zippydedodah

we were early adopters of a 4g Note 3 samsung phone... and have noticed over the past year that 4g coverage has dramatically improved around town.

We live out in Sansai and get 4g, also getting it down in parts of Hang Dong and Promenade side of town as well...

Our plan provides for 1.5 gigs (true move) of 4G, then cuts back to 3G if you exceed that limit... since the wife

likes to watch instructional videos (say, while waiting for the kids drama class to end, or other outside activities)... this serves us well...

We don't believe that sound quality of calls is affected by 4G, but our data stream certainly benefits from it.

vipboxasia has been streaming all games, in very good quality... and for all your other sport needs also... hook up

a pc/laptop to big screen via HDMI and ENJOY!

thanks for added info, but i don't have experience with dependent visa for under 50 person... again, i would recommend the chaingmai immigration website, since they have most/all forms needed downloadable from there.

best of luck with that...

and different pharmacies will carry different meds... depends on whether the pharmacist is used to supplying western medications (at least as far as thai law allows)...

I take sirdalud for back pain and very few pharmacies carry it... but it is available... so just depends on if thai law allows and then finding the right pharmacy.

well, i don't know what kind of info you are expecting...but the address of immigration and the proper forms are all there...

other than that, the only "local" info you might get is on how to get a queue number... which involves getting to immigration by 6:30 am for a yearly visa extension...

otherwise, just show up (usually after lunch) for your 90 day report and you will probably get in and out very quickly..

anything else and you will need to be more specific in your question...

start here: http://www.chiangmaiimm.com/en.html

and then look at pinned topics here on CM thaivisa page

expat auto near big c extra on the superhighway... google them and make appt...run by falang

i used to really enjoy Spanky's burgers... but the shop (and Spanky? whatever happened to him?) are long gone.

Gecko burgers just don't do it for me... Duke's is passable, but thanks for the thread... I am inspired to try

some of the mentioned places

What a magnificent thread.this is turning in to. Please keep the stories rolling in.

I used to think it was just me, but that feeling of coming home seems to be a recurring theme. Maybe it's not me that's being a bit odd, it's a phenomenon, just like the Bermuda Triangle, but being so close to the Golden Triangle with all of those poppies up in them there hills, maybe it's the Opium Triangle.

What is it about Chiang Mai that makes us feel as though we're home when we get here?

Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors?

kamthien behind tesco lotus on the superhighway.... Shogun Farms or Sun Aqua (both are owned by same family) has everything you need....fish, plants, chemicals to take out chlorine, etc...

Puer Tea is explained here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pu-erh_tea

I would only add that the process can be applied to just about any group of tea leaves... my other pal, noted tea expert David Hoffman,

took some wild Akha tea i brought him (from above Chiang Rai) and made excellent Puer Tea back in California from it.

a tea drinking friend of mine who lived with us last year, used to go to Warorot Market to the main tea stall (whatever, wherever that is) and get puer tea... he was a highly respected connoisseur of the stuff and he liked what he found there... give it a try...

we found them at Central Festival...but the "footprint" was too big for our small kitchen... so we opted for a smaller, electric one, that holds about 1 kilo of meat at a time

and has a glass base, about 4-5 inches across.... and mince meat it does...also performs other functions in our kitchen too... i like it and the wife loves it!

not seen neti pot, but several pharmacies sell saline solution and applicators (a syringe type thingy) that work the same way

Ive been to literally every moo ban on 121 and the inner ring within the past month, and there isnt an abundance of leftover rentals.

The only moo ban I can see as having problems is 'Home in park' lots of speculation and overpriced homes there, ridiculously overpriced.

hmmm... well, i live in siriporn 2 and i see around 15% vacancy rate in the homes here.... at least that much over in my old mooban of Pimuk 2 and i can only guess, but looks like same or even more in Pimuk 1.... while i don't think the jump in total numbers is much more than usual (meaning probably always been 10-12% vacancy rates), what I do see are slightly lower rents on the average... but still, all in all, LOTS of empty homes.

I won't even hazard a guess as to why there might be more homes empty, it is a bit surprising to see lower prices... Thais are notorious for sticking to their guns when it comes to pricing...

hmm...the wife says this is all part of the proposed road that will go from Mae Rim area, cross 118 highway (near where doi saket is), and circle around down to the new airport proposed for San Kamphaeng, then continue on down toward Lamphun. There has been a lot of speculative land buying out that way, with land prices going up and actually a fair number of transactions happening... and that was the local explanation for it... but then... TIT and could be local smoke going up merely to inflate prices and then nothing happens... and whatever did happen to the San Kampheng movie studios venture....???

