klubex99

aussieinthailand, you really must try to attribute the right comments to the right people it was I who made the comments not waza.

If you seek the truth (an unusual occurrence for a Thaksin supporter I know) check out the public domain and you will find the video clips of a Red Shirt leader exhorting people to bring both bottles and inflammable liquids to Bangkok and his stentorian strident comments concerning his idea and plans for burning Bangkok down.

It would indeed seem as if some people are still following his orders as current events so clearly show

I think we all thought the same thing when reading the OP.

It's pretty obvious that this attack came from 'the other side of the fence'.

With regards to red leaders urging supporters to commit mass murder and vile acts of terrorism on their own capital. In any 'civilized' nation he would not make the next 24 hours as a free man and would likely be locked up for life.... But I said, in any 'civilized' society.

Thailand is all about saving face. Image is the most important thing in thai culture. She made him look bad and his culture demanded revenge. Not unlike in India where a man will kill his wife for asking for a divorce or a Muslim father will kill a daughter if she marries a Christian or embarrasses the family.

Is it really that face-saving thing again? For the life of me I cannot understand how what this man did and how he did it will save/restore his face with his fellow Thais.

I think most Thais will be just as appalled by this as us foreigners.

If it is a cultural thing, where is it taught? How and where do Thais pick this up? Cannot be just Thai TV soaps.

I think this guy is just a scum lowlife, and not a bright one at that.

You don't get lessons in it. It is considered yet another face saving thing because in his own words he said he did it because 'he felt insulted by the sight'. AKA I felt like I lost face.... This is the same knee-jerk excuse used for almost every unexplainable act of violence in Thailand. It is very much linked to this backward face crap.

It's almost like it is a universal excuse for being inhuman.

Yeasterday threre was an excellent post, complete with pictures, of an industrial area that looked like it was trying to be the new Lost City of Atlantis yet according to a spokesman it was operating normally.

You have to hand it to Thai officiadom as no matter how many eye witnesses and photographic evidence is avaiable if they say something is or isn't happening it's set in stone and don't dare suggest otherwise.

Those factories build submarines.

Car manufacturers have wind tunnels.

Same same

This is absolutely true.

While Thailand has a huge tourism industry if all the expats went home it would not effect GDP in anyway.

Lets not confuse what Tourists spend with what Expats living here spend.

Thailand generates about 70% of GDP from Exports. 7% from tourism.

What expats spend (and most live a fairly frugal existence) doesn't effect Thailand as a whole.

So as kikoman correctly points out "Expat greatly exaggerate their financial contribution to the Thai economy."

This statement is absolutely spot on.

You blokes don't get it.Let me put it this way.If tourist numbers equalled expats(250,000),would they spend more money than us.Over1month,maybe,but then they're gone,and i'm still here spending my pittance.In the next 11months I catch up,if not sooner.Expats also have a wider range to spend their money.No tourists out here spending money down the local shop,school,wat,ect.Direct injection of funds to local communities.Where does tourists money go?

Don't worry about it. I am sure the penny will drop eventually. You have to expect that some are slower than others to understand basic English and some just flat out will never be able to understand it. Then you have the ones who will just read what they want to read between the lines to throw up some pointless argument that they will refuse to let go of..... The rest will just be apologists trolling round the threads.

You totally get it.

You state that (using your figures) 250,000 western expat, spending $500. (whatever currency) monthly for 12 months = $6000 yearly (Euro) for each of 250,000 expats.

While in 2012 there was a total of 22 million tourist came to Thailand.

The projected tourist numbers for 2013 is 27 million tourist visited Thailand.

So in 2012 in a month average of 1,800,000 tourist visit Thailand each month.

7.5 times as many tourist per month (7.5 tourist per each expat per month).

Using Your projected Tourist visiting Thailand in 2013, 27 million an average 2,200,000. monthly

8.8 as many tourist per expat visit monthly in 2013 (8.8 tourist = 1 expat).

There is no way that 250,000 expats place more money in the Thai economy than Tourism, Tourist are more free spending than expats and in any given month in 2013 there is an average 8.8 tourist to 1 expat, while some expats have an excess of money to spend, most cheap charley expats just barely get by on a monthly budget.

You blokes don"t get it, you math is extremely fuzzy and your number just do not add up right.

And when you finally get it when the penny drops, jump out of the way as those financially challenged expat will grab it before it hits the floor!

Cheers:

Hahaha.....

You still don't understand anything, and are now embarrassing yourself.

Everyone here can now see how backward you thinking is. Up to you mate.

