zthyadat

Borders are open as usual, they are not affected by holidays.

Immigration offices are closed.

Anyone have any idea what dates immigration will be closed? I need to do an extension on the 11th and get the feeling it will be my fault if they decide to take the extra days off...

"landslide that killed ... causing the horrific landslide that killed ... prevent landslides ... slow down flashfloods ... counted over 60 landslides ... had caused landslides and flashfloods ... areas that were damaged by flashfloods and landslides after the floodwaters recede ... Most landslides had occurred ... factors behind the landslides ... damaged during flashfloods ... high risk for landslides ... the main causes of landslides ... the flashfloods and landslides in the southern provinces ... Most of the mudslides had occurred ... the ground to prevent landslides and flashfloods ... said the landslides ... said severe landslides... recorded over 30 landslides and eight flashfloods"

it's possible to write a long article with just a few words, just by repeating them in different combinations. Good journalism.

It is due to the Nation's shortage of copy editors. Some online stuff even goes up untouched. As a former Nation editor, I can assure you that this is how many pieces look when the foreign copy-eds first get hold of them, before cutting them down to half their original length (which can really upset the writers). The Thai writing style works in spirals, ideally ever decreasing ones, but usually not. It is a tricky thing to manage. In the right hands, this diplomatic style can say a lot without seeming to say anything in particular - there have been some annual speeches in Thailand that are excellent examples - though it still doesn't work in English where we just bluntly get to the point. Among other things, this orbital approach enables (though not in the above example) criticising a person without falling afoul of the libel laws. Just say the same thing with slight variations over and over until the reader sees where the finger is pointing.

So men like to wet their dicks? Is this news, a story 100,000 years old. Perhaps if some of these overweight grump wives lost a few kilos, put on some make up and smiled occasionally, they would not be cheated on? Give me a break, is this the biggest problem Thailand has? No.

And perhaps if the husband was not a sweating heaving snoring farting beer-bellied mass of arrogant suet in the bed next to her, she wouldn't feel the urge to cheat either.

From what I can tell, this is just a story that fills English language readers in on one of the countless people and things that Thais are already well aware of (in this case, a relatively famous detective) that we are normally oblivious to. Why is this a problem? There is plenty of other "proper" news to read. If you don't like this kind of story, skip it. Not every story in the newspaper is intended to appeal to every type of reader.

And by the way, people have also been murdering each other since the dawn of humanity, but murder is still discussed. This is simply a lesser social crime.

There are not many courageous decent useful guys out there these days, as when I was young. There were heaps of them back then and my man was great! All my friends married good ones too.

There were also heaps of brothels back then... People only change in rose-coloured retrospect. But congratulations on finding a good one.

Why does Admin. continually run these ridiculous stories? When do I ever see anything positive come to my e-mail account. Nothing but crap.

You want positive news? I don;t think it has been invented yet.

It has always amazed me that so many people start their day with the newspaper, just to confirm to themselves that the world sucks before they drag themselves off to work.

Yes. Thailand should bring in this law to prohibit older Farangs and other foreigners from marrying very young women .

I have seen some farangs with young wives who could be their grand daughters!.

Laos and Cambodia have enacted these law: why not Thailand.

This may come as a surprise to you, but the purpose of laws is not to ban things that you personally do not like. Who someone else marries is their business, not yours.

"Permanent residency applicants, many of them from Phuket, represent the best and brightest of Thailand's expatriate community."

Not sure that's saying much. Most foreigners I've seen working here are pretty incompetent (I doubt anyone would employ them in the West, which I suppose is why they are here) and anyone retired here presumably doesnt need to bother about permanent residency anyway.

Maybe there's some other group of sparkling expats that I have yet to encounter.

Yeah, but it might require leaving the saloon occasionally.

The Canadian economist Ross McKitrick puts it into perspective:

Encouraging people to turn off lights doesn't demonise electricity. It could also be seen as a celebration of how precious it is by not wasting it. We do need to look closer at managing consumption. McKitrick appears to believe that we should turn on all our lights and appliances instead, as if because electricity was a good thing, more and more of it is better.

