Lacessit

I suppose your post does make a change from the guys who claim they are so hot the bar girls support them.

You may be right. However, if I was to have Stage 4 esophageal cancer, which usually is not detected until it has reached that stage, I doubt surgery and chemo would do much more than fatten the wallets of hospitals and doctors. I also remember reading somewhere metastasis of smaller tumors is promoted by removal of a primary tumor. Perhaps chemo is supposed to address that eventuality. OTOH, I have been a bladder cancer survivor for 16 years, so it depends, as you say, on the type of cancer. And luck of the draw.

I'm too old to attain fluency, I'm just happy to get along. Even with all the research I did for 6 months before coming here, there was still truckloads I did not know.

I beg to disagree. Remind me - how much does your GF weigh?

It impressed the hell out of my GF.

On ignore now for posting egregiously stupid nonsense, and trolling.

I don't know what the statistics are now, years ago survival rates after surgery were no better than tossing a coin, because the surgery tended to spread the cancer cells elsewhere. Personally, at my age, rather than facing surgery plus chemo for an uncertain outcome and huge expense, I would rather pull the plug for the sake of my heirs.

Medicare in Australia has devil in the detail. True, healthcare is free. However, if the condition is classed as elective surgery, a patient could be waiting in pain for 1-2 years before getting the surgery done. OTOH, with private health cover, I can be on the operating table within 2 - 4 weeks of landing.

Kindly enlighten me how I protect myself from shonks given a free pass by the government body funded by my taxes. Example: I lost $30,000 in a marina development called Martha Cove. It's actually been a very good project for the receivers and managers who took it over. The original investors got nothing. The initial City Pacific company had a CEO, Phil Sullivan. The prospectus said management fees would be fixed at about $3 million per year. Except the management fees suddenly inflated to $25 million during the project. ASIC stood by and said nothing. Check out the name on Google, he is still operating on the Gold Coast. OK smartypants, tell me how that could have been avoided. Or perhaps that problem has never arisen for you, as never having had a pot to pee in. I suggest you troll somewhere else.

I would suggest unless the OP is fluent in Thai, it's a probability of 0.999999999 he will be taken to the cleaners, one way or another. He may as well wear a neon sign saying ATM. It's something I have noticed about businesses run successfully by foreigners here, they have been in Thailand for many years, and they speak the language as well as any Thai.

For a guy typing with only one finger, you do pretty well. I guess it depends on the luck of the draw. My 16 yo defacto relationship in Australia was OK as far as the sex went, it was the other stuff that had me looking for greener pastures. Liking watching TV programs that were more brain-dead than any Thai lakorn. Or insisting she was still beautiful as she blew out past 80 kg. My GF here is not the greatest sex I have had, but she is pretty close. As we age, our frequency is declining, although I have not reached celibacy, nor do I want to. She has not let herself go, like so many Western women. She exercises daily, as I do.

I'll bet you saw more pretty Asians than the "otherwise".

I had a pretty good idea of what my pre-existing health conditions were, and what to do about them. I do still have private health insurance in Australia, I pay about 15% of the normal yearly premium to maintain it. Reinstated with an email or phone call if I go back. In any case, even then premiums in Thailand were prohibitively expensive. Even if a company would accept me.

One marriage was enough to convince me never again. 28 years of it, I was a slow learner. My Thai GF will do 10 minutes of massage for me. She is not professionally trained, just village teaching. If I want a thorough massage, I'll use my regular lady. I'd disagree with the proposition the best sex is in long term relationships. I have had some of my best sex with women whom I only knew overnight, or for a week at most. Although I will admit my GF of 8 years still has my attention. And also admit I encountered an equal number of short-term duds.

How did you get to know the person doing the massage without having a first time massage? Personally, I prefer an experienced woman for massages or anything else. Virgins are way overrated IME.

Take a walk through any shopping mall in Australia, the vast majority look like beached whales. One can only pick the younger ones by the absence of wrinkles. Kylie, Danni, and Nicole Kidman are statistical outliers.

Let me purchase a two-by-four to tie around my waist first.

You'd need more than a foot to get there.

"Take it to the Limit" by The Eagles expresses it very well: "You can spend all your time making money, You can spend all your love making time, If it all fell to pieces tomorrow, Would you still be mine?"

IMO massage is a learning process, for the masseuse and client both. I'll put up with one incompetent massage. However, I don't go back. If one refused to back off, I would cut the massage short, pay the full amount, and leave. I moved to Chiang Rai over two years ago. After experimenting with several massage shops, I settled on one 60 yo lady who has been doing massage for 30 years. She knows the level of pressure I can take. Tourist areas would not have the same regular clientele. As they are frequently dealing with Koreans and Japanese, who demand very intensive massage, it's not surprising the OP should encounter a woman who did not understand his limitations.

Quite easily, if you are Australian. We have a government organization called ASIC, which has the job of protecting investors. The number of failures to do so are legion. I mean, when a body with oversight of ALL companies in Australia does nothing to prevent bankrupts and convicted fraudsters from becoming company directors, what else would one expect? There are tens of thousands of investors whose retirements have been put on hold or ruined by ASIC's incompetence. Which is why I take every opportunity to screw the government for every cent of age pension I can get, and have no qualms about it.

I understand it is necessary to buy two Jaguars, because one will always be in the service shop getting fixed.

IMO most Western males lack the intestinal fortitude to realize what they want, uproot themselves, and adapt themselves to life in a foreign country. Many are paralyzed by the prospect of losing half their assets to someone they don't even want to sleep with anymore. Every time I go back to Australia, I get the same reactions. The men are envious, and ask timid questions about my lifestyle. Not in front of their women, who look at me with hatred, as they know I am setting an example they fear. I put a lot of work into researching various retirement destinations, and learning Thai. I knew if I stayed in Australia I would be living very modestly, and also be bored out of my skull, just waiting to die. I live as I want to in Thailand, and just wish I had come here 20 years earlier.

I would split the money between a number of accounts, all less than the 1 million guarantee. I seem to remember an aphorism about putting all one's eggs in one basket. I would also be bringing the money across in stages, safer. $700,000 on current exchange rates is 17.5 million baht, that's one hell of a big property. I am wondering why anyone would spend that much money on a project when they cannot own the land underneath it.

Bumrungrad has an international reputation, I'd suggest checking there first.