I am so glad that this thread has affected you so much.... me..... just makes me laugh.

Carry on... But you will be talking to yourself from now on.

If all the tourists dispappeared Thailand would have some problems, but it will never happen. If all us expats disappeared nobody except our nearest families would care at all.

Why would you think that the tourists disappearing would never happen?

One scenario.... What if some radical islamic general in the south decided to have the bright idea to start targeting tourists? Do you think this is an impossible idea? Because I think it could well happen. Nobody knows what they will do down there next, bombings and shootings daily, and neither side are making any headway.

So Mr General decides it's time to turn their attention to tourists and farangs. To obviously hit the economy and force the hand of the government. Or don't you think that these radicals are too decent to do such a nasty thing?

They would clear the entire south of foreigners within weeks, and then go for Pattaya and the North indisriminately murdering expats that remain. After all.... wouldn't be the most difficult campaign to pull off would it?

That could turn LOS into a ghost town.

Obviously god willing it would never happen, but I have thought in the past on more than one occasion that I am actually surprised they haven't got to that stage yet.

I suppose the pictures my wife showed me on the internet yesterday of dozens of factories standing in water, were just cleverly photoshopped by the media?

I wonder for what purpose?

Sorry to quote the whole post. Just so I can retrieve the info at a later date.

Very interesting, thanks.

Was the 15 500 Baht ticket for 2?

No, that was each

BKK_Mike

When we were there last, there were maoist strikes going on demanding the elections. But as far as I am aware, it is still not decided.

We were caught up in a strike, they only happen in KTM and are over by 4PM, all it does is generate traffic problems... There was no violence, they are very routine happenings.

According to the English guy I met over there who has live there for years, he said that he feels for the maoists because they come largely from the west and there is nothing there for them, no roads, infrastructure, amenities, electricity etc.... I guess I feel for them too. But the violence in Nepal was quashed many years ago, and there really hasn't been any since as they have settled into a system of peaceful but disruptive strikes instead.

KTM is far too secure for violence to erupt, the place is full of army bases and they are ready to strike if there is any problems. The maoists know this and that they would not come off intact.

My Thai mother in law is a very good driver and she has a Thai drivers license. I don't know how she got it as she cant read or write of course she bought it.

I wondered why she would not drive from Lop Buri to Pattaya to stay with us, and the wife said she cant read the road signs. That's when I woke up to how she got the license.

Amazing a thai that cannot read or write thai. It isn't anything unique you can easily find ppl like that in the USA for example.

It's the sickening morality/superiority mentality at play in here.

Guy from the USA hears/read about thais that bought their license or are illiterate thinks he's better than them but forgets that there are equally as many or more ppl that are just the same in his home country.

I've never met a native American who can't do basic reading and writing. Never. Illegal aliens and tourists and other legal guests, yes.

It's impossible to buy a license, too. You take the written and driving test and the driving test is real, on the streets. One mistake and you fail. Caught without a license you go to jail.

I've heard that the written test in Thailand is stupid tricky. I don't know. If that's true, I'd study the laws, but if possible I'd buy the license. I don't like being unfairly screwed with.

Sorry, but the wife just read this and laughed.

She was taught by her father over about 6 hours, and her father doesn't even drive a car, although he has a license, he only ever rides a motor scooter, he hates driving.

The test was just an eye test (colour blindness) and then into the rear car park and into the car for the practical test... Consisted of pulling out of parking space, driving round building and back to rear car park and park up.... test complete. No open roads, she says they never test on the road.

If you fail, it's 300 baht and changed to a pass. Her aunt and brother all failed and drove home the same day.

The transport headquarters where they do the testing is close to my house, and I often drive past watching people pull into the road with their nose stuck to the inside of the screen, and proceed at 30 KM/H straight on to the bypass, a 110 KMH road.

They really ought to move that place.. I mean, 50 meters from the bypass entrance is a joke. Talk about a baptism of fire.

100,000 is a pure fantasy made up by the usual TV alarmists and doom mongers.

I was pulled up for no license and the copper really didn't like me, he kept muttering to his mate 'huh... falang come to Thailand and disrespect our laws.....blah blah blah.'

I got an on the spot 2000 baht fine. I have held a UK full license for 30 years almost, I just hadn't got round to the Thai license yet.

I didn't have any cash on me barring about 300 Baht, so took the ticket and wife handed over her ID card to the coppers.

Got home... wife make phone call to uncle (much higher rank copper than the road monkey) an hour later, wife's uncle came to the house picked up the ticket and handed the ID card back to wife. Asked me to please get my Thai license.... Done.

