gk10002000

5 hours ago, jimmybcool said:

I owned a condo in Pattaya for 10 years.  I sold it last year and have had some twinges of regret wondering if I did the right thing.  I did so because I was planning on reducing my Thailand visits or even not going any longer.  And I missed Thailand.  Now, I am so happy I own nothing there.  I feel sorry for the guy who bought my condo but it clearly isn't my fault if the prices drop from this event.  Heck, the money he gave me I put into the markets and isn't as valuable so we both took a hit.

 

I still feel as I did back then.  Only reason for me to own a condo is as a second home.  Not as a rental.  Not as an investment.  

yes.  And many years ago I almost bought a place.  Kind of wish I did because the price was not much at the time and with the exchange rate still 40 baht to 1 USD.  It would have been like 30k or 35 k USD for a decent little place.  I always went twice a year on holiday, but slowed down a bit as I got some very busy years at work. But had I owned the place I may have "forced" forced myself to go a few more times or probably would have let one or two friends or relatives use it for a week or two.  But who knows what headaches would have happened.  Water leaks, utility issues, theft while I was out of country, etc.  Of course I may have decided to punch out and retire sooner.  But as things turned out, this virus thing, the visa extension hassles, the insurance hassles, etc, retiring there probably would not have been the best thing.  And with the recent market downs, I am fortunate to be working on a crazy high rate contract and doshing things up for real retirement (63 now).  So you never know how things would have been.  In general, buying unless one is there for a real long time is risky.  Not to mention if you have issues with the building, neighbors, etc, but can't get away from the property.  That alone might make it better to never buy and just pay a little more on rents and leases for months for the flexibility

Yes you may get a decent price, but under what conditions?  In the future the place will be like a massive Air BnB with short term stayers coming and going?  Will rooms or entire floors be commandeered for mass rentals to Chinese tour groups or others?  Buyer beware

That was a weird video.  but the videos on that face book page showed one example of Thai mentality.  Side road two lane road, one lane each way, and a bunch of cars were just trying to get ahead of the slow traffic by moving over to the right hand lane.  So dis respectful

On 4/21/2020 at 6:50 PM, Ron jeremy said:

Gogos were at their best??????????

please explain, with the exception of several of the 80-90 the rest have been desolate at best.High barfines and rising costs for the gals, combined with dozens of closures in the last few years. Quality is has never been that poor( exception of several)

have you ever been to pattaya scuba???????

with comments like that I'm starting to wonder. 

RIP the Carousel.  And yes the bar fines are out of control. 

if they would let me travel to Thailand I am prepared to get my SETV and stay for 60 then 30 days with an extension for a long vacation.  But no way to meet any of the insurance stuff or get certificates, and things scheduled at the same time to synch up with my travel

outdoor baggage area?  how can that be good?  Say a transferring flight where one must get baggage and check it in onto the next flight?  how about any theft control?

19 hours ago, jaiyen said:

Who the hell chose the carpet ? It is so ugly.  But it will hide the dirt as it will never get cleaned.

it is like casino carpets.  Designed to hide everything.

18 hours ago, LomSak27 said:

I wondered where you were going with this and then There It Is. 

Truth is I hope you are all correct in your medical predictions, because if you're not. ... well we know what happens then. 

yeah, the same thing that has happened.  something like 30 % to  40% of the deaths attributed to the virus was in nursing homes in several of the USA states.  Pennsylvania the percentage on the news was 52%. 

4 hours ago, mrfill said:

Tripe.

For a start, the '1917' flu. I assume you mean the so called 'Spanish flu' outbreak in January 1918. That occurred during a world war where thousands of troops were closely packed in trenches with no sanitation, masks or social distancing. Rather unlike today. By August 1918, just as people thought it was finished, a second more powerful wave spread. This was helped by many infected troops being repatriated as the war was coming to an end and consequently it infected their home countries more. The armistice was signed in November 1918 after which the remaining infected troops returned home and the outbreak continued until late 1920. Actual figures for infections are vague to say the least. Wiki suggests a third of the world were infected (500m) and there were between 17 and 50 million deaths - that's about as vague as you can get!

 

The 1918 flu was particularly serious as it unusually affected young adults badly. Not as you suggest.

 

Covid may well have infected huge numbers - it could be 90% and if 89.9% are asymptomatic, it is not so important. Unfortunately even the best tests are not 100% accurate - 95% would be regarded as excellent but means 5% could be misdiagnosed as being clear when they are not. Cheaper tests have lower accuracy (I saw some were reckoned to be only 55% accurate which rather stretches the meaning of 'accurate' and would be worse than useless).

 

People are still dying of influenza and without proper testing, would be registered as an influenza or pneumonia death rather than a covid19 death, even if they were riddled with it. 

As flu and covid19 are transmitted the same way, precautions are similar except this year vast numbers are now wearing masks and washing hands frequently, which would slow any flu outbreak, just as it appears to slow covid19 spread, so I would certainly agree that the 2020 flu death figure is likely to be lower.

 

Comparing deaths by all reasons may give a slightly better insight. For example, Ecuador has reported only 530 deaths countrywide. However, the government said 6,700 people died in Guayas province in the first two weeks of April, far more than the usual 1,000 deaths there in the same period. (Guayas is home to Guayaquil - a key port and the part of the country worst-hit by Covid-19.). Without testing or even a half decent health system, the extra 5700 get reported as pneumonia or whatever. And that is just one province. Its a big mess...

