TPI

I've just finished a house (2 x bedroom, bathroom, kitchen and car port, fencing and gate) 8m x 5m for ฿700K...about ฿15K per m2 plus concrete and fittings...I hope this helps!

Thaksin got into politics in 1994. Was he a billionaire by then?

No idea but he was certainly a multi millionaire, earned legally unlike most Thai politicians.

Bloke! he is a man, a half colonel of police, who married a police generals daughter, pray tell how could he be a "multi millionaire" at the age of 45 after spending his time in the police force then he makes a mind boggling leap of business acumen (to equal warren buffet) to turn his pewter into gold...what a man

Sir, If you are so well informed as you pretend to be, then you will know exactly how "Takki" made his money...and it wasn't honestly!

The Singaporean allegedly fled the crime scene in a BMW 325i that he had bought for his wife. He had previously also bought her luxury gifts and is believed to have given her an allowance of 70,000 baht ($2,900) every month, The New Paper reported.

Link

Married her, bought her a 325i and passed her 70k baht per month, plus luxury gifts and she's b*nging another guy. Of course murder is wrong, but he should have iced the chick. Call this a crime of passion, the escapee serves 30 days and is set free.

There is a crisp clear message in there...!

Well, seems to be the "go" in this country, one may assume after all she did not love the "singaporean" much, except his material support.... and some may even think that they are "clever", agreed, she should have been "iced"..

The guy was and is a fool, he could have tossed out the boyfriend (or not) and tossed the girlfriend out of the window...suicide!

In Queensland a public servant has been charged over the theft of aud $ 90,000 of "Disaster relief funds"

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-11-27/public-servant-on-disaster-fund-fraud-charges/3697784

Why does anybody find this unusual? After all we are in asia! Can anybody point to one asian country where this doesn't happen? It appears to be a cultural thingy, if someone is down, kick him! If someone gets rich (by any means, fair or foul) worship him!

I think it comes from eating too much rice or wearing your sarong too tight or something?

Very strange!

Don't waste your time...It's time this thread was closed!

TC exchange rates in Aussie land go from the sublime to the ridiculous! They offer to sell baht for 35 to the $ and buy at 25 to the $ when you can get 31-32 at any ATM while in country! Only newbies get sucked in before they fly! It's like dealing with a piranha!

Gosh! Australian immigration would probably have you in jail/detention center in a minute! They're too busy watching you from behind one way mirrors to explain or help travellers, if you're old and white, you're a pedephile, if you're young you're a druggie and if you're an asian woman, God forbid! you've got to be a whore!

"I didn't stash cash at home. Just imagine how you will stash cash worth Bt1 billion. Where is the Bt200 million amount? It will take 200 bundles of Bt1,000 banknotes to make up the amount. And the thief said he took Bt200 million. If there was Bt1 billion, why didn't him take it all?" he said.

Because him could not carry that many more bundles, Him not elephant. ( Ugh, whats with the logic?)

The report also said that there were 7 or 8 gang members, those two were the ones caught! All of whom are now flying to ........?

My lady and I flew into Swampy on Tuesday, more than half empty plane that was a combination of three seperate flights, 10 minutes in immigration and 30 minutes waiting for the bags to arrive!

The people around the airport were great and the new "big" taxies first class. there's nothing wrong with the people, generally, the people they vote for......!

Takki's and his toady's have got a lot to answer for, speed the day!

I still can't work out why the man is still alive! He's made so many enemies both inside and outside Thailand, ripped off millions of dollars, made foreign government officials lose major face, totally ripped off his own clan for God's sake! And yet, he still plots to take over/control this 2nd world country?

What's wrong with Cambodia or heavens forbid, Monte Negro? Takky...go away!

It seems that there is a couple of problems, the schools only pay "lip service" to quality teaching ie thai teachers teaching grammar don't co-operate with the "conversation" teacher, examinations by making a mark on a score sheet and no post mortem of results show the students that the teachers don't really care, farang teachers pupil scores are meaningless as they generally end in the bin and to top it off the farang teachers salary is usually paid for by the parents, not the school, with the school taking their cut of the donations!

