LuukKoeyKorat

Good, factual and accurate article.... 7 years on the Island for me.

Not LOS, but pretty much the same latitude as Chiang Mai, although higher altitude.....here just outside Luang Prabang, the 'winter' season kicked in two days ago. 10 Celsius this morning at 6am, misty until 10am, hot 30Celsius all day, then the temp drops as soon as the sun sets. Coldest last year in January was 6C!!

Phangan is getting power for 4 hours a day - 2 in the afternoon, 2 in the evening. Just about long enough to chill the defrosted food......as well as play havoc with fridge and freezer electrics

any decent bungalo has a generator, and some resorts run off of a generator year round on pha ngan

Only those resorts on beaches not yet connected by govt road, ie on the east coast. The rest of the island has been fully connected for ages.

The idiot doesn't have a clue. High season runs from Dec-Apr. July-Aug is an interim 'mini high season' due to European holidays.

This is the best OP I have ever read, a great piece of writing, thank you! Had me in stitches all the way! Personally, Harald is the hero in this story....but then - I'm a Kraut too. ;-)

Please more of the same

It started in Tha Ton, if you ever get a chance get yourself up to Tha Ton next to the Burmese border. The boat trip from Tha Ton to Chiang Rai is excellent, and you'll get a chance to see some real Thai rural life on the way down. The boat journey is three hours and it stops off at an elephant camp and snake farm. Now that sounds impressive, but I'll tell you what is really impressive.........I saw a healthy buffalo. I know you don't believe me, but it's true!!

Tha Ton itself is a sleepy little one street village, with a couple of beautiful Temples. I booked into a cottage by the River and was fascinated to watch the fishermen out netting their catch for the day. Well worth a visit, well worth an overnight, and don't forget you're camera, there are some breathtaking views. But that's not the point, the point is......the bus.

We arrived in Chiang Rai and booked into the hotel for one night, went for a walk around and were suitably impressed by this lovely little northern town, another place that is well worth a visit and I have been back since for a few days to soak up more atmosphere and to visit the superb Doi Tung Royal complex. Myself and my travel party rolled out to the bus station the next morning, expecting to easily hop on to the VIP bus back to Chiang Mai.

My travel party? Well I cannot disclose the real names but let's call them the Fireman, Dundee, and Harald, who is German by the way. we were disappointed to hear that the VIP bus was full, however we were mollified when the nice lady with the glint in her eye said that we could catch the 14.00 hour Second Class bus. Great, a couple of hours to burn so we could have lunch, and this delightful lady with the big grin and glinting eyes gave us the very special seats on row 11. Lovely lady.

We made our way to one of the little restaurants next to the station and were entertained with the sight of the Soi dogs intermittently romancing each other and making soft gentle love, as they do, and then being reduced to snarling dog fights. I speak a bit of dog, I know what the cause of the fight was. What happened was the male dog said to the bitch that he would love her forever, jumped on, had his evil way with her, jumped off and said "Finish yourself off"........well you can imagine the reaction from that bitch huh?

So the bus turned up, and we trooped on, down to the special seats at the back that the lady had allocated for us. It was an old bus to be fair, what do you expect when it's second hand? But I suppose comfortable enough. On came the usual cast you see on a Thai bus, the Mum and kids, the Monks, the young people heading back to work in Chiang Mai, and we're off. Totally unremarkable. leaving me with memories of Tha Ton, Chiang Rai and the special glint in the bus ladies eye.

We pulled out off Chiang Rai city limits, turned right, then we were off!!.......I think the first time I realized there was something wrong was when I saw bottles of M-50 and Red Bull being tossed out of the drivers window. I didn't know that using the brakes was against the law on Thai buses either, this old rickety bus flew up to 120 kph and stayed their, irrespective of curves in the road, oncoming traffic, nothing. Being cool and charismatic as I am, I sat their unperturbed for about 3 minutes, then the panic started to set in.

Dundee was sitting next to me, and he was going the same way. "theblether, what the hell is going on here, does this guy have a driving licence?" he asked going a whiter shade of pale. Theblether was unable to answer as the bus was hurtling towards a bend at high speed, and theblether could see a drop on the other side that would guarantee headlines. Fireman was looking straight ahead in a state of panic and Harald was sleeping. The bus swerved up onto what felt like two wheels and just managed to sneak round the corner, surely the driver knew he was at his limits. No, accelerate, there's a little farmers buggy, let's overtake in front of oncoming traffic. At this point theblether, Dundee and Fireman reached for the handles in on our seats, this is it, all over. Here come's a head on crash into a bus coming the other way as we overtook the little truck full of chickens. There were no handles, they had been ripped off, we could see where they had been off and on a few times, but now they were off and gone and that's it. Special seats??, the special scary seats at the back of the bus!! Just at the last second the bus pulled in, cutting the nose off the Chicken truck, and we survived this close encounter with death. I heard the chickens shouting "Cluck off you idiot" to the driver, ( I speak Chicken too ), as we settled into a temporary release from terror. All too temporary though, here comes another corner.

