TPI

What a run away system you would think this would be taken care of by the defense minestery with input from the AirForce.

Lets see who is on the boarding list for the Junket to Sweden......they're the ones picking up the money?

Is it already that time of the year again?

These are the same men who complain about "spagetti straps" on bra's (ooops! that's next week), meanwhile their 17 year old Mia Noi's are saying "Oh pappa get me a new phone na ka"............sometimes Thai men are really boring!

<BR>The worrying question here is whether or not politicians and civil servants are still eligible for further Education funding, <BR><BR>........................or if not eligible, what are the reasons for denying them these channels of development.<BR><BR>Rather than concentrating on ineffective measures to punish the vulnerable and to disenfranchise them,<BR>would it not be more effective to<BR><BR>1.   Ensure proper and informed effective and efficient health and sex education for the young, uncorrupted by personal religious belief.<BR><BR>2.   Acknowledge that the millions of youth living in present-day cities do not have the supportive networks of communal and village life anymore.<BR><BR>3.   Setting up a Child Support Agency with the facilities of pre- and post-birth DNA testing to establish paternity.<BR><BR>4.  Informing potential fathers of all ages and all social positions that in fathering a child will mean providing a minimum of financial support every month for that child ( say, 3,000 baht ) until they reach the age of 18 and that this legislation will be enforced by the Courts of Law and monitored independently by a U.N. delegation representing the Rights of the Child.<BR><BR><BR>.........0r if a student gets pregnant whilst attending school or University, <BR>a Government Cultural Agency could shut down the institution for 9 months or until the child is born, ( whichever is the sooner. )<BR>

Say again? Consider the fact that most Muslim communittes both here and o/seas see sex education as akin to devil worship.

Believe it or not young people do have communal support of some kind as it is the nature of Thai's to work together.

Looking to blame someone after the fact and then trying to impose a financial burdon on only one of the "offenders" will lead to the insanity that is practiced in Australia, where "Mum" lives with the new boyfriend and has all of her children paid for by past boyfriends (some as long as 25 years ago) while picking up pensions etc. from the Govt! Meanwhile the poor sap who can't even remember the event has his pay docked every week by the tax man to the point where he can't afford to look after his own children!

And where, pray tell, could a young student find B3000 a month?

My friend if you were to drift down to Earth and really, really think about your last comment, don't you wish you could edit it out.

<BR>And you don't consider a racist post suggesting that they should encourage foreigners to live here and father children because they would be of a better quality than Thai children insulting

/quote

Not at all....You're the one that bought up "racism", I belive he is merely suggesting that farang, generally, bring up children better in Thailand than many locals.....case in point...the "Look Kungs" on TV soaps and in the movies! Even Thai ladies are of the opinion that 50/50's have a better start in life!

Automatic visas to couples who have a Farang father who stays with the wife and child

Now that is an instant way to get better quality babies and more of them

Ditto

Ditto

A good friend of mine (a Thai lady) has just taken her redundency money and invested in a 7/11....she was very happy with the support she was given and is making money from the first day she was open. Contact 7/11 at their HQ in Sala Deng (I think?) And they will give you all the information you will need to make a decision...in English! Best of luck!

Soros is to blame!

What do you mean, "Soros is to blame" DON'T MAKE STATEMENTS YOU CAN'T QUALIFY

Now Garfield...upper case is yelling in this forum, it's very impolite to yell at someone with a thick neck so be nice! OK?

After seeing what has happened in New Zealand with "Foreign investment" looks to me like the Thai way is better.

