falangadang

Your first mistake was handing the phone over. Unless the guy insisted you threw the phone to him then he would have had to come within arms reach to take it. At which point he's not expecting any violence if you indicate that you're handing it over,... then disarm him (a swift kick in the nuts or punch to the throat would work wonders)

Your 2nd mistake was not running him off the road when you had the chance.... I would have reversed over him just to make sure he got the message

Your 3rd mistake was placing any faith in the police doing diddly squat to help you.

No matter where you go in the world you will find villains and ar$seholes! There are far worse places to be living (such as Fullerton California where the local police can form gangs of 6 and beat you to death for absolutely no reason at all and then get exonerated by the judge).

All of a sudden we see Chalerm enter the fray!

Where's he been? .... on sick leave I suppose!

Seems to me that as Thaksin's thug of convenience and brown nosing sycophant that he's been given a directive to "get tough" even if it means breaking a few heads.

I would say that from here on in its going to start getting rather shitty!

Its all starting to get very murky!

Whichever way you look at it, this election will fail.

1) If it goes ahead (seems inevitable) then we have a situation where the major opponent to Govt (Suthep's PDRC) are not represented in the election,.. and neither are the dems

2) The enrolled candidates wont be able to get a full response from the Thai public because of the blockages to the election. Many will abstain to avoid violence.

So in the end, whoever wins wont be able to claim a fair democratic victory,.. and the opponents of the winners will make this clear.

Once again we would have a government not really representing the democratic will of the nation.

Sad story,... all you can do is learn from the experience and start to rebuilt your life and your business.

I have found that even in my own marriage to a lovely and honest Thai wife that she has limited money management skills.

Yes she can budget shopping for the household well but when I used to give her all the money in advance for the month's requirements it would invariably not last until the end of the month for now other reason than mismanagement (not abuse). And she isn't a dummy either,.. not a bar girl and with a double degree from Uni.

This is the case with most Thai women unless they grew up with money in a Thai-Chinese family or something.

Since I took over 100% control of the money we never have any problems and I sleep a lot better at night.

Lesson learned; next time don't give your wife control over any of the money!

Perhaps there was some damage otherwise why would they have been so willing to come up with even 100 baht?

I realize that perhaps to Russians the notion of getting "arrested" by "police" is very real and scary as they come from a powerful police state and know that once in custody it can be hard to escape.

We can give benefit of doubt to the jet ski operators that there was damage,.. and perhaps the "anti" was raised by using the fear factor?

Whichever way you look at this, its not looking like a good outcome whether the election goes ahead or not!

Well they've been saying that Suthep is going to be arrested for ages now but nothing happens.

Thankfully Chalerm's back and seems to have it all under control!

Now he only needs to find a tough crack shot police team willing enough to head up the arresting squad and run the gauntlet with Suthep's body guards!

‘‘It would be better if you do not go out because you will find we have taken over the polling stations,’’ Mr Suthep told voters.

True colors finally showing through!

..... just when you thought things couldn't possibly get any worse!

When the music sops the person holding the parcel will have to do a very un-Thai thing, make a decision. In this case there are two holding the parcel, YL and the EC.

The Constitutional Court tossed this hot issue back by saying the election could be postponed it did not say it has to be / must be / even should be.

YL will want it to go ahead and the EC does not so what next and who will prevail ? I honestly can't see the two sides reaching a reasonable accommodation, I'm sure the election will go ahead and prove nothing.

It just doesn't look good.

If anything the dems might get accused of sabotaging democracy.

What's in a name huh. The democrats who don't play democracy.

At the end of the day,.. it doesn't matter which party is voted in as they are all in it for themselves and in reality the people have little say in the outcome despite appearances.

This actually applies even more in the west (US/UK/AUS etc) as the people are ruled by a Corporate Autocracy and not via a Democracy (just look at what those countries have done to their own constitutions).

But at least in Thailand the people can take to the streets and can hold the country to ransom when they are not happy. Regardless of who is leading such protests, the fact is that they do happen and the people are able to exercise themselves in that way. That is WAY more "democratic" than the western system which would stomp on such public protest in a heartbeat as we have seen with the various "occupy" movements.

Democracy is an illusion created by those in power to appease people and coerce them into compliance and obedience!

As sad and hurtful as this is to the Thai rice farmers,.. it's all part of the meltdown factor necessary to bringing down the YL government.

They have shown their true colors and gone from shining saviors to deceitful liars in a short time and this will destroy them in the eyes of their most ardent supporters if it all does go south.

Oh how the mighty have fallen!

Thanks Briggsy.... is that the usufruct option? can one of these be sorted out before the house is built?

i read that the cost is only 100B when we are married, so this sounds like a good option

A Userfruct (UF) is an instrument/document that gives you lifetime use of the property.

That said,...IMHO not worth the paper they're written on because lets say you built a house on it and that the UF gives you a technical right to occupy (for the term of your lifetime), If you had a split from your GF/Mrs then she could claim that the UF to you would force her onto the street and cause hardship. This scenario is amplified when kids are involved. A Thai court is HIGHLY unlikely to kick her out and you can forget calling the police to get her out.

If she was to sell to someone else (without your consent) then you may have some leverage by way of a UF or a 30yr lease being registered on the back of the Channot at the Lands Office. However, such things can be overcome with the aid of the "right" people in the transfers dept or via a cunning lawyer. It's not like the west where you can register an "absolute caveat" which can only be extinguished by a court.

