jfchandler

Yep... my experience with that, in particular, was in fact at Bumrungrad.... But also at a few other places as well...including BNH Hospital on Soi Convent near Silom...

Actually...when I've done that (asked the doctor to just write down what he wants me to take, with all the dose details), they've never had any problem doing that. So it doesn't seem to cause any problems...and they don't get huffy about it..in my experience.

But, there have been a few occasions when after I asked, their response was...no...you won't be able to get that at outside (non-hospital) pharmacies. And when I later checked to confirm that...in those instances, I found the hospital doc was telling the truth...that the outside pharmacies didn't have it.

Of course, as with anything, your mileage may vary...from doc to doc and hospital to hospital.

And then there is common ground... what to do....

Golf ? Sit in the pub and solve the worlds problems ? Go on holiday with girlfriend and take the ‘female friend along’ ? it all seems a bit too unlikely that anything more than a distant friendship can exist.

Hmmm...I dunno... What might any two people do together in BKK?... Eat... drink... dance... shopping... bowling... swimming.... jogging.... karaoke.... concert... and on and on and on....

Ya...you're right... It does all seem a bit too unlikely....

There's quite a few small independent bakery and bread and pastry shops just outside the Paragon supermarket...apart from the offerings in the market itself. No shortage of selection there.

Good advice given above to the OP...

In my experience, hospitals (especially the western oriented ones in BKK) tend to heavily overcharge for their prescriptions/medicines. And if you go there and don't know any better, the doctor will simply order/prescribe the medicine and tell you to go to pay your outpatient hospital bill for the visit and pick up the medicine at the hospital pharmacy.

The doctors and nurses at the hospitals here never seem to mention that for many (but not all) medicines, they are equally obtainable from any local pharmacy and often at substantially reduced prices. So one approach is to have the hospital doc simply write down the detail of what he wants you to take, and then take that info to your local pharmacy. If they don't have it, you can always go back to the hospital pharmacy and get it there.

The other difference here is...even if you need a "prescribed" medicine like an antibiotic, you don't need a written doctor's prescription to go to the local pharmacy here to get it. Just go in, tell them what you want, and buy it. It's a totally different system from that used in the U.S., where prescription medicines are only available via a doctor's written prescription. (I say the above with the caveat...people absolutely shouldn't self-prescribe their own prescription medicines or overuse antibiotics...)

One common OTC (over the counter) medicine that I haven't been able to find here in BKK as yet is Guaifenesin, a very common and inexpensive decongestant. I've gone to a couple different pharmacies, showed them the printed name of the medicine, and all said... no have. Anyone have any luck finding it???

I took a copy of all pages in my current Bank book, just in case.

I was asked for copies of all the used pages including the inside cover with my personal details at the front of the book.

So my 25 satangs worth, copy them all, then you are well prepared for whatever they ask for.

marshbags

Marsh, which immigration office did that? And how recent or far back???

Well Midori... a couple of things here...

1. You should at least be pleased that farang guys are ASKING you for sex as opposed to NOT asking..... Think of it as a compliment....

2. I have and keep a number of different Thai female friends here in BKK where we comfortably have ongoing non-sexual relationships.

For me, as a single man, GFs may come and go (such is life and romance), but my women Thai friends and I stay in touch and together because we like each other, feel comfortable together, and typically have some history together...

When you're dating, it's typically a much more regular schedule of meeting and going out... But for my platonic friends, it's more sporadic... We may not get together for a month or two... But when we do, it's just picking up like nothing happened in the meantime.

It's also kind of nice...because it's break from all the game-playing and occasional strife associated with romance. Given the choice of a night out with the guys or a night out with one or more Thai women (platonic), I'd choose the ladies any day...

Ever since I began eating Thai food years ago, some of the things I have loved best are Isaan grilled meat and meat salad dishes, which were a staple food for me in Los Angeles before moving here.

But now living in BKK, it's been hard to find a reliable, inexpensive, but good quality source for these dishes.... On the low end, there's some street vendors where, if you order any beef (which most often they don't have), it's reasonably likely to break a tooth and be almost inedible. And their larb gai's more often than not tend to be chock full of diced up hearts and livers (which I prefer to skip). Then on the high end, there's a couple Isaan oriented full restaurants around BKK where you can go and order these, and pay restaurant prices...

But lately, I found a nice solution to this from a surprising place. In checking out the different offerings of ChefsXP delivery service one day, I was reading the online menu of a place called Marina HK restaurant, which I had never heard of before. And to my surprise, after a long list of Chinese dishes and dim sum, their menu includes an almost as long list of Isaan favorites including som tams and Thai meat salads... all priced for delivery typically between 68 and 78 baht per dish.

