newnative

You again. You seem to be solely focused on Pattaya and its supposed bad crime. Never mind that crime in Pattaya mostly falls into what would be considered petty crime in most places. Never mind that Pattaya is the 15th most visited city in the world, according to Mastercard, and with that many visitors some crime can be expected. Never mind that most of the 'crime' stories on Asean Now--someone has a gold chain snatched, so-and-so arrested for drug possession, another so-and-so a victim of this or that scam, etc.--would likely not warrant one line in any newspaper anywhere else in the world. With Asean Now and its expat reader focus, a clueless tourist having a gold chain stolen on Beach Road is apparently breaking news of the highest import, sometimes leading the AN news of the day. We can all respond with variations of 'What an idiot' or 'Another heinous crime in "family-friendly" Pattaya', but it doesn't add any importance to what is still a petty crime. Of course, some serious crimes do occur in Pattaya. And, Bangkok. And, Chiang Mai. And, Phuket. True for places big and small. Teenager shoots up a mall--but not in Pattaya. Some Swiss guy murdered his Thai wife recently--but not in Pattaya. A British teacher was just arrested for sexually molesting some of his young students--but, not in Pattaya. Crimes also happen elsewhere, too. You were the one who made the preposterous statement in your earlier 'Part 1' thread that, what was it, 95% of the crime in Thailand occurs in Pattaya. And, even more preposterous, you stated that you based your idiotic, incorrect, damaging statistic on what you read in Asean Now. Once more, here you are again, with Part 2. What exactly is the point of Part 2, other than more Pattaya bashing? Wasn't it all covered to death in Part 1? Nothing better to do with yourself? Apparently not.

Ridiculous lawsuit, should have been rejected from the get-go. How can a party or a candidate be prohibited from making any changes to government and laws? Or even just debating the issue? Ludicrous. If the party is disbanded, just start another, like they did before. Move Future Forward. Future Forward Moving. Future Moving Forward. Just keep doing it. The public, especially, the young, will follow you whatever the name of the party is.

If the rider can be found, deport him. Lowlife.

Yeah, right.

Some good advice from other posters. Ignore the usual posters who always question a thread if it concerns anything to do with more than meager amounts of money. Apparently for some, the only farangs living in Thailand are on small pensions with no COLAs and anybody with any money would be living somewhere else. Just an afternoon's drive around Pattaya would put paid to that. My spouse and I built our first house this past year, after renovating two other houses. Three bedroom four bath pool villa outside of Pattaya. Project started in February and finished around October. It was much more stressful than what we thought it would be. The project developer did not provide what we considered to be adequate day to day supervision of the work so we took it upon ourselves to do this--which meantwe were on site almost every day except for a few breaks when we did a little traveling. The massive project you are considering would, of course, take much longer and be much more complicated. No matter how good the construction crew, there will be a lot of work for you, with a lot of decisions to be made and a lot of planning to get things right. In our case, the construction crew would do the work but they first needed to know what to do. For example, we had to come up with the electrical plan, which is more work and more complicated than you might think if you want to get it right. Where exactly do we want plugs? How many? Which light switches need to be two-way? Where will ceiling lights go? How many? Ceiling fans? Etc. Ditto for designing the kitchen and its layout to get it to function at its best and have everything where it should be. Also armoires and vanities--what size, how many drawers, location in the rooms, etc. We did all the designs ourselves. You can hire designers, for example, for the kitchen, but you still need to work with them so you get exactly what you want. Just some examples. Most every day was a new challenge, with a new set of problems to solve. Most of the interaction with the work crews fell to my Thai partner, as I don't speak Thai and the workers had limited English. So, it was a lot of work for him. Is this massive project something you want to take on with the work involved? As others have said, I don't think building the mansion you have pictured is a good idea. I doubt your wife would ever be comfortable living there, to start. I don't think I would, either. And, as a foreigner, I don't think it's a good idea to stick out so much with such a grand dwelling. I, myself, prefer to blend in and not call too much attention to anything I am doing here. Our house, once finished, is very nice but it's surrounded by houses of the same calibre so we don't stand out as a specific target. In your shoes, I would build a house that meets all your needs and fits your lifestyle. If you want a home gym, put it in. We like to swim so a relatively big pool was important for us. I would build a house that has absolutely everything you want and be happy and satisfied with that. You might end up with something in size between your house photo and the house photo shown by another poster. You might also think about having a getaway place, perhaps Bangkok, to break things up from time to time. My spouse and I have a condo in Bangkok and we try to visit about once a month for a change of scenery. Good luck with whatever you decide and keep us posted!

You may not believe TAT forecasts but they're more accurate than not. They were very close, for example, for last year. Some posters focus on TAT changing its forecasts as the year goes on but that is the nature of forecasts; as you have more data, you can fine-tune your forecasts. This is just January; likely the forecast will change a number of times as the year goes on. Normal. Since you have used flight costs in British pounds, it seems you are focused on tourists from Britain. While certainly important for a diverse Thailand tourist demographic, the UK numbers are not a very big factor in Thailand making large increases in tourism numbers. For example, from 2015 to 2019, UK numbers were slightly up for those years. So, not declining but not rising steaply. If that was the case for all countries, Thailand's tourism numbers would just grow modestly each year. Thailand had a record year in 2019 due to large numbers of tourists from nearby Asian countries, including China and India. Nearly 11 milion of the 39 million just from China. Both of those countries showed large percentage increases from 2015 to 2019. To reach its 2024 goal, Thailand will mostly need to rely on visitors from Asian countries coming closer to their 2019 numbers.

So true. And, good day to you, too.

I'm super proud to be a Trump hater, too. And, of course, astounded that anyone would be a Trump supporter and, even more astounded, admit it.