Please explain, because the reality is that foreign investment has allowed the residents to maintain a comfortable lifestyle and modernize. It's a country with an insignificant population of 4 million or so, That is hardly the critical mass that can fund the hydroelectric development that in turn frees the population from an addiction to oil. New Zeland's life is sustained by its exports to Australia, the USA, China and Japan. Unless it had foreign investment it would not be able to keep up its highly profitable export sector. The New Zealand strategy is sound, and I suggest to you that it is Thailand that could learn from tiny New Zealand. New Zealand does not discriminate when it comes to foreign investment Thailand discriminates. Its not as if the NZ OIO does this willy nilly: Investments that would control 25% or more of businesses or property worth more than NZ $100 million have to be reviewed by the OIO and if it is not in national interest, the investment is not approved. That's a heck of a lot better than the Thai approach that favours MNEs that aren't subject to proving the benefit of the investment activity.

Agreed, Oz has much the same sort of system.

So, being a farang, speaking Thai and offering flexible personal itineraries and transport on the web is illegal is it?dam_n! another business shot down!<br>     <img class="bbc_emoticon" alt="" src="http://static.thaivisa.com/forum/public/style_emoticons/default/annoyed.gif"><img class="bbc_emoticon" alt="" src="http://static.thaivisa.com/forum/public/style_emoticons/default/angry.gif"><img class="bbc_emoticon" alt="" src="http://static.thaivisa.com/forum/public/style_emoticons/default/sad.gif"><img class="bbc_emoticon" alt="" src="http://static.thaivisa.com/forum/public/style_emoticons/default/violin.gif"><br>

Yeah! Its always been illegal for farang to work as tour guides....its on the 1st list.

Regardless of what TOT says, or maybe in spite of it, Insurance companies will not issue travel insurance to anyone traveling to a country that is under a State of Emergency. And while some governments may have eased their travel warnings, that hasn't necessarily alleviated the situation, and until those warnings are petty much downgraded to "normal", most tour operators won't even bother trying to book tours to Thailand, and will, instead, encourage their travelers to try other destinations. Such as Vietnam, Bali, Malaysia, Indonesia.

The one thing I find truly "Amazing" about Thailand is their ability to act as if absolutely nothing is wrong, everything is perfect, and everyone loves them. I live in Chiang Mai, and while I realize this is "low season", this is the lowest I've seen it in the last 3 years. I'd like to know where the 7.5 million tourists so far this year went, as most of the major hotels here are running at around 20% occupancy, which is very low, even for this time of year. When I go into town near the mall, I see twice as many tuk tuks sitting idle than I do on the street with customers, and most of those customers are Thai.

Yeah, it's "Amazing" all right.

Ditto here. I went for two days in a row to Kao Sarn rd. in the morning and early afternoon. If I had shot a gun on one end of the street I would have hit the wall at the other end. Deserted would the right word to describe this Farang hub in Bangkok. Then I went to Wat Chanasongkram, around which 95% of backpackers go to find lodging, cheap beer and meals. It was empty. Nevertheless, amazing Thailand once again did its

"I am out of touch with the real real world" bit. Small restaurants on the Trok around the Wat where beer has been for years 50 and 60 THB, now proudly advertised a new price: 80THB! At one of those places I asked a waitress: "with these prices do backpackers come to drink and eat? She replied with candor: no, they don't. The go to 7/11 and buy beer for 45 THB." I stopped by a place where I have bought rides to and from the border to do my visa runs and what was 500THB for a round trip now is 550 and up. I went and asked if they had available seats for PoiPet the following day and they told me that maybe they would not do the run as they did not have enough people to make it viable. Thais just don't get it. From the TOT brass to small businesses they want to wish a change and only by wishing and raising prices things will be better. But, TOT's official truth makes the government very happy and they think that CRES or not, that the free tourist visas will be all they need to bring zillions of tourist back to LOS, where most businesses are not smiling at all. What a pity!

"What a pity" Agreed, on a quick trip to Chiang Mai from Phrae my friends and I couldn't get over how few tourists there were. It's as bad as what it was 10 years ago when TAT stopped advertising Chiang Mai and the tourist numbers collapsed!

About half of the farangs in Phrae are either leaving or considering leaving because of the strength of the Thai baht against the Euro and the Pound, dam-ned if I know why the baht is so strong, it must be hel_l trying to export goods overseas?

