Sydebolle

The mother-of-all-hubs; we've been there before ........ yaaaaawwwwwnnnnn. 80% of Thais have access to high-speed internet; really? So my wife's village was not taken into the census evaluation then - not that it matters as they really have different problems like stable electricity, the very much interrupted fresh water supply. My mother in law (who is a wonderful woman with three years of public schooling) is in total disagreement with Techsauce Global Summit 2024 and the MQDC’s FutureTales. Is ever anyone reading what they write, are they aware that the internet can also be accessed outside Thailand? The statement that almost all you adults have a smartphone, is most likely correct. Another debt trap and I can give you this in writing; most users can handle the gizmo as a phone and otherwise it comes to good use for TikTok, LINE, WhatsApp, Facebook, Sanook and all the other stuff - apart from millions of photos nobody ever will look at ever again afterwards .........

Well, if you ask me, I can gladly attest, that the legalization of cannabis seems to work absolute wonders down at the offices of the Tourism Authority of Thailand. Nobody believes their figures - for years already. Nobody is interested in their fanfares of how great the TAT boys are and that without them the country would still run around half naked wearing coconut shells etc. They did it again, the first price of manure definition goes to .........

Got screwed in Nong Khai. Sitting on a permanent resident visa, having had a Thai license for 40+ years, I asked for an international driving permit, requested so by the insurance company in Phnom Penh in relation to cover my Thai-plated car. While the ASEAN license is OK for the Cambodian authorities, the insurance company saw that differently. The Dept of Land Transport wanted a letter of the immigration, queried my listing in the blue house register (normal for a PR) and wanted a yellow house register and a pink ID card. Latter I never sought for as I am not aware of a single advantage. To top it off, my wife was supposed to issue a letter of guarantee covering my request. Needless to say, that I had to just walk out of the office as I cannot handle stupid. At the DLT's head office in Bangkok it took 'em literally 15 minutes and all was done; no extra papers, copies, certificates, letters, seals and other funny ideas. The bureaucracy in this country has reached a level that it gets close to no longer manageable - while Khon Thai keeps kissing the feet of the semi divine officers and underlines their requests with the usual little "pour-boire" - as the French call it

What an embarrassment for the semi-divine Royal Thai Immigration Bureau - seriously. Look up your fancy computer screens and you can run lists of who exactly has an overstay and, if data were entered correctly, you would have had a start where to look for the culprit. Quite obviously, if he would not have been sleeping on the road as a caucasian, nobody would have ever noticed - me thinks!

The government does what? It now RACES to protect local businesses? What a load of crock is all this. The more the government is putting its noses and little fingers into anything, the worse the outcome. These online platform are an uncalled consequence of various elements. Prior to the pandemic, lots of customers (including me) bought stuff in retail outlets, supermarket etc. The frustrating element back then was, that you would walk up a shelf for a product, which was "out of stock" and nobody had a clue, when it would be in stock again. Then the pandemic came and people had to get themselves covered differently due to the governments stringent lock-down of anything (unlike Sweden, which never did anything the like). The internet is your friend and today I do my non-perishable shopping online, be it shaving cream, tooth paste, olive oil, WD40, light bulbs etc. - simply anything. The prices are even lower (as the retail is cut out completely) and there is no reason for me to go back to sometimes empty shelves, incompetent staff not knowing anything at higher prices. What is left is perishables for obvious reasons. Shoes and clothes are also purchased in stores to make sure, that I really get, what I want. The customer decides and the Thai retail trade has lost it years ago, arrogant, ignorant, unfriendly and incompetent. This should answer the question and TEMU is just the latest addition to the Lazadas, Shopees, eBays and other internet shopping facilities.

I just LOVE it, hilarious. Thailand is facing a significant competition of cheap, substandard goods from China, sparking widespread concern among local businesses and consumers. In the past, Thailand had no competition in fakes and cheap more-than-substandard stuff; now the same people cry foul as the Chinese seem to be quite a bit faster, quicker, smarter and better than their Thai brothers.