One's still a double murderer and one's still a rapist, even if they both managed to escape doing jail time--although Trump might still end up in jail for other serious crimes he is currently charged with. Do you really want a rapist as President? Can't believe I'm even having to ask that question--that's the state of things in the US. Sad.

You're free to look. I don't need to. As I said before, I'm happy with Judge Kaplan's clarification that Trump was found to have raped Ms. Carroll.

I'll go with the judge's clarification of the court docs. Rapist.

And, with that I rest my case. Enjoy the Kool-Aid.

When it comes to Trump, I'll go with Maya Angelou: 'When someone shows you who they are believe them the first time.'

People who have met him say he stinks. By the way, you might need some help with your sentence, 'People who met him so he's very charming.' ??? As an adult, I'm here to, in your words, 'teach you stuff'. You might want to change 'so' to 'say' and the sentence would make more sense--unless it was suppose to be a 'joke' and once again I didn't see the 'humor'.

I certainly wish it had been a joke but, remember, we're talking about Trump--the biggest egomaniac on earth. Let's also remember Trump, himself, said, "I don't kid'. And, no, that wasn't a joke, either--his poor White House staff had to scramble to try to do damage control.

Yes, that excuse again. Always trotted out. 'It was a joke.' Trump was deadly serious and meant every word. Sadly, he is also probably right--he could shoot someone on 5th Avenue and still keep some of his supporters. If being a rapist hasn't turned them away probably shooting someone wouldn't, either. Sad state of affairs for America.

Totally missed the point of the post, which was to distinguish between a fact and an opinion.

According to Judge Kaplan, Trump is guilty of rape, by the legal definition of rape. Headline from Washington Post: Judge clarifies: Yes, Trump was found to have raped E. Jean Carroll

You've gotta be kidding. Had Trump made that tame, off-the-cuff remark it would have totally disappeared without a trace, utterly overwhelmed by all the other far more provocative, mostly untrue, remarks he makes every single day, every time he opens his mouth. We could start off with his Big Lie that the 2020 election was 'stolen' from him. Imagine any other politician getting a pass for that huge lie. Then, maybe go on to his statement that he will only be a dictator for one day--how do you think that would be received by any other politician? And, umm, are you sure it will only be for one day, Donnie? Would any other politician get a pass with all the Nazi Germany rhetoric Trump has been using lately? Or, the free ride he is getting as a convicted rapist? (Never mind that no other convicted rapist would ever entertain the idea for even a second that they could be presidential material--big problem right there.) The truth is, there are so many Trump outrageous lies, gross distortions, inaccurate boasts, half-baked half-truths, wild, nutty claims, slurs, and insults in all shapes and forms, that the Press, and too many of the public, have, 1, gone numb from the sheer numbers, and, 2, been overwhelmed in trying to cover, and keep track of them all. Remember when we were all shocked to our toes when Trump said he was so popular that he could shoot someone on 5th Avenue and not lose any voters? Now, after all that has spewed out of his mouth since then, in a free-for-all foul flow, it seems rather tame in comparison. Or, maybe I'm going numb, too.

Yet another example of the poor quality of teachers.

Measly 12,000 baht. Fines are a total joke.

I think saying '80million that support him' is stretching it quite a bit. In American presidential elections, large numbers of registered voters support their party and vote the straight ticket, no matter who is the candidate for president. In the 2020 election, it was around 42% for Democrats and 38% for Republicans. Goes both ways, Democrat and Republican. So, whether they actually support the party's presidential candidate, they will, in many cases, hold their nose and vote the straight party ticket, supporting the party. With this in mind, a political party could, if it was totally bonkers, theoretically, nominate, say, a convicted rapist, or, a convicted swindler and serial liar, or, a candidate with, say 90 or so very serious criminal indictments hanging over his head and, while not supporting him, a certain percentage would vote the straight ticket. Hey, wait a minute . . .

Let me get out my hanky and cry my crocodile tears for poor, super-rich Tesla. Boo hoo. Competition is good. Tesla models only came down in price because of competition. They were grossly over-priced--as shown by how easily the price was reduced once there was some competition. Buyers were being gouged. And, still being gouged, in my opinion. If you want a red car, it's an extra 85,000 baht. All colors cost extra, except black. So, if you don't want to pay extra on an already expensive car, channeling Henry Ford, you can have any color you want as long as it's black. Welcome to the early 20th century. If Tesla had better, fresher, more diverse product, it might be doing better. It makes 3 look-alike 4-door sedan models and an ugly truck. Only a couple of the look-alike models are currently available in Thailand. Most of the models sold have been on sale for some years now, virtually unchanged. Spend some money, Elon and keep your product fresh. Spend some money and produce more distinct models--and make them all available. Spend some money and open more dealerships. You're getting beaten by new and better competition, and this is just the beginning. You had the market to yourself and you coasted, raking in the profit but moving forward way too slowly. Take a look at MG, for just one example. They make a 4-door sedan. They make a large passenger van. They make a truck. And, they make at least 4 distinct SUV/wagon types of vehicles, some hybrid and some all-electric models. They're making the investment in new models and also opening up dealerships. Same with BYD--planning to open 100 new dealerships in Thailand in 2024. Both have dealerships in Pattaya. How many are you opening, Elon? If you are being 'demolished', it's your own fault.

Yaa! Cough it up, Donald, you convicted rapist. (I concur with the judge's interpretation of his sexual assault.)

You might be able to tell the difference between 'wheat facts and chaff facts' but you are apparently challenged in telling the difference between fact and opinion. Falling in the fact category would be 'Unemployment in the Biden presidency has averaged at ___%, while unemployent in the Trump presidency adveraged at ____%. Falling in the opinion category would be your 'Biden is a good president worthy of re election.' One could, of course, cite the unemployment fact as one reason to support the opinion that Biden is worthy of reelection.