Nautilus05

Whew, do you ever have a short temper. How did you manage a full year in Thailand?

Oh wow! I'll go make some popcorn, cause this gonna be gud! BRB

Nau05...what does wages have to do with how much money one caries? Stupid to carry a lot I can buy but that is any travel...

Your logic is the same as Thais who think foreigners should compensate drivers at fault b/c they are poor and a way to balance the scales...

Because it's about the equivalent of me carrying $25,000 cash, while traveling on the trains throughout Europe. Who in their right mind would do that?

Must be a lot of poor travellers on this site if they think $2500 is a lot of money to have for a month of travelling.

100% agree with......... IMO it's the minimum amount of money needed....come on: anything can happen..... there are so many reasons you might need cash while travelling

Name one. The only possible one I can think of is if militants / drug traffickers kidnap you, and for whatever reason accept your measly $2500 as a ransom to let you go immediately. Even then, that's a pretty stupid reason to be packing that much cash around Thailand. Other than that, I can't think of one single reason.

The vast majority of money in my personal account isn't even accessible via ATM. I have two accounts, one that's accessible via my ATM card, and one that isn't. I only ever keep maybe $500 in the account that's accessible via ATM, and the rest stays in the other account. When I need more, I just transfer it via online banking, and it's instantly available to me.

I've been forced to withdraw from an ATM in Barbados before, so if that happens again to me, I don't particularly care. I'll give them the $500 or whatever, they'll see the balance is now like $2, and that will be that.

What has that got to do with the op then?

Ohhh, sorry. I am the OP.

I thought you were making a jab at me, saying I was being hypocritical. Never mind, carry on, nothing to see here.

If it's a matter of being sneered at in 7-11 what does one have to do to offend someone in 7-11?

And yes I have heard the vitriol under their breath and it's a disgusting thing to be talked about nastily in ones own earshot.

Not sure I quite understand. Yeah, I expect to be treated with the same level of common respect as show to everyone. That has nothing to do with culture, and is just common decency.

However, you won't hear me saying, "Thais are stupid, if they just did shit my way, then things would be better". I may say that about a specific individual, but that has nothing to do with them being Thai.

No wonder so many people on here get a bad reception from the Thai's they encounter, it's the massive superiority complex because they are white and apparently have a higher IQ.

It's all well and good claiming 'we' have the best scientists, mathematicians, astrologers, inventors etc but what have YOU done? Probably nothing of any significance so not sure why you feel so superior and smug.

You entirely miss the point on so many levels. It is the Thai's who think they are superior and are distinctly racist. Hence my tongue in cheek retort.

Really? Yes, because farangs never say how stupid Thais are, and how they should do things this or that way. Farangs are always respectful of the way things are done here, and never criticize while looking down from their high horse.

PS. If anyone has any pointers on how to get dogs to quit eating / scaring away those little green geckos / lizards, that would be great! Little shits, now I have moths and little beetles everywhere. I prefer the green things.

Moved into a new house about a month ago, and I don't really know, but I guess it'd be considered a fairly wealthy area. The previous house was in an older subdivision where I lived for about 3 years. I'd still say it was middle class, but not quite as wealthy as here.

In the old neighborhood, it was more of a townhouse setup, so all the houses were attached to each other. This means we lived fairly close to each other, and we all at least somewhat knew each other, which created a nice community vibe. By no means best friends, but more of a, "hey i'm heading to the market, do you need anything?" type of thing. Or we'd just chat each other up whenever we seen each other, sometimes share some beers, etc. Or if one of the neighbors seen me walking in town, they'd stop and ask if I wanted a lift. Most nights there were always one or two guys hanging out at the local store after working having a couple beers, and you were always welcome to join them if wanted.

I have to admit, I liked that. I remember it took quite a while to get used to, because I couldn't even take a shit without other people knowing. They'd know when I woke up, where I went, if I got a haircut, when I did laundry, what I bought at the market that day, and so on. Anytime someone would see me leaving, I'd always be questioned as to where I'm going. Nonetheless, it did grow on me.

Now in this new neighborhood, it's quite different. It's all detached houses, and quite isolated. Nobody seems to know or talk to each other, or at least nowhere close to the degree as the old neighborhood. The few mom & pop shops are nice enough, but not chatty nice. Not once have I seen anyone hanging out in front of one of the shops having a beer either. I've managed to get a couple smiles out of the next door neighbors, and they seem more than nice enough, but I highly doubt we'll be sharing plates of food together when one of us cooks a special meal, type of thing.

I have to admit, I don't like it here. I'd much prefer my old neighborhood. Anyway, so the question is, which would you prefer?:

1.) Isolation and privacy, like my new neighborhood?

2.) More of a communal atmosphere, where everyone's up in your business?

how would they have known he had this money on him to start with ?

Maybe he accidentally flashed it while buying his bus ticket. Or maybe he was packing it around in baht, so about 75,000 baht... that would make a pretty noticeable bulge I would think.

If this is even true, I have a hard time feeling sorry for people like this. The minimum wage here is about $300/month. Who packs 8 months of wage around with them while visiting a foreign country?

I've never understood how / why some people (especially in Thailand it seems) are proud to be a complete peasant, and extremely lazy as well. Do you guys call your parents up, and say, "hey mom! I get by one a simple $3/day. aren't you proud of me?" or something?

I just don't get it. Obviously I don't like people who brag about how much they have / make, but at the same time, it just seems stupid to brag about how little you have, as if it's an accomplishment or something.

