charlieboz

Also the reason Manly kept their identity better is that they are no longer part of a merged team; the merged team was disbanded and the Bears where kicked out of the competition and Manly allowed to stay in. Not sure how/why they where allowed to stay in but not the Bears but a lot of Bears supporters I knew in Sydney have never gotten over it and refuse to support RL to this day. Hopefully if they bring a new team into the competition it will be on the Central Coast of NSW and they will be called the Central Coast Bears as has been mooted a lot in the press

In the mid 90's they had the super league 'war'. Basically Rupert Murdoch wanted Rugby League for pay tv in Australia, couldn't get it so started a new competition with half the players and teams (pretty much every team outside of Sydney, except 1, and a few of the big Sydney clubs). They where going to revolutionise the game, blah, blah blah.

When the competitions merged together a few years later they had to get rid of a few teams as there where too many (the powers that be said). So they gave money to any teams that merged and created a set or rules/conditions (crowd attendance, sponsorship levels, etc) to decide who stayed. Teams then joined together as they probably would not have been the team to make the cut (Balmain and Western Suburbs, Steelers and Dragons) and did not want to be kicked out. Hence the merged clubs.

Souths did not merge and where kicked out but took it to court a couple of years later and where allowed back in. This is part of the reason a lot of people like them, they are seen as the underdogs who fought the rich and won (also they have been so bad for so long that for a proud club to now be making a comeback is always a good story, like when the Tigers won in 2005).

This is a really basic summary, please don't anyone jump down my throat if I have forgotten anything (in case you did not know Keddy it is still a sore point with a lot of RL supporters in Australia). Lastly, go the Raiders!

My favourite line

but one thing stays the same: the holocaust of human misery that parades through Bangkok at 5am.

Hilarious

A good way is sport Ashley (not sure if you are interested but I will tell you in case you are). Southerners sports club runs netball for ladies with training on Monday evenings in lower Sukhumvit, lot's of expat ladies there. From that they also have a lot of social events. Mainly expats, probably 75% of the club, but a lot of the guys have thai girlfriends that come to the social events and a lot of the rugby boys are thai as well. After that I would try meetup (it's a website), they have a lot of different activities in BKK (bookclubs, movie clubs, running groups, entrepreneurs group, etc) I am sure you can find some stuff on there. Lastly at your uni a lot of thai people will want to be friends with you as you will stand out and they will be interested to meet someone from a different culture. Good luck, I am sure you are going to have an amazing time over the next year or so!

100 million baht; wow, that is crazy. Especially for a 37 year old farmers daughter. Oh well up to him

Whats her fathers status got to do with it ........Snobbery reigns supreme with charlieboz !

So according to you, if she was Khun Plods daughter, that would be wonderful, even romantic.

Well sinsot is negotiated on the families social standing; the higher the families social standing the higher the sinsot (among other things). So 100 million would be in the vicinity of a hi so family who themselves have a lot of money. As she comes from a farmers family and was working as a waitress when he met I am going to hypothesise that this is not the case (I think it is a fairly safe assumption).

Now what that has to do with Khun Plod, (what does that even mean?) I am not sure

I don't understand why they put the LPG in the car to save 124,162 TBH in tax? Surely if you have enough money to pay for these cars (which are worth millions and millions of baht) you can afford a small amount (relative) to keep it running at optimum levels?

I have done this plenty of times from many different banks (Kassikorn, Ayuttayah, Siam, Bangkok). I think the rule basically depends on the branch. I was taking $100,000 baht at a time out of the same Siam bank for a couple of years and then one day they said sorry, only $50k at a time now, new rules. But I could go to the other Siam branch, about 5km away, and take out $100k still.

Have seen some refuse to let me take out more than $50k at a time as well and I gather it is just the tellers rule, not the branches. No idea why this happens, TIT

It has definitely gotten a lot better since they re-opened Don Muang for domestic flights. It was crazy before but I have flown international and domestic out of it 3 times in the last 2 months and it was perfectly fine each time

Squid; most thai's I have met (not all) seem to struggle with that. Squidge, squim, squit; all sorts of pronunciations but 90% of the time it is wrong.

If you're an honest guy, please let the gentlemen know what their wives are doing when abroad.Guess you'd be more than happy, when somebody would "open your eyes."

It's pretty much common here. I'd guess 80% of Thai women are doing the same shit.And you won't loose face telling it through let's say your wife.-

Do not do this; it could go really wrong for you if you do. If the husband does believe you, which he probably won't, it will mean that he stops sending them money. The locals will not take that well and will take it out on you. Unless you are very good friends with the guys stay out of it otherwise you will end up being hurt.

Phuket is different as well; when I lived there you saw a lot more of the bar girl relationships than I do in BKK. Is that maybe what is amusing to you OP?

Wondering where some great steak houses in BKK are for around the 500-800 baht price range? Any tips?

I found the food in Costa Rica (totally bland and rice cooked with LARD) worse than the Philippines.

Wow; that must be some bad food. My friend who worked in Africa (not sure, somewhere on the east coast) said the food was worse there too. I always thought South American/Central American food would be quite tasty; then again I thought the Philippines would be a great mix of asian and Spanish food and I was completely wrong there

The food is terrible. I could not believe how bad it was. They just fry whatever they want and then melt some cheese on it and consider that as being delicious. TGI Friday's is considered as having really good food by the locals.

I did like chicken Adobo and pork sinigog (not sure of the spelling) but if I walked into a thai restaurant there are about 100 other dishes I would order before either of them.

The Shawarma is pretty good in the Philippines though; that is the only dish that I can think of that tastes better there than in Thailand (I realise it is not local food before I get flamed on here, but the reason I like living in BKK is because I can get great food from all over the world here).

Street food is not as easy to find as in Thailand either; by that I mean the variety of food that you can eat. You can eat it but I am not sure I would; the lack of hygiene even compared to Thailand is pretty bad.

All in all it would probably be the worst food I have eaten on my travels (have been to more than 50 countries). Loved the country itself (the natural beauty, the ppl themselves are very friendly) but the food is abysmal.

Friend of mine in Phuket nearly died when riding a motorbike; a pickup pulled out without looking from a drive way and my mate plowed into the side. It was his fault as he was the farang was my understanding, even though there where about 8 witnesses who said it was the other guy (who was also drunk as hell). Don't think it happens everytime but it does happen a lot.

I saw that one but heard another from another mate; he stopped to help a thai lady who had come off her bike on chalong hill (a fairly common spot in Phuket). When the police came they asked what happened and the older thai lady pointed at him and said the farang did it! ha ha. Last time he stopped to help someone in an accident

Also Mini bar royale on soi 23 in the Citadines hotel; they do some really good food and it is open from 630am onwards. I particularly liked the fritatta

Does anyone know if it is being shown live in BKK? What time it will be on?

CMU has a outdoor court where they play streetball most afternoons, is that what you are looking for?

Gastro on soi 22 opens at 830, very good breakfast

I read an article in the economist a couple of years ago that looked into some research done at a University that stated that this was very common with bilingual children. It goes away after a while (as other posters said, they just develop at their own pace). The part I found interesting was that bilingual children are much more likely to develop stutters it stated, something like 10 times more (might have the figures wrong but I remember it being a substantial amount)