KoreaElte

1. What level are you at?

I am at beginner level. Meaning I can deal with taxi drivers, police and waitresses but I can't participate in business meetings or study some course that is run in Thai.

2. Can you read and write Thai?

Yes, just finished learning the alphabet and all regular and irregular grammar rules so I can read and correctly pronounce stuff but I don't necessary have the vocabulary to make sense of it yet.

3. How long have you been learning for?

Casually / passively: 3 years. Active, formal training: 10 weeks.

4. How did you learn?

I have been here a few years and picked up some street Thai and vocab. on the street. I have tried some Thai language schools around Sukhumvit but none of them worked for me. Finally I ended up at some sort of boot camp at Chulalongkorn University and that really did it for me. 10 weeks full-time and you will start to read and write.

5. What other languages could you speak before Thai?

English, intermediate German, lousy Spanish.

Interesting topic. I recently thought about physical Gold, too.

All the Thai people I know who keep a few hundred k to a a few million Baht worth of gold at home buy it from accredited gold sellers, mostly around Chinatown.

The gold price is published daily in the local newspapers and they have small bars available. Don't need to buy kilos Not sure about coins or silver.

I personally don't understand why someone would keep a few hundred k / millions of Baht worth of phsyical gold at home... Just sets you up for a home invastion IMHO. But I see the appeal in having gold at hand in times of crisis and looming inflation.

To safely have physical gold in Thailand you would need to have an insured bank vault. Just putting it into a safety deposit box at your bank will mean it's not insured. Want to have it insured and the cost will sky-rocket.

www.perthmint.com.au let you buy gold and silver and store it for you. It's not paper gold, it's physical gold. But that's not local so wouldn't really address your need.

Let's bring this thing back to life!

This thread basically made me take the plunge after 2 years of procrastination. I am now in this insane program at Chula.

Anyone wanting up to date info on this course, fire away!

And I wouldn't do the Chula program, it's not easy unless your thai is at a high level already and you need to learn thai fast. It's more aimed at business men and Japs.

When were you on this course to get that idea ?

I seen some bad reviews about the Chula course from back in 2005 but I think some things may have improved since then. I am doing Intensive Thai at Chula right now and if you start from Basic 1, you don't need any prior knowledge whatsoever.

I have met students who started before me. They're now in Intermediate 3 so they have had about 600 hours of tuition over 8 months and started from zero. They're basically fluent in conversation and can read and write pretty well.

For a retiree who has time to be on Campus 1000 - 1500 every day and do some 90 mins of homework and review this course is fantastic. I fooled around with private label language schools last year and most of them were visa mills that didn't teach crap. 5 hours @ Chula is like a week at the Thai school down the Soi.

Cnxforever- bro. You are trippin'

He made some valid points though. Thai Immigration laws are quite restrictive - a bit like Japan. Welcome as a tourist but for everything else we will constantly remind you that you are a foreigner....

Coming from a Western background we are always used to things being PC and fair, promoting equality, etc. Simply not applicable here. We are in SE Asia and in a developing country that takes great pride in never having been colonized.

I hate it, too, but I think if you put yourself into "their" shoes it makes a bit more sense.

I will have a play with the missus' 2011 Accord and see what can be scoped out also.

Personally I don't even have a car (MRT fan) but I will hijack hers and poke around a bit. There's a USB port I will plug into and see if we can shed some light on this. If they are Garmin maps that would be awesome (could save a lot of money).

The Unit in the 2011 Accord is not Garmin, it's NAVTEQ. But there are 6 flavours of Accord in the Thai Market. Separately Honda offer a GPS accessory on all their models which may be a Garmin...

The 2.0 NAVI and 2.4 NAVI nodel have the NAVTEQ unit built in. They told me it only comes with Thai Maps.

The best way to call AIS from abroad is to use Skype or some other cheap way to call Thai landlines and dial +66 2-2719000

You can tell them to try stop the stuff, they may ask you for the date and sender ID of the SMS in question so keep your SMS inbox at hand when you do speak to them.

