Sydebolle

Sir, whatever you avoid or ignore - Chiang Mai is a disaster zone and has been for the recent past. When I came 40 years ago, it was no subject and no haze, no smog, no nothing. Today Chiang Mai is Thailand's worst air polluted city and toggles, worldwide, between 1st and 5th rank quite often. Your ignorance is typically Thai; it does not go away with it. Get the police force to act less as highway robbers for bribes and more onto doing their jobs. Land owners can be easily identified = any fire = off to jail. Simple as that, juicy fees and jail sentences. You're not protecting tourism, you're killing the next generation of Thai voters and tax payers while the micro organism in the soil is - literally - getting fried. How hopelessly stupid; someone must have pampered the police and politicians nicely, just look for the beneficiaries and you might find the answer!

Maybe he rings the miracle man running the agricultural ministry; the latter seems to be an expert in conversions ....... and let's face it; ending up as a minister after having served four years in a "dirty farang" slammer in faraway lands is quite an achievement on the curriculum vitae - me thinks! If the picture shown is the accused gentleman's residence and the police has to "negotiate" 20 minutes prior to being granted access ...... the salary slip must be wider than tall 😉

Paying respect to all those metal and concrete figurines paid back nicely - the neck brace is gone and the wine glasses are on the table - nice going while on parole, Sir!

That money would put Thailand on the forefront of overland train travel; combining all those ideas of the men in uniform would be digging the Kra channel between the Gulf of Thailand and the Andaman sea and really bring home the bacon ........ But the generals, admirals, commodore and sea lords would have to live on their official income ......... nahh, no option = no chance!

Maybe time to clean up yet another hive of money wasting if not money destruction. The aircraft carrier was a total waste of money, now they start nuking their own boats and I just hope, it does not culminate in a battle where the new submarines without engines start launching torpedoes against each other. Yet another governmental part which should be closed, everyone sent home and the arsenal sold off as scrap metal. Latter revenues to be used for better education, social welfare of the underprivileged etc.

Whoa, how great is this. Thailand is training all customs offers to be ....... but read for your self " the customs and excise will determine the wine value". The hub of all sommeliers it seems, if not the mother-of-hubs 😉

Let's wind up the clock ...... Tik Tok Tik Tok Tik Tok .........

What a co-incidence; they boys are attending the world's biggest tourism fair in Berlin, the ITB and then Anutin executes marching orders for the governor of Phuket - arguably one of Thailand's most promoted tourism destination. This story with that Swiss bloke went completely overboard; as said earlier on, file a police complaint, pass it on to the court, listen and execute the verdict. Take the landlord to the cleaners as well for constructing said staircase on public land - without which the whole story would have never happened. But, for crying out loud, if you want tourists, then do not hang out some individuals to dry; Thailand is - percentage-wise - much worse than those few wrong-doing dirty farang. Hence, process matters by given paths and a got set of laws. How can such an incident keep the governor, the interior minister and the prime minister busy - a world's first indeed. Just be very very very careful, the spark may jump over and the Maldives, Bali and the Philippines are valid alternatives for sun, fun and nothing to do!

The dinosaurs walk on ice which gets thinner and thinner ...... the world is watching as well as the 14.4 million voters who voted for this party ..... let's wait and see 😉

The carriers care only about one thing; does the passenger get off the plane at the end of the journey. If this is not allowed as the passenger has no valid document to enter the destination country, then the carrier has to repatriate the passenger on the first available flight back to the boarding point. a) in this case the passport remains valid for another five months, i.e. is not expired yet b) the passenger cannot stay in a country with an expired document hence that point is obsolete c) the admission of a person with expired documentation back into his home country is a Geneva convention decision which was introduced after WW2 In closing, I don't know, what the passenger's thoughts are. I - for one - would get the passport renewed, even a slow bureaucracy should be able to cough up a new travel document in five months .........

BMW - as far as you can see. Cheaper vehicles would allow better training which then would do away with "tourist" police. Is the "Thai" police as forcefully represented in the media? The police budget must be astronomical ...........

Does this also include unwanted nationalities, this month apparently mostly Swiss and German?

Give the returned son a medal for his bravery; pay respect to one of the planet's 5,000 listed gods and spirits, wearing the neck brace (which keeps him comfortably warm) in the company of his daughter-sweetheart. Bottomline for me is, nothing has changed in the last half of the century 8-)

Remember the days, when kids would sell illegally imported non-Thai cigarettes everywhere, three packets at a time? Then someone had the glorious idea of importing tobacco legally and tax it accordingly. Then, the taxation of an imported box of cigarettes was higher than the sales price of locally produced fags in the shop. Unknown to me is the fact, why Thailand is not following suit on these products. The customers want it and get it; question is if the government is following suit and allows import against taxation. But that would make Somchai's envelope thinner as there is no extortion possible anymore ..........

So the wage doubled in 10+ years; question is, did the labour perform double as well? If not, it fans inflation and Somchai, getting more money for the same work will be stunned over the fact, that his Somtam and noodle soup will increase as well - as the person cooking it, growing the ingredient etc. get more money too. Vicious circle it is called!