However, I do believe that these single day conservation events achieve little - in fact they tend to let people off the hook because they made their little "contribution". Some may discover how much electricity they waste and adjust their consumption habits but one suspects they are in the minority.

Exactly, Who is it that hates littering here? No one seems to give it a second thought...it's like second nature to just drop whatever paper your holding onto the ground.

And if you want to hate Thai's just try driving in Bangkok for a few days...the most selfish drivers I've ever encountered.

Guess you can add 'being hypocritical' on the list.

You don't have to drive to find this out - you just have to try crossing the street.

Suthep's comments might seem a bit harsh and inappropriate (they are!), but if you ask any Thai - who isn't an ardent red shirt - how they feel about foreign election monitors, you'll probably get a similar response!

From various discussions with pretty well educated Thais about condominium investment and purchasing many said they were happy for other Thais (rich) to take advantage of them and accepted it as the way Thailand is, but were indignant about foreigners doing it as wrong and immoral.

You can only laugh...

or complain on internet forums.

Geez my Thai wife owns three properties in Melbourne Australia and that includes the land.

Wow that is amazing. My dog is half Chinese.

If this is a direct quote, it was poorly structured. I doubt he actually meant 'I do not respect Westerners'. Read in context, I understand what he (hopefully) means, and I would expect most people on here would feel the same way if it was their country.

For example, if it was David Cameron that said 'I do not respect the use of Asian election monitoring organizations as I believe that it would imply that we are unable to democratically monitor our own country's election'. Then I am pretty sure most people would understand.

But using the word "farang" as it appears he did, is definitely pejorative. It's never too far below the surface of a lot of Thais, unfortunately.

Instead of being worried about high speed, let's worry aboutfixing the traffic for getting some speed in the streets. It seem it gets worseand worse, and the lack of discipline on the road also makes it worse anddangerous

Yeah, public transit is stupid - let's worry about how best to accommodate private cars!!

Amazing that this is even a consideration in what claims to be a democracy... It is effectively saying "Yes, we have the might and the power to take over and throw out any government we want, but we promise we won't do it this time - though we could, you know, and don't ever forget it, folks." So they will steer the country back to democracy by not having a coup - wow, they should give trophies for that. It is like claiming you are some kind of hero for not going around punching people in the head.

Its a way of life, I wear long shorts/polo and steel caps to work, in a social enviroment I wear long shorts/t-shirt and surfer joe thongs, hell will freeeze over before you see me in long pants.

May I ask why.

I come from the Gold Coast in Queensland Australia, long pants have never been a requirement of my work or social life.

Should I be impressed? BTW, this topic is Thailand related. So nobody couldn't care less what you wear in Australia

"Nobody couldn't care less?"

$112 MILLION WASTED OVERNIGHT

when the dust settles and the new muslim regime backed by Al Qaeda is in control, these insurgents will spit on their new found friendship with the western allies, as the infidels they see us as

this is a major blunder by all the parties involved, they should have left it well alone and let this civil war work itself out.........

I worked in Libya for 6 years for Gaddafi and his regime on his personal pet project the Great Mad Man Made River. Be sure that the people behind the uprising are definitely not Al Qaeda or Muslim Fanatics. The only Libyans that appear to be anything like Al Qaeda are the ones shown waving green flags and shouting long live Gaddafi in Green Square. Remember that Saif-Islam recently let alot of Al Queda detainees out of prison, who swore allegience to him and are probably fighting for him not for the other side.

I can tell you from personal experience, that Gaddafi rules by fear, everyone is scared of him, I kept a low profile. 10 Bulgarian nurses were sentenced to death by firing squad although we all knew they were innocent of all charges. Another friend, Max Goldi, who was Country Director of ABB was jailed just for being Swiss, in retalliation for the arrest of Hannibal Gaddafi in a Swiss hotel when he had beaten up his servants. Subsequent to that Gaddafi suggested to teh UN that Switzerland be broken up and divided between Italy, France and Germany.