They can see your SMS from their end, too. If the sender is a third party who doesn't pay AIS to send marketing on their behalf, they may tell you that there is nothing they can do about it. As is the case with the f*****n TrueFitness spam I get every few weeks.

"Asian Stocks" is a bid broad.

For local stocks Kim Eng and K-Securities (Kasikorn Bank group) have staff who speak English and both offer the Java platform that they license from settrade.com

For other countries, E-Trade just stopped servicing HK, so I typically suggest Interactive brokers. Via their HK office you can open an account that can cover many many countries including Singapore and HK.

I can recommend a guy who used to work at CBRE and now moved to Jones Lang Lasalle as CBRE limited him to property management and at JLL he is allowed to get into sales as well as property management.

He always showed up on time and speaks good English and helped with maintenance issues months into a lease. PM me for his details.

I got mine from the Klong Toei district office last month.

I am not married and single.

Ended up not needing any guarantor and it was issued free of charge.

They wanted my chanote, translated and certified copies of passport and visa and the blue tabien baan for my place (with nobody's name in it) and that was it.

Had pre-booked meeting with the lady who oversees the district office and she made me sign some forms and checked that my name was spelt in Thai script in the same way on the passport translation as on the chanote.

Then she sent me to a guy who asked me some questions, mainly asking me to confirm if I live at the place indicated on the chanote and what my parent's names are. He then put them into Thai script and asked me to wait 20 minutes. After 20 minutes the yellow tabien baan was handed to me. No charge.

To summarize:

Farang, single, not married. Have chanote for my condo and a blue tabien baan for my condo (but my name can't be in it). Have yellow tabien baan with my name in it.

They told me that if a Thai person were to live with me at my condo I could go to the district office and have that person entered into the blue tabien baan.

My observation is this:

All the "big 4" thai banks are "OK". The service you get greatly depends on the branch.

For the past two years and until last month I had accounts with SCB and K Bank and Bangkok Bank.

Now I only have K-Bank. OK I have HSBC also but that doesn't count because they aren't really Thai and there's only one branch.

Most Thai business contacts I know love and use Bangkok Bank and Siam Commercial Bank.

All the banks I mentioned have good English-speaking call centers.

Here's my review:

SCB:

My experience was that at my branch Siam Commercial bank totally sucked! Excellent ATM network but the dam_n things are in poor state of repair and when you report it to the English speaking and very polite call center they promise to send a tech but then nothing gets done.

For a few months last year the electricity company changed the format of the barcode on the bills. Every bank quickly updated their ATMs but SCB took over 2 months so during that time you couldn't pay your electricity bill by scanning the barcode at an SCB ATM.

In the branch, they have no queuing system and people avoid me because my Thai is poor and their English is poor. In absence of a queing system I am conveniently overlooked and a million people who entered after me get served and I still sit there and smile.

Yet most of my Thai contacts use and love SCB and tell me "It's your branch, dude".

K-Bank:

Awesome! They try to help me with the most random stuff I throw at them. They call me back, they give me good rates on incoming wire transfers, they unlock the door for me at 6.01pm to write me a bank draft after closing time, the manager gives me his mobile number and tries to speak English, ATM faults are addressed quickly , Internet banking is solid. Yet many of my Thai friends tell me that K-Bank sucks. I tell them "It's your branch, dude."

Bangkok Bank:

That was my first account actually. Solid internet and phone banking. I like that they have a "Be 1st" Visa debit card with micro-chip. If you use that card you are well protected against skimming / cloning but it won't work upcountry as it will only work with the latest model BKK bank ATM which are progressively being rolled out. Also what I like with BKK Bank is that the phone banking allows you to set limits for the visa debit card - including a zero limit so the card can't be used until you switch it back on. Branch service was OK, phone service was OK. ATM network is OK. Also nice with BKK bank is that they have cash withdrawal limit of 20000 baht per hit whereas the other Thai banks usually limit you to 15000 baht per hit. But then you can do multiple withdrawals in a day and the total daily limit is usually higher so that's perhaps a moot point.

