Choscura

Thaksin deserves to get his come-uppance.

Conman, fraudster and his cohorts need to be prosecuted because Thailand is the laughing stock place of the western world.

Go get him.

corrections in bold.

people who try to look down on you generally find out later on that they've been upside down.

and now on a more logical train of thought:

thai women are a mixed bag, just like women anywhere. the stereotype seems to be some 17-year-old bend-over-betty who goes after retired guys because thats who's most likely to have cash to blow on them. which makes the stereotype stupid straight out of the starting gate, the majority of thai women I come in contact with are in my age range or above. children are generally pretty sheltered here, all things considered, they aren't whored out at the first opportunity. of the people I regularly interract with- classmates, fellow workers, etc, only one has gone after a retired guy. and she's older herself (about 34). it's still a big age range, but I've picked up on the fact that she genuinely respects the guy she's with for her own reasons, and that said, she's got her own money anyway. she owns a tour boat agency in southern thailand that is run by her cousin and has a farm somewhere in the northeast, doing what I don't know. just going by the age she acts, it seems like it's a good match up, and this is the only- I repeat, the only- marriage I've ever seen with an age difference more than ten years that I think may possibly work, if both people want it to work.

for myself, I've only really had two girlfriends here. one was a year younger than me, and it was kind of a mutual breakup because it got to the point where we just wanted to be friends and not lose that (this came after considering marriage, which scared the key out of both of us), and the other was about 8 years older than me. neither one was a big money grabber- the older one actually spend somewhere in the range of 4 times as much on me as I spent on her. I only slept with one (the older one- so sue me, I was trying to be a good guy to the younger one and do things 'properly'), and that wasn't spectacular, at least not to start- it took a lot of coaching on both sides to get the sex life up to spec. things like "don't put your teeth there" and "make sure your hand is wet first" and so on. thats a pretty small sample, and it doesn't really show a trend for me in any way but that thai women aren't the legends in the sack that everybody thinks unless you've taught them what it is you like, or you don't know any better. after talking to some of them about this, it seems like it's a cultural thing to not talk about sex except with close friends, so I can see how the knowledge doesn't really get passed on, etc.

I guess the point I'm trying to make is that the stereotype of thai women being whores only applies to thai women who *are* whores.

and now for some fun: what about reversing the stereotypes on the people that are trying to make fun of us? like the stereotype that if you have a western girlfriend, you're completely pussy-whipped, she's bitchy about everything, and if you try to stand up for yourself she'll sue you for everything, take the kids (if there are any), put you in prison and still make you pay child support, and then go on oprah (or the local equivelant) to be hailed as a hero for womankind? I don't mean any offense to anyone reading this, whatever the nationality, but that's a stereotype I'd kind of like to see, just because it would ruffle so many feathers.

I've heard the name mentioned about. also, to the original poster, I believe it's spelled 'mio', not 'miyo'.

anyway, I've got a theory- I'd be willing to bet that there are a half dozen samauri gangs that are entirely seperate entities that have nothing to do with each other if they can help it. why? because it looks like theres at least two descriptions of actual members in this topic- angry teenagers and the 'all ages' group which would probably encompass all the criminals who were smart/good enough to survive at what they do for a living. that would make them of a higher 'status', without being dangerous (directly) to people who imitate them. if you pretend to be in the mafia, the mafia asks questions. if you pretend to be khun aiheah who nobody knows, but most people know *about*, who cares? so I'd bet theres something like that going on.

hey, I'm curious where I can find some chewing tobacco, I've looked in a few dozen places with no luck, and I'd greatly appreciate the advice.

thanks in advance.

I jumped on the wagon for that promotion. the stats? I can't get to international web sites more than maybe 30% of the time, kind of a pain in the butt, thai sites seem to be just fine, downloads from internet explorer/firefox go just fine, but file transfers are at about .02 kbps, according to one of the programs I was using. so far, I'm happy with the speed and terribly unimpressed by how unreliable it is. in many cases, sending smoke signals in a chain across northern thailand, laos, china, siberia, alaska, canada, and down into the lower '48 states would be faster, because even a snail moves faster than something that isn't moving.

it's a superiority complex. thais feel inferior to farangs in many cases, so they show the farangs in lower positions- or as being slow, or stupid, or useless, etc- to even things out. I can site any number of examples- anything from mattress commercials to movies (kung &lt;deleted&gt; tootsie is a recent one with a lot of this in it, if you're looking for it) to tv shows. it's kind of like the racial segregation you saw in the US back in the 60's and 70's. "stupid roles are for <insert social group here>!".

