JimsKnight

Heh, only on the CBR 150 were those moves pulled!

Never again, I hope!

I was into the Rayong Land Transportation Department office today to see about getting my Thai Motorcycle Driver's Licence.

I had all the necessary papers - photocopy of my passport first page, photocopy of my visa page with entry stamp, photocopy of my departure card, photocopy of my Canadian driver's licence (both sides), letter from the embassy showing my address, and medical certificate from local clinic. (and originals, of course)

Got a bit of help - sign here and here and here - and spent a lot of time waiting.

Took the colour test, and the reaction test.

Sat and waited.

Maybe they didn't notice that my Canadian licence was for a car; maybe they didn't care; maybe .....

Had my picture taken, waited a bit, and plop! out came my Temporary Thai Motorcycle Driver's Licence. I'm good for a year, and will head in next November to get the five year one.

They also accept the Driver's licence as positive ID for you to enter most National Parks and thus pay the same as a Thai citizen, seeing as now your eyes can see what they can see and not discriminated against. Also have used the Driver's licence to go over into Myanmar for shopping (no passport). So it is a very handy document to hold.

You say most, but it's not always that easy, I've had to argue for local discount despite having thai drivers license.

But undoubtably good to have.

I'm coming up to my 5 year expiry on my license soon, that should be fun and games...

Buy without book but set aside a chunk o' change for when you start getting perpetual fines from all angles.

You might be lucky, but the BIB only have to be lucky the once when a big bike crackdown is ongoing and you'll of been financially better off buying a legit bike.

^ Morning Allan, wow, that's a lot of 4's...

Dude, I thought my eyeballs were going to pop out as well!

Easy on them keys big guy.

Jomtien Ride down the hill and through the obstacle course of roadworks...

Rolypie, I couldn't get the bike to gatecrash into any bars for added heroics, sorry about that It's a bike journey vid.

And................

What more do you want? Dancing go-go girls to appear in your room?!

Go out there and see it for yourself

It was a frantic scramble through traffic to get it from the post office (customs charges no less) but now at least I've got a replacement bike cam

It no longer will be mounted onto the helmet. It was a bit shaky wakey up there the last time (as BBBK pointed out more than once )

So instead it'll go onto a fixed position on the tank. It's much easier and less hassle than jury-rigging it to the helmet. But it does mean I lose some luggage space with it sitting there...

Here it is, the new Tachyon XC and compared to 2008 model it's miles better the quality is improved, as is the sound. A bit wind rushy but not too bad.

No more wavy lines when at a standstill either.

Here's a sample:

Not too bad eh?

Well I can tell you one of the reasons the work is taking so long is because they are running power and phone cables underneath the road. It will cut down on the messy looking spagetti factor of wires everywhere. This is a Thailand first I'm told...

That info is coming from a thai who lives in Pattaya and has an ear to the ground. I'm just passing on the message.

The road truly is a disgrace with no end in sight. You don't see major road jobs like this take years to complete that ruins tourism and the local business owners lives . I see no long term disruptive projects in Pattaya, Naklua or the Pratamnak areas. It seems like someones got it in for Jomtien in the government here and this has to be helping these other areas.

Even the completed section going down the hill towards the flyover from Jomtien has dust caked for hundreds of metres and is an irritant for motorbikes and baht bus passangers choking on the dust as the speed increases on the new surface.

You would never see long term mess this in Phuket, Hua Hin or Chang Mai but they find it acceptable to screw the people of Jomtien. My rant over.

Phuket has a bunch of thugs in tuk-tuks who make the pattaya motortaxi crew look like angels.

Hua Hin is a place that has none of the benefits of a small city and none of a fishing town. It doesn't even know what its own identity is.

Chiang Mai isn't too bad, but the morality police and repressive mindset hold it back. At about midnight the whole place shuts down.

Just been heading out on my daily adventures.

Where the Highway police base is between Pattaya Klang and Tai on Sukumvit they were carrying out vehicle checks. Bikes and cars.

A whole phalanx of us were pulled on in and checked out.