All this heart wrenching wail about not making the "level" is just self justifing w_nk!

I've been there, and painfully gave it up as a lost cause after 12 years! :jap:

No offense, but I seriously doubt there is anyone here who is so financially kaput that they would let their wife do a menial job for 6-8 hours a day with only a couple of days off a month for 6-8000 baht a month. If so I fail to see the logic in losing what time you have left together just for a few extra baht in the pot when we should all see a sub 10k a month salary as a mere blip on the total family income. I for one certainly wouldn't subject my wife to such hardship for practically zero reward.

I give my wife 50,000 a month, out of which she has some obligations such as weekday food etc for the family, but the rest she can keep. As long as my dinner is on the table and I have a steady supply of toothpaste, deodorant and toilet paper she can do what she wants with the rest. I love her and she's worth it. I personally can't fathom why anyone who can afford to live in Thailand on retirement, or working etc cant afford to keep their spouse out of a backbreaking menial low paid job unless they had either seriously mismanaged their own finances or were just incredibly selfish.

A lot of people would prefer to work full time for 6-8000K rather than being a luxury-escort-pretending-to-be-a-loving-wife for 50K, it's just a matter of preference, why judging?

While not being a saint I put all of OUR money into the pot and we both take out what is needed, when it is needed!

I remember my grandfather giving my grandmother "housekeeping money"....making her a low paid "slushy"...if you're happy with your set up then go for it, don't complain if she turns around and bites you, big time!

Trang is desperate for a Farang English teacher, 30K a month, plus free accomodation plus free lunch...if you can teach maths or science then it's 45K..."Yantakwao school" Khun Yeow. As the man said point at their crotch, curl your little finger and laugh!...then, talk to the parents and mention how you will sue!

It's a pity they say Australian citizens, definitely not originally from Australia.

Who are, except the Aborigines?

As a person whose photo you stole (no acknowledgement) Aborigines came originally from Africa via India, like everyone else they're just tourists who overstayed their visa's? :jap:

\Floods can't wash away politics. On the contrary, they have inflamed the political division in the country.

All governments praised His Majesty the King on his advice on flood prevention. In 1995, the King warned of "disaster", called for a "floodway" and suggested road tunnels and more: YouTube/Uv5HO7nA5EQ. Since then, there have been 24 governments.

Exactly the situation.

Being a citizen of a country, who can only exist by a perfect control of waterways and water dikes, Netherlands, I fall from one astonishment into another. There is no limit to stupidity.

In our country, the dikes along the Rhine river estuary were FINISHED around 1050 AD, long before Sukhutai era. From then only enforced and enlarged. In 1134 the count of what is now Bremen and Hamburg brought dike builders from Holland in to build a water protection along the rivers Elbe and Weser and the North Sea. Yes, 875 years ago

In Thailand, despite the floods of 1942 and 95: close to NOTHING is done.

In our country, the WaterSTATE is completely independent of politics, under the supervision of a Dike COUNT ( Compte, Graf ) , with a separate from government. Tax to be levied seperately for “dry feet”. Water ways blocked? He has two answers: “bulldozer+dragline”, and “totally on your expenses, inclusive big fine”.

In Thailand, people, who know water only in hard form ( ICE) in their drinks, in bubble form in their baths and in steam form in their saunas, with MAYBE an idea the garden people use it also for something, decide what and how to do. Instead of cooperation there is a permanent obstruction of each other’s way of doing, misinformation etc. Waterways, klongs, blocked by illegal building. Not since yesterday, but long time

On TV and pictures I see a flooding of 25-75 cm, sometimes more. Sorry, that’s close to nothing, In 1995 it seemed to go wrong here, so the entire evacuation of population and their belongings was ordered and done in 3 days. But water levels between the dikes was 5-9 mtr, not a lousy 1-2 mtr as now in Thailand.

Will the Thai’s learn from this ?? Sorry, but my experience since 1993 is: they will go to temple to pray about their bad karma, and await next election, to get a 20-100 THB in “election money”. Never thinking: why a politician wants to pay for my vote? Maybe to be able to rob more tax payers money as his/her initial investment ?

