NorthernRyland

I'll try to summarize this but if you click on the link and go to the 32 second mark you can see the relevant evidence. The channel blurs everything so it's hard to make out but there's English at least so you get the idea. Sorry mods, this is the best I can do but I'm posting because it's relevant to expats in Thailand. Basically what happens is this English guy has a child with this Thai woman and is working abroad while sending her money to support the kid. They have disputes about her allowance and how much she's asking for so the woman abuses the child on video calls as a form of blackmail. Final straw is when she pulls out a gun and points it at the kid on video (still frame below with text saying "gun"). At this point the man calls the police in Thailand but it's not clear what will happen next and how it gets resolved.

Speaking of braking hard and veering he's another video I saw recently. The stupid taxi decides to cross the entire road at slow speed and the pickup (probably going way too fast as usual) veers and gets destroyed, kills 2. The taxi is unscathed.

he's making a totally fair point. Drivers here will absolutely run you down at zebra crossings if you don't watch out. Maybe you live in some rural area and you never saw it but I assure you it's' real. Go to any large city and watch how Thai's handle crossing roads at zebra crossing. It's pathetic to see them put their hands up and then rush across the road really fast because they have a credible fear of getting hit. This is what I've seen with my own eyes for years.

Fair enough it's hard to tell from the choppy videos frames but I suspect (like the newscaster) the cars are going pretty fast because that's the norm and they didn't stop in time. There's a timer at the top and you can probably tell how many feet they were going per second if you really wanted to.

If you ask them about these problems the answer always seems to be "that's just how it is". It's a kind of slave mentality they the world happens to them and they can only respond. A good example is what happens when a traffic light stops working. They have no plan-B or ability to communicate with other each other. It's a free for all every man for himself situation. That's how thin the veneer of civility is in Thailand.

Well Americans have decided anyone with government ID is an American so the sky's the limit. Literally everyone in the world is an American, they just haven't got their papers yet.

You mean the American boxing icon Muhammed "Thank God my granddaddy got on that boat" Ali?

Not according to the original Americans. This seems to be some idea that came about after WWII with the Boomer generation but it has no historical precedence.

Fo sho yo.

I'm seeing black Americans are making YouTube videos and promoting Thailand as the best place to come pickup girls. Welcome to Thailand guys.

Riding motorcycles is one of the best things about Thailand but they make it oh so hard by allowing literally anything on the roads going any speed.

Oh so "Issan-style" is a thing? In other words it's a really crap well that only poor people would make. Why are you asking the question then if you know what a proper well is? Of course you need to get rid of your well and make something better. If you're living in a bamboo house with metal roof you should replace that too.

Then why in the 70s were they warning of a new ice age? Maybe we're just coming out of a cool period and it was this hot previously before records started?

I have a house in Mae jo too and it's roasting now. The city heat blanket envelops us here. It's noticeably cooler on the west side of the valley in Mae rim near the mountain. Not a great location to be honest.

Even if it's a rental invest some money and put some insulation. It's 100% worth it.

The way she tried to wave down the cars to get some help. So sad. It must be terrifying being that old and trying to get around on the roads here. Thailand 90 years ago must have been bliss. RIP old lady at least she had a good long life.

How about here?

I'm going to be making a well in the coming years and I'm told it will need to be anywhere from 40 to 100 meters deep as the land in on a slope. I don't know anything about wells but isn't 16 meters kind of pathetic? My wives dad has a well that's 40 meters deep and hasn't gone dry in decades. Seems like these Isaan people didn't have the money required to make a proper well so they need to reinvest in the project and it right this time.

I posted this because I saw another video of how Amsterdam is reducing the speed limit to 30k/hour on an additional number of roads citing safety and noise concerns. That seems a little slow but I'd rather have this than what we have in Thailand. This is what a civilized country does that cares about its citizens.

Because you were curious have you ever tried to drive at the same speed as some of the people here just to see how what speed they're really going? Today in small 2 lane road through a village I followed a motorcycle and found he was going 70k/hour! That's a totally unreasonable speed on that road but this is pretty normal and to be expected here. They removed frames so you don't see the full impact but in the video you can see this 90 year old women trying to cross this 2 lane road and getting hit by a truck which appears to be going too fast and throws her about 10 feet to her death. Really tragic but this is normal driving in Thailand. Whey they report on tourists misbehaving they've been "farang again" but never do they allude to "another preventable accident". I don't even think Thai people know they have problem. Of course nothing will be learned and it will happen soon. I seriously can't understand what's wrong with these people and driving. No amount of death will ever teach them any lessons. It's terrible and I hate it but nothing will ever change.

the Thai were there before them? In Chiang Mai the Hmong occupy all the mountain tops and I assume have been back there all the way up through Burma into China long before Thailand annexed any of that. Even to this day the Thai presence is very minimal on all the mountain regions in the west. There's Thai/Burmese people but even they are a different group from Thais.

I'm friendly with my long time bike mechanic too. Hair salons too are social places which is nice. I like to chat with the older women at the massage parlor. It's out there for sure but not at large scale in public, not in a city like CM at least.

vile. I never heard of this before. You may have similar stories from our Indian friends and their caste system. I know such things are happening in the US in certain companies and even lawsuits have been filed for caste discrimination.

not so much in Chiang Mai. Masks on, face down. I guess they say thank you at the end sometimes.

but you can open a shop basically anywhere with virtually no regulation. Building is extremely lax too. You can even sell food at markets without permits. In the US doing any kind of business is tedious and expensive. Taxes are another thing that don't affect so many Thai people doing business.