kimamey

3 hours ago, spidermike007 said:

The army seemed to have defied his wishes, and used the LM laws as a tool to prevent protests. 

Yes, respect only goes so far

I think they ignored his advice on submarines as well.

15 hours ago, bunnydrops said:

One big plus about being buried is you have something to leave a message on.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TKNhP28T9qg&ab_channel=BossDT

A part of you lives on forever.

Brilliant. Thanks for that.

On 2/7/2024 at 11:02 PM, Stevey said:

I don’t know how eager I’d be to get some bones. 

I liked the guy so I was happy to pick bones out of the ashes but I left the choosing of which to take to the rest of the family.

On 2/6/2024 at 3:14 PM, jts-khorat said:

 

I think you read the wrong things then. Theravada Buddhism in itself is actually quite a logical setup and its basic tenets are reflected well in Thai/Isaan culture.

 

But the same as you would not expect anybody in the west to eat only fish or beaver meat on Fridays or pray to a specific different saint each day or do daily bible studies in the circle of your family each evening, obviously popular culture is unlikely to have ever been an exact match to religious orthodoxy. It is not different in Thailand.

A lot of religions are followed by people who spend their time trying to explain why they aren't making much effort to abide by the rules of their religion. Religions generally start from some fairly reasonable sensible concepts or guidance. Then a group of men, it's always men, decide that if they claim to have a fuller understanding of what was being put forward they can elevate themselves above the rest of the followers of that religion. This is particularly the case if there isn't actually any, or much direct evidence of the thinking at the time the religion started. That's certainly the case with Christianity and Buddhism, where nothing was written down until many years later and where, if you wanted to feel a little more important you could claim to have a better understanding and start your own version and thus be the head of it. These men have the ability to either absolve you of any responsibility for following rules or at least not pushing too hard in suggesting you should.

Obviously very few people will obey all rules absolutely whether they are religious or not, but I find it noticeable here that in a lot of cases there doesn't even seem to be much effort to follow the 5 precepts. Take the idea of not taking life. If you look at the UK as an example, vegetarianism seem much more prevalent in the UK, where religion is dying out, than in Thailand. My view on the reason for this is that there are 2 main reasons to be vegetarian or vegan. One is for health and the other for moral reasons although these can often overlap. I've never been totally vegetarian but when I lived in the UK my daughter was so I moved away from a lot of meat and fish. When I was shopping I'd often see things like pork pies for example. In my head I knew I liked them but I shouldn't have them. Almost always, with the occasional weakness I'd resit the temptation. Here I think that monks don't really push that and put it as something you should try to do, if they mention it at all, so without any real pressure to avoid meat and the silly excuse that I didn't kill it, most people eat meat.

Thailand kills thousands of innocent men, women and children because they won't have a proper driving test, wear helmets or seatbelts, or have a proper functioning police force. Ultimately that's their choice but it doesn't show the respect for life they like to claim.

I did actually ask a monk about the killing of animals for food. He said that you have to eat meat to live. Obviously that's not true, and judging by the grin on his face he knew that as well.

Lastly you say you think I read the wrong things. You have no idea what, or how much I read so you can't know if it's right or wrong. I did mention that I thought vanity wasn't very Buddhist when replying to a post saying that the loud noise was a 'face thing'. Is that incorrect?

Maybe he didn't know it was fake and did get it from another man. If it's true, which I doubt, he was taking a big risk if he didn't know this other man and will probably end up a lot worse off.

2 hours ago, Henkjan2 said:

 

If we start paying them, becourse you're scared then within a week they will all do it. 

 

Make a picture of the drivers card and file a complaint. It really helps  ..

If the driver threatened the passenger with a knife whilst in the cab it might be better to pay and then report him, but since the passenger had already got out,  which I think is the advice given by the police,  then I agree with you. 

On 2/3/2024 at 11:40 AM, Georgealbert said:

Here is a comparison of the safety records of Boeing and Airbus.

 

https://www.solotravellerapp.com/airbus-vs-boeing-safety/#:~:text=Fatal Accidents&text=Out of these 147 accidents,it comes to fatal accidents.

You do need to separate incidents occurring due to manufacturing faults from those due to pilot error or poor maintenance. Even if Boeing manage to turn things around and produce well put together planes, if passengers don't want to fly in them then they won't despite any logic. It's a production failure and a PR one as well.

