Furioso

Well, he either gets stuck in Thai prison or sent back to Darwin. Either way he loses.

My home base is in Thailand, this last week I flew to Da Nang for a 46 day visit. Da Nang is a few degrees cooler so that's a nice break all its own. It's true about no fake smiles. It does seem at least 20% cheaper. Much wider roads, less traffic, similar pollution. The beach walk in Da Nang is way bigger, better. It took awhile(last trip in March) but I found several nice restaurants that serve italian, greek, uzbek, western, etc. and the service is excellent. It's great to go back and forth between Thailand and Vietnam as each one has it's benefits/drawbacks. I recommend Bali as well to get away from the pollution.

Dusk.

Late night after 11PM: How about immediately after the last world cup on Soi Buakhao? Anybody remember that one?

I'm a night owl but in Thailand I feel it's a little too dangerous to be out past 11:00 PM.

Tats = Trash

I would eat at McDonalds but man I'm just grappling with uncertainty right now...and have been for over 15 years. Okay, I did eat some McnNuggets and fries on Sukhumvit a couple of years ago but I was drunk and hadn't eaten much that day. Other than that McNADA!

You're right there's a lot of tourism here in Vietnam nowadays, Viet probably 15-20 million compared to Thailand's 35-40 million. I've been here on short visits before but now I'm here on a 7 week rehab the weekends are pretty crowded/noisy but the rest of the week is pretty laid back. It will be interesting to see how crowded Thailand is when I get back in June, when I left last week it was still pretty packed.

Bingo, were not surrounded by a healthy bunch of well adjusted winners.

I can understand the Thais have been overwhelmed by too many millions of tourists. I think it's called "overshoot". I now see these huge mega condo buildings being built Im thinking it's going to get much worse. It's Asia, it's crowded at least there's a pulse of life instead of the soulless west but I think I can only do 4 - 5 months a year from here on out.

Yes I agree with you 100%. I used to visit Pattaya many times between 2007-2010 you could walk many of the main streets at night there would be just a handful of people probably 1/5 or 1/10 the amount of tourists there are now. no wonder the locals are testy. You're also right about Bangkok being much more than just a tourist destination. They at least have a lot of normal people with normal lives there.

I just arrived in Da Nang(my 3rd trip) from Bangkok a couple hours ago. I can see a big difference. It's not nearly as crowded nor overwhelming. The roads and side walks are wider and much easier to get around. Weather about six degrees cooler (for now) and it doesn't seem to have as much air pollution but maybe it's a different type, maybe worse. Da Nang is much more laid back, not amped up to 15 on a 10 scale. There are many tourists here but just the right amount so they're not completely overworked and jaded. In short it looks like moderation wins again.

Yes they could very well be fed up with tourists and if so we should not blame them. One falang visitor to Bangkok said to me he loved Bangkok but can never live there because almost all the falangs there were pretty unstable. ymmv.

Well my post was referring to the heavily populated sexxy tourist areas not the country in general.

Yes I can see this communication issue is worse in Pattaya, Jomtien, & Bangkok since they're flooded with millions of tourists. When I go to stores around Jomtien I often see nonverbal communication from the Thais. Some frustration, slight anger, irritated, and certainly talk amongst them. For some reason when I'm in Pattaya I don't really see this nearly as much, maybe it's a suburb thing.