Traveling Sailor

Being an American, I miss:

• Good roads and excellent public transportation
• Police that are friendly and do their job
• Doctors that know how to diagnose and are willing to take the time to do it
• Good American pizza
• Having intelligent conversations on a daily basis
• Sailing on San Francisco Bay

I don't miss:

• outrageous prices including drugs and rent, etc.
• cold weather

"So there are only two choices left, burn or keep them, he said". So, the only way to get rid of anything in Thailand is to burn??

Take it all to Chang Mai and burn it. Probably won't increase the haze by much.

Another reason why pedestrian overpasses are the only solution for a safe crossing the way these people drive.

Pedestrian overpasses are no solution at all for people whose knees are a bit wonky.

The solution for safe pedestrian crossing is to fine bad drivers. In fact fining bad drivers would be the best solution to most road-related problems in Thailand.

The only way these crazy,lawless Thai drivers will stop is when,as the light turns from green to amber, large steel posts rise up on both sides of the walkway and, when they are fully raised,the light turns red. Then the the pedestrians will be able to safely cross the street.

Well it isn't at my place 10 km east of Pattaya, aqnd it also wasn't available this evening on Thepprasit road in Jomtien.

Hardly to call those places the boonies, don't you agree?

So very true. And when I take a road trip from Krabi to Nakhon si Thammarat, there are plenty of places where there is no signal at all. AIS, TRUE and 3BB all still have a LONG way to go.

this is ridiculously sick

they should remove the balls of the perpertrator!

Perhaps it would also be appropriate to question the boy about what he was taught and/or experienced at the temple. Did the monks teach him about "marriage play"? If so, perhaps it is the monks who should have "cosmetic" surgery.

I had a check sent from California, Registered mail, Airmail. Postmarked 26 February, arrived 9 March. I regularly have boxes of herbs sent, USPS Priority Mail. Takes anywhere from 10 to 25 days to get to Samui. I would never consider having anything sent to me without a tracking number. As soon as the letter/box is shipped, I receive the tracking number from the shipper. I go to the USPS website and request email tracking info. It works great. After I get the email that says the package has cleared customs, I wait about 5 days. If the item is not delivered, or if I do not receive a notice from the local PO, I print out the last email, drive to the PO, smile and politely ask if they can help me locate my package. In two years of living on the island, I have never lost anything, using this procedure. Good luck to you!

The problem is, if the media tells the truth, then they will run afoul of the defamation laws. Or are they exempt?

So they will end up without knowledge and untrained. Kinda like they are now!

"Bacteria in Thailand not same for farang"

"Farang arm not same Thai arm"

I have actually heard these things.

My wife is a nurse in Chiang Mai.

Your ignorant comment is an insult to her and the Thai medical professionals who attract patients from all over the world.

With all due respect to your wife and her colleagues, I have been treated within hospitals in Nakhon si Thammarat, Samui, Phuket and Bangkok. I have been bedside in two other hospitals. I have seen first hand the poorly trained/informed doctors, un-professional and poorly trained staff at these so-called "international" hospitals and regional hospitals. I have witnessed abysmal care at a rural hospital in Nakhon si Thammarat Provence that caused the un-necessary death of a patient. So I must say that Bluewater's comments, while they may not be true where your wife works, are not ignorant, but definitely true in some, perhaps many, hospitals in Thailand.

Court sentences 15 core red shirts to four years in prison for disrupting ASEAN Summit in Pattaya

PATTAYA: -- The Pattaya Provincial Court today sentenced 15 red-shirt core leaders to four years in prison after finding them guilty of leading red shirt protesters to storm and disrupt the ASEAN Summit in Pattaya in 2009.

The 15 red-shirt leaders who included Arisman Pongruangrong, Nisit Sithiprai, Surachai Danwatananusorn and Pol Maj Sa-ngiem Samranrat were prosecuted by Pattaya prosecutor after they led several hundreds of red-shirt protesters to break into the ASEAN Summit held on April 11 in 2009 at Royal Cliff Beach Hotel in Pattaya, forcing the summit to collapse.

After the sentences were handed down, the court denied temporary release on bails for all the convicts. They were later escorted to prison for detention immediately. However their lawyer will seek bails for them again tomorrow.

Two red-shirt leaders Pol Maj Sa-ngiem and Surachai did not appear at the court to hear the verdict today.

Source: http://englishnews.thaipbs.or.th/court-sentences-15-core-red-shirts-to-four-years-in-prison-for-disrupting-asean-summit-in-pattaya

-- Thai PBS 2015-03-06

These people are little more than paid thugs. Why shouldn't they be behind bars for a few years?

