Japhrodisiac

They are sitting on over 100 billion USD by all accounts in reserves, not counting baht reserves as well. The Revenue dept must also have quite a treasure trove collected over the past 2 or more years with unstable govenrnments and little spending on infrastructure or other programs. Seems a better idea to slowly devalue the baht as the above poster mentions...

The amount of tax money taken in over the past decade and not spent on really anything useful or productive for the island is shameful. Now we will have a drawn out low period due to the economic situation, and Samui will continue its cycle of not enough funds to take care of the problems. Compare to Phuket, Krabi, Bali, or any other established island and the situation is quite sad. So many unpaved "government" roads, lots more cars and motorbikes, it is really getting tiring to run the gauntlet every time you go out here.

You may wish to look at page 3 of the classifieds of today's Bangkok Post, where there is a Thai language ad running for a new MD for Thailand Elite (?!?)

Thanks for the name, this is the Bangkok Nursing Home Hospital? Cheers -

I'm looking to get a full heart health checkup done, and was wondering if anyone has any good experiences/recommendations for either a good clinic or good cardiac ward of a hospital or great doctor etc. I live in Samui but can travel as necessary. Cheers

Seems to me that a (relatively) simple solution is to forego phone line based adsl and move over to Cable internet. Just about every home in Thailand has cable tv, so it seems like there should be a relatively easy switchover to this existing technology. ??

I just called to book a ticket at the discounted rate (the discounts don't work online) and they said that a condition for the discount is that the ticket must be issued within 3hrs of booking, meaning you have to get your butt to a Thai Airways office (or travel agent must do) immediately, otherwise promotion fare returns to normal fare. A bit silly, no?

I was referring to this line "I understand what you're saying but one of the Italians hit him with a Paint Pot filled with Concrete..." which I believe in most countries would make it a homocide. Not the same as punching him and the victim falling onto the paint pot full of concrete. Anyway, same sad result for the victim and his family. RIP and I hope the perps get the maximum penalty, a 2 on 1 fight resulting in death is no accident in my books.

So these two Italian gentlemen will be doing time in a Thai prison for manslaughter, or be sent back to the dolce vita?

If you beat someone to death shouldn't that be murder?

I was wondering if there is a deposit limit for THB (in cash) at the banks. In many counties anything over US 10,000 equiv throws up the flag and one has to go to greater lengths in terms of justifying the origin of funds. Is there a similar limit here? Thanks -

I moved house, from a 20,000 baht/month rental to a smaller but just as nice 11,000 baht/month place nearby. the landlord was hurting so i took advantage and locked in a long term at this price. I drive the car less and the motorbike more, we are eating in a bit more but frankly unless you go extravagant it is usually not too much more to eat out than at home. Buying dvds instead of going to the theater, and thats about it.

I'm a beginner also but would be willing to meet and discuss strategy. Pm me if you like -

What is sad about living here is that the island is close to being great, but fails misreably to change itself that last few percent that would make it that much more habitable and enjoyable. Some things will never change. When Chaweng was developed, the beach road was put in the wrong place, cutting off the beach from the public. You have to walk through a resort, reastaurant or find one of the few narrow paths that squeeze between buildings to get to the beach, which is public. This only happens in Samui, as Pattaya, Phuket, Krabi etc all planned their beach strips accordingly. This will never change on Samui. The allocation and planning of land use here benefits only a few locals, that's it.

There are few places on the island where you can walk comfortably without trespassing on private property. Where to picnic or take your dog for a walk? My mother was here last year and proclaimed the island the most pedestrian -unfriendly place in the world, and she has travelled every continent.

What can change here are the roads, drainage, garbage bins and collection etc. tidied up power lines, zoning, building restriction enforced and more. My Thai neighbors have garbage strewn all around their road and lawn, with a public bin and daily pickup 15 meters from their house. They can't seem to ever put garbage in a bag and put it in the bin, ever, even when i buy the bags for them. Therefore there are rats sometimes running around their house and they will spend hours trying to catch them and devise ways to get rid of them. Guhhh. 1+1=I dunno...

Samui seems to be unique in this regard. Go have a look at Krabi, the roads are immaculate, planning is well carried out and the place is spotless. My girlfriend is from a small town with no money in northern thailand, and their town is clean, no garbage left about and things kept in their place. If there is a hole in the road near their house and the tessabaan won't fix it, they pour some leftover concrete in the hole themselves.

Some good, some bad, a lot of potential that may never be reached. Samui in a nutshell.

I have had a number of problems with Kasikorn, missing funds on two occasions that were later returned after much prodding and me not giving up, then finally a nightmare of a missing wire transfer where they kept blaming my bank in Singapore for losing the funds, but would not ever provide their internal proof of transfer. I kept at them for 3 weeks, every day on the phone, and in the branch, sometimes 5 times a day on the phone until I managed to get ahold of someone in the BKK head office that let it slip that they forgot to put the beneficiary address on and no one wanted to admit their mistake. Funds were not in my acct but in the purgatory of the "not sent but not returned" pile at the head office account. When this became clear, finally my funds were returned, I drew all funds out of my account and closed it. The attitude of the branch staff was polite yet incompetent, they were relectant to get anyone on the phone and were basically hoping the problem would solve itself. Everyone insisted that I or my Singapore bank (HSBC) must have made the mistake, no way they could do that (even though I kept the copies of the remittance form signed and stamped by the bank, all filled in perfectly by me).

Banks are still staffed by humans, and if the humans are lazy, corrupt, incompetent etc then these things tend to happen.

