The Kuruvillas

What about our trip in HKT?

Great thanks guys!

Thanks for all your input fellas, we've decided to adventure into the rough and tough travel methods of Phuket. If we need a car, we will rent one, but off the cuff, most of the places we want to go are easily accessible.

Well if the event is on October 25th, so be it, we'd be missing that. Anyways if the Thai people of Chiang Mai don't want us there as it seems, we wouldn't want to be uninvited guests. We'd also be missing out on the paid event, which is fine really, a charity that's unheard of online except for an overpriced segregated event they hold once a year and seems to remain unregistered is not where I would like to volunteer my money. If there's anything I know about Thai Tourism is being naive will cost you and the typical Thai lack of transparency is what is costing this charity this time, if they're the real deal that is. In other words, Loi Krathong, for which the Thai people appear to be willing to share with outsiders will make our trip worthwhile.

Hey CMSteve,

Yeah, the charity raking in well over 3.1 million THB from just one event isn't even heard of online. Right, I find that rather hard to believe and if you do, it doesn't say much about your aptitude for whiffing out a scam.

And as for AnotherOneAmerican, at least he / she and other members of this site contributed some semblance of answers to my queries posted and you contributed pretty much nothing.

I don't think you have the language skills required to comprehend both my queries and my suspicions about the charity you claim to support with such fervor so I am no longer going to entertain any of your comments. If you don't like my suspicions or opinions of the YeePengLanna International event or the charity / foundation that claims to be behind it, you don't have to but kindly leave this forum topic alone to those who can be of some help as opposed to none at all.

And FYI, I never judged you and called your opinions 'stupid'.

Farewell.

Meanwhile, those here who have some idea as to when the free 10,000 lantern release will be held at Mae Joe University grounds, do share as my wife and I would love to know.

So would it be better to book a car rental then online or to just go up to the kiosks at the airport and negotiate directly with them instead on arrival?

It seems rather unfortunate that the tuk tuk and taxi mafia end up engaging in self mutilation economics.

Hey guys,

In BKK we have the convenience of public transportation, however in HKT, we're reliant on private carriers and their subjective rates. This is something I have read up a lot on so far and while my wife and I are looking to stay in Patong, we aren't looking forward to dealing with difficult taxis and tuk tuks. I checked out the car rental option for our 8 days in HKT and that works out to approximately 6500 THB with a economy car from Sixt or a similar rental company for those 8 days. That's 812 THB a day in air conditioned convenience and we would be free to travel all over HKT back and forth, exploring without any hiccups. Obviously this excludes fuel.

I wanted to know from you guys and girls if this is a practical option. We do not want to ride bikes so that's not an option either.

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts

And one more thing, looks like all the research you did was check the one website that even mentions the Tawan Bon Doi Project which is yeepenglanna.net. I may have actually done a bit more research than you did here given that's all we've been doing regarding our trip out there in the first place. We posted on this forum to gather more clarity on what otherwise seems murky, subversive and dishonest. If everything online was clear about these two events, I wouldn't have had to come here and seek further information. I therefore do not think what I said was stupid in any way and I wouldn't sit here and judge anything you said either because that kind of negativity online is both pointless and a waste of our time.

Fair enough CMSteve, not looking to stir up any ill feelings here. My experiences in BKK while generally awesome (hence me returning a few times a year), often were wrought with touts and scams artists at the ground level. People stopping me from entering a historical site falsely claiming it was closed and instead trying to convince us to go to some shop or location from where they get a commission is just one example of that.

The YeePeng Lanna International lantern event being held as a VIP paid event may be for a charitable cause as you say, however as there is little clarity on the whole affair, I would rather keep my money to myself.

And usually when I donate to charities, they're registered and provide tax receipts. When a charity charges 100 USD for an event that has say 1000 attendees on the low side, that's 1,00,000 USD a year being raised which is rather fantastic if it's being used to educate girls up in the mountains. I am sure 31,00,000 THB from just one event is quite the fund.

Somehow, as there is close to no information about either of the foundations involved in YeePeng Lanna International lantern event available online aside from yeepenglanna.net which you claim is a privately run endeavour, I must remain skeptical about the authenticity of that event and those charities.

Based on the above and the information being provided to me online, I do feel the whole event is suspect and the intentions of the so called otherwise unheard of foundation that raises at least 3.1 million THB are not entirely charitable. It is therefore my opinion that it could very well be racketeers and scam artists after all. Maybe it's not, but we can agree to disagree if you like but as you said it's a matter of perspective and mine derives from my opinion. No offence.

AIS is better than TRUE?

My apologies CMSteve, I had inferred the paid Event was a tourist trap affair from AnotherOneAmericans post above and several websites. I come from a country where many charities are being run illegally so their trustees acquire immense wealth preying on the sympathy and compassion of donors. Also given the last time the Yeepeng Lanna Website was updated was 2012, a tout on the ground trying to convince me to drop 100 USD would seem suspicious. Either way, the lack of clarity on the whole thing seems rather subversive and while I would happily donate to a charity for a worthy cause, dropping 100 USD for a charity event that seems to use a religious and cultural act as an excuse to sell tickets and that uses exclusion and segregation as marketing tools makes me uncomfortable. During my previous visits to Thailand I learned not everything is as it seems and coming from a country that trained me to be suspicious, I have a strong preference for clarity, transparency and forthcoming behaviour.

It's just a matter of perspective that remains when clarity does not.

Well looks like we will be there between the 4th and 8th of November this year. We do not want to go for the paid lantern scam thing and support such racketeers with our hard earned money so worse comes to worst, we'll just buy us a few dozen lanterns and let them soar up high by ourselves. You guys and girls are most welcome to join us and of course, we will be there to see Loi Krathong. If the Mae Joe lantern release occurs during our time there, maybe we could bump into some of you who'd be attending it

AnotherOneAmerican, your reply seems rather confusing and worrying. From what we found online, the 10,000 lantern release is on full moon which is the 6th of November, 2014 and that information was backed up by several websites. We booked our tickets keeping the same in mind. In fact most websites currently list 6th November, 2014 as the event date for Yi Peng and the 10,000 lantern release at Mae Joe. It appears the only website I found supporting the date you suggested it's on is the same link you provided. If in fact it is on the 25th of October, 2014, we're going to miss it as we would be in BKK on that date. I could try for an alteration of our flight plans if I can get accommodation sorted out and Thai Airways is amenable to the same, but given the varying dates being mentioned, I obviously won't want to change things without 100% confirmation. Are there any other folks here with supporting data that confirms the date for the 25th of October, 2014?

Anyone in CNX attending? It's our first time and we wanted to know where we should go and at what time. Any suggestions would be most welcome. Are there things we should avoid? Lessons learned worth imparting? We really want to not get screwed on this and want our experience to not be scarred by the tourist traps and disappointments that usually befall the unsuspecting.

Hey everyone,

My wife and I land in BKK on the 16th of October and are there till the 27th of October post which we will be heading to HKT till the 4th of November post which onward to CNX till the 8th of November and then back in BKK till the 13th of November.

Visa, flights and hotels have already been booked but I had a query with regards to mobile telephony. Usually when in BKK I pick up a True SIM from the airport that lasts me 2 weeks just fine, however given we are staying for a month, we wanted to know if there were any good plans we should look at. Over a month, our data usage might be around 2 GB each and 3G or 4G is a must. Mostly we would be calling one another and rarely internationally.

I might estimate about 600 minutes each in Thailand during our time there would be more than sufficient.

Anyone have any suggestions?