I was a bit skeptical, but I ordered via ChefsXP a couple of times, and tried different Isaan offerings from Marina HK, and everything has been very good.... tender meats, good portions, well prepared and flavorful. I haven't gone to the restaurant itself yet, which is located in Siam Square near Siam Paragon. But at those prices, the delivery is almost as inexpensive as the food you'd get from a street vendor. And the quality of their meats (chicken, pork, beef and duck) are infinitely better.

Here's the info on the restaurant itself:

Marina HK

216/1-6 Siam Square Soi 1

Rama 1 Rd., Patumwan, Bangkok 10330

And here's a link to their menu on ChefsXP... The Isaan offerings are at the very bottom.

I scrounged around on the Internet, trying to find any info on the place... There's not much out there on them....but I did find one stray photo of the interior... (the photo is not mine...)

I'd be interested if anyone else has had good or bad experiences with Marina HK.... And, if you've got any other alternate suggestions for convenient places to find comparable, quality Isaan fare at less than full restaurant prices...

I just came back from grocery shopping at the Villa Market Sukhumvit Soi 11, and WOW, some kind of BIG shipment must have just arrived. Because right now, they seem better and more fully stocked than almost any time I can remember in the past year.

I don't know if all the different Villa's get their new stocks at the same time from a central warehouse, or if it varies by store location. I'd assume they are supplied from a central point in BKK. So it may well be that other Villas are similarly replenished right now.. Anyone have any experience at other locations of late???

In any event, to the OP, among other things, they had a couple of cases of pretty good avocados (Thai version) on display in the produce section... I've been thinking a lot of avocados lately after a friend and his Thai wife here in BKK treated me lately to some homemade guacamole. She fixed it herself under his direction, and it was excellent.

Anyway, back to Villa, right now, they have fresh half gallons of Florida's Natural OJ (not the crappy, sugary stuff offered by Malee and Tipco), all kinds of baking and flours and cereals, canned Rosarita frijoles, and more and more...

As an aside, in the produce section, they also had full-length bundles of fresh aparagus for 22 baht apiece. Usually, they have the packages of the cut tips for a similar price. Today I saw the full length fresh spears.

Needless to say, I blew my food shopping budget for the month...but came home happy.

Hey JFC, I do agree with you on some thing. Some stores have this and other chains have that, a real pain.

Don't forget... we also both agree....Via Vai is tops...

The list is growing....

bagels

One wonders why someone hasn't started a dedicated bagel shop or chain here that does real bagels (no, NOT the American chain that sells bagel shaped breads, Au Bon Pan!) and also sell the toppings for a quick meal. In the US there is so much competition with this, but here it is virgin territory.

It's nice to know...there's at least SOME virgin territory left in BKK....

The OP asked about a variety of different food things...

And in my experience, the general difference about BKK is here, you gotta go to multiple different places to typically find the staple things that you might have normally purchased in the U.S., whereas there, one trip to Trader Joes and the local supermarket usually would suffice.

For pre-prepared foods, indeed, the food halls at Emporium (Suk Soi 24) or in the lower level of Siam Paragon (Central BTS) are pretty well stocked. The Emporium seems to stock a lot of Japanese and other Asian-influenced pre-cooked dishes, perhaps because of the Japanese neighborhoods nearby.

For fresh bakery things, Tops markets and Carrefour stores seem to do best. Carrefour, at least the one at On Nut, often has avocados as well, though they tend to be rock hard and in need of ripening...

Villa Markets do pretty good in terms of stocking a variety of dry pastas and Italian sauces, as well as olive oils.

Villa usually has a pretty decent fresh butcher section. And after a recent visit, I must say that the fresh butcher section in the Emporium food hall (5th floor) has pretty much anything you could look for meat-wise, for a price.

Bagels seem to be a bit of challenge. There are many Au Bon Pains around town. But some folks don't consider their offerings real bagels. Villa Market has its own version of bagels typically, including cinammon and a few other flavors in four-packs.

I too would love there to be a TJs here in Bangkok, but it's going a bit far afield... I do the same thing...every time I go back to California, I bring back a suitcase full of TJs things that are hard or impossible to come by here...

There was a discussion here recently about so-called Thai bank time deposits, which are similar to U.S. CDs.... I gather, though, there is at least one notable difference between the two. With a U.S. CD, you're pretty well locked into keeping the money in the account to term, or face typically a very substantial $ penalty.

But for Thai time deposits, you can withdraw portions of the money early, and the only effect is to reduce your interest earnings to those of a regular savings account (instead of the higher time deposit rate). Depending on the terms right now, Thai bank time deposits are paying in the 2.5% to 4% range...