Who cares.... TIT If you can't beat em, join em, and you can't always beat em.

Works as a labourer for less than 100 Baht a day?

This thread describes 2 problems that face expats living in Thailand today:

Too much time spent isolated with their thoughts and too much time to think too deeply about too much.

The wise man says; take up a hobby, watch a few movies to escape the realities once in a while, or get out and socialise more often, or in other words, get a life.

You are right.

I tend to have a couple of days blast, because I am doing almost all my current work online, so I keep TV in the background. It's my way of communicating within my own language and in some cases school of thought. It also gives me brief periods of relief from the drudgery of my work.

In a few days, my work is quite a lot offline, so I will use TV less. But like to keep my hand in the game.

If you catch my drift.

With the camera... If it is up to $600 then chances are it is a Nikon or similar upper mainstream grade brand. Then be very careful. Remember that China is the world's top producer of counterfeits and that is anything from shampoo to Armani to Rolex to Nikon.

Is it worth the risk for a couple of thousand baht that you may even get stung for by customs if you are the unlucky one?

If it is a refurb, it won't be from China, I used to sell refurb cameras on Ebay, they come directly from the manufacturer's refurb shop and are warranty returns.. Or they go to an officially appointed outsourced refurb production agent who sells them in bulk to certain companys.

How would a Chinese trader buy legit cameras and then resell them to the west cheaper than the licensed and authorized dealers? The high end camera manufacturers strictly regulate the licensing and you can not sell them to another country where a license is present. You would lose your license for stealing the market from other authorized license holders. Add to this that the global price is pretty much controlled and there is usually little or no margin for profit by passing it over the borders.

Remember... Buyer beware.

Excellent post. Lived in India for three years but never got to Nepal.

Definitely on the list now.

Thanks

R

I have had a few PMs thanking me with a vow to go there and a few comments here.

I wonder if I can get money for this from the Nepal Tourist Board

What is yours ?

Mine is not to prioritize rules that I think are important in life and pretend that I am being deep and philosophical. Claiming that loyalty or integrity or honesty or whatever is my ruling mantra just makes me sound like a outdated hippie, especially since most people would happily be disloyal or corrupt or dishonest if it served their purposes and would make things worse by fabricating some feeble justification for what they did.

You deal with each new situation as it comes to you based on your life experiences and those things you consider important, not some single rule or small set of numbered rules and you should avoid judging others by those alleged lofty standards.

Absolutely the best post on this thread ! IMO

So the irony was definitely lost on you then

What is yours ?

Mine is not to prioritize rules that I think are important in life and pretend that I am being deep and philosophical. Claiming that loyalty or integrity or honesty or whatever is my ruling mantra just makes me sound like a outdated hippie, especially since most people would happily be disloyal or corrupt or dishonest if it served their purposes and would make things worse by fabricating some feeble justification for what they did.

You deal with each new situation as it comes to you based on your life experiences and those things you consider important, not some single rule or small set of numbered rules and you should avoid judging others by those alleged lofty standards.

2 small points.

You say you have no single rule in life... then you hit us with 'deal with each new situation as it comes to you based on your life experiences and those things you consider important'..... So what do you consider that if not a single rule?

second... 'you should avoid judging others by those alleged lofty standards'..... When your opening paragraph is basically a total judgmental rant of other posters on this thread.

Then you end with an image parody of 'hypocrite'.... Is the irony lost on me or what?

money is the only rule, the real world not the fantasy in your heads

Money is an abstract fantasy. The cause of worry, pain , suffering and death to many..

You need a real life!

Those who laud money as the most important thing in life are the ones that never really ever had much money. So all they can do is fantasize over it without having the means to actually be able to acquire any in a decent volume.

Those who have succeeded in attaining a good volume of money are the only ones who will ever really know that it is not that important for a happy and fulfilled life.

I have both been very comfortable and also very broke..... There is little difference in your quality of life or your internal happiness.

Also, you never feel satisfied with lots of money, because no matter how much you have, you want more and more, the more you have, the more you want and in essence it never slakes your thirst, so really you are just chasing your own arse.

I think anyone with financial capacity will agree with me.

If you choose Nepal, I would only do a very short time in Kathmandu. I spent 12 days there last year. Piles of garbage on the streets being rummaged by the cows and street dogs,

who also bark all night - equal or more dogs than in India- way more than in Thailandia.. Very disturbing to see children begging on the streets looking like the ones portrayed in the movie Slumdog Millionaire.

The air pollution is very bad. A lot of hotels there have rooftop terraces and one can barely see the nearby mountains sometimes. Streets and sidewalks way worse than here.

