spidermike007

A change in consciousness must start at the most basic level. Most Thais think plastic is the best thing ever invented, and the percentage of Thais that even consider the negative ramifications of plastic is incredibly small. This requires some education. I always do two things to avoid the consumption of plastic.

1. I bring re-usable bags with me every time I go shopping. I use the larger shopping bags I buy in the US, which are made of recycled materials. Most of the clerks have to be dealt with. Even when they see my bag, they still start putting the stuff in plastic. I always mai sai toom. No plastic! Then they start loading up my bag. Most look at me like I am from Mars. Do I care? Not one iota. About 1% thank me, and get it. Not many do. My Thai wife does not like bringing the bags to the store. I force her to. By now, she expects it, and sometimes even asks if I have any bags in the car, or on the motorbike. Same with the water bottles. It used to embarrass her. Now, it is second nature, as I have been doing this for so long, she expects it. So, if a Thai can be conditioned to follow these simple principals, then anyone can. 

2. I bring a bottle of water with me, every time I go to a restaurant. I refill my plastic bottles from the 20 liter bottles at home. It is easy. I never buy bottled water at a restaurant. This saves 300-600 bottles a year. I use a plastic bottle dozens of times. I never get any flack from the restaurants. Only once did someone say something to me. She said you cannot bring you own water. My response was if you serve the water in a glass bottle, and I do not have to consume a plastic bottle, I am happy to pay for that. She was lost. I told her to leave and get me my food. She went away. 

We simply cannot say we are concerned about the environment, and then do nothing about it. Action demonstrates commitment. Lack of action demonstrates nothing. 

Lastly, restaurants can demonstrate their commitment, by serving drinking water from the 20 liter bottles. It saves alot of plastic. They lose a small amount of revenue, by not selling thousands of bottles of water. But, their operation is still profitable, and they are making a real difference. 

There really is not need to be consuming water in plastic bottles. At least not often. There are alternatives. Those damn bottles are a real culprit, when it comes to fouling the environment. What can we do, if we say we care? The issue of BPA and chemicals leaching from the bottles can easily be avoided by purchasing these bottles shown here. They are on ebay, and shipping to Thailand is either free or less than $1. The bottles are one liter, and a half liter. The plastic ones are only $2-3 each. Worth it. I use them daily. 

17 hours ago, rtco said:

Errr did you read the headline??? ... "Drunken Aussie tourist admits he wasn’t robbed at gun point in Phuket"

That was a subsequent update. Why would anyone do something so dumb? Five minutes of fame is one thing, but to be forever known as the clown who reported a fake robbery? What is up? Off his meds maybe?

16 minutes ago, jayboy said:

It's Buriram. What do you expect?

I think it is indicative of how the nation feels, as a whole. I do think the army is truly despised by the vast majority of the Thai people. We shall see quite soon. I predict a whomping at the polls. 

I have a couple of friends, who have worked in South Korea. At legitimate massage shops. No specials. Some of the guys try to lure the gals out for dates. They made 100,000 baht a month. So, one can understand the motivation for them to do the work. I believe they went over on a tourist visa, as they were only able to work 90 days at a time, then they had to come back to Thailand again, before returning. They said the work was pleasant, but the men did not tip much. LOL. 

Not sure what this "arrest" was all about. Did they accomplish anything, other than deny alot of Thai opportunities to work, and make a living wage? If only the police and immigration engaged in real, honest work here. 

On 5/23/2018 at 8:36 AM, darksidedog said:

Two days ago we get the cops telling the motorbike taxis to behave themselves, which they probably won't. Now it is the mafia on the beach behaving badly. Don't forget the street vendors, who aren't averse to getting aggressive when you don't buy their crap. I am not even going to start on the taxis.The amount of poor behaviour by those who make a living from tourism is really disgraceful. All the time those who actually do get caught get off with a wai and 500 Baht fine, expect to see a whole lot more from the whole sorry lot of them.

Good points. The beach should be something that everyone has access to, 24 hours a day. The beach should not be a franchise. If the police had any concern for law and order, these creeps would be locked up for years. But, you do not want to bite the hand that feeds you. It is amazing that people still visit Pattaya, after all these years of incidents, and the police doing absolutely nothing to improve conditions for the tourists. As far as the Indians go, I am not going to engage in small minded racist rants. I tend to like Indian people, and feel they bring an awful lot to the table. On many levels what they have accomplished as a people and as a nation in the past 70 years since their independence is astonishing. The British stole so much from them. India was a very prosperous nation if you go back to the 4th millennium BC, to about the time of Christ, and then look at the period from the 11th to the 18th century, before the Brits got their hands on their riches. There was a reason they were referred to as the jewel in the crown.

The army has changed very little here. Made few improvement.

Good riddens. In a few more months they will be gone. They are deeply unpopular. The elections will demonstrate that. Nobody will miss them. They have accomplished very little in their four years of rule. Gone baby gone. Goodbye guys. Good luck! See ya! 

All it would take would be a concerted and sincere effort on the part of the authorities and teachers nationwide, to convince the youth of the importance to protecting the head. The head just does not do well, when hitting asphalt, concrete, or a metal object at speed. The skull is a rather delicate thing, and the brain is something we need on a day to day basis.

