sezzo

I stayed at a very cheap hotel within 50 m of the embassy. It was about 400 baht per night but was very basic to say the least.

As you look at the embassy from the road there is a large driveway for the malaysian embassy. Next to the driveway going away from the embassy you will see a restaurant with a driveway next to it going into an internal carpark for this particular building. If you go into the restaurant you will see the reception for the hotel. Further down the driveway for this building is a translation service, travel agents and other offices.

Like I said it is a budget hotel but its accessability to the embassy is great. The restaurant food is ok and also handy to the embassy.

Sorry but I cant remember the name of the hotel.

Good luck

I forgot to mention that the hotel is situated to the left of the embassy as you are looking at it from the road.

Sorry about that

Finally I have been able to procure ABC Asia Pacific up here in the sticks and I was so thrilled to see the adverts for all the super 14 rugby games, 2 NRL games per week and every AFL game.

To all those non believers, Yes there is a god. I have died and gone to heaven with all this great sport that I can watch sitting in my little retreat in Thailand.

Go the Cats

I stayed at a very cheap hotel within 50 m of the embassy. It was about 400 baht per night but was very basic to say the least.

As you look at the embassy from the road there is a large driveway for the malaysian embassy. Next to the driveway going away from the embassy you will see a restaurant with a driveway next to it going into an internal carpark for this particular building. If you go into the restaurant you will see the reception for the hotel. Further down the driveway for this building is a translation service, travel agents and other offices.

Like I said it is a budget hotel but its accessability to the embassy is great. The restaurant food is ok and also handy to the embassy.

Sorry but I cant remember the name of the hotel.

Good luck

I have been through the same process for the past year or so and could maybe add a little bit of my experience and advice.

Firstly the nearest carrier or transmission lines are about 600 m from my house on the farm. We approached the electricity office in our nearest town to see what needed to be done to get connected. They more or less put us on the books and told us to wait. In addition to this we asked how much it would cost for me to pay for the connection. The price was 90k baht for transformer and 20 power poles required at 7k baht each. It came to about 240k baht for the job to be done. I had also been through the process of considering slaving of someone else but it wouldnt be enough to run a house safely.

One guy at the office told my wife to gather the names and tabian baans for other people in the locality that didnt have power, register this with the amphur and submit that to try and get the government money allocated to provide your "neighbourhood" with power. This is what finally is happening to us but the problem is that it is going to be quite a few months before we are connected.

Since then we have been hearing about allocations of money for solar power connections to the house. My wife went and asked about that and was told that was correct. Problem being that it only gives you enough power for 1 light and a small tv. No thank you.

In Dec we had a visit from a guy from the amphur who wanted my wifes family to give them 1 rai of land in exchange they will build the closest village water supply there. This means that they have to provide power to run the pump so this will give us access to electricity as the pump will be situated across the road from our house. This sounded like a good idea so we gave them the ok. We received a visit from the amphur representative and he told the wife that we will definately be getting water and power sometime this year. At least we know its coming and it will be relatively cheap. Just normal household connection prices.

So basically my advice is to start pestering (nicely) the local electricity office for options on how to obtain power. Dont just accept that you will have to pay the full cost of the supplying the power to your place. There is always another option. Dont listen to the wifes family or friends that they know someone in the office and they will get it done cheap for you. That never eventuates. And above all always show them respect when you are negotiating all this or you will get put on some sort of black list or go slow list with them.

I got me some tickets for the green and mundine fight, i cant wait and hope its a good fight, green will win.

Lucky You of course danny green will give him a flogging, but mundine will probably not turn up , he will probably be washing his didgeredoo or be on the grog nignoy

I think that 99 percent of Australians will be backing Green for a win and hopefully he will. Mind you if he does win I reckon that Motormouth Mundine will be blaming Racism for his loss.

Blame the ref, crowd, TV stations, newspapers etc for the racism against mundine. At least thats what happened when he was left out of the Oz rugby league team a few years ago.

Funny, if he had some talent he would have made that team

Go Danny

KL could be the answer for me as well if I get knocked back on my Non Imm extension.

Will find out on the 5th Apr

Trond,

Will be there for sure.

Fan room for me will be fine.

Better get some drinking practice in now.

Carl

Scott123,

I was quoted 150k baht for an operation to rectify a detached retina at Bumrangrad. The operation ended up costing 186k baht and I still have to go back for some follow up treatment quoted at 30k baht.

While definately a first class hospital it is quite pricey. Spoke to another guy from up my way who had the same operation at another hospital and he paid just under half the price that I did. Pays to shop around a bit.

But still much cheaper than getting the same procedure done in Oz.

Good luck

1. Subject does not state if he has a work permit but that is a requirement for using the 40k method of stay - without local job/work permit he should maintain 400k in a Thai bank account as was suggested.

