Phil Conners

AFAIK, the only institution that distribute blood between hospitals are the Thai Red Cross. I think blood donated at Banglamung hospital will only be used in Banglamung hospital. That's of course good for Banglamung hospital and any patient there needing it, but won't help patients in other hospitals. That's how I understand it anyway.

What is it? What's included with the 300 baht? I checked the website but it doesn't really say much...

Always agree on the price first. No exceptions.

Unfortunately there are no places to donate in Pattaya. The nearest location is in Si Racha - I would suggest start by calling QUEEN SAWANG HOSPITAL SRIRACHA - 038 320200

We did some reasearch and found that under Tort law in Thailand you have the right of free access to your property at anytime of the day. The project owner consulted with their lawyers and they agreed with us so no such gates have been installed.

That's interesting, anyone else care to comment? The HOA in this village is new so they are still learning the ropes. After years of nobody having to pay any monthly fees they are struggling to get everyone to contribute, I think around 30% of the homes are still refusing to pay up each month. It's been suggested that in extremis they can prevent residents entering the village if they haven't paid their dues as the village owns the common areas including all the roads and so the committee can stop people driving on them to get to their homes if they have a reason to, such as non-payment of the maintenance fees. Any comments on that, would it be legal?

I'm in the exact same situation. Previously the maintenance was collected and controlled by the developers, but now that all the houses have been sold it's up to the residents to provide for their own security and maintenance. There is already a strong indication that some of the Thai owned houses are going to be difficult when it comes to paying, so the majority are in a dilemma as to how to force them to pay. There are rumblings that if one or two (or more) houses refuse to pay there will be a mass dropout which will see the entire village degenerate rapidly.

We have been advised by our legal council that if anyone doesn't pay their community fee (20,000 baht/house/year) we can disconnect water and electricy, and we can raise a barrier, for instance concrete, in front of their gate to make it difficult/impossible for them to enter/exit their property. We can not touch their property, i.e. for example lock their gate shut. Our village common areas are owned by the owners cooperation, the builder handed it over when the project was sold out. The village common area as such is private property so we can decide who has the use of it. We can also, for example, deny anyone motorized access to the village, for example if they don't obey the speed limits in the village.

.A few days ago I went to Banglamung hospital with my Thai girlfriend to enquire about the special health insurance apparently available to foreigners for a yearly fee. I took along money, a copy of the blue book, a copy of my passport together with originals. The official we spoke to said that they were not doing it yet because no decision had been made as to what exactly the yearly premium would cover. She took my phone number with the promise she would call me if the situation changes. She told me that I did not need the blue book, but the yellow one (whatever that is). Finally, she said that even having the yellow book was no guarantee of getting cover.

For the record, I am an Englishman living in Pattaya, and own a company house

Did they ever call you back about this? Anyone know what the status is now?

I strongly encourage particularly anyone in Thailand with 0-neg to donate blood as often as possible.

Only 0.3% (yes, less than one percent) of the indigenous population has 0-neg so realistically the only way to ensure there is enough 0-neg blood in Thailand is by foreigners donating it. Add to that the many rules limiting who can give blood and when, and you will understand that if you're 0-neg you really should donate blood as often as possible -- you may be the next to need it yourself!

We have such a gate, a complete waste of money. It cost around 70,000 baht and after 3 years they couldn't provide spare parts so when it broke again we had to spend another 70,000 on a new gate. We have now agreed that next time it breaks it will be replaced by an old-fashioned manual iron gate. We still have security operating it so not the same situation as yours. Can't see how you'd let in post, garbage, visitors, etc without security.

Don't agree security is useless, I think it depends on you (the village) and how you deal with them. We used a company for the first years and they were indeed useless, but once we hired our own staff, give them a decent salary, treat them as part of the village, take care of them when we have parties, i.e. bring them some food and drinks (soft) they feel they are part of "the family" and do a very good job. Well worth the money, but of course it also depend on the size of the village. Our village has an annual budget of 1,2MB and about half of that goes to security.

I can't believe nobody mentioned the "Liquor in the front, poker in the back" bar.

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Thaivisa Connect Thailand mobile app.

A couple of bickering posts arguing British vs. US English has been deleted.

As for state of repairs of the roads, you'll probably get used to it eventually.

I think there is a quite large shop on Pattaya Klang as well. Can't remember exactly where I saw it, somewhere opposite from Foodland.

