thailien8

If you like Chipmunks style music, just wander around the Thai department stores any time in the month or so preceding Christmas. They play entire tapes of all the Christmas songs sung by little chipmunk children. It drives me bonkers in 3 minutes flat. Also delightful in some bars are the disco-ed up versions of slow songs like Sounds of Silence, ruined so that the girls can go go to them.

It's not a club as such, but there are 2 courts with lights behind AUA Language Center on Rajdamri Road. Sign up for an hour at a time (80 baht) at the AUA clubhouse, next to the cafeteria. The courts are open until 9 pm. 7 days a week. They have a couple of Thai tennis instructors to give lessons or just hit with you if you want.

So, in their endless quest for image over reality, Thai gov't. has steam-cleaned Sanam Luang to sanitize the place for the big image fest on Saturday Feb. 7. Free chicken, eggs, entertainment by stars with avian nicknames (Thongchai "Bird" Mcintyre), a chicken cooking demo by the antiquarian Bkk. guv, Samak, even an appearance by the finger-lickin' PM himself! Will you do your patriotic duty and show up to eat? Not me, thanks, but I can afford to pay for my meals. This farce will probably succeed in drawing lots of hungry, desperate people who will eat the chicken, as they can't afford to eat clean food anyway.

So what is the cost of bringing over that much-loved velocipede and seeing it smashed by a careless taxi-driver on Sukhumvit on day two of your bangkok stay ?

And what is the cost of your hospital stay, if you are lucky enough to survive the death-wish activity of biking on Bkk's traffic-choked streets?Before you bring your bike over here, you might want to have a first-hand look at just what you would be riding in, any time you want to go anywhere.

Just relaying something I read in the paper a while back--there was a warning to never throw your ATM receipt in the garbage bin near the ATM you just used. Apparently it is possible that someone could be peering over your shoulder as you entered you PIN number, memorized it, then watched where you disposed of your receipt. The article in the paper said that there is a way to use info on the receipt in combination with the PIN number to withdraw from your account. Keep your receipts and dispose of them elsewhere.

Table tennis in Bkk. is hard to find. A few years I wandered into the large indoor sport building in Lumpini Park, near the takraw court and swimming pool (yes there is a pool but I've never seen it open). In the sport building were 3 or 4 tables with Thai teens playing. The building office has some paddles and balls to use. I played for a while with a kid for free. Haven't been back there for a long time.

In Pattaya there is a real table tennis club behind an open front restaurant on Central Road, right-hand side going away from the beach, between 2nd and 3rd Roads. First-class equipment and some good players. Not sure of the prices as I only watched.

I remember reading a year or two ago in the paper that the BMA was asking for help from the citizens in their avowed task of spaying and neutering the street dogs. Apparently it was too hard for the city officials to collect the dogs (tho they did get a few for APEC later), so they were offering, as I recall, 20 baht per dog that was brought to their sterilization, wherever that was. I suggested to my motorcycle-owning friend that we work as a team. He could drive while rode pillion with a baseball bat and a large sack. Easy money! He didn't take me up on it.

Sorry to interrupt the dialog between plachon and socal. I agree that there is more violence in Thai society, random and purposeful, since the advent of Social Order. This gov't. policy seems mostly concerned with sex, drugs and rock n roll, rather than making any real effort to help people live together peacefully. The war on drugs set such a glaring example of solving perceived problems with a maximum of violence, making blacklists of one's enemies who could then be safely eliminated. Following that, those people (the ones still alive anyway) who used to spend their time getting high, and making their money by dealing drugs, suddenly had to look for new pastimes. Now we see more muggings on pedestrian overpasses in Bkk., the inter-school brawls that result in innocent bystanders getting shot or pushed out of bus doors, and of course the Muslim violence in the South. Personally, I've had a few close encounters with the ranks of katoey hugger-muggers on Sukhumvit and Nana at night.

I wish the social order campaign had something to do with actually improving the quality of life for most people, but it seems much more about reducing the amount of "sanuk" available. Standard moral majority, Republican right-wing stuff.

The back page of Bkk. Post's Perspective section of Sunday 26/1/04, "Ignoring the Highest Law", deals with the petty little so-called laws that are arbitrarily enforced whenever the powers-that-be decide to stop political protesters from assembling and making "trouble". One of these laws deals with noise. To wit: On the use of amplifiers : The Sound Amplifier Control Act, B. E. 2493, Article 4: "Those who want to use sound amplifiers must get permission from the authorities before doing so. Officials have the right to authorise use, to stipulate the time and place, and specify the amplifier equipment. Those who get permission must abide by the attached conditions."

Of course, if anything is officially authorized, then it is suddenly OK. Where does this leave the loudspeaker trucks, the Wall's ice cream carts with their infernal jingles, and the construction sites that continue on into the night? Who knows, there may even be a law dealing with unamplified noise, tho as anyone knows who is familiar with TIT, good luck getting any enforcement activity. There were some letters in the Post last year about the outdoor karaoke music in Lumpini Park, and the blasting music emanating from the Suan Lum Night Bazaar, to drive the neighbors crazy. Has anything quieted down there?

I suppose if our new generation of 40-F-U-S-Ts need/prefer "eye watering candy"rip off noisey,humourless,psuedo gin joints ...just like home...then so be it.

If Club Electric Blue were "just like home", I would never have left.

Now that Nana and Cowboy are all prudishly covered up every night, it's good news that a dud bar like Rififi is (I hope) to be replaced by Club Electric Blue, which is full of eye-watering candy in Pattaya. If a bar as good as this appears on Patpong, that will be a real boost for the suffering Bkk. gogo scene.

Yes, Khun?, that's true if you put your face up against the vehicle tail pipe and suck it in, like smokers do.

Isn't it amazing how the moralists use the excuse of protecting children in order to control adults' behavior? The hypocrisy involved in the proposed early nightlife closing hours makes me sick. I will believe that they really care about protecting the children when places like Nana Plaza and the many beer bar areas in Bkk. and Pattaya keep out the pitiful children working late at night selling flowers, gum, etc. Last year, the first encounter any tourist had upon entering Nana was with the cute little 6-year-old flower girls, all dolled up in adult clothes, running up and clinging onto the tourist, trying to sell her wares. Pathetic! Talk about encouraging the pedophiles, and damaging the precious image of Thailand! I suppose that even if the opening hours are cut back, the children will continue to be forced to work where adults only should be.

Many thanks to PvtDick for the excellent suggestion of Khun Kho's restaurant. I had dinner there this evening, and am still pleasantly tipsy after sampling two of their Belgian beers, along with some well-prepared catfish salad. I'm not well-acquainted with Belgian beer, but the first sip of Maredsous told me that this was definitely not Beer Chang. Chang I chug, Maredsous I sipped and savored. I also tried a bottle of Tongerlo, equally good. They also have Ename, Goliath and Floris Gaarden, all priced at 150 baht a bottle. I'll be back soon.

For those of us who appreciate the lovely sight of the undraped female form on stage, try Pattaya. The social order party poopers seem to be slightly less stringent there at the moment.

On my recent visit to Hillary Bar on Soi 4 Sukhumvit, I was pleased to see that they have hung a sign above one of their tables, stating that this table (only) is reserved for playing with international rules, i.e. ball in hand after a foul or scratch, and calling the pocket for every shot, not only the 8-ball. Hopefully this idea will catch on, and more places and tables will be switching away from the 2-shot rule, making it less of a hassle to play pool.

I think that posting a very favorable review of a business venue, whether posted by the owners or satisfied customers, is a legitimate way to get feedback. Why not?

I agree that Megabreaks is an excellent place to play pool, with quality tables, good cues, reasonable prices, decent music and nice girls to rack the balls and hand you the bridge when needed. Tim and Henning are good people and I wish them all the best.

My negative feedback will probably cause some groans among the posters on this board. Megabreaks is currently holding a weekend pool league, to which I was invited when I expressed interest in playing in it last year. Indeed, I would very much like to play in this competition, but unfortunately I cannot. The reason is cigarette smoke. Whenever I go into Megabreaks during a crowded time, I am quickly forced out by the very strong, to me unbearable, smell of smoke. It seems that most pool players are also smokers. As a non-smoker who is allergic to the toxic fumes, I can't stay in a place like that for more than a few minutes without feeling terrible. Megabreaks could use a better ventilation system if they want to attract non-smoking customers. I do enjoy playing there sometimes in the afternoon, when the air is breathable.

I've played pool off and on in Bkk. and Pattaya for a decade. Besides the lopsided tables, both inside and outside various venues, the thing that always drove me crazy was, and is, the 8-ball rules. I got tired of having problems with not understanding just what rules applied in any venue. The main problem has always been with the silly Thai 2-shot rule after a scratch or foul (including when you accidentally knock in the other player's ball). The other bit of stupidity is the "down and back" rule, where you cannot shoot directly at your ball after a scratch if it is above the headstring. Several other minor variations from the standard rules have caused me to abandon games and venues in frustration. A good example is the large pool/live music venue on Soi Cowboy very near Asoke. Posted on a wall there, in English and Thai, is a set of sensible rules. However, they are ignored. Instead, the table attendants enforce the accursed silly rules above.

To play a fair game of 8-ball, all that is really needed is to get rid of the 2-shot rule, and instead play "ball-in-hand" with one shot from anywhere on the table after a foul or scratch. That eliminates a lot of other silliness. The problem is that I know of only two venues in Bkk. where this rule is posted and used: Megabreaks and Brunswick, both on Sukhumvit 4. Megabreaks is by far the classiest place to play pool in Bkk, with excellent tables, rules and service. The problem there is that if you come alone, it can be difficult to pick up a game.

If anyone knows of other venues where "ball-in-hand" is the accepted rule, please post!

I haven't been to NEP since the Bali bombing.

2 weeks ago I figured checking out the security setup at the entrance to Nana.

I grabbed a beer and settled down to watch the arrivals etc from the quiet bar opposite Big John's(?)

Now, NEP has only one entrance, AFAIK, inside, is the rough shape of a huge bowl.

A well placed bomb would destroy everything in site.

Now, back to my bar-stool, security is/was non-existant between 1800 & 2000 and the uniformed guy who may have been security seemed more intested in playing with the illegal, underaged flower sellers.

To me, security was a farce. any other thoughts on this?...... Nana only.

PS I know these security guys get paid in peanuts, maybe that's the problem!

Nana Plaza is a disaster waiting to happen. The design makes the whole place an inescapable firetrap. It would be too easy for a car bomb to drive right on in the unguarded open entrance and blow up. The resulting fire would almost certainly kill everyone inside, as there are no fire escapes or back doors. To make matters worse, the many motorcycles that were moved out of the open entrance area are now parked in front of the side stairs, blocking the way. The lack of awareness, responsibility and safety conciousness is amazing, but only too typical of Thailand. It would be so simple, as has been suggested in Asia Bugle, to block the entrance to the Plaz at night so that only people could get in, not vehicles! I have cut down on my visits to NEP since the Bali horror, knowing what a very soft target it is.

I'm American, 56, lived and taught English for hand to mouth wages in Bangkok for 10 years. Now with an inheritance, I would like to get the retirement visa.

A couple of questions:

Is retirement visa the same as long-stay visa?

The form I picked up from Immigration in Bkk. was a bit confusing. I'm not sure if they require 800,000 baht in a Thai bank AND income of 65,000 baht per month, OR only one of the above. I sure hope it's not both.

Does the bank have to be Thai owned, or can I deposit money in a foreign-owned bank with a branch in Thailand?

Thanks for any tips about this process.