2. It appears the office is not satisfied that this is a real marriage (rather than a yearly meeting to obtain visa extension) and that the medical test is thus being proposed under the other documents criteria. I have even heard of such a test being required for a visa on basis of marriage if you do not have children.

3. You are expected to maintain the amount in your account until final approval of visa extension is received from Bangkok. Nothing new.

Above is only my best guess and may be wrong but from what you have written it seems to fit. Believe your obtaining extension with outside income (if that is what it is) is not the norm.

Financial documentation:

- Bank statement and copy of bank account showing at least 400,000.- Baht deposit

- Employment evidence, work permit, and tax documentation showing an income of at least 40,000.- Baht.

Lopburi,

Point 1. On the Immigration website I scrolled down to the criteria required for supporting a thai wife and it informs that I need an income of 40,000 baht per month or 400,000 baht in the bank or a combination of both. I certainly meet this criteria. There is nothing at all mentioned about a work permit. This is the second yearly extension that I have sought from this office and there was no problems at all concerning the monthly salary last year.

Point 2. I have visited this office about 8 times in the past year, each time with my wife and her son for various reasons ie. 90 day reporting, application for extension, application for re-entry permit. They definately are aware that we are a married couple.

Point 3. Last year the extension took 3 months to be granted which on questioning other expats in the area is the correct timing for a first time application for extension. Does this mean that I shouldnt have touched my money for 3 months. How is a person on a Non - Imm O (marriage) visa supposed to support the family for which basis he was granted the visa in the first place.

Shall keep on plugging away

Matters like this are never "announced at a conference".

They have to be Gazetted.

I suggest you write to the head man at Immigration Suan Plu.

There should be a board in your local immigration office giving his full

name and address.

Just quote what you have been told and ask when these "new" regulations

came into force.

All low key and polite.

I have found his responses to be helpful in the past.

Exactly what I will do

All I now for sure is that I wish I had a lot of baht right now. I have to make a wire transfer from the US soon and the exchange rate is 38.76 to a dollar. My last transfer was 40.5 and the one before that was 41.6.

I think as soon as the dust settles regarding Toxin's funds the rate will improve to around 40. Before Toxin made the deal the government panicked when the rate got down to about 40. It seems things have changed.

I hope you are right. My monthly Oz dollar transfers have dived in value over the past couple of months.

Have to cut back to only 6 changs per day now.

Very sad indeed

Nignoy,

Always up for a coldie. Just let me know when and where.

Will be interested in seeing the face of the Ozzie basher that has kept me amused for the past couple of years.

Sezzo

That sounds like a bad experience. There is a number you can call to report that. I have dealt with a few immigration offices, being Surin, Suan Phlu and The one stop shop, and I have never seen or heard anything like that. I also am on a Non-O visa, so all the threads about Non-O, I am interested in.

Sorry to hear you have had a bad experience.

I was sitting there yesterday morning and saw 2 things that now seem relevant. One was a new sign that gave an email address for the head honcho of the immigration dept saying that if you are not happy with the treatment received, to email him. Might go that way.

The other thing was a big polystyrene sign in the office that says "The security of the kingdom and public SATISFACTION is our main priority"

Funny now that these two things have stuck in my mind.

As promised in a previous thread about extension which I cant find just now, I have just returned from lodging my application for extension. What I thought was going to be an easy process turned into a morale sapping experience.

Firstly having to wait at Phibun Mangsahan immigration office for 2 hours just to get served really tested the patience. Not their fault as their seemed to be about 10 application pending from farang, filipinos and other asians all waiting their turn.

Then handed in the appropriate paperwork which I got from Bangkok last week. During the interview which took over an hour (nothing personal at all asked) I found out that the minimum transfer of funds into a thai bank account had risen from 40k baht per month to 45k baht. This amount is just above the amount that I receive from my super fund. I queried this and was told that at a conference last week they were informed that the minmum had risen.

Next thing I was informed that next time I apply I will have to go to a clinic in Ubon (50 ks away) and be tested to see if I can have children. I almost fell off my chair with this comment and when pressed further this action also came from the conference previously mentioned. Nothing to do with the fact that I have no intention to have kids as my wife already has 2 and thats enough for me to handle at this stage.

So at this stage I was feeling a bit hot under the collar but restrained my anger and kept things going. The trump card was finally played when I was informed that under the new rules I cant touch my thai bank account until the end of April. I said to the officer how do you expect me to buy food, diesel etc for my family. He said that if I just transfer the 400k into my bank I will expect no problems with getting the extension.

And on top of that he casually said to my wife "that he would like to have a coffee". Having said that she slipped him 200 baht. I stormed into the car and just stewed for the drive home. Not only did he ruin my day but he wanted a tip. Had he asked in english I would have gone to his tea room and made him one myself.

I am really considering going to the multi entry system and just go over the border every 3 months.