A lot of interesting street scenes and for children of the 60's Freak Street is a must.

Beaucoup art and high end handicrafts available.

Edit - I forgot to mention that the electricity goes off 8-10 hours a day due to power shortages. Every day.

I totally agree with you about getting out of Kathmandu as soon as you have seen what you need to. 2 Days is more than adequate because the best of Nepal lies outside of the capital.

We never really saw piles of garbage around Thamel, at about 6 am we would watch a fleet of Indian looking ladies rolling down the road with brooms sweeping the roads clean, into little piles and these were cleared by a cart. It was amazing to watch how they had it finely tuned. I found KTM cleaner than Thailand regarding garbage.

The street kids make interesting photos, they are a rag tag bunch but we were never once bothered by them, and the pavements were very bad if there were any at all, but that just adds to the charm of the place, its basically like being transported back in time by 100 years. But with all the modern touches in the right places.

The electricity did shut off once or twice which is basically load shedding, but never affected us because every hotel has generators to compensate, and when you are not in your hotel you don't need it anyway and only ever happens during the day, we never had one at night that we knew of. But from April next year they are importing it from India so it should improve by a lot. The new lines are being put in right now.

Freak Street was on my agenda, but we never got around to it. I will be deffo doing it next month.

The air pollution is caused by dust because KTM is situated in a valley bowl in the foothills, and is totally surrounded 360 degrees by mountains. The dust is kicked up by traffic during the day and settles again at night. The wife wore a dust mask some of the time, but I never bothered, it wasn't really that bad for me, and i am a smoker anyway so I have a pretty tough set of bagpipes in me. In the mornings the air is a lot clearer.

You don't get any of those negatives outside of KTM apart from maybe the electricity which really is not that bad if you stay out of the cheapo backpacker hostels.

Next month i will spend 1 day in KTM then get out to see the best of Nepal and stay another the night before our return.

BS there was 22 million tourist that came to Thailand in 2012, the biggest year for tourism in Thailand. they spend a lot more money than expats that claim 100 - 200 baht is too expensive for them to visit Thailand's tourist sites, they also complain that the cost of living is becoming to expensive. Most spend their money on Booze and women.

As most tourist are going to be here for a short time, they pay top dollar for every thing, during the high season most of the more expensive hotel are fully occupied, you would need a very large expat community to spend more money than 22 million tourist.

Expat greatly exaggerate their financial contribution to the Thai economy. You leave and some other retiree will move to take you place..

Cheers:

This is absolutely true.

While Thailand has a huge tourism industry if all the expats went home it would not effect GDP in anyway.

Lets not confuse what Tourists spend with what Expats living here spend.

Thailand generates about 70% of GDP from Exports. 7% from tourism.

What expats spend (and most live a fairly frugal existence) doesn't effect Thailand as a whole.

So as kikoman correctly points out "Expat greatly exaggerate their financial contribution to the Thai economy."

This statement is absolutely spot on.

You blokes don't get it.Let me put it this way.If tourist numbers equalled expats(250,000),would they spend more money than us.Over1month,maybe,but then they're gone,and i'm still here spending my pittance.In the next 11months I catch up,if not sooner.Expats also have a wider range to spend their money.No tourists out here spending money down the local shop,school,wat,ect.Direct injection of funds to local communities.Where does tourists money go?

Don't worry about it. I am sure the penny will drop eventually. You have to expect that some are slower than others to understand basic English and some just flat out will never be able to understand it. Then you have the ones who will just read what they want to read between the lines to throw up some pointless argument that they will refuse to let go of..... The rest will just be apologists trolling round the threads.

You totally get it.

Oh look! Another 'they don't appreciate us' thread has turned into an Isaan whore bash... my, how unusual.

Erm..... Since when was this a 'they don't appreciate us' thread?

This thread actually is in response to all the other 'they don't appreciate us' threads. Because it shows statistically what our value here is the Thailand and its economy and what good it brings in relation to employment etc. Rather than just whinging about this and that with no real statistical data, at least this thread opens up the eyes and minds to show many who were not aware of the data.

With regards to Isaan whore bashing. I know someone mentioned Thais working abroad and sending money back to isaan. Since when was that whore bashing? Who said everyone from Isaan is a whore? .... YOU DID! by your very statement.

Look, I know its just gone midnight and you are probably pissed on chang. Which would explain your irrational outburst there.

I hate it when people bash Newcastle Utd, because i like Newcastle United. I hate it when people bash rock music, because I like rock music, I hate it when people bash smoking, because I enjoy smoking..... I can see why you hate it when people bash Isaan whores

There is a huge difference between bashing smoking etc. and racism.

