Ned

To Mobi D'Ark

One of the best letters Ive read on this site. Perceptions so different from the vast majority of farang who write here.

Best advice about Samui: Don't bother. It's a dump.

All the top brass in the army and police and courts are all Thaksin appointees. What are they going to do?...Simply give up their power and privileges without a struggle if their boss decides to call it quits? They won't have to worry. The Great Man isn't going anywhere and when the senate elections come up in April he will get win hands down and all the real support that he has will become apparent. Then look out!

Don't forget about your partner's relatives. They can often make the life of the upcountry farang very unpleasant . You might be lucky but then again you may not and you'll have to be on your guard against the leeches who want your cash. Your partner in the village setting also may lose a lot of her independence . There's often a lot of pressure on people to follow the herd in the village.

Have heard something about a giant (1,000 rai) rubbish dump and incinerator to take care of the north's garbage to be built in Doi Lo, 45kms SW of CM city along the Chom Tong road.

Can you imagine what sort of stuff they're going to burn down there, and all the dioxin and other nasties that they're going to pump out. I wonder what sort of distance away will be a relatively safe distance. I'm about 15 kms from the planned site.

Yeah, with the blood of drunk motorcyclists. Sanuk dii na. Mai mii panhaa.

They reckon there's plenty of water in the reservoirs north of the city of CM......if you can believe anything you hear. Down here, forty kilometres south on the Ping the water level is already quite low and dropping. Last year's flooding was caused by a couple of heavy downpours only. Areas away from the river are heading for another dry hot season. So what's new?

Drought already and not much rain likely for at least another 6 months! It was my understanding that there's been a lot of construction work going on in Phuket lately. If they haven't got enough now, then what do they expect is going to happen later? I realise we've all got to dwell in the present but.......

Now with guard dog breeds such as rottweilers and alsatians gathering in popularity you could expect t see lots of them discarded onto the streets. Imagine the offspring in their thousands prowling the sois. Try holding off three or four of them with a stick in hand.

Another angle: What happens to the tons and tons of stray dog crap? It dries in the sun, turns eventually to a fine powder and you and me breathe it deep into our lungs.

Not to mention rabies and night long barking sessions.

The jury has returned its verdict Your Honour. As painless a death as possible to all strays.

Concepts like kreng jai or honesty are applied only when it suits. Being honest when it could lead to a problem is for idiots. Being kreng jai to someone who can't damage you is for wimps. If there's an advantage to lie (ie to be less than honest) then that's okay. If you want to build a pig pen five feet from someone else's kitchen , and that person's not in a position to do anything about it , then stuff kreng jai. Superficial, superficial, superficial. Bend like the bamboo mate! Kreng jai's a very excuse for not doing something though. ...Kreng jai khun.

More relocations of sub-contracted factories to the border areas are set to increase in search of Burmese low wage workers. Anyone been out to Mae Sot recently? Vietnam looks like shaping up as this country's main competitor in coming years.....China and India of course too. Long gone are the days when Thailand had aspirations of one day joining the Tiger Economies of Singapore or Taiwan , and talks of real value added productivity coming from the results of an improved education and training system. Now it's a case of putting the Burmese, Lao and Khmer slaves to work for the country, dragging down the wages of their Thai equivalents. Corporate bank balances are fat but none of the contents are going anywhere to improve the country's productivity. It's just dirt low wages and good private profits for the real big boys (the so called 26 Families) from here on in folks.

Whatever you do , don't complain. I reckon Thais define freedom as the freedom to do whatever they want on their property. Same goes for speeding taxi drivers. Tell them to slow down and see the reaction. It's their freedom to drive as fast as they want. It's their space and you're in it .

I can remember in Patong in Dec 1975, at a time when farang were thin on the ground (maybe a dozen in Patong) an Austrian guy was robbed and murdered on the beach after he went out for a walk after dinner. They caught the scumbag the next day when he tried to cash the bloke's traveller's cheques in town.

No, nothing new.

Is Thai beer preserved with formaldehyde......or is this just urban myth?

Guy today tells me that a random alcohol check in beers here revealed a range of between four and fourteen percent for beers marketed as between five and six plus.

