whimsy

Mini Twister? What is that !

Just a typical squall, to my eyes

OK. It was a squall, but one where the wind moved rapidly in a cyclonic motion in a small area within the car park and knocked over a large tree. I would have thought a squall was where the wind blew hard in basically one direction, not in a tight circle.

Wikipedia calls this type of wind a 'minor whirlwind'.

We are near Hillside 4 condo. That storm downed a large tree at the apartment opposite. It is now lying across the Soi. According to my wife it was a mini twister that did it.

City Life did an article on water quality a few years ago and had this to say about getting water tested.

take a sample to test yourself. Jaroon's advice was to buy an 800 baht kit to test water for bacteria which can be purchased at the Chiang Mai Health Centre on Suthep Road. If you really want to do the full test you will need to take a sample of your water to the Regional Medical Sciences Centre which is a large building about 1km after 700 Year Stadium on the same side. The test here is much cheaper than the do-it-yourself alternative.

If you get some water tested I would be interested to hear about the results and costs.

You could try Nim See Seng Transport. This Chiang Mai based transport company runs trucks between Bangkok and Chiang Mai all the time. I don't know the costs but worth enquiring. They have a 'moving' service, but also just do general goods transport that may be cheaper if you can take the stuff to their Bangkok location. You might get more ideas by asking a mod to move this thread to the Chiang Mai forum.

Just did a quick search in Blogger help many complaints similar to yours about Blogger defaulting to the local language. This post "How to change language if you are an expat in a foreign country" has some useful details about setting the language preferences, but of course this only works once you are signed in to Google/Blogger.

I know what you mean about Google and Blogger. They seem to serve a page in Thai if the IP address is in Thailand. The best workaround I have found is to be signed in to Google and check the box to stay signed in. If your settings are for English then Google will (mostly) serve the page in English and the same when you go to Blogger. Sometimes even though signed in, the pages still revert to Thai for no apparent reason.

The original links I posted no longer work, so I am updating them.

Report of the murder in the British press. A report from the inquest here.

The Nation article - appears to no longer be available

May I join others in expressing my condolences to Paul's parents. If any good can come from this terrible crime, this thread is a part of that as a warning to others.

In my opinion, extreme jealousy is a common and unfortunate part of Thai behavior. Jealous reactions of some lead to harming themselves or others.Take heed folks.

These are a disposable, single use type. Throw them into the fire and they explode releasing a dry chemical extinguisher powder.

We use 315 Water from the Sansai area. Have done for 5 or 6 years. The water in the 24x500ml glass bottle crates tastes and smells good, 45B. The water in the 20l water cooler plastic bottles sometimes smells and tastes of chemicals a little. I think it is something they use to clean these bottles. 20B delivered.

I think CMSteve is referring to the Thai designed and made Elide Fire Extinguishing Ball. http://www.elidefire.co.th

There is another news link and more comments about Bill Young in the page of remembrance thread pinned at the top of this forum.

William Young, Helped U.S. Organize Secret War in Laos, Is Dead at 76 - Obituary in Today's NY Times.

CHIANG MAI, Thailand — William Young, a missionary's son who mixed evangelical zeal with covert missions for the C.I.A. in Southeast Asia and who helped organize the "secret war " in Laos for the United States during the Vietnam War, died on Friday at his home here in northern Thailand. He was 76. (snip ...)

William Young followed his father's path and joined the C.I.A. after a year serving in the United States Army. In the early 1960s, as the war in Vietnam escalated, Mr. Young assembled an army of local tribespeople in neighboring Laos, a force that at its peak reached several thousand men.

"We used to jokingly call him the American warlord," said Bertil Lintner, an author and longtime friend of Mr. Young's. "He was ideally placed to organize the secret war in Laos."

As far as I know, I never met him, but would have liked to. He must have been very knowledgeable about North Thailand and Laos. Anyone here knew him? Lived in and around Chiang Mai almost his whole life by the sound of things.

In my house we just use an English installation of Windows with a Thai keyboard so that they can type in Thai.

If you need the menus, help files and dialog boxes in Thai as well, then see the Microsoft Windows 7 official language help here. This will only make the Windows software itself appear in Thai, not the installed applications. Each user account can have their own display language setting. You will need the expensive Ultimate edition for multi display language support (or a hack).

You may also want to get a copy of Windows 7 Ultimate installed before you come as that is the only way you will be able to type Thai.

For the benefit of future readers of this topic I feel I should correct this. Any version of Windows 7, Vista or Windows XP can type in Thai just by enabling the software for a Thai keyboard. This is found under language options in the Control Panel. If you want the Windows menus, panels and help files to be in Thai, THEN you need Windows 7 or Windows Vista Ultimate or Enterprise editions in conjunction with a downloaded Thai language pack.

I have no association with this charity, but it looks like a good new home for your PS2 to me.

http://www.crostonhousechildrenshomethailand.org/

The daily top 20 posters are here

You are #2 on todays list Jingthing. Beaten by the classifieds robot.

Member list sorted by # of posts is here.

I wouldn't worry about it too much yet. You have got a loooooong way to go until you will make the leader board.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sXoPXstEvdY

A friend in Mae Sai is reporting a crack in his building and can see some other minor damage in the downtown area.

If we are talking about the nuclear reactor situation I hope Thailand never builds any reactors so the situation can never arise.

As far as coping with the aftermath of a tsunami, in my opinion the Thais coped admirably with the situation in 2004. They got onto dealing with the aftermath quickly and with a minimum of fuss. No wallowing in national self pity. Many people volunteered to help and the work was often not easy or pleasant. It was probably the period that I have had my highest opinion of Thai society.

There are some suggestions in this recent thread.

Plenty of guest houses around for under 10,000B/month and many have wifi, though the speed and reliability of the connection may vary.

Here is one I know of. http://lannamoon.com

I have had several phones repaired at the phone shop on the basement floor of KSK in the furthest corner on the right hand side (with your back to Huawy Kaew Rd). They are just by the stairs that go up to the souvenir/Lanna food area. The opposite corner to where the TT&T office is. They speak OK English, prices are fair in my opinion and they usually do the repair while you wait. They can fix both hardware and software issues with Nokias.

Googled up another article that says

World Moto is starting its pilot project in several tourist areas in Bangkok beginning February 14, in coordination with the Bangkok city government, before making the devices commercially available. The rate is set at 10 Thai baht ($0.32) per kilometer.

So someone may spot a motorcycle meter in action soon. Also one of the developers is a member of ThaiVisa and has a gallery of images stored here. Perhaps he will be along at some point to contribute to this thread.

Came across this article about a Bangkok based company that wants to launch meters for motorcycle taxis. Do you think this will take off? They are going to be available next month.

Many thought that Bangkok would never get metered car taxis but it eventually happened. I don't know the history of how that came about. I can't see motorsai meters becoming popular unless the BMA mandates them. I would be surprised if moto drivers are as keen as this article suggests. Apart from the upfront cost, it would make them more accountable and could lead to being able to tax their earnings. Meters could make it easier to agree a fare for longer trips, but I don't see it helping much for trips up and down the local Soi.