TallGuyJohninBKK

ThaiVisa seemed to be having some problem with its servers when I did the above post, and it seems now some of my uploaded speed test images aren't loading well or correctly.

So, let me recap in text form the results I got running the tests thru TestMy.net's Seattle server with 25 MB downloads, 4-5 pm this afternoon.

True cable direct - no VPN: 1.5 - 1.6 Mbps

True cable with HMA L.A.-based VPN: 4.1 - 7.6 Mbps

True cable with HMA Singapore-based U.S. virtual VPN: 5.7 - 6.8 Mbps

True cable with HMA Seattle WA-based VPN: 477 - 494 Kbps

Partington, understand you have a particular and somewhat unique situation. My comments above were really aimed at the more generic U.S. citizen expats.

I don't know all the details of your situation, of course. But overall, getting a U.S. mailing address for an expat, even a non U.S. resident expat, isn't a problem at all. And if you had still-active U.S. brokerage or bank accounts, you probably could do an address change to that newly obtained U.S. address -- provided you were willing to pay each month to maintain it.

If you did have a still active U.S. bank or brokerage account, you could then certainly arrange through one or the other of those to ACH any distribution funds to the BKK Bank New York branch and then onward to a BKK Bank account in Thailand.

It's also possible, at pretty minimal cost, to obtain and maintain a U.S. phone number as well, through services like MagicJack or, until recently and perhaps again soon, Google Voice.

But if you had NO active U.S. brokerage or bank accounts right now, trying to start from scratch as a UK citizen living outside the U.S. would certainly be a challenge.

FWIW, I've been getting very good results to the U.S. lately with HMA VPN, much better than any of the prior several VPNs I've used over time.

With a 15 Mbps-rated True cable service in BKK, with HMA, I'm getting 2 - 3 Mbps sustained averages to the U.S. during daytimes, and sustained 1-2 Mbps averages even in the peak evening times here. That's about double what I had been getting previously. And those a REAL results, verified by the real-time NetWorx app readings on my PCs.

With the HMA service, it's totally eliminated any periodic streaming buffering issues I'd been encountering previously -- since I too mostly live in the single stream world.

HMA has a server based in BKK, but that's not the one I'm connecting to... And I don't know if their local server here is helping me reach the U.S. in an expedited way. All I know is, it's working better than any previously that I've used.

Are you seeing any improvements in latency to US servers when using HMA?

I'm not sure now is the best time to be running representative international speed tests... But I figured, what the heck...

So I ran a series this afternoon between 4 and 5 pm BKK time connecting to the TestMy.net server in Seattle WA, using various configurations here in BKK working from my True Online 15 Mbps cable internet service. All using a 25 MB download package.

Here's the results, which as pretty consistent with my past tests that show a direct True connection lagging well behind most HMA VPN connections, except in this instance, Seattle, which performed very poorly for some reason:

True cable direct - no VPN:

True cable with HMA L.A.-based VPN

True cable with HMA Singapore-based U.S. virtual VPN

True cable with HMA Seattle WA-based VPN

just did it yesterday - inside the government office is a translation desk, they did translate ours in 30min for THB 700/2pages (our previous translation from another office have been not correct, so we had to do it again after 3 hours waiting already) - in total we left after 5 hours with all documents for me and her (non Thai).

What location are you talking about...re the translation service desk? At the Esplanade Mall complex where MFA has a temporary office?

I just sent an email to the US Embassy BKK asking what do they have to see, documents, to certify my monthly income. Hope they or someone answers.

You swear under oath that the amount you are stating on your document is correct.

There is no requirement about providing documentation to the Consulate, though Thai Immigration is free to request documentation if they desire, which they usually don't.

How many different Education ministers were there during YL's reign?

And what exactly of any value to the country did they accomplish???

I knew it was a goodly number...but apparently, the correct answer is FOUR different Education ministers in less than three years. Good job, YL!

Four ministers in two years is too many

Chularat Saengpassa

The Nation 2013-07-04

BANGKOK: -- With the latest change in the man at the helm of the Education Ministry, any hope for a better education system is faltering.

It's not that the new education minister is a bad choice. But just that the government's lukewarm attention to educational issues has becomes obvious.

Since Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra came to power in August 2011, she has named four different men as education minister.

Had she carefully picked her choice, the country would have not seen four men rising to the helm of the Education Ministry in less than two years.

Her first nominee, Worawat Auapinyakul, was remembered for developing a new line of command for the country's educational sector. He believed units under his ministry should be divided by zone when it came to the line of command. So, he assigned his deputies to oversee zones, not agencies. Worawat also boasted about a project to have students speak at least one English word a day after the daily flag-raising ceremony at schools.

All his initiatives soon disappeared. Worawat, after all, was minister for just a little over six months.

