akspace

Just a thought - has anyone heard from the OP since 13.00 today ?

No, I thought not. He must have got on a plane - or he's a troll !

He is online now.

I found this other post of his:

"I don't help at all, but my girlfriend sends every extra baht she has home. Normally I don't mind, but sometimes she doesn't budget enough money for herself and comes asking me for money. Normally this happens if something goes wrong, broken motorbike, lost cellphone, etc... It only happens once or twice a year, but I still wish she would budget better. "

Sounds like she has some bad luck.. I hope she has a nice brother to take care of her while she's alone in Bangkok.

Or you can read the post I put just above yours...but I guess that would be harder then a bad attempt at cyber stalking

I knew this would happen, don't know why I posted here but I'll play along with the various trolls. I talk with her on Skype last night, she has obviously been in an accident, it's hard to fake things like a cast on the arm and road rash that bad.

As for the missing bike and other personal effects, I can't prove it. But then again she isn't answering her phone when her mother calls or when I call, so it's likely that is really missing. She wasn't wearing the ring her grandmother gave her, in two years I've never seen her take it off. She also wasn't wearing her Buddha pendant, again I've never seen her without it.

Oh yeah, I called her parents after she had been missing for 48 hours to verify she decided she wasn't finished with me, she hadn't called them. She didn't go to work on Friday or Saturday either (called them as well).

But obviously this is an attempt to get money out of me. As for the comments about other countries, I've been knocked out twice in the last five years, both times I woke up with all my valuables still intact. Once the person who found me even came into the hospital with me to make sure I was going to make it. But I guess it's a different culture, most people I know stop and help someone when they find them bleeding on the side of the road. They don't stop to rob them.

Just got off the phone with my girlfriend, she was in a motorbike accident on Friday, while she was unconscious on the side of the road someone stole everything she had. They literally took the rings off her fingers! The motorbike disappeared too.

At this point I'm just happy to hear from her, last time we talked was on Thursday morning and I was beginning to worry. She has been in the hospital since Friday and was just released today. I'm ecstatic she is well, I was considering an emergency flight back to Thailand tomorrow. The robbery just makes me sick everything went missing and the police claim she was found on the side of the road with nothing.

Sorry for the very scatterbrained thoughts, I've been at wits end for the last 24 hours, imagining the worse. Only to find out this happened. Now I can't put together a coherent thought.

Anyway is this sort of thing common in Thailand? I've read many stories talking about dealing with traffic accidents, but I assumed many of them where overblown second or third hand accounts.

I don't help at all, but my girlfriend sends every extra baht she has home. Normally I don't mind, but sometimes she doesn't budget enough money for herself and comes asking me for money. Normally this happens if something goes wrong, broken motorbike, lost cellphone, etc... It only happens once or twice a year, but I still wish she would budget better.

I think in the west a lot men marry uneducated women. Else there would be lot singles.

Most men marry girls who are better educated than they are, thanks to their dilligence in school. In the West, we are kindly blessed with an ample supply of young men to whom education would not stick were it applied with a wallpaper brush

SC

Actually I once had a girl that was not educated at my level. I was young and stupid but I was cured after her it was a constant battle on the most simple subjects.

After that I decided that there should not be a too big a discrepancy of intelligence and education in a relation. Sure if your only after sex and a hot girl then a hot body is enough. But that does get boring after a while if you want more from a relation.

Funny, constant arguments over everything is why I don't date women with a similar level of education. I spend my entire day arguing about every single little detail, I sure don't need that when I get home. Any women with anything close to a similar education (two bachelors, masters and PHD) spends entirely too much time questioning everything for me to have a chance to relax when I'm with her.

This is as good a place as any I suppose. Just got the notification that the I129f was approved, but I had the consulate listed as Chiang Mai (that is where the GF is from), of course I found out only Bangkok handles immigrant visas so now I need to get things fixed. Anyone know the process?

What about flying Concorde, London to New York.

You arrive before you departed, quite amazing.

Same in Australia. I flew from 1 state to another on the day daylight saving ended. With the standard time change plus DLS, I was home 30 minutes befor I left.

Happens every time I come back to the US from Thailand, land two hours before I left BKK. Even with the horrible immigration lines at SFO I can be home before I took off!

Now I'm counting the days until I come back, leaving SFO early morning on Thursday back to Thailand for three months...

Edit: That is actually the flight from HKG to SFO, I get home a few hours after I leave BKK.

Exactly. The romantic idea of workers 'taking over' has failed miserably everywhere. In the 70s, co-op and worker owned businesses sprang up everywhere. NONE exists today, for the simple fact that the workers discovered they couldn't lead and operate an advanced process such as business.