I guess the modern western equivelant is in horror movies- it's always the black guy that dies first.

I'm all for a wage hike. I'd gladly shell out a little extra if it means the guy on the bottom is making a bit more to feed their family. but I don't think thai culture will ever allow for something like this, or at least not in a way that really makes a difference- thus we have the ruling class who have no idea of what the expenses for the people under them are making decisions that are going to cost them more. being rich isn't just about having a lot of money, it's about being able to keep yourself in the flow of money. the best analogy I can make is that of a river- the money being the water- and the poor people are the streams where very little water (money) flows. if the rich want to be a dam, by all means, let them, dams are a good way of producing something greater than the sum of it's parts- hydroelectric dams are vital to the economy where I'm from, and without them, the water's going to flow anyway. but when you have larger deltas, with more money going into the small streams, you can build dams there too- after all, the water from the river doesn't STAY behind the dam, it goes out in such a way that it does things, and I'm all for that- economic developement and so on. but it seems like the dam thai upper classes can't figure out how it's supposed to work, and think that frivolous spending on parties and so on is water going out of the dam in such a way as to make something useful, and it's not- it's like the water is evaporating from behind the dam faster than it's powering the turbines.

I wonder if anybody out there could follow this... but I'm not gonna retype it now. you figure it out.

personal philosiphy: the drugs should be available to old people. if you're old and are gonna die soon, why not? but for the majority of the target market of drugs, they're messing up a lot of lives, any single one of which is worth at least as much as the dealer's. The death sentence can be justified under those terms, to say nothing of the turf wars that go on just for the right to sell drugs in a certain area. But humans aren't robots, you don't just destroy a 'defective model', but still, these guys have had relatively long lives behind 'em and should know better [by now]. at the very least I'd like to see some life incarceration, but thats probably more than can be hoped for. they'll probably be extradited and live in a gated community (western prison) instead of being legally punished, like they would in a thai jail. corrupt as the thai legal system may be, if you're in there for a legitimate crime, you've earned it, and whatever happens in there is part of the deal.

funny 'ol world, this.

bring your own solid deoderant, really good socks and shoes- the quality available here is either horrible or very expensive, bring rain-x for your helmet/windscreen because you'll be going through a full year of rain here in the course of two years, bring a good rain coat, and if you're going to be riding a motorcycle, the helmets they sell here are buckets with a bit of cloth stapled inside- bring a good HJC helmet from the states with you in that regard. last but not least, I highly recommend bringing a leatherman (or a gerber, but leathermen is generally better) multi-tool. if you're going to be here long term and probably don't speak the language, this will save your @$$ when you need to fix something in a hurry. also just handy to carry around.

hmm.. what else...

oh! a good flash light. a mag-lite will do (pocket size), and it's nice that you can upgrade it to be an LED flashlight and put a pocket clip on it, and a camp towel- get them from a sporting goods store- is worth it's weight in gold. I don't know what the brand is, but it's some kind of wierd fabric from korea that is very absorbant, almost like a sponge, but it doesn't get mold and it dries off incredibly fast. even here during rainy season, just wring it out and it's dry in like 10 minutes. also a lot smaller and easier to carry than a regular towell. hmm.... a good bug spray is recomended if you're going to be outside a lot. also, do some basic research about what plants/animals are dangerous/nuisances. the scorpions here can be painful, some of the centipedes can be deadly, there are of course the 'endangered' (protected as, not actually endangered) thai cobras. don't mess about with them, just get as long a stick as you can find and hit the snake as many times as you can.... the list isn't terribly long, but it's just stuff you've gotta watch out for, even in the cities.

long live the king!

I know it was a little kid, can't remember if it was a girl or a boy. probably a girl, given the nature of the song.

"cheee maaa jo daaaiiaaaaiiiii! chee maa jo daaiiiii..."

UGH

hey, some time ago a thai kid got ahold of my phone- I think I was busy teaching and had it out as a prop- and they put a ringtone on it that the person calling me hears. the phone is a 1-2-call sim, how do I take this stupid ringtone off?!

any of the la gondola locations. the guy's italian, does excellent pizza, and at 95 baht for the Mark 1 Mod-0 pizza, you're not gonna be breakin the bank. fulfills both requirements given with ease.

