BernieOnTour
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Posts posted by BernieOnTour
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7 hours ago, keith101 said:
LOL,LOL,LOL they really dream big don't they delusions of grandeur . 1 million they would be very lucky to get 1 thousand and what exactly do the expect them to spend 100,000 on every single month , cmon time for a reality check .
Well ...they had it already, before closing the borders due to Covid !
At least 6 months a year, the country was full of wealthy retirees from Scandinavia, Germany, UK... who spent the winter here in the sun.
What’s 100,000 baht today?
... Just 2,900 Euro and 40,000 baht more than the minimum income to get a retirement visa.
Open the borders !
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5 hours ago, nchuckle said:
Because if you had a basic understanding of statistics you’d realize the risks associated with catching Covid are far,far greater than getting blood clots ,which ironically is a symptom of Covid! The incidence of blood clots suffered by vaccinated are either the same or less as would occur normally within the population. Now you understand the difference between causation and correlation...?
Before discussing causation and correlation,
I would suggest, you check the death statistics from Gibraltar for 2020 and then compare those with Jan-February 2021 ...
(Gibraltar has the highest vaccination rate worldwide, vaccinating all residents and foreign workforce above the age of 16)
After that, I would suggest to inform yourself about:
1) Endothel cells, capillaries and the function of CD8 lymphocytes
2) SARS-CoV-2 spike proteines, ACE2-receptors from thrombocytes and thrombocytopenia
3) Finally, look up the effect of SARS-CoV-2 spike proteines on cell fusions and resulting inflammation and micro thrombosis
(all currently available Covid vaccines produce SARS-CoV-2 spike proteines to produce an immune reaction)
Hint: the British Medical Journal, Nature and Lancet are a good source with peer reviewed studies on these topics.
In case, you should still have time to spare, look at the bigger picture and read again good old Darwin:
Charles Darwin’s Theory on Natural Selection
... in essence: if you increase the pressure (something, you are also doing with the vaccination) on a species, it leads to a natural breeding, resulting in:
1) more mutations
2) survival of the fittest... i.e. more resistant, stronger and more dangerous
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On 3/29/2021 at 2:47 PM, snoop1130 said:
From July, inoculated tourists will be allowed to visit Phuket without the mandatory two-week quarantine, and from October Pattaya, Koh Samui, Chiang Mai, Phang Nga and Krabi.
Smart idea! ????
So - in the raining season, you open up first the region fully exposed to the South-West-monsoon ?
And Samui, sheltered by the mountains, you keep closed?
And additional to that you also close less affected areas, like Chiangmai and Pattaya?
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4 hours ago, Strongheart said:
Corruption is nothing but "Big Joke" to those who run this Country
No reason for us in the West to sit on a high horse !
Only the PR is better ... calling it lobbyism and philanthropy.
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Even, if the World Economic Forum in Davos with its “Great Reset” suggests that as the appropriate way into our “future”:
That means the death for all the entertainment business!
Who wants to collect negative “Social Credits” ?
PR China, here we come ... 555
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Forced vaccination, really ?
And that with Sinovac from PR China, I suppose?
Well ... try it!
- And you will see the next “Tourist”, “Alien”, whatever..., leaving your country, who before injected 1000s of Euro in your economy every month.
Tanzania, Madagascar, Kenya, Seychelles, Caribbean : here I come.
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On 2/25/2021 at 1:38 AM, webfact said:
animal markets,
On 2/25/2021 at 1:38 AM, webfact said:particularly Thailand’s Chatuchak Weekend Market
Well... I really hope, the missus doesn’t learn, that Chatuchak is now
not only suddenly a wet market, but also selling animals !
... that would extend the usual shopping spree, hunting for cheap clothes and useless <deleted>, to at least another day, because she has to touch all the pets and finally buy at least one of them ????
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On 2/16/2021 at 6:03 PM, Miami007 said:
You may be joking, but the USA news yesterday spoke about 7 new variants found in the USA (for some reason named after birds).