Oh this sounds just wonderful. I have experienced the level of competence of doctors in a couple of rural Thai hospitals and it did not seem to be very high. While I have no way of knowing for sure, from what I have experienced, some rural hospital doctors probably graduated near the bottom of their class.

And now medical students will be sent to these places to learn from the resident doctors? Way to go! Since most Thai doctors that I have met don't know how to diagnose anyway, these medical students will probably end up being the worse of the worse. Smooth move, x-lax!

TV is usually mixed at between -18db and -20dB and adverts are allowed to go up to -12dB in Europe and USA, so why on earth they are aiming for a level of just -1db is madness.

Madness perhaps, but Thainess for sure.

'Pik'......Its like this, it take a minimum of two people to get scammed.... One to cast the bait and one to take a bite.

Try looking at it this way, maybe its LOS....Land of suckers.

good one

any one that knows thaivisa.com will never be a sucker

therefore only

Land of Smiles (LOS) or (LOS) Land of Scams

apples to my post

Or perhaps, Land of Stupid (LOS). A lot of tourists and farang seem to leave their common sense at the immigration counter. A lot of Thais seem to exhibit stupidity when doing certain activities.

Lucky bastards had crews on thier plane. Last time I flew thai they only had one crew on board.

I am sure that you can provide the details of that flight?

Yes, please do. I would love to hear how a plane of this size flies with just one crew member. I find it hard to believe that there was only a pilot, no co-pilot, no stewardesses, etc. Perhaps you only saw one??

Q. What do you call a small aircraft carrier with no aircraft?

A. A boat.

Mind you, being Thailand they'll probably fit sails to the thing (at a cost of 28 trillion baht) and call it a yacht.

It's only submarines which are refered to as a 'boat'

Very true! Usually a surface vessel that is large enough to carry a "boat" on board is called a "ship".

amending a law won't protect children, enforcing the law will

Same as all the other laws on the books in Thailand that don't get enforced. All talk, no action. Land of blah blah blah!

So, if I am reading this correctly, the police were not clever enough to station officers at all exits before announcing their presence??

Some people love a bloody good moan don't they.

Some farang cyclists are much stupider, and perhaps more arrogant as well, than the average Thai.

"It can withstand a quake with a magnitude of up to seven on the Richter scale," Anurak Chuchern said yesterday in his capacity as the overseer of the dam.

However, his assessment is based on the supposition that the dam was built to specs.

Since there do not seem to be any quality control inspections on large or small projects here, who knows what kind of shoddy workmanship or sub-standard materials went into the construction of this project?

I, for one, would not want to live down-stream of this project. Disaster waiting to happen???

"The boat operators face charges of operating tour boats without a permit which carries a maximum fine of B5,000, and also operating the boats on an expired licence for which they could be fined a maximum of B10,000."

These should be MINIMUM fines, not maximum.

Inactive post's for them all then

They are all now inactive at their current post.

He was a bright spark!!!!

Joking at the tragic lost to anyone's life is sick.

Common sense tells you not to mess around with electricity,he was 18 years old,not 8!!!

Most 18 year old Thai kids have less common sense than most 8 year old European, Australian, North American or Japanese kids. It's the home life and education system. Shouldn't blame the kids.

"Meanwhile, Prayut, who marvelled at the advancement of Japanese technology, said Thailand planned to develop 1.435-metre tracks in the initial stage."

Yes, general, this is what can happen when children are provided with an excellent education and society is not hung up on "saving face".

However the results will take a generation to appear and the general population must make excellent education one of their top priorities.

Good luck Thailand!

There are several words in the English language that you need to learn and use with conviction. The most important one is "NO". This should be used often and firmly while shaking your head from side to side for emphasis. And, to make it perfectly clear to all within hearing distance, multiple uses interspersed with the Thai equivalent would probably be helpful.

The second one, to be used if the first one does not work, is "GOOD BYE".

Very simple.

All these words require of you is balls.

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I will be discussing this article with all of my uni students next week.

This is getting to be a ridiculous problem. I went to registration desk at hospital here and had to wait for employee to get off her personal phone. I raised hell with the int'l affairs office because I previously worked in healthcare administration back home . Friday I ordered a sandwich and while waiting for it to heat in a toaster oven the employee took two phone calls. The bread had several large burn spots. I demanded my money back...I got it but unfortunately no manager available to complain to.

It's already an issue at my uni and many of the students are adamant that they should be able to talk and text to friends while thy do their work.

In the discussion I posed:

- A situation where they were the business owner who had have many staff often talking / chatting on the phone or doing personal e-mails on the internet.

- Customers are not getting personal attention.

- Mistakes are happening because people are not focused on their work.

Each team (about 7 teams) had to agree a response to each point.

Overall summation, "So what, I need to talk to my friends".

And this is why Thailand will never change from "third-world" status.