I would imagine they use a pill / capsule counting machine.

I don't get why so many people are angry about it. These parks and monuments need to be maintained, and it does cost money to do that, so which would you prefer? You pay 100b for admission, or the price gets changed to say 40b for everyone, which then excludes some / many of the poorer Thais from being able to visit their own national parks and monuments?

100b is absolutely nothing to us, but for say a rural family of 6, that extra 120b they'd be charged if the prices were changed means alot more to them than me.

It might be best to contact the Canadian government instead of Thai Visa, but hey, that's just me.

Don't worry, I just shook some jars full of coffee beans in your name, and released the voodoo. You're good to go!

And I believe in voodoo about as much as I believe a child's doll named Chucky may become alive tonight, grab a knife from the kitchen, and stab me to death in my sleep.

To the OP why did she talk shyt about you for no reason? Did you do something to provoke such a response from her?

Nah, didn't do anything to provoke her, and as far as I can remember, have never seen her before in my life. I've only been living in this community for about a month. And there's nothing wrong with me. Early 30s, well dressed, clean shaven, don't have tattoos, bald head, wife beater, or even a gut. I'm pretty boring and average, actually.

She was just being young, stupid, and I'm guessing a little drunk, as they were starting some family feast / event. I don't particularly care about her actions, and have heard similar cracks from other young idiots before. For example, I've heard people make jokes because I bought a couple packs of mama noodles for dinner. Apparently since I have white skin, I'm supposed to have a personal chef who cooks me filet mignon every night, or something. No lazy dinner nights allowed for white people in Thailand!

The part that aggravated me was the fact the older folk there (I'm assuming her parents) didn't speak up. They put their eyes down, and hoped the situation would go away. It wasn't until I spoke up that they reprimanded her, and forced her to apologize. That's the part that got under my skin.

But I well, I'm sure I won't die due to it, and should continue to live another day.

This only really applies to people who speak a little Thai, or enough to overhear conversations. What do you do when someone starts talking shit about you when they're about 2 feet away from you, and they don't realize you can understand what they're saying?

God that pisses me off.

I just went down to the store to grab a few things. Just a typical, family owned mom & pop store. They had some family event / meal going on, mom was the clerk, and this ~20yo female was milling around, who I'm assuming was their daughter / niece. The young ditzy thing starts saying I'm stupid, and so are all farangs, and this and that.

I figured she probably already had some lao khao in her, so gave her a bit of lee-way for being young and stupid. The part that angered me was the mom / aunt didn't speak up at all. This lady is about 45, and doesn't know my level of Thai, but knows that I know at least some. I don't know, maybe she was just silently hoping I didn't understand what was being said.

So I got pissed, and just said, "excuse me? yes, I do understand what you're saying". The ditzy thing then just tried to joke her way out of it, and said it's no problem. That just pissed me off even more, so I began putting my things back on the shelf, and said, "sorry about that, and i'll never come to your store again. don't worry, there's about 6 other stores in walking distance, and i'll go there from now on".

At that point, the mom / aunt spoke up. She spoke really quickly in Laos though (i'm in Issan), so I didn't catch what she said. Whatever was said prompted the ditzy thing to apologize to me though, so I grabbed my stuff again, and bought from that store.

I don't know, just pissed me off. What do you do when things like that happen?

Ummm...

Speaks excellent English, married to a farang before, has a gay male friend you're not allowed to meet, and a job you're not allowed to visit her at.

Definitely sounds like a keeper to me!

You're over thinking this way too much. Simply don't worry about anything, and just be yourself. 98% chance they're simply not going to care, and you'll be left scratching your head that they didn't even acknowledge the effort you put in to be kind and respectful.

As far as I'm aware, it's not illegal. The SPCA has been trying to get an animal cruelty law passed in Thailand for I think 11 years now, and has yet to be successful.

Assuming they're cooking up soi dogs, I would imagine there's some pretty severe health hazards to it. Have you seen how diseased those soi dogs are? Gross! Couldn't imagine eating that.

For an example. This is not a mountain:

This is a mountain:

Try telling that to a Thai though, and they generally just tell you Chiang Mai has huge mountains. Fun stuff.

They can always refuse entry but would normally have a very good reason for doing so.

Good to know. The irony of the whole thing was after getting a shaking head and disgusted look from the border official, I ended up catching a ride to Udon Thani with an immigration officer. Didn't know that until I was in his truck, seen the "Royal Thai Police" decals, his "Customs" baseball cap, business cards, etc.

No idea who he was, but after listening into a few of his phone conversations, I'm pretty sure he was definitely on the higher-end of the pay scale. Really nice guy though.

I think there's a chance the immigration officers / police have a deal worked out with that bus from Nong Khai to the Laos border. Around 4:30 - 5pm, all of a sudden the buses stop coming. Then the immigration officers (who are just getting off work) are nice enough to lend us foreigners a hand, in getting us to Nong Khai or Udon.... for a fee of course. Who knows, maybe I'm wrong though.

I'm curious, can a border officer refuse you entry, even though you have a valid VISA? Or are their hands tied, and they have to abide by immigration law? If you have a valid VISA in your passport, no criminal record or anything like that, they have no choice but to let you in? Or on a whim can they decide to void the VISA, and refuse entry?

Only asking, because I got some pretty nasty looks all around a couple days ago. Thankfully my passport is now full, so I'll have a new one by the time another immigration official looks at it.