Luma

I can contribute with 1,000 Thai bht only. Paid up.

I have seen these huge restaurant air fans with water spray, that produces a cool outdoor climate with some technique with "water fog". Do you understand what I mean?

How do these machines work? Where to buy them?

Would it be possible to construct such an animal with a huge electric outdoor fan and connect a thin water supply?

Any url or pointer with details of the construction would be very much appreciated! Thanks!

My family have about 15-20 free going chickens around nearby my house in Isaan.

Should I just kill them to be safe from the Bird Flu, or just let them be around?

If kill, where to dispose them?

I am doing a border run at Mae Sai in the next couple of days, to get my next 90 days on a NON-B multiple..

1. What do i need to get the Burmese visa at the border by myself, without using the visa touts around there?

2. Do I first leave Thai soil and stamp out of Thailand, walk over the bridge, then apply for the visa on arrival and then stamp into Myanmar?

Thanks for any details and tricks on how this works, this is my first Burma crossing trip.

3. My Thai GF want to cross over to Burma with me, does she only need Thai ID card, or any other requirements?

4. How is the Tax Free shop pricing on the other side?

5. Anything to sightseeing or visit while over there in Burmaland, or just do a quick revert back to Paradise?

Thanks for your valuable input!

FAKE-STAMP CRACKDOWN

Immigration Bureau urges foreigners to shun visa gangs

http://www.thaivisa.com/index.php?514&backPID=10&tt_news=599

Just got this by email, article from The Nation.

Bangkok Room Service

Room Service : Morny, rune sor-bees.

Hotel Guest : Oh sorry, I thought I dialed room service.

Room Service : Rye, rune sore-bees. Morny. Jewish to ordor sunteen?

Hotel Guest : I'd like some bacon and eggs.

Room Service : Ow July then?

Hotel Guest : What?

Room Service : Aches. Ow July then? Pry, boy, pooch..?

Hotel Guest : Oh, the eggs! How do I like them? Sorry, Scrambled please.

Room Service : Ow July thee Baycome? Crease?

Hotel Guest : Crisp will be fine.

Room Service : Okay. An Santos?

Hotel Guest : Ugh.....I don't know....I don't think so.

Room Service : No? Judo one toes?

Hotel Guest : Look, I really feel bad about this, but I just don't know

what judo- one toes means, I'm sorry.

Room Service : Toes! Toes! Why Jew Don Juan toes? Ow bow eengligh

mopping we bother?

Hotel Guest : English Muffin! I've got it! Toast! You were saying toast!

Fine. An English Muffin will be fine.

Room Service : We Bother?

Hotel Guest : No, just put the bother on the side.

Room Service : Wad?

Hotel Guest : I'm sorry. I meant butter. Butter on the side.

Room Service : Copy?

Hotel Guest : I feel terrible about this, but ....

Room Service : Copy. Copy, tea, mill.

Hotel Guest : Coffee! Yes coffee please. And that's all.

Room Service : One minnie. Ass rune torino-fie, strangle aches, crease

Baycome, tossy eengligh mopping we bother honey sight, and copy. Rye?

Hotel Guest : Whatever you say.

Room Service : Okay, Tenjewberrymud.

Hotel Guest : You're welcome.

So, did someone actually see Pres. Bush motorcade in Bangkok??

That was the topic of this thred!

After trying virtually every service provider for broadband in Thailand I am thoroughly disappointed.  From what I can gather CAT (communication Authority of Thailand) holds the reigns on the network here.  They even have a policy that only they can give you an ISP license.  What does this mean?  It means consumers get stuck paying rediculous prices for ADSL speeds that are 1/5th of the speed of connections anywhere else, including Malaysia, SG, Korea, China, JP etc.  Have you ever noticed how silly slow speeds are outside the CAT network?  Have you seen the rediculous prices posted for iPSTAR satellite internet feeds?  have you noticed every ADSL/Cable modem provider in Thailand has the same rediculous prices.  This is CAT at work.

I could rant for hours about how bad the ADSL/broadband connections are from EVERY provider in the Kingdom from every angle:

1.  Service is laughable with unskilled technicians fielding huge amounts of calls from customers they have no possibility of actually helping, Thai or English speaking.

2.  Getting charged by the hour on a pppoe connection which limits your bandwidth to 25k/s!  My bill is in excess of $300 USD every month from TA ADSL and I have yet to download faster than 25k/s.

3.   If you want to change your 'promotion' they make you pay another $2500 baht setup fee.  FOR WHAT?!?!  If you move locations you have to pay the setup fee again!  No negotiation.

4.  The guy who installed my ADSL took 6 hours with no success.  He had no business setting up this rediculously simple system and had no basic networking skills whatsoever.  I had it working 30 mins after he left the house.