Another issue with Bangkok Bank is that they are like the only Thai bank that doesn't let me pay a Thai HSBC credit card online or via ATM. All the other bank's have that connection.

I closed BKK Bank account when I switched from the Be 1st Visa card to a BTS Visa card that doubles as a BTS ticket. They gave me the card and told me it's ready to go but the ATMs never let me load value onto the BTS chip. The branch screwed me around for 2 weeks and I don't have time for that. 4 visits to the branch later they still told me it is working and I'm doing something wrong. Eventually I had the manager go to the ATM with me and see first hand that the option isn't enabled on my card. She apologized and went to her terminal to fix it. Next day I try to use it and it's still not working.

On the 4 visits to the branch they never took it seriously and basically kept telling me "the ATM you tried was broken" - So I tried 3 other ATMs and went back then they told me they forgot to activate the option, bla bla bla. Long story and any more detail would be off-topic so let me summarize:

BKK Bank is OK but my branch let me down. I closed it and my Thai friends who use Bangkok Bank tell me "Bangkok Bank is great, it's your branch, dude."

I would laso like to be able to configure a static IP address on this nlink router.

For port forwarding.

For use with torrent downloading.

The website portforward.com has yet to include the nlink routers to its database.

I got one of these today, too.

It basically sucks.

The firmware true pre-load is easy to use in that it helps you activate a new account via self-service (if the router is unconfigured and plugged into a TrueOnline DSL-enabled phone line it will take you to a sandboxed web-environment where you create your new TrueOnline username.).

But one thing it does that truly sucks is everytime a device with a new MAC address connects, the router hijacks your first DNS request and sends you to a true portal page. They confirmed that this feature is part of their firmware and cant be disabled.

So I started hunting for plain vanilla firmware hoping it's just a re-branded ZyXel or Billion.

I checked the nlink n100W's MAC address in the MAC address vendor database and it seems it's not a ZyXel or Billion but some really dodgy crap thing made by these guys:

http://www.twsz.com/

Thanks for the info. When my house is finally completed next year, it will be transferred to my son who will get a new blue house registration book and be listed as the home owner. My wife will also be listed as living at the same address. As such, when they do the blue book, I will do the yellow one at the same time with my son and wife acting as my witnesses.

It would seem that the yellow book is more useful than I first thought. I am only getting one because it is a required document for citizenship applicants, and I hope to file my application in the next year or two.

Just a caveat: I don't know how old your son is... I think the witness needs to be 20 years old or above.

I just won a breach of contract legal issue with a major developer in BKK South Local court last month.

The law firm I used was Ployprathip. It's a good team of lawyers who speak perfect English. They have 2 guys who specialize in Intellectual Property / Patents / IT and the rest of the crew does general commercial and civil stuff.

They don't do criminal law IIRC. Well, all lawyers in Thailand technically can practice in any area of law but my experience with this firm relates to a breach of contract thing with a property developer so I think they might be a good match for your job.

10k Baht an hour is insane. I have seen quotes that average around 7,000.00 an hour for a senior partner, 5,000.00 for a lawyer and 2,000.00 for a para-legal. 10k an hour is definitely BS. Maybe Baker and Mckenzie would charge that if you asked them to handle a billion baht deal for you but your run of the mill civil case should be well under 7k Baht an hour. My case the value of the dispute was 12M Baht.

I have since then have them do a due diligence case relating to the purchase of a second-hand condominium for me and they were worth their money again.

I will PM you their number and website and the name of my go-to guy there.

Has anybody had any experience getting the yellow book from the Prakanong District Office?

Yep I was there last week and it was a nicer office than Wattana! Fully air-conditioned and friendly staff.

The guy told me to bring

- My passport with visa + copies thereof

- The original title deed for the property

- Thai driving licence if I have one + copy

- 2 Thai citizens to "guarantee" for me.

Then it turns out that my property falls under the jurisdiction of Wattana.

When I got to Wattana, the story changed and not in my favour.

Wattana want

- certified translation of copy of my passport + thai visa.