Anyone who looks at the new daily cases in the UK and South Africa can see a steep decline in countries with the "highly contagious" strains... sort of counter-intuitive that the cases fall, when this variant is sooo dangerous and infectious.
There will always be a variant to justify the next lockdown.
I’m sorry that I didn’t add an emoji, indicating this was a sarcastic post !
Astonishing, how many people are now “boxed” in their own camp, no matter if it this the killer virus camp or their “opponents”...
And btw: I can read statistics and analyze available data, set them in proportion and correlate them. - So, I’m well aware that despite rising test rates, the percentage of positive incidences is going down with these “new” mutations.
And that despite the huge increase of the number of antigen tests (from which in most countries negative results are not reported...), which are used to preselect potential positive candidates to increase the percentage of positive PCR-tests...
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11 hours ago, ukrules said:
They're even quarantining people in hotels in the UK now due to this new African variant, British and Irish people only - if you're not British or Irish, forget about entering the UK from Africa - it's not happening.
Interesting...
First, we had the dangerous UK mutation, coming from that “terrible” country, which was so impudent to leave the “wonderful” EU with its Brexit.
Now, we have the dangerous Southafrican mutation, coming from a continent, where there’s only light lockdown (South Africa, Kenia) or even no lockdown (Tanzania, Zanzibar, Madagascar).
... by the way, if one would check the viral genome data bases, he would find out:
In the meantime, we have now more than 7000 mutations !
What next, with 7000 mutations?
- The Wales mutation, the Northern Ireland mutation, the Paris mutation, the Canary islands mutation, the Florida mutation, the South Dakota mutation (no lockdown), the North Dakota mutation (lockdown) ???
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Well... looking back on all those contradictory statements in the last 14 months, WHO made, I can fully understand the Thai government.
(Corona is no pandemic - Corona is declared a pandemic.
Face masks do not help, we recommend Face masks.
Coronavirus is a killer virus - Bulletin: Covid has a case fatality rate of ~0.2%
Banning Chinese from travel to USA is rassist - We recommend travel bans.
Chinese lockdown in Wuhan was a successful experiment - Lockdowns do not prove successful.
And the list goes on....)
And a national government should make sure to do, what their people suits best. Relying on an international organization, working together with 2 private funded NGOs, obscured decision process, decisions influenced by political muggling and lobbyists - that’s for sure not the way to achieve the best for your electorate.
Add in to that: Thailand is regarding Covid deaths and number of incidents at the bottom of the list. Therefore, they would have to wait for their vaccines far longer than those with high Covid numbers.
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On 2/11/2021 at 3:47 AM, webfact said:
Somchai said they spend $100 a day each on average or around 3,000 baht and on average stay in Thailand 4-6 months of the year.
Well ... „Elite“ ?
3000 baht a day sums up to ~ 90,000 baht a month
- That’s a mere 50% plus of the minimum income requirement (60,000 baht), you have to prove for an extension of stay based on retirement.
I know quite a number of guys, who spent double of that 3000, but consider an Elite Visa as too expensive.
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12 hours ago, welovesundaysatspace said:
Top executives, whether Thai or (even more so) expats, make way more than the 150-200k that’s being mentioned as the highest salary there. I can only assume they got their data from the job openings posted on their site, where I doubt the C-level type of executive jobs will get advertised as those typically are being recruited through a headhunter, internally or via other connections or recommendations. I have access to salary data and top executives through my job and the best earners make way way more than that.
Exactly.
The „top level“ here is JobDB‘s top level.
It’s unlikely, senior management or even C-level is hired via JobDB.
However, the salaries up to supervisor level sound sensible.