I can't believe I forgot pizza mania. how could i forget pizza mania!

pizza mania is the best pizza in town. I should have remembered this!

anyway, to get there, starting from the connector that goes from the superhighway to the airport- go south down the old chiang mai road (the one with the huge trees that are planted on both sides of it), go until you see the tesco mini-mart and the 711 on your left hand side, and it's right across the street. absolutely PERFECT pizza, and they'll put anything on it in any combination you can dream up. a fried egg and bacon pizza? may as well try it

I never much cared for beef gravy, but a good turkey or chicken gravy is always good. drippings from the turkey on thanksgiving, put 'em in a pot, add a bit of oil if it's too water, and then add a spoonfull or two of flour to thicken it a bit. absolutely perfect. can easily be made from any kind of stock you've got- turkey, chicken, duck, goose, beef, etc.

oh man. I just realized I haven't had mom's gravy in almost 3 years. I miss it!

well, theres a few places around here I can probably add to the list.

for thai food:

the best pad thai is available from a little tucked-away shop right next to DK bookstore, on the moat. when you're facing the book store, it's behind the parking lot and to the right. try the 'pad thai mai sai saen', it's quite good, and even many thai people haven't tried it.

the best gapao for my money is from a little sidewalk shop in front of the 7-11 on sankampaeng/tha pae road, inside the superhighway (very close to the sankampaeng/superhighway intersection). absolute best pat grapao moo/gai/gung in CM, and I'd bet money that it's among the best in thailand.

best som tam- same area, but further away from the road. on that little island of restaurants, there's a traditional isaan restaurant (furthest to the north) that makes absolutely wonderful som tam.

best tom yam- tunghotel road, right in front of the d-town hotel/condominiums. it opens at 7:30 (AM) and closes early, and it's always packed at lunch time. 25 baht a bowl. wonderful stuff.

best muu ping (pork on a stick): theres a little stand at the first major intersection on tha pae road (inside the moat). it's 8 baht a piece, but well worth it- 3 sticks will fill you up. there's quite a bit of meat on those things. on sunday nights, the lady moves her stand further south, just south of the road block for the walking street.

best chinese... I don't know the name of the restaurant, or the street it's on, but if you're on the night bazaar road, go to the end, hang a left at that intersection, and about halfway to the road that runs along the river you'll see a big chinese restaurant front on the left, with a small soi right after it. park in the soi behind it, and head in. this place has been confirmed as the best in town by all the chinese people I know who don't already have restaurants of their own.

best ribs: hells kitchen. all the down-home southern cooking you can think of. if you want ribs, corn bread, collard greens, sweet potato pie, corn on the cob and potato salad, hells kitchen. definitely. located on a small market just off the night bazaar (on the east side- left when you're driving the night bazaar street), in the same line of buildings as omalley's irish pub.

best burgers: Dukes is the best I've found, without making my own. mikes is a close second.

best pizza: La Gondola or La Stefano's, under the Rim Ping condominiums and on tha pae road inside the moat, respectively. dukes pizza is good too.

best french restaurant: Chez Bous (may be spelling that wrong). just north of the mae ping hotel, on that same street.

best chilli dogs: chiang mai saloon, off the night bazaar to the right, go past the go-go bars and it will be directly on your left, across from a bank and a tattoo parlor.

best mexican food: Salsa Kitchen. in a string of tourist bars, just off the road that runs paralell to the sunday walking street (to the north). a bit hard to find, but well worth it. also... I think it's called 'baja kitchen' or something- by the same guy that made mike's burgers. on the east side of the moat, on the outside, close to the northeast corner.

best coffee shop: Dok Talom. located on tha pae road, inside the moat, behind the wawee coffee (don't go to wawee. wawee is the mcdonalds of coffee), directly across the small courtyard from la stefano's.

best italian food: any of stefano's restaurants. La Gondola, La Stefano's, I think there's one other, but I haven't been to it yet.

also:

best thai wine: Monsoon Valley. their white wine is excellent. I've seen french conniseurs try it and demand to know where it's *really* from (kind of a joke my friend's dad here enjoys playing on his clients- "here, try this!" "it's good, where's it from?" "thailand." "mhmm! no, really, where's it from?"), but it's really thai. the red wine is so-so, but the white is excellent.

