mfd101

Um, well I know what I imagine and I know what I need and don't need.

It's a bit long (if you'll pardon the expression).

I've never met another mind like mine. In any case I doubt it would be a pleasant experience.

If you read the full article it's mostly a load of drivel ... On the one hand this On the other hand that Anything could happen Or not.

Having visited the place twice 11 and 10 years ago I can't imagine ever having the need to visit there again.

One day Thailand's leaders will encounter concepts such as 'modern technology' and 'productivity' ...

Will be interesting to see how many of these 'new airlines' survive the next 12 months. Not to mention their passengers ...

That's what all the ifs & buts written in to the contract are for. It's not black & white. It's grey and a matter for judgment. Whose judgment? Theirs, not yours.

(1) Insurance companies have to make a profit. Otherwise they cease to exist. (2) How long you've been a customer when you front up with a major claim will undoubtedly affect their consideration & decisionmaking. Why wouldn't it? You've been paying for 20 years and this is your first claim, for a heart attack. Fine. You've been in 3 months and you said all was fine and now you're claiming for a heart attack? Mmmmm ...

Health insurance is fine when you've been paying premiums for the previous umpteen years. Just the last 5 minutes? Not so good. It's all about risk, not just yours but the company's too. So joining up here as an expat late in life is never going to work well for most people.

What depressing reading! I said, he said, they said, no they didn't ... And anyone and everyone is to blame except Me Me Me. Seen from afar, one can only conclude that British social & cultural & political incompetence, mixed with racism & petty ethnicism, produced a catastrophic economic & social outcome. The country will take decades to recover, probably by rejoining the EC once the latter's members have gotten over their outrage and bitterness. (Why would anyone trust the Brits in terminal decline?)

I have a cunning plan: I'm going to keep hiding under the bed until 1 Jan 2026. By then we should have a fair idea how things are panning out.

Do they have an Almost-Darwin-Award award?

Impossible to answer as I'm always reading or browsing about 20 books at once. But beside my bed is a book I've been reading at a rate of about 4 pages a night before falling asleep: Gonçalvo M. Tavares' 'Uma viagem à Índia' which I'm reading in French translation (no Eng version as yet). Poetic and weird but interesting enough to keep me going (wondering where it's leading - well, to India actually).

It's 2030ish here. Just back from our NYE dinner in Prasat. As usual our favourite restaurant was closed. So we went to an outsideish cook-your-own-meal-at-table place. As usual my b/f selected at least 3 times more than we could possibly eat. OK but not quite what I'd had in mind. We managed to get thru about 3/4 of it ... Now home and the village musaks are rumbling not too loudly, but loud enough with occasional pops of fireworks to not be worth putting on any decent music. But if I did put on something (some 700 CDs of classical music) it would most likely be something in the range from Bach & Haendel thru to Schubert, but it could extend from Monteverdi to Rachmaninov. Extremely conservative musical taste by today's standards. The other problem though is that, if I did play something while my b/f is at home, he gets the giggles and starts conducting ... Which means I can play CDs only during the day when he's away at the farm (sigh).

In short, sensible people read the fine print and make sure they understand what and how BEFORE they hop on that motorbike or fall down the stairs drunk.

Yes & Maybe.

Yes, I've had exactly the same experience. But of course there's so many useful things you can do under (2): blowing your nose, wiping your bottom, lighting the kindling for a bonfire on Guy Fawkes night and cooking spuds in the ashes ... There's no end of possibilities.

Even that's going to take about 30 or 40 years.

Um, I think he's moving in the right direction but you don't get there in one big step. Bangkok wasn't built in a day.

Right. I rest my case.

And the then members of the Constitutional Court were blissfully ignorant that a coup was about to happen to overthrow this appalling Thaksin regime that threatened law and order in the kingdom?

I know them well. Still as gracious and welcoming as always.

(1) Used for note paper (2) used for all other relevant activities (3) handed - on back - with notes for other falangs to use & be amused by.

I guess I'm just used to the roosters out back starting up at 0400 each morning and continuing till after dark. I am - so to speak - aware of them but not conscious of them. By comparison the koel (at least the one recorded on the vid) sounds blissful.