It is called police and Thai law. Losing a child is the most terrible thing which can happen to any person but let the authorities execute. It does not take the media to accuse anybody or anything as well as it does not take the media to glorify a person they never met. To the parents, I share your grief over this most terrible loss in your life and hope that over time you will be able to cope with the untimely loss of your loved son. And to all the others, stay factual, correct and less xenophobic - thank you!

By 15 years experience running an authentic Italian garden restaurant I can share with you, that Thais are - in many cases - difficult as they expect "Thai-style Italian" and "sapechian service" all the way. Pizze must be thick manhole lids, served with Roza ketchup, the Bolognese sauce may not contain beef (as they don't eat beef) and Sriracha sauce has also no space on the Italian menu. Duck breasts must be cooked pink (medium) as well done results in chewy affairs. Upon ordering guests were told about it in their language to avoid misunderstandings yet Thais insisted on "well done". Once served, they drove the staff crazy over the chewiness - although they've been told about it ahead. Same with Salmon steaks which should be served slightly soft in the centre for ultimate flavour and dining pleasure. "Al dente" is the proper way to cook pasta; we had a "T" button on the POS system for "Thai" so the kitchen would know to overcook the pasta - as all Thais seem to have a problem with "pasta al dente" (which means slightly bitey - but properly cooked already). Table manners = another highlight, specially with children shouting, roaming around and disturbing other diners. Asking parents to take care of their minions resulted in the standard reply was "you know how it is with children, ha ha ha ha". Another issue was "corkage" for drinks they bring along. Our wine cellar stocked THB 300K; starting from affordable real Italian house wines at THB 120/glass and market-comparable priced spirits. They showed up with their boxes of Mont Clair and Castle Creek when we told them about the corkage - also shown in the menu. Every second bill with corkage resulted in discussions and nagging for discounts. More breaking news came steadily from the (mainly ladies) rest rooms. A mother misused one of the sinks for a toilet bowl, washed the child's backside and did not even rinse; sanitary napkins in the ladies loo happened more than once, entire toilet rolls disappeared and once even the soap dispenser was forcefully semi detached. We had cloth towels to dry hands afterwards; within the first 18 months some 350 towels "disappeared" in God-only-knows-where and some were stolen by putting them into handbags without stuffing the towel in properly. We switched, against our standards, to paper towels instead which created a mess in the sink, toilet bowl or on the floor. Shoe prints on the ladies toilet ring were a monthly classic. The gents, preferring the toilet over the fully automatic urinals, were regularly out of focus and quite honestly, many gentlemen preferred leaving without washing hands! My wife and me did the housekeeping check every hour to the hour ourselves - the rest rooms are the name card of a restaurant. We could identify the "culprits" on the CCTV recordings and in 95% of the incidents it showed Asians. The staff was not too keen on their fellow compatriots for sometimes rude behaviour, trying to change each and every dish and leaving at the end, many times without leaving a tip. Latter is commonplace, I know, but explains, why 40 years ago a petrol station would blow out your air filter, fill up your wiper water tank and clean the windows, which I always appreciated with a nice tip. As Thais did not tip - that service element of at least cleaning front window disappeared. Of course we would not "ban" Thai customers but given the choice, I could have easily done without that particular segment of the esteemed clientele.

If the airline has safety issues in not being able to attend to the passenger's possibly special needs in case of an emergency evacuation? Let the passenger sign a disclaimer form? Accept him and - in case of problems - face an avalanche of juristic maze? Would other airlines have accepted the passenger under the preamble of the above? It has to remain the discretion of the vendor/service provider to communicate its limits and, in case of exceeding possibilities, refuse selling the product .... or in this case, the airline seat.

The Swiss again, this time producing something everybody else - except Thailand - wants to copy ......... how inconsiderate of those hillbillies with their timepieces 😉

Yes, as a Thai she can return anytime with identity documentation on her nationality - even if those should have expired 😉

When the Thais want to outdo the Swiss in the media worldwide ..........

Routine inspection ........ of the envelope, most likely!

So the 39th gender in the semi divines society is now taking the men of the cloth to the cleaners?

This xenophobic racism is on its very best way to get completely out of control. Thailand might have to be reminded, that they are walking a very, very, very tight rope here. Irrespective of nationality, race, religion, gender etc. - everybody is equal in the eyes of the law. So treat everyone equally. Anything wrong, file a complaint, take it to court, get a court ruling and execute the verdict = simple as that. But maybe some people are more equal than others? Do never forget, the percentage of non-Thais doing wrong is marginal compared to the semi divine Khon Thai with all this petty crime, raping, mishandling of children by parents, relatives and teachers etc. etc. etc. - and hardly anything gets reported. So beware that this Farang-bashing will backfire as every farang moved once in their lives already ........ and can move away somewhere else to spend their money. As said, leave it to the police and courts and keep the manhunting media out of it. The average Thai is not educated enough to read between the lines and see the difference!

Well, unlike his many predecessors he keeps smiling all over the planet and has not achieved anything bag (nor good for that matter but that does not matter) 😉