Thaiophil

At last, the pointless and ruinous curb of the nighttime economy is partly lifted.

Frankly, why bars have to close at 2300 in Bkk but midnight in Pattaya, is anyone’s guess. 
 

But better than nothing. Will avail while here in Pattaya and again on return to Bkk later in the week????????

On 2/19/2021 at 4:40 PM, overt2016 said:

Stop panning Pattaya. WHY?

Because it’s actually quite pleasant compared to polluted Bangkok and the bars are open

Just arrived for a few days to get out of the smoke. Reports of it being a ghost town are greatly exaggerated. Terminal 21 is actually quite busy and about half the bars in Soi 6 are open

My pleasant clean hotel 5 mins from the beach is costing me less than 600 bt a night and the new motorway gets you here in 90 mins flat.

With much less traffic and fewer sex tourists it’s really quite nice.

The booze ban in Bkk is out of all proportion to the problem. Infections numbers in Bkk are tiny compared to the population. There is also no scientific evidence that alcohol consumption leads to higher infections. The virus doesn’t care if people drink alcohol or not.

In my area, large groups are sitting at tables at exactly the same distance from each other as they were before the ban. And as others have pointed out, illicit pubs and private parties are riskier than legal, controllable bars.

Time to junk this pointless, irrational policy which is causing huge hardship to the 100s of thousands whose livelihoods depend on the nighttime economy.

I invested a reasonable amount in Jan and my portfolio is now worth 50% more than my stake. 
 

All investments carry risks and rewards

Interesting articles in Bangkok Post showing how Thailand relying on basically 2 vaccines, with only a small amount of Sinovac, is in sharp contrast to other SE Asian countries who are diversifying

Anutin is also quoted as saying foreigners will be able to avail private supply of other vaccines from the private hospitals, once they have FDA clearance.  Wonder what the mark up will be? More than wine in a restaurant I guess????

According to their figures Bkk accounts for less than 5% of cases, but it has more than 15% of the country’s population. So the Covid rate is low in the capital.

So why can’t I get a beer with my meal?????

3 hours ago, webfact said:

“If any vaccine company contacts us, it will go through the system immediately.

At a time when govts around the world are pushing the manufacturers for early supply, the strategy is to wait for them to come calling. Why would they? ????????

5 hours ago, Poet said:

Thailand will replace testing and quarantine with a vaccination requirement, for all visas and visa extensions, within the next 3 months. The past year of not being able to go out or take short vacations will mean that many in the West will have the desire and, more importantly, the money to take a more exotic vacation than usual. With the quarantine requirement consigned to history, that pent-up demand will make this year's high season a record breaker.

????????????

and then you and the Governor of TAT suddenly woke up...

57 minutes ago, webfact said:

vaccinated tourists from the United States and Europe could start arriving in Thailand as early as March or April, with a focus on what  would be the Easter holidays in Europe. 

By then, only health workers, the elderly and the sick will have been vaccinated. They are highly unlikely to fly to Thailand, even if there are flights.

Easter 2022 maybe...

19 hours ago, rooster59 said:

And while you’re at it stop bashing Thais without cause. There are many decent people on Thaivisa of course (many nice ones read this column) but some need to get out more and meet some Thais, perhaps learn some Thai language. My message to those who use online forums to continuously purvey their negativity purvey is you only show your inadequacies and look nothing better than schoolyard bullies (not that they are likely to have got this far in the column of course, they only read headlines).

Thanks for saying this. Thaivisa is often useful, interesting and funny. But I find the prevalence of sweeping negative and borderline racist generalisations about Thais offputting. Hard to follow why some of these folk are in this forum or in Thailand at all since they apparently hate the place.????