Sydebolle

Apart from that endless merry-go-round on the visa issue here in Thailand this is yet another reason to do a major clean-up of the immigration. Most passports are machine-readable and the immigration posts of Thailand are online connected with each other and that includes very remote border posts like Pudu, Huay Kon or Buengkan. Based on the reading the screen could pop up the authorized stay in Thailand by showing a date and that is, what Somchai has to stamp into the passport. Given the selection of possible days of stay being 15, 30, 60 or 90 days - apart from open end for PR holders and Thais, the process would take up the better of 15 seconds per entry. The selected few with non-readable passports could be treated at separate counters.

This is destroying the image of the country and also the image of Phuket taxis. As if this country would have no other problems ....... Phuket taxis, like the brethren in Bangkok and Pattaya, are nothing short of a mafia-style operation and would need a proper clean-up. And if you're at it, clean up the police as well and once that's done, carry on the good work into the government and hammer it into those pirks, that the government is elected by voters and hence the government and its subbranches (like Police etc.) are there to serve the majority of the electorate - me thinks.

How about publishing everything else in the gazette like traffic rules, driving under influence and mandatory driving lessons by experts, first half in a court yard and the rest on the streets? How about doing away with racism like looking down on dark skinned people (Khaek); some Thai citizen living here in fourth and fifth generation which arrived from South Asia? How about streamlining and tremendous bureaucracy to make the Thai people understand, that the government is elected by them and hence has to serve the electorate - and not the other way round?

It is all rotten rust under the fake gold colour of Thailand's position about foreigners, be it tourists, long term expatriates or immigrants. Racism in its finest order and then they cry over the missing cash of the afore-mentioned, which is so desperately needed as they cannot get ends meet due to the totally stucked social structure, rampant corruption and a complete vacuum in the education sector. Thailand is heading for a very, very, very bleak future - to say the least all the while the ever-so-rich-non-Thais are packing and leaving in droves ....... what a pity about a really nice country with mostly really nice people :-(

Ensure double pricing for the local tourists as well and you will see those staying away as well.

The grilling - what another nice repeating activity in Thailand. Well, the grill masters handling the grill station will be overjoying, that all is just bad mouthing and misunderstood and that everyone wishes Dr T the best of everything in a fast recovery which, by some medical professionals, might be taking place on 22 Februar 2024. Get well, Sir, (almost) whole Thailand prays for your recovery

Wonder how they deal with all those Middle Eastern and hand-written third world country passports. What happens with TM6 if someone arrived overland (via Laos, Cambodia or Malaysia) and leaves through BKK by air, where TM6 is no longer required. Lets cross the bridge once we get there, for the time being I would still plan ample time for Thailand's departure bureaucracy which, best case scenario, will allow you to have a nice, stress-free, cool farewell beer the airport 8-) Bon voyage ;-)

Take it that the immigration knows, unless your check-in is accepted against a Thai driver's license. Alternatively, if you are traveling with a Thai national, then let him/her do the check-in on their ID papers - no worries. The TM30 procedure can, apparently, also be handled online from a mobile phone (I have no clue though how that works); the TM30 is technically the responsibility of the host/land lord/property owner and many Thai land lords simply refuse to follow this, yet another useless, paper trail of the immigration to tell all those non-Thais, who is who on the banana boat ;-)

If I'm correct, Thailand had 20 constitutions since 1932 or roughly one ever close to five years. People have not understood the purpose of a constitution and hence the 21st version will be no surprise either. But to please the rest of the "democratic" world, it serves as a swindle sheet for the goons in Thailand's steering house ;-)

