mran66

I don't understand why he just not add his prices then as he has full right to do so. No need to involve government. Amazing to see even American businessmen to start thinking like thai politician if long enough in Thailand.

Early closing no need, can just drink warm beer and grope your companion in the dark of night. Higher risk for surprise in the room later though...

What is so special about owning land in Thailand? So many countries to choose to own piece land if that's your thing, why bother with it in Thailand. But yes, land ownership right for non nationals should be reciprocal between counties, just like relative ticket prices for national parks.

Interested to see pictures of those temples, clean beaches and nature of pattaya....? Plentyful here though nature is fairly rare.

For RGP at least in Pattaya best to keep closing time jusft before the business peaks hours start. That way police can extort more to keep the clubs open. If official closing is 4am, less gratuity needed.

I would guess would be big challenge as the threshold to get started is so high. Very difficult for any small brand to get much volume, especially as the big boys control big volume distribution. For anyone to be able to grow, would need free open market and a lot of time to grow business gradually.

Would be very interesting to know what was the cost to the dominant players to get the voting result right...

TRUE is throttling, even with VPN on especially on evenings, daytime I have not noticed. I also wondering if should change provider due to that, but have not done anything. Wonder if AIS or 3BB are better with that?

Can not disagree with his statement. Monitor for sure not to miss any revenue opportunities. And prosecute those who miss their payments.

Hilarious, that's all I can say. Can only wonder what they thinking and what they discussed in the decision making meeting as well as other preparatory meetings and reviews. Had someone been in position to record, would have a lot of subscribers in YouTube.

The whole concept of having separate tourist police sounds xenophobic...Wonder what the history of such is, created to spy and police dirty farang I guess.

In a country like Thailand (or most of developing Asian countries for that matter) average does not really tell much at all about real income levels - actually the 'average' part of population is likely very small, as very high incomes on top (for small % of population) and very low income on bottom (for large %) arithmetically just averages out somewhere, probably to a number that does not tell much about income distribution at all. Average persons with that measure are few and far in between. Top that off with substantial percentage of informal income in both ends, let it be corruption income (which is substantial indeed, many times official salary income for quite a few people), prostitution income (which also is substantial for many) etc which is likely not included in official statistics. Still many official positions that people fight to get to in some way or another (nepotism often the method) where salary is meaning less - actually people might pay big lumpsum to someone higher up to get the small salary job as the corruption income opportunity that comes with the job is substantial. This was very common also in China when lived there.

...maybe about time to check amulets of everyone in the household, must have something to do with them...

Shopee app in my phone seems to work OK, as does we www site on computer. Have not ordered anything since May though, but all seems to work like before.

I have understood something in range of of 13-15k in Pattaya. Wondering if should continue with the 800K approach with the upgraded funds requirements, or switch to agent and not to worry about the account balance.

Okay - so it appears that it is the reporting that is not really taken too seriously, but they still check the balance back for 12mo at the time of next renewal. How about experiences of shifting to agent-based renewal the following year, and not keeping the balance over 800k after the previous renewal, does it matter at all? Or all the tricks the agents do to meet the financial requirement for their renewal job are completely independent on any history of previous renewal(s)?

question really is would I have issues if the bank account goes below 800K during the 3mo post renewal time, i.e not only skip the report, but also use the funds (but still have the 800K 2mo prior to renewal).

Will have my Non-O retirement visa annual renewal in couple of weeks time, using the 800k-in-bank approach as before. The post-renewal reporting requirement that came some 3-4 yrs ago I guess is still there - wondering what kind of experiences people have if not filing for that report at all? I have properly done it since it came, however thinking if should skip (and go for agent approach if causes issues next year) as every time I have done it, it appeared that the officials really did not care about the whole thing, and no receipt or anything given submit the report. Felt like direct-to-bin approach. Anyone who have skipped the reporting completely, yet successfully renewed their visa a year later without issue? Will be doing in Pattaya immigration.

Whats the puzzle? Dictators usually don't criticize fellow dictators as that easily hits own foot later. And if they do, it will be more subtle and diplomatic, kind of like expressing their own idea of dictatorship rather than condemning. Having Thailand condemning Russia would have been surprising actually. Public explanation of why not to condemn is ridiculous of course.

News comparable to a headline "Roads were found to be wet when it was raining". With 1.1B funds accessible without extraordinary controls to Thais you are pretty much guaranteed to find some stolen in some way or another, let it be university, department of roads or a buddhist temple. Odds of finding case not like this I would say are about equal to finding a dry road when its raining if you ask me.

Almost got a freebie on Soi 6 yesterday. Wasn't refused entry though, not even almost.

Place looks quite unique so should be recognizable by someone who has been there, even if there would be condo or hotel nowdays - looks like a place with two fairly small beach coves and a small cape between those, and recognizable stones on sea not far out. I wonder if such geographical location exist at all between dongtan and jomtien as beach is mostly one long curve for the some 15 km it covers. Looks like a place that could be in some of the larger cape areas (naklua, pratamnak, sattahip), however does not look familiar to me. And Sattahip capes mostly occupied by army anyway, just few public beaches open in the areas that geographically remind this. And sure not further out in Rayong area? Do you recall if the place was on flat land, or had to drive down from a hill to the beach resort? That might give a hint.

Pattaya has been center of culture and arts for quite a while. I recall it was late 1980's I came here for first time, and already then there was a lot of cultural shows and acts and different artistry visible, mostly focusing on dance performances on stage. Predominantly female performers I recall. Areas of cultural shows have since expanded,, which I think is normal in places where culture is so unseparable from local life. I recall cultural activies were mostly in WS and around soi 13s where most of artist shows happened. Now spread to Buakhao and even Jomtien, so for sure Pattaya deserves to be called a hub. Gender balance also broadened, though only a bit. Modern approach to sexual orientation choise broadly accepted, including all shades of grey between the extreme genders joining the culture activities. Graphical and sculpture artistry seems to be more and more extravagant also, esp on skins/bodies of performing artists. Graphics used to be fairly small scale black-white art before, now quite large size and multicolor. Sculpture was fairly uncommon, now sculptural work visible everywhere, mostly using modern silicon and other chemical materials, not bronze or clay like in some other places. In terms of the core Thai cultural shows that include objects like fruits, pingpong balls and bottles, progress since 80's seems less - which often is the case with areas of art with long history and deep rooting in local culture, progress just slows down and things start to look like ancient culture. Thus, we have combination of ancient show culture and more progressive too. Now just call it hub (like they do for everything these days) instead of center,!

Can recommend Eastern Home Decor on Sukhumit directly opposite to Tesco (at Thepparasit junction). They have all kinds of curtains and blinds (made to measure & installed blinds for me) https://goo.gl/maps/1SNvsLa1mWrFPrfU6 I recall they also have wallpapers but no personal experience on those. Friendly and professional family business, good price compared to many other shops.

Past couple of decades have been mostly steady improvement in terms of foreign income from tourism, thus regardless of all the talk over the years about casinos, there has not been burning need to proceed from that perspective, rather more than enough work to keep infrastructure in match with tourism volumes. Now, with the developments since 2020 with covid, the war, and consequent coming recession, situation is different and I also would be pretty suprprised if casinos would not come into the toolbox. Unrealistic to expect the decisionmakers to let that money to flow to neighboring countries who have the gambling places that attract asian gamblers. I would guess those casinos would be for foreigners and maybe for rich thais, and local mass market gambling will stay underground as it has been to fund police and other goverment officials related to that.