Given this whopper it's hard to take anything else you say seriously. Lets start with REI, small little co-op that does over $2B in business a year. Then of course I can name a dozen bank co-ops, then I'll move on to insurance co-ops and finally I can start listing the various local co-ops I frequent.

It's been said in other threads and I'll say it here.

Many, but not all, expats are out right low-life rejects in their home country.

They drag their low-life habits to my country for no good reason(s) and it makes me sick to my stomach.

While you are right, id wager to say in general the expats are more educated and have better manners as Thais. Then again there are enough expats that are as you describe.

Yes the ones that consider a clean pair of jeans as dressing up are not far removed from trailer trash basically.

Luckily I live somewhere more enlightened; shorts, t-shirt and flip flops are work attire. Around here judging wealth, class or intelligence based on attire and grooming won't get you very far...

You can talk to therapists until you are blue in the face, but it won't shed the lbs. Only one way. Eat less garbage and exercise more. You have only one life to live, being a reasonable weight will make everything better.

Your depression is probably a result of being fat. I go through the same thing. When I am fat I feel horrible. Everybody is the same. Anyone who says they are comfortable being fat is FoS.

Go running. No excuses. If you run 30 min 4-5X per week you can eat normal meals that taste good, without having to resort to a depressingly bland diet. I see my friends control their weight by eating like a rabbit. Personally that isn't for me. I love pizza, burgers, rice, curry, mocha frappaccinos, etc. so I run.

Thailand is a great place to exercise. So many interesting places to walk/run.

I'm comfortable being fat, it doesn't bother me in the least. It doesn't prevent me from doing anything, I'm completely healthy, so who cares. The only time it really matters is doing KOM races on the bike, hauling the extra 20-30kg up hill means I can never compete!

Right now I'm sitting around 107kg, earlier this year I ran a marathon, in a normal week I'll put 150km or more on the bike. I spend an hour at the gym 3-4 days a week too. I just like my food and booze, in the end all is well, who cares what other people think. In fact I'm probably more fit then anyone who looks down on me.

I'm 5'11" and about 210lbs and less than 10% BF.

That equates to a BMI of nearly 30. Borderline obese.

For that height and age 40ish, the healthy weight range is 133 - 180lbs

Check it on http://www.nhs.uk/bmi

Ah BMI...the great myth...

I'll never be anything other then obese according to BMI, but this year I'll probably complete an iron man because it's the last endurance event on my todo list. I've done the century (160km), marathon, double-century (320km), 24 hour solo ride, etc...

And that is why when I go to San Francisco in 3 weeks I will be eating Chinese & Mexican food galore. I have to agree both venues here are not only near non existent but the quality or portions just are not there. Sometimes it is hell just to find re-fried beans . Even Macro has been out.

Unfortunately Pattaya is no where close to San Fran on any level in the food dept.!

Do yourself a favor, go to Oakland if you are looking for Chinese food. It's a short trip and it's worth the $3 bart fare for what is arguably better food.

http://faculty.kfupm.edu.sa/coe/gutub/English_Misc/Retire1.htm

Longevity Vs. Retirement Age

The pension funds in many large corporations (e.g., Boeing, Lockheed Martin, AT&T, Lucent Technologies, etc.) have been “Over Funded” because many “late retirees” who keep-on working into their old age and retire late after the age of 65 tend to die within two years after their retirements. In other words, many of these late retirees do not live long enough to collect all their fair shares of pension money such that they leave a lot of extra-unused money in the pension funds resulting in the over-funded pension funds.

Dr. Ephrem (Siao Chung) Cheng provided the important results in the following Table 1 and the associated chart from an actuarial study of life span vs. age at retirement. The study was based on the number of pension checks sent to retirees of Boeing Aerospace.

Table 1 – Actuarial Study of life span vs. age at retirement.

Age at Retirement-Average AgeAt Death

49.9-86

51.2-85.3

52.5-84.6

53.8-83.9

55.1-83.2

56.4-82.5

57.2-81.4

58.3-80

59.2-78.5

60.1-76.8

61-74.5

62.1-71.8

63.1-69.3

64.1-67.9

65.2-66.8

Table 1 and the chart indicate that for people retired at the age of 50, their average life span is 86; whereas for people retired at the age of 65, their average life span is only 66.8. An important conclusion from this study is that for every year one works beyond age 55, one loses 2 years of life span on average.

The Boeing experience is that employees retiring at age of 65 receive pension checks for only 18 months, on average, prior to death. Similarly, the Lockheed experience is that employees retiring at age of 65 receive pension checks for only 17 months, on average, prior to death. Dr. David T. Chai indicated that the Bell Labs experience is similar to those of Boeing and Lockheed based on the casual observation from the Newsletters of Bell Lab retirees. A retiree from Ford Motor told Dr. Paul Tien-Lin Ho that the experience from Ford Motor is also similar to those in Boeing and Lockheed.

