Jingo

So was it disrespectful for me to be walking by on the road? Is the reason to not have pedestrians/cars on the road cultural rather than security?

I thought it was for security concerns or maybe to keep jaywalkers from getting killed because they were driving very fast definitely above the limit.

Beige cars in a motocade = Royalty.

Wear yellow. Smile. Everything is perfect.

Cool. I'm a monarchist myself so there is no need for false pretenses.

Kind of weird to choose beige? Is it just because yellow is too weird to pick for a car color and beige is the closest color that isn't too bright?

I was just minding my business and I walked onto the street and thought it was the dead zone... no cars... and all the Thai were hiding back from the sidewalks... I'd never seen anything like it in my life. One of them says "don't... Police!!" and so I back up for a bit.... and sure enough notice police are holding back all traffic from the road... then a big motorcade passes by.... the car in the middle being some beige like color (nothing all that fancy IMO).

Just curious who that was. Would it be a high-level politician? Or do even mayors get police escorts like that?

Will they be executed?

I know in Singapore if you get caught with even 15 grams of Heroine that's an executable offense.

And in their home country of Taiwan it's also executable to do this and Thailand does have the death penalty as a possibility for drug trafficking....

Guns never protected people, that sad story is the very proof of my affirmation (the Petty Officer did own a gun, and he died at the end of the day, did he not?)

The attacker had a gun (the petty officer), the victim did not. It is not proof "of your affirmation" (you need to work on your English skills as your posts are hard to understand).

If the female had a gun, she may be alive. The PO died because he killed himself. You don't need a gun to kill yourself, it's just faster and less painful. And nobody is arguing for disarming police and army officers. So there is no situation in which this guy wouldn't have access to a gun.

But people like you create a situation where LAW-ABIDING people like the female here don't own guns and thus become victims to those who do (government).

Live by the gun : die by the gun !. In 90 % of cases you are harmed by your own weapon. Have nothing to do with them. Charlton Heston and yankees are a stupid race.

It comes out to a perfect 90.00% huh? Do you enjoy making up statistics?

Each year there are about 20,000 firearm "accidents", the majority not being fatal (shooting self in foot for example). Whereas the last time self-defense was studied, under BILL CLINTON in 1994, the DOJ reported that there were roughly 1.5 million times per year that guns were used in self-defence to protect from assailants.

So there are 75 times a gun protects someone for every 1 time a gun accidentally harms someone.

It's also worth noting that knives cause more accidental injuries than guns.

A very sad story which prove one more time than guns cannot be given to mentally challenged people.

Anyone that owns a gun except for farm use or hunting is mentally challenged to begin with

I'll agree with farm use but, to hunt and kill wild animals? The mentally challenged sentiment still applies!

The heck, did I leave ThaiVisa and stumble into the PansyForums or something?

So I guess to you fishing poles should be made illegal too or a butcher's knife.

As for the other guy who thinks only farmers should own them....

First, owning a gun protects you from criminals who DO NOT OBEY the law and own guns anyways. It even protects you from deranged police or military officers like the one in this story. Had the woman been carrying a gun she might be alive or at least had a CHANCE at defending herself. Guns are the best anti-rape defense women have available. Not many other things can equalize the power differential between genders. There have been horror stories where a guy didn't go down after being tazed and proceeded to rape the victim, and tazers cannot be used effectively against multiple asssailants nor do they inspire much fear, whereas even a single bullet in a gun would be able to generally keep off multiple attackers just by pointing it at whomever gets uppity.

Second, guns offer protection against government, which is the largest murderer. Had the Jews in Germany been armed things would of went down much differently. Had the millions of Chinese or Russians sent to gulags/re-education camps had guns, they may be alive. Heck even the Native Americans suffered greatly for lack of guns. They quickly learned they needed guns to be taken seriously by Western governments.

As Mao said, "Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun". Those without guns had no power with which to contest their own demise.

Statistically speaking in the 20th century, there were about ~150 million people killed by their own governments, but only 8 million murders (and many of those by govt). And of those murders, less than half used a gun. So in the past century you were 40x more likely to be killed by a government worker carrying a gun, than by a fellow citizen with a gun.

I am renting a condo and curious how long of a notice do I have to give before I leave.

I have basically given up on the deposit since I've only been here 2 months of a 6 month lease.

