khunjeff

It's not clear from the media reports (all of which just parrot an ASEAN press release) whether this would involve full fifth freedom rights or not, and I can't locate the actual text of the new protocol online 😕

I'm not British, so I have no dog in this fight, but my understanding is that these are what the US calls "totalization agreements". They allow people who work in multiple countries, but don't have enough years in any one country to qualify for a pension, to add up all their years and end up getting retirement benefits. What I do not understand is why these agreements have anything whatsoever to do with whether British pensioners receive annual increases - that would seem to be a 100% internal UK decision that doesn't require agreement from any other nation. Just as an example, US Social Security recipients get the same amount of money whether they live in the US or abroad (other than in a tiny number of countries that are under sanction or don't allow official access to beneficiaries, but even in those cases the benefits will eventually be paid if the recipient moves out of the problem country). The presence or absence of a totalization agreement doesn't affect the payment at all.

A wondrous condition that didn't stop him from flying around the world the day before returning to Thailand, or traveling around the country giving speeches as soon as he was free. Truly complex.

Ex-con with no position in the government says whaaaaat??

I didn't realize the Dept of Corrections had jurisdiction to decide what the Parliament can and can't do.

I drink alcohol, and I stay in hotels, but I have never, ever ordered room service alcohol from any hotel restaurant or bar, and I don't know anyone who has...

As though this hasn't always been permitted?! Do any hotels come and empty the minibars at midnight and refill them again at 11am?

Translation: the car drove onto the tracks without looking and without considering the possiblity that a train might be coming. We were taught even as children - when approaching a railroad track, STOP, LOOK, and LISTEN before proceeding.

Is the good general clueless? Or does he think we're clueless? Or did the reporter just cut and paste from old stories? This is from 1 Dec 2022: "Commander of the Immigration Bureau Pol. Maj. Gen. Choengron Rimphadee has said that officials only spend 45 seconds checking each arrival's passport information, visa status, biometric information, and blacklist status." https://domesticflightsthailand.com/news/suvarnabhumi-airport-ready-to-process-150-passengers-each-minute And this is from 5 Feb 2024: "The inspection revealed that it normally takes about 45 seconds for a person to enter Suvarnabhumi Airport." https://www.khaosodenglish.com/tourism/2024/02/05/pm-evaluates-the-suvarnabhumi-issues-with-his-own-eyes/ That's very interesting, because APPS has already been in use for the past nine years: "AOT will start using Thailand APPS on 1 December 2015. Arrival passenger, transit-transfer passenger and departure passenger will be charged 35 THB." https://dcs.aero/product/thailand-api/ If you don't believe that, look at any international ticket that you've bought since that date, and in the "taxes and surcharges" section you'll see that 35 baht fee under the code E7...

The description is very poorly worded, but I think the idea is that a tour agency hires a properly licensed Thai tour guide to fulfill legal requirements on paper, but the real "guiding" is actually done by the foreign tour leaders who have the necessary language skills to communicate with their customers (while the Thai guide just "sits").

People experienced years of traffic chaos during the construction of the eastern portion of the Orange Line, but due to breathtakingly incompetent contracting procedures, they have yet to see any "convenience" from the project at all.

I was wondering why UNESCO was ranking airports, and the answer is that it isn't. The Prix Versailles was started by Diversum, "an association founded in France in 2006 that has always had a focus on questioning the links between the economy and culture under globalization". Neither the association nor the prize organization is run by the UN - they simply present their annual awards at UNESCO headquarters. https://immobilier.lefigaro.fr/article/quand-l-unesco-s-interesse-a-l-architecture-commerciale_aea227fa-18ba-11e5-a3b7-228dc60e8a1e/

Oh, they've been told to refrain from overcharging! Then it's all taken care of. Thank you, police! 😁

There are 54 judges on the panel?! Doesn't that seem like overkill?

This is about illegal entry, not "illegal residency".

Aggressive vending is an occupation reserved for Thais 😉

Those places all implemented congestion charges after a good public transportation system was already in place, so that people had a good alternative to private cars - Bangkok seems to be doing things backwards.

In the great majority of cases, those hotels are owned by Thais and managed by the international chain under contract.

Even after reading the article, I have no idea what this actually means 🤔

Oh yes, urine tests - the Thai police answer to every problem.

It sounds likely that these were trafficked persons, not "illegal migrants" in the sense that the police are implying.

Why do Chinese need to be smuggled across borders, when they can enter Thailand visa-free? Or the scammers just don't want any record of their entries and exits?

They're talking about Chinese products that don't have Thai-language labels attached. And as far as I know, that lack of a Thai label in no way makes the products "unsafe". (By the way, if you've ever read those Thai labels that are affixed to imported products, you'll note that: they're virtually unreadable, due to tiny, poor quality printing; are inaccurate, in that the information on them is different than what was on the original label; and they cover up useful information - like preparation instructions - that was on the original label.)

And the rest of us know that that is false, because we've been shopping at multiple Makro branches for years without a membership. As others have stated multiple times in this thread, the cashier does indeed always ask if you're a member. If you say no, she simply proceeds to check you out, and then issues a small-format cash register receipt. No questions about phone numbers, and no scanning of mystery cards. If you say yes, she scans the card and issues a large-format red and white fanfold VAT receipt with your name and address at the top.

I can only speak for Big C, where I used to shop a lot. The points that you collect are worth a bit, but not much. They send an SMS when the points are going to expire, and a year's worth of points would usually get me a discount of 100 baht or so. The real value of the membership was that nearly every week there would be a promotion for members where you got a set discount for spending a certain amount on one receipt on certain days (usually Friday-Sunday) - often 120 baht off when buying 2000 baht of goods, for example. I easily got over 1000 baht in discounts each year by doing my shopping on the assigned days.