Awk

His sets have in the past started too late for me to hear them most of the time, but it's obviously up to him and not me if he wants to start them at 01:00 or 22:00, so I'm not really sure what your point is. Has he regularly announced that he will play at 22:00, but then only sauntered on stage at 01:00 or 00:00, after everyone has been waiting for a couple of hours?

My point is the one you just confirmed!! Took is a perfectly reasonable man to talk to but even when his audience is ready and waiting he "saunters onstage" whenever he feels like it, and thats just not professional !! Even the likes of Eric Clapton ( and Took aint him !) dont disrespect their audience !!

As far as I know, he has not committed himself to play at any given day or time. Was CM, or even just his own place, full of posters announcing he would play Friday at 22:30, and he instead sauntered on stage half-drunk at 01:00, after sitting by the bar and feeling up groupies for the last hour or two, you'd have a point. As it is, your point makes no sense to me I'm afraid. I cannot see any disrespect in this behaviour from the man, and cannot understand why anyone would. As somebody else said, it's not like anyone has bought a ticket to see him play at a given time on a given day.

Tooks problem has always been that he revels in his own reputation and behaves accordingly. He thinks because hes a "rock star" its OK to keep his audience hanging around forever until he feels like playing.

People who behave like that, and I include some "real" rock greats are tiresome for me! No doubt Tooks a great guitarist, but hes not that great that you have to sit there religiously sometimes for a couple of hours until hes "in the mood" !!!

I don't know the man, but during my very brief exchanges with him I can't say he has given me the feeling of being anything other than a reasonably friendly and down to earth guy.

His sets have in the past started too late for me to hear them most of the time, but it's obviously up to him and not me if he wants to start them at 01:00 or 22:00, so I'm not really sure what your point is. Has he regularly announced that he will play at 22:00, but then only sauntered on stage at 01:00 or 00:00, after everyone has been waiting for a couple of hours?

Anyone know where Took is playing now. Miss him at Brasserie

When I was at Brasserie two-three weeks ago, Khun Took said he was playing once a week there, and trying to start earlier than before. He said (at that time) that he was going to play on Friday at around 23:00. I'm not sure if Friday 23:00 is to be a regular occurrence unfortunately, but unless anyone else chimes in with more info, I guess you could check it out this Friday and report back here.

Thanks for all the great suggestions. It sounds like best options are Sansara, Dong Tuan and Shangri-la. Of the 3, Sansara is a good 30-40mins away so only got quotes for the other 2 as follows:

Dong Tuan

1x guest entry - B300

membership:

1mo - 2000

3mo - 5000

6mo - 8500

12mo - 12000

Shangri-la

1x guest entry - B300

membership:

1mo - 3000

3mo - 20,000 (interesting rate jumps so high from 1mo)

6mo - ?

12mo - 29,000

Anyone confirm these rates?

Shangri-la rates have to be wrong. Why would anyone pay 20,000 up front for a three month membership, instead of paying 3000 per month for three months?

I don't like hotel gyms much myself, so I would also check also Harris fitness (gym only so-so, but would expect it to be better than most hotel gyms, even at 5-star places (not that I think Duangtawan is 5-star)) for the off chance that it can be combined, possibly separately, with a membership for the hotel pool that I think is in the same building.

Just for refence, I think 5-star chicken is pretty bad

The best bbq chicken is imo to be found at Warorot market. There's a woman that has been selling it there for at least 10 years, and it's great.

If entering Warorot market from the Chang Moi side, into the right hand soi before the road along the river, just go straight for about a 100m. There will then be a soi on your right hand side with various food stalls on the left side of the soi. This woman is at one of the first stalls and you will usually see the steam rising from her bbq. She only seems to get going around 11 or so, and I guess quits at around 16-17.

Possibly the gym at Sansaran moo baan is the closest, but I do not know the area well.

Was on the bus to BKK a few years back, sat at the front, driver kept falling asleep. As we approached Pinklao he drifted off and so did the bus. Sat in a stationary bus on main highway till conductress woke him up.

