Andrew65

One thing in Thailand is that women's-lib is yet to arrive there as it did in the West about 50 years ago. I'll give an example of what I mean. I remember my old (very wealthy) Swedish friend talking about his Thai live-in girlfriend. He said that she would get up every morning to make his breakfast "A Swedish lady would never do that". Thai ladies haven't spent their entire lives being indoctinated with the idea that they should be just like men. IMHO, many Thai ladies have a femininity that is hard to find in Western ladies nowadays, many of whom seem to be out to bust the balls (mainly financially) of any man who's unfortunate enought to get involved with them.

"If it flies, floats or <deleted>**s, rent it"

When men do such things they're "Sex Tourists". When women do such things it's a "Holiday romance". ☺️

Evasion is illegal, avoidance is legal, it's knowing the difference between the two. Avoidance could also be called "Mitigating one's tax liability", legally reducing how much tax you pay.

About 10 years ago I worked in a job where I got to travel a lot around Australia. We were in a town near the QLD/NT border and in a local shop where you could drink a few beers, but there was a sign there saying no booze to be taken away. Also big signs by the road stating NO ALCOHOL - NO PORNOGRPHY. In PNG booze was banned on our camp, mainly because if the locals started drinking they were likely to start hacking each other to death with 'bushknives' (rather like a 'machete').

You're right. But we all know that whenever a farang dies in Thailand the conspiracy theorists come out of the woodwork. As you say, it's perfectly possible and most likely that this guy died of natural causes, RIP. Some years ago the Australian authorities reported that more Australians die in Thailand every year than in any other foreign country. (Common causes of their deaths being drowning, riding motorbikes, illict drugs).

Nope, legally you still need a work permit. You even need a W P if you're doing unpaid voluntary work.

FUD?

Just make sure that you don't upset the locals!????

"...unemployment is barely above 1%" If you'll believe that you'll believe anything. For one thing, Thailand doesn't have a proper system of measuring employment/unemployment. Also, many older Thai people live with their children, in the UK/other western countries they would be living independently of their children, and classed as unemployed. In Western countries is often said that realistically the lowest that unemployment is likley to be is 5%.

In the UK large numbers of people are allowed to come in and do pretty much any job they want. We now have 10 million people here who were born overseas. Things like roads, the NHS etc are creaking under the strain. There's also a "Housing crisis".

Mowing your own lawn? You could/should be employing a Thai person to do that. I had an old friend that lived in Phuket and used to worry about pruning his Lime trees, just waiting for the immigration police to show up!

I had 2 old friends who were millionaires, one worth tens of millions, one of them drove a beat-up old Honda, and the other a VW Golf, they weren't "car men". If it weren't a necessity they probably wouldn't have owned a car at all.

It's my theory that uniforms and the position of authority/power that comes with them can enable and exacerbate the behaviour of certain kinds of people. The police and the military being prime examples. (Mostly good people though, a small minority that are bad in this way).

What I was getting at is that as falang we can't claim welfare benefits etc in Thailand. Around 3 years ago I got chatting to one of your compatriots who had renounced his US citizenship and was actually a Cambodian citizen (showed me his Cambodian passport). That's a VERY big step to take.

I didn't realise that there were any "free rides" available in Thailand for Johnny-Falang!?????

Also no monetary (400k/800k) requirement, just the agent's "fee"????

The last time I was in Patts (3 or 4 years ago) you could get a large Leo for 60 Baht!☺️

Britain's economy has been sinking since the 1970's.

What's so special about London? It's only about 13% of the UK population.

Immigration was said to be the single issue vis-a-vis Brexit. Scotland and Ulster voted against Brexit, according to the BBC 95% of immigration into the UK has been into England. That would be 9.5 million of the 10 million foreign-born people living in the UK.

If someone arrives illegally, having thrown away their passport, how can we know who they really are, or where they come from, or whether or not they have a criminal record where they come from?

Isn't it the thing that it's not people entering Schengen or the UK that's the problem, it's that the ECHR makes it incredibly hard to deport them once they do. The soveriegnty of our country was signed away when we were signed up to it. Decisions on who gets to stay in the UK are ultimately taken by mainly foreign judges in France. Also, most or all of the illegals entering Britain wouldn't even be given a tourist visa using the legal method.

It's a really good point that Brexit and COVID19 happened in the UK at almost exactly the same time.

Many years ago I was on the banks of the Mekong River near Nong Khai. There seemed to be small boats crossing the river from Laos with no apparent checks at all. I would think there must be staggering amounts of 'contraband' coming into Thailand every year in such places.