The bus went whizzing round and my heart sank to my ankles, it wasn't lonely as Dundees heart was down there too. This is beyond a joke, I looked up and saw the Monks looking unperturbed, it's ok for them, they have 500 lives to play with, I've only got the one. Accelerate, downhill, overtake, corner, accelerate, overtake, downhill, corner, accelarate, overtake, downhill, corner........blur, blur, heart palpitations, sweats, close eyes, pray. Not working.......try again, oh no there goes another Red Bull out the window . Accelerate, downhill, overtake, corner, accelerate, overtake, downhill, corner, accelarate, overtake, downhill, corner........blur, blur, heart palpitations, sweats, close eyes, not working again. Try praying again, Dear God, Dear Buddha, Dear anybody, please help me survive this nightmare. Dundee is collapsing into a pool of sweat and Fireman is transfixed into a state of shock. Harald is sleeping.

Ok......I know what to do, just close your eyes like it's Xmas Eve and don't open them again. At least at Xmas Eve when you open them you have a lot of presents to look forward to. This policy was going well up until Fireman decided to give us a running commentary. Theblether, theblether, another corner, oh no he;s overtaking, oh no, BRAKE BRAKE, oh no another corner, here come's a truck, oh no oh no.......corner CORner, CORNER!!!......I opened my eyes to see this final corner just in time to see us flashing past a graveyard. Lucky bast*rds, at least they didn't haven't to endure this. One of the monks gave me a calm smile and try to help me through my predicament. I appreciate the effort sir, but could you drive the bus please? I thought to myself. Anything would be better than this nutter. Out goes the last Red Bull........and out goes my last hope of survival. I've never been in a plane crash but I would like to think there is that moment of calm when you know it's all over, and that will be fine. That's how I felt at this moment. It's a lost cause, relax, and if you die, you die. That's it.

I hand Dundee a towel to dry himself, he has lost 10kg of sweat in the past two hours. Fireman has returned to his transfixed state, and Harald is still sleeping. You'll be pleased to hear we made it back to Chiang Mai, Dundee ran to the bottom of the bus to assault the driver, but the driver had leaped out and ran for his life. Fireman awoke from his trance and Harald awoke from his sleep and said " What happened?".

Back to the hotel, I was on my knees thanking everyone I could think of for helping me through this day, straight onto the whisky, and myself Dundee and Fireman had a right rattle at calming our nerves. Harald went for a sleep.

I was sitting there thinking about the nice lady that gave us the special seats, that smile and glint in her eye, that evil bitch knew what she was doing. It was "Terrify a Farang" day and she had won first prize.

So my questions is........do you like travelling by bus in Thailand?

BigJohnnyBKK

Always makes a good, fair, factual and balanced comment. Also never any spelling mistakes... ;-)

Avatar... :-)

Let's not forget that the most important item..the content of the train Packed Lunches .....has been decided upon already. Priorities...

;-) we agree to disagree, but hey, what was your experience before? Similar situation?

Start working out the size of the sin sot. A formal invitation to meet the folks at home is as good as a marriage proposal. ;-)

I think this is probably stubble burning after the rice harvest, rather than slash and burn?

@ transam

You know one now. I'm under 40 and moved to Thailand 10 years ago. Have had three respectable and successful businesses in the Kingdom and moved on to Laos now. Considering my age maybe that makes me a net importer of yaba and opium im your opinion..?

, good stuff. Nice to hear, BUT LOS is open to shit we read about every day. Thankfully it seems the BIB are onto stuff to deter others.

You obviously came into some cash to do your stuff. Let me know how for my future,

A lot of hard graft, guts and some luck to make something, but it worked out fine in the end. Mind you makes me look more like 50 now

@ transam

You know one now. I'm under 40 and moved to Thailand 10 years ago. Have had three respectable and successful businesses in the Kingdom and moved on to Laos now. Considering my age maybe that makes me a net importer of yaba and opium im your opinion..?

Can someone who also has the GMM-Z box, tell me what channels the footie is on tonight? Can't make head or tails of this rubbish decoder....

CHANNEL 3....the password on the box is 0000 forget everything else(lot of rubbish being writ about free channels english commentary and registering your 16 digit number) just enter you password go to thai tv channel 3 and thats your lot..some games are on channel 5 next week-good luck

Ok, so I press Menu on the remote, enter 0000. Takes me to a menu screen with 'EPG' as top option followed by several other options listed below in Thai. What to do? Cheers

Can someone who also has the GMM-Z box, tell me what channels the footie is on tonight? Can't make head or tails of this rubbish decoder....

What a fantastic, fascinating thread! Thanks guys for cheering up my crappy morning :-)

Exactly why it makes essential viewing! :-) This year is building up to be a cracker, what with The Hump and a coach load of 70 year old Russian grannies performing!

Does any one know which channel it will be on, if at all? ;-)

"You can't let a human being die on the street"

Well, apparently you can. The article provides an illustration of palliative care and mental health resources for Thailand's poor and destitute.

The political party in power at present has only one agenda. Me Me Me. They don't care about common or poor people. They are all rich and don't want to bring themselves down to that level. But making passports and visas instead of taking care of the flood tipped their hand, even for the common person. PTP, Red Sirts, and UDD want it all and they want it NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

You've got some serious issues. Sad case.