Very rarely use the bus myself, but heard people swear by NCA, Nakornchai Air. Supposedly they always (on the longer routes, at least?) have two drivers on each bus, changing drivers halfway, as well as some regulations regarding sleep time. All hearsay to me, but heard it enough times, both by Thai people and here on tv, to recommend them if available for the route.

Soi 1 Bar cafe Bakery is good. Check them out on Tripadvisor.

Be great if you can post back on the various burgers you find in your quest please. I am not a big burger eater but when I hanker for one, it's got to be a good one and not a Big Mac!!

Some new places for me to try here I see, but at the moment my vote also goes to the Soi 1 restaurant.

What is sad however is that the Soi 1 "big" beef burger is almost twice the price of the fabled White Plate mango burger, and perhaps only half as good. That's how incredibly good the White Plate mango burger was. Any other burger I've ever tasted pales in comparison to it, and that is before I even consider the very reasonable price of the White Plate burger.

Still, I have eaten the Soi 1 beef burger a handful of times now, and both quality and consistency has been good. Looking forward to trying out some of the other places mentioned her. E.g., Rock Me Burger.

Why is there an hourly rate if a relatively large tip is expected? I also don't want to go to places where I will be called names after I leave if my tip doesn't meet expectations.

Fair enough question, but I guess that's just how things have ended up here in Thailand regarding massage. There are other countries also where the jobs, for whatever reason, to a smaller or larger extent depend on tips. E.g. waiters, perhaps particularly in the US. So into the salary/commission an expected tip is calculated by the boss, which lets him offer a lower salary for the job than would otherwise be required to attract staff.

In Thailand, massage is one of those jobs, and so it is prudent for people to be aware of that, rather than post nonsense about leaving 30B tips.

This suits me fine, as on the few occasions where I do get a complete dud, some girl with neither clue nor interest in doing an even half-hearted job, I at least avoid the extra 100B which, was it not for the expectation that most people will leave a reasonable tip, would have been added to the base cost of the massage. In cases like this, I simply don't leave a tip, and try to remember the girl so as to avoid her the next time.

Message member 'Eyecatcher' on here, he knows a thing or two about a good massage.

Are there some amusing stories in that regard that he wants to share with the rest of us?

I've just written a post about the best massages in Chiang Mai in my opinion, with a breakdown on cost, treatments, directions etc. Hopefully it's helpful: http://www.justinewharton.com/2015/03/30/best-massage-chiang-mai/

"30thb (or 10%) is considered a reasonable tip."

Is that completely out of whack, or am I being the one-week idiot millionaire by never tipping less than 100B for an averagely decent Thai massage?

Having in the past also had one or two friends who worked at the lower end massage shops, I never heard any of them express anything but disdain for the 20-40B tippers. And that was 10 years ago. At low-end places. Not the spa-like places the above blog posting refers to.

Rant? I don't think so, I'm calmer than mud.

And don't put words in my mouth; I don't think a park official should have been "holding his hand," Mr. Melodramatic.

What I do think is since there have been "several" accidents at this particular spot perhaps roping it off or a guard rail, might have been in order.

It appears that you aren't familiar with the situation at all.

At the top there is indeed a platform with a strong wooden guard rail. No one viewing the waterfall from above can go down without climbing over the guard rail and being quite aware that they were doing something wrong.

To the left of the platform the area is roped off and there is a sign that says "Danger, please stay off".

To the right of the platform it is also roped off, and there is a sign that says "Danger No Entry".

I didn't see the man fall. But from where he ended up, I don't think he could have fallen from that top area. I think he must have climbed down to the top of the next tier, and that drop is the one he fell from. That tier is impossible to reach from the trail - you have to go through the forest to get to it. Even so, you can see from a distance that the top of that tier is roped off and a sign saying "No Entry" is hanging from it.

From a public safety standpoint, I believe the park has done all the preventative work they can do. The only additional measure I can imagine is a sign just straight up saying, "This many people have died here. Don't do it."

