NorthernRyland

I started to get annoyed by noise in my mid 30s but that was maybe early onset annoyance because I'm living with people who are especially noisy and obnoxious. It's a real pleasure to be around nice quiet white people when I go back home for a couple months a year. :)

Vientiane is actually a pretty nice city within a certain radius. In fact I'd say it's cleaner and more organized looking than any city in Thailand but thanks to the French actually knowing how to plan a city. Outside of that it turns to ghetto in a hurry though.

These drivers are brain damaged. They get in a car and they must drive at the maximum speed possible at all times. Not even drunk or anything they just can't control their emotions and reason about what speeds are safe.

Project manager too? oh dear. Well that explains many things I suppose.

This list makes no sense. Pai has more people than Lampang, Lampun, Chiang Dao etc...? No way that's true. Missing tons of other cities also which are metros of their province.

I'd pay top dollar to see Mr. T knock out some lady boys.

It makes no sense whatsoever if you ask me to build a house in the middle of some God forsaken field instead of paying for land in an actual nice area. Anyways, there's lots rural areas around Chiang Mai that are close enough to drive in a regular basis. Land in Chiang Dao and rural Lamphun for example is cheap yet close to the city. Land in Chiang Mai is a rip off so don't bother.

I have asthma in Thailand and require an inhaler while I'm here (all times of years so probably allergic to something like mold). Goes away when I go home to Colorado which has a much dryer climate. Smoke season doesn't seem to affect the condition.

I've become convinced that Thai people have a higher risk tolerance than other people groups. I seen them so often getting inches from death and they don't even flinch. Letting 13 years speed around on motorbikes without helmets and drunk drivers abound is common where I live and this raises no red flags with anyone. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R/K_selection_theory comes to mind too.

Catching people who burn illegally is the easiest thing ever given how there is a trail of smoke in the air which can be seen from miles away. Just like traffic laws the police have never once even bothered to go outside and arrest people or give fines. Not even mere warnings. They are worse than useless. All they have to do a pass a law and go out and enforce it but of course they are too lazy and incompetent to do even this. Crying to the prime minister as if he can do anything more than them just shows what clowns these people are.

It's hilarious when they say enforcement is a challenge given how they literally never once made a single effort to enforce anything and only pass laws (which are useless) once the problem has already become critical. If that wasn't bad enough there is a collective mass amnesia and everyone forgets about it until next year when they repeat the same feeble process over again. The joke is anyone who still takes the government serious on such matters.

well then they can just join ASEAN now and be in good company. 😂

The heat and the inability to go for a simple walk outside (heat, no sidewalks, dogs etc...) would make my parents miserable. The only thing you should be doing now is getting them here for a few months to see how they cope.

Installing takes time and is annoying so if they fail you're gonna have to take them out and waste time. Not worth it IMO.

We really just need to wait and see how this unfolds. How much tax can they really get away with taking? The entire point of Thailand is that it's a budget retirement destination. If they start asking for numbers like 100k baht every year for taxes that will shift the entire agreement and the thing could blow up in their face. I could see it for digital nomads but there's not even a visa which fits the needs of the lower income people who come to Thailand anyways. None of it makes sense given the reasons people come to Thailand in the first place so it's likely to fizzle imo.

I was just in Koh Samui and got to row around in a kayak for the first time in years and man my back feels so much better after that. I was wondering is there any kayaking areas around Chiang Mai? I've seen some reservoirs and dams (like Mae Kuang which is the nearest large water near my house) which could maybe work. Ideally if they have one to rent that would be great because even if I buy one transporting it would be a problem in our little car. I've heard in the Ping river they have some areas but those could be hard for me to get too if there near the city.

I was in Pai visiting family a few days last week. It's a stunning valley and has an interesting perk of lots of fancy foreigner oriented restaurants and resorts. However like you said during high season the only Thai people you will see are the people who run the shops. It's just obnoxious to be there and be surrounded by the incessant tourism. Compare that with Mae Hong Son which has a good vibe to it and feels more natural. My only complain is that it's seriously remote and the weather isn't nearly as good as Pai despite what you'd think by looking at the map. If I could do it over and I would have lived that last 10 years in Mae Hong Son and ditched the dirty Chiang Mai city live. However after that I was in Koh Samui for the first time for 4 days and I literally saw not a single Thai tourist there my entire time. 100% European people with the exception of one Chinese and Indian couple I saw. Even the staff at restaurants were often Burmese and didn't speak Thai well enough to talk with our wives. You would never know you were in Thailand.

yeah but this is Thailand so they'll just pretend the law doesn't exist and that will be the end of it.

Pai is higher elevation and cooler for sure. Has lots of big mountains nearby so cool air flows in to the valley. It's a tourist trap though so I wouldn't live there.

Mae Hong is much hotter than Pai due to lower elevation. Very pretty area though and one my favorites in Thailand. Best idea is stay there for a few months in a rental to find out for yourself.

I guess I just can't see this happening so I'm biding my time. It's such a radical change to immigration to require people to hire an accountant to quality for a visa. The chance this fizzles out and dies is high in my opinion so I'd rather ignore it and pay fines when and if it actually happens. Not prudent I know but this is just too out there, even for Thailand.

It's been well document for many years that increasing tax rates can result in reducing tax revenue. If it's too heavy handed people will leave for 6 months and spend less money overall in Thailand thus hurting tax revenue and local economies. That's the gamble they're taking.

Savings before 2024 but anything earned after that point can no longer be considered savings under any time frame. Imagine trying to prove to them which money was earned in which year though. I don't see any reasonable way to asses this unless you volunteer the information.

but the government here throws out laws and then never enforces them. Not even the police follow simply traffic rules. I've spoken to two family members here who don't even know about these tax rules because they don't follow forums like this. people are just going to ignore this until it's put in front of their faces and then the authorities can figure out how to deal with all the delinquent expats which owe them money.

Agree 100%. For every one sensible Thai person that thinks driving here is broken there are 100 who couldn't care less. They're out numbered and no government local or otherwise will take on the task of fixing the problem.