In the case of the Dutch couple, the bank concludes their own internal investigation, reaffirming that nothing has happened and no further action will take place, when a clear issue is flagged (ie 250,000 baht/day withdrawn from another province when a 20,000 baht card is issued) is an obvious discrepancy that remains unexplained, save for a vague referrence to the husband perhaps having something on the side (which also would be litigable in most countries to say that to a customer)

The duck soup guy in Lamai is related (son I think) to the duck soup guy in Nathon which I believe is still open. Have not heard of the Maenam shop, but will look out for it. Great duck on rice too with the reduced dark soy sauce.

Site says the new owner is Peter drago, and the old owner is Patrick Drago....

The villa names are completely made up, using low res photos of villas that are on others' websites. Looks like it was written in html by crayon, the post releasing themselves of any liability was dated Dec 8th, AFTER the airports were reopened. I like the way it ends, "can't help you, too busy saving lives..."

The name gives it away in the first 2 seconds, no?

Best of luck to all who paid. desperate times now we'll see more of this type of thing to come.

The tone of this is quite scary. The "do as we say, all of it, or else" is indicative of very bad things to come.

I ordered mine from the Mitsu tent that was up here in Samui before we had a Mitsu dealer on-island. They of course had no demo models, could just sit in a 2dr 2.5 and that was it. So, I took the plunge and ordered one, and save for the slightly noisier than I would like engine, I have been very happy with it for almost 2years now. It has, to me, the best interior and control package, is the roomiest in its class and goes up anything that the tires will let it go. I'm keeping mine.

I have noticed something in terms of the noise though, it seems to depend a lot on the fuel used. Ie one tankful at PTT in Chaweng might have it runnning fairly quiet, while the very next tank at another station might have it rattling a lot more. I suspect that the engine runs very lean, and therefore is sensitive to fuel quality. this may be a by-product of keeping the largest engine in its class competitive in terms of consumption. Just a guess. I also suspect that a layer of under-hood insulation would help a lot, as the noise is basically blasting off and being amplified by raw steel inches above the engine.

I have heard that there is a good NY style deli somewhere close to nana, but cannot confirm. I grew up in Montreal, so a nice thick smoked meat on rye with mustard is one of the things I miss most from home!

The perception is, the BOT are buying dollars. They like to maintain a tie to the USD, so by propping up the dollar they policy have having a set value seems to work out. However eventually the war chest wil empty, and the Baht must surely fall. The current policy is not making sense as it is costing jobs, by hurting Thai exports, icluding food stuffs.

your perception is "slightly" flawed if the BoT was buying Dollars the Baht would weaken. what the BoT does is SELLING Dollars (which are still in abundance in their coffers) to maintain a certain USD/THB range respectively an orderly depreciation of THB.

Agreed, but what is your prediction in terms of how long they can last, and how long they should be doing this to give the illusion of a strong economy? The treasury reserve is only 80-100B USD in healthy times, so what is left at the moment after many months of selling? Selling large amounts of an appreciating currency to prop up a currency that is highly likely to be worth less shortly seems like an interesting monetary policy...

There was a study done for bicycle riders, it seems that a fall without a helmet going as slow as 9km/hr could cause serious and permanent injury, even death. Saying that, I wear a helmet only when going for a "ride". Hopping on the bike for a couple of blocks, I guess I'm too lazy. No excuses, it is stupid...

The problem that I have with all of these speed tests shown is that they are showing essentially the connection speed with the provider and country, but not the dynamic real world speed. Try this site and I think you'll be in for a surprise : http://www.broadbandspeedchecker.co.uk/

I use TOT 1.5mb download/512K upload and the best numbers I can get in real world downloads are about 30-40kb/s, which is about 1/15th the speed I get in Canada for a similar price. When my contract runs out they will be getting the heave-ho in favour of a provider that cares at least a modicum about their service or reputation.

Always makes me wonder why, with relatively few homes having a land line, and most having cable-TV (can't miss the soaps...) why there are no cable internet providers here. 10x the speed for the same price, more reliable, clearer VOIP capability, can stream video with ease. Too obvious?

I just returned from a week in Bali, had not been there for many years and it was interesting to compare with Samui, where I have lived for the past 4 years. Bali taxis are cheap when they go on the meter, which they will do if you ask them (their default is to not mention it and try to haggle with you after the ride), and i don't mind topping up with a decent tip for a pleasant ride. Also, you can get your own minibus, with english speaking driver, including fuel, for an 8hr day for equiv of 1000 baht. The roads are mostly very well maintained, The hotels much cheaper than here, and there is almost no visible garbage. They fly 747's and the like in from all over, so it is easy to see Samui taking an ass kicking from this island. Samui will not change until they lose tons of money, and then they won't change because they lack the funds to do so. I still enjoy my life here on the whole, but there certainly are alternatives...

2 guys on two different motorbikes carrying each end of a large pole, maybe 8-10M long, and trying to do a u-turn on the main road in traffic. Really

A very nice little machine that no one has mentioned so far is the relatively new HP 2133 mini-PC. I am running one now, they come in a few versions, Linux and Windows etc. I have the top current model that came pre-loaded with Vista Business and it runs great. The build is much more robust than the little plastic guys that this thread is concerned with, has an 8.9" screen, great keyboard which is 95% full size and a few other great features. 160gb hard drive is nice too and 2gb ram standard. I run it at home with an external 17" widescreen LG monitor and take it with me everywhere else. I bought it the week they launched for 34,000 baht but they are now down to 24,000 due to the stiff competition with the eee and the acer.