I think that just about covers it for now.

I can sum up the possibility of a healthy, long term relationship- from what the OP has described- in 4 words.

no way in hel_l.

it will turn bad, and you won't know about if, if she's a good girl. if she's not, you'll wind up on the street while she and her long-term boyfriend party hearty with your hard earned cash.

look, for all the idiots I meet here who have wives and girlfriends half your age, it doesn't work for too many reasons to count. you've got the language barrier- women *need* to communicate the same way you need sex- you've got the cultural barrier which you are REINFORCING by giving them and their families so much money (I'm not saying be sticky, but please, don't seperate yourself from them by making it unavoidably clear that if their daughter wasn't hot theres no way you'd ever meet), and any number of other reasons.

why would a thai girl do this? well hel_l, all she has to do is bend over and shut up and she's quadrupling her income every month and helping her family. is it any wonder that so many of them do this? and this isn't just bar girls. and not all bar girls do this, either. but....

I can't go on. stupid people like this make me depressed.

I don't generally drink much- a beer or two with friends, but not trying to get drunk or anything, but when I try to get drunk, I *DRINK*. I'll down a bottle in about an hour and then be happy because I can't remember why I can't walk and why I drank so much. and then the next morning comes and I vow never to do that again. but I've never posted on a forum while drunk, and oddly enough, I can still type/spell just fine when drunk. lots of practice, I guess.

Great to hear but as always all talk no action.

Smoking is disgusting as are smokers

gee, someone's never smoked before.

smoking is an addiciton, and while I don't think it something that should be encouraged, saying something is 'disgusting' as a reason to rule it out is pointless. coffee tastes disgusting to everyone the first time they drink it, but it's one of the most popular drinks on earth.

no, it's not the smoking- or the taste of coffee- that's disgusting here, it's small minded people that lump everyone that does/is something into a category without asking any questions, simply because society says something is bad. sound familiar...?

:edit: I guess I should go into detail about this.

I smoked for almost a year, hated every minute of being a smoker but treasured every second of smoking. it really is an enjoyable addiction, which is why it's supposedly harder to kick the habit of smoking than it is to kick the habit of, say, heroin. to anyone addicted, the taste and smell of cigarette smoke isn't disgusting, it's actually quite pleasant. like the smell of coffee in the morning. when i smoked a good cigarette (I just recently quit smoking) and inhaled, the taste of the smoke- on my tongue- would be comparable to sugar. what I think happens is your brain says "okay, I want more of this stuff (cotinine, the active chemical that causes addiction in cigarettes- not nicotine, I'll post up some sources if anybody is interested), so I need a way to detect it." and thus it adjusts your sense of smell to find cigarette smoke pleasant to taste and smell. mostly just smell. even after you quit, it's still quite a pleasant smell because of that adjustment, which is why reformed smokers hate it so much- because it's so tempting to have a cigarette again when they smell that.

so for all you non-smokers, now you've got some basic perspective on why smokers smoke. and when you tell a smoker he can't smoke, his first instinct is usually to light up another cigarette. kind of funny, right? it shouldn't be hard to see why- "I can't smoke in there? okay, better smoke before I go in there!" or "this is stressfull (they're depriving me of something I 'need'), what will calm me down? oh! a cigarette."

there you go, theres the details. some of them, anyway.

people who don't understand this and are unwilling to ask the questions about why people would smoke if it's bad for them have disgustingly small minds.

the simple fact was that I offered her a way out of the boredom/stagnation/whatever, and she took it just to experiment, it seems. but it's over and done with now.

Why is IT over, did she find you just as boring as the other guy?

no, I eventually got pissed with sharing her with some saggy/wrinkly old guy who I don't know if he's doin anything bad on the side that could hurt her (and thus me, herpes, AIDS, etc). the other reason is that I don't cheat, I did it once and nearly killed myself when I sobered up and realized what I'd done. I just can't deal with it, and I don't want to be stuck with this girl now and I want to move on.

then again, I *have* ended things with her twice, and she's ended them with me twice now. we've had sex after all but the last of the endings....

