scorecard

OIC, maybe vendors or clerks have special permission to do this. How quaint.

Never experienced what you're saying and doubt that I will. Thai folks don't change things because of farangs.

You do it your way / I'll do it my way and occasionally use 'ignore'.

Each to his own.

I'm not looking for 'happiness and fulfillment' from using this forum. But there is some element of these items. It is what it is: some good information and sharing and lots of total crap. A good point is the ability to easily ignore members who submit crap and even insults. Just put them on ignore.

Keep in mind that in Thailand there's strong cultural / behavioral rules that indicate 'low class' and 'hi-so class'. For some activities many would not wear shorts (which may actually be more comfortable in regard to the weather) because that would be seen as 'low class', which is to be avoided at all cost'.

...and there's plenty of very capable designers / manufacturers of quality innovative smart phones in China / Korea.

And the US still not commenting on / contributing to the recovery in the serious Myanmar / Thailand earth tremors.

Good salient point, well said indeed.

Google says total population of all scandinavian counties is approx. 27million. If musk is really so clever why can't he create systems to massively reduce corruption within a national health scheme. And perhaps that could mean only including 'legal' citizens. Can be done if there's a will.

Many other countries have established very successful national health schemes and in many cases with very small levels of corruption, especially in the Scandinavian countries. Australia has a very successful and comprehensive National Health scheme, Medibank, which is efficient and reliable and provides international quality health care and treatment and provides world class quality attention equal to any treatment anywhere in the world. Medibank provides the latest world class equipment. Medibank Australia has been in operation for several decades. When the Australian Medibank scheme first started the scheme had some teething problems and corruption but these were identified quickly and fixed. For at least 30+ years corruption has been watched carefully and many types of analysis have been developed. A doctor discovered to be falsely billing patients or anything similar will be charged and severely punished very quickly (often jail) and his/her license to practice medicine cancelled for life. If it's a foreigner they will be quickly deported and banned from entry for life. All medical services are available to all citizens and in some cases available to specific visa holders and some international students studying in Australia. Is it free? It's close to free, most of the funding comes from general / all taxation receipts. Australian working citizens pay about 1% extra tax when they submit their personal annual income tax return. The amount paid is very small and is reduced by the deductions available to all citizens for children, education etc.

What a big load of rubbish.

Or, -Legislate opening and closing times for alcohol sales (bottles / restaurants etc.), say 0800 tp 0200. and - Ban all alcohol advertising. - Must show proof of 20 years old to buy.

I can't give any official announcement but I can share that our Chiang Mai city family house (2 levels, built 12 years ago) shook quite seriously. Some cupboard / cabinet doors opened a bit, nothing fell out of cupboards. Front and back door of the house is now slightly misaligned to before the quake but both doors can be opened / locked etc. Many folks would probably not even notice the change in the doors. Our village has 410 houses, one village committee member (farang) has shared that no houses were strongly affected in terms of walls etc., falling / separating from the main construction, no houses have any cracks. and our large swim pool has suffered no damage. Our local BIG C and similar didn't close. My Thai son says there's no reports of damage to roads or bridges in the CM city area. Further: Chiang Mai city is spread out across a large area. Perhaps other CM members can share their experience / observations on this subject.

And some members are good at search. Other, perhaps older (me 80) not so good at search.

But let's see whether schools / teachers observe the ban. Case in point, parent visited teacher at his daughters primary school in Chiang Mai after teacher caused a cane to severely punish the girl. Parent tells the teacher (no language barrier) it's illegal to cane kids at school. Teacher responds 'Yes I know that but at this school teachers are allowed to use this punishment'.

So he doesn't think that the monkeys (there's thousands of them all around Lopburi city 24/7) might get out of control and aggressive / violent when food appears and try to grab the food away from the humans. And he doesn't think that the security guard is doing the right thing to try to keep the thousands of monkeys away from food thrown by visitors to avoid chaos and violence. Some folks have no brain whatever.

I have a western friend who teaches English conversation at a very good government school in Nakorn Sawan. He's highly qualified from England and very professional. He focuses on conversation development and uses many different techniques and activities to get the kids involved and talking. He has a good salary and benefits (free nice house, free electricity, gasoline allowance). Been at the same school for 8 years. The school charges the students extra for his English classes (2,000Baht per term. He privately checks which kids in the main class haven't paid the extra 2,000Baht per term and he gets an old school society from England to sponsor the kids who can't afford the 2,000Baht. I've stayed with him for several days on about 10 occasions. His Thai friends / student's parents all respect him. Most times we have been to local restaurants the owners won't accept payment of the bill. He never goes to bars or massage places and the parents etc., know that and that's a good part of why he's respected. There many small / nice restaurants, local features to visit and more.

Thanks for sharing. I guess I'm lucky; I live with my Thai son and his Thai wife and 4 kids in Chiang Mai in the North of Thailand. Both son and his wife have good jobs and their kids all getting good education. Whole family very involved in sport and never any disputes etc. Our 'world' is balanced and calm and we don't visit places where fights happen etc. We never visit Pattaya, Phuket etc. I worked in Japan 10 years ago for 2 years. Worked/lived in Osaka, Iwakuni and Hiroshima. All very calm / clean places, very pleasant people, very nice / helpful work colleagues. I'm lucky that I can make good comparisons.

Examples... things that shocked you... please share.

My wife passed away from second hand smoke from cigarettes smoked by her father. At that time vapes had not yet been invented.

"But I was reaching for my phone so I didn't do anything wrong sir." Further, seems he was going to make a call, if that was when driving that's illegal too.

Another example, I have an Australian work buddy, been with his Thai wife (married at local Amphur office 5 years ago). He's generous with gifts and support, she's generous with taking care of him and with great food specific to his wishes. But she never says thank you. One year he bought a birthday card for himself, wrote basic stuff in the card and gave to his wife, asking her to return the card and held his hand out to receive it. Her family originates from a not small village right on the border of Lao and not far from the area of Lao which was originally part of Vietnam. He's asked her politely many times to say 'thank you' but she ignores it. Sh'es mentioned several time 'why do you want me to say 'thank you'. Further, 'please if you want to give me things that's fine of course but don't give me things to get a 'thank you'.

Many professional investigations say that vaping is just as dangerous re lung cancer as typical cigarettes. My beloved Thai wife (a dr. of medicine) died of lung cancer (second hand smoke).My wife never smoked one cigarette in her life. Her 2 sisters and 1 brother and her mother all died of lung cancer second hand smoke. The smoker was her father, a chain smoker 23 hrs a day. He chain smoked at the meal table, he had a lighted cigarette sitting on the top of the shower wall at all times. He chain smoked in bed. The family car was always full of smoke, and his wife / kids had to have the next cigarette already alight to pass to him. Car windows always up (otherwise air-con can't cool the car). After my wife dies my teenage Thai son got angry with his grandfather 'Why did you kill my mum?' Son's emotional outburst ignored / shrugged off. So I support any moves to stop all forms of smoking.