Since I've given up (should i not?) on the deposit, do I need to give notice before I leave or could I just tell them the day before or what?

Is it basically just up to my courtesy or are there rules on this sort of thing? I probably won't be coming back ever but still want to know.

Thanks.

Funny to see that a country that wants to be a global player, what kind of drugs are they on , have to follow internal acts of security and declare the state of war and so on to deal with protestors and how many coups de militaire happend since 1946, 15 ones. Is this country not able to install a functional democracy?!

You seem blissfully unaware of the nature of democracy. There actually is not ONE democracy on Earth (although Switzerland comes close thru referenda). The word "demos" means of the people, and the Greeks who invented "demo"cracy used a lottery system to choose representatives at random amongst the citizenry. A system of elections is a popularity contest, not Democracy, and was labelled by the Greeks who witnessed Rome as "Aristocracy", since the Roman senate was exclusively Aristocrats since only the rich or famous could win a popularity contest. I'm guessing you look to the USA as some sort of mythical ideal, despite it being modeled on the Roman Senate. It is no coincidence both Rome and America's Senates were run by aristocratic slaveowners.

And today as well, the US Republic is quite dysfunctional. If you think Republics are "stable", you really don't know history. It's only because of the relative abundance and debt-financed welfare that things are "stable". As soon as the US is forced to live within it's means (no more loans from China for example) then class warfare will break out in force. Or worse if an economic collapse happened there is no religion, ethnicity, or even language (millions cannot speak English, and even amongst English speakers there are vast regional differences, etc.) at this point that unifies Americans.

Countries like Thailand which cannot afford generous debt-financed welfare thus are instable. America is just copying the "Bread and Circuses" Roman model: Constant warfare to keep your citizens distracted, and free bread for all (ever since Clodius Pulcher was elected by promising it), and the system was never reformed until Caesar took over.

Just remember. Iran is a Republic. North Korea is a Republic. Egypt is a Republic. Pakistan is a Republic. Electing politicians is choosing them by popularity and thus is Aristocracy not Democracy, since fame/wealth are required for name-recognition.

Because they dislike some company ripping off their customers with some artificial 'expiration' policy? What would be the purpose of expiry after 30 days.. do the trains vanish?

Yes that's the rip-off and it takes advantage of poorer people more than richer. For example I do not have much money currently SO I decided to buy the package to save on trips to my new job. Only to discover the job was a fraud so I can't work there. So now I'm stuck with a pretty sizeable loss since I bought the trips to go to work each day and no longer have a job to go to. Whereas someone who STILL has their job (or decides to work the scam job) gets the savings, kind of ironic.

But it's also my fault for not selling it to someone once my situation changed but it's probably illegal to walk around BTS places and bother people into buying it. Sure somebody coulda used it, I coulda sold it for half off or something. Stupid me (and unlucky for whomever coulda bought it and saved a ton on BTS).

Just giving it away even woulda been better still had like 40 trips...

http://www.bts.co.th/_admin/uploadfiles/files/404.pdf

You could try asking here, with luck someone will speak some english there.

BTS Tourist Information Centers can be found at Siam , Phaya Thai and Saphan Taksin

It's the orange one and I put trips on it. Is it possible to like pay a fee and get back part of it? Or pay a fee to prevent the expiration?

Or pay to convert the remaining trips into cash or something...

I ended up using less than half and feel stupid.

Also I read something about 45 days with the 30-day trips, is it not exactly 30 days but expire in 45 days? I guess it's just wishful thinking...

To clarify it is not the 30-day smart pass, but it is the Orange rabbit and I think I bought 50 trips for 1,000 and I am worried it expires within 30 days, I don't know why but I got the impression when I bought it that it expires in 30 days, is this right?

Also I just checked bangkokbts.com and it says "30-Day Rabbit Card : Adult" for my card... definitely worried. Would topping up further extend the life of the card and preserve the trips? Because it says "Valid for 30 days after the date of purchase or last refill."

So if I re-fill like 100THB can it preserve the trips or would they expire regardless?

Can anyone please let me know how this works? I'm confused if my card will lose the balance after 30 days or if the 50 trips don't expire.

I bought a Rabbit card and put 1,000 THB on it for what I thought was the 50 trips for 1,000 deal.

My question is, will the remaining amount expire after the 30 days?