5.  Thailand is one of the only countries on the planet with no access to local public FTP's for free Linux distributions, BSD, Unix'es etc. Don't get me wrong there is a couple ftp's but they are outdated and for that reason useless.  One pub even has old warez on it (this is on a major Thai ISP's FTP site!).

6.  My ADSL modem cost me $10,000 baht (6 months ago).  It retails in America for around $80.

7.  Some really lame ISP's started blocking some ports to protect against recent outbreaks of msblaster worm.  Now that everyone has patched their OS most competent ISP's have reopened those ports.  This is why on my $300 USD internet feed I can no longer ping, tracert, nslookup, use my VPN back home and a miriad of other DNS issues.  Do the service people even respond to me emails and phone calls?  #### no!

8.  3 phone calls to my ISP's 'help desk' have yielded confusion and 'I will call you back' responses to my simple question:  What is the address to your news server.  No calls back.

Anyways, I could go on and on but the fact is, if your planning to work in Thailand, and you require broadband that actually IS broadband, think again.  I have now started to look outside Thailand for satellite feed internet from another surrounding country that has no rediculous government sponsored monopoly on its network.  I refuse to pay any more cash into this retarded and infantile local system.

The greed and selfishness of the people who have monopolized Thailands Internet market (if you can even call it that) have done terrible damage to the youth of the country.  Because of their foolishnesss they have pushed the local IT infrastructure back 10+ years and its painfully apparent when you browse literally ANY Thai websites or IT businesses.  Truly sad.

Please post if you have had a different experience...

The 10 most dangerous sois in Bangkok

The Nation

20. September 2003

The following is a list of the 10 most dangerous sois in Bangkok, as they are listed on popular local websites.

1. Soi Lat Phrao 21: High grass, thick bush and trees; robbers can flee through Ratchadapisek Road.

2. Soi Vibhabadi 64: Abandoned old houses are frequently used by robbers.

3. Soi Charansanitwong 37: Drug addicts sexually harass women walking at night.

4. Soi Charansanitwong 89: Drug traders and addicts run rampant in the soi.

5. Soi Suanpak 11: A very isolated and dark soi.

6. Soi Pirom: The soi is very dark, and there is a small forest nearby where robbers can hide.

7. Soi U-Mai, or Charoen Nakhon 23: Robberies are frequent here; the soi is dark and isolated.

8. Soi Vimuttayaram, in Bang Phlat district: This soi is used as a brawling ground by gangs.

9. Soi Ruamraksa, in Huay Khwang district: Since the crackdown on drug dealing, this soi has become rife with robbers.

10. Soi Wat Makok: There are many small intersecting sois that robbers can use to escape.

---

Source: http://www.nationmultimedia.com

Scandinavian Church at Sukhumvit 33 have it. Both Ettan and Grov, portion and loose. 10 dosor for 1,500 Baht, or 150 Baht for one.

Located in Sukhumvit Road, Soi 33 near Phrom Phong Sky Station. (Picture and url below).

Scandinavian Church

No foreign guides: Sonthaya

Published on Aug 22, 2003

Tourism and Sports Minister Sonthaya Kunplome yesterday told local tour guides that foreigners would not be allowed to work as guides.

He said the Cabinet agreed last Tuesday to allow tour operators with at least Bt20 million in registered capital and that serve more than 5,000 foreign customers per year to hire 10 foreign workers.

But these foreign workers cannot be employed as tour guides.

"Tour operators can hire some foreign staff.

However, foreign workers are not allowed to work as guides in

Thailand," Sonthaya said.

He said the position of tourist guide was reserved for Thai nationals. Tourist guides in Thailand are required to be licensed.

He also said the Professional Tourist Guide Association did not fully understand the Cabinet's approval of the recruitment of foreigners.

Sonthaya said the government would set up a taskforce to assess the impact of the employment of foreigners by Thai tour operators.

Jarupol Ruangket, the president of the tourist guide association, said more than 1,000 local tour guides would gather in front of Government House next Tuesday to protest against the policy, which he said would allow foreigners to work not only as translators or tour leaders, but also as tourist guides.

CHOOSAK JIRASAKUNTHAI, THE NATION

© Nation Multimedia Group

The Thai government obviously feels that there are now too many tourists in the country. As of 26 August you will receive a bonus of almost USD50 (TB1900) for leaving the country early. It relates to the one month extension on the tourist visa which used to cost TB500 and will now cost TB1900.

I bet the tourist departments in neighbouring countries are rubbing their hands with glee. Prices for most visas are being hiked and some visa types are changing.

Don't worry if you are just about to come to the country as you can still get 30 days free on arrival by land, or by air if you have an onward/return ticket.

