ronnie50

Hmm, there were 5,500 reports of damage (varying degrees), yet in a matter of a couple of days some 29,000 existing buildings were supposedly inspected and cleared. But it could take months to find out why this one building collapsed. Is Anutin smoking the merchandise he lobbied for?

That's frustrating/worrying. I guess you must book you flight before the visa application (or after submitted)? After makes more sense of course. This nonsense about where one is staying is silly too. If you are going for 2-3 weeks, you're not likely to stay in the same place for more than a few nights. Do they expect you to list all the reservations and dates, or just the first one? So if we wanted to fly from Bangkok to Da Nang how far in advance should we plan?

So you mean peviously they weren't doing anything with the TM6 cards then. No research by manually inputing details like country, age, duration of stay? Of course they were. This just makes it easier for them and more work for the traveler.

Thanks. But I thought only certain nationalities can apply for the e-visa (e.g. British and EU), other nationalities need a visa from the embassy (and the stupid invitation letter - from an agency I guess), isn't that right?

Yeah, I've seen that one. Or how about this one: 'speak English in are country'

"Greatest country on earth" - In a word - No. But that's obvious to most and not worthy of a further reply as I'm sure it's been well-covered by others (and I'm not reading it all - again).

That's what I think too. It's just another creep, creep, toward us doing all the work - while paying for the air travel and the entry fee with no human service. In Japan, they made me do it all. No check in desks. Nice ANA ladies around at the self serve kiosks, but that's not the point. Like many (not just Japan), I had to self-check-in, scan my passport, print my boarding passes, print my baggage tags, glue them to my bags, then take my bags to the self-loading belts (hoof them up yourself of course). Before you know it, we'll be loading them directly into the belly of the aircraft ourselves with a loudspeaker playing on a loop saying 'keep moving, place the bags in the last possible spot in the rear of the aircraft'. They'll replace the flight attendants with 'safety robots'. A meal? Make it yourself in the galley's microwaves.

There is a bewildering array of websites claiming to be 'official' tourist visa sites for Vietnam. Many URL's ending with 'V.......gov.vn' (how they manage to get that domain extension, who knows). But trying to do the visa yourself is equally confusing. Unlike most ASEAN countries, the Vietnam Embassy here in Bangkok (and I guess everywhere) still wants an 'invitation' letter from a Vietnamese source. Anyone successfully done this themselves with the embassy here in Bangkok (without an agency) and what was your experience? How long, where did you get the invitation, etc.? Cheers.

No names of the condemned structures and anyway, the whole thing will disappear from the news by Songkran.

Thai baht is still way over-valued. BOT must be propping it up

Have four filters under the sink - and new - bought the new filters last year. Cooking with it is ok. But I tried washing fresh peeled fruit with it and had a weird stomach afterwards. So I'm only drinking store-purchased bottled water. As the tree huggers say, I'm paying mpre for the bottle than the water. So be it. My stomach thanks me for it.

Hmm. They didn't specifiy what he was spray painting. Was it just jibberish? Or something more substantive, like 'Boycott Trumps' US Products' (in Thai)? The only reason they got him is because he was caught on CCTV and probably the hotel/landlord ratted him out (and will keep the deposit of course). Grafitti - come on. It's everywhere (by Thais), why focus on this guy? Squeeze a bit of cash out of him before kicking him out of Thailand?

Will I stay or will I go!....

Won't affect me, whatever reciprocal actions the Thais take against the US. I'm already boycotting US franchises here in Thailand including, but not limited to, McDougals, Starbucks, Burger King, Oscar Meyer products, US beef (Aus instead), McCormick products, Tim Hortons (US owned for many years), Coke, Sprite, Pepsi product. No US booze (beer is weak anyway, and Kentuky whisk(e)y tastes like rotten socks) nor other US junk food at Villa and Big C/Tops. European booze and wine is far superior anyway. I don't order from Amazon anymore. People in other countries (EU) for example are doing this too. I never take a US airline. And then of course Canada kicked all this off (credit where due) with air passenger traffic down 70% to the US as of last count. The Trump supporters will try to joke and minimize this - but here's the thing: once this takes hold, getting those customers back, if at all, could take a generation. That means tens if not hundreds of millions of non-US consumers that previously bought US goods and service - gone with all that money.

You just gotta wonder if Trump and his gang had issued puts through a complex series of proxies in advance of this (unexpected more widespread tariff action) to short the market.. Would you be surprised? I wouldn't be surprised. But we'll never know (most likely).

Here's some info in the link below on WISE from Forbes (UK edition). It also does a very basic/brief comparison with TOR-FX, XE.Com, and WISE. Both WISE and TOR-FX appear to be British operations (WISE HQ in London; TOR in Penzance). XE.com is Canadian (at least its HQ is in the Toronto area). I wonder if moving Sterling via WISE might be easier than with other currencies (and what if you don't use Kasikorn in Thailand, does that make any difference?) https://www.forbes.com/uk/advisor/money-transfer/wise-review/

Aside from the human tragedy, the 5,500 damaged buildings is the 5,500 pound gorilla in the room. Everything else is a distraction at this point. Names of condo and office buildings to be condemned/closed/demolished are not mentioned, even though they have already identified several. Can they not be mentioned due to media libel chill?

That was similar to my experience. As I only do it once a year or so, and as the traditional method worked well before and was actually less than Wise, I'll stick to traditional I guess. If I need to start doing regular transfers, Wise might be more convenient/logical. But I also see their reputation is starting to suffer. Might be just a few odd snafus, dunno, but anyway.. (edited to correct the name)

I only transfer money internationally to Thailand once a year. Do you think it's worth using Wise? The rate I got from my sending bank last year seemed quite good and no big extra charges there or here. I also don't like the idea of giving money to Wise to sit on... Is Wise only worthwhile if you need to make multiple transfers (e.g. like monthly or more frequently)?

Not according to the article - but who knows? 'Furthermore, Clause 13 stipulates that the contractor cannot evade responsibility by citing the presence of an inspection committee or project supervisors. In this case, the construction was overseen by the PKW Joint Venture as the project supervisor.'

Two immediate things jump out here. First, will the joint-contractor claim it's their 'employer's' fault' (effectively officials of the RTG), and accuse them in court of pressuring it into using sub-standard materials and changing building support specs for kickbacks? I'm not suggesting that happened and it would be a risky move for both Ital-Thai and Chinese government. Second, it will be interesting to find out who insured this project. Usually a standard exemption clause in many insurance policies is earthquakes and other 'acts of God'. I wonder if the RTG as owner or 'employer' is self-insured? For big projects that usually makes sense rather than paying public funds to a third-party private insurer. Remember the 'red shirts' accused of damaging Central World and who the insurer turned out to be? (though underwritten by foreigners - smart move).

And pills right? Why a 'bottle'? A bottle of Indian Kamagara pills? Maybe it's poor translation.

Never had a woman say that to me - always 'ka'. As someone said earlier, women say 'krap' to young boy children. They don't use 'pee' for age with young kids either. It's 'kwap' - song kwap, sam kwap, etc.

Post-earthquake, do you believe the BMA will honestly declare seriously damaged hi-rise offices/condos uninhabitable and order demolition?