I have read in other posts that have mentioned there could be changes in the wind. Hopefully I am wrong and have just imagined what has happened to me today.

Well they were certainly rubbish against South Africa! 90 odd all out, a total embarrassment! Compare that with the supper showing of the English in India, the hardest place to win. Half the team injured and yet they are favourites going into the last day!

I guess a day is a long time in the cricket forcasting business. Australia beat the Yarpies in the third ODI with a solid all round performance.

Meanwhile, England must have taken an early supper on the last day because they couldn't roll the Indian batsmen and the game ended in a draw.

Not being a fan of australian cricket in general , thought it worthwhile to make the comment, so the aussies lost a couple of matches its just a glitch,, they have a wealth of young talent coming through, they are in process of building a team, even playing as they are at the moment they are still the best in the world!!england have their odd flashes of brilliance but lack the killer instinct to clinically finish off opposing teams , so they will always be nearly the best,Cant believe it Moi defending australian cricket Blaim udon!! he has finally got me brainwashed Nignoy

Thought I would never see the day when Nignoy would say something positive about Oz.

Or maybe I have had too many changs last night and am just imagining all this.

Sezzo

I would have been there, but my 'Mate' Yorky said it was a private do, invitation only. I was gob-smacked when I saw a lot of our customers on the pics. Still maybe next time.

Martin,

I was actually very surprised to see Yorkie there and spent the rest of the evening looking around for you to pop up. Good to see both the Surin and Ubon mobs mixing together.

See you there next time.

Sezzo

BJ,

Our favourite eating/drinking place on the Mekong has UBC and Im sure the owners will switch to F1 if we ask them. There are also a couple of farangs in the area that have UBC installed as well.

I used to have UBC but cancelled it before my last trip to Oz. Too much soccer on it for my liking.

Anyhow when you are here give me a call and we will see what we can do in that area of viewing.

Carl

From what my gf tells me , the water buffaloes only value now is for fertiliser from their manure and meat. The tractor has replaced them in all farm work.

Around our way the two wheel tractor is the main tractor implement but in the poorer villages you still see the buffalo pulling along the wooden plough in preparation for the rice planting.

Marco,

Just a suggestion, but if we have name tags for the first event what would be good is to put down the TV names as well as our real names on it. hat way we can put faces to names we read about on this forum.

Just a thought.

Busking around Thailand. Interesting thought

Marco,

We have arrived in Phibun, have the map, and looking forward to meeting you all.

Well done for organising

Which hotel would you (or ThaiBites0 or anyone) recommend that is close, clean and comfortable and around the 1000 baht price range. We do not need pool and all that stuff, just a bed and a shower

Thanks,

Mike

SEZZO

what was the hotel where u guys stay??

-Marco-

We are staying at the Sri Issan which is near the bridge going over the river (near the park where they have the candle festival). Thats about 600 baht per night. Its a way to go from the pissup venue but we are going to stop off at the Polar Bear cafe first.

Marco. I will send you a list of names by email tonight for the Khemarat mob.

Carl

There will always be buffaloes in Thailand much the same as there are shire horses in the UK but when was the last time you saw your local pub being serviced by a horse drawn delivery wagon?

They look very nice when done out in thier finery and bedecked with horse brasses but it is only on special occaisions that you will see them. Water buffaloes were a standard sight along the roadside some years ago but you would find it hard to spot one now!They are there and will always be there but not in any large numbers.

You obviously dont drive around Khemarat (100ks nth of Ubon) very much then.

We play dodge the "Kwai on the road" every day. And thats on the main road from Khemarat to Amnat or on the Ubon road.

From the photos of the roads you dont really get much idea of how to get there. Maybe some sort of map would be a little easier to follow.

I spoke to Marco yesterday afternoon and he was going to try and scan a map of the area and post it.

Sounds good though. Looking forward to it.

Sounds like this get together is gaining momentum.

I was in Ubon yesterday and dropped into a nice little place called the The Polar Bear cafe/wine bar. Its run by an english guy. I was telling him about the get together on 24th and he is also interested in it and said that quite a few of his clientel would be also

It is a declining market I'm afraid to say - the tractor started taking over about 15 years ago and the villagers sold the oxen! My father-in-law at the time went from 6 to none in 6 months and the family have never bought another one.

There is a fortune to be made if you have the time and space to buy and breed oxen to sell to the villagers when the crash comes and oil prices put the tractors out of business. You will have to wait 5 years before recovering any venture capital though.

thanks thaibites. how about growing yang pa la(rubber) I have 10 Rai near campia city and need to start something soon.

Nicelee808,

My wife and I have a newly planted rubber farm about 50 ks north of Trakan Phuetphon. There has been a fair bit of stuff posted in the Issan forum about rubber farms. Just do a search at the bottom of this page for it.

If you want some more info just PM me and although Im no expert I will try and answer a few queries if you have some.

Cheeers,

Carl