We visited Raju restaurant for Dave's grand opening. I had the Italian beef and my girlfriend had the Lasagna. Both dishes were excellent. I would love to see Dave open one of his restaurants at Maya Mall. Great job Dave :-)

Wait until he gets his Mexican restaurant open. He had a few samples of it in front of it yesterday during his Italian Ragu grand opening.

You people do realize there is free songthaew's from all over the city. It is not necessary to pay 200 baht to get there.

the samples being distributed in front of the Mex restaurant were free samples from Ragu... Dave originally planned to have several tables of free samples set up around

the mall, but the turnout was so good that he decided he did not need to... short story long... that was not mexican food being served out in front of Baja Jo's (i think that is the new name)..it was Ragu samples

I arrived yesterday (thursday) at 2:30pm, got my number and was all done and back on the road by 3pm... a bit longer than usual,

but then, as folks have noted, with the holiday coming up, it is making the place a bit busier than normal.

Been doing the late afternoon 90 day report for about 2 yrs now and usually it is less than 10 mins.

i have a couple of pals who do the 28/28 rotation offshore and been doing it for years... they only get a regular visa on arrival at the airport (as they are here for less than 30 days) and come and go every month... easy peasy... they have never had a problem in 8 yrs of doing this....fly in, fly out, ever 4 weeks...even with "new" rules in place the last few trips for them have not been a problem

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Shogun-Farm-Chiangmai/334694096559521?sk=info

Aqua is the big shop, Shogun is the smaller shop around the corner... the page DOES say open 24hrs a day, but

i tend to think that is an oversight as i have been to Shogun in the evenings and it was closed..

once the 4th ring road gets in (how many years though?), going from doi saket to points down south (meaning the 1317 SanKamphaeng Road and hence, Promenade mall, Bo Sang, Mae On and eventually the next great airport!) will be a lot easier... question is, how long is it gonna take? Lots of "smart" thais i know are buying property on that stretch, near the new road and intend to make big money... but again, with the coup in place, how will public works projects fare?

Shogun Farm and their sister store, both in Kamthien Market, behind tesco/lotus near highway 11... beautiful tanks, lots of them, wide variety of fish, etc

well! If we're going to stay here in CM, then what are the options? An international school which will leave her (from observation) with a strong American accent and little Thai? (She's never going to go to Uni in Amarica) or a 'decent' Thai school that will prepare her for life as a Thai?

Go listen to the kids at the international schools which teach British English, the students still end up with an American accent of varying degrees due to movies, music, and a large contingant of people speaking American English.

Your choices are K2 and up

Montfort, Prince, Dara, Sarasas, Wichai, Regina, Sacred Heart, Varee, for ~30-45k a term.

Don't expect much at these schools, but it could be fine if you plan on having a large influence in the kid's education and then in Matayom having them go on to a proper school

Panyaden is Bilingual, and is about 60-70/term and has certified foreign teachers, not kids with 1 month TEFL's. Best of the bilingual programs as far as actually achieving the goal of students being bi or polylingual. However their philosophy isn't for everyone

Then you have APIS, Grace, Lanna, NIS, and CMIS which are proper American international schools, expect them to be higher been awhile since I checked their Kindergarten fees, but I believe it's 80-100k plus with upwards of an extra 40k in fees, especially if the student is ESL.

Prem is the only other one I can think of at the moment. They are also the most expensive.

Just thought of some other schools that I have little idea about

Hannah Christian, Baan khun Mae, CM Christian, and the Christian German school.

Long story short, expect to pay a few hundred thousand a month for a western level of education. This does not mean that there are not many successful Thai's graduating from private schools and in country universities.

well, CMIS fees (and CMIS is probably one of the best accredited international schools in the city) are close to 200K/year... not per month. Our child went there for 4 yrs and we are now homeschooling her... which is done via enrolling in an online accredited academy... and that is working out even better than we expected.

thanks for the input folks. In USA i installed and repaired many a pneumatic air door closer, but they were always on the outsides of heavy metal security/fire doors.

The ones i have here in our doors are overhead in the casing... i am well aware of the adjustments that need to be made, ratings for size/weight of doors etc... but since the homeowner asked for "professionals" to deal with it and we had gotten blatantly ripped off the first time (3 yrs ago), i was looking for different/better professionals.

Anyways... talked to a guy i had a good sense for, and he said given that they are Diamond brand doors, it indeed should just be an adjustment and unless the doors were locking up, no new parts are necessary... so i tweaked a screw or two and LO! they are fine... and the owner in none the wiser and we hope to get our full security deposit back (that was the driving force in all of this)... once again, thanks for your comments.