If so, can I use it on McDonald's and other things like a normal Rabbit card?

I just wasn't sure if the amount is "locked" into BTS or if it expires or whatnot or if that was the old 30-day card's rule.

My card doesn't say 30-day anywhere on it but I just want to make sure.

Really? The first 2 reports I read on these were from BBC and an Australian channel, even Al Jazeera. Can't really compare China's ghost cities with the ones in the US. Most in Detroit are old, and would be good to tear down anyway. China's are brand new and never lived in. Like Kangbashi. Intended to house 1MM people, but only 20-30k live there. I'd call that a ghost town, and probably the biggest in the world. Al Jazeera broke the news on that one.

Comparing Chinese housing to American ones is impossible. Vacant houses in the US are being absorbed at a very fast pace. I've got friends in this business and it's moving quickly. Biggest impediment is funding. A mess in the US right now. But things are changing rapidly. Look at the increased in Phoenix. In Vegas, they're having bidding wars on vacant houses.

Methinks you've been reading too many anti-american websites. Maybe RT? Zero Hedge?

No, I've worked in real estate in Chinese and American regions (I am fluent in Chinese), so this is just common sense for me, and I got the statistics from US government websites.

And you are really amazing. You think having 20 million decaying houses is better than 60 million brand spanking new apartments? You do realize "tearing down" houses ITSELF costs about $20,000 per house. You seem to think bulldozing is free....

And "houses for sale" in the US are only a FRACTION of how many are empty, so yes the market is doing just fine because the banks are withholding properties to make sure prices stay up but they can't do it forever in a shrinking economy. And Phoenix and Vegas are part of the growing areas of the USA. Texas is growing too and real estate is doing good there. The problem tends to be in blue states (Real estate markets in Detroit, Los Angeles, and Chicago should provide a good perspective). Part of the reason is their huge bloated pensions which usually invest into the real estate market and so cutting them, while looking good from an outside perspective to save the bankrupted state budgets, would cut off the last lifeline the property market in those shrinking economies (CA, NY, IL, etc.) have left.

It would be real nice if you'd include credible links when you make claims.

Link

Beijing Alone Has 50% More Vacant Housing Than The US

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 06/05/2012 10:16 -0400

Total housing inventory at the end of April rose 9.5 percent to 2.54 million existing homes available for sale, a seasonal increase which represents a 6.6-month supply at the current sales pace, up from a 6.2-month supply in March. Listed inventory is 20.6 percent below a year ago when there was a 9.1-month supply; the record for unsold inventory was 4.04 million in July 2007.

So, broadly speaking: US: 2.5 million available homes; Beijing - one city in China - has 3.8 million??

The Beijing Public Security Bureau Population Administration Department said yesterday that have checked the information of the mobile population 725.5 million, mark the rental housing 1.39 million, checking vacant houses to 3.812 million.

That is all.

There is a key word you used there: "available for sale". The US has over 16 million empty houses that are not up for sale because the banks are holding them to try and keep up home prices. The reason is if they flood the market with homes prices would collapse much faster and it would trigger the very sort of housing collapse you are worried about in China which DOESN'T hold their properties off the market to inflate prices as the US is doing).

The US government reported there are 18.4 milliom empty housing units (mostly houses), and that means the US needs 47 million residents to fill them (since average people per housing unit is 2.6 in the US), whereas China's 64 million empty units are mostly apartments and China's average occupancy per housing unit is 1.4, so they need about 90 million people.

China has 5x the population but needs less than 2x as many people (90 million vs US' 47 million). In addition, China has a growing economy, whereas the US GDP is shrinking if you factor for inflation, and per capita GDP is shrinking rapidly (since you have to factor inflation AND population growth, many people forget the latter). So more and more Americans cannot afford housing and move into apartments, the crisis will only get worse.

Want to know the REAL reason why the banks HAVE to be bailed out in the USA? Because if they release even just a few million of the 16 million houses they are withholding from the market, the US economy would instantly crash due to plummeting housing prices. In bankruptcy proceedings a bank would be forced to sell it's houses even for a loss to pay off creditors.

I also hope this isn't any indication of how the Russians will run the Sochi Olympics, the IChO Russia website is slow as heck and poorly designed... and apparently they had actually lost the experiment of the third place scorer from Taiwan for hours before finding it again.

