steveromagnino

If PT win (which of course they will) then they should be the ones running the country, no question. The problem that's happened, the Government abused its position in a huge way. So reforms are needed before an election can come about again.

What exactly are those reforms needed?

At a minimum, off the top of my head, there are a wide number of measures in which Thailand is failing, and the only way they will be addressed is with reform, whether before or after an election, first there must be agreement that, for instance, reform is needed on the following:

Great wish list. Let's add world peace and a cure for cancer whilst we're at it, eh?

hey, he asked for reforms needed, I gave him a 5 minute list.

planning and doing positive things for a country often are a lot harder than just skimming 60% of the government budget and hoping no one will notice. but doesn't mean it isn't worthwhile.

I'm an ABAC grad, I would go with Mahidol if I did my degree again, mostly because ABAC IMHO has gone backwards a little.

FYI if you speak (as I assume you do) Chinese, you should not have a problem getting a job at all.

We hired a Chinese guy out of ABAC, he struggled the first year, was good the 2nd year and now is frigging AWESOME at his job (since promoted) and he has leveraged that he speaks Thai, Chinese, English very well - you could be the same.

Feel free to PM me if you want to talk further.

short vowel - when the first syllable is a short vowel then the rising tone transfers to the next syllable.

ขนม same principle.

Get him into the following (a list of ideas)

- triathalons (trinerds and various other triathalon groups online all train every week)

- sailing (sailing club at Rama 9 park off Srinakarin or go the whole hog join Varuna Yacht Club and hang out with loads of other expat kids of similar age)

- windsurfing/kite boarding (Pattaya or Hua Hin loads of clubs)

- wake boarding (Taco Lake in Bang Na, loads of kids there too)

- Muay Thai or boxing (sport of kings here and really good for self confidence - if you are in Din Daeng Jitti Gym in Rachada would be close)

- running - regularly go to sports club or parks to run

- volunteer in some activity to help others e.g. English at a local school, start tutoring

- basketball at Thai-Japan

- join one of the billion online facebook community clubs for expats - mostly a little older but still useful e.g. science, movies, etc

- cooking classes

- if he's reasonably decent looking - modelling/acting even extra work

- Learn Thai (meet other students, AUA or similar)

Loads and loads of things to do here beyond walking around shopping centres. Learning Thai I personally think is one of the easiest and most important things that is easy to learn here and very hard to learn somewhere else.

On soi Tepprasit there are a few places, other option would be going to one of the boat builders almost all of whom have circular saws and workmen, and give them some cash to do for you. The places in Soi Tepprasit would probably want you to buy the wood from them.

I know that Andaman Boatyard for instance in Na Jomtien has the equipment for instance, as would serenity but whether they would do it or not depends on the owner I guess.

This is an industry (construction) I have some knowledge of, and I can say there are plenty of foreigners working in the sector in management/project management roles. Thailand is a stepping stone and a hub for some of the firms for the work they also do in Cambodia, Burma, Laos etc also, plus Thailand is in the middle (well it was until the last month) of a building boom, and with more to come if this current government continue to build white elephants left and right.

With loads of jobs available, in all honesty, the real way to get in is to start with any firm, doesn't matter which and what salary, and immediately start 'pressing the flesh' (in the non prostitute connotation of the word) by networking. If you are good, once you are networking, you will have more job offers than you can handle. The proviso is you need to be competent, capable of communicating and working in a Thai environment, and your results will be what matter - note that I don't necessarily say you need to speak Thai, rather you need to be an effective communicator with the people around you. Thai helps, but English - proper decent English - is vital in engineering. As is knowing what you are doing.

Certain firms are French and prefer to hire French etc, but on the whole, international standard project management firms and design consultancies and engineering firms are ALWAYS looking for competent people, and yes, Thai Engineers can do it, but there is a huge amount of construction going on here, so there are jobs around. However, you will not be able to get into this group if you are not here, not working and not spending the effort to get to know the people around you. And you must be decent at what you do.

The idea that occupations are 'restricted' may be true on paper, but in reality there are Expat doctors, lawyers, architects, etc throughout Thailand, there is a legal work around and so it's just the job title that might be a bit different (e.g. legal consultant rather than Lawyer).

Construction at the moment is a better industry perhaps that O & G for foreigners, in fact most construction sites now have a substantial proportion of non Thai workers/labourers simply because the sector cannot get close to enough people - at an upper level the same issue is occurring with some firms (only a few, but enough nevertheless) wanting to achieve an international standard....and to get there they are using international standard firms/consultants; I truly believe that there is not an issue finding great Thais to do the jobs, but there are simply not enough great Thais, there are plenty of inexperienced ones, but the good ones get snapped up all the time.

I would almost go through the list of firms you are applying for, remove all the big Thai developers/firms unless you have specific experience in an area (e.g. marina construction), and focus on international level consultancies for project management and specific aspects of construction; and apply for those ones. In my experience the world over, really craft and focus on creating a great CV, and be aware that the hit rate is going to be low; your aim is to get a job that gets your foot in the door, and from there, you will leverage that first year into a decent job - assuming you are decent etc etc.

I'm not a huge fan of jobsdb which is mostly for middle/lower Thai office worker recruitment; check out Bangkok Post and also identify the 50 firms you could work for and take a good look through their websites for what jobs are going. A huge number of jobs are not advertised, as is the case in other parts of the world also.

BTW and take this in the spirit it is meant, if you plan to come here to hang out at Soi Cowboy every night or show up at work with an Isaan 'maid' turned wife, etc then you are likely not really going to go anywhere in Thailand; we party hard, and we enjoy our work, but the label of 'farang kee nok' or 'farang tuan' will not wear off if you act like a knob as many farangs tend to do here.

Actually, there are a number of Israeli firms and consultants doing business in Thailand, and having a network of people to deal with for translation may be a good business for you.

There are also a lot of Thais going to work in Israel, again having translation 'on demand' is something useful.

I would strongly recommend you make contact with your Ambassador and Embassy, as the Israeli/Jewish community is quite big here for business, there are a number of jewelers, lawyers, consultants, construction/property, fashion firms - now some of these won't need translation being that so many Israelis speak good English, but for legal documents etc proper translation might be useful.

Thai is a single syllable language (for the most part). So it is a lot harder to contextually fill in the gaps, plus unlike English Thais have (except in Bangkok where there are quite a lot of thai speakers) yet to hear a lot of Thai that is outside the regional accents....resulting in a bit of an expectation that the word is said correctly because there are so few syllables to join together.

Honestly, if I heard you mispronounce it, I could make the mental leap to get to what you wanted by the context (hardware store, so you are not wanting crab eyes for instance) but given the way I have hear so many farang speak to Thai shop assistants (rattling off a list of things in English often using brand names, then getting frustrated and losing their temper when their list is unable to be understood).

For what it is worth, I had to repeat almost every single thing I wanted to say in USA when I lived there, because of my accent, so I am not sure it's so different.

Which is why, even if you have given up, perhaps a small way to reduce your frustration is get a handheld eng-Thai dictionary, and carry it with you in the car; when you need to buy something you can use that to do a translation on the spot or point and show - it makes doing certain things a lot less frustrating.

the problem with this measure is obviously things are very different now compared to say the mid 90s - for instance a number of state owned enterprises are now publically listed (at least in part); there are new entrants to the stock market from the previous family business; there are new businesses.

For USA, this is less of an issue, because the market fundamentals of who is listed and who isn't doesn't change as much - whereas Thailand look at the biggest firms the two largest by market cap were (for the most part ignoring the roll up of various smaller entities) IPOed in about 2003/4. Banks, telcos and energy make up a large proportion of the market cap, and these are all industries undergoing deregulation and substantial change.

I really cannot see the relationship, other than that in good times, firms are more likely to enter the stock market and affect the market cap of the stock market in that country. So it's one of those correlation is not causation type cases.

I believe it happened like this.

Ban - Hello PM

PM - Hello Mr Ban

Ban - I am calling to ask each party in Thailand what they want me to give them for new year.

PM - sorry, I think it's not appropriate for you to give me a gift, it could be considered corruption

Ban - no no, this is hypothetical, I mean, if you could have anything what would it be?

PM - well, I suppose a small box of crystallised fruit would be acceptable

Ban - (confused) are you sure?