Be careful if your bike is 'hot' or dodgy.

I showed them the tax and bike license and he was asking what CC my bike was. I told him 400 and he was considering taking it further. He got distracted and I slowly moved away. He didn't have a problem with that. But I could tell he was wishing he'd hit me for my green book (which is legit).

Pull on over or don't travel down sukky for a while if your unsure

Bottom line vigilante justice is regarded as a bad thing for a reason. The police are there for a reason. If your can identify him report it to the police and let them investigate.

The State police system only came about because of the growth in cities and population rises. Plus it's a good way of instilling fear without going overhand with a militia etc.

Vig. is a bad thing if it's done wrong, but if the police aren't available or are in 99% of cases a reactive clean-up force then it's you folks on the ground that are the 'police'.

Think about that one...

Well it says 62 have veiwed this, no comments ?....am i to assume its not worthy and is normal practice for thailand,......

Pattaya is not Thailand ....

This is normal practice for bar in Sukhumvit road etc Bangkok and places like Pattaya , Phuket (Patong Beach) and also Koh Samui now

80% of the bars in Pattaya are Russian, Police or militairy "co-owned"

So for any new comming farang with Bar idea's in that area .. you must at least have 10 years of prison in your own country or at least be a little criminal.

Pieter

Or (usually if you are thai) have your own small, private army to man the place (which is what we had on Koh Tao that way you only get nit nawy police hassle

The draw back is it costs almost as much to keep the place safe as it does to pay them.

The moral of the story is, don't open a bar unless you allow for the 'security payments'

Watching Fox "News" tv my blood came to a boil watching the Mike Huckabee show in which the ex-governor and future republican party US presidential hopeful let loose an expat bashing tirade.

It made me think that there is a long tradition in US politics for the right wing to demonize people who leave America as the most heinous kind of unpatriotic types. For example, the old canard, Love it or Leave it.

Now I realize many people leave their countries for negative reasons (they really hate their countries for whatever reasons) but in my view most of us leave our countries for POSITIVE reasons (because we have really good reasons to go the country we are moving to). Leaving doesn't usually mean we are more or less patriotic than our less adventurous brothers who stay home and it doesn't always mean we won't be back someday.

So my intention here is for expats from different countries to discuss whether there are political factions in their home countries which bash expats, or not. I really don't know or have any preconceived notions about it.

As a background to the Huckabee rant, he was reporting on a news story where a gym owner had a big US flag displayed in the gym. Some customers complained that they were offended by looking to the flag while working out. The owner refused to take down the flag and instead suggested the complaining customers go away. From this small story, Huckabee went into a virilunt rant about how anyone who is offended by displays of the American flag should go buy a ONE WAY ticket out of America, and the America would be much better off without them. He also mused that some of the stimulus money should be spent to send away such people, again on ONE WAY tickets. You get the drift here, the strong implication is that the many people who have actually left America on ONE WAY tickets are horribly unpatriotic and that anyone who has left the US (except of course SOLDIERS) hate the American flag. A politician like Huckabee uses this kind of rhetoric to whip up nationalism and hatred of the foreign.

So, does this kind of thing happen in your home countries, or is the USA a little special this way?

Mate, it depends on your ideology and political persuation whether you let this drive you nuts.

I know from your posts the right wing isn't exactly your hang-out so you've automatically given it from your side of the fence.

Huckabee isn't one of the bad repubs. In fact a lot of Dems I know admitted if they had to vote for a Republican it'd be either him or Ron Paul.

Nothing wrong with a bit of Nationalism, as long as the expats aren't being hounded.

Afterall if you had a nice house you'd looked after you wouldn't want people coming and going whilly nilly without knowing they are ok.

If anything I personally have been more affected by the vile and despicable labour party who have been hammering UK expats for some time now.

So for me Huckabee was right in what he said apart from when he said they should clear out of the country. I think he was just caught up in the moment and got carried away.

If we are to take all this business about carry-on security seriously this new step is a terrible idea.