The results are posted here although without the exact scores (previous sites usually show that)

=======

http://icho2013.chem.msu.ru/index.php/en/

China had the 1st and 2nd and 5th place winners. "Chinese Taipei" (aka Taiwan) was the next best after China as they got 3rd and 11th place.

Thailand's "gold" winner is actually 25th place. And the silvers are like 40th and 50th place (not exact too lazy to count).

So the real story is China dominated this year, much better than last year where Germany had 1st place and Taiwan did better than China, but this year the tables have turned. I'd say China probably put good effort into Chemistry education.

"192 medals given to the 291 students"

Basically the medals are a participation trophy.

Sad that type of thing is becoming global these days.

For those acting like Thailand achieved something, I would note only the golds were in the top 10% and Thailand only got one.

Taiwan by comparison got 3 golds and a silver.

34 gold, 64 silver, and 94 bronze were awarded.

It's not a real competition. It's basically like taking a test and they give medals based on the scores. In a real competition gold means 1st place, not 1st thru 34th place. Silver should mean 2nd place, etc.

Literally:

Gold medals are awarded to approximately the top 10% of students, silver medals are awarded to approximately the next 20% of students, and bronze medals are awarded approximately to the next 30% of students.

So basically in my opinion many of those who ranked 4th to 34th all got a gold medal when they wouldn't deserve ANY MEDAL in a traditional competition. You don't give gold medals to the guy who came in 30th in a marathon...

Edit: It seems this year they extended bronzes, so they are giving medals to 65% of the participants! Also apparently "Honorable Mentions" are awarded to the next top 10% of the participants that do not win a medal. So top 65% get a medal, and the next 10% get "honorable mentions".

Apparently being far below average is worthy of an "honorable mention" and scoring 192nd out of 291 will win you a medal. In the Olympics scoring 192nd in an athletic competition would be considered humiliating.

What's most sad is this is occuring in a logical, brain-using competition. Is it because they are afraid of hurting their fragile little emotions?

bigbamboo, on 01 Jun 2013 - 21:56, said:

If the Elite Card was being re-established as a trustworthy entity, not one that changed the conditions once you've handed over your money up front then they should price membership at an annual rate not a flat 2 million. That might at least encourage a few more mugs to take up their offer.

Oh I see. I was actually reading this and thought it sounded great so I didn't understand why all the hate on it.

So even after I hand over the 2 million baht, would it be possible they will rescind it later even if I make all the yearly payments?

Kind of seems like a contradictory policy. The card sounds a lot better than going the investor visa route which I was considering.

Also I don't understand the wording, 5 year multi-entry visa doesn't mean you get 5 years stay? What does the 1 year stay thing mean? Like I could stay "up to a year". If I am paying for a 20 years valid card that grants 5 year visas, why can I only stay 1 year... definitely fishy. Plus does this grant the right to live and work as one pleases? I doubt it, still gotta go through stupid work pemit processes every time you switch jobs, etc. correct?

Heck, when you take a look at this Wikipedia article and table regarding List of Countries by Traffic Related Death, Thailand is a safe place to drive compared to many other countries. The table can be sorted different ways...try sorting by Road Fatalities Per Year Per 100,000 Inhabitants...Thailand is way down the list...heck, I just may cancel my 1st class insurance tomorrow and stop wearing a safety belt.

This is because MANY thais don't own cars/bikes and those people rarely die. Even so Thailand's rate is 2x the USA's and that's no laughing matter. Look at PER 100,000 motor vehicles and Thailand has nearly 8x the rate of fatalities as the US or Europe (per motor vehicle).

All the other countries that are above Thailand in that list are countries where there are very few cars (so 100,000 motor vehicles causing 14,000 deaths for example is because in Togo/Ethiopia/Africa is since they often run over pedestrians).

I'm sure if you were to isolate the high-traffic cities, the fatality rate may be above 200 per 100,000 vehicles, so close to 0.2%/vehicleowner a year. Almost a 2% chance of death in a decade of living in Thailand is no joke. Add in a 10% chance of serious injury.

So put that seatbelt/helmet back on and keep your insurance handy.

Maybe he doesnt live in a farang mansion in Issan.

Maybe he didnt meet his latest squeeze in the "hansum man" bar.