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31 minutes ago, curlylekan said:
Hey government, when you say you want quality tourists, then you make sure that tourists have to do things so that those people are quality tourists, these are the type of tourists you get. I love Thailand, but it is not a quality tourist spot like in a high income country like Norway or Iceland. The whole atmosphere, like the entertainment industry is created around and caters to all types of tourists - high end tourists, middle end tourists and low end tourists. Sorry, you can't have it both way. You want high quality tourists, this is what you get, about 5% of your GDP will come from tourists
Actually, I think Thailand had its fair share of quality (meaning: high income ) tourists before...
Expensive pool villas and (real) 5 star hotels are abundant in some tourist spots in Thailand.
However, it’s also obvious, you can’t achieve 39 million tourists with this tiny percentage of the global population.
Some smaller countries, eg. Seychelles, Maldives achieve more than 65% of their GDP with tourism. But for what price? The tourism was built up artificially and is totally in the hands of foreign hospitality investors, the locals get only the bread crumbs falling from the table ...
Thailand being far bigger, having evolved over dozens of years with a lot of different business sizes has a totally different structure. The drive for „quality tourists“ is coming from the big players, not from the smaller, family owned businesses.
Unfortunately, I am afraid, all these travel restrictions, because of Covid, will finally lead to a monoculture Seychelles style. Concentration on the big players, driving the smaller ones out of business.
And that will be accompanied by reducing the numbers of us „average“ travellers with higher prices, more restrictions and „saving the climate“ ...
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On 2/8/2021 at 4:37 AM, Bangyai said:
Looks like the ' Row py teeo gan ' ( We travel together ) promotion did not pass that resorts gates.
On 2/8/2021 at 5:00 AM, Always Lit said:Expensive yes. But don't you see a menu with prices listed before ordering? (if it's a fancy resort)
Not the first time, some complaints like this showing up on social media...
IMHO the problem behind that is:
1) Using the „We travel together“ promotion, some Thai travel to places and stay in resorts, they could never afford before - but now: rock bottom room prices and on top of that a 50% subsidy.
2) When coming there, they apply their usual behavior.
- How often have you seen a Thai, not even taking a short glimpse at the menu, but immediately chattering -for minutes- with the waitress what they want to have in what style? ????
3) Then, when the bill comes, they suddenly have to realize that the food prizes staid the same level as before ...where well healed Thai in such a resort or restaurant would never have thought about formerly ... and are also not part of that 50% subsidy...
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15 hours ago, Tropicalevo said:
To be accurate here, this is not true. It is not Covid.
It is the government's response, closing of borders or 14 day 'pay yourself into a 5* hotel' is the reason that there are so few tourists/foreigners.
Many foreigners have family, jobs, retirement homes here. They could and would quarantine at home. The government has killed the goose.
Friends of mine have quarantined themselves at home where they live.
They calculated that it would cost them 7,000 GBP (280,000 THB?) to get here and then stay in their home as they would self quarantine again. (They have been coming here for more than 20 years. Four months every year.)
I am not saying that the government is right or wrong. Just saying that what is printed is NOT the reason.
This government has said for a long time now that it wants 'quality tourists'. Well this is the result.
Just over 11,000 - per month.
Thank you. - At least one making it clear:
No matter, if in our home countries or Thailand,
it’s the governments setting the rules,
why tourism suffers, businesses go bankrupt, poverty is rising and globally ~12,000 people (daily!) die additionally from starvation.
And all that using lockdowns first practiced in Wuhan, as if we still were in the middle ages, fighting the Plague.
I could somewhat understand that in March/April 2019.
However, they still base they regulations on weak data combined with weak statistical analysis and mostly even reacting contrary to the scientific knowledge, we have available nowadays.
It seems, unfortunately we elected a bunch of Global Hypochonders ????
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4 hours ago, Kerryd said:
Just did some searching and found that there are 2 "Blue Dolphin" RoRo ships (as well as a whack of other vessels also named "Blue Dolphin"). It seems the one the Thai operator has was originally the "Horus", built in a Japanese shipyard and launched in 1994. (Renamed the Panstar Honey in 2007 and then the Blue Dolphin in 2010 when it went into service with a different Japanese company - Tsugaru Kaikyo Ferry.)
