Shaksey

I can stay in Thailand for 3-4 months at a time but that's it. There just isn't the wide enough range of social, cultural, sporting and other activities/attractions that I enjoy and can easily find in the UK.

I think the place you put that you're staying helps too. Tourists generally stay in hotels. If you're address on the TM6 is a cheap condo down a sub soi off Sukhumvit soi hundred and whatever then you don't look so much like a tourist.

The TV topic title is completely ott and inaccurate and does not reflect the actual Nation story initially reported either. No building, let alones buildings were engulfed at all.

I was on Soi11 at the time and saw the same fire guy on the bike with all his gear on, followed by about 3 pickups and a larger van. Minor incident very quickly controlled. By the time i'd finished my drink it was over.

Ladies with babies/small kids outside so many BTS stations now!

Rule of thumb - Do they look dirty, dressed in rags, homeless? Usually not and if not do not give.

10 hours ago, Scooby and Puppy said:

Fallen?

it's 20 Billion 'smackers'.....   if someone offered you 10 times what your house is worth, would you 'rip his arm' off?  I certainly would.  

Very well put.

A hundred years ish ago Thailand's main allies and trading partners, the UK, USA and The Dutch were asked/offered to move away from their river side embassy's to what is now Wireless/Ploenchit. Of course at the time this area was fields/nothing. The USA and Dutch took the offer of free land to use from the Thai (Siam at the time) Govt but the UK BOUGHT their plot from Nail Lert, I believe the price was about £20,000 at the time.

This is why the UK Govt could sell their front garden to Central to build Central Empty and why they can now sell the rest for nearly half a Billion Pounds. So £50Million 10 or so years ago and nearly £500 Million now. Not a bad bit of business considering the purchase price and also the whole site was valued at only £8.8 Million in 2001.

Great topic.

I've been to four of these so far and all were great. Highlights have been the compositions by His sadly passed away Majesty which were exquisitely composed and played and also often the opening pieces such as the William Tell which they played impeccably and will be doing again this Sunday I am happy to see.

The weekend of Children's day was also very good with many Disney/Fairytale pieces played with real joy and verve.

They often also have guest singers and a couple of weeks ago the Russian State Opera singers they had were stunningly good. Voices of angels is no exaggeration.

I extended my SETV at Chaeng Wattana today as usual with no issues. For info - British Passport, SETV issued London, Long history of TH visas/stays. Arrived 08:15, walked out at 09:45 and that was being chilled/not rushing. Did not see anyone doing the same have any issues other than usual inappropriate dress or not having copies, TM7 etc prepared.

Seems no pattern. My usual flight is BA9 which now gets in at about 09:30ish, i'm always in Biz so have Pri Pass but at this time seldom have to use it.

What I do notice when it isn't busy is that with a good history of TH travel the immigration officers take more time to ask questions and be more thorough. BUT at the same time they seem to be more friendly and polite too.

I flew a friend over here to visit me early Feb and put her on EVA Prem Eco but gave her a Pri Lane Pass to use, her flight got in at 4pm-ish and she said the normal immigration channels were super busy but Pri Lane she stepped up with no queue.

I experienced the same when I came in Jan 2nd on Cathay at around 6pm and normal lines were not too busy but Pri Lane was empty.

Malaysian or Cathay would be good choices to break the journey up into a  short hop from BKK and then a long haul. Both are nice airlines.

Qatar has some good sales on if you don't mind breaking the journey into two 6-7 hour flights. Their home port at Doha Is very slick and well run, you can easily make 60 min mtc's if you needed to.

For direct flights THAI, EVA and BA are usually very close in prices and sometimes will price match/beat leading to great prices.

Any help or info you need in the UK i'm happy to help :)

5 hours ago, tukkytuktuk said:

Andrew Drummond amateur journalist with website and twitter account, nothing like Jonathan Head from the world renowned BBC. I shouldn't worry it will be a repeat of the Andy Hall trial. If found guilty a suspended sentence and a fine.

Wrong. Drummond had decades of experience as international (SE Asia) correspondent for multiple major British national newspapers and also made TV docu's for Channel 4, BBC etc.

6 hours ago, samsensam said:

 

not as much as we used to after gordon brown sold a heap of it at a bargain basement price

The reason for that and why he announced he was going to do it before hand (obviously making the price go down, why do that...) is that a few of the big banks had got themselves into potentially disastrous positions around the gold price and with the positons nearing their end the banks would be in serious do-do with the price as it was. Brown stepped in selling the UK gold, announcing it first etc to force the price of the commodity down which meant the banks escaped near collapse. This was all kept hush hush but since then a few sources have leaked this info.

6 hours ago, mike324 said:

The Nailert family sold majority of their land last year to the Dusit group, it will become some medical center in the future.

They sold the Swisshotel Nai Lert Park, they have kept their family compound, mansions, park etc and opened it as a heritage park.

27 minutes ago, bartender100 said:

The upkeep of such a large piece of land most be huge, so it makes sense, days of embassies like these are long over

 

The shame is all those lovely old trees and greenery will disappear to make way for another boring shopping center

Walk up the small Soi next to the staff entrance to the embassy and you'll get to the Nai Lert family mansions and park. It used to include the land the embassy is on that they sold to the British but even without that land it's still a good size and full of trees, greenery etc. It was actually the first public park in Bangkok, pre-dating Lumpini. It's 500thb for a tour and well worth it.

Usual slack reporting from Cocotoss. The British Govt do own the land fair and square, they bought it from Nai Lert, his old boundary marker is still on the corner of Wireless outside Central Empty.

Makes perfect sense to sell such a valuable piece of land, there is no need to maintain a compound that big for what is now an insignificant mission in a country not very important to the UK anymore.

1 minute ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

Not sure WHAT area of Sukhumvit you're referring to, since there were several different areas mentioned above.

 

But when you say bikes, do you mean motorcycles or bicycles?  I can't recall ever seeing Thai police on bicycle patrols along Sukhumvit. Motorcycles, yes, rarely to be seen.

 

Near Asoke. They were on Police motorcycles.

Couple of weeks ago I was stopped and searched twice in 5 minutes in that area of Sukhumvit by two different pairs of cops on bikes. Same procedure both times, emptied pockets, got patted down, basic questions. No issues, thanked and went on my way.

Bangkok. Stay here 3-4 months a year to get away from the European winter.

21 minutes ago, Thainess said:

The OP sounds very suspicious. Borrow someone else's card reader so that you can then transfer their complete card data stored in to your own blank card, and then empty their account?

They don't work like that, they don't store any card data, they're dumb and read the chip on the card then use algorithms to generate the code.

What I would be worried about though is them being infected by malware and somehow used to a fraudsters advantage.

Honda Super Cub is the biggest selling motor vehicle ever, 90 million plus sold.

So a good argument it's one of the most important inventions changing peoples lives around the world for the last 60 or so years.

Jet engine is another good one.

5 hours ago, bokningar said:

How much is 2.38% of 0? 

 

Well actually, thinking about it, Greece's contribution should be attributed to Germany as it's Germany's loans and gifts that Greece is actually spending! Why not spend big when it's not your $$$!

How is perpetually bankrupt Greece managing to spend 2.38% of it's GDP on defence?!?

So where are the teargas zones? The story on the linked to site does not say.

Is "Oh My Cod!" still open in the KSR area? I was considering heading that way this weekend as i have to fly down S. on Monday

No, had to close.

From their website -

Those of you local to Bangkok know there was a fire in the kitchen and this damaged a large number of our kitchen equipment pieces as well as damanged to the two floors of the hotel directly above us. Due to this and the hotel owners believing that the fire was a cause of negligence they revoked the lease that was currently in place as well as contacting the police in hopes they could somehow squeeze some extra money out of the situation.

So with a heavy heart and more than the usual dose of disgust at the way things seem to go in Thailand for non Thai people we decided the only thing we could do was lock the doors put the equipment in stoage and hope for the best moving forward.

To all the great employees that are affected by this closing we wish you all the best and are sorry we can't continue to operate and help provide you with a living.

Good luck one and all and to the hotel owners we say a hearty <deleted>

I went in there last night -

Chips - Awful. More like fries.

Cornish Pasty - Near inedible. Frozen/Microwaved blob of tasteless gunk.