Originally, two sons, Saadi and Saif-Islam had the idea to introduce Democracy, to promote Tourism and to turn Libya into another Dubai withh Zwara being modelled on Monte Carlo with Casinos, hotels and a harbour for luxury yachts. To do this they persuaded Gaddafi to retire but instead he agreed to step down as leader if he was given the position of President of the United States of Africa, and they proceeded to pay a number of the Africa States considerebale sums to support this. The idea was that he would step down in September 2009, the 50th anniversary of the revolution. In the end the African states did not all support this and so Gaddafi refused to step down and relinguish power.

Two of my Libyan bosses, who had been working with these two sons to replace the old regime and establish a Democratic state, fell foul of Gaddafi and fled to Egypt in 2009, to join the opposition. Many of the younger generation have studied and travelled abroad and are into pop music, parties, and many other western persuits, which are not allowed in Libya, although Gaddafi and his sons hold rave parties even with Beyonce paying $2 Million to perform, whilst 26% of the youth have no job. Tourism is continually held back by the old Regime although Libya has the most stunning Roman and Greek buildings still standing including a whole city at Leptcis Magna. The people of Zwara, Al Zawiyah are Berber and are related to the Tunisians and the Lebanese, being decendents of the ancient Phoenicians.

Alot of them studied in the UK, Germany and the USA, and since 2006 when Gaddafi allowed them to have internet, have been communicating with the the outside World, and they realise that they are amongst the poorest people in the world despite Libya having earnt US$32.4Billion last year in oil money. That is US$5million per Libyan. This is what has caused them to seek to remove Gaddafi and seek a Western style democracy. Remember that Bengahzi was part of Cyrenia in the Ancient Greek Empire and the Greeks invented Democracy. These guys are definitely not Al Qaeda.

You had me right with you there until the part about wealth distribution. With a population of 6.5 million people, $32 billion comes to just under $5,000 per person, not $5 million

So here we go again with the right wing Christian crusade.

Actually, this is mostly coming from the left. Many conservatives are saying it is a big mistake, but Hillary and Obama are insisting on it.

If you imagine that any President of the US since FDR has been anything resembling a leftie, then your definition of left is only relative to being left of America's right. The democrats are conservatives and the Republicans are ultra-conservatives.

a small, private war by the rednecks.

the un security council should first to calm situation down, and if it doesn't work threaten with gradual pressure, including military

Gaddafi was not prepared to listen and he was murdering his own people. I have been against most of the USA's little ventures (especially when they are acting on their own with coerced partners), but I agree with this one - it isn't just the USA - far from it.

Al Gore will probably try to say it's " climate change" caused by our SUV's!

Right on Miami Bob!

Mr. Gore and his cartel of elites, who produced the movie on global warming called An Inconvenient Truth, would probably tell you that all of this cold weather is being caused by global warming. Yes, Mr. Gore and his friends spent a few million dollars to convince you that cold weather really means hot weather

What Mr. Gore did not tell you in his film is that he and his friends own very lucrative companies that deal in the marketing of Carbon Credits, and that they stand to make billions of dollars if they can convince you to support your government's plans to pass legislation to limit carbon emissions and to legally mandate the global, international trading of Carbon Credits. Hummm. That was just a small, inconvenient truth that was left out of the movie. Darn!

So everyone! Open up those beautiful minds of yours and connect the dots... and enjoy this wonderful cool weather we are experiencing in the middle of the hot season. 'Tis just a small proclivity of Mother Nature for your enjoyment.

"Gee Whiz! Thanks Mother Nature!!!"

And of course, the concept of climate change was entirely dereamed up by Al Gore, so the conspiracy is entirely of his making. When you are talking about average temperatures going up globally by say, one degree celsius over a decade, it isn't going to manifest (or be perceived by individuals) as hotter seasons all year round everywhere in the world. It is mainly going to manifest as buggered up weather due to alterations in sea and air currents - sometimes hotter, sometimes colder, but averaging out over the seas and the land masses as slightly, imperceptibly (to humans) warmer. That climate change is occurring is not really in dispute. What is in dispute is the cause of it. I personally don't think it is absurd to believe that the amount of fuel we are burning and tossing into the atmosphere is having an effect on the climate, but doubtless it isn't the only factor - there are longer term cycles that the earth can be going through - it is one thing to measure global weather and another thing entirely to analyse it. But one thing is sure; some guy shivering in his armchair reckoning that as the temperature in Thailand is unseasonably low, this whole global warming malarky is just a conspiracy by Al Gore, is not really in much of a position to share much more on the subject than his ignorance.

Looked on YouTube for the video mentioned in the OP, but no success.

This was the closest match:

He's no Douglas Fairbanks, is he?

I'd rather the tourists pay their visa fee and the proceeds pay for the processing, rather than being subsidized by government funds that could be spent on something more worthwhile, like healthcare, schools and infrastructure.

Ahahahahahahahahahahaha!!!! as if! Or into the pockets of the brave and the few.... how long have you been here matey? You're not in the UK anymore.

But he was fit enough to hike about in the hilly border region repeatedly crossing into Cambodia? A bit of a drama queen. Probably as 'fataly' ill as al-Megrahi appears to be.

It is certainly possible, though I can see why so many would doubt it. Cambodian prisons are even worse than Thai prisons (and almost as bad as Cambodian hospitals) and contracting nasty diseases is far from unheard of.

I recall when Samak went to America for cancer treatment, this forum was teeming with disbelievers (myself among them), saying it was the old hospital trick politicians here use when in trouble - you can't be in trouble when you are sick.

Within a year, Samak came back and died of liver cancer. Huh, imagine that.

So all I am suggesting is not to be too certain of something none of us has actually seen.

LOL.... those immigration officials...

Always trying to pull a practical joke on some unsuspecting person.

What a bunch of cut-ups with a great sense of humor those guys are...

Actually I feel sorry for the Immigration Officer. That snooty ambassador caused a loss of face. Lucky the ambassador wasn't slapped?

"Snooty ambassador? Do you know the woman or are you just assuming she is snooty? Or did a friend of a friend meet her once? Or are you talking out of your bumhole?

"an investigation at the depot found that a total of hundreds of items mainly weapons were gone missing and believed to be allegedly stolen from the headquarters."

My god, what an appallingly bad sentence. Do the Nation's bosses know how crap the paper has become? A story this important and they couldn't be bothered putting one of the few remaining farang editors on the case?

"believed to be allegedly stolen"?! kind of possibly maybe... And if hundreds of weapons are missing, there is only one conclusion - they were stolen. Not believed stolen or allegedly stolen, but flat out stolen - by thieves. They were not borrowed, they were not lost behind the sofa cushions.

How can Suthichai Yoon show his face in public when his newspaper prints such garbage?

Britishers 78 and 73 'theoretically' died of heart attacks from having sex together, but were found in separate beds. Dual simultaneous heart attacks, what are the odds....but one found the strength to climb back in their own bed to finish dying.... but never called for help....

Do the Thai police really think most people are that stupid,

or does this obfuscation only need to fool their bosses?

It fools no one, but since they have always gotten away with it, they are crap liars - no need to think up a credible story.

There is a war being waged down South and in wars there are victims - of all ages. Maybe these do gooders should undergo a reality check.

I've always found it rather odd that "do gooder" is mostly used pejoratively.

"Last year Thailand received 15.8 million international tourists, generating income of Bt585 million, he said."

That averages out at a tad over 37 Baht per international visitor. Is the quoted line a typo, or are the PM's advisors/scriptwriters slacking a bit?

Anyway, sad to say that Thailand (in common with just about every other country trying to entice tourists) can't be too picky at the moment.

I believe the figure is billion, not million. It is chronic in the English language papers. One would think that anyone with a semi-engaged brain would take note that the figures don't match up - a background awareness of the fact that since these two figures are related, they must agree with each other....... But no.

And assuming that figure is billion, then it means the total spending in baht terms (Bt37,000) is only slightly more than it was more than five years ago. Of course, since most of it comes in as foreign currency, dollar spending has increased.