.

Oh, I am all too familiar with "the situation," even without having been there. I have attended a number of accident scenes in Thailand, and the rescue efforts are typically poorly executed. On one occasion, the "rescuers" killed the victim by improperly lifting him.

I've also been to many national parks and a number of waterfalls in Thailand, and I have never seen any serious means of protecting visitors from dangers.

As for my unfamiliarity with this specific situation, why would I be familiar? The report is vague, and even your own earlier post, based on your first-hand observations, failed to mention anything about barriers and signs, and focused solely on the poor attitude and general incompetence of the "rescuers."

So, thank you for your update. Now I am familiar with the situation.

Right. You say "nothing has been done to prevent future ones" and you think that "roping it off or a guard rail, might have been in order". And you are ``all too familiar with "the situation"''.

Then somebody, in a rather intelligent and polite way, corrects you on both accounts by informing you, who is already `all too familiar with "the situation"'', that measures have been taken to prevent it from happening; they have both roped the area off, and installed a strong wooden guard rail, as well as put up signs.

Instead of eating humble pie, you reply to the information and corrections in a condescending manner. Would your parents be proud? Would anyone?

Thai builders can hardly build a roof that doesn't leak when it rains. I can't fathom the laughs when they were instructed to build a nuclear fallout shelter.

Ahh, but our builders have German nationals involved in the entire process and they maintain a very high standard on everything. They have past projects which would truly WOW you.

My parents purchased a German Mercedes Benz 15 years ago, and it came with a 30 year rust warranty. Yet when the front axle broke due to being corroded throughout by rust, Mercedes Benz just shrugged. After this, I no longer trust Germans, and would not be interested in any Germans being involved in making my roof.

Hi,

I do, though I think they're monthly aggregate reports, not per day.

Still useful though to compare over many years / decades; it shows the monthly average PM10 and also the number of times per month that 120 ug/m3 is exceeded. So you can't go down to the individual day, but it serves quite well to determine how a particular year stacks up.

I mostly went with Station 35t for my own record keeping as it's an out of town location and presumably less affected by local (traffic) factors, but I have data for both.

Files are here: http://mydearyou.com/dryseason/CM%20Air%20Pollution%20Data.zip

I mostly use it to do graphs of this type, showing a longer term trend:

Capture.JPG

Note that the number for 2015 is not final of course, but we're currently up to 14 times that we went over 2015. The actual PM10 for the year provides more detail but overall the number of times 120 is exceeded follows the trend for the overall average PM10 really well. It also shows that some (most) newspapers aren't being factual when they write that Chiang Mai is experiencing the worst haze ever. It's even doubtful if it'll be worse that last year.

People do have short memories.

Some monthly stuff I think I saw as still available at the older air4thai site, but that is less interesting to me, at least at the moment. Also, it can of course not be used for comparing months in the way I compared, which uses hourly data for each day. I think I remember air4thai had hourly data available before, but could not find out how to see it earlier today.

To me it looks like this is the worst March, based on the plots I posted. It started at the highest pm10 level, and for most of the first 20 days, remained with the highest pm10 count, even though there were longer periods where the pm10 count was relatively low. Then a few days ago it dropped to a very low level, and remains at a very low level.

One can of course define "worst" in countless different ways:

- average pm10 per day.

- number of days with pm10 over 120.

- sum of pm10 for all days in March.

- etc.

Using one or several of the above definitions, this is probably not going to be the worst March. E.g., at the moment it looks like the last 10 days or so might be the best of any March of the past 4 years.

I'd be interested in what medical people would consider the worst March. I.e., what is most dangerous to the health.

^ Nice! How does it stack up against 2007 though?

(I could find out but if you have the data right there to graph then that might be quicker)

Sorry, but I don't have data for time prior to December 2010, which is as far back as aqmthai goes for station 36t. Possibly older data is available at the older site, air4thai.pcd.go.th, but I am unable to find my way to it.

If anyone has a dataset from older years, feel free to forward to me.

I updated the plot I made a week or so ago, with updated data from station 36t. As can easily be seen, so far this month the pattern has closely followed that of year 2012, which until this year, started out as the worst March of the last four years. If that trend continues, things should become relatively acceptable from now on, and perhaps I will avoid the drive down south, which I have perhaps stupidly been delaying until school break for little Awk begins at the end of this week. Will check again how things look on Thursday/Friday.

Burn the fields progresively, This will just make he problem last longer. Simple answer change practices and stop burning or stop growing corn.

Quit with the intelligent answers already.

Will it? Are the health consequences of, say, March having an extremely high level of pollution, the same as Januar-April having a more moderate level of pollution?

I guess you may consider it a rhetorical question, as far as you yourself is concerned, but perhaps somebody else knows? Vivid?

Corn farm fires causing North smog

Ayuthai Nonnitirat

The Sunday

Chiang Mai chamber reveals 5 million rai being burnt to clear fields, asks businesses to take responsibility

The Chiang Mai Chamber of Commerce has revealed that the burning of corn plantations to clear the fields, covering 5 million rai in the North, is the main cause of the severe haze problem facing the region every year.

Chiang Mai Chamber of Commerce deputy chairman Wittaya Krongsap, a member of the Chiang Mai-based private sector committee tackling haze, said the annual problem did not mainly stem from outdoor burning in communities or cross-border wildfire smoke.

Wittaya said an academic team in Chiang Rai found that the main culprit responsible for 70 per cent of the problem was the fires at corn plantations to clear the fields.

I thought that was quite interesting.

I'm sure I may have missed it, and unless it was quoted on thaivisa, I'm sure I missed it, but I have not seen any paper previously estimating how much of the pollution is local, and how much is blown in from other places. Considering how politically incorrect it may be to say that most of the problem is local, kudos to whatever "academic team" are saying it. Hopefully the research behind it is solid too.

Interesting. Thank you for all the replies everyone =)

So i spoke to a thai girl who frequents the gyms here and she told me hillside doesn't have the equipment for a bodybuilder compared to Go GYM (off super highway) BUT Go Gym has no air conditioning. Don't want to have a heat stroke

So will check out Harris tomorrow then if thats no good Fitness Thailand / City gym

Anymore recommendations are welcome!

First time I was here I trained at the gym at the old 700 centre here in town, where the 400m running track is. Talk about old gym ... No aircon there either, but in truth, one does get used to it.

Walking around the Maya gym once at night while waiting for the cinema to start, it's easy to see why that gym would suck. Even the upper-class babes I guess train there is not enough of a positive to compensate for the lack of a squat rack. But then, is anything?

I have not been to GO gym, but of the others you mentioned, I'd choose FT. Probably it is also the cheapest. Old equipment that is neither of all that good quality, nor all that fast on getting repaired when it breakes, but it is big and has a decent range of stuff. Difficult to forgive that whatever dofus purchased the barbells, purchased some low quality 15kg junk, but still, ok, kind of. Perhaps the fact that a gym with low quality 15kg barbells is considered "ok", and even is the preferred gym by some, is quite telling of the situation here.

City gym is the best gym I've seen here, but small, out in nowhere land, and I got tired of being surrounded by 99.999% dudes, half of them training in their boxers only.

Perhaps you'd fit right in, with your shirt off? People were friendly though, the gym was unusually well maintained and clean I thought on virtually every visit, and the price good. For half-serious bodybuilders, I'd guess it might be one of the best here, though 4-5 years since I was there last. Was a nice place to train at I thought.

Another gym that opened a year or two ago, but which I have not seen mentioned much here, is "extreme fitness", or something like that. I think I may remember the name wrong, since I cannot google it, but location is approximately this:

https://www.google.com/maps/place/%E0%B8%96%E0%B8%99%E0%B8%99+%E0%B8%A3%E0%B8%B1%E0%B8%95%E0%B8%99%E0%B9%82%E0%B8%81%E0%B8%AA%E0%B8%B4%E0%B8%99%E0%B8%97%E0%B8%A3%E0%B9%8C+Tambon+Chang+Moi,+Amphoe+Mueang+Chiang+Mai,+Chang+Wat+Chiang+Mai+50300,+Thailand/@18.8003763,98.996954,17z/data=!4m2!3m1!1s0x30da3ab93187e503:0x56499bc17ba4e2c3

Not sure why that link comes out a little wrong. It's about 300m west of what the link shows.

Looks like some sort of gay massage with all the posters on the outside I thought, but who knows.

Now, watch the Chinook squadron with its minuscule water buckets, which do help in limited way (with good aim) to (maybe) dampen a fire a flight, take credit for today's significant drop in air pollution!

Who does the credit belong to? I have no idea, but there's an almost incredible drop in the pm 2.5/pm10 levels for station 36t during the last few days, and as of last hour reported, 21:00, pm10 is still dropping, though one cannot say for sure what is happening to pm2.5 right now. Starting to go back up possibly.

Myself, I don't see the point of ridiculing the attempts at improving conditions by dropping water or seeding clouds. I'm just happy some people are trying, and I am sure the people who organise it know a hell lot more than any of us posting here.

Bro awk, you ought to get at least a second air purifier....for the living room.

Well, the light haze in Singapore since yesterday has worsened a bit for the past 3 hrs. Malaysia too. Seems like we too are joiningntou folks, albeit at much lower levels.

Actually I have tried carrying both the Blueair 650Es down from the upstairs bedrooms and in to the livingrooom, and running them at full blast there. After several hours, there is little improvement in air quality unfortunately. After 5-6 hours, it looked like an improvement was appearing, though I would have to repeat that test several times to feel confident about it. And in any case, 5-6 hours is too long.

Unfortunately the living room is very large, and perhaps equally important, has nothing to close it off from the second floor. Additionally, insulation is quite poor in mid-class Thai houses here usually. Perhaps if I had five 650E's, or a couple of the largest "pro" models I read Blueair is introducing "soon", it would suffice.

Anyway, we are hoping to start building our own house soon, and that is one of the problems I will spend some time on thinking about how to alleviate.

Indeed, things are not looking good now. Above is the second article I've seen recently indicating the smog will remain for a while, and graphs based on data from the last 4 years also indicate that things will only gradually start improving, hopefully from the middle/end of next week.

Been procrastinating (for financial and other reasons) about driving down south to Hua Hin as usual this year, once little Awk's school takes a three week break at the end of next week, but looks like we will have to do that drive again. This entire week she and baby Awk have been locked in the bedroom almost the entire time, with the air purifier at max the whole time, rather than attending school as usual. Unfortunately I pulled her out of school a few days too late, so she had already developed the "Chiang Mai cough". :-(

Hi, does anyone have any recommendations for a short-term, 1-2 bedroom apartment to rent, from the end of next week and for three subsequent weeks?

We've been renting at Mykonos, opposite of Market Village in HH, for the past three-four April months (escaping the seasonal smog in Chiang Mai), and would prefer something similar.

I.e., something with an ok standard, a decent swimmingpool, and ideally with easy access to the beach also. The price at Mykonos has been increasing for us, and last year we paid 10,000B per week there (or 9,000B if on a higher floor), and so I've been growing less happy with the value for money there.

Can anyone recommend something somewhat similar, but less expensive? Sport Villa is nice enough, but they usually only have studio rooms available, as the "town houses" seem to be mostly rented out long term.

Never stayed in Cha-Am, but recommendations there are also welcome.

We'll be driving down from Chiang Mai, so will have our own transportation, though it was very nice to be able to walk to Market Village from Mykonos.

Thanks.

Amusing. The op explicitly says he's not interested in comments from bar-stool lawyers, and the only public replies he gets are from bar-stool lawyers.

Welcome to Thaivisa, Bassman.