This article covers it all: - Common sense - or rather the complete absence of it by the court; let's face it, a jail sentence of two hundred and fifty years, seriously? Graciously reduced to only 150 years - what were these judges and courts thinking in the first place? - Reality - a budget of 20 Baht per meal per child is not enough to live and too much to die. What do you want to serve for 20 Baht. Nobody expects a five course Oriental meal but being a retired restaurateur I can tell you - mission impossible. The kids were shortchanged with the 20 Baht already. - Corruption; stealing 6 Baht and leaving 14 Baht - congratulations As long as schools are semi-divine, teachers are semi-divine and everything attached to a school is semi-divine = that's the outcome. Congratulations; well done!

Ah, now it is the monkey pox again - we had that once before but it was launched too soon after the bat pandemic and did not get noticed. Wondering if there are more this time round to fall for the trap?

Judging from the picture Chalerm seems to have possibly a major health problem. What beats me is, why are such crooks voted back into office over and over and over again?

Maybe the dinosaurs have not realized, what dog they woke up. For sure that dog will not go back to sleep. A bumpy ride into the 21st century is ahead!

Repeat and repeat again the elections ........ until the figures tally?

Leaves some interesting questions regarding passenger name list of Finnair as well as the super-modern system of the Royal Thai Immigration ....... unanswered - seriously. How is this possible, honestly? Maybe the whole story is a hoax or some juicier details remain unmentioned?

As said before over and over again. Travel with your own car from Thailand to Laos and enjoy the bureaucratic paper avalanche of TM2, TM3 and TM4, apart from an international transport permit which is used only between these two countries. Some border points can be crossed with a visa-on-arrival, others with an eVisa and yet others need a visa by a Lao diplomatic post (Consulate in Khon Kaen or Embassy in Bangkok). Thais can enter with a border pass (based on their ID card) for three days at a time and only within the bordering province; a passport obsoletes this nonsense. Traveling (in the past) by your own car into Burma/Myanmar takes half a day to clear visa and the car - forget the insurance = non existing. Cambodia offers a different aspect on the caleidoscope; insuring is not possible and you, technically, cannot leave the province you entered Cambodia. So Mr Srettha might want to drop this potato; unless you untangle these bureaucratic mess maze from scratch in all these countries without any country losing face - you will not get anywhere. Result is heavy hinderance of travelling between countries. An EU system whereby you get off a plane in Stockholm, rent a car and drive unhindered by customs or immigration all the way to Lisbon ......... wishful thinking and not happening in our lifetime 😞

I'm not a friend of the official US out of Washington DC but in all fairness, America did not criticize but "expressed concern". From their point of view understandable, but uncalled for ... to start with. Yet it is unwise to pour more oil into a fire which gets bigger and bigger by the hour .........

The contributions are deducted and funneled to the Social Security Insurance by the EMPLOYER. For Thais there is a possibility to get coverage by paying both, the employee's and the employer's contribution - which does not apply to non-Thais. So your membership with the SSI is mandatory during an employment you might have to seek private coverage for any such SSI-services and benefits through an insurance. In closing, don't expect miracles; I contributed 35 years and got a one-time-pay-out based on the last seven years only. Financially speaking it was a joke and a loss but luckily I do not depend on this and the 30 Baht health scheme was never used by me due to its complicated set-up of using a hospital 60kms away from work/home as all other medical institutions were "full of membership" already.

If the customer applies normal common sense ......... but yes, it starts there!

Well, history in the repeating mode; last time in the North, this time in the South - keep up the good work and all tourists will be scared away from anything cave-like. Pure management mistake by cave operators and tour company. But yes, it is the tourists fault; if they would not have gone into the cave, the incident would have never happened - back to Square One!