4 hours ago, grain said:

It's a face thing, the louder the noise, the bigger the sound system, the more money you have and the bigger your face. It's often to the point of absurdity. Right bang smack in the middle of the covid pandemic in Thailand a lady up the road from us had her son become a monk and she went the whole 9-yards with the massive sound system blocking the road. My wife went to the party, she told me everyone wore masks, but due to the deafening volume everyone had to lean in close together to hear what each other was saying, and of course this was at a time when everyone was supposed to be social distancing.

True. Sounds a bit like vanity to me which I thought wasn't very Buddhist. I did read up on Theravada Buddhism when I first came here, but I gave up when I realised it was nothing like what I was seeing.

21 minutes ago, youreavinalaff said:

No. The ceremonies and parties do not last 100 days. That is the mourning period.

 

There might be a 100 day ceremony, obviously on the 100th day after death, bur the ceremonies are not continuous for that period.

 

As far as I know, and have experienced, the pre cremation get togethers last for 1,3,5 or 7 days. Depending on the money situation.

I think I remember 100 days being mentioned as the time before the bones or ashes are placed in the temple wall or in a river.

2 hours ago, connda said:

This is a typical Thai funeral.  Most villages have "funeral funds" that the villagers pay into every time someone dies.  Over a life-time, that can amount to a significant amount of money.  The pay-out to the families of the dead in our village is 200K THB.  Most families blow the entire amount on ornate caskets and canopies as well as the three day Ngaan Sop (festival for the dead). 

At the funeral grounds, if there is a gas crematorium, after the casket is placed in the oven, the canopy is placed on a cement structure which looks like a foundation for a building.  It is then burnt as well.  I've got pictures somewhere.
Watching these events really give you insight into one key aspect of Thai Buddhist culture.  "Life is not certain; only death is certain."  So here in the Land of Different Cultural Practices Than The West, well, it's just different. 

So embrace it.  It is sure a healthier perspective than the morbidity of Western funerals. 

A lot of the funerals I've been to in the UK haven't been that morbid, although they were mainly for older people. In the funerals in Thailand of close family or in the case of a cousin who was 19 it would be difficult to know if someone was getting married, becoming a monk or had died. It's only at the removal or opening of the coffin that feelings are shown.

2 hours ago, Stevey said:

 I remember my first funeral here. I'd met the woman 6months previous and she was really nice. A change from the usual Isaan know it all fishwives. She was 50 and it was mid 2022 and I heard about how she had suddenly been diagnosed with a cancer of sorts and saw a pic of her in hospital with swollen eyes. Within a week she was history. 

 

The girlfriend asked me along to the Ngarn Sop funeral but anticipating a lot of sadness I declined although I did make a good connection with her when we'd met before. 

 

I spotted my girlfriend on the map with her sharinoher iPhone positioned. I guess that the pre funeral was over and they were at the ' Tee Pow' burning place. I made my way up there. I was alone in the forest, everyone had gone back post the ceremony. I was surprised to find that the Tee Pow was in a clearing in a forest and didn't have the usual white structure for cremation but there was brick surrounded pit on the floor where a fire was burning. As I made my way closer I realised that she was on fire. This cremation was done publicly. A roaring fire had been created and she had been placed on top. I didn't get to close or look to hard but it was an eerie sight. 

 

I made my way back to the house in the village. Everyone was there laughing and joking like it was a wedding. I , as a Falang with an actual soul, was emotional inside but the family seemed quite jovial about it all. 

 

Next was the night time doo where I learned more about these people. She was one of 9 siblings. Her mother is the sister of  my girlfriend's Father. It seems having 8 kids back then was common. I sat amongst the family and visitors and detected an undertone of sadness. I sat near her mother in her mid 70's who sat alone. I think she was very upset. I heard  a man laughing on our table with one of the relatives that it's good for people to die so he can have a party, dark humour indeed. 

 

I heard that some of the men had to go back and retrieve some bone from the funeral pyre. And then it was all over.

 

I have always been of the thinking that burial is such opulence taking up valuable ground but after seeing so many people disappear which put a trace here I am in two minds. I’ve buried every cat and dog I’ve owned and feel they are still around but under the ground. There is just something so final about cremation that I can’t get my head around it. The last dog I buried a few weeks ago I dug a hole for out of respect. One final effort of sweat to counter the lack of effort the in vaccinating it against the distemper virus it had succumbed to. My Thai girlfriend would have thrown her in a refuse bin. Such is the divide in respect for a person and a dog who can similarly dream and feel pain and distress at being lost from its owner.  Although in my experience has no concept that some one is missing  from the group.