- title deed

- Thai driving licence if I have one + copy

no "guarantors" were mentioned at this office but getting the certified translation of my passport and visa is a huge pain in the ass.

Anyway. jai yen yen and I will get the paper and go back (to Wattana) in a week or so to get the yellow book.

Why do I need the yellow book ? a) my gf wants to be on my tabien baan and i am sick of paying my embassy over 1000 Baht every year to provide a letter saying that I live here so i can renew the driving licence. My visa doesn't allow for a 5 year driving license so the Tabien Baan is helpful indeed. My bank manager also said that he can cut me a visa card even without a WP if I can bring a yellow tabien baan (most branches wouldnt even open an account for me previously).

To think some people are happy, that this man has been shot is really very sad.No matter what he ha said or if he wears a red shirt.Someone getting shot and there life nearly taken away is not somthing to be happy about in my books .

Do you know what kind of stuff he has been instigating in the past few weeks ? The "peaceful protesters" who have "guards" who are "not armed" yet we see them on Aljazeera armed with sharpened bamboo stakes and handguns.

And the shrapnel from the grenades his thugs launched at the "multi color protesters" that are still stuck on the facade of my office building outside Silom MRT are a daily reminder of what this man has been up to. "Security" and "Military Strategy" was his responsibility within the red shirt movement and the buck stops with him.

I am sorry but before the bleeding hearts cry for humanity and sympathy please do go over the events of the last few weeks and keep in mind the death toll this person has contributed to.

This is inflammatory talk...totally stupid for farangs in this dangerous time to get enmeshed-albeit verbally- in SOMEONE ELSE'S WAR!!!!

In the era of twitter and various forms of instant communication imagine if it leaks out that farang kii nok are rubbishing the reds...

Moderator...are you at the controls???

It isn't someone else's war when I am resident here and have business interests here and I, part of my family, most of my close friends and all of my staff are affected by what is going on every day.

Besides there was no violation of any forum rules in my post.

TAN Network: Bullet hit Seh Daeng from left temple through to righ temple

Ouch. He'll be brain-dead if he survives at all.

One could argue that he was kinda brain-dead all along. Good riddance!

Thanks for the quick replies everyone. So it seems that like most things Thai, half the room will tell me it worked out smoothly, the other half were hassled for paperwork and turned down. Hit and miss.

Maybe I could go to the BKK Amex office in person and act like I own the place. Try to meet a manager and explain my case face to face ?

Does anyone know anyone on the inside @ Amex BKK?

I have a visa, an overseas Amex Plat charge card, a thai bank account, good bank references and liquidity. I just don't have the work permit.

Hi,

I have a non-immigrant visa without a work permit in Thailand. I also have a Thai Bank account at K-Bank. I live off investments outside of Thailand. I am busy with that, but I am not an employee.

I have a Platinum Amex in Korea and wanted to "Global Transfer" it to get a Thai chargecard in THB.

hxxp://xxx.americanexpress.com/globaltransfers/global_card_transfer_other_countries_en.shtml

The Thai Amex office told me that without a work permit, nothing can be done. Apparently "It's the law" that foreigner cannot get any credit card in Thailand without a work permit.

I confronted them with the fact that K-Bank gave me a Platinum Visa credit card (not a debit card) and that I don't think that such a law exists but it's more likely a policy.

I would be interested to hear from anyone who has successful or otherwise, gone through the Amex Global Transfer programme to Thailand and if you had a work permit or not.

I do not have anyone to recommend, but I can tell who whom to stay clear of.

I was in a similar situation last year and *thought* I needed a PI.

I came accross www dot thai - spy dot com

Who also seem to have a forum account here on TV, albeit not having logged in for a long time. In any case, we agreed on the scope of the project and I sent a prepayment to cover travel expenses which is quite common with PI work. They got the money and that was the last I heard from them.

When you think you are being ripped off and you want a PI, make sure the PI themselves aren't going to rip you off.

Only deal with them face to face if you have not dealt with them before or received recommendations from people you know in person.