Thanks for your replies everyone but it seems that the jury's still out on whether you can extend a non o (retirement visa) in any office in the land. Looks like I might have to go and ask the mob in CM about it....unfortunately.

Well Thetyim, that is not what happened to me (one year visa) and my two farang friends (tourist visas with weeks to run). All three of us had our TM cards removed, we were stamped out and we left our passports with the Burmese, not on the Thai side. The one photocopy (not two anymore) we kept in place of the passports whilst in Burma.

We made it clear that it was a day trip only and not a visa run.

Is this happening to anyone else or did we simply run into an official who didn't have a clue?

Some real rude dykes at CM who I'd rather not have to sit opposite again. Last time it took me almost 3 hours to get the twenty minute job done. Most of the time that I was sitting in the office, the official was either chatting and laughing with all the other clowns (workplace must be sanuk you see) or having a coffee break. Either that or the fat mole's rectum was so clogged with clay that she had to sit on the bog for hours to clear it.

All my paperwork was hunky dory and I'd already extended the visa a number of times. I can also converse freely in Thai so there were no misunderstandings. It was a Friday afternoon so perhaps the monkeys were all getting excited and couldn't stop chattering and shrieking before being let out of their cage. Whatever the reason, the work was unprofessional. A number of times the official had to correct mistakes she'd made because she'd been too busy bragging about the cheap price she'd paid for a set of screwdrivers or something about food and not concentrating on the task at hand.

I forgot to add that no payment is required any more to the Thais. The Burmese require 250 baht.

Yeah Lordfoul, I told her I was only going for a few hours. In any case I wasn't carrying any luggage so that I was only heading for an excursion would've been pretty obvious. On re entry the official didn't ask me why I'd been stamped out.

I went with two other guys and we all had to get only one copy of the front page of our passports.......not two as previously. When I queried the photocopier she said this was the new procedure. My Thai partner had to go a few kilometres back up the road to get all the relevant paperwork. The photocopy caravans near the border post are now gone.

So in other words if you go over the border in Mae Sai for an excursion with a non O visa make sure you have a re entry permit. The farang sitting here with me here have never had to use a re entry permit at Mae Sai before. By olden days I mean about a year ago.

These are not sombre affairs. Just go along with an envelope if you want, sit and eat, walk to the crematorium, sip your coke and ice and if you're called upon by the family to do anything , just copy everyone. No need to look or feel sad....unless that's how you feel.People will think you're weird if you come on with all that stuff. Recently I attended a funeral in CM and the crowd observed a minute's silence for the deceased. All very dignified but the first time I'd seen that. The key thing is to remain dignified....and you don't have to look and act sad to do that. That's what I reckon anyway. As Ringo said: Act naturally.

I'm no scatologist (ie. one showing excessive interest in excrement) but I think it makes a difference what sort of faeces was flung at the enemy. Human shit definitely has more impact than say, a shovel load of bufflao or dog waste. Wouldn't you agree? Now let me tell you about this cat I saw......................

I have a one year non O visa (retirement) valid till Dec 2006. Went over the border at Mae Sai the other day. The official this time tore out my departure card and stamped me out. Coming back in I had to do the paperwork and got stamped in till Dec 2006. No problem for me as I already had a re entry permit (multiple , as it happens.) A mate of mine with the same visa was thinking of heading up there next week but he doesn't have a re entry permit and is afraid he'll only get one month at the border and forfeit his retirement visa. He reckons, though that the official shouldn't have torn out the old departure card as I was only going for a few hours and I already had a non o visa. ........like in the old days.

Any ideas anyone. Cheers.

Can i extend my non O visa (retirement) at any immigration office in the country?

I've been living in CM with this visa for a few years now but after my last session at immigration there, I'd prefer to do it somewhere else next time.

Cheers

A farang near -neighbour of mine reported a sick chicken to the village headman last Saturday and was told to kill the bird then bury it. Not satisfied by this response his wife rang the district office who sent out an inspector the same day. The next morning (Sunday) a team arrived with disinfecting chemicals which they sprayed his yard with and air rifles which they used to shoot his remaining five or six birds. The sick chicken was taken away for tests. Haven't heard anything yet.

You'd reckon this would be happening all over the country. What's all this crap about "a bird flu free country"!!