BarryM

Before Thailand fix the correction facilities they need to fix society

This particular boy had the stereotypical alcoholic father, illiterate mother, had been sent to be a monk aged 13 where the abbot and his mates took a shine to him so took turns buggering him for a year before something younger and prettier donned an orange robe.

The juvenile detention facility completed his education, turning him into the syphillitic rent boy that I found in a bar on surawong.

I visited change Mai with a Thai friend who'd had two years in a juvenile detention facility there for yaba.

We had dinner with his former teacher a woman in her 40s. Somehow we ended up in a boy go go bar for drinks. She recognized more than half the boys there as former inmates

So I guess the Thai system isn't working, or it it - depending on your point if view

Thai airways prevents you from using fasttrack immigration if you have overstay, however you can check in at regular counters and obtain boarding card at economy check in with overstay on a foreign pp

So in practice you present your Swedish pp at check in and Thai pp at immigration

So the issue is do immigration check you have valid visa for destination? Do they cross reference names?

Might be worth a shot. If you get caught out then plead ignorance, smile, explain urgency of travel etc and hopefully just cough up the 20k without hassle

Theres little else to be said about this tragedy. It will be repeated, the causes will never be properly investigated and no meanigful action taken on tourist safety in thailand.

I will certainly not be using thai buses, for the simple reason that my family and i no longer take holidays here, despite living in the country.

There are far better, safer, more welcoming, better value destinations outside thailand. Besides its allure of cheap sex i cant imagine why anyone comes here

I'm sure the problem these guys have will be fixed on payment of appropriate payments

The irony of comments by tvs resident thaiophiles about these people giving farang a bad rep is wasted on them.

Even they believe the Thai to be too dumb to differentiate, believing them only capable of thinking that some may be rogues, so they all must be so.

They may well be right. My experience of the Thai lends itself to that lack of faith in much cognitive ability. Still, quite amusing to hear it from the rose timed spec club

For all the arguments here, one fact emerges.

In a country with unusually low IQ and EQ, poor education and rampant corruption do not be surprised if you get stabbed if you dare to question anything.

If you don't like it, go elsewhere. And that's exactly what well heeled tourists are now doing.

Asking a Thai bus driver to slow down is like pi--ing into the wind. They seem to regard driving at 150kph as essential to maintaining their macho cool guy personae.

The only consolation is that there is hopefully one less idiot behind a bus wheel in Thailand.

That, and hopefully the fact that tourists might realize the danger of riding in these death traps at last

If PT issued Platinum color plastic health cards instead of gold colored plastic health cards the problem would be solved. Better still, rename it the Diamond health card

Agree that TG is now uncompetitive. I'm squeezing the last drops out of my platinum ROP card, using up miles and upgrades etc.

In future it'll be Etihad and Even BA rather than TG to uk.

My main holiday last year was to N Iraq. I felt far safer there and enjoyed a far more genuine welcome that thailand

There's not been a single bombing in KAR Iraq since 2005. Unlike Thailand

Much more tourist friendly than Thailand in every way, mountains, clean lakes, friendly locals.

aside from a few road side bombs, its all safe and open

I think my next holiday i will take my family to Afghanistan, i hear beaches are just superb

The culture of casual violence against tourists in Thailand is reason enough that I no longer take family holidays in the coubtry, despite living here

The limited education and most Thais and their pseudo cultural values make living abd working here a challenge at the best of times.

Friends back home increasingly see Thailand for what it is and the genie is out of the bottle. My main holiday last year was to N Iraq. I felt far safer there and enjoyed a far more genuine welcome that thailand

if you had the money to meet the MM2H criteria you'd understand the difference.

Thailand is still a great place for retirees with limited means. The wealthier people I know here have already left or are planning to do so.

The MM2H program is not cheap, but it is excellent and beats the pants off even the promised benefits of the joke Thai Elite program - most benefits of which were withdrawn anyway.

Apples and oranges. The defunct Thai Elite nonsense was taken up by just a handful of people, and was never more than an alternative solution for show-offs with more money than sense anyway. Just like fancy credit cards.

Compare the MM2H programme with the bog-standard 800KB-in-the-bank Thai retirement visa extension, if you want to compare like to like. And there can be no serious comparison.

The MM2H program is not cheap, but it is excellent and beats the pants off even the promised benefits of the joke Thai Elite program - most benefits of which were withdrawn anyway.