 

I've been to a few, in fact I went to one yesterday for a friend of my wife. He was 55 and died in his sleep. I'm not sure why but apparently he drank a lot. His wife seemed happy enough. Oddly we didn't go up to the coffin before the cremation which I've never seen before. That's normally the last thing before everyone except the family leave. There doesn't usually seem to be much grief but then even in the UK I think the funeral is a turning point when you leave it behind. In Thailand the flashpoint for grief seems to be when the coffin is removed from the house, often a precarious task down some stairs, and the opening of the coffin before the cremation.

My wife's sister died in September one year and her husband on the 2nd of January, roughly 3 months later. Their son hadn't even grown his hair fully back before he has to shave it again. They lived in Phayao a few metres from the temple, but it had no cremation building onsite so we had to go about a kilometre to where the cremations were done. They had a normal cremation building but the coffin had an ornate canopy over it which made it too big for the oven. I'm not sure I can remember the name for it, but it might be something like 'bassard' The point at the top was hinged so it could be lowered to pass under overhead wires, but there were still a couple of guys with long bamboo poles to raise the lower ones. There were two raised platforms to support the coffin and canopy, between which the logs could be piled. In this case we had to leave it for 3 days and then go back to collect the small pieces of bones. I'd never done this before so I wasn't really sure what to look for. The bones were laid out in the shape of a human  body and prayed over. My wife's uncle who was a monk was there and he died a few years later. HIs funeral was obviously a lot bigger and on this occasion the bones were collected the next day whilst the ashes were still hot so tweezers made out of bamboo were handed round to pick out the bones. 

In the case of my wife's sister and husband, his bones stayed there as that's where he was born but hers were split and we bought some back to Mahasarakham where they were thrown in the river and I think some were put in the temple wall. With the monk I got a strange video of a couple of trays of bones with members of the family picking out which ones they wanted.

1 hour ago, OneMoreFarang said:

I remember some time ago I visited with my gf a friend of her up country.

At the neighbor's house they had music playing all the time.

I almost asked if there is a party going on. Later someone told me someone died in that house and now they play that funeral music for some time. 

It seems to differ depending on the area. In some cases there seems to be 4 days of visits by monks, which is for the deceased according to my wife, and then 4 more after the funeral for those left behind. 

4 hours ago, Geoffggi said:

when does SAFETY come in again? obviously they keep forgetting ......!!!

They put up a sign with a white cross on a green background with 'Safety First' underneath it. Isn't that enough?

14 hours ago, kwilco said:

had he done base jumps before?

I'm not certain but I think he had.

On 1/15/2024 at 1:46 PM, Liverpool Lou said:

So you know her personal circumstances, then?  Why not enlighten us.

They might be relying on the comment of a neighbour saying they'd never seen a man entering the premises. That might suggest the possibility she was a single mother but that may well not be the case.

If she is a single mother, and depending on how long she's been here, that must be a difficult position to find herself in. I would imagine it's bad enough for anyone, let alone her.

On 1/23/2024 at 6:08 PM, Liverpool Lou said:

How do you know that "he doesn't want to prove that he's in hospital"?  He doesn't have to prove that he is considering that, (a), there's no evidence that he is anywhere else and, (b), he's under the control of the DoC.

I don't know for sure, but since there seems to be a desire to find proof one way or the other by various groups in and outside of parliament it seems odd to me that nothing can be done to set the record straight given that there are regulations regarding someone staying in an outside medical establishment over 120 days. If he wanted to provide proof, and was prevented from doing so, I'm sure he could find a way of getting his views known. Who would want to stop him providing proof that his hospital stay is legitimate? I read an article yesterday claiming he was seriously ill, which may be true.

It's just that I can see why he wouldn't want to be in prison and be in a comfortable hospital or his own home instead so I can see the incentive for him and there seem to be credible questions about the current information.

On 1/16/2024 at 11:47 AM, Liverpool Lou said:

"I think all the facts that we've been told, and what we know of him suggests that he isn't that ill..."

Huh?  Which facts suggest that he is not currently ill?

 

"We also don't know that he's at home and not in the hospital because there's no evidence through pictures"

Which facts suggest that he's at home and not in hospital exercising his right to privacy as a patient and a prisoner?  There have been photos published in the press showing him in hospital.

 

"Are there now, or has there ever been another non elite prisoner who was given medical treatment in this way?"

Very possibly but, as medical treatment is confidential, I do not know either way, neither do you, neither does anyone else so that's a moot point.  If you have facts, either way, then it could be discussed rationally.

Your posts are normally ones that make some sense but I'm not so sure on this.