The new fees at Royal Thai Embassy, Stockholm, Sweden:

Tourist visa: 200 SEK/entry

Non-Immigrant: 400 SEK/entry

1 SEK = approx. 5 Baht

I use IpStar sattelite from CS-Loxinfo.

http://www.cscoms.com/en/product/ipstar_service.html

IP STAR EXPRESS

Entry Fee and Installation Fee is 15,000 Baht (One-Time Charge)

Monthly fee: From 3,500 Baht per month.

Speed 256/128 Kbps

You don't need a phone line, everything comes from the sky!

I have IPstar since a couple of months now, and are very happy with it.

http://www.cscoms.com/en/product/ipstar_service.html

Thanks for that info. Would it make it easier if we got married in Thailand?

The reason I ask is that my work is obliged to get long-term visa for partners of married couples.

Yes, ;legal marriage recommended. Your wife can then obtain a Non-Immigrant "O" extension (dependant visa) for one year. You shall definitively marry her in order to ease up her visa situation.

When is the wedding?  

Name suggestions:

1. Sombat

2. Somchai

Sorry, couldn't resist....

Buying something in a department store in Bangkok:  

One person takes the item you want from you and rings it up at the cash register (if they have one!)  A second person takes the item from the first person and walks off somewhere else to put it in a bag.  A third person writes up a receipt (even though it's just been keyed into the cash register).  A fourth person takes the money you've just given the first person (because they never had any change) and wandered off somewhere else to get change.  Meanwhile, the second person comes back with the item now duly wrapped.  But.....you then wait another ten minutes for the fourth person to come back with your change.  And all the time they're all standing looking at you and smiling.

Isn't it great!

Here is an eyewitness story about last night at Grace:

Drug tests at grace last night

     23/04/2003 05:09  

Well, last night they did it again. At 03:15am the music turned off and the lights turned on. Police officers entered the grace coffee-shop with a bunch of tv(!)- and newspaper-reporters. Some guys wanted to leave the shop immediately, some simply made trouble (they didn't want being filmed or photographed and were asking for the film). They were well taken care of. Everybody had to make an urine-test before he was allowed to leave the shop. One lady felt unconscious (what I have seen).

ID-check: Thais were asked for their id-card, while the foreigners were waved through (after the test of course). I heard some ladies asking their "boy-friends" for support ("Give me money, I don't have id-card. You pay."). Others were saying: "I showed them my brother's id-card. No problem".

However, the test had not to be taken under the eyes of any police officer. So, everybody who was in doubt, could very well have been able to manage a deal with somebody else. I have not any information, if anybody fails the test.

ps: The grace-guards were very rude to some people before they were handed over to the police (after the guys were making trouble).

pps: I have never been so happy for a stamp in my live (the one that stamped me drug-free).

- Peter1964, nanaplaza dot com

I returned yesterday (Friday) from Shittagong in Bangladesh on TG 310.

This flight goes Shittagong - Chiang Mai - Bangkok.

At Chiang Mai it stops over and picks up for an internal flight to Bangkok; consequently pulls into the domestic terminal at Don Muang. Passengers from Chiang Mai who have also exited the country to join international flights from Bangkok are also on this flight; they have a sticker on their clothing to so identify them.

International travellers from Shittagong are given a different sticker  by TG staff at Chiang Mai, where you all wait in the transit lounge, and do not go through immigration, if going on to Bangkok.

You can also disembark at Chiang Mai & go through the normal

immigration procedures, if this is what you need to do.

At the domestic terminal in Don Muang, the passengers with both types of stickers are herded together into a bus to be taken to immigration at the international terminal.  This bus departs from the domestic luggage pick up point on the ground floor.

Therefore, there is intermingling of both domestic and incoming/outgoing international travellers at the domestic luggage collection area.

The only identification the TG staff use to detect both types of international travellers is the adhesive sticker on your shirt., which peels off quite easily.  No count was done of the number of bus passengers and cross checked to a list. Both incoming and outgoing international passengers were on the same bus.

Now to my way of thinking, there is nothing to stop a person from removing either one of these stickers and exiting Don Muang via the domestic terminal exit.  Of course luggage is sent to the international area to be collected for passengers ex Shittagong, but with carry on only this should not present a problem.

Conversely, you could  "exit" Thailand at Chiang Mai, and disappear out the doors of the domestic terminal at Bangkok, if so disposed, with your passport stamped as leaving the country.  The only problem with this is that you would be a "no show" on the international leg of the flight.

I am amazed at this apparent breach of security for incoming

international passengers in Bangkok, (maybe someone can point out an error in my reasoning), particularly bearing in mind the fact that Bangladesh citizens have quite extensive travel and visa restrictions placed on them by Dubya since Sept. 11. There were quite a few of them on my flight.

Luma

(asfo-list)

Officials of the Thai Government have reportedly (on front page of Bangkok Post) advised tourists to stay away from the border so I would not expect too warm a welcome.

Bangkok Post article: Foreginers told to avoid Cambodian border as tensions rise