WinnieTheKhwai

That's ridiculous..

This was an official (and very successful) policy aimed to fight the illegal lottery that was rife at the time (and now is once again) by adding a lottery format for which there was (and is) obvious popular demand.

You really wonder what's up with the courts in this country in willing to pursue official policy that was approved by parliament and officially signed into law. It makes Thailand look ridiculous.

I vote Coup, just because I would like to see the Baht drastically devaluate.

Thank you, thank you, thank you. (sincerely, actually, I'm not trying to be sarcastic)

This because your comment helps a lot to explain and put in perspective the poll results and general attitudes I witness on this forum when it comes to topics of this nature.

IF THAILANDIS SUCH A GREAT PLACE WOULD THESE GUYS WHO ARE NOT HERE FOR THE SEX WANT THEIR KIDS RAISED HERE

Judging from posts here, and from looking around at so many foreigners raising kids in Thailand, I think I can safely answer that one with a 'yes'. Though quite obvoiusly many others would not want to raise kids in Thailand, and I have severe reservations on this myself; however none of those reservations have anything to do with sex or nightlife.

(In the unlikely event anyone'd ask, those reservations revolve around safety, environmental pollution, expense of an education approaching Western standards, legal security/lawlessness and perhaps some others I can't think of right now).

Nothing wrong with a couple bars tho; kids don't typically go to bars so I think I can safely call this a non-issue, and as you see above I'm not blind to the negatives!

Y'allschmellarat I think.

I too have trouble with the phrase 'unfaithful'. Very loaded term, not very objective. I'm not whining about it, but submitting that the poll will lead to skewed results because of it.

I'm sure it could be worded in a more objective way.

If anyone was voting on a policy basis, PPP would never have got in!

That's just another great example that perfectly underscores the gap between many people's perceptions here and Thai policitics (or Thailand & Thai people in general I guess.)

-> PPP HAVE policies that their voters want. (Ok they're making a mess of it but the allegation was that they don't have policies or that these policies are meaningless)

-> Those policies appeal to a majority of the voting public currently. (Hence election after election being won by TRT/PPP)

-> Those policies are in some publications (The N.) classified as 'populist'. To the voters themselves however, they mean getting health care, a viable market for their produce, roads built and generally an acknowledgement of their existence and aspirations that the Democrats (and other elements with potential power) so far seem so blind to.

To sum it up: "Rural Thais Are Not Stupid!" Anyone ever planning to achieve anything in elected politics in Thailand better respect them!

Right, so this friend is close enough to correctly identify his son, but suddenly cannot be called back to even find out what area was meant in the first place with some directions.

Gotta give high marks for getting all the response though!

Heard an apt one on those.. Q - "How do you know The Nation is lying?" - A - Their presses are moving.

Don't do it. Bigger tyres will not do a whole lot for comfort (look into suspension tweaks for that one) but will:

* Increase fuel consumption

* Reduce wheel-torque

* Make your speedometer and odometer incorrect

* Anything but a very marginal increase leads to the wheels hitting the wheel arches in tight turns with a bump in them.

Of course adding a small lift to the suspension would get rid of that last issue, but overall there really is no point.

Why not get your friend to send you a Thai Sim card with Credit on it

Or, almost as easy, the second you step out of the baggage claim area into the terminal area, there will be outlets by AIS and DTAC selling you a SIM with some credit for around 100 baht.. easy easy..

Well it is an article in The Nation.. You can't expect them to get anything right. (To the point where it actually makes more sense do just ignore things with number in them, and distill it to toddler level, like "Nok Air aren't doing so well at the moment."

The world has gone mad.

I suggest closing this topic until we know there is a topic.

Could be a master-troll though.

Riveting.

Time to lay off the sauce.

There is no precedent in the history of manking when writing and rewriting constitutions, staging military coups, setting up Asset examination committees,

Sure there is; Burma, Zimbabwe... Perhaps Thailand aspires to that level? They've had one desastrous coup against a popular leader.. If they can do it against Thaksin they can do it against anyone and most certainly Samak / PPP.

