viktorrak

hi!

I tried to register, but at a certain stage I got this message:

Sending new PIN to (my number)....Provider not supported

which providers are supported? how do I know this? please help, I also want to use this service

thanks in advance

edit: I guess I figured out the problem...according to sms pricing list the NetPrefix of my country is 35...which in reality is 36...so I gave a wrong number.

would you please reset my account, so that I can register again

thanks

Never under-estimate Mother Nature.

First it was SARS,

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I believe SARS is more correctly written as SAMS ( Severe Acute Media Scare)

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SAMS - totally agree, you made the point

does anyone know if western union is running in Patong? i wanna send some money to thai friends in Phuket and that would be the only way...but i don't know if western union is working or not and if not, when they will open again.

if anybody has info about this, please send me private message or email ([email protected])

thank you very much in advance !!!

i appreciate every kind of info :-)

any users here online from Patong? if yes, please give me a pm!!! i am seriously worried about my friend in Patong. no news about him...not even sms...it goes through but no reply...hope he is ok!!

i would appreciate any kind of help/news/advice/whatever

"People concerned for the welfare of friends and relatives believed to be on or near the coast when the wave hit can call the emergency rescue center at Tel: 076-214492 or 01-6432755. For calls from outside Thailand, the numbers are Tel: 66 76-214492 or Tel: 66 1 643 2755." (from Phuket Gazette website)

does it have any sense to call these numbers? can they help? can they tell anything about the welfare of our friends, relatives?

if yes, i will try to call until i get through

yes, just let's hope for the best and pray for the people in the South-East Asian region. that's all we can do at the moment

is somehow, somewhere a list of the injured or dead available?

(if my friend isn't on the list, it must mean he is safe...)

my prayers go to all affected with this tragical disaster.

are the mobile services really down or why cannot i contact my friend? anyone knows a way to get in touch with him??

am still scared to death...

can anyone tell how many peolpe died in Patong and if they were thais or farang?

Could anyone tell what time exactly the wave hit Patong? I have my friend there and i cannot contact him. The mobile service seems to be down...is there any way to know more about who is injured or dead? I am scared to death...

I am trully shocked....such a bastard...i hope the authorities find a way to keep him in jail for the rest of his life...and i hope he will have nasty and painful ending. i usually don't want anybody to die or suffer, but this man deserves to suffer...long and very badly.

Poor girls...my prayers go to them and their families .

Also I do not mean any disrepect but your thai friend that was with you. Did she recommend the hotel, has she been to Patong before or lived there. Something to think about. I have heard of this thing happening before. Just another thought but hopefully a wrong one.

Thanks for the warning but without my friend i couldn't have done anything. He was a very big help for me, and i don't have any concerns about him. I know him for a year now, and before going to Phuket we already spent 2 weeks with travelling around in Thailand. During this time we always shared the room, and anyway, i trust him 1000 %. He helped me from the first moment and it was him who asked me to let the world know about our case and warn others.

So the warning may be right in some cases but not in mine. My friend is a real friend and i trust him.

Otherwise, the police had the same idea and the way they talked to him was more than humiliating...sometimes i felt i teach them how to talk to an ordinary man but as we all know it is better to show respect towards to the police in Thailand even if they don't deserve it...

I would like to tell about what happened to me during my last journey in Thailand. The story is not unique, it has happened to dozens of tourists already but the reason why I want to tell about it is that there may be a few who hasn’t heard about things like that and it may be a warning for them.

The following happened to me in Patong Beach, Phuket on 20 June this year. I checked in with my Thai friend at a new and nice hotel named Patong Premier Resort at midnight 19 June. The reason of the late check-in was that we arrived with the last flight from Bangkok. The hotel advertises itself with 24-hour security, there were two receptionists and also a security guard, so we thought we are safe. We already spent a week in Koh Chang in a small bungalow and we had no problems. The first strange thing we recognized was that there were some guests with some ladies around the pool late at night which shouldn’t be allowed. But we locked the door of our room and went to sleep. Next morning my friend recognized that my hand-bag was not at the same place where I left it last night. My digital camera with more than hundred beautiful and unique pictures, my wallet with two credit cards and about 4000 baht and both my and my friend’s mobile phone were missing. Of course we made a report to the hotel and the police as well, and at first sight the hotel seemed helpful. But we had to realize soon that they are not that nice. First they charged me 1500 baht for the telephone, because I had to cancel my credit cards and also contact my insurance. And when I asked about how it could happen to us, the manager told us some stories which later turned out to be not true. He wanted to blame my friend and tried to suggest that it must have been either my friend or some friends of his. And he tried to protect his hotel which is understandable. But later he suggested to the police that it was maybe me who made this whole thing happen just because I didn’t want to pay for the room. This was the point when I lost my temper. Not to pay 700 baht for a night….this is non-sense.

The security guard reported to the police that there were two Thai guys who come to the hotel at 5 a.m. and wanted to go to the rooms. And the security guard let them go to the rooms. The receptionist was in the restroom so there was nobody who could have stopped them. They only needed 5 minutes to steal our belongings. And when I asked the manager how it could happen that two guys came to my room at 5 a.m. the only thing he said was that this is another question and this doesn’t have anything to do with my case. For me, it has something to do with my case because these guys could have killed us in the room. And the manager hasn’t done anything against this. Both the receptionist and the security guard are still employed there.

One of the main reasons I am writing about my case is the make a warning: the Patong Premier Resort is not a safe place to stay!!!! So I warn everybody not to stay in that hotel!!!

My story has another part, with the police who couldn’t do anything to find the guys. And they have – or at least could have had – a video tape with the face of one of the guys and the car they used. Because the guys tried to use my credit card at a Thai Farmers Bank ATM in Phuket Town. I saw the tape and have some pictures as well. But the police couldn’t get the video tape. Or didn’t want to. The superintendent had the tape in his hand but he wasn’t smart enough to make a copy of it. He only had five pictures from the tape. And when I tried to ask the bank for a copy the bank manager refused to help. First he said I need to write a letter to the head-office in Bangkok, but after a few days he refused every kind of help. He is holding back an evidence in a criminal case which is – according to the laws of my country –a crime itself. And he even refused to tell me his own name….

The investigation was mainly done by me and my Thai friend, because the police officer had more important things to do – he played card games on his computer.

Of course I must say I was lucky because the guys only stole my things and didn’t kill me or my friend. And the police tried to help me in some way. The superintendent was quite nice to me, but he couldn’t do anything. And when I closed the door everything changed again. And I spent five days at the police station instead of enjoying the beauties of the island.

I learned the lesson: try to avoid any contact with the police in Thailand and keep my values under my pillow.

Thank you for everybody who takes the time to read my story and if you have any comments or tips do not hesitate to write!

Sawadee - Viktor