Boys and girls, I've just looked up the "Nominal Roll" of Vietnam Vets, a web document listing everyone who served in SVN, available from the Australian War Memorial....Bill, Bill...another wannabe, it's a wonder he didn't say he was in the SAS doing "secret" behind the lines work etc. etc

This guy will run into some Ringers where he's going in WA....these tough guys will sort him out...one way or another!

winston churchil didnt say that about being drunk it was the marx brother the one with moustash he also said you get any biggeer there tear you down and put up an office block to the rather large lady

And I thought it was W. C. Fields who said it. OC

Bessie Braddock: Winston, you are drunk, and what's more, you are disgustingly drunk.

Churchill: Bessie, my dear, you are ugly, and what's more, you are disgustingly ugly. But tomorrow I shall be sober and you will still be disgustingly ugly.

This exchange was confirmed to Richard Langworth by Ronald Golding, a bodyguard present on the occasion (as Churchill was leaving the House of Commons in 1946).

Note : in the 1934 movie It's a Gift W.C. Field's character, when told he is drunk, responds, 'Yeah, and you're crazy. But I'll be sober tomorrow and you'll be crazy the rest of your life.'

As cited in Churchill by Himself, ed. Langworth, PublicAffairs, p. 550 ISBN 1586486381

Thank you "Bagwan", it's about time we had a little itellectual discussion on this blog;)!

No-one seems to have mentioned that the Police duty officer was no where to be seen, the shift had, what could have turned out to be a major problem, and the duty officer couldn't let himself be dragged away? To do his duty!...great suffering mergatrood! What was he doing ....hiding in the toilet?

The Meteorological Department ensured that its tsunami and quake detecting system is operating 24 hours a day.

So they got the budget to replace the battery in their US supplied tsunami detector ?.......

It wouldn't be a G200 would it? I've heard it from a Police General that they're extremley accurate, cheap too!

I heard someone say earlier that Super Rich has few guards.

You will rob Thai central bank easier than you would get away with their B3000. Well If you are superman that can fly as well. You can only exit into chitlom from a road that is always clogged up, or get back on petchburi rd , having to avoid the long buses to to make a right turn, rurn left you will sit infront of Big C Rajdamri for at least 5 minutes.

There is another way out by going over the klong with high angled bridge only to come on petchburi and then must head to Panthip, which is near impossible if you happen to be in a hurry.

And At Super rich they have people directing parking cars and others sitting around and all these exists have motorcycle taxis , all are armed staff.

several motocycles are parked outside the house too.

You can come in there and convert the entire Laotian foreign reserves in to Thai baht , no questions asked. But if you show up carrying serially numbered USD notes , more than hundred pieces, they will have to copy your passport.

And for the guys that would come to change your money for you at your house or hotel, They must have known you for years or someone vouched for you, and he is never alone, Did I mention he is always armed if he had more than a 100 G on him.

My guess is the thieves knew its a good place to stake out to see who will leave with a horrible sum and tag him. All the transaction is done in full public glare.

The company is dodgy letting only one staff go do the transaction.

I also wonder why a local company would convert money into local cash, except if super rich is advancing them the money for a fee.

My only prayer in this case is the hope they nabbed the thieves and not some unlucky guys.

Wow! I'm impressed, damned if I've ever heard of "super rich"....perhaps I've never had the entire treasury of the PDR to change into Baht. Lumumba seems to have gone the whole route, I'm very jealous!

Peace only comes when there is prosperity, money makes the world go 'round, so the song goes!

Do you think that Thailand will change in our lifetime? A hundred years ago Thailand was entertaining the Tzar of Russia, there were unreleased slaves and many poor people, all this 4 years before WWI...What's the problem? The poor will always be with us, as will the dis-affected! If you don't like it, get out amongst it and be an instrument of change instead of just bleating about the "poor".

Speaking about religion (ANY religion) seems to drag out the self-professed experts making all sorts of claims.