I enjoy the many avatars that are both creative and technically well done. I have never taken a dislike to any poster for the content of their posts, much less their avatar...

Thank you; I do take pride in mine; a custom design for this site!

As it was an International License he should have told them to keep it and just get a new one back home.

...Which costs more than 600 baht...

Well, go check it out then already. Bangkok has taxis right.. Jump in and bring a camera; some pictures would help this topic along.

A friend of ours just called us to say he saw our son on a billboard in Yommarat, he stopped his car because he was so excited and he was sure it was our son but we never done a photo shoot with CP so what can we do about this?

You could find out for yourself first if it is indeed your son before parading around Thaivisa on high heels and feathers in your tiara.

(Typically getting anything on a billboard means a very high resolution image; those don't happen without photo shoots.)

And all kids look alike.

Grace Hotel and surrounds.

Half full aircraft should mean discounted seats,

No, that's history.

These days, half-full aircraft means that a flight is taken out, with the passengers moved a day later or earlier to make up a full aircraft.

Flying half full planes is a thing of the past.

I have read that Thailand is self-sufficient in rice.

Um, a lot more than self-sufficient; Thailand is a major rice exporter. Thailand is the Saudi Arabia of Rice.

On an up-country village level, Thailand is self-sufficient for just about anything except fuel. Especially for food of course, though a case could be made that rising fuel/energy costs will affect everything.

Still, it hasn't been THAT long ago that people didn't HAVE a lot of the things that depend the most on energy and foreign trade, so the knowledge and experience is there to go back; Anyone up-country over age 40 most definitely remembers how to handle a buffalo.

No worries. How did that claim of one of the historical kings of Sukhothai go.. As long as there is rice in the fields and fish in the sea...

What are the chances of us adopting a luek Kreung baby?

I'd say that greatly depends on which particular two krueng backgrounds make up the whole. While for example Wester-Japanese would be the hardest to find, there might be more opportunities for Khmer-Isan, or Hilltribe-Thai.

Have you though about sperm donation? IMO if your wife really wants a child & you are unable but want a half thai one then finding a suitable farang donor would be quicker

Where do I sign up?

Almost no one is here only for sex, but the flirting and attention from females and certain knowledge that sex is available if they want it is the main attraction that brings them here and keeps them here. There are beaches all over the planet. What keeps all these guys going to these particular beaches?

And that sums it up very well. I'd say this question has been answered.

No one learns Thai just so they can read a menu, it's an undertaking to say the least.

Well, yes, but the larger question is "is one comfortable being effectively illiterate". There's a lot of texts that are in Thai where a person would benefit hugely from a basic level of literacy; not talking about books and newspapers, but basic signage and indeed menus. A step up from there would be short notes & emails. Menus are an enticing challenge actually because it's a very finite set of words that you'd have to know to be able to make sense of it. (Dish names, ingredients and methods-of-cooking basically.). Then given that Thai is written pretty much just like English, Greek or Russian (i.e. with a fixed alphabet representing phonetics) and that written language and spoken language match each other a lot more consistently than, say, English, it's not beyond anyone really to make the effort.

Re "Lose face" -->

Note that this is of course not a particularly grave scenario, but in general it must be understood that the 'loss of face' can be on the part of the other party, in this case the waitress when it's shown that she doesn't speak English and/or is unable to communicate with a customer. (Other mechanisms at work here are that the waitress is in a lower position compared to the customer, and any problem or issue would therefore be her fault. )

Re "normally in this situation, i just ask for a chicken curry"

So what dish would that be then in Thai.. There are dozens of curries that might have chicken in them. If this is a restaurant without an English menu and (likely) not aiming for the tourist trade, then they will also not know which dish is typically meant in tourist restaurants with "chicken curry". (For reference, that would be 'kaeng garee kai', a.k.a. yellow chicken curry, a.k.a. indian chicken curry, or combinations thereof)