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thaigreenlab won't let you order anything

This is a fantasy I know, but just in case somebody powerful is reading... What is the difference between letting me stay here indefinitely as a retiree on a visa vs. letting me stay as a citizen? I think I can speak for many Americans (who are taxed by our government regardless of where we live) when I say I would jump at the chance to pay taxes exclusively to Thailand. Can only do that if we renounce our U.S. citizenship, and we can only do that if we get that second passport. I have to believe this would end up being a huge chunk of money. It wouldn't just be the Americans who are already here, you'd find all kinds of people who would come here and happily pay taxes to Thailand just for the opportunity to not fund the things the U.S. is doing today.

I'm happy for those who can qualify. I just worry about what this means for Thai culture long-term.

The audacity of the U.S. State Dept. is truly without bounds. BTW, do you know what their answer to this is going to be? That what you're talking about is human _smuggling_, and which is to be held as different from human _trafficking_ because the former doesn't involve criminal activity at the end of the line whereas the latter does, but do you know what? Human smuggling DOES involve criminal activity because the act of entering the United States without a visa is a criminal act. It was always a meaningless distinction, and the more they cling to it the more obvious that becomes.

The convenience of the mail-in passport renewal cannot be fully comprehended until one has made the visit in person.

A man took to Twitter to share a story about a Thai masseur who touched his penis while providing a service at a massage parlour. The shop owner defender her employee, telling police that touching a man's penis is often part of the service.

All new level of horror, this one. What can be done for the kids?

Just wanted to say, the mirror balls are incomplete without a bubble machine. A bubble machine is exactly what it sounds like, it's a machine that makes bubbles. The light reflects off of the mirror balls and then is refracted by the bubbles and it presents an impressive display, at least as impressive as a fluorescent light fixture or even two.

Not speaking Spanish, yes. So banks are really hard because few have English-speaking staff (I hear Mexico City is not so bad here), apartments is kind of the same, but fewer big developments and more mom-and-pop kind of places which again, language poses the barrier. Mexican websites will use PNG and GIFs to relate text information, so a lot of the times things like Google Translate don't work, and except for the very big banks there is no English toggle like there almost always is on a Thai website. I didn't mean fight like kung <deleted>. Probably a bad choice of words.

Yeah, I'm amazed nobody has brought up the visas. You get Residente Permanente by showing income/savings, and once you have it, it's the easiest visa in the world to maintain. You have to report address changes. That's it. No re-entry visas, no 90-day reporting. Bonus! People in the U.S. will complain mightily about the process to do this because they have to deal with their local Mexican consulates and these are by all accounts understaffed and very busy, but if you have the long-stay visa here in Thailand, you can just hop over to the Mexican embassy in Bangkok and use them instead. I found the process to be super easy; my first email query to them was answered in like five minutes, every interaction thereafter very prompt and helpful. Had to go into the office twice (drop off passport/pick up) and then of course you have to present yourself at imigracion in Mexico upon arrival. My port of arrival was Mazatlan which proved fortuitous as there was a little office next to imigracion that could handle a lot of the paperwork for you for a small fee; other imigracion offices further away from tourist zones aren't as well equipped. The big difference between Mexico and Thailand for me as a non-native speaker is, to survive in Mexico on a budget, you really got to fight for it, whereas in Thailand, the doors just magically open for you. Compare opening a bank account there vs. here, renting a house or apartment, dealing with utilities. I miss desayunos so much.

They say that sitting is the new smoking.

I find it very difficult to find fault with this statement. But I see that many of you have succeeded? Perhaps we're reading different statements. Hard to see this as anything but good news.

Easily the most dangerous road anywhere for pedestrians. And I say this having been hit by a scooter on Klang.

You get what you pay for with UPSs. My local-brand just gave out after just under a year; not the battery, the circuitry started wigging out. But they're cheap, so I guess go through one a year? Seems wrong. I like the idea of just getting the car battery and matching it with the inverter/charger as mentioned above but matching the components is beyond my level of expertise. A very popular thread here would be to go through the steps necessary building your own UPS but using locally-sourced components. Include necessary warnings, like if you're using standard car batteries then you have a hydrogen problem unless you have good ventilation, etc.

Which just makes it all the more insane that the U.S. does.