cmsally

If you start reading about the history of this guy it gets quite interesting! He certainly had his ups and downs.

https://futurism.com/neoscope/google-project-nightingale-medical-records

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/nov/14/google-healthcare-data-ascension

https://www.wired.com/story/google-is-slurping-up-health-dataand-it-looks-totally-legal/

https://www.forbes.com/sites/jilliandonfro/2019/11/11/google-ascension-project-nightingale-electronic-medical-rehttps://www.wired.com/story/google-is-slurping-up-health-dataand-it-looks-totally-legal/cords/#700c63707a0a

Woopeedoo, Down to the countryside.

16 minutes ago, Sheryl said:

There is currently no exception for SS, Tricare or (except for the onitial yrar of entry) foreign insurance. One of several major flaws with this scheme.

What about foreigners who are married to Thai spouses who are government employees? That would be applicable for quite a number of expats, although probably not the ones on OA visas.

For starters missing an objective pronoun (after prepared) and the word population should probably be proportion.

Should be an interesting 120 hrs!!!

From what I could see most lanterns were heading approx NW. Therefore any landing at the airport came from maybe Mae Hia/Lamphun/Ban Tawai areas.

55 minutes ago, Nicknoodle said:

I don't live in Chiang Mai but I have spent a considerable amount of time there in the last 7 years. I have only seen a minimal increase in hotels, but as earlier mentioned on this thread, the increase in numbers is only attributed to "guesthouses" now being licenced. In regard to numbers, you can ask any hotel, any bar, any travel agent, they will all say the same thing, numbers of tourists is well down year on year. But one thing I have personally noticed is that there are many more independent Chinese tourists booking cheaper hotels instead of being on tours and paying through the nose. This has in turn has caused the cheaper end hotels to increase in price. If, as per this article states, the number of hotels was up, but the number of guests was pretty much the same then I have no doubt that the hotel prices would have dropped, but they haven't! Always gotta love the Thai statements that are so obviously false. 555

If places at the lower end got licensed, then it would have cost them a considerable amount . Impossible to drop rates or keep them the same if you have to fork out that amount of cash. There is also the phenomena of thinking that a vast upgrade and entry into more middle market would make it much more profitable. Not necessarily the case as CM has a vast glut in the middle market.

13 minutes ago, khunPer said:

Do you think that "booking.com" represent all hotels in Chiang Mai?

I would say a good 70-80 % . I can think of some places not on Booking.com, but not too many. Then there are some which are condos, rooms on AirBnB only.

38 minutes ago, 0815 said:

... and owned by Chinese companies.

Would be nice to see some statistics of how many of the new places are built on 30 year leases held by Chinese are by proxy companies funded by Chinese. I think it is quite  a few.

For some reason I awoke with thoughts of the Great Leap Forward which of course was followed by the great famine/crash. Except this time we will probably all be going along for the ride!

8 minutes ago, LomSak27 said:

 

I worked in both Korea and Japan and still have passable Korean. Hey Don't believe me, get your hiney out there to both walking streets next week and see if I'm wrong. Check out out Airport and Festival malls while you're at it. Don't just sit at the keyboard, cyber whinge-ing & reading footie scores. Get out there, do some first hand reconnaissance. Make us proud!!

 

 

 

 

 

I would agree with that , have heard a lot of Japanese and Korean being spoken. Also Chinese around, but not so noticeably skewed towards Chinese as in the last few years.

Definitely lanterns being let off from Ping River area but probably only a few locations. Much less in the way of noise and fireworks. Seemed pretty quiet compared to previous years, but then downtown in previous years has often resembled a warzone. Accommodation at the lower end has been booked out for the Loy Kratong days but after is anyones guess. Anyone in business for many years in CM might be thinking about the old tale of the hare and the tortoise. Hares are mostly toast.

I think you might find that the Amphur about a block west of the 3 Kings has now moved to be in the same compound as the SalaKlang (out on Chotana, going towards Mae Rim). I don't know if that is all their services but I know for some things they have definitely moved.

On 11/10/2019 at 9:29 AM, faraday said:

Yes, I'd like to experience snow one last time: Magical.

I still remember the time in junior school when my friend saw snow for the first time. She was born and brought up in Kenya. Snow started to fall in the early afternoon in the middle of class. She just got up and walked over to the window like a zombie , stood there and stared, totally silent. It took a while for us to process what was going on!

Golden Tree Snake.

The ones I have come across are not timid at all. We had one a few years ago that had a sense of humour, its favourite trick was to drop out of the tree on top of you. The first couple of times we thought it just had a bad grip up there. But after about the tenth time we figured it must be doing it on purpose.

I was told if its a cash payment and person who ordered does not show up/ not there, the delivery person has to pay. Not sure if that is true but wouldn't be surprised.

It is just another big company who will trash any competition then turn the screws on.

Isn't Starbucks here owned by the same franchise as Hong Kong. Seeing as they are getting trashed in HK maybe a plan to expand more here.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-starbucks-thailand/starbucks-licenses-thai-operations-to-charoen-backed-venture-idUSKCN1ST17K

https://www.hongkongfp.com/2019/09/25/hong-kong-uni-students-boycott-maxims-caterer-founders-daughter-blasts-pro-democracy-protesters-un/

053 243036  Ang Tong water pumps Charoenrat Rd.

If you are in the city area they are quick , if in the outer suburbs you may need to wait a few days as they gather a few customers in the same vicinity .

9 hours ago, IraqRon said:

Do the French tourist have insurance to cover their hosp. bills or will they be unpaid and the amount added to the baht that they say expats owe???

 

This is an example of why I support the idea of charging all tourist some small amount upon entry to cover such incidences.

If they took a trip with a registered TAT licensed tour company they would be covered for hospital bills, as it is a type of accident.

22 minutes ago, kamahele said:

Is this different than the "royal bees" which are aggressive but are supposed to bring good luck? Had to live with one of their nests in the yard for 6 months until they moved away to avoid bad luck lol. Couldn't keep the outside lights on at night as they swarm at the light.

If you are in the North of Thailand , the ones that most people regard as lucky and won't move the nests are called "min".

Not too sure what the proper name for these are but they are very dark and can build some huge nests. Luckily they mostly like to build nests high in trees (but not always). They don't seem very aggressive though.

When it comes to present day Thai officialdom runaround/ridiculousness , I think I may have discovered the "piece de la resistance".

A close friend (Thai) needed to remove his tour van from the yellow plate system and convert it to a private vehicle. The whole debacle took 4 months ! I kid you not , 4 months. He had to put together a file of endless photos, bank statements, land titles, literally an essay on why he didn't want to use the vehicle for business any more. At one stage where it looked a sure fire success they said it wouldn't pass because his van picture was parked at his "rural place". So he ended up moving his house registration for a week just to satisfy their requirements!

Then again looked sure success, but the woman at the desk sent him back because his file wasn't as "big and beautiful" as the others - stressing how thick the other files in the pile were! Like some kind of Prathom 3 paper glut project!

Then when the file was accepted he naively thought that was the end. NO!!!! They took off his yellow plate and told him he would have to wait to see if his application was successful! So now basically it was an illegal vehicle with no registration that he had to keep off the road and just park. Then he waited about 6 weeks for them to have their meeting and decide. Lucky for him he was one of only 3 to pass from of a whole stack of he estimated to be around 30.

Then he still had to wait a couple of weeks before ordinary book and plate could be issued. This is to get out of the system and not in! The others that failed would have to have gone through I guess double the trouble to get back into the system!!! What a mess !!!!