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Thaivisa Connect Thailand mobile app.

Not Pattaya related. Moved to Farang Pub

Some off-topic bickery has been deleted.

Belucky on Naklua road has some pretty good spicy sausages they call Italian, no idea how authentic they are though.

Aviate is a new type of homescreen that changes during the day and depending on your location. They've been underway for a while but were just bought out by Yahoo who wants to use it to gain an entry into the Android world.

You can read more about Aviate at http://getaviate.com/.

Aviate is still in beta but I've used it for a couple of days and though it's a change from the old well-known home screen it's growing on me. Aviate can be downloaded from Google Play but there is a waiting list. I was able to get in using the code "YAHOO" but that may no longer be available.

If anyone wants to try it out and can't get in any other way, send me a PM, I have a few invites I can give away.

Just fell over The Korora Project. This is basically Fedora + Cinnamon + some pre-configured repositories and better default apps than in the standard Fedora distro. Not a huge difference from installing the parts individually, but easier to get started and install, particularly for newbies.

I was looking for these as well. On Ebay and Amazon they're 3,000+ -- considering it's just a couple of ropes that sounds a little expensive.

There's an instructables page here explaining how to make your own for a lot less.

Actually unless you encrypt your emails using something like PGP, there is no such thing as private email. Email is by design like an open postcard.

Ob topic: Favorite distro is Fedora with the Cinnamon desktop environment.

bash/ssh/mosh

Plenty of free emulators for both Commodore and Sinclair for both PC and Android phones.

A couple of unnecessarily nasty replies have been deleted.

A fair question was asked and has been replied. Let's leave it at that.

Actually it looks like a nut but it seems to be welded onto a plate that goes perpendicular under the belt thingy on the left.

Open terminal, su, go to the directory (folder) , issue the command

bash file

With file being the file you downloaded

It looks to me that it's the auxiliary belt tensioner pulley nut.

The only reasons that it would be moving like that is:

The mechanics that worked on that area before forgot to tighten it and it's just

worked itself loose.

or

The bearing inside has collapsed and the whole tensioner needs replacing.

If i were you, the first thing i would do is try tightening that nut to see if it is loose.

If the nut is tight and it is moving like it is in your video then you need to take it to a workshop and have it repaired asap.

Actually it looks like a nut but it seems to be welded onto a plate that goes perpendicular under the belt thingy on the left.

Find it hard to believe its ever been in a Genuine Honda Franchise , a blind man on a galloping horse could spot that. alt=thumbsup.gif pagespeed_url_hash=1443177670 width=25 height=19>

I think if you read my OP that was exactly what the mechanics spotted and pointed out to my wife. The problem (or at least part of it) was he could not explain what the problem was in a way that my wife could understand and relay to me who for reasons irrelevant to this discussion did not have the option of being present.

#1 '...one of the rubber engine mounts that needed replacing'

As an aside, it is my understanding that all rubber engine mounts are replaced even when only one appears to need replacing. FWIW.

They probably do in the west where salary costs are an issue. Here in Thailand the usually replace one at the time until actually needed. Yes it surprised me first as well, welcome to Thailand.

For what it's worth, the belt tensioner pulley bracket appears to be broken and needs replacing. Also one or both of the pulley bearings may also be bad and the bad pulley may need replacing, there's two of them. They all wear out over time and 5,000B is cheap compared to what you'd pay in the states. I had to replace the same bracket in my 2007 Civic also but lucky not the pulleys. The sound goes away as the belt gets warm and loosens up. We suspect the mechanic over tightened the tensioner but could never prove it.

Yes I know 5000 baht would not buy you a lot of time in the west, but we're in Thailand here. Cheap as it may seem to you, I'm quite sure a good independent garage would charge considerably less, assuming they were not getting fleeced on the parts prices from Honda. It was my understanding there are only original Honda parts available, but thinking about it that doesn't sound right either.

The point of the post was that we just had something repaired in the same general area and it just seemed to me that it was quite likely to be related, hence why I wanted some second opinions.

That is correct - I noticed that while taking the video - and it's essentially also what the mechanics were trying to explain my Wife. Any ideas why that is and why Honda feel it should cost another 5,000 baht to fix (just paid them 5,000 to fix something in the same general area a month or two ago, something related to the power steering iirc.

Sorry for the delay, here's a recording of it ....