fisherd3

I fly TG regularly, bit of a sucker for the air-miles now!

Has anybody been with Phuket Air? I'm surprised it hasn't been mentioned. I think they fly direct from Gatwick, which is a bit of a trek for me. They're around £400 direct, which is good value but maybe you get what you pay for?

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I flew with phucket air in november 2004 from lgw to bkk, 747: old, landing: faultlessly smooth, service: OK, free Thai newspapers (in english) , eye candy:good, food: mediocre (by airline standards), alcohol: not quite forthcoming enough though free, legroom: not good not too bad (I am 6'), price v.reasonable GBP355 overall rating: An efficient budget airline, good value , nothing went wrong, would use again but then I am not rich. I believe they only fly LGW-BKK in the winter season.

It is obviously possible to travel to Samui by bus via Bangkok very cheaply, however I am advised that the journey is a nightmare 12hrs + with a then 2 hour ferry crossing, for true back packers only.

I always use Direct Travel Insurance www.direct-travel.co.uk ,buy it on line underwritten by AXA plenty of choice in policies with or without money/personal possessions , and they pay. Check them out.

I have used net2phone but not from to Thailand, quality nothing brilliant and big hassles when your credit runs out, say your credit card has been replaced in the meantime , you have to start faxing bank statements with the new card number on it etc to the US, this may be Ok if you're at home but it was abig problem when abroad without access to all documents.. Generally difficult to top up account.

JUst checked out Wayne no sign of five free credits when you sign up but double credits when you first purchase if you upgrade to full membersip GBP5.

I seem to remember looking on ebay that US mobile networks use different frequencies than the UK that uses the same as Thailand. Which is GSM900/1800 , therefore I believe although there might be multi frequency phones available many U.S. phones will not work in Thailand.

I was initially refused boarding on a Thai flight from Sydney to Bangkok as I had left my BA flight tickets from BKK to LHR at my house in Samui.

that's news to me. I am wondering why airlines bother about whether you have a return ticket out of Thailand. I always thought their business is to fly you into the country. How and when you get out of the country in none of their business. Pardon my ignorance. Please enlighten me.

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Airlines have to be concerned about your visa status as if they bring a passenger to a country who is denied admission they can be fined or maybe are responsible for taking him out of the country again, I believe.

ipipi seems to work when you pay according to other members and its charges are reasonable less than half of sending an international SMS from a Tesco (!!!) mobile in the uk.

I found sms.ac a stitch up I couldn't work out how to send an email outside UK and they would be sending useless textmessages to you for which they were charging about 50p each.

I would steer well clear of this web site as they have charged you a couple of quid (from your mobiles credit) before you realise whats happenned but would be interested to be corrected if I have got it wrong.

Talking to my TGF about such matters a while back she came out with with absolute conviction 'Free sex me hear about that in England, girlfriend and boyfriend....." in such a way that her observation was a general Thai attitude and not an attitude limited to BGs , obviously there are 'good' Thai girls who can afford to be 'good' but for many in between BG and 'good girl' moving into Farang territory = money whilst leaving whatever?! morality restrains there behaviour in Thai society. A bit like English girls going on holiday to Spain and doing three or four guys something they would never do England.

We musn't forget the twisted Victorian attitude we at least UK farangs have towards simple bodily processes and the commercial utilisation therof, the concept is almost foreign to us compared with other peoples including our close neighbours the Germans who have whore house opnely in the middle of their big cities, this makes it difficult for us to grasp the simplicity and ease of the transaction for the impoverished.

My PC has two front mounted hard disks in caddies, 40gb Maxtors one went toes up and I have received an 80gb Maxtor as a replacement. This disk did not contain any system info as system ran OK with it removed, I have loaded the new disk in the caddy and installed it in the PC.

In Device manager it is there properly identified 'This device is working properly' but in 'My Computer' I still have only the other disk information i.e. 40gb so it seems to me the new disk is not effectively in the system.