Thailand is intent on becoming the Zimbabwe of Asia. Good luck with that, I'm out of here as soon as I can.

And to to rose tinted fools who say we won't miss you - I won't miss you or Thailand either

In Thailand it is far more important to be seen to do something than actually doing it. Tablet pcs fit the bill perfectly. The peasants are delighted that PT seem to care about them and their offspring and that's all that counts. They themselves have no idea how to improve their lives beyond walking behind the big man.

On a positive note for many foreigners here, the next generation of bar girls and boys will, at least, have some idea how to connect to their customers on hook up sites, those saving the tedium and expense of bar fines.

My experience of massage in hotel spas suggests their three month training program consisted of learning to fold towels and arrange orchids in a bowl of water, learning to switch on the machine to play that god awful pling plunge music, arranging towels over me whilst maintaining the minimum of 3 mm distance from my tackle, learning useful phrases like "it the plessure ok for you", manipulating my groin area to elicit pleasant surprise at the results and offering to "take care him" for tip, errr that's it.

I've been visiting / living in Thailand since 1985. The atmosphere, especially in tourist areas has become far more intimidating. My impression is it started when TRT came to power. For the first time ever the socially and economucally disenfranchised majority felt they had power for the first time ever. Of course it was and remains illusory.

Farang are easy prey for a growing number to exercise this sense of empowerment.

There's always been anti foreigner resentment of course. Aged 19 I was often in the company of a neighbors, a girl in her mid 20s. Although "respectably" dressed Thai men would make insulting remarks as we passed because she was with a foreigner.

The Thai male does suffer from a small man syndrome far more so than many other nationalities, save inner city blacks in the uk perhaps. Again I think it comes from a sense of empowerment with the evidence of their daily lives points to the total opposite

Paradise Villas has kids being picked up for Regents. Just be wary of one or two of the Russian landlords, otherwise usually a few places available asking 50-120k month.

Quite a few empty houses there right now so worth making an offer.

Three years ago the Avenue was quite full. I think Central has killed it. I guess it'll be another condo project site within a few years

Twenty five years ago I visited Thailand as a backpacker. Ten years ago I was visiting 3-4 times a year as a "proper" tourist paying 40k baht a night for beach villas.

The best thing Burma can do is to encourage young adventure seeking tourists who are priced out of Thailand, because in ten years when they have their feet under trading desks at Goldman Sachsen et al they will be back with serious tourist dollars.

It's a lesson that Thailand has failed to heed in the last few years and I suspect the traditional thaiophile tourists who visit will simply age and die off.

My experience of Burmese workers is of a work ethic that is wholly elusive to the Thai.

If Thai government officials learned how to read maps they might also notice it's western coastline has the development potential of a thousand Phikets. Without, I hope, it's endemic scams, lawlessness, murders, mysterious deaths etc

Don't forget to remove any cash, sunglasses and other items of value before you leave your car to be washed

Myanmar /Burma has one of the worlds longest, unspoiled coastlines ideal for tourist development. It has the potential of several hundred Phukets.

Thailands eastern seabord is a largely polluted mess, dependent on sex tourism and associated entertainment or weekend escapes from Bangkok. Ko Chang is too far from Bangkok to be a viable short break from Bangkok and it's murky shallow seas are hardly the stuff of dreams, except to mostly low rent backpacker types.

Thailand can carve it's niche as the worlds brothel and entertainment circus for busloads of Chinese. Indeed one establishment in Pattaya now offers coach parties industrial scale sex show entertainment. It's a future that Burma can easily avoid by sheer dint of it's pristine beaches and relatively intact culture.

The history and mistakes of Thai mass tourism is a lesson they will no doubt be studying with great interest.

Even if she was paid I will say that the performance was an important piece of performing art.

If art is intended to force people to ask difficult questions, stimulate debate, challenge convention and entertain this performance is probably the most creative thing to come out if Thailand in many years. Beats seeing another portrait painting for the sole purpose of deification.

Girls painting with their tits is also much more interesting than watching dogs dance a salsa.

I had a Thai post grad student stay at my home in the uk a few years back. His family own a large hotel in change Mai.

When he returned to Thailand he left a box full of papers behind that I cleared out. I read through his dissertation. It was total gibberish with no reasoning or thought process - so much so that i was reminded of Jack Nicholson in the Shining.