PM - yes, that's what I would like.

Ban - After discussing with all parties in Thailand, I have reached a list of demands for each party, based on this time in the new year where each party should be willing to reach a compromise, and show their love for their fellow Thais.

Chalerm would like to see all members of the public stop breaking the law, and then discussion can begin.

Aphisit would like to see a non partisan reform committee to adjust the constitution before election.

and the Prime Minister would like a small box of crystallised fruit.

While they are round at Chalerms they might want to look for "that" gun. The one that killed the sgnt at club 21 and was searched for repeatedly at chez Chalerm without success. Any long termers will remember that outrageous case of injustice surrounding the murder and coverup perpetrated by the PTP heroic strongman.

Actually, I feel obligated to correct you.

It was Club 20, not Club 21.

And the son apparently only needed a year while Chalerm aided and abetted his fugitive son to somehow find a way that all the witnesses either suddenly hadn't seen anything or blamed "Ai-Peud" who apparently was the shooter. He was a proud MP at the time helping his fugitive son, so in this respect it's not so different now.

I clearly state that "on average Thais make 1/10 the wage of their American counterpart" in some cases it might be 1/8 in other cases it might be 1/15th, and this is true for those making minimum wage right up to those with advanced degrees Is it possible that you have been over in Thailand for so long that English is your second language now? In any event I come back to my premise in answering what the OP was asking, and that is why would anyone come to Thailand to seek employment at 1/10th the wage they could make back home when the living costs on average are on only about 1/2 of what they are back home

While it may be true on average to consider 1/10th, I would say that Bangkok management wages vs. USA senior management are closer to perhaps 1/4 - 1/2 depending on the role. Speaking from personal experience (as I have always earned a totally Thai salary rather than an expat package) I know that every senior exec in my company now (and companies I worked for in the past) is earning within the ballpark of what they would earn in a similarly sized mid level company in a 2nd tier city in USA other than arguably the CEO (exec management around $100 - $200k USD per year; senior management around $60k - $90k USD per year; junior management $15k - $75k per year etc etc). This is quite on par with jobs outside my company, and in fact when I am approached to change jobs or in discussions recruiting new staff, I am fairly sure these numbers are quite typical for a "decent standard" Thai company (i.e. subsidiary of an MNC, Thai listed company, decent size Thai company). No doubt wages are less if you are working outside the CBD in some tinpot little organization in Nakhon Nowhere. There is definitely a difficulty in pulling really decent New York/LA/SF level salaries however, hence why I'd say it's 1/4 - 1/2 maybe on average for the type of job a foreigner could do.

So for someone like the OP looking to move to work here, there are decent paying jobs out there, loads of them in some industries (PR, advertising, finance, property, construction, etc), but they tend to require or look at a decent work record; a decent academic record....and you need the connections to land a job or find out about a job here - made a whole lot easier if you are here already.

The best jobs are not going to be advertised, so you need links with recruitment agencies, and to closely follow the firms you want to work for. The fact you are not a Thai (and resulting need to do work permit etc) are not a deal breaker, however proving your worth here is more difficult. It's well known that Thailand is a major 'loser magnet' economy - there are some real dregs out there working here for a pittance simply to hang out at Nana Plaza. You can forget that whole aspect of life here if you are serious about working here. There are also some very very smart people here too from around the world (plenty from Japan, Singapore, HK, Australia, etc) so you need to be hanging around the right people to some degree - here it's know who, not know how that matters most, at least to get in the door.

Although I have only lived some of my life in USA, I am unsure that I would be financially better over in USA compared to here, I doubt it simply as I am a person of simple tastes; if you want to live like an American(eating steak daily, driving a BMW 5 series etc etc) in Thailand, then the equation won't work at all because it will cost you more to live here, and you'll earn less, on that I agree.

I am not entirely sure nor do I agree that Thai bosses are tyrants any more than any other nationality, at least not in an 'international standard' company - certainly the ownership can result in more owner interference and less oversight than a US firm - but there are ways to work around almost every aspect of the workplace. In general, I can say I find the work environment to be pretty relaxed and enjoyable; my staff are willing to work far harder than their American counterparts, but certain aspects of managing them is required to ensure they are kept happy, for want of a better word.