Well, well, another ignorant member of the leading elite of this country has spoken. Rachada Dhnadirek might be well advised to study the Vienna Convention stipulating clearly, what a diplomats duties are, what a diplomat is entitled to etc. For the time being, MFP remains the party which got the most votes in last "democratic" elections a little more than a year ago, even according to Thai law. That might change today but the meeting between a diplomat and ANYBODY else in Thailand is none of Thailand's concern. If any of those diplomats wanted to get the comments and inputs of the self-seated government, then I am sure, that the German Head of Mission would have extended an invitation to lunch. In order to get a picture on domestic affairs, with absolutely no intention to intervene in the same domestic affairs is, to invite all parties. In the case of the Swiss ambassador 10+ years ago, she managed to get the red and the yellow shirts to the same table at the Swiss residence. This time round the Germans chose to invite the parties apparently individually, for the very same cause. So Rachada Dhnadirek is well advised to keep her shirt on, to cool it and go back and study the Vienna Convention. She had her 15 minutes of fame but ridiculed the government, embarrassed the Thai foreign affairs ministry and made a complete fool out of herself. Next please!

Once the Thais have learnt to follow general rules and laws, that illegal entries are a no-no, prostitutes are officially not welcome and as long as there are plenty of alternative laborers (from Cambodia, Myanmar etc.); latter following the Korean script .......... You can take a Thai out of Thailand but you cannot take Thailand out of a Thai!

Noted, and yes, correct, but the process remains a domestic affair. Tomorrow is MFP's "D-Day" and we'll see what is to follow. It remains up to the Thai voters to voice their concerns against getting the party with the most votes thrown out allowing for all sorts of little hat tricks by other parties. Democracy is a form of government, which actually does not work anywhere perfect; the closest to it might be Switzerland. High education standard by the voters, small country, multicultural (mix of French, Italian, Romansh and German as a language base) an a federal management among 26 cantons. If a country can arrange for post-vote "appreciation" on the voters tax payments, then there might be improvement possible - me thinks 😉

In all fairness, in all countries I lived I never came across such a confusing, never ending changing of rules on visa regulations. Meanwhile even the immigration officers do no longer know what to do. Some stamp 15 days, others 60 days, some allow only two entries overland per year, another guy said "lazy to count" and meant that the two-trips-overland-per-year rule is no longer as well. All this at the Friendship bridge in Nong Khai, which I (PR holder) cross almost weekly. But then it is to be said, that it is an excellent entry experience for the inexperienced traveller; the way all this visa headaches and immigration rules are changed more often that other people change socks; that's the way the whole country seems to operate. Welcome to Thailand

Ben Cardin is well advised, to keep his well-meant advice to himself. Thailand's sovereignty has always been influenced by the US, not once to the benefit of the country. He might be right but it remains with the democratically elected people in the driver's seat to decide. If their decision is not what the voters want, then let the voters take the necessary steps and action. Any influence from the outside is uncalled for and, coming from the US, has always to be taken with salt; not a pinch but a 50lbs bag instead!

If it was not a mechanical failure then I wonder, why I have to go and retest my driving skills including a two hours video (yaaawwwn) viewing and a ridiculous brake test, lining up two sticks and a colour blindness attest. If it was a mechanical failure, fine the tour agency which, in turn, can take the garage to the cleaners. But, me idiot, I completely forgot, this is Thailand! All OK, fish the van out of the pond, quick fix any visual damage, dry the upholstery and put Somchai back behind the steering wheel 🙂

Define "essential expenses". I see gardeners trimming bushes and trees with two smart phones, either one costing certainly more than they would earn in a month. I see kiddies with motorbikes with all sorts of fancy nonsense on their bikes but no money for a helmet. I see cars with lucky draw car plates costing sometimes more than the vehicle those plates are affixed to. Only once you educate your people, that they: - have to work for money and - they can only spend the money they have only then you'll get the majority of the Thai people out of this financial death trap. My wife bought a plot of land for 2.5 million; the balance of a bank credit on the plot by the predecessor was 1.8 million. The initial loan was 500,000 Baht and they must have made some payments in the ten years between the loan taken and the land sold. The comment of the seller was, that they got 600,000 Baht for a plot of land they paid (with said loan) of 500,000 Baht. The real juicy cut was taken by the bank though but the seller did not understand that.

For once I am on the same sheet as Kim Jong un, mainly because the chances of triggering off an open war between Europe and Russia are considerably fewer than under Harris. It remains with the American voters to decide but if Harris makes it, then Europe is most likely lost as the US war gear industry by the chosen people will not stop at anything. Trump is the lesser evil, the one-eyed among the blinds but .... as said, the Yanks have to choose