Thank you for pointing out some of the details of the Spanish flu.  And opposite of COVID 19 it did affect severaly mostly the younger whose immune systems overreacted.  COV ID 19 seems to have no effect at all on the very young, and not surprising of course complications on old people affects them more.

1 hour ago, timendres said:

The number of 824,698 infected in the US is without question an understatement. In fact, it could very easily be an order of magnitude greater. This would shift your death toll dramatically. Influenza is a virus we have known and studied for years. Wuhan is not. So we will not really know the true numbers for some time. It is quite possible that it is not at all as lethal as we think at this moment, because we are finding more and more that large numbers of people are asymptomatic, or simply do not seek treatment.

And many people that died were NOT tested because test kits were short.  And even if they were tested, it may just have shown they had been exposed or had some 19 antibodies in their system, but would have died from a regular flu complications.  The percentage of deaths in each state by people in nursing homes stands out.  Some states had 30, 50, even 52 % of their deaths in Pennsylvania for example from people in Nursing homes.  Now of course many of those people were very old, weak, had many issues which is why they were in those sort of facilities.  So frankly, locking down every thing when the highest percentage of at risk people are a fairly narrow group is a poor solution 

11 hours ago, owl sees all said:

In some states in US, hospitals who treat C-17 patients get a gov' handout of 30k USD. If they then die, that jumps up to 40k USD. Someone being admitted from the 'flu, is only worth 4k USD.

 

Best way to eradicate 'flu. Pay the hospitals not to record it.

I am not surprised that some money is involved.  If you say COVID 19 all sorts of billing things probably come into play.

What does it actually test?  how accurate?  Does it prove you had the virus, does it check for antibodies in your system?  Is it useful if you had the virus two weeks before, 4 weeks before, etc?  And the next question is who gets the results and what are done with the results?  If a person tests positive as having had the virus, do they quarantine them or track them down and investigate?  Thousands and millions of people most likely had the virus but had no symptoms now or in the past.  So if the test detects something positive, then what? 

On 4/4/2020 at 3:17 AM, Borzandy said:

"between 3,500 and 5,000 baht. The price range was not explained" easy to explain 3500 for Thais and 5000 for farangs.

and he said health insurance would cover the test.  but how many middle to low income class Thais have any insurance?  I thought most Thais literally get some routine care free at Government hospitals.  I

Does she have or make more money than you?  Does she have more to lose than you?   Check out the 1960s comedy "Guide for the Married Man" starring Walter Mathieu, and Robert Morse I think was the other guy's name. 

Haha.  So living in a polluted air city which induced people to wear masks, may have been a healthier place ?  Gotta love cause and effect sometimes

3 hours ago, daveAustin said:

The wai and bs figures. Hardly anyone was wearing them when it was spreading enmasse.

The Wai I think is a big factor.  Look at Italy, that got hit hard initially.  The up close and personal greeting of kissing each other on both cheeks, man or woman or child.  the children seem not to have been affected much but no doubt carried the particles on their outside if not in their breaths.   I would have no problem with a Wai type of greeting.  There are only a few people I have a desire to hug and kiss or hold hands with, and it certainly does not include strangers or acquaintances.

On 4/21/2020 at 3:41 AM, Sujo said:

He is stopping an illegal act. No issue at all. The person in the car is not free to drive. If the car hits him it wont be the doctor to blame as pedestrians have the rights over the car.

It is not an illegal act, and the twink nurse has no authority to stop any thing

On 4/20/2020 at 6:44 PM, Tug said:

Ahh nooo you have no rite to run someone over with a suv or Vespa it’s called assault and if ya kill that person it’s mansaluter at the bare minimum murder most likely just like that dirt bag that killed that woman in Charlottesville 

Ah no, you have no right to block somebody which is tantamount to kidnapping.  

13 hours ago, pmarlin said:

Those who live in condos or apartments will never see it because the building management controls the water bills.

Last time I rented a condo the water bill for a month was very small.  3 % would have made little difference.  Now that was just me and an occasional guest so I am sure a couple or a family of course would be larger

4 hours ago, Pib said:

Couldn't say....I guess FSB is your bank....you would need to ask them.  By law US banks only have to accept checks up to 6 months old; if FSB accept older checks then that's purely their policy/choice. And maybe they do accept any check/govt check where it specially states on the check the validity period up to 1 year...especially a govt check.  Nothing special about FSB....it's just another U.S. bank.....its not a Federal Reserve/government bank or anything like that.

 

You keep saying that but I believe any Federal bank has to accept the treasury checks.  And Treasury checks are considered Certified checks as the funds are guaranteed and available

39 minutes ago, jastheace said:

if they use an adblocker blocker, does that mean I have to search for an adblocker blocker blocker or an adblocker blocker deblocker or even.... an adblocker blocker deblocker reblocker ????

Yeah, you need the anti anti anti missile Tao type of thing.  It really is sad how they force the ad.  closing it just opens it up again.  An intrusive ad is only going to annoy and not encourage anybody to buy anything.  What does the VDO.Ai that pops up on my screen supposed to tell me, that I should go buy a space satellite?

22 hours ago, swerve said:

Install an ad blocker.  Ads gone after you do that.  I think the one I used is this: https://adblockplus.org/

I have installed that and others to no affect.  And in some cases when on a computer that is not my own, I can not install anything.  

the VDO.AI thing I keep seeing is all about space stuff, satellites, rockets, etc.  what do you guys see?