George FmplesdaCosteedback

Funny how building regulations are ignored.

All the fuss over Pattaya Walking Street signs and yet Bangkok if full of apartments that are not accessible by fire appliances (not that they could reach that height anyway).

RIP to the dead and quick recovery to those still affected.

Time to have a look at the planning department employees' bank accounts???

Wild East.......

I don't see the problem.

The MGBGT lot want equality, so sign them up and see how they do.

Thailand hasn't had an armed conflict since they were invaded by Burma about 2-300 years ago.

So what's the problem?

(Please don't mention the 2nd World War, as there was not a shot fired when the Japanese invaded).

On 4/1/2018 at 9:50 AM, alex8912 said:

I say “ when in Rome” It’s fun and it’s therapeutic! 

BTW do you know how many people die in their own houses? The bathtub slip is a BIG one.  Staying home is not always “safe”. 

Got to be safer at home than on a bus in Thailand though?

All I can say is that if you can play the game the girls really get pi55ed off.

Just more excuses by the BiB for not doing the job the are employed to do.

TAT's new slogan.

Thailand: The Most Amazing & Dangerous Thrill Rides In The World.

Just take a bus ride!

Since surviving two bus crashes and observing the lack of any skill by the majority of drivers here I know it didn't take a survey to prove the obvious that can be seen on any street, road or highway every day.

Let's face it, the carnage over Songkran is not significantly different to the rest of the year...

Without an effective police force and regulated inspections of vehicles and drivers this will not change.

11 hours ago, Cranky said:

80,000 Baht will get you a pile of junk that will quite probably cost the same again to bring up to a half decent standard.  Robbery when you see that in the UK you can find a pretty decent motor for around 2 thousand quid. 

Yep, all about taxation. 80k is a starting point but it possible to find things for that and up to 120k+ which are serviceable if you are not trying to keep up with the Joneses...

High mileage is a myth these days though, as anything untouched (not modified) in most of the Jap ranges will do 300K kms if they have been looked after. Rust is not usually a problem, but if you want something smart remember the paintwork fades in the strong sun here and a respray isn't so cheap.

Best of luck.

13 hours ago, TheFishman1 said:

Go to a Car Auction you will save lots of money I bought a car here at Auction and two years later only oil changes everything on the car is perfect just my two cents 

I didn't know they held them here. More details please.

18 hours ago, soalbundy said:

Why hasn't the UK triggered article 127 yet ? last day today otherwise it's a very soft Brexit but then the government knows that already. Makes getting back in again in 10 years time so much easier.

No "Trigger" needed.

The UK was in the EEA before we joined the Common Market.

The EEA is a trade agreement: not a unified, control orientated, corrupt, undemocratic and expansionist bureaucratic dictatorship.

I am in favour of the UK rejoining the EEA (after the UK leaves the EU), and we will be welcomed back without any doubt as the offer has already been made.

Keep up!

18 hours ago, kannot said:

Id  doubt you were treated as equal, as you "know"  Thai society.

Well, as equal as you can get in this xenophobic society.

20 hours ago, stephen tracy said:

If the cap fits...

Top Hat? Deer Stalker? Turban?

What is your choice.

You sound like a Trilby...

Anyway, last comment.

Better things to do.

19 hours ago, stephen tracy said:

I thank you for your pearls of wisdom and great insights into Thai culture. As of tomorrow I shall make every effort to join you in the "real world". I would thank my mother but she passed away a few years ago.

My mother died years ago too, but is not missed.

My insight into Thai culture seems to be from a different perspective to yours. We could both be correct? It depends upon who you interact with and their social standing. If it is only one strata then you will not get a balanced view.

I hope anyone new to Thailand reading this can learn from both of our experiences.

Best wishes for the future.

Catch you on another thread sometime.

So, this is an interesting case. The cops can claim 20% of the fines legally as a bonus, something that has been suggested recently as if it wasn't already an incentive.

Seems this guy claimed it as his when the boys on the street should have got it, so he is a cop stealing from cops...

Well, he already has an "inactive post" since he is retired, so I wonder what the court will decide is his penalty?

Cut his pension? Or a couple of grey bills and we will forget about it?

1 hour ago, stephen tracy said:

I suggest you go back to your little self-righteous, I'm an ignorant farang life in Thailand. You are way out f your depth. Your comments clearly illustrate how little you know about the country you profess to be a cultural expert on. Their are plenty if farangs like you here, you're a statistic.