You make a good point, sometimes it's WHERE you meet people, not who, that matters more. These posters are overlooking human nature and not comparing it with their old countries. Despite being "one of the crowd" in America, almost everyone I know has been a victim of fraud (sometimes extraordinarily creative fraud), or has been targeted by a gold-digger, or taken advantage of in some other manner. But as a farang in Thailand one obviously stands out more and there is in an inherent wage gap that also attracts with it those fraudsters/gold-diggers, etc. I'd say if you drove a lambourghini and wore flashy clothes in America you'd probably have a greater chance of being frauded than a farang in Thailand.

Basically your skin color (generally correctly) advertises a lack of knowledge of the region, a greater amount of wealth than the average person, etc. So any fraudster would be a fool to overlook you and target a native instead.

And I find it hilarious how people can complain how they are treated abroad as if back home is much better. Back stateside I'd have to deal with dozens of rude people on a frequent basis, and being "jumped" by random stranger happens to many Americans quite frequently. I had to fight off three guys once for my life's sake and it was only my quick reaction to take out the first guy as they approached me that night that allowed me to survive. Nothing like that happens in Thailand especially for NO REASON as it did to me stateside.

If you frequent American bars half as often as many farangs frequent Thai ones, I'd estimate they'd get assaulted twice as often, and a hundred times as often if you visit an American bar with even HALF the pride/attitude that we foreigners tend to have while living abroad.

I mean imagine if a Mexican who can't speak English came to pubs in Kansas and acted arrogant and insisted on speaking Spanish most of the time or spoke in broken English (can create misunderstandings), he'd probably get assaulted a good percentage of the time.

If you speak Thai and have Thai citizenship only then do you have any right to claim to be "Thai" and not "Farang", but even then, why do you want to attack their cultural solidarity? Why can't you accept that you are DIFFERENT?

So many pampered babies in the West. You don't have to go through anything like a black in 1950's "multicultural" America did, or like a white man walking in Harlem would today. There is obviously a difference in races, and by trying to FORCE people to treat everyone the same, you only suppress their inner reactions which then explode (closet racism). The only real way to make progress is to embrace our differences, and respect them.

Calm down, yes, there are many foreigners who are getting treated badly, do I say that every one of them would have not being ripped off or scammed, had they not being referred to as an object (that is Farang), hell no!

But do I see a clear connection between the constant need to refer to us as "farang", rather than humans, and many problems we face here on a daily basis, hell yes!!

Your comment is even more weird. Last I checked, "human" is not a commonly used noun to describe other people. Only insane people walk up and say "hello human!", it implies you are not one yourself. As for referring to people as foreigners Thailand is not unusual in this respect, in Japan they will call you Gaijin, in Korea waegukin, in China waeguoren (or the less respectable laowai).

Unless you hold Thai citizenship you have ZERO right to complain. That you want the rest of the world to become a multicultural melting pot (which has FAILED in Europe and is about to fail in America the moment the only social glue it has left, money, starts to dry up) displays either ignorance or a complete lack of respect for other countries' cultures.

I have to weigh in on the "not smuggling" side, since the quantities are within the limits and were not secretly transported. That said, you yourself don't smoke because you recognize it's harmful effects I presume, so that you got punished with a fine for helping other people kill themselves is not so bad (morally speaking though the law itself isn't designed for this purpose).

My friends often ask me to bring back duty free cigs or do similar things and I refuse simply because I can't view it as a gift or "helping" them to get them "bulk" death-sticks on the cheap, I'd feel I'm hurting them more than helping. But I guess since marijuana sadly remains illegal everywhere there isn't much of a legal alternative to give people.

Just seize on this as an excuse to not be your friend's mule bringing them the tool that quickens their demise.

What if you paid the 10,000,000 baht to get the investor visa and extend it ever since? Heck it used to be only 3,000,000 baht so I don't see why retirees or other people wouldn't just buy property to get the investor visa (if they don't work or are like me and own a business abroad) I've heard plenty of people are still using those 3 million baht ones and extending them.

Even though I'm using a work visa, I had planned to change it to an investor visa (it's easy to change it I heard), so my question is just if the investor visa equally applies or if there is a certain number of months each year I have to stay inside the country? Also is it possible to ever have your investment visa extension rejected for not staying inside a certain number of months? Or is it all good as long as you keep the investment in place?