The only thing being secured is what passes into the departure area at that point. What about when the shops get their deliveries, etc, how secure can that possibly be? No need to go into detail, you get the idea.

I've seen this in other airports as well, all it does really is boost business for the snack concessions.

At manchester airport you have to buy a £1 bag for any liquids you have. They won't give you one like they used to.

So this profiteering garbage is nothing new I'm afraid.

Hi,

I am resident in Thailand since almost 10 years, so I know in advance what you will reply

So why asking ?

Simple: A friend of mine, who doesn't know Thailand, asked for my opinion, and I wish him to realise that I am not blackening the picture.

The case :

His young nephew came in vacation in Pattaya, got a girl friend who (quote) "loves him a lot".

Back to France, he sent, as asked by her, some money by transfer.

Squeezed by his family, he stopped one day and the girl vanished.

A year later, he came back and found a new girlfriend who (quote) "loves him a lot".

He informed recently his uncle that he opened a small bar in Jomtien with his girlfriend.

He has a tourist visa.

What will happen ? What the family should do ?

Please, no jokes, that topic will be followed by a worrying uncle.

Thanks in advance !

From a galaxy, far off in the multiverse, 50,000 collective sighs and groans went out...

'Not again!'

Well back in 2005-06 when I was knocking about bangkok I can tell you Ramintra was a nightmare for the police snooping about and early closures.

We're talking bars and kareokes getting shutdown by the police at 1130pm! I thought I was back in the UK sometimes.

Then there was checkpoints etc

This was back when Toxin and co were on their morality mission it's better since he's been usurped but nowhere near the glory days of the 90s.

There's always some new big cheese cop who wants to makehimself known as the biggest gang leader in town.

Once he's happy the old groove comes back. Until he's posted out and the whole thing repeats

I reckon I'm the only person/farang in Bangkok to of rode across the Rama III bridge on a motorbike (excluding police).

That was by shadowing HGVs at every tollway checkpoint while on my CBR motorbike all the way across the Chao Phraya river Rama III bridge.

Saved myself a whole lotta traffic bs on that one

The problem is I don't have transportation so I need to be able to tell the taxi driver where to drop me off exactly. I can't find any park on the map nor the wat nor the vineyard?! If I'd tell the driver to bring me to Wat Yaan will that be OK? Is the entrance close there?

Can you not just hire a bike or car?

Just moved to Kampheang Phet and need some help to find out what the city have to offer in adult entertainment and

would also like any tips on good pub, karaokee, live music venues etc... Basiclly tell me everything I need to know about the nigthlife ( if there are any ) in kampheang phet..Thanks..

Mate, the best way is to get out to the city what til' nightfall and find it yourself.

We can advise you on the 'mainstream' places, but you've got to get your self out on the ground looking for the racy stuff.

I've lived there for a bit and it has the 'adult' places but it's a question of you finding them, and not the other way around

Good luck, and watch the traffic. It can be a bit tight and congested.

Being a bit over ambitious on this one I think.

Why would any expat need to be told on his phone what's going on in Thailand when they can find it out for themselves using other media or by simply getting out there and seeing for themselves.

Good god George, where or indeed when will the over-commercialisation of this place stop!

Am I the only one seeing this?

They say it's the cowards way out.

But living your remaining days here as a cripple is a big cross to bear for any man.

RIP german dude!

OP

Is your avatar just a coincidence?

....i wonder how he escaped?

Yeah!

I think he took the money and scarpered!!

Nor will much happen, people power and common law still hold sway in Thailand thank god.

If this were the UK that piece of slime would be trying to sue those who'd given him his due punishment.

Sometimes it's nice to hear of something that puts stuff in perspective

So apart from smoked makarel, decent bread and cheese the only thing I really really miss living in Pattaya is being able to take a nice and quiet walk in nature.

I understand this is kind of a white people weekend family thing and thais don't go out for a walk but there has to be some place?!

So if anyone knows of a nice forest with some trails in it or a place where you can have a quiet walk along the coastline anywhere near Pattaya please let me know!

This place in Pattaya was kinda cool: