judokrab

Just aim to drink water if you feel thirsty, or if your urine looks dark, or if you are about to exercise. There is no need to measure anything.

On 3/30/2021 at 8:14 PM, khunPer said:

Might depend of how big a class is, and also your body size.

A standard "glass" is 8 fluid ounces (240ml).

The 8 glasses a day thing is a myth. Ignore it.

The source of this myth was a 1945 Food and Nutrition Board recommendation that said people need about 2.5 liters of water a day. But they ignored the sentence that followed. It read, “Most of this quantity is contained in prepared foods.”
 

On 3/30/2021 at 2:04 PM, wombat said:

curious asks...is bamboo a plant that needs fire through it to generate the next crop of bamboo shoots for sale?

No. The burning can be for many reasons: (1) to make it easy to harvest mushrooms, (2) land clearing so they can grow crops, (3) to herd animals for easy capture, (4) etc.

12 hours ago, petermik said:

I wonder if it were a Thai agent would they then seek out all who had used their services....nah no chance.... too much loss in "pocket money" to the folks in Immigration here...

They have done that. Someone on a marriage extension was deported and backlisted after using an agent to obtain a visa with having the required financials. That agent obviously could not keep up payments, and they went after all his clients.
 

On 2/13/2021 at 2:47 PM, Yellowtail said:

 

I don't bother with the letter, I just make a deposit that morning and update the book so it shows the deposit and the balance same day.

 

Most offices require the letter (no more than one week old) AND the bank book updated on the same day that you apply.

6 hours ago, Mavideol said:

why would somebody waste of money and time reporting such BS.... how can a poll using 1,318 people be reliable/credible

Every time a poll is reported in Thailand, the armchair experts come out in force to belittle the work of the professional pollsters, based on the amateurs' lack of understanding of the field of statistics. That number of people (1318) is quite sufficient under the circumstances (assuming that the cohort was sampled randomly).

As a very rough rule of thumb, the sample size should be about 10% of the population, but there is not much benefit in going over about 1000 participants. And you should not go below 100. 

A poll of 1,000 Thais will give a result that is very close to being as accurate as a poll of 1000 Americans, despite their population size being five times greater. 

On the other hand, if you had two groups that you were interested in comparing that were of size 100 and 200, then you'd need to survey everyone in the first group, and half the people in the second group to get a reasonably accurate result.
 

6 hours ago, Henk Langeweg said:

I wonder where it al goes? Is it scanned and stored digitally or after processing in the waste bin?

There are huge warehouse full of boxes of these papers. 

1 hour ago, CLW said:

How do you know they are testing and how many? These number are never published...

 

The numbers are published. You can access the data on the World-o-Meter site and on the Johns Hopkins site.

2 hours ago, Silurian said:

Thank God. I personally met the man and he's a little bit of a jerk. The Thai people that I talk to said that he's comes across as arrogant.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sean O'Neill (US Consul-General for Chiang Mai) is a really nice bloke. 
P.S. I'm an Aussie.

On 12/6/2020 at 5:42 AM, jacko45k said:

Which country will you be obtaining the Visa(s) in? There are 3 types of 'Retirement' Visa that might be associated with what you are asking of . A simple Non-Imm-O based on being retired can be obtained in some countries, but only permits a single 90 day entry. There are also long stay Visas designed for over 50s, the Non-Imm-OA and OX. 

Non-Imm-O based on being retired can be obtained inside Thailand. (I don't think that any other countries even offer it any more.)
 

16 hours ago, kbb said:

Last year, I converted from an Annual Retirement Visa to the 20 Year Elite. 

 

[...] The insurance requirement for retirement visas only gets more and more expensive (and restrictive) as you get older.  Do the long term math, and the Elite Visa is cheaper. 

 

[...]

But there is no health insurance requirement at all for an O-visa (retirement) ... so it is a lot cheaper than the Elite.

On 12/6/2020 at 11:40 AM, Delight said:

 To answer your Q. directly -A retirement visa costs 1900 Baht per applicant. That is  the easy bit.

To qualify for such a visa -which is technically a visa extension you have to start with a Non immigrant 'O' visa . Typically this can be obtained in your own country.

However I understand that you can arrive in Thailand on the 30 day Visa on Arrival-and obtain a Non immigrant 'O' visa if you intend to convert to a retirement visa. Your local immigration office will give you more advice on this.

 You also have financial obligations.

800K Baht in a bank for 2 months prior to application date and the same 800K  90 days after.

Alternative if you can show 65000 Baht coming into a Thai bank for each of 12 months prior -then that is also acceptable.

The foregoing -in your case -has to be repeated . There are no concessions for a married couple.

1. 2000 baht - not 1900 baht
2. You cannot get an O-visa for retirement in the USA.
3. There is not such thing as a 30 day Visa on Arrival. You mean 30 day Visa Exemption. Anyway, neither are available during COVID.
4. There *are* concessions for a married couple. One can piggyback off the other person's visa.

On 12/6/2020 at 7:07 PM, sdweller said:

Thanks to everyjone for this info.....to be clear, I need to show 800,000 thai baht balance in a Thai bank, or my bank here in the USA?  

If you apply for an O-visa in Thailand, the money must be in a Thai bank. (It can be in any currency. And it can be in a term deposit, as long as it is accessible.)

If you apply for an OA-visa in the USA, it would normally be in a US bank. 
 

36 minutes ago, mrfaroukh said:

Go for non immigrant O visa in your country it will be valid for 3 months. If you are retired and your pension is greater than 65000 bhat a month get this letter from your embassy in Thailand then go to immigration, apply for retirement visa, it cost you 1900 Bhat. You have to apply for reentry visa if you want to leave Thailand and come back on your retirement visa, it cost you 1000 bhat for a single reentry and 3900 bhat for multiple. 

 

If you don't have pension one you enter the country you have to open a bank account and transfer 800000 bhat to your account, after 2 months get a letter from bank and go to immigration and get your retirement visa. So as you see retirement visa is much cheaper than elite visa 

Lots of misinformation above:
1. You cannot get a non-O (retirement) in the USA. In fact, I don't think any country issues them any more.
2. The US Embassy stopped issuing income letters nearly two years ago.
3. The visa costs 2000 baht - not 1900.
4. It''s a re-entry *permit* - not a re-entry "visa".
5. It's 3800 for the multiple - not 3900.
6. You don't need a pension. In fact, you don't need any income at all. You just need to transfer money.
 

On 11/15/2020 at 2:54 PM, maxcorrigan said:

I think also the 400,000bht in a Thai bank for marriage extension must show to have come from overseas, correct me if wrong!

Only required for the initial visa application - not required to come from overseas for extensions.
 

13 minutes ago, smew said:

Trying to contact Tai embassy in Canada to obtain COE to no avail.

Not even an answer.   

Try contacting them via Facebook. Thais love Facebook!
 

For anyone married to a Thai, there is zero advantage to getting PR. They instituted the "fast track" to Thai citizenship so that you could skip that step.

11 minutes ago, Neeranam said:

It was for me, to get me over the 50 points required. Also, pretty hard to do the interviews if you can't speak Thai! 

The  multiple choice test was easy but of course in Thai. Nowhere in the process will they speak anything other than Thai. 

If you make no effort to learn the language, you might find your file rotting in some back office.  

Yes, knowledge of Thai helps raise your points level (which may or may not be mecessary) but that is a different matter, and my statement is correct: The requirement to be able to speak Thai and sing the national anthem has been removed (for anyone married to a Thai). They will speak to you in English as nexcessary.

13 hours ago, hotchilli said:

Having permanent residency/citizenship gives you no added benefits or rights as a foreigner.

You cannot purchase land in your name, it can only be bought/registered in a Thai name.

 

That is not true. With citizenship you can buy land and do everything else that a Thai do except be a politician.

On 11/11/2020 at 4:55 PM, sometimewoodworker said:

Permanent resident is not a visa and requires you to be working in Thailand for years, it is an easier ( not easy) option for those not married to a Thai.

 

Both PR and citizenship can be revoked.

Actually, PR *is*  visa. If you leave the country without a re-entry permit, your PR visa automatically gets cancelled just like any other visa.

Also, it would be extremely unusual for citizenship to be revoked, and it could never happen if you no longer had citizenship of any other country.

On 11/11/2020 at 1:19 PM, abrahamzvi said:

Mind you, for both PR and citizenship, a reasonable knowledge  of the Thai language is required.

No knowledge of Thai language is required when applying for citizenship, if married to a Thai.