Let's be clear, I've never met the man, so apart from what I've read, and pictures I've seen. I have no proof of anything, so I don't know if he's in hospital or even if he's in Thailand. He could still be in Dubai or anywhere else for that matter. He might be dead or the pictures might be of someone else and we've no idea who he really is. But that could be said of anyone before I was born and most people since, so I'll have to just go by what I've seen and read. 

I've already pointed out that he apparently claimed he couldn't fly to Thailand before a medical check up, but was able to go to Cambodia. Maybe that was because he wasn't going to prison in Cambodia, but then he hasn't here either.

This thread was the first time I'd heard the suggestion that he might be at home and not the hospital. I actually mixed up 'home' and 'hospital' in my post. It should have read:

We also don't know that he's in the hospital and not at home because there's no evidence through pictures, video or a visit by a trusted person.

Having said that you've mentioned his privacy, which I acknowledged as well, but he has, unless the reports are incorrect, released details of his admission to hospital and medical conditions of which there were a few if I remember correctly and we've been told which floor he's on. It seems strange to me that after releasing those details he doesn't want to prove he's actually in hospital. As for other prisoners that might have received the same level of treatment, that information could easily be released without identification thereby maintaining privacy. I might have seen a picture of him in hospital early on but I've seen nothing recently. Maybe I missed it

Around the time he returned there was a report that he was anticipating only days in prison rather than months or years. This was from 'a source close to Thaksin' so may or may not have been true, but given the subsequent events, it might have been true.

There are plausible reasons for all of these mysteries but when I look at all that has happened I'm left thinking that I can't say I'd necessarily believe him.

8 hours ago, DjSilver said:

But you most likely bought your wife and is low educated right?

 

Even a baboon doesn't need to be rich these days. However, are they educated and have class, just because they have money? Absolutely no. One can always spot a low class who got money from blue color jobs 🤮

It was actually not meant seriously. Yes I brought over money, and still do but my wife has a masters degree, unlike me, and she is a government employee.

'they could be immediately arrested'

Who by for goodness sake? From my experience you're very unlikely to see a policeman on a rural road, unless he's going to or from his very large property. They might be given the opportunity to make a 'charitable donation' but I doubt they'd be arrested. It's probably been illegal for years but nobody bothered about it.

Having said that, a couple of nights ago I was driving back from the market with a bike close behind me, either with a very bright headlight or his main beam on, so I slowed and pulled to the left to let him pass. This was with a straight piece of road in front of me, not on a bend as some Thais seem to favour. As he went by I noticed he was a policeman.

On 1/13/2024 at 1:54 PM, DjSilver said:

Haha, this song is so true. I really wonder if the low Thai self-esteem is because of that the Thai culture is based on prostitution, and having woman from Isaan marry poor western men? 🤣

My wife is Isaan and I wasn't poor when I met her OK!!

Nice to see the UK getting more deserved recognition for having the best looking flag.  

On 1/12/2024 at 2:23 PM, Koratdave3 said:

Hello all

We are hoping to move to Thailand however there may be a stopper.

Our soon to be 8 year old daughter suffers from Absence Epilepsy.

It is currently being treated with "Ethosuximide".

It has kept her from seizures.

Also if she were to have a seizure we have the nasal spray "Valtoco"

I emailed Bumrungrad Hospital and asked if they used it to treat 

epilepsy. They said they do not stock it there, and they did not know

if any other hospitals had or used it.

I'm wondering if anyone on the forum has a family member who is 

being treated for Epilepsy or if you would know of anyone who might.

I truly need some guidance in this.

If anyone can help it would be greatly appreciated.

I'm just trying to find out if the meds are available in Thailand.

If they are not we will not be able to move there.

Thank you all so much.

Is there an alternative that would work? Not as serious but there were a couple of tablets I used to take in the UK for high blood pressure but they didn't have them here so they gave me alternatives which my UK doctor said were fine.

It would be terrible if your plans were ruined by not being able to secure, what seems to be a common treatment, or alternative.

On 1/9/2024 at 2:49 PM, sirineou said:

I am not an expert also.

And I am sure a determined thief could defeat them , like you said they could easily cut the zipper with a pair of box-cutters. There there IMO to deter the casual thief. and make it difficult enough so that they would move on to an easier target. 

Personally I never put anything of value (if I can help it) in a checked in bag. 

 TSA locks are locks that the TSA has the codes or pass-key to open for inspection. Last summer traveling to Greece the wife had put a non TSA lock on one of the suitcases , when we got the lagage ,  there was a note saying "This bag has been opened for inspection" and the lock was cut. 

 

I've heard they can gain access just with the tip of a pen  pushed into the zip.

My son used to travel to the US for work a lot and he had a TSA lock which was cut by customs in the US