Actually, now that the U.S. federal reserve keeps cutting domestic interest rates, those percentages are not so much different that what U.S. banks are typically paying for regular savings and CD accounts.

To address the question above, though, in the recent TV discussion, I don't believe there was anyone who with any authority said time deposits would not be acceptable for satisfying the 800K retirement funds obligation, and there were others who said they knew of no reason it wouldn't be acceptable.

After all, the time deposit money would be in a Thai bank, and actually it would be accessible, even though the immigration rules don't have any requirement about the 800K funds needing to be "accessible."

That's indeed what the rule says... 800k in a bank IN Thailand....

For anyone reading this thread, my comment above and Mossfinn's as well, I believe, were directed at one particularly idiotic post that since has been removed from this thread, presumably by the mods. Our comments were NOT directed at the original posting that created this thread.

After watching Matt Cassel for 4 starts, and nearly 5 full games, I am now convinced that he simply is not an NFL caliber QB. He hasn't got a clue of what is going on around him in the pocket; or what is happening downfield any time that his first option isn't there. The performance against the Chargers was one of the worst I've ever seen by any NFL QB.

Hey, you obviously haven't been catching JaMarcus Russell of the Raiders too much. Last night in the Raiders 34-3 loss to the Saints, Saints QB Drew Brees threw like 15 or 16 consecutive completions before making his first incomplete pass well well into the game. He ended up completing 26 of 30 overall. It was pretty amazing to watch as he totally demolished the Raiders defense.

By contrast, Russell couldn't complete a pass if his life depended on it, and if he wasn't throwing incompletions, he was fumbling or being intercepted. I know he's basically a rookie, but it was sad to watch for a team that carries the legacy of Daryl Lamonica, Kenny Stabler and Jim Plunket.

Basically, the Raiders can't seem to score a TD if their life depended on it. As the SF Chronicle reported this morning re the Saints game... "The Raiders failed to score a first-half touchdown for the fourth time in five games."

Dang Lom.... I stayed up last night from midnight to 6 am to watch my California NFL teams... the Raiders and the 49ers... get their butts kicked all over the field...

So after that, I just couldn't hang on for the 7 am Dodgers game this morning. So I went to sleep and just woke up lately to find your posting here... and mention of the wins-loss count in the series!!!

Now I already know who won!!!! Before, I was figuring, how am I going to avoid hearing or seeing the outcome before the Truevisions afternoon replay of the Dodger's game comes on... Next time, don't post the game outcome so quick!!!!

Nothing much different.

The Basco mix box recipe (the mix I used most recently) calls for adding to the powder just 1) one cup of water and 2) one egg... That's all.... After that, blend and bake.

Re spices, I remembered your mention about adding paprika for color and flavor. So, I had at home some dry mixed seasoning mix (Mrs. Dash) and I added a few teaspoons of that while the dough was mixing. The resulting loaf came out with a very nice brownish color all through and through...

The prior loaf I tried with Orgran, which also came out fine, I added NOTHING extra too....because I wanted to stick to the base recipe for the first time. The result was a loaf that was entirely pale WHITE through and through. Tasted fine, but, I prefer to have a bit of color in my bread.

Right now, fyi, I'm going to stick with my own DAK breadmaker, and use the workaround approach mentioned above. Turns out, the machine has an automatic feature to beep 10 times when it is 5 minutes prior to the end of the final kneeding. That's meant as an alert time for yeast breads for people to add raisins and nuts and such, so they don't get pulverized and break up too much in the kneeding.

So, those 10 beeps with 5 minutes left of kneeding work as a perfect alert timer for me to add the gluten-free batter to the machine. I just let it run empty for the first 100 minutes. Wait to hear the 10 beeps, and then add the batter and walk away. Fresh baked bread two hours later (one hour of rising time, followed by one hour of baking and cooling time).

Just out of curiosity, because some folks on the web sites you referred me to were talking about Walmart stores in the U.S. as good places to shop for bread machines, I checked their web site yesterday. They had two Mr. Breadman models and a well reviewed Sunbeam 5891 -- all for under $100 U.S.

By comparison, one place in BKK that I know regularly carries breadmakers is the Verasu shops, one on Wireless Road near the U.S. Embassy and the other in Lad Prao... Last time I checked, they were stocking two different models, in the 4,800 to 5,900 baht range. The advantage there, I suppose, is that they would run on regular 220 AC... where as my U.S. 110 AC model needs a power converter to work here. But Verasu's prices seem a bit high, and I'm not sure if their two models are gluten-free friendly...

Verasu's Severin model

Verasu's Hitachi model

I'd love to know if someplace in BKK is stocking the Zojirushi brand breadmakers....which got pretty good reviews for being GF friendly and very programmable based on individual needs.