His successor, Suchart Tadathamrongvej, lasted a little longer, managing to stay at the helm for more than eight months.

During his tenure, he courted much controversy by suggesting that popular schools should be allowed to accept "tea money" and allocate such donations to help improve educational services for all. Due to strong opposition, Suchart later backtracked.

Not long after, Phongthep Thepkanjana replaced him. Under his leadership, the Education Ministry unveiled a grand plan to drastically change the country's curriculum. In line with this, hundreds of hours are due to be removed from school students' class schedules, to allow them to learn more outside the classroom.

Phongthep has solid reasons to support this plan. While Thai students spend many hundreds of hours in class, their academic performance is poorer on average than their peers from countries that require much less time learning.

Just a few weeks ago, Phongthep said he really hoped he would be able to complete the educational and curriculum reform during his tenure. But his hope was dashed.

Chaturon Chaisang has now replaced Phongthep as education minister.

While Chaturon has vowed to continue with Phongthep's policies, not all educators are convinced this can happen.

http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/topic/651180-four-thai-education-ministers-in-two-years-is-too-many/

Looks like unchanged on Happy Home Cable in BKK.

All the Thai over-the-air stations including ThaiPBS HD are back on.

But all the Thai cable and international channels remain off, except for a half dozen or so international entertainment channels such as Universal, CI, Animax, Sony, Syfy, etc. All the international news channels remain off -- BBC, NHK, Channel News Asia.

Maybe there's some transmission/technical reason, but I just can't see how/why the military gains anything by spiking a bunch of Thai sports and music video channels.

Some really important details missing here:

1. Will she be able to use her Skype account?

2. Will they organize daily shopping excursions?

Your posts are juvenile and sophomoric ant totally inappropriate given the gravity and seriousness of the situation. The freedom and lives of a great country are at stake here. What ever side you happen to be on your posts and similar posts attacking PM Ying Luck's persona have no place here. Because she is a woman you attack her personally in demeaning and sexist terms. Your comments offer nothing of substance.

So, you're saying in reality she DOESN'T have a keen interest in shopping and making/taking Skype calls from Dubai?? Really??

Don't quite understand. It's already an IRA. If they close the account I have to find another provider that will open a new IRA account for a non-resident, non-citizen, in order to do the rollover.

But this is the potential problem that this thread is about - it is being reported that providers are no longer willing to open these accounts for non-residents, and in some cases are closing existing accounts on the grounds of non-residency.

I guess I don't see every bank in the US, most of which offer IRA CDs, turning away non residents who want to open a rollover IRA. That "non resident aliens" participate in IRAs is certainly not a cause for alarm bells at the IRS -- since they've already addressed the tax situation by dictating the 30% at the source withholding (vice 20% for residents). So, a simple IRA CD for a non resident alien seems, IMO, an option that is not going away. Now brokerages have gotten antsy about non residents and related red tape -- since their products can be considerably more complex. But, my money says you'll have many rollover options, should it come to that. Which, hopefully, it won't.

There have been "reports" of some brokerages engaging in account closures for expats... But I think a good question to keep in mind is, in those cases, were the account holders contributing to the end result by doing things to advertise to the brokerage that they were in fact not residing in the U.S.? I suspect, in most cases, they probably were, such as using a foreign address on their account profile info. So my answer to that is... DON'T DO IT!

But I think Jim's main point above is that while the reports of some closures have talked about brokerages, I don't believe we've heard/seen any of that coming from banks and credit unions, which also can host IRAs, admittedly not with stock holdings. But at least, if worse came to worse, a person would still have the option of rolling over via that route, rather than liquidating and taking a huge tax hit on a distribution.

And honestly, I can't see the situation arising where NO brokerage option would be available to expats. I suspect and believe, while some choices may be foreclosed, there are likely going to be others available, especially if one approaches it in a sensible way.

Fascinating account of what went on at the army club with all the factions up to and including the moment when Prayuth declared a coup:

http://m.apnews.com/ap/db_306485/contentdetail.htm?contentguid=3mAbmJMO

I think the best we can hope for now is some kind of coalition comprising the main players who were detained, with Prayuth as CEO. This way perhaps the followers of each faction would be appeased for a while.

From the AP report:

And then, Prayuth stood up and addressed the room. "Sorry. I'm taking power" from this moment on, he said calmly, according to Sirichoke.

Another lawmaker who recounted the same narrative of Thursday's meeting, and also spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity, said it was not immediately clear if Prayuth was joking.

What is it with people who repeatedly seem to think Prayuth is joking?

The other day, when the generally apparently verbally slapped down the DSI's Tarit, the original news reports portrayed his comments as "joking." But then I noted, in the subsequent reports on the same exchange done a day or two later, suddenly the references to joking had vanished.