The statistics shown in the Pre-Retirement Seminar in Telcordia (Bellcore) indicates that the average age that Telcordia (Bellcore) employees start retirement is 57. Therefore, people who retire at the age of 65 or older are minority as compared to the number of early retirees.

The hard-working late retirees probably put too much stress on their aging body-and-mind such that they are so stressed out to develop various serious health problems that forced them to quit and retire. With such long-term stress-induced serious health problems, they die within two years after they quit and retire.

On the other hand, people who take early retirements at the age of 55 tend to live long and well into their 80s and beyond. These earlier retirees probably are either wealthier or more able to plan and manage their various aspects of their life, health and career well such that they can afford to retire early and comfortably.

These early retirees are not really idling after their early retirements to get old. They still continue doing some work. But they do the work on the part-time basis at a more leisure pace so that they do not get too stressed out. Furthermore, they have the luxury to pick and chose the types of part-time work of real interest to them so that they can enjoy and love doing that “fun” work at a more leisure pace.

The late retirees are small in number, tend to die quickly after retirement and disappear from the population of old people beyond the age of 70. Late retirees, therefore, have very little weight on the statistical average life expectancy of the population of “old people” dominated by the early retirees.

Several years ago, a Japanese friend of mine told me that most Japanese people retire at the age of 60 or earlier. This may be one of the factors contributing to the long average life span of Japanese people.

4. Conclusion and Recommendations

The pace of innovations and technology advances is getting faster and faster and is forcing everybody to compete fiercely at the Internet speed on the information super-highways. The highly productive and highly efficient workplace in USA is a pressure-cooker and a high-speed battleground for highly creative and dynamic young people to compete and to flourish.

However, when you get older, you should plan your career path and financial matter so that you can retire comfortably at the age of 55 or earlier to enjoy your long, happy and leisure retirement life into your golden age of 80s and beyond. In retirement, you can still enjoy some fun work of great interest to you and of great values to the society and the community, but at a part-time leisure pace on your own term.

On the other hand, if you are not able to get out of the pressure-cooker or the high-speed battleground at the age of 55 and “have” to keep on working very hard until the age of 65 or older before your retirement, then you probably will die within 18 months of retirement. By working very hard in the pressure cooker for 10 more years beyond the age of 55, you give up at least 20 years of your life span on average.

Boeing says that data is garbage, that retiring at 65 does not decrease your live expectancy on average. Nice try thought

http://www.boeing.com/companyoffices/empinfo/benefits/pension/seminars/Rumor.pdf

Helmets for bicycles, wow. What next, wear a helmet whilst walking in case you trip and bang your head on the kerb?

Next time you are going down a hill at 75kph on 18mm wide tires you'll be praying for that helmet...

Even with a helmet on I was unable to work for two months after coming off my bike, to this day I still haven't made a full recovery, I sometimes have trouble remembering things.

ImageUploadedByTapatalk 21368993198.227519.jpg

This one wasn't much really but I've had the double pricing a few times too. I don't agree on it out of principle. Imagine if we charged tourists here an extra £10 to see local attractions? Don't know how they get away with it the.

As many of us have pointed out, the same things happen in our home countries. When I lived in Lake Tahoe I could ski for $10 dollars a day, visitors paid $60! When I lived in Florida I could get into Disney World for $20 less then non-residents. As I said in earlier in this thread, it's illegal to discriminate against race, creed or religion. But not residency, which is exactly that they are doing in Thailand, evidenced by multiple people saying they get the Thai price simply by showing their Thai ID...

Or we realize that even at 2400 baht it's a fraction of what a similar outing would cost at home, so we go anyway

Simalarly, my family has a car dealership in US. Cars are significantly cheaper there than Thailand so I always tell my uncle that Thai people should pay 1/2 to double more than americans pay.

A new nissan costs 20,000 dollars, Thais should pay 30. They are still getting a deal, in Thailand they would pay 35-40.

According to your post you surely agree, right?

Not the same, but sure if your family thinks they can charge more go for it. Of course it will probably be illegal to charge based on race in the US, so they will have to set the sticker price higher for everyone. You might get away with charging more for for people who are not local residents without considering race, at least that works for tourist attractions in many states....oh wait that is exactly what we are talking about...it's legal and widely practiced in the US

So there we have it, Thailand doesn't produce scientists because the business models here extend to family majority ownership, or business connection ownership who don't see the value in innovation and invention. The top salary belongs to the owner, and the business model relies extremely heavily on having cheap workers, not innovators. Do you think a company in Thailand would pay royalties to an in house patent creator on the going international rate?