The Japanese ship (MMSI 431008386) was built in 2016 apparently and is currently operating in Japan as you noted.
The "Thai" (registered) ship (MMSI 567071500) was built in 1994 and is currently anchored just off Laem Chabang. Prior to it's arrival in Thai waters, it had been last anchored in Busan, South Korea.
Sheesh, talk about confusion. Wiki Commons shows both ships as being named "Blue Dolphin" and entering service with that same Japanese Ferry company, with the older ship supposedly in 2010 and the newer one in 2016.
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:IMO_9100437
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:IMO_9773818
OK. It took awhile but I sort of have it worked out now.
The ship the Thai company will be using is the one in the photo posted earlier. Formerly the Horus, then the Panstar Honey, then the Blue Dolphin (or Blue Dolphin 2 depending on which site you look at).
The "Horus" (2007 photo) The "Panstar Honey" (2007-2010)
The Seahorse "Blue Dolphin" (2010 - current as far as the name is concerned)
(Anchored at Laem Chabang currently.)
The newer (2016) Blue Dolphin still in Japan.
Will be interesting to see what the fares will be.
Personally, I'd be interested as I don't want to ride all the way to Songkla just to turn around and ride back a day or 2 later (in my quest to visit every province in the country). A one way trip there would let me wrap up all the Southern provinces and then take a leisurely ride back with some stop overs in Phuket and Ranong maybe.
(It would probably be better to be on the first few voyages and not during the rainy season. One would hope that the ship has had a decent overhaul and would be mechanically sound for at least the first few months. Once it's missed a few "maintenance cycles" (i.e. oil/filter changes and routine maintenance) and they start sailing in monsoon season, it could be a bit dicier.
After all, it's not like they wouldn't skip any maintenance or overload the ship and sail through heavy monsoons or anything.Thanks for the detailed information.
Seems, this time they chose at least a vessel, which should be suited for that route.
The Tsugaru Straits, where Horus/Blue Dolphin operated, is not without challenges. Connecting the Sea of Japan with the Pacific, it has strong westerly currents up to 6 kn, relatively windy in summer, frequent fogs and even some blizzards during winter.
In the end, it really drills down to the question, if they made a decent overhaul and what maintenance routines they use.
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7 hours ago, berrec said:
Wonder how many of the Myanmar Bangkok house slaves are legal.
Well ... „slaves“?
I assume, you have strong evidence for that ?
Unfortunately, I am only aware of 2 families, having Myanmar staff in the household:
1) 3 young girls, paid monthly. Huge 290sqm apartment in Bangkok, the grandkids also often there, but for 3 easily manageable. All 3 sent to school, paid by the family.
2) Family in Central Thailand, managing a big hotel. 2 Myanmar girls staying with Khun Mae, keeping her apartment clean, regular salary, eating with the family and also attending family outings.
Their family is living ~10km away in a small settling of mainly Karen from Myanmar - I have seen their houses and how the family is living ... I bet, the girls prefer to be „slaves“ ...
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On 2/8/2021 at 6:48 AM, Emdog said:
Only Bangkok and 2 other provinces, so no worries? It's like saying "only one room in the house is on fire"
You mean, like:
We have a few hornets under roof!
So, make sure, they are all killed.
Let‘s burn down the house !
????
????????
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2 minutes ago, treetops said:
The Thai one is 27 years old and has had a few previous names:
This is the current Japanese Blue Dolphin ferry:
Thanks, that cleared it up.
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23 hours ago, GeorgeCross said:
only way thailand can open tourism with their current zero tolerance is if they vaccinate their whole population.
Sorry, but that is only wishful thinking ...
To achieve that, you would need a vaccine giving you immune sterility
(in essence, stopping you to infect others) !
Even Astra Zeneca is not claiming, their vaccine is achieving this:
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3777268
Their primary endpoint was:
vaccine is effective at preventing COVID-19, with no severe cases and no hospitalisations
Secondary endpoint was:
early prevention of severe disease after the first dose
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On 2/8/2021 at 9:57 AM, tomauasia said:
... Thanathorn and all the other brave Thais march forward. ...
Thanathorn?
Are you talking about this excellent example of a neocon ? :
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On 2/1/2021 at 9:27 AM, Kerryd said:
They (Seahorse Ferry) have a website set up (English and Thai), the booking page is set up but you can't make bookings or check prices but if you browse the options it looks like they will have a number of choices for cabins as well as VIP and Regular seating. No mention of a galley.
https://www.seahorse-ferries.com/Home/blog-single.aspx?args=8F9CB7482264B41CD3BF54927B0B723279E0720352DFFB7D6F5466F9A597EF0D1AE3BD5D4103D510
The ferry they say they are going to be using looks like a proper boat:
It's a roro boat, the bow lifts and a retractable ramp folds out. Can't find any pics of the rear though. Has to be something similar though.
The ship's name is The Blue Dolphin. It appears that it was in service in Japan as a ferry as recently as 2015.
This blog has some pics of the galley, cabins and a couple pics of some seating areas. However, those pics may be from when it was being used in Japan.
https://www.blockdit.com/posts/6004eae45a8f410cde89379cI am not sure, if they didn’t just take a photo from web, because it is so „bjooteefull“ ???? :
- the japanese Blue Dophin is just 4 years in operation ... normally, they buy cheap and old
- the japanese ferry company still listing it amongst its ships
- the japanese Blue Dolphin is still sailing between Hokkaido and Honshu ... easily to check on internet marine traffic websites like Marinetraffic.com, MMSI is 431008386
Anyway, that route means, they are not just tinkering around in the relatively protected Gulf of Thailand, they are used to.
They are leaving the protection from the Vietnamese coast.
In certain weather conditions, with easterly to southeasterly winds, there’s a long wind fetch - so be prepared for a bumpy ride !
However - that shouldn’t be a big problem:
The excellent maintenance by Thai ferry operators and the renowned seamanship of their captains will make sure, that’s a minor issue ???? ????
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Excellent, I wouldn’t have expected that, Thailand smarter than all others !
At least one country keeping its independence, its decision making by those in charge for that - the government.
We have seen so many supranational organizations falter, the best example is the EU.
Acting this way, they will keep their flexibility to decide about quantities, suppliers, timing and type of vaccine.
Relying on the WHO, their supply would be dependent on political muggling.
And with ~80 Covid-fatalities only, they would be the last ones getting access to the vaccines (... if they really want it, considering the benefit-risk ratio).
By the way, also interesting:
that’s the first time, I am hearing, countries have to pay a surcharge on the vaccine price to the WHO ... A really benevolent approach by the WHO, especially for poor underdeveloped countries, eg. in Africa...????
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10 hours ago, Lacessit said:
Obviously, you have no idea of what a college/university education costs here. It's why quite a few students become "sideline girls".
That’s not their motive ...
It’s more: the newest iPhone, expensive cosmetics, getting new silicone boobs, visiting “HiSo” places, partying 7 nights a week, ....
And the ultimative objective: finding a rich Thai sugar daddy, giving them a nice apartment and a monthly allowance.
Education rates a poor second !
Phuket expats will be vaccinated, officials confirm
in Phuket News
Posted
Well ... then let’s compare this number to the most recent study from Prof. Ioannidis about infection fatality rates:
https://doi.org/10.1111/eci.13554
”the available evidence suggests average global IFR of ~0.15%”
So that means:
your 1 in 1000 for DVT compares
to an infection fatality rate for Covid of 1.5 in 1000
Shall we conclude from that, in analogy to DVT,
you consider Covid as not very dangerous ???