Define "pyramid system". Amway is a MLM vendor, MLM stands for "multi level marketing". The comparison to pyramid is relevant although Amway has been doing nothing else, in an honest way. Your wife sells Amway products to any third party among your friends and acquaintances for 133% Your neighbour sells Amway products to you at 121% Your neighbour gets the products from another neighbour down the road at 110% That down-the-road-neighbour gets it from a fellow across the city, latter gets it from Amway directly at 100% The money is made by the mark-up commission, i.e. shampoo at USD 1 sees an increase of, say, 10% from one to the next level. So your wife closes the sale and everyone in between has a cut of 10%. The products are usually good but just too expensive; a natural result if too many people make money without adding product quality to the item you buy ;-)

Various scenarios possible: retired toilet bowl on a brick basement with a rusty metal bar frame left and right to the bowl so the sobering-up customer can easily puke into the bowl comfy old sofa, with torn PU-cover in light blue or smoked-white and the usual array of cigarette burns a collapsible Coca Cola chair, left over from the last monks visit during a house ceremony or simply stolen next door from the neighbour. This version has the advantage that it can be cleared upon closing up into the bar/pub/drinking place the less fancy HiSo place might feature a flower pot with a dead plant into which the sobering-up result may be released On a more so(m)bre note, are these government officials pissing all those ridiculous rules and regulations, followed by even more ridiculous fines and jail sentences ..... for real, honestly?

To clarify, the government does not subsidize anything as the government has no money to start with. It has to live with less income which will affect the profitability and the bonus panel of the selected few big wigs at the top. Having said so; if I would have been given a discount or a compensation for all those brown-outs and black-outs I constantly experience by the PEA, then I would not only have electricity free of charge but made a lot of compensation payment savings. So get your act together, PEA, and stop whining

Could there be a little more to this story - me wonders?

The corona phobia is in full swing again; SCB in Nong Khai hands out masks to customers who want to enter their premises. I refused as the mask as it showed traces of being reused more than once. Luckily I did not represent a risk to the staff, wearing double mask behind an acrylic glass panel. Latter ensured that it became impossible to even sign papers on the desk of the staff. Instructions from Bangkok - was the staff's comment which nobody really understood; all customers no mask and the entire staff force, forced to follow the leadership, overprotected to a ridiculous level ;-)

The bottle neck is always on top of the bottle. If Thailand is serious (and it is not), then clean out interior ministry. In a normal state, the police and army is there to protect the state, police internally and army externally. Both follow the marching orders of the government and its interior minister, the government follows the marching orders of its "shareholders" - the voters. Not so in Thailand where the army and the police tell the rest of the semi-divines what to do and what the going rates are. Once in a while the overcomplicated bureaucracy, so utterly enjoyed and kept alive by the two "protective" forces, burps up as Khon Thai to this day does not know, how other cultures, races or religions work. Throw this influencer out of Thailand for good - good riddance as they say. But then start cleaning from top, if you are serious. And as we all know, that nobody is serious about it (at least for the time being), it will be business as usual and nobody talks about this absolute irrelevant incident in a short while. Nana is not known for its prayer halls, Pattaya is not known for its second-hand-bookshops. The latter suggests to legalize prostitution, keep the bureaucracy to an absolute minimum and get the government to take out its ever-nosey face out of the private market industry as much as possible and rather concentrate on what is more relevant. On the subject of Nana, all this kitchen waste of all those street kitchens ending up in the gutters at the beginning of Soi 4, the placing of all those kitchens forcing pedestrian onto the street etc. could be a possible start. In closing, nothing will happen as the sweetheart holds Chinese citizenship and the present array of government goons must avoid anything possible to upset the red brethren in the North. In short "next please" - your call!

Covid-19, upgraded to Covid-23 Version December 4.08 For how long does the Pharma industry intend to take the world for a financial rip-off ride on the influenza merry-go-round? Asking for a friend!

Seems to be an island thing in Thailand, first Koh Tao, then Koh Phuket and followed up now with Koh Chang. The chauvinist part of the semi-divine at work ...... ?

Hilarious! I was always wondering how long it would take, until Thais get sick and tired of what resident non-Thais got excited much earlier on without any possibility of getting their concerns heard.

