tomahawk

Visa regulations are not all based on hatred and racism. Every legitimate country in the world has immigration regulations, and to be honest many, including western countries, are more restrictive than Thaialnd's. I do not think it is a bad thing for Thailand to try to keep terrorists, fugitives and pedophiles from invading the country and using it to hide out from the law. Perhaps I do not understand or agree with some of these regulations, but I am also free to leave if I want. According to farangs I know who have been here a long time, many of the farangs living here now would have been made to get back on the plane in Bangkok 30 years ago. How many English teachers does 1 country need, anyway? I know English teachers here who can barely construct a coherent sentence.

I feel something must be wrong with me but I cannot relate to all these problems. Thai people treat me fine, probably better than my countrymen at home. I have never once felt like the "nigger of Thailand." I have retirement pension and retired when I was 53. I live at a much higher standard here than I would back home, where I would have to work in order to survive decently. I do not feel there is any danger of being kicked out of the country and I am not afraid to go out at night. If I cannot get a work permit, this is fine because if I wanted to work I would not have retired. And as far as farangs being treated badly, I constantly see farangs who are too cheap to leave a tip yet complain the Thais are not kissing their a_ _, and others that smell so bad that even in open air taxi it smells like they died 2 weeks ago. If some younger, better looking guy stole some potential wife or girlfriend from me, as one guy said, then this is just reality. I was young once. Now I'm not so it is time to grow up. If you flash a roll of money there is no problem getting some young girl to go with you. This does not mean that the same young girl wouldn't rather be off with the young guy, except maybe he doesn't have any money. This is Thailand but I think it is also fantasy world.

I would not jump to conclusion that work permit change means govt. wants to kick all farangs out of Thailand. I imagine the work permit change, which apparently no one is saying even what changes are, have something to do with safeguarding economy of Thai workers. Kicking farangs out would destroy economy of Thailand. The bottom line is work permit rules purpose is to help Thais make money. Kicking farangs out makes Thais lose money. So one thin g has nothing to do with the other. Unless you are in one of occupations affected by work permit change, I would not worry about it.

What Asian country doesn't teach that their country is superior? I don't find Thailand to be anywhere near as racist or xenophobic as China or Japan. I suppose it depends where you live and who you know, but my personal experience is that the Thai people I know are not really anti-Hmong or pro-deportation. I am not saying they spend a lot of time talking or worrying about it, but when the subject is brought up they do not express any hateful sentiments, and in fact the hilltribe people who live where I do are treated the same as the Thais.

As for the elite war, or whatever you wish to call it, this is just one more power struggle just like has been going on for ages, long before any of us farangs got here. Is Thaksin somehow worse than every other self-serving politician? People preach democracy, and then when the people elect who they want, he is removed without any due process or whatever and some figurehead gets appointed. Thaksin was elected, and if he ran again, he would get reelected. if this is wrong, then just hold an election and prove it.

It is not obvious that most Thais support deportation of Hmongs. It is an old trick to say something is obvious in a feeble attempt to get others to agree with the point as not to appear too stupid to see the "obvious". This is also obvious. Fact is the Thai people I know for the most part do not support deportation of Hmongs, and the ones that did did so because they were not informed about what would happen to Hmongs after they got deported. Once they learned this, they changed their minds. Thai people for thr most part, at least ones I know, are not in favor of murder of women and children, once they are aware of it.

it is not complicated why so many Thai people support Thaksin. All you have to do is talk to them. They say it is because they can afford health care because of Thaksin, as well as cheap loans. They have access to internet and cell phones because of Thaksin. Crime and drugs were down because of Thaksin. If someone does something which benefits you, then it is natural for you to support them. One does not have to be a brilliant political analyst to see this. It would appear to me some farang political experts on forum only talk to the other farang political experts.

I am not saying I do not believe there should be trials for suspected criminals. I am saying that I have a greater sympathy for Hmong than for drug dealers. Actually, every single Thai person I have talked to about this drug war thinks it was a good thing, and the streets were safer then. I am not saying every person inTthailand feels this way, but I believe the majority do.

Now that it has been brought up, I believe the Hmong situation conducted by current regime is worse genocide than the drug dealer extrajudicial campaign that occurred during Thaksin administration. But there does not seem to be such public outcry against this. At least victims of drug war were criminals. Hmongs did nothing except try to survive. The PAD airport takeover and this Hmong situation did far more to undermine Thailand's standings in the eyes of the world than whatever Thaksin did, which basically most people outside of this country neither knew of nor cared about. I am American Indian and see many similarities between situation of hilltribe people here and my own people in America. However, what is going on here is worse. Many Indians were killed by white man, but to be fair many white men killed by Indians as it was war. Hmongs aren't killing anyone in Thailand. And though Indian land was taken, and they were forced to live on reservations, they were not forced to go someplace where they would be murdered. And also to be fair there have been many things which US govt. and people have done to help Indians and make life better. Not much seems to be done to help these people, and that which is done is by western foreigners and Christian church.

Which poor people here used bombs and terrorism to get into power? What poor people are in power, anyway? None that I am aware of. And if bribery is involved, are not both the giver of the bribe and the recipient both responsible? If the claim here is that the only people who should be allowed a voice in a democracy are the rich or educated, then someone does not understand what democracy is. The rich and educated are in power everywhere, anyway, and anyone who things they are doing a great job must be living in a cave.

It is a mystery to me why foreigners here cannot see this whole political mess for what it really is. I may agree with some of the alleged philosophy of one or the other of the two main groups, but I cannot really respect either one as a serious political party. They are two gangs run by people who are using their supporters basically to further their own personal agendas. Conversations about who is worse, the reds or the yellows, are pointless. They are both guilty of taking over airports and govt. buildings, throwing bombs and shooting at people. They both pay people to come out and support them. I have seen so many arguments on forum about who is worst, reds or yellows. Who cares? Just the fact that they are known to everyone as reds and yellows should give a clue as to the true nature of these "parties." It reminds me of the crips and bloods in LA. I am a guest here like most everyone else on this forum and basically don't have a nickel in the outfit. After reading the political history of this country, I now believe Thaksin is just the latest in a long line of leaders which are the usual in not just Thailand, but Asia in general. This is the way this country is and we farangs should either get used to it or go somewhere else. I do not see things changing real soon, whether reds or yellows or greens or whoever stages the latest coup or demonstration.

I always said I would never accuse anyone of this, but I think the guy who says Bangkok is only place that counts must be some kind of "troll.

I cannot believe someone would seriously say something like this, even if they believed it, which obviously many people do and is a large part of what is causing all this trouble in the first place. For my part, I wish no harm to come to Bangkok or its people. However I personally try to avoid the place as much as possible. It is dirty and smells terrible. Traffic is horrible. In many ways it is not even like really living in Thailand.

You never said what her reason was for not answering phone. Was phone not working, or no money for call? if she had a good explanation no problem. But if she has no explanation then I would have reservations about relationship.

Once again, these incidents occurred while I was with farangs from other countries besides America. If I were alone, I would agree it was just a matter of politeness that they expressed this pro-American sentiment. However, my point is it was not just politeness or we all would have received this same amount of politeness, which was not the case. And who said anything about tuk-tuk drivers? I do not even ride in tuk-tuks. And as far as the "most thais don't give a flying <deleted>> about foreigners," I have found most of the people here to be very friendly, and perhaps if someone has a different experience, their own attitude might have something to do with this.

If I were alone and they said, "America number 1", I would agree they are just being polite. The point is I was with people from other countries, and Thais did not same same polite things to them, so this argument is invalid.

I have farang friends from England, France and Australia, and we travel different places in Thailand and invariably whenever Thai people ask where we all come from, they seem most impressed by America. When my friends say where they come from, the Thai people are always polite, but when I say I come from America, they get all excited and say, "America number 1", and almost always say they really wish to visit America someday, which they rarely say about the other countries. Thai people seem to like American movies and music more than European, and American stuff like Coca Cola. They do not go on about war in Iraq, which I am sure partly is because they have their own problem with Islamic terrorists. They do not consider America to be evil or whine about US foreign policy. After being in countries where anti-Americanism is popular it is refreshing to be somewhere that it is not.

I was not aware that Chuck Liddell was a kenpo practitioner. As for the comment about the most effective Chinese techniques being allowed, I was referring to techniques of chin na and shuai chaio, which are grappling techniques, as well as lethal type strikes which are obviously illegal. However, muay thai itself is a sport style adopted from muay chaiya and other styles now called muay boran, which also had many effective techniques not allowed in muay thai sport competition.

On a previous posting I offered to use third floor of building in Sansai for such a club but there did not appear to be a lot of interest in this idea. However I still would be willing to do so if enough people are willing.

Merry Christmas to forum and Chiang Mai.

There have been many, many bouts between Chinese and Thai fighters over the years. The Thais won the vast majority of them. It is not a coincidence that most MMA champions at least study muay thai, whereas there has never to my knowledge been a MMA champion who is mainly a kung <deleted> or Chinese style martial artist. I am being objective here because I have never trained muay thai but for many years trained in mostly Chinese style martial arts, and have great respect for all styles, but the record speaks for itself and the edge definitely goes to muay thai. However, to be fair it should also be noted that many of the most effective techniques of Chinese style are not allowed in the competition.,

I have a question about a strange occurrence. Recently I sent a posting on local forum and afterwards received a PM I do not understand. The PM itself was, I believe, written by someone suffering from schizophrenia. I say this because the PM was very rambling and incoherent, and had little or nothing to do with subject. I know a schizophrenic man who speaks in a similar pattern. This is not what I am confused about, however. What I cannot understand is that my posting was sent with PM but instead of my forum name attached to posting as uusal, it contained name of the member who sent the PM. I do not know much about internet, but was wondering how this was done. Thank you.

I will be in a very similar position soon myself, and so found this advice very helpful also. My mother is 80 and lives in Florida. I am only child and no family back in US to take care of her. She also has mental problems, which are not from old age since she always had them, but now getting worse. Her physical health is okay but soon I fear her mental state will render her unable to care for herself. I do not want to put her in nursing home, so my only other alternative is bring her here. She would have no problem with hot weather, and I live in area with good hospital and transportation. Main problem I think is dealing with her mental problems, but in my mind I have no choice. My wife says she has no problem taking care of my mother, since her own mother lived with us a long time and I took care of her medical care also. But she has never met my mother, so she does not know what she is agreeing to. The plus side is I do not think culture shock will be big problem as native Americans and Thai have similar culture in many ways.

One other thing for the OP, I do not know where you live but in Chiang mai there are several private care houses for alzheimer patients which I think are excellent care but expensive. If you wish to know more I will let you know.

The way I see it, a forum like this has two main purposes. To help people obtain information they need about something, which in this case is Chiang Mai. Or to engage in discussion and social interactions. I can understand why people give opinions and maybe even get emotional about certain issues like politics or religion, and I have engaged in these kinds of thing myself sometimes. What I don't understand is why, when someone asks some thing like how to get to the train station or how much something costs or something like that, there are still people who will find some way to give some kind of sarcastic or nasty comment. I do not understand the mentality of these people. They must be very bored or have too much free time if they have nothing better to do than this. In my opinion, this is the one thing which would destroy a forum like this, even more than the supposed trolls.

Thanks Don. If I find out more I will also let you know.

I have been told Maejo University fitness center is open to public. If this is true, does nayone know details such as location, hours and rates? Thank you.

Thanks groongthep and 007. I will try this and let you know how it turns out.