On the new disk there was a diagram giving 3 positions for a jumper one of which was 'if used as a slave device' which it seems to me it is, as I could not find the jumper I loaded it anyway, as I was told it would work this way.

Any suggestions as to how to get this disk up and running, is it the jumper?

Thanking you in anticipation of your kind assistance.

Ladies and gentlemen I am sorry if I have been somewhat imprecise and possibly done what might be Bangkoks premier zoo (Dusit) a disservice but I have been referring to the Crocodile farm at Samut Prakarn 30 Kms sth of Bangkok, however my intention was not to start a debate about the morality of prejudicial pricing (it happens), but to enable falangs to have some guidance as to whether or not they should invest in such a visit , in other words have the information with which to make the decision NOT TO GO (for Lady penelopes benefit) how else would they have a clue?

Had alook at ipipi but in common with every other 'free' sms offer, in this case their 'few' trial sms (2) do not enable you to compose a message and anyway couldn't send it to an optusnet phone in australia without buying credits, the runaround, I wonder what further 'tricks' lurk once units have been purchased?

Charging more for a quality product is more acceptable but to provide a thai quality Zoo and charge falng money to get in is the con.

Although the Bangkok Zoo is worth the 60 baht charged to Thai people it most certainly not worth the 300 baht charged to farangs, and I invite all members to research this judgement if considering a visit or are being invited to visit by a Thai who is not going to pay.

It is a long way out of town and when you get there you might as well pay the money, your Thai host/ess will probably not know the entrance fee in advance.

I guess it depends on what kind of account you need I opened a savings account with ATM card in 10 mins in Bangkok Bank Pattaya with Passport and 2000bht and have transferred money from England via wire from my bank there cost GBP20 I believe it is about US$20 from U.S.

yeah you just go to web site sign in with given user name and password and change to your choice , I had a bit of trouble doing this as there was an 'r' next to an'n' which looked just like an 'm' to my declining eyesight!!! so watch out for that.

does say on card packet 'use only TOT line TT&T not recommended'

1222 never had any problems speeds look a bit slow but OK in practice

I am using the JI-Net 'card' 'Shark Byte' which is 179 bht for 15 days unlimited and I believe about 325bht for 30 days.

You can use outlook express a la pop3 and change the supplied username and password to one of your choosing which is retained when you renew.

I buy this card upstairs at the big Tesco Pattaya and it is also available in computer shops.

I leave my computer on line all day and don't get cut off I certainly hopee it is 3bht per dial up as I have been told, I am on my second fifteen day card (currently with a five day bonus) and have no problems.

Anyone know if there are any euro style automatic photo booths in any of the big shopping centres?

A bar girl will kiss you OK because she perceives she is being paid to do a job and basically has a perception she can't say no. The same bar girl will become 'Thai Lady' at first opportunity on having opportunity to leave bar work and will then start behaving like 'Thai lady' which I believe does not involve enthusiatic mouth on mouth kissing.

I read in the Pattaya property trader that :

"The general rule is that Thai nationals who marry foreigners are not allowed to own land in Thailand, unless the foreign spouse signs a document which declares that the property is separate, and that he or she has no interest in the property in any way. The Thai spouse must also declare that the money to but the property was his/hers inm the first place.

So, putting land into your Thai spouses name is difficult and fraught with difficulties."

This is news to me and seems to beg the question are all the houses owned by mixed married couples owned via the company method, even though this seems to cost around 2M baht to set up? A disproportionate amount considering the price of the average property.

Pattaya property trader also mentioned the 'Nominee with mortgage' method I have seen described on Thaivisa mentioning it had seen the method on ''an obscure web site".

Any ideas on methods and cost of co-owning house with Thai citizen?

I came out with phuket air this week, I would rate them as good, food very average , drink not all that copious, 2x singha, did not quibble over 28kg baggage when should be 20kg, overhead locker old fashioned drop down type not too large, service charming, drop down big TV screen, on time.

fisherd3