My idea: bring all politicians in court, and carry out the king’s idea of 15 years ago, so your children and grand children can see the high water levels from the top of the river dikes and not from the top of their homes.

dam_n! Will anyone in power read and understand this "spot on" opinion??

Ha!. You guys have got it all wrong, I don't know why no one has seen this before. While all the speculation and rumours are flowing (sometimes faster and more prevalent than the flood itself), the Shinawatra building dynasty is preparing for the biggest rebuild of Thailand in history.

Can you just see it. Shinawatra building sites all over the country busily rebuilding and repairing Bangkok, all the while filtering public money back into their back pockets.

do you really think they are THAT evil minded?

i mean what solid evidence have you to suggest that they are that inhumane to everyone in the country

the only the things i can think of that you could put forward as inhumane, is the south in which he was indirectly responsible for tragic events due to his policies and thaksins drug war, which i'm sure he did have a "<deleted> em, kill em, they're only scum" attitude, and that's something he deserves to be loathed for imho....unfortunately a lot of the country had the same attitude judging by its popularity.

so yeah it was a horrible thing to do to what were deemed as criminals, and a lot of who were killed weren't criminals/addicts/dealers, tho i don't hold thaksin directly responsible for those but it certainly was his policy that caused it... so he was indirectly responsible, as they wouldn't have happened if this crackdown on drugs hadn't been implemented.

but to answer you...

no i can't just see it, the way you put it sounds like they're rubbing their hands and laughing at the countries population saying :

"ha ha bleed them dry of whatever they have left and make more money as we rebuild on top of it...

to hell with them all, hopefully we'll have another natural disaster when we make our profits from this..

sorry did i say 'natura'l LoL i meant man made obviously.....muahahahaha" *champagne glasses clink*

seriously, do you genuinely think they're pure evil and don't have an ounce of care for the people of Thailand?

and you're perfectly entitled to think that if it's your opinion.

To put it in a nutshell...yes! The man, the family, the Clan think only of themselves for themselves. Investigate the Clan's connection to S'pore and then look for rainbows! You wont find any! IMMHO

Here we go!

http://bangkok.anglo...ax.asp#resident-

Interesting info. Sure glad that they do not tax income from retired pensions and social security.

I think if you read it again it will come under the heading of "other", the only solution IMMHO is to transfer your pension from your personal account in your home country into your Thai account. This gives a scenario of sending money to yourself regardless of the source in your home country! :jap:

Thailand! Send your civil engineers over to the Netherlands. They had this problem figured out over a thousand years ago. You could learn about and use that technology they developed over the years -- or -- just raise your dikes and add some windmills: you'd be better off than you are now.

Oh wait a minute -- I forgot -- everything would have to be constructed with built-in obsolescence so that the structures fail during the first major floods and have to be rebuilt with kick-backs to the PMs and bureaucrats who set up the initial contracts.

Never mind.....

That's very cruel! Anyone would think that you don't have a high opinion of Thai politicians or beaurocrats??

Wow two streets in the whole of Bangkok, what a joke, yes lets all run.........

It is this type of attitude that excuses the government of the responsibility of informing the Bangkok masses in a 'timely' manner. The fact is that if Bangkok were told to evacuate one week ago, people would have stayed. They would have looked around at all the dry ground and thought 'where is the evidence'. Bangkok barriers begin to fail, the northern section of the city is inundated and still people will look around their little world and say, 'where is the evidence'.

This is not a flaw and I am not picking on the poster; it is human nature. In psychology, denial is a subconscious defense mechanism characterized by refusal to acknowledge painful realities, thoughts, or feelings. We were all blessed with this defense mechanism.

I myself was the same way in Chiang Mai at the end of September... we were being told that water was incoming and I looked for all of the reasons that this would not effect 'me'. I was as much a putz as the poster with this comment and shame on both of us.

My house and my business ended up being flooded by just over 1.5 meter flood levels. I was stranded on the second floor of my office building for 4 days, with food, water, electricity, Internet and it was still hell. I cannot comprehend in my worst imaginings what going through 3 or 4 weeks would be like. My advice is to pay heed to the government warnings, think worst case, and evacuate... including Sukhumvuit and Silom. You will realize that, once the water hits, your options are considerably reduced.