I think your Aunt had some good advice. She probably understood more about cognition than she realized. I know I speak too quickly; perhaps in an attempt to sound more fluent.

When I repeat I usually try to say it in a different way. Maybe it is better to say the exact same thing, slowly and clearly.

(Reminds me of a visit to the hardware store. I asked for ตาปู, but they didn't understand. I tried miming the action of a carpenter pounding a nail with a hammer. Still no luck. I found the nails on my own.)

Yes, my auntie speaks Thai, but not so much English, so it was good when I first moved back as I had to speak almost all Thai. Sadly she didn't correct many of my mistakes, but most of them, so I guess I did ok.

ตาปู is actually ตะปู (so that's the really short vowel sound for the ตะ and then long for the ปู; when you see the ะ it's the aim to cut the vowel sound as short as possible, a short break between the syllables, then the ปู is long vowel sound. ตะ is not an easy sound for a westerner to say, I swear I cannot hear the difference between ต and ด even though I know exactly how to say each. ด is like a D in the word door, dawn, dog. ต you move your tongue from the middle of the roof of your mouth when you say d to instead press your tongue fairly hard against the back of your front upper teeth and you push the middle of your tongue to the roof of your mouth, sealing the airfloor, then push slightly more air through your mouth when you release your tongue from against your teeth and say the ต meaning it comes out as a harder sound halfway between a D and a T (which doesn't exist in English).

It's the same for บ and ป, not easy for an English speaker to say correctly, again (my aunt) taught me the physics so the sound comes out correctly, so even though I cannot hear the difference always between the 2, I get the sound right. บ is easy like bike boy band, you push your lips together gently and gently exhale and the sound comes out. ป is more complex halfway between a P and a B, and the way to say it is to force your lips together so they are rolled onto eachother (rather than just touching) they are holding ALL the air from coming out of your mouth, push about twice as much air through and then release your lips almost like a P sound and s you say ป

I did find that exaggerating the way to say each at first was a little comical but ended up in getting the sound actually correct.

So the word ตะปู is one of the hardest for a western speaker to get right; it is very rare I meet a western Thai speaker who seems to nail a word like this

- the vowel lengths (in English tend to all be medium length, this word needs short vowel then long vowel)

- the ต sound correct (normally comes out as English D which is sounds same to us, but is a multitude different for a Thai listener)

- the ป sound correct (normally comes out as English B which sounds same to us, but again is very different for a Thai listener)

If you know the word hammer ค้อน (long vowel high tone) then the context would be easier, but for sure this is the type of word I would also stumble on sometimes to get myself understood.

And just to put in context, I use Thai all the time in the workplace and am (sometimes) confused for a native Thai speaker (not for long though)...but there are certain words like ตะปู that give me away.

Oh man i would really really like for you to record saying หมูทอดกระเทียม". (or something other)

http://vocaroo.com/i/s1O79FAt2iVZ

BTW, what kind of media files can be uploaded? I tried m4a, m4v and mp4, but all were rejected.

I have zero problem understanding what you are saying.

It is easily clearer than 95% of the farang I have heard speak Thai; you seem to have a pretty reasonable understanding of the tones, Moo is actually a rising tone (you are using a high tone because you have cut the sound so short, it should be more like moooooooooo (rising) toooooord (falling) you are cutting it a bit short, G (gratium) not K (kratium, yes it is written kratium but said with a G) but that is still easy enough to understand.

The only thing I can guess is you don't have the context, I would not walk into a Thai restaurant and just say this. It would be like walking into McDonalds and blurting out "cock". With a little context, it would be quite understandable (despite my mispronounciation)

(wait for server)

hello can I take your order?

Hi, can I get a big cock?

you mean a coke large size?

yes

would you like fries with that?

no, just the coke.

etc etc

I can think of countless farang I work with who speak Thai far, far worse than this and they get understood, I can only guess it is perhaps who you are speaking to, and perhaps not wrapping enough context into the conversation, or it is some sort of alignment of the moons. Honestly, I have zero problem understanding you.

