Bangkok Barry

Come on! Life in Thailand is far more entertaining than anything on Netflix ????

Has anyone dared to try the Chang Expresso beer? I don't have the nerve. The only Thai beers I drink now are Tapper (6.5), Red Cheers (6.0) and Leo Strong Brew (a not strong 4.1).

If Thailand disbanded its police force the crime rate would plummet.

They don't even do that. They just delay doing anything until everyone has forgotten about it.

There are many who know full well that peaceful protests get them absolutely nowhere. And when people are deaf to your protests you end up shouting louder and louder. You do not simply go home. The government appears not to understand that basic fact. Violence, in the form of water cannon and rubber bullets, none of which have come from the protesters, does indeed breed violence. Something else that the government appears not to understand.

The video says there was a security guard who tried to put the fire out, but it was too big. Nice to see the sprinkler system was working to normal Thai standards. And the video shows plenty of people out after curfew watching the action. Better than watching Thai tv, I suppose.

You write of a time when a bar fine was 100, ST 500 and LT - and that really did mean all night - was 1000. So I'm told ????

Had me laughing out loud. But so many people in Thailand will believe anything without question, so you frequently get statements like this.

There's still sand on Pattaya beach?

The explanation is in the linked report.

We had a huge storm in Kalasin Province around 2am, completely filled the roadside ditches which are wide and at least a metre deep. They're usually most useful in stopping cars and lorries that can't follow a straight line and veer off the road. Even forced water under a roof join and down the wall of one room (combination of wind direction + poor workmanship dictates which wall gets affected during any heavy storm). Water pouring from the roof like a waterfall. But that's okay. The soggy season has been too dry, despite us being warmed early in the year that the season would be wetter and longer than usual. But we aren't supposed to remember that. Being a weather forecaster is a great job. You can be wrong 100% of the time and people just expect that and so you never get fired. Anywhere.

But daily deaths still often hit three figures. As to the headline, Covid is coming to an end? Where? When?

And it spreads only near alcohol in restaurants, as well as only after 8pm, but never in homes. Covid is a remarkable virus. In Thailand, anyway.

Thai girls are one of Thailand's most successful 'exports'. They can be found all over the globe offering public relation services.

Around 80% or more of people in Thailand do not live in Bangkok. Worth mentioning to a government that appears to be oblivious to the fact.

Not only the government. I had to sign my name at least 15 times (I lost count in the end) simply to get a new ATM card when Bangkok Bank was urging replacement a couple of years ago. I'd renewed my passport and that threw them into a panic. It all took about an hour, and not once did the employee smile or speak with me other than to tell me to sign here, there and everywhere.

Funny. They tell you where to get it but provide no addresses, or a floor or room number in the case of the airport. As always in Thailand, they have to add a layer (or more) of complication.

My sister lived in Spain, and she was not only welcome at local political meetings and asked for her views, but was able to vote in local elections. Why not? She was as much of a resident as the locals and was affected the same as the locals by any decisions made. Can you imagine being asked for your opinion by Thai politicians and being allowed to vote? Instead of 'Thank you for your valued input' we get 'Speak up against us and you face deportation'.

Bizarre, isn't it, when they say that, when in fact they mean buy one, get two. Just one more aspect of the lunatic asylum.

Been there. It's great, and a very popular haunt for evening drinking and dining. LA has a network of canals too, but that's a residential area.

I used to manage a record shop back in the last century and would play that if it was raining. And when it was closing time I'd sometimes play the national anthem. Always brought a smile.

Your response came the morning after we lost electric power for four hours and I had to shower from a bucket of cold water by candlelight. We have power cuts at least once a month as the infrastructure barely works. Whether water is drinkable is debatable. Making it so would, of course, hit the bottom line of the companies that supply bottled water at massively inflated prices. In my location, I can buy a 20 litre bottle for the price of a small 10 baht bottle in the store. It is widely acknowledged that Thai highways are dangerously designed, especially the U-turns which result in numerous deaths every year. As for other roads, try walking along many of the side roads in, say, the centre of Bangkok or Pattaya, without having to walk on the road and risking your life. And then there are the third-third masses of wires above the roads, sometimes resulting in fires or causing motorcycle accidents when they come loose and fall. Airports, fine. Internet, fantastic.

I've put it on Facebook.

There are indeed sophisticated Chinese, those who do not descend like vultures on the buffet, and I've seen them elsewhere. But they have rarely come to a country with third-rate infrastructure like Thailand before the pandemic, and there is absolutely no reason at all that they should in the future to experience an industry that will be only a shadow of what it was before. Who wants to invest in tourist hotels when there are no tourists? Perhaps Thailand will go back 30, 40, 50 years or more to when staying in a shack on the beach made the country such an attraction for many, with the 'posh' tourists staying in small and simple hotels. That might very well be Thailand's future, rather than five-star hotels and rich tourists flooding in. Those days are probably gone for good.

Sounds perfect, then. Ready buyers. The problem is that there is no-one to stay in them, which is why they are closed and being sold in the first place.