My post is to warn people not to fall into false comforts (and to later throw in some political commentary)... it is safer to avoid denial and give some thought about what life would be like with water levels up to your chest or neck (and that is for tall people). My thoughts go out to all of you in BKK... I hope that the water does not reach central areas but the reality is that you have an ocean of water above you and, any breach in flood defenses, physics takes over and water level inside the city will find equilibrium with levels outside of the barriers.

It is truly a scary thought, that it could happen in BKK; please do not be unprepared. In my opinion, any actions over the past couple of days, and in the coming days, are individual decisions... shame on anyone that wants to use this potential disaster for caterwauling, mudslinging, and general uneducated tripe we endure so much on this forum.

It is time to stop the armchair quarterbacking and take care of yourselves and your neighbors. If you are not in the flood effected areas, even some positive karma in this time of need is going to take this country a lot further than the moanings of a bunch of expat curmudgeons.

Perhaps if more than a small fraction of farangs on this forum understood the Thai language and ways, you would know that the work that is being accomplished and the level of support and cooperation of Thai people is humbling, regardless of shirt color. I am not a PTP supporter by any stretch but I think Yingluk is doing an outstanding job and I am certain beyond doubt that every decision she is making is with the intention to be in the best interest of the Thai people. That is all anyone can hope for or ask for, so lay off people.

Thai culture is 'amazing' and most of those of us that live here have realized this at some point in time... it is a shame that many of us have let this slide so easily as we return to our western ways and pick at every bloody detail like we are king shit of the universe (generally speaking, of course).

My belief is that Thailand will survive this catastrophe better than any other country I can imagine. It is the reason I love this country and it's people and I understand that I am an outsider being welcomed into a world different than any I knew before.

To the sound of applause! Hear him! Hear him!

What about from the Northern bus terminal to Swampy? Any problems?

I don't know about departing although my trip to "swampy" from Phrae via train has had to be redesigned...the trains cannot go beyond Lop Buri towards the capital and only 6 wheel trucks should attempt the road trip....as of 0944 on the 22/10.

I think you've got it wrong...no CD sellers, no floating meatball sellers, no floating tuk tuk's!

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A war that had little effect on Thais?????? Apart from being completely wrong, you are in essence saying its ok to parade around portraying people responsible for the greatest atrocities of the 20th century as long as we were not directly involved. Education is supposed to teach, regardless of whether it is in the classroom or at the school carnival. What exactly were the Thai teachers attempting to teach in this particular exercise?

For someone spouting off a lot about teaching and education, you appear to have a problem with reading, comprehension and history.

By the way, Thailand was not in the war and did its best to play on both sides (Japan vs. Allies) and gained rewards from both the US and Japan due to the war.

So the Japanese were not really there?

I do indeed have problems with reading, comprehension and history, but not as much as I have problems with morons with even less of a grasp on reality than I do.

Allowing the Japanese here (and being rewarded for it) is a lot different than being occupied or being in the war or what many other countries went through. After the war Thailand was also rewarded by the US.

Despite your admitted lacking in reading comprehension, you should realize what I said was 100% true in it was a "war that had little effect on Thais compared to much of the rest of the world"

Why don't you tell us how many Thais were killed during combat in the war.

The last world war ended 66 years ago, most of the comments seem to be from people who not only had no part nor had a close family member who had a part in the war?

Yes it was insensitive! Maybe even rude? But seeing that they responded in a in a joyous way, celebrating their youth and enthusiasm what can be the problem? They must have seen photo's of the cruelties of the nazi regime and decided to go ahead anyway as if the ADULTS would understand that not offence was intended.....it was only a sports day after all!!

If you want to know how many military people (Thai) died in WWII go read for yourself on the "Victory Monument" in Bangkok!

My "Boss" is pretty ancient but with the little bit of work its had it's giving 30K to the litre. They're pretty tough, shouldn't need a rebuild, perhaps as suggested, a little tune up and clutch adjust??:jap: