WinnieTheKhwai

I am a person who absolutely LOVES Songkran. Very much including the water fights, the fun, the music, the drunken and wet dancing in the streets, the lot of it.

However I will say that I think Pattaya is the worst place in the country for it.

I strongly recommend to pick a town of any size in the North, or in the North East. Chiang Mai would be a prime contender.

Additionally, it seems you plan to marry under British law, which makes this entirely a British/Embassy kind of question, nothing at all to do with Thai marriage law or Chiang Mai.

Yesterday was a great day for the time of year.

Just wanted to get that out there.

IanForbes you're the man!

topless?

If you want her to be? Just means tweaking another layer in the Photoshop file.

I think it goes without saying that interfering with a gay parade (or any kind of parade or gathering that does no harm) is deplorable.

The BKK post article however is equally deplorable in the way it tries to slander anyone with grievances against the Bangkok/Yellow elite. Some very legitimate concerns there.

Forget weather forecasts for Thailand.

Period.

The End.

By far the most accurate weather report for tomorrow is yesterday's and today's hourly reports.

Quote an ordeal!! Happy to hear your wife is recovering.

I've only been to Klaimor for small stuff, and to take people who crash vehicles in front of my house, and found nothing wrong with it. The Mrs. likes Ram though, god knows why. Lanna is my preferred hospital, that's my social insurance hospital anyway.

You can come out of there on two sides.. (Either Ratwithee Road or Ratchapakinai Road.. which is it?)

BTW, if directions are ever hard then just give the coordinates or the link to plug into Google Maps.. Nothing on this planet is ever hard to find these days, that's SO last century.

[ never mind.. I posted this from the Bangkok post from their front page but it's old (24 Feb), so never mind. Kind of wonder why they leave that tripe on there but okay, I didn't move to this country for the great newspapers. ]

(I can't seem to delete the post or change the title)

Just one month, give or take a bit and not every day is going to be super hazy. By Songkran it's okay.

Winnie,

do you aspire to be a politician or Bangkok governor or the likes of that??? Sounds like a promise....

And I was trying to trying to forget about Songkran. How many died last year?

Every year about 400-700 people die I believe? Best not to do any serious road travelling. With the weather like this I do kind of start to feel that Songkran excitement building up, knowing the party will be starting soon...!

( ...and wouldn't it be great if people who enjoy complaining about such things every single year would just admit to themselves they made the wrong choice on their place to live and move off to Phuket.... In Phuket hardly any Songkranning goes on (well, one day and that's it).. People still die on the roads there though; it's still a major holiday. )

I'm so happy to have The Nation to tell me these things.

And.. "failed to convince people not to destroy garbage burning" ... Their grammar must be improving because I almost can't understand what that doesn't mean!

Factually it's also iffy because it seems to imply that the smog is caused by garbage burning.. I thought we established in this topic that it's a regional condition, so not specifically related to Chiang Mai but to the whole North, and also not primarily caused by garbage burning. (No points though for stating the obvious, that garbage burning MUST also be curbed to not add to the problem, that goes without saying)

By the way, I also need to submit Ob Khan Gorge & National Park as a great place for a swim. ( As a disclaimer though: won't do for Scuba, the water's flowing too fast fast for comfort after rains, and sand and mud is present, especially in the rainy season )

Reservoir and lake are the same.

People have different interpretations of clean; there are no houses or villages bordering the lake, there is no waste water going into it.. Just rain water and run-off from the hills. However some (many) people would include 'sand and mud' as a substance that can make something not clean. I'm not one of those people. Note: It's a lake. Lakes come with mud, and fish, and wildlife. Nothing wrong with people who don't fancy that, for those people invented swimming pools, and God created chlorine; so no need to despair.

As for snakes, the lake can't be too dirty cannit otherwise snakes wouldn't fancy it. Anyway I've seen snakes on the non-swimming side of the lake. Strange as it may seem, snakes aren't actually that fond of people splattering around in the water and will steer clear of the swimming side of the lake..

So anyway, not being the mysophobic type, my kid swims in it quite happily, and I was happy to note a nice breeze out there yesterday! It's the closest thing we have to a beach.. (Even some sandy patches along the shore on the 'swimming' side of the lake )

Just one month, give or take a bit and not every day is going to be super hazy. By Songkran it's okay.

Then you're pretty much looking at Mae Ngat lake I think.. That's deep at least. (Part of Sri Lanna national park).

But for scuba better head South to the islands..

just stick your heads back in the sand where they belong.

That's a great way of filtering out dust particles youknow.

Great post, keep 'em coming. Very entertaining every Feb/March. And I'm already looking forward to the next great recurring topic, whether Songkran is out of control, or not.

www.<URL Automatically Removed> has a great construction forum.

Edit.. Oh.. That's www.teak door.com (Remove the space from the url)

The locations I follow are, with their respective average pollution levels since the beginning of 2000:

Samut Prakarn 114.7 (since 2003)

Sara Buri 100.3 (since 2003)

Din Daeng (BKK) 68.4 (NB this is a roadside location)

Chon Buri 57.3

Lampang 57.1

Phuket 49.1

Chiang Mai 46.9

Khon Kaen 36.2

Surat Thani 31.1

Given these numbers, the air in Phuket is on average, more polluted than Chiang Mai?? I find that a little hard to buy into...

Not really. Phuket sometimes gets a whiff of crap air from forest fires in Indonesia / Sumatra. This is in different months than the hot & dry season in the North Though.

As for rankings, keep in mind that it's a random sample of locations; There's 76 or so provinces so to do any sort of ranking you'd need sustained measurements for all of them. By and large though it's regional, so what you see in Chiang Mai is similar to Lamphun, Mae Hong Son, Chiang Rai, etc. Sometimes people seem to think it's 'big city pollution' but it really is not.

Right because it's mostly morning FOG, for chrissakes.. John B, you didn't notice a pretty chilly night? Then you get fog in the morning, as well as added condensation to whatever particles there are in the air.

So, Winnie, where can you lead the conversation productively with something authoritative on humidity and suspended particulate matter? Without an appeal for divine guidance, I hope. Fully cited references are welcome!

Please don't be unnecessarily insulting. I'm not responding to flames; The PCD link is out there.

Six voices singing "Happy Birthday to You"

Six? Where's the sixth? Under the table?

Inside the cake, waiting to pop out.

LOL!!!! But, you think pictures take themselves?

Sheesh.

(And yes, the person taking the picture is another cute girl. If it happens to be a peripheral Farang geezer so thankfully absent from the main scene then I do NOT want to be corrected with this information. Thanks. )

Right because it's mostly morning FOG, for chrissakes.. John B, you didn't notice a pretty chilly night? Then you get fog in the morning, as well as added condensation to whatever particles there are in the air.

I'd like to take this opportunity to voice my appreciation for this picture. I think it's BRILLIANT, bordering lovely!

The Chang beer robustly in hand, the rose, the sweet surroundings that simply don't need any added peripheral Farangs to clutter the scene.. Six voices singing "Happy Birthday to You" seconds after this moment.. oh the bare necessities of life condensed in one perfect scene.. It shows the celebration of birthdays with a child-like joy, instead of dreading to clock up another year..

You should get this done as a painting from one of those guys at the night bazar, then give it a prime spot in your living room.

sirancha john, you seem to want to provoke people in chiang mai into a debate

Made a mental note to refer to it in that way, much more polite than the T-word. Thanks..!

So Dr. Somchai recommends wearing a medical face mask against PM-10 particles? Good luck with that.

Sorry, but what an idiot.. I wonder if he's ever seen a PM-10 mask and it does not resemble a little white piece of medical cloth that he'd wear being a doctor..

PM-10 masks are actually pretty hard to breathe through, so much so that it's uncomfortable and won't work when doing any kind of exercise like biking, etc. (i.e. when you'd need it most)

Personally I'd just recommend not biking or other exercise in March.

Didn't read the whole discussion, but how is this different from ANY condominium development where units are sold over time and then completed up to the new owner's preference?

I think it's silly to single out this particular one, it's the same everywhere.

Don't buy a condo then. And even when buying a house, do it in a mature neighborhood, but even then you sometimes get construction. On another forum that's a bit construction-centric (PM me if you need a link) there is a detailed topic by someone constructing what looks like to be a very nice house inside the old town area. It's nice and interesting, but no doubt if causes noise, dust, blocked sois, etc. That is the way of things.