Now, we have a lawmaker saying he thought Prayuth was joking when he said he was going to take control of the government.

I don't know the good general. But I'm beginning to get the feeling that when he's talking on matters of national import, we ought to take him at his word, and not think he's trying to be a comedian.

Some really important details missing here:

1. Will she be able to use her Skype account?

2. Will they organize daily shopping excursions?

Got this in email about 4:30 pm today. I believe that's a change from prior advisories.

U.S. Embassy Bangkok

Security Message

Friday, May 23, 2014

The U.S. Embassy in Bangkok recommends that U.S. citizens reconsider any non-essential travel to Thailand, particularly Bangkok, due to ongoing political and social unrest and restrictions on internal movements, including an indefinite nighttime curfew.

And from the main today's news thread, just now:

RT@Tulip_Oum: Yingluck and the former cabinet that reported to the military today, all detained and taken to "safe house" (via @WassanaNanuam )

I just hope it's not one of those "safe" houses where the fake police will try to extort money from them in exchange for not accusing them of shoplifting from AOT.

I guess this was part of the message they received:

Posted Today, 12:31

Thai junta bans former leaders from leaving country

BANGKOK, May 23, 2014 (AFP) - Thailand's army said on Friday that 155 prominent figures, including ousted government leaders, were banned from leaving the country without permission following a military coup.

They include former prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra and several relatives.

-- ©Copyright AFP 2014-05-23 | AFP News Sponsor
Published with written approval from AFP.

OK, this thread is now 10 pages long, and it gives little clue of just what's going on with all those reported/detained.

Midway thru the 10-pages of posts, there was a single Twitter post from a source I don't recognize saying that the PT and Dem leaders had been released, but the PCAD and UDD leaders were being held. And then nothing further about that anywhere in the subsequent posts.

Can anyone point to any reasonable credible info source about just what's become of these folks??

BTW, through all these pages, I don't think I've also seen anything from the Army saying just what exactly was being done with or said to all this politicians once they reported to the Army. Be kind of nice to know what marching orders were delivered.

On Happy Home Cable in BKK right now, all the regular over-the-air Thai channels seem to be back. But the cable system is broadcasting Army Channel 5 on most of the other channels except for a few international entertainment channels like Universal, SyFy, Animax, etc. that have been restored.

All of the news channels they'd normally air -- BBC, Fox, Channel News Asia -- are still off-air.

However, I did see that Thai PBS HD is back on our cable system -- despite the comments earlier in the thread with the NBTC saying they'd be delayed in being allowed to return because of their YouTube episode last night.

This morning, about a half dozen of the international channels on Happy HOme Cable in BKK have returned, including Universal, SyFy, Animax, Sony and some Chinese origin channels. All the Thai local and cable channels remain down, as are all the news channels, local or international.

Income is solely from investments, mostly long term capital gains (LTCG) and qualified dividends (QD).

Not to mention, the above example seems to assume that the account holder has zero pension income and zero bank interest and CD earnings.

It also looks like it's assuming tax amounts related to a married and filing jointly couple.

Interesting that in the last coup here, when the TV channels were blocked out,

they showed soothing footage of His Majesty so the populace would not be

afraid. This time they have not. I wonder why....

I don't follow the logic or thinking behind killing all the normal junk content on Thai TV...

News reports I can understand. But what's the point of blacking out lakorns, etc???

Opiate of the masses and all that. Better watching lakorns than out in the streets.

TBPS News programme director taken away by military after airing news on Youtube

Thu, 22/05/2014 - 22:57 | by prachatai

The military took away TPBS Deputy Director on news program Wanchai Tantiwitthayapithak, after he insisted to air the news on Youtube despite the coup makers’ order to cease all broadcast.

Source inside the TPBS station said that Wanchai was taken to the first Army Area around 9.30pm to “tune in understanding” between the media and army.

The online broadcast was ended shortly before he was taken away by the army.

Earlier, the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission (NBTC) reportedly requested cooperation with the TPBS not to broadcast any program on Television. The order was implemented by the TPBS board member, but the news division insisted on airing the program online.

The Thai Army comes knocking at ThaiPBS this evening:

BREAKING NEWS NOW GUNFIRE IN BANGKOK

Link please? Nothing on twitter?

Why do people demand a link !!

Because I have family in Bangkok mate and I want to ensure their safety.

Rumours on TVF are common though against rules.

Is that too much to ask?

It's pretty darned quiet outside right now in my little part of central BKK...

But it's a big city...Who knows what's going on out there.

Based on the news report above, it sounds like the coup wouldn't necessarily have happened if the current "government" ministers had been willing to step down. But obviously, they weren't.