Theravada Buddhism isn't a cult. The neighbors of Thailand practice the same form of Buddhism for the most part. Myanmar, Cambodia, Laos, Bangladesh, Thailand and perhaps most importantly Sri Lanka all practice Theravada Buddhism. Songkla is a city/province in Southern Thailand. The Sangha was established by the Buddha.

Buddhism teaches many things including right action and right speech, people of faith*, including people that wear orange, almost always fail to live up to the IDEALS of any religion. Lay people of any religion are usually less rigorous in practice than those who are ordained. People who are ordained often fail to live up to the ideals as well.

To state that "Buddhism is not practiced here" besides being inaccurate is also not "right speech". The middle path, while guided by the dharma, is actually individual in nature and thus judging others by your own practice is an exercise in futility.

I should have said 'rarely practiced' because most Thais whilst they would say they 'are' Buddhist have more connection with Animism and asking 'favours' from images of the Buddha than with understanding the larger concepts of karma etc.

Personally I just don't see – viewing Thai society – that Buddhism is put into practice much at all – this is a generalization I accept and there will be those who do have an understanding and try to apply this in their lives - but generally in the way Thais live their lives and treat others - I just don't see it.

After 11 years....I agree, greed seems to be the ranking action!

CHON BURI: -- An 8-month-old baby girl was found discarded inside the Memorial Pattaya Hospital early Thursday.

Am i the only one who thinks that leaving a baby (even in a hospital) isn't a good thing, like most of you are suggesting.

Simple fact.. he abandoned the child, discarded is the exact phrase the news article used... I don't give a rats ass if the guy was the kids father, step-father or just some random guy tapping the Thai mother, you don't just discard/abandon a 8mth old baby in a hospital and walk away... If this guy was such a decent chap, as most of you are suggesting, then physically handing over the child to the authorities is the right course of action, not getting to the hospital grounds and leaving the baby carriage somewhere and walk away.

Agreed 100%.

If I found a baby on my doorstep, do I just drive to the nearest hospital and DISCARD it there like some soi dog? Of course not and no decent person (whether he is the father, the BF, total stranger or a mere one-night-stand) would do it. I am shocked that so many posters seem to think that Ron did the right thing! Perhaps he should have taken the trouble (we are talking of a human life) to go to an orphanage and explain the situation re: the mother, and let them handle it. To just dump the baby at a public hospital and walk away is neither decent nor kind; it is plain irresponsible, careless, heartless, inhuman and stupid.

If anyone did what Ron did in a western country, I am sure he wouldn't be lauded as quite the hero as some posters here seem to think he is. Shame.

Doggie, look around you! Parts of Oz are worse than Thailand. Exactly what orphanage should he take the baby? Do you know where one is? I've been here 11 years and damned if I know!

Ron did what any reasonable man would have done, in the circumstances IMHO

Looking at the times most of these comments and opinions were posted I'd say that the posters were either sobering up or still in a bit of a haze...not a flame, merely an observation.

Can I ask a slightly off topic question: Why are the sentences handed out by the courts so lenient? I mean isn't going to prison supposed to be a deterrent to crime and if you are only sent to prison for a short time, where is the deterrent? So if people get such lenient sentences there is no incentive to give up crime? So if Taksin does return to Thailand and does get prosecuted, will he be able to pay money and not spend any time in prison? What I mean is some terrible acts have occurred and the people who did them get off with such lenient sentences that there is no incentive to give up crime. So why don't we all just become criminals and give up the poorly paid day jobs?

Perhaps, it has to do with the social hierarchy of institutionalized inequality through law that the Sakdina* system established in Thailand. Persons considered of higher stature, owing to wealth and occupational status, have higher influence in the courts and receive lighter sentences than common people.

* http://www.hrsolidarity.net/mainfile.php/1999vol09no06/1018/

(edit - link didn't activate)

Aaaaah! Clarity at last!