So don't be a racist then.

Or is this an apologist in the extreme who is attempting to extract racist commentary from the OP where none exists?

Man.... You apologists really do scrape the bottom of the barrel at times.

I think the OP should think less about what he (and other farangs) contribute and more about what he (and they) don't

totster

I don't agree there.

These are things I think about from time to time and seeing as it is relative to Thailand, then I can't see why the door should be closed on wanting to post a comment about it to hear what other people think about it.

Personally, I haven't furnished anyone my own views or feelings in relation to the questions I asked, just published and explained the economic details and handed over a scenario for discussion.

After all.... What else is a forum for?

By the way... Just for the sake of clarity.

The 250,000 expats are full timers living here on 'non tourist' visas.

Just disappearing - like an "end-times" kind of thing - isn't reality.

We would all have to sell our assets (or want to sell anyway) and get a realistic price for same.

To suddenly think that we wouldn't crash the market trying to sell our assets all at once so we could disappear tomorrow wouldn't be realistic, so we'd all have to sort of 'trickle out' gradually, over time.

Of course, some people (maybe the Chinese), sensing an opportunity, would probably come in to fill the void left by the sellers/departures, so they would replace us at pennies on the dollar, and things would be just the same for the Thai government.

Actually, I didn't read all of what you had to say on this - it gave me a headache after the first few lines - but I hope that some of what I just said would reasonably dispell a lot of your nonsense. We don't matter as much as you may think.

No... That is purely YOUR assessment, I didn't say end of times style. I said if everyone found a new LOS and made a mass exodus over 5 years.

Why would the Chinese come and buy your assets? What is stopping the Chinese from coming and doing that already? There are plenty of cheap assets sat right next to yours mate. They don't need yours.

You need to look at how an economy gets its money to stay buoyant.

You don't make any sense at all.

Pure nonsense.

So you think the loss of 3.5 trillion per year won't make any difference..... Get real. That's around $116 Billion USD a third of the GDP.

If you can't be arsed to read the OP, don't bother commenting, and that goes for any thread.

Klubex99,

Please do not attempt to manipulate what I stated in my post, The question the OP (you) asked was, "What if we all disappeared tomorrow" what effect would it have on the Thai economy,

Your point is that on a one to one bases a expat spends more than a tourist, while I would also dispute that, it was not the question that you as the OP asked, plain and simple!

The underlying message is that the expat population contributes more to the Thai economy that tourism, which no matter how you "extrapolate" it, is not accurate,

Your conservative figure of $500. dollars expat spending per month, a tourist spends that amount on a 5 star hotel room in 2 days.

Cheers:

Lol.... sheeeesh!

Go back and read the OP properly this time.

Or let me put it here for you where I mentioned in 3 places exactly what the OP was questioning.

Direct Quotes from OP

What would happen to Thailand's economy if all farangs disappeared tomorrow?

I am not talking about all foreigners. I am talking about all the farang from westernized countries who bring money into the country month after month.

So that is what foreigners have been worth to Thailand.

What would happen to Thailand if over the next 5 years or so, some other destination took away all the interest from LOS?

These are the glaring questions you completely missed or just 'brushed over'... Where does it say anywhere in the OP that I was asking about if only the expats left??? That has just come out of your own mind and nowhere else.

So basically, it is yourself that has been doing the massaging.

It is obvious that I am asking what would happen if all the farang (westernized) tourists and expats vanished... what would happen to the Thai economy... It's a simple as that. I will get my children to read it, and see if they can understand it. I am sure they will.

What would been the point of the OP to add all the tourist financial data if the OP was not including the tourist dollars?

You claim there is an 'underlying message'..... lol

It couldn't be more straightforward....... underlying?

You also point out a tourist spends on 2 nights in a 5 star hotel than an expat spends in a month.... Way to go.... you just used the tiny proportion of super rich tourists against a very conservative expat eking out an existence.... again, massaging.

'the expat population contributes more to the Thai economy that tourism'... as you say.

Again, in the OP it clearly shows expats contribute 45 billion versus tourist at 3117 Billion.

So 27 million tourists contribute 3117 Billion works out at THB115,444 per tourist.

While a conservative expat on a mere THB15,000 a month is THB180,000 a year.

So on a fair average mean and not your figure massaging top spender versus bottom feeder, it shows that an expat will bring more in than a tourist on a 1 against 1 ratio.

I am not the idiot you make me out to be. My post is not one that you would expect to see from an idiot.