Rob13

It's been 15 years since I was last here. Don't know how many governments ago that was but everything I remember is still the same. You buy a can of coke and they put it a bag. They need a calculator for the simplest transactions; and then the slips of paper. Everywhere I go I get a slip of paper to keep up with. First the departure slip at the airport,then cash slips for eating,parking the motorbike, I get 2 receipts at alot of places when I pay, don't know why ,because I always pay cash and it's usually a small bill.And then the signed copies of my passport.It's all trash.Thailand must have a strong garbage union.

Ticket to Kuala Lumpur was a hundred bucks, Penang sounds like a good spot ,maybe I can change it. Sounds alot easier and a nicer place anyway.

My ticket into BKK was only 575, that seemed pretty cheap to me,coming from half way round the world

That's the one. Complicated rules but when you get here they just breeze you through. Pays be a gringo with some pesos to spend.

If Kuala Lumpur is bad for going for a visa where would be a good place?

If you can enjoy yourself on 250 bills a month more power to you. I'm here not to worry about and the cash for awhile. Worry about that in the spring when I go back to work.

I plan on living on the same budget here I do back home just distributed differently

Visa rules and regs are really hard to understand here. I went through the visa on arrival line at the airport. They gave me a 30 day stamp. Guess I don't know what the official title is. I hoping that I can pick up a 60 tourist visa in Malaysia over New Years

I thought the 15 days was for land crossings and 30 days was for airports.

The embassy said they needed at least 2 weeks to process the visa maybe longer, just seemed easier to do the VOA and get a 60 day visa later on. Is visa exempt entry different then VOA

Hi,

I just signed up. I'm not new to to Thailand but it's been a few years since I've been here.I'm an American from Tennessee. My reason for joining is to keep up with what's going on with visas. I'm here now on a VOA, but I hope to stay til it's spring time back home,so I'll need to do at least one visa run,seems like the rules are changing quickly these days. Everything I read before I came was that I had to have a return or onward ticket so I bought one to Kuala Lumpur but nobody asked me for it at the airport. In fact nobody said anything except to look at the camera while they took my photo. Easiest border crossing ever.