As are you. An ignorant arrogant idiot with no understanding of the true culture.

I have met lots of expats that have the "superior" attitude like yours over the years and it is great to be wined and dined (as I have been) but if fact just a token sycophant looking for an advantage they can exploit.

You need to join the real world, or maybe you don't need to thanks to mummy?

Grow up !

15 minutes ago, stephen tracy said:

My grandmother died before I was born. My Thai circle of friends has no problem discussing such matters because unlike you they are not ignoramuses and not afraid to express their opinions, despite the current climate. They're the kind of people the Prayuth would love to lock up. I expect your a fan of his.

One again you are completely wrong.

I discuss politics with my Thia friends. Some are very wealthy and others are simple workers.

They talk to me as an equal, not try to impress some jerk like yourself as happens in Thai culture, that you DO NOT comprehend.

You really know very little in your insulated world.

I expect when you venture out of the cocoon it is to a 5* hotel in Phuket, not a house on sticks in Nackon Nowhere.

Go north, give some coins to the kids to ease your conscience...

What a waste of time you are,

15 minutes ago, stephen tracy said:

How can you comment on a book you've never read? And so how can possibly comment on a country and a culture you nothing about? Nix, nada. Marry a local woman from a socio-economically marginalized part of the country doesn't - I'm afraid - qualify you as an expert, although it is a common delusion amongst your type.

"amongst your type"

Ah! Your type? You presume AJD is in a different social/economic class to you, that's a leap of "faith" or stupidity.

Zuckerberg is one of the richest guys in the world and he is getting his arse rightly kicked.

(see my earlier post on "mummy's boy")

35 minutes ago, stephen tracy said:

I didn't live in a compound, and it was actually my mother's job that first took us abroad. I did attend international schools but with local kids in attendance as well. The fact that you said I "need to study"ore about Thai culture speaks volumes about you. Your just another clueless, Western farang who came to live in Thailand (no doubt the first time you've ever actually lived abroad) and are under the delusion that you actually know a thing or two. I've got news for you, you don't. I laugh at people like you and have dome since I was about 10. For elaboration see my last comment. A 5 year ban?  How bloody stupid. Even the Thai friends I have in Bangkok thought the whole thing was an embarrassment and a complete over reaction. They too laugh at western expats like you.

Ah, of course I expect mummy looked after you just the same, and nanny gave you a rub when you wanted one.

What a load of privileged crap.

Steven, you don't live in the real world, Very few Thais would dare to question the monarchy unless they are so rich as to be "untouchable".

Thai fairy land with the rich, famous and vacuous.

Enjoy.

The rest of the population are not of the same opinion.

2 minutes ago, stephen tracy said:

One part of me actually feels sorry for you. I had more experience of the world than you'll ever have when I was 9 or 10 than. The girl was laughing because her "boy friend: made a fool of himself, just like you're doing now. Anyway, Mr Thailand cultural expert, you're boring the B'Jesus out of me now so get lost and find hobby, or better still, a job.

I retired thanks, and your experience is worthless for the main part.

You are lost in a vacuum, and should be emptied into the trash.

My son did all you did with his step father after a divorce, so I know much more about it than you assume.

If anyone needs sympathy it is you for not understanding the question ON topic.

Respect.

8 minutes ago, stephen tracy said:

Well Joey, if you'd read my earlier post, you'd see I don't have a "back home". I've been living abroad since was 6 years old and was therefore aware of different cultures from a very young age. By the time I was 10 I used to look at adult expats as a little "clueless". Because I was a kid I made friends with other local kids at whatever school I was attending in whatever country and picked up the language (kids heads are sponges in that respect), rather than the majority of adult expats who spent most of their time hanging out with other expats in their boring little expat enclaves discussing the locals (often in a negative way) as though they actually knew something about them. What is it with western expats, particularly in Thailand, that think they know more than others about "Thai culture" than other expats?  Most of them have never lived abroad before, then they come to Thailand to live for the first time and all of sudden they're experts on the place. A little anecdote for you to illustrate my contempt for the this mentality,  About 5 years ago I was in the cinema in Paragon trying to kill an afternoon, and as usual the king's anthem came on which was everyone's cue to stand up. I was slow getting up because I had a sprained ankle at the time. There was a farang male with what looked like his Thai rent-a-girl-friend, who thought that because I was slow standing up that I wasn't going to, and so the guy (he was British) told me to stand up asap "because of the culture mate, in'it". I told him to mind his own (deleted) <deleted> business and lowered myself down again and sat through the whole anthem. All the while he was standing their behind me huffing, puffing and tutting. The funny thing is his g/f was chuckling the whole time.