What is the going rate for a employee patent in Thailand? Around here we don't get royalties, we get a one time payout of around 150,000 baht per patent, that is the industry standard actually. Of course most of these patents make no money they are just used as defense in patent litigation lawsuits (or ammunition when going after another company).

I would not worry about this at all if you are talking about being held up at the airport or something.

I find it ridiculous that they did not cancel after a month or two of unpaid bills. Isn't that True's problem? They should have cancelled for lack of payment.

Nope, not True's problem as the contract written up between the OP and True is still in force. They have stopped the service but will continue to bill on a monthly basis until the contract has been cancelled. This is part of their automated billing system.

It is not up to them to have a human going 'hands on' to remove it out of the system. The contract needs to be closed out.

This would be illegal in most other countries, you cannot be billed if they are not providing the services, regardless of the contract you signed. I would be surprised if that was any different in Thailand.

Not sure about the legal implications, to be honest. With the automatic billing, until the computer is told to stop, it will continue to accrue the unpaid bills and send them out. The computer will be told to stop when the contract has been cancelled. This is my understanding anyway.

The service has been stopped, but will become available when the unpaid bills have been settled. Or cancelled when the contract has been terminated.

I'm not sure which other countries you are referring to where businesses do not operate like this?

Again, the above is only my logic of the situation as this is not my field............

If you cancel the service you are providing in the bilateral contract then the obligations of the second party become void, this is well established in contract law in the EU and the US. My understanding is it also applies in most other countries with similar judicial systems.

When applying it to this case, as soon as True stops providing service you are no longer legally obligated to pay for that service. You still owe any unpaid balance or contract cancellation fee, but you are not required to continue paying for the service.

I would not worry about this at all if you are talking about being held up at the airport or something.

I find it ridiculous that they did not cancel after a month or two of unpaid bills. Isn't that True's problem? They should have cancelled for lack of payment.

Nope, not True's problem as the contract written up between the OP and True is still in force. They have stopped the service but will continue to bill on a monthly basis until the contract has been cancelled. This is part of their automated billing system.

It is not up to them to have a human going 'hands on' to remove it out of the system. The contract needs to be closed out.

This would be illegal in most other countries, you cannot be billed if they are not providing the services, regardless of the contract you signed. I would be surprised if that was any different in Thailand.

My understanding is that the company provided the connexion. That is what the contract is all about...

If the client does not use it, well....

I wonder what country you are from.

This country where you rent a car, do not drive it for some months, and can refuse to pay.,

Read the post I quoted, if you still don't understand, read it again...

I would not worry about this at all if you are talking about being held up at the airport or something.

I find it ridiculous that they did not cancel after a month or two of unpaid bills. Isn't that True's problem? They should have cancelled for lack of payment.

Nope, not True's problem as the contract written up between the OP and True is still in force. They have stopped the service but will continue to bill on a monthly basis until the contract has been cancelled. This is part of their automated billing system.

It is not up to them to have a human going 'hands on' to remove it out of the system. The contract needs to be closed out.

This would be illegal in most other countries, you cannot be billed if they are not providing the services, regardless of the contract you signed. I would be surprised if that was any different in Thailand.

Lane checking is illegal, learn the road rules.

I searched through the first 3 pages of google for "lane checking" without result.

But I guess you either mean lane splitting or undertaking, and you also endorse the car driver's actions.

GECD +1

Checking is a synonymy of blocking, so you can infer he means intentionally impeding traffic via changing lanes...

Or you can make snarky comments about your inability to use google

So my question is, if you can pay 1000 Pound a month on rent, which you are doing as you live there, plus the additional cost of food and utilities, then why you need to do it here with half that budget ?

That is a stupid question, normally I have more tact but I can't phrase it any other way. He's already said he is moving to Chiang Mai to study, which suggests he won't be working full time. Even if he was working full time the idea of getting paid the same in Chiang Mai vs London is laughable. Finally there is the fact that living expenses in Chiang Mai are a fraction of what they are in London, so of course things should cost less.

More importantly why should you question how anyone chooses to budget? If you don't want to be frugal is your choice, but don't tell others they should be spendthrifts.

Perhaps a poll is in order for this thread. One that is not anonymous so we can ferret out the misogynists.

I wouldn't treat my dogs the way the man in the OP treated his wife. Of course my dogs can't reach the handle on the fridge anyway, so it's a moot point.

But if they could...

I've had a dog who would fetch beer it was quite easy to train him. First you need to tie a rope to the door handle, it makes it easier for a dog to open