Can I ask a slightly off topic question: Why are the sentences handed out by the courts so lenient? I mean isn't going to prison supposed to be a deterrent to crime and if you are only sent to prison for a short time, where is the deterrent? So if people get such lenient sentences there is no incentive to give up crime? So if Taksin does return to Thailand and does get prosecuted, will he be able to pay money and not spend any time in prison? What I mean is some terrible acts have occurred and the people who did them get off with such lenient sentences that there is no incentive to give up crime. So why don't we all just become criminals and give up the poorly paid day jobs?

Well, they start out as long sentances but because the police are too lazy to investigate they are halved if the accused puts up his/her hand! Pretty simple really!

Of course if you're a doctor, a politicians son or any member of the perceived elite then there's a very good chance that, no matter what the crime, you wont even go to jail!

Think about the doctor who drugged and killed his wife, he then chopped her up and tried to flush the bits down the toilet, the judge said he was loath to send him to jail because he was a "good" doctor and seeing his mother was dead it would be bad for the young son to have his father in jail?

Imagine that the Chief Whip of the opposition is your father, who incidently, is thought to be the Capo de Capo in Thailand, you murder a senior policeman in the street in front of maybe, 100 witnesses, what is the result? "I can't be guilty" said the son "it was my drivers gun!". You'll see the young man walking around the streets today!

Maybe all the farangs will be happy when Thailand is a police state like the UK and America?

Or maybe they'd be happy if the police simply performed their duties properly with honor and without the endless extortion attempts.

Precisely! However, in all fairness, we can't really expect the police to perform their duties with honour and without extortion if they're only being paid peanuts...

From what I've been told, the police have to pay for their own uniforms, gear (incl. hand gun) and many of them even have to use their own motorbikes!

If the state doesn't "care" about them how can we expect them to care about the state/their duties?

I for one don't want to see Thailand turning into a police state like we have back in the west - that's the other extreme.

Can you guys elaborate on how the west is more of a police state?

Sure!

In Oz the public are so frightened of the police, when on the road, that if a police car is doing 20 Km on the freeway no one will pass them and the mobile roadblock will continue until they leave the freeway.

In a country town the local Sgt and 3 officers walked into a gun shop, handcuffed the 15 year old son of the owner who was watching the shop for his dad (who had gone for a dump), threw him into the back of their paddy wagon, took him back to the station and grilled him for 6 hours about a trivial complaint. Apart from the fact that the arrest was illegal, they didn't bother to have a witness present when questioning a minor and wouldn't allow him to make a phone call or contact his parents who, in the meantime had organised a search for him...the upshot was that nothing was done against the police as the minister said that the police "probably had a good reason for acting as they did"

In Oz no-one likes or respects the wallopers!

I guess if the government would have let the Red Shirt stayed in Bangkok and helped with the Cleanup everything would be OK???????????

You never know, it might have made all the difference in the eyes of the innocent people who were hurt by the violence.

The Trickle Down Effect......I am here in Melbourne Australia with my thai partner of 5 years. He is from Roi Et. His family is dirt poor, subsistence rice farmers. We received a phone call from his aunt who told him I am too old to be concerned what people think. It just seemed surreal to receive a phone call from Isaan at this time asking for money. It blew me away and of course the mind and the imagination reel, are these people in trouble due to the crisis. I tend to think "Yes"!

Have you considered applying for permanent resident status for your partner, he is entitled so long as you have been a couple for more than 5 years...he could get a temporary one if you had only been together for as little as one year! His next move would be to apply for citizenship, although he could get unemployment benefit from the day he gets his PR? That might solve your financial problems?? There is always family reunion once he's a citizen...why not????

'Puea Thai party to grill PM and four ministers; will nominate Chalerm as premier' http://bit.ly/cjvdis

Not only does the PTP support these red terrorists now they want to intall a person totally devoid of morals and principles as the next PM of Thailand.

They have no shame.

Yeah! What's wrong with the head of the mafia and his two murdering sons becoming the PM of Thailand, they could bring takki in as Minister For Justice and everything would be just "peachy"?