Up until recently I was not confident that westerners had much chance of recovering any equity in Thai land when marriages or relationships end, but I have read many reports here on TVF where the courts awarded 50% of sale proceeds to the western husband. If you're not married and not intending to (legally) then I'm not sure how the courts look at defacto relationships and you ought to seek advice on that one.

Disclaimer... I am not a lawyer and this is not advice; just my opinion based on many years of experience here and many conversations with Thai lawyers on the topic when I was first getting married and investing here 10 years ago.

Cheers and best wishes with it.

So Thailand get's the technology later than its poorer neighbor?

No, he told the world secrets that belong to the American gov't. That is called treason. For THAT, he deserves to hang.

He could have stayed in his own country and told people. He didn't. He chose to tell countries who are hostile to US interests. He didn't seek asylum with any allies, like say the UK, Australia or even some relatively neutral country like Sweden or Switzerland. He went to China and then on to Russia. He sought asylum in such places as Venezuela.

“I know no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them but to inform their discretion by education. This is the true corrective of abuses of Constitutional power.”

Thomas Jefferson

How did the shooters not get a good few shots into that

fat lump. I mean, he's an easy target is he not?

They used an AK-47,.. not exactly known for its brilliant accuracy!

The cops here are very good at their job when they want to be.

Problem is usually no one makes it worth their while, they get paid a lot more to abstain.

Actually the cops are brilliant at their job,.... collecting money at traffic stop shakedowns!

An outrageous sentence.

Firstly, he plead guilty.

Secondly, it wasn't pre-meditated murder.

Thirdly, "the pitbull" got 25 years which was premeditated murder.

Fourthly, the "body in a suitcase" murderer only got 10 years.

Thai justice.......an oxymoron.

This doesn't just apply to Thailand. It's world wide.... and the reason for that is that its a "legal system" and NOT a "justice system"!

They read Thai Visa,.. find the Achilles heel and go for it!

Seriously,... they learn from each other.

About 10 years ago I met a great Thai girl from BKK who was working in an Internet Cafe and she was telling me how all the bar girls would come in there and share notes and find out what the latest killer routines and money extracting emails were and then play the field.

She said it was common for many of them to have 5 to 10 "Johns" on the hook at any one time and just played the law of averages!

wow, that's crazy fast!

Coming soon to Thailand?

I think your poll list is crap............

That's fine everyone has a right to there opinion lol can you suggest an extra answer for my poll?

LOL,.. yes I think he already did: "I think this poll list is crap"

Crazy, one or more of the three have to fail, Promenada, Central Festival or Maya, there isn't enough customers nor money,

How do you know this? The mall investors likely did their research, along with expected increase in population and wealth over the coming 5 years. Not saying they can't be wrong, but they likely gave it more thought than the average Thaivisa pundit.

Also, competition is good. If two of them prove to be much better than the others then it's just fine if the lesser ones don't make it.

Excluding KSK for now (as it doesn't really compete unless work is done on it), that means four proper malls in the Chiang Mai area. (And pretty much the whole of Northern Thailand). Wikipedia has the population of the Chiang Mai Metropolitan Area (which includes Lamphun) at a million people. Plus tourists. Plus that also for people in, say, Lampang it's an hour and a half to drive over and go shopping.

Four malls does not seem completely unreasonable. Sure, maybe one of them doesn't make it, or shifts focus away from a general mall. That's okay. Maybe the other two new ones only turn a profit in 10 years. That's probably okay too.

Well we would think that the mall investors did their homework prior but hey,.. this is Thailand and they seem to put up constructions and start businesses here just because it seemed like a good idea at the time.

You can see this from the myriad of small malls and street front rows of shops. No thought into traffic exits, parking, traffic flow, street visibility.. I could go on and on but needless to say this is the reason we see so many vacancies. Add to that the plethora of empty condos in BKK alone and yet they're still putting up more.

As for the current mall scenario in CM. We live here and think its great. 10 years ago when I first came to live here you could always get a car park at Airport Plaza.even on busy days there was always a ton of parking in the outdoor carpark. Added to that there were a lot of vacant shops on the 4th floor, Then about 5 years ago it really started to change with no parking and all shops occupied. The last few years it was hell to try there on Fathers Day, Mother's day etc... just a stay away zone.

We expected when Promenada opened in July that it would take the heat off but it didn't,.. mainly because Promenada was a bit of a disappointment then (opened prematurely) but now its looking good and a really nice mall to visit.

The big difference was when Festival opened. Now we really notice the difference in lower crowds to Airport Plaza (which is still great) but Festival has to get the award of #1 CM Mall IMHO. Shopping great, entertainment and food - great, parking -AWESOME! and the access is good and location first class. Clearly some thought went into that one and we noticed on opening day how at least 95% of stores were open and well ready for business.

Not sure how Maya will go,... it seems a bit close to KSK,.. maybe will steal some traffic from there.

Bottom line: with the massive influx of new residents to CM (just look at how many new estates have gone up in the last 5 to 10 years) I think that the shopping malls might be a little on the oversupply at present but the local market will soon expand into it.

And this is meant to be breaking news???

This has been the status quo for centuries,... and at least the past 40 years or so in our modern era!