1st class disrespect.

Ignorant fool and idiot.

Spending time in the compound with mummy is no experience.

The guy (Brit or otherwise)  in the cinima was right to stand as I bet all the Thai audience members did.

The Thai girl you cast aspersions on was likely thinking you might get a kicking out side, hence the laughter.

Sheltered life in all the countries Dad took you too.

I bet he got you a job too....

Clueless is right. Nowhere to call home you have no idea,  no allegiance just lost in the ether.

4 minutes ago, stephen tracy said:

I lived and worked in Bangkok for 11 years and speak, read and write Thai. I also lived in the Middle East for 10 years after a completing a BA in Arabic with Middle Eastern and Islamic studies, and so am fluent in Arabic. Prior to all that  - due to my parents' job - I have been an expat in various parts of the world since I was 6 years old. I barely know my birth country. As a result, I am very aware of cultural sensitivities in general. Your examples are not apt at all, in fact they are quite absurd.

Well, an interesting life of multicultural experience.

It seems to have made you immune or unaware of how much some behaviour can upset the locals. Ah daddy took you and mummy to live in the compound.

If you were conversant with Thai culture you would understand the outrage.

I do and have been here far longer.

I'm sure you behaved in the Arabic countries for fear of devastating retribution however old you were.

The Serbs got off lightly in the end. I would have given then a 5 year ban on top.

A year in jail for a cigarette end on the beach?

Sorry, your argument doesn't stand up.

2 minutes ago, stephen tracy said:

She didn't do any of those things. That's silly comparison. She wore a long skirt that rode up without her realizing. It's as plain as day. A simple honest mistake cannot in anyway be compared with setting a copy of the Quran on fire or hanging your jacket on the Basilica Alter cross. Those examples would both be deliberate acts. I haven't a clue why the incident even made the news, let alone why a bunch of farangs on TV would endorse the sad, pathetic creatures that actually took offense at such a trivial (and unintentional) thing. Totally sad. OMG, female tourist's skirt rides up accidentally at a temple... Hold the front page! And by the way, there is a big difference between "despondent" and uneducated.

You need to study more about Thai culture.

The sort of outrage you can expect is equal to the perception of the action in the country you are in...

That is why the examples are apt.

Do you, or have you ever lived and worked in Thailand?

6 minutes ago, stephen tracy said:

What a joke. A tourists very long skirt rides up at a temple and now she's public enemy number one. And I love this: "The status quo will continue until all Thais are better educated"... If I had a thousand baht for every time I've heard a farang expat (or shall I say sexpat) refer tp Thais as stupid or uneducated by stupid uneducated, unworldly farang expats. I could have retired years ago. Many of the farang expats I've met in Thailand are living proof that travel doesn't necessarily broaden ones horizons.

Well Steven. what makes you an expert?

Thailand has many very intelligent people, I have worked with lots of them, but mostly they are as despondent as I am about the future.

I said in an earlier post: "hang your jacket on the Basilica Alter cross" or set fire to The Koran and see what people have to say.

You must respect the culture of where you visit.

Next...

The Serbs were wrong and deserved more than they got.

Justice in Thailand is a different question.

Thai behaviour abroad is not an excuse and they should be prosecuted with the law of the land they are in.

Ignorance of the law is never an excuse.

However some (or most) Thai laws seem to differ depending on how much money you have, or which official you are talking to. 10 years in jail for a "grope" over Songkran? Which law does that come under?

The corrupt seem to have enough money to persuade all but the very few honest in the system to make any changes.

The reforms promised have not come about under the latest junta, and have not under "democratically elected" governments before.

The UK has had 400 years trying to make it work, with blood and guts spilled. Cromwell chopped off the King's head in 1649 and cancelled Christmas don't forget.

Yet the 2016 referendum result is still being disputed?

The status quo will continue until all Thais are better educated, and the generation following that might have to fight for it.

IMHO

On 3/29/2018 at 9:57 AM, maxcorrigan said:

Very sad, at least he saw she only got the burnt relics of the house, car, and motor bike,

so he had something of a last laugh!

All very sad, but far too common.

I bet his missus is kicking herself now for spending the money he gave her to renew all the insurance policies...