Glad for the post and health warning for the North east...

Amazed at the stupidity of the responding comment. Utterly amazed.....

I think what we might be saying here is... the photo is very nice...

But... WHERE did you get/find it??? (the can... not the photo....)

Written by Patrick Frater

Friday, 07 September 2007

Story Categories: Finance, Hong Kong, Internet, Malaysia, Sports rights, TV,

HONG KONG – American football is to get a bigger kick in Asia. The National Football League has signed a major TV deal with Hong Kong-based Yes TV.

Deal covers simulcast rights in all media across the region, which has traditionally been a distribution weak spot for the gridiron game. Yes TV, which is headed by former Morgan Stanley executive director Thomas Kressner, specializes in sports content aggregation and production of sports channels.

Deal may allow American football to piggyback on the massive popularity of soccer in the region. With Astro, the Malaysian pay-TV giant, Yes jointly owns Goal TV which claims to be Asia's only 24-hour soccer network.

Other carriage deals and distribution partners on terrestrial, pay-TV, broadband and mobile platforms are now being finalized by Yes TV and will be announced in coming weeks. Deal covers all of Asia, including the Indian sub-continent, but excludes Japan and Australia/New Zealand.

"The National Football League is one of the most successful sports leagues in the world," Yes TV CEO Kressner, said. "We have a track record in building significant viewership for European soccer leagues across Asia, and are now very pleased to have the chance to do the same for the NFL.”

Yes TV provides exclusive coverage in Asia of the French, Dutch and Scottish premier soccer leagues, plus programs and matches from leading English soccer clubs Manchester United, Chelsea, Liverpool, and Spain's FC Barcelona.

http://www.varietyasiaonline.com/content/view/2058/

Dunno what they did before...

But right now... it looks like Goal TV is exclusively soccer.... don't see any mention of NFL...

In fact, their Wikipedia entry lists them as being a soccer games provider to TrueVisions in Thailand...

http://www.goal.tv/goaltv/en/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GOALTV

Here's one summary listing for that project...from the web....

Sukhumvit 13 40 sq.m up studio-3 bed 18,000-70,000 Sukhumvit Suites

Source: http://www.bkkcondos.com/sukhumvit-condos.html

OK... things are definitely getting better here!!!!

Last night, relying on Zorro's helpful advice, I baked a very successful and very LIGHT/AIRY loaf of bread using my electric breadmaker and the Basco bread mix mentioned above. Very easy ingredients: the flour mix from the box, one egg and one cup of warm water all mixed together, along with any flavorings/herbs you choose to add.

The secret to success was not relying on the bread machine's long, double kneeding cycles intended for yeast/gluten breads..... But instead, just adding the gluten-free bread mix ingredients when the machine only has about 5 minutes left of kneeding, followed by about an hour of rising time, prior to baking. Also, I lightly pre-mixed the wet and dry ingredients in a bowl prior to pouring them into the already running bread machine, so it's rotating paddle wouldn't send the dry flour flying into the air, like occurred the first time I tried adding to the already running machine.

I was surprised because this loaf turned out much lighter and airier than the Orgran mix loaf I'd tried previously. The Basco package of ingredients, however, is smaller and thus makes a loaf that is smaller in size, compared to Orgran.

Another advantage of the Basco mix is that it seems to be readily available via Carrefour stores, whereas the Orgran mix is available, albeit rarely, from Villa markets in BKK...

The only downside, for people who may have allergies, is the Basco mix relies on some soy and dairy ingredients (but no yeast or gluten), whereas the Orgran mix has none of those ingredients (gluten, yeast, soy or dairy).

After not eating any bread for many months because of being on a yeast-free diet, and finding commercially baked yeast or gluten-free bread in BKK almost impossible, I had the luxury this week of enjoying freshly toasted Orgran bread and butter for breakfast all this week. It was a very pleasant change. Now Basco bread for the week ahead.

Why not come to LOS on a multi entry tourist visa, and then convert that to an O visa once he's already here?

By converting in Thailand (instead of doing the O-A in the U.S.), the OP would avoid having to go thru the hassle of police checks and medical exams in the U.S.

By doing a multi entry tourist visa with additional one month extension in LOS, he's get at least 3 months. And then, if he needed it, he'd have up to 3 additional months of visa exempt entries. All of that would be more than enough to take care of meeting the retirement funds requirement thru one means or another.

Just to clarify regarding the above post, TrueVisions IS showing the American and National League Baseball championship series games on ESPN. The only detail is, only TrueVisions Gold and Platinum-level subscribers get ESPN, not the silver and lower packages...