I know you have sort of given up, but at least when I first moved back here (I could speak a little Thai as a kid) I had an aunt who said the following things:

- speak slowly, it will help the person speaking to you to speak slowly

- if they don't understand, carefully say the same thing again, exactly the same

- there are many reasons why someone won't understand you, it doesn't mean you are saying it wrong, it may be they are partly deaf; they may be preoccupied with something else; they may just be a moron - don't assume it's because you are speaking gibberish

Anyhow, I really do think you are very very close, easily good enough, are you in Bangkok? Upcountry sure, people cannot even always understand a city accent, in Bangkok people should be understanding you with this level of pronounciation.

Comparing to SIA, isn't it that Nok Air is the low cost carrier (equivalent of SCOOT, Tiger), and Thai Smile is the regional secondary cities carrier (equivalent of Silk Air)? Like a bridge between LLC and a normal airline?

LLC usually means:

- paying for food onboard

- reduced luggage and no frequent flyer benefits

- possibly no assigned seating/preferred seating premium

- reduced seat size/recline

- using secondary airports

- point to point

Much as I love Tony Fernandez, I never fly Airasia and other LLC, the tiny non reclining seats, hygiene, bus like atmosphere and general way the whole experience works just means I either go with a 'proper airline', or I drive.

BTW I was actually at the conference when K Tossapon actually stated (way back when Suvarnabhumi first opened and they were running to there) that they didn't care about the plan of a low cost terminal at Suvarnabhumi, they were quite happy to move over to Don Muang to save their customers money. As it is point to point, the idea of linking flights matters less I think to their customer base (who don't mind paying 400b to go from one terminal to the other I guess, and that's not money Airasia sees anyhow).

So it's not a conspiracy from Thai to keep them out of Suvarnabhumi, rather mutual agreement to head over to Don Muang as a result of the airport being not really being able to handle the traffic.

For what it is worth, I think for a CX5 few would look at it, since it is a new model, and the dates are almost the same.

However, many people (myself included) look at the manufactured date when buying 2nd hand cars. In your case doesn't matter much, but there are cars made in 2010 and first registered 2 or 3 years later (a lot of demonstrators for Euro cars are like this). Also a lot of import cars are 'claimed' say 2012, but are actually far older (e.g. 2004) because the date of the white plates is what is claimed in the ad.

However, that then would rely on someone being able to check the manufacture date, for BMW, VW etc you can use the VIN to check when it was made.

I know what the car looks like, but have no greater understanding than that, for any new model car what you might want to check is if there are any minor changes between the first cars off the production line and subsequent cars e.g. changes in firmware or settings, fixes for annoying things - e.g. Ford seems to have quite a few things when they released their new models relating to the dual clutch; won't make much difference to resale but would be worth checking to see if there is anything that you should check should be done prior to driving off (or making sure it is done at the first check up) just to get the best possible driving experience.

BTW it's a really really nice looking SUV. Great size, congrats!

I cannot believe that any Farang from a democratic western nation would support the fascist protesters.

The Government has been democratically elected.... Let them govern.

Can you imagine all the wealthy people in the USA or UK rioting in the streets, shooting policemen and savagely assaulting taxi drivers because they dont like who the majority of the country had voted into power.

the attack was shameful, and very disappointing to see.

If anyone has details of where this taxi driver is, I would welcome a PM, as I would be willing to make a donation and support any costs of his medical care.

For what it is worth, I don't really place so much faith that this is any sort of majority view of the people protesting against the government (to beat up a single person) any more than a small minority of the red shirt mob who were in 2009 then again in 2010 "rioting in the streets, shooting people and assaulting various people because they didn't like who the majority the country had voted into power in 2007"

I really hope that people understand that this is not a black and white situation; that either you are against the rule of democracy, or you support the current government. Not only is it a nonsensical false dichotomy but it also ignores the very real grievances on BOTH sides.

I can only hope that cooler heads prevail, but given that there was no consequence for violence/trespass/etc in 2006,7,9,10, it seems like the current way of doing whatever it takes and then going back and fiddling the law/court process to ensure no consequence is proving a true dead end. I suppose arguably the precedent was set in the asset declaration interference case - lean on the courts to get what you want and ignore the rule of law.

This is why amnesty is always a crappy, crappy idea. Those responsible should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.