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Hi all you folks in Nakhon,

I'm dating a man from Langsaka and was wondering if trying to have a life in Nakhon might be easier for him then where we are now. I really would like to see myself staying near to the beach so the coastal areas would be of the biggest interest to me. Any thoughts of what Nakhon will be like in the next 5 years in terms of small business oppertunties and tourism?

Is it possible to buy a say 1/4 of a rai near the beach? Right now we are in Phangan and I love it, but he is not from that island, so it can be uncomfortable for him sometimes. He doesn't like to complain or talk to much about it, but I'm thinking I might need to let go a little of where it is that I want to live to make both our lives better.

Any thoughts?

I've been going back and fourth from Thailand to the states for going on 6 years now. I have a pretty full life in the states and I'm not ready to let it go completely. The work thing is another issue, as I can make so much more money in the states. I am thinking about opening a small business in Thailand, but that makes me very nervous.

I live on the same Island as SBK when in Thailand, so there are a lot of western women where I am. The other thing about where I live is that there are so many people that come every year that I have a few friends that are popping in and out of the area. It's nice and we e-mail each other a lot. It's just good to have someone to vent too, can't do a whole lot of venting with most of my Thai friends. Some stuff you can, but it's not the same.

I love the simple slow pace of where we are and nearly everything about it. I will be in Thailand full time one day absolutely.

He owned a restaurant on TNP or Sarat Thani? I often wonder why you are sill living there too.

Hi CCGirl,

Depending on where you live and what kind of work you are going to do will have a lot to say about the type of people you are going to meet. There are a few things that I'd offer up to make your life a little easier.

Finding a good western girl friend is number one. A gal you can pal around with and talk about what's going on at any given moment. This is far more important to find then a bf when you first get there. Your going to go through a lot of adjustments and need to have someone to talk that is western.

Be respectful and blend. One of the best ways to earn the trust of the Thai people in your area and make Thai friends is how you conduct yourself and being mindful of how you dress.

Check your western standards at the door. When dealing with the land lord, the vendor on the street etc. try not be be upset and laugh off anything that doesn't seem right to you. If someone rips you off for a few baht, frown a bit and even say something nicely and just don't go back there. Try and be clear and have your dictionary handy when making important deals. Smile Smile Smile

Accept that you are a farang and are going to get charged more money then Thai people, this is a fact of life.

If your the type of girl that likes to have flings, do that away from home.

If you want a relationship that has meaning and might go somewhere. Go super super slow. Size him up. Watch him in action for a long time. Many Thai guys have some pretty wild ideas about western women. Talk a lot and ask a lot of questions.

Don't get swept up by him telling you that he loves you right off the bat. He might very well love you and he might be the most wonderful guy in the world and very sincere, but there are many pitfalls in this.

He is a player and says that to all his girlfriends.

He means it and you sleep with him, which to him means your ready to be his wife. You don't want to break someones heart.

He means it, but he was not raised monogamous and as my dear friend says, "I have many rooms in my heart."

Read up on Thai Culture and enjoy your life in Thailand it's my favorite place on earth so far!!!

I don't know if they are any good, but I think Spa Samui has one.

Yeah, I'll check it out when I get back. Thanks SBK

I saw the listing that's what got the whole thing started. The one thing I don't think the island needs is another tourist shop. I'm thinking super small and there an awful lot of little shop spaces in Had Rin so that's attractive to me. The down side is I really don't think folks from the north would drive down to Had Rin. I think my target customer base would be the north west side of the island and where I live. I'm going to give some products a trial run on HTout of my friends shop and if things go then I'll rent a space.

Thongsala I'm sure is my best bet in terms of traffic flow, but I haven't seen any spaces that are really attractive to me, but something may come up. There is a strip of what I'm sure is retail space in Ban Kai that were being built when I left and almost finished. Anyone know what they are going for a month?

You know girlx you might be onto something...

The price of rent in Had Rin is another consideration. I never really thought of it that way. So many places going Out of Business and Had Rin is a mess with all the construction and all the awful cement motel style accomadation going up. Tommy's is heart breaking and that huge hotel thing being built by the market.

I really don't even want to own a bar or restaurant and am thinking more on the lines of a little shop that would cateer to long term vactioners and local people. Had Rin is super close to where I live, but Ban Tai would be better to get people from other parts of the island to come and check it out. Thongsala would be perhaps the best place since everyone goes there at least twice a month I would guess.

The ideal situation would be a small little place with a bathroom and back room to sleep sometimes.

I just love the location of the Corner Pub and the building. But have no idea what would work there in terms of business.

Hi SBK,

Yeah, I think your right on the Corner Pub. I just love that building and it's such a great location to live, but customers are sort of important. I was just talking with a friend about how we might make that work and being a madam just isn't on my things to do.

For Love of Cod Want's 3 million baht and it seems like way too much $ for the current Tourist situation.

Hey, I sent this really sweet deaf couple your way a long time ago, did you have a bungalow for them? She was Thai and he was from Europe. They seemed really lovely.

Hi SBK,

Yeah, I think your right on the Corner Pub. I just love that building and it's such a great location to live, but customers are sort of important. I was just talking with a friend about how we might make that work and being a madam just isn't on my things to do.

For Love of Cod Want's 3 million baht and it seems like way too much $ for the current Tourist situation.

Hey, I sent this really sweet deaf couple your way a long time ago, did you have a bungalow for them? She was Thai and he was from Europe. They seemed really lovely.

Hi all,

Anyone know the story on Corner Pub? For that matter House of Cod in Had Rin. Both of these places look to be really nice and great locations and both up for sale. I'm kicking around the idea of having a business and making the plunge to move full time the island. I have to say I've never seen anyone in The Corner Pub, but don't go by that often. Any thoughts or knowledge of why either are up for sale?

Sounds like your problem is with tone. If you have a good musical ear that part is a lot easier, if not, then it is clearly more difficult. If I'm not sure I always ask.

It again gets tricky because the southerners will use different tones for words then in central

I just sing the tones in my head: mai, mai, mai, mai, mai and say it out loud if I'm trying to get help with a word.

Also, the vowels; long or short and knowing some of the names of them so you can ask if it's sa ra "a" or sa ra "aah" I ask people to spell words in Thai to me if I can't seem to get it and that helps a lot. You know like is the word Rah Rua or La Ling.

Little things like that helped me a long. I'm not fluent by any means, but it starts to click after awhile.

Hey Girlx,

Do you have any of the books with CD's? I found the Thai for Beginners to be really helpful. That's a good start and they have a lot of add ons to the original course. I just picked up the first to volumes of their Speak like a Thai series. It's all slang and more contemporary.

The next thing I would suggest is asking at some of the internet shops. Maybe ask Ann or Om at Honey internet. I bet Om would get into it. Do you know them? Om's about 17 now and is a little shy at first, but warms up pretty quick. I think she would get a kick out of being paid to be a teacher.

Also try to write down things you hear often and ask what they mean. Since everyone on TNP for the most part is speaking Phangan Thai, you will want to try and get some of that down and you won't be able to look any of that up in a phrase book.

The interesting thing that I learned this last time was that Southern Thai is not all the same. My boyfriend is from Nakkon Si Thamarat and he often will give me choices, like on this Island they say this. It's a little maddening on Had Tien because we have Issan, Burmise, Phangan and Central Thai being spoken. It's pretty fun, but sometimes makes you a little nuts when you have different friends trying to teach you their dialect.

My Boyfriend gets hit on all the time, but luckily for me he isn't the least bit interested. I would however, have no problem what so ever telling a women to back off. He started wearing a ring on his wedding finger to try and help ward them off, which I thought was very sweet of him as it was his idea and not mine.

We all know the reputation of Good looking Thai men, so girls who just come for a holiday lay or two often could care less. Then of course there are the guys that have two or three girls going at one time. Just point them in the direction of Had Rin, lot's of boys willing to service their needs.

Ban Rak is one of the best places to stay in Samui, by far. I've been staying at Maya Inn off the ring road. You turn left at what used to be Ting Tong Corner.

They have about 10 rooms at 490 baht a night. It is adjacent to their resort that the rooms are much higher. The rooms I stay in are for fellas and their girls for hire, but who cares. The rooms are super clean and the staff are so nice and not at all slimy. Free porn channel and one free condom.

The other thing that is great is that check out is at 12:00, but you can pay by the hour so if you want to go do some shopping and what not before you head back to KP they just charge you like a 100 baht to check out later.

I'm going to be taking the new boyfriend there as soon as I get back

Anyway, Oriental next to the pier isn't bad, but check the bed. Some of them need to be replaced. Samui Garden is good that's going towards boput. Mermaid was great, but the water got bad. Anyone been there lately in the cheap rooms? Is Shambala the one with the Yellow sign? I stayed there and very nice, but no T.V. in the room I stayed in.

There is a fantastic place to eat across from 7-11.

Everything is there. Yummy Issan, Southern you name it. It's like 3 different food stalls all grouped together. One of them is called 3 guys or something like that. All the people working there are men. They make the best Larb and Som Tum and the khoa Nieo is always hot. So yummy. BBQ cat fish!!! They open around 4:00 pm.

Boput is too expensive now. I used to stay there all the time, but I don't think you can get a good room for under 700 baht, can you?

Here's the website: http://www.hamuniverse.com/everlifeflashlight.html

They are really cool. You just shake them, better for the environment too!! Lot's of batteries going into burn piles where I live, yikes!! But that's what is done with the rubbish on the Island. SBK is so right about the leatherman. Even if he isn't the handy type, he'll love it.

Hey bb,

Is he one of the guys up at Horizon on KP? If so one of those flashlights that you just have to shake to make them work, would be great. It doesn't need batteries.

You can get them on line.

You can never go wrong with Levis. I think most Thai guys would say that's the number one pick of gifts from the west.

I can't say too much about Samui, as I'm not there that often. So what ever numbers the TAT has come up with may be true or maybe not. But they are not true for KP. The 200-400 bt. are mostly on KP and they are doing okay. Those businesses will be able to ride out just about anything, because frankly that's where most people want to stay.

As for Havanna Girlx, I agree with one one hunderd percent. We all knew it was a joke and bad idea before he ever broke ground and the place just kept getting bigger and uglier. It just breaks my heart to see it. Did he ever even get the Indian food on the menu. I went there to give it a try and they didn't even have the Indian food on the menu yet.

Just wondering what's happening? Anyone got any news?

They moved back away from the road about for shops in one the other side of the street. The street going into Chawang. Unless, they had two locations before. I never went there but used that as a land mark to give people directions to get to that area of the island. Ban Rak, ring road right?

Maybe this will have some of the developers and folks building so many resorts and hotels rethink what they are doing. It's awful to book a lovely looking place and discover when you get there that there is a construction site right next door or worse your in the middle of one. Here is you lovely room with all the amentites and at 7:00 am you will be woken up to the sound of hammers and the like at no extra charge. Samui is off the charts on what you have to pay for a room. You really have to dig around to find a room that is worth the money.

I've heard that the number of people coming to the area was up, but all season long we were waiting for it to get busy and it just never did. We always use Had Rin as our bench mark to see how busy it's going to get and Had Rin stayed super quiet all season except right around full moon. Maybe the tourist are coming and not staying as long as the had in past years. Of course you have to factor in the amount of new rooms that have been built. But just walking around in Had Rin or going into Chawang in the evening looked like September in January.

I think all the 200-400 baht a night bungalows will do all right and some of the old favorites. But it's going to be very interesting to see how some of the new resorts are doing. Havanna on TNPY already wants to sell and they haven't been open for even a year. Makes me want to scream. He's a nice enough guy, but the place that was there before he bought the property was perfect and people staying there all the time.

Hey there everyone,

Well I'm back in the states, which means I'm lerking on TV

Have any of you spent any time on Koh Paluai? The net doesn't seem to have anything about it at all and I'm just wondering if any of you have been.

I've only been gone for 3 weeks and it seems like such a long time already. Funny how that works out.

Hope the islands have been getting a little more rain. and everyone is doing well.

Dr. Niyom

Bumrungrad Hospital. He has been my Doctor for 4 years now. He is worth the extra money to see him at Bumrungrad. I asked him about Botox for my crows feet and he was very honest and told me he does it, but that it only last for 6 months and didn't think that would interest me and he was right. I have a mild form of skin cancer and he has been just great. He listens to me and we discuss the best plan off action together. You can go to the website and look at his credentials and book an appointment on line if you like. I am normally in and out of there in 15 minutes.

Well I was there about two months ago and enjoyed it. It was expensive, but Sushi is expensive everywhere. You are correct on the wasabi.

Emotion of Sushi in Had Rin very nice.