor handing you a bottle of water, grasshopper, then it will be time for you to leave, haha (apologies to anyone unfamiliar with the 1970s US television series "Kung <deleted>"...I'm showing my age!)

Note that the above guidelines assume that you've already achieved a fair level of fluency/fluidity of *grammar*/sentence construction...the OP did ask specifically about accent removal, after all.