I guess it should be said that you need to meet some people and talk to them to understand exactly what's going on. this stuff isn't black and white in the least.

that said, i know she's not the ultimate good girl, but I was using that to illustrate that she wasn't the type you'd expect to be doing the kind of thing she did. no serious family problems, not really from a poor background/in serious need of cash, etc. I was trying to illustrate that even the really 'good' thai girls can still do bad stuff. I still think highly of her, because she had the courage to come forward and actually tell me what was going on, on her own motivation. and so we ended it, but it's still a bummer.

I was speaking metaphorically. she really was a good girl, and you're doing the same thing I describe the thai people as doing at the end. the simple fact was that I offered her a way out of the boredom/stagnation/whatever, and she took it just to experiment, it seems. but it's over and done with now. I don't wish her or the other guy any harm, I just think they both deserve to know the truth of what the other is doing.

the age difference is important. I say this because all you idiots- and yes, you are idiots- that get thai girls half or a third your age are asking for trouble. even if she's the nicest girl you've ever met, it's going to be assumed that she's a) got someone else saved up for when you die, is getting at least a good portion of the money when you die, and c) is probably with you for no other reason than a and b. mostly b.

why do I say this? because I just got through with a relationship where I found out I was the guy being saved up for when the old guy died. and this wasn't a bar girl, this wasn't somebody that was going around and looking for somebody with rolls of cash- if she was, she wouldn't have gone for me at all in the second place (;P). the story I got out of her when she told me this shit (and this is why I consider her a good girl, because she felt guilty and came out and told me what was going on) was that she lost some money when she was down south and she got stuck with an old dutch guy named (censored) who now considers her his wife of five years, even though they aren't married. it's actually more complicated than that, he's supporting her entire family pretty much on his pension... somehow, I think all hel_l is gonna break loose if he's on here reading this, but at this point, I don't care. my head is spinning from how stupid this kee is. but yeah. great girl, just has needs that weren't being met by the guy, and so she took the opportunity when one presented itself to have an outside relationship.

I need to stress that this was the ultimate good girl. in college, almost done with her degree. wanted absolutely no money out of me at all- in fact, and I find this kind of ironic, she was using the other guys money to buy me stuff. nothing major, just little things where she said "you don't have one of *those*?!" and she'd show up at my door the next day with it.

but yeah, anyway, that shit is overwith, I'm gratefull, I hope it never happens to either me or the old guy again (what do I have to hold against him? I was -ing his girl, even if he got her just out of some cultural nonsense). oh, and if you're in a situation which (from your end) looks similar, and your wife/girlfriend just got done with an internship you suggested, PM me, we might need to talk.

what was I saying?

oh, yes.

anyway, this was the ultimate 'good girl'. doing everything 100% right by her cultural standards. supporting her family, helping the old guy- who she really does love (as a father), btw. theres nothing wrong with that. but this happens to what look like great relationships and the thai people are just like "yep, knew she was a whore." no matter how good the girl was doing up until that point.

and granted, this is aimed more at the young/old relations, but it applies to some of the same-age couples as well. I've seen it before where a thai girl with a thai boyfriend her age cheated on that boyfriend with a farang kid (actually cheated, not just tried to get money out of the farang for both her and the real bf's benefit). hi-so girls are too much maintenance to be worth it. if this is what thai people do to each other, what's to stop them doing it with farangs?

it's a tragedy, but you're over-reacting. it's not a massacre. I'd rather thai people support themselves than have them worry about the fate of their souls because of some trees.

and this is thailand. there are many beautiful things here, and I'm willing to bet there always will be, if you know where to look. this is a humid area, everything grows here- and grows rapidly, to huge sizes, and a great deal of it has some 'cultural nostalgia' value, like the type of tree that Buddha supposedly attained enlightenment under. even in the middle of the city here, you can find tokay geckos as long as your forearm and squirrels (and flying squirrels, just saw one today- in the middle of a tree in chiang mai). there are philodendrons here- commonly known as philo dumb-dumbs where I come from, because they're too dumb to die- that are 20 times the size of the ones you see anywhere else. they grow fast, everywhere, aren't a damaging plant (well, not really), look nice, and hey, they can be used to provide shade if you want. same with nearly any other type of tree, vine, bush, etc here.

long story short, stop whining, life goes on.

I'd agree with the people saying 'life in prison' if I didn't think he'd die faster in prison, but lethal injection looks like it would technically be the slow way in this, given what some of the prisons here are like.