Certain European countries take culprits to court for such illegalities irrespective from where they happened. I think the Swedes and the Swiss are doing the same. Yet it might be a long way until Thailand is walking the same footpath .......

Well, a former Prime Minister, Samak Sundaravej, had to clear his PM office for less. He participated in a cooking show on TV and was compensated with some ridiculous amount for transportation (I think it was THB 500) in connection with his appearance on TV as a hobby cook. The law stipulates, that the PM is not entitled to receive any money apart from his remuneration as PM - which sent Samak packing and he disappeared from the political stage. He was a hopeless nuisance politically and certainly an apparent crook (remember the fire engine deal for Bangkok's BMA?) but the whole dismissal was politically motivated.

Melly klitsmats - in that case. Possibly they will start to evaluate, what precisely is inclined in the 120-days rule. Per calendar year, per lunar year or by some chicken bones lying in ashes ....... Until this is verified, the sick Dr T must remain, of course, under careful medical care for which he, apparently, can even get the state to pay for - unlike non-Thais injured in hit-and-run incidents by Thais .....

Fallout from the documentary by a German TV station, really? I would assume the contrary, if the authorities and the government would be - for once - honest. Despite the decades of denial on the planet's oldest trade it remains a fact, that Pattaya is overloaded with "houses of ill repute". That, in itself, is OK for me, provided the service providers are a) of legal age and b) do it voluntarily. By experience, it is literally almost impossible, to find non-horizontal staff in Pattaya, see all the hotels and restaurants desperately seeking staff. The sleazy trade pays off quite a bit more, despite all the Baksish left, right and centre. This TV programme, which I have not seen, will only propagate the trade and facilities and will, if anything at all, promote the non-spoken reputation of Pattaya and will see increased numbers of visitors without scaring away the quality tourists - latter not interested in Pattaya in the first place - me thinks!

A rip-off which went wrong and then the TAT goons in general and those medical temples in particular wonder, why medical tourism is completely behind budget and forecast. Go to i.e. Rutnin Eye Hospital or Bumrungrad hospitals; all the rich Middle Easterners and the Dirty Farang from Europe are missing as many of them got sick and tired to be grossly overcharged over what a Thai patient pays. The latter, most with their 30 Baht badge, are of course not admitted in the eliterian health institutes of the Kingdom - go figure!

This was to be expected as the greed in this country is definitely second to none. The popularity of 7/11 is market-leading as being the first ones and rarely did a 7/11 close. I've been to a main intersection in Pattani/Southern Thailand many moons ago; they featured a fully operational 7/11 in each of all four corners of the intersection. And you know what, all of them were busy and had customers. The key of 7/11 is, that they operate exactly in the "disposable income" range of necessities. If you take a shampoo, nicely portioned in those small pouches and multiply the latter to a family-sized bottle, you would be never ever buying that brand again for outrageous pricing policy reasons. This applies to almost every product in 7/11's shelves. The rest is education which is a scare commodity here; the average Joe cannot work out the difference of 4 small milk packages of 250ml compared to a one litre bottle. And is exactly, where those "convenience stores" come in. In addition to this, all this is electronically wired, the order to replenish shelves is done automatically, the logistics is done professionally and rarely a product goes out of stock. The facility of paying utility bills, airline tickets etc. through 7/11 brings in tens if not hundreds of millions of interest-free cash - similar to what department stores do when suppliers deliver consigned goods against a VAT-invoice whereby the department store claims back the input VAT which they never pay on "consigned" goods. David and Goliath, here it is the fight between two Goliaths and, unless a miracle happens, both will survive with tremendous bruises and unnecessary financial endeavours. Given Thai-Chinese company structures the sitting generation built it up, the next generation might keep the level and the third generation will ruin it. Is all this to the benefit of the uneducated customer? Your call.

The 23rd February is 2 ½ months away and then we shall see the reshuffling and musical chair in full swing - be patient and get your popcorn ready ;-)