Getting on a scooter, or a motorcycle anywhere in Thailand, much less Phuket, Phangan, Dark Tao, or Samui without a very good helmet, is like playing Russian Roulette with three or four bullets in the chamber. It is absolutely asking for problems. The degree of recklessness here is astounding. And many foreigners come here thinking "how much trouble could I get in on a little scooter, on a tropical island"? Well, the answer is alot. The amount of foreigners who are killed on the Southern islands is staggering. Most are not reported in the media. I had a friend who worked for Samui rescue for many years, and said the numbers were about 30 a month, on Samui, Phangan and Koh Tao. The official number is about 3 a month. Rider beware. Use as good a helmet as you can afford, and do not use these eggshells pieces of crap. They crack at the first impact, and what lies underneath them? Your skull, which is very delicate. 
 
Just ask yourself- do I have enough problems already, without a broken skull, or smashed head, or face injury, or lost eye? I have two friends who have been in motorbike accidents on Samui within the last two years. One still cannot walk, or talk or function on her own, from a motorbike accident, where she hit her head on the pavement going only 20 kph. The other one has lost alot of his mental capacity after hitting his head. He insisted for years he would never wear a helmet. Now, he seems 15 years older. 

On Samui, up to 30 people a month, are killed on the roads. The majority being on motorbikes, and the majority of those not wearing a helmet. The press here is highly censored. The report only what the so called leaders want them to report. Nothing else. Social media? Why would social media report these statistics? They report individual accidents, but not overall statistics. Anything you read about accidents on Samui in the media would be false. Thailand has the highest number of fatalities in the world, and there is no doubt Samui has the highest within Thailand. The hospitals there are a cottage industry. 

9 minutes ago, JackThompson said:

And it is actually less "genuine" - when you consider the income-letters were a "declaration under penalty of perjury" (Felony, for US and AU), so T.I. could have made referrals for prosecution where applicable to deter abuse.

 

"Deposits into a bank" don't really prove income, and there is nothing illegal about tricks to create this illusion of income, so the bar would be much lower.  Unless the goal is to increase expat-populations, I am skeptical this will be adopted as the new standard.  That said, I certainly hope immigration will be happy with just the deposits.  Thousands of new expat-retirees would be great for Thai businesses and employees, if it were. 

 

In hopes that "deposit proof" is at least part of whatever "new formula" might exist in the future, I have already changed my foreign-transfer patterns to "monthly," in order to suit what immigration is purported to maybe be wiling to accept in "bank-activity" patterns, which resemble "income," as per statements by the embassies. 

Generally I would agree with the jest of your summary, except for the fact that the vast majority of guys I know, that were using the affidavit system, did not necessarily have the steady income to back up the statements. Therefore, they were less genuine. The perjury aspect is a minor one, in that I have never heard of either immigration of the home embassy prosecuting for that offense. 

Why is the income statement from the embassy an issue, for guys with the required income? Shouldn't local bank statements, showing an income in excess of 65,000 a month, from abroad, for the past year be sufficient? That is far more "genuine" than the income affidavit from the embassy anyways. Is that not the point of the change? To validate real income?

Does anyone have clarification on this specific point?

13 hours ago, ChakaKhan said:

Where Big Joke?!!!!!

He was transferred to immigration, so the police no longer have a totally objective, big man who is completely above the fray, and spending his every waking moment looking out for the common man. 

I am from Saskatchewan. I was born in Regina. Which makes me a proud Reginan. It is always fun telling the gals where I am from. The most common reaction is, it is really cold there, right? Correct. Very cold. The conversation pretty much ends there.

31 minutes ago, thaiguzzi said:

You were doing quite well, and acceptable, until the last photo..............

I understand your sentiments. But as far as scooters go, that bike rocks. Super bikes are not for everyone. 

The most important question is, have the Burmese done anything to make conditions better, or safer for these people, to return, and should they be forced to return. When asked to choose between exile, or genocide, rape, and murder of your family, one would usually choose exile. 

A few of my current favorites. Unfortunately, it appears Bimota is all but out of business. Oh well. Dreams live on.

2 hours ago, Peterw42 said:

Have a look at the Data on this website, a lot of your presumptions are incorrect, in fact Chinese actually have the highest daily spend, (but stay the least amount of time). http://www.thaiwebsites.com/tourism-income-Thailand.asp

 

 

 

 

Tourism certainly isnt in decline either

 

I do not buy the numbers on that chart, for a nanosecond. The Chinese spending more per day than the Westerners. The vast majority of Chinese in Thailand come on very low budget tours, including airfare, hotel, hotel meals, etc. They do most of their shopping at 7/11. The only luxury spending they seem to do, is at King Power. The only way that chart could be accurate, is if they somehow averaged in what the 800 or so Chinese billionaires spend on their travel. Not sure how it would be possible for them to even access those figures. When it comes to charts and surveys, I always like to take into account what organization did the work, what their agenda was, and who paid for the study. Alot can be learned from that. 

This article relates specifically to Chinese visiting Russia, but alot of the detail relates to Thailand too, in that most of the tours are similar. 

https://carnegie.ru/commentary/75921

2 hours ago, simoh1490 said:

The amount spent by tourists from different countries in different countries on holiday is widely understood and available, they are not just Thai government numbers they are numbers that others have compiled in order to better understand tourist behaviour. And whilst every nationality has its high and low spenders it's the average that counts, there is no way on Gods green earth that daily average western spending in Thailand is even remotely close to $4k per day so why even mention it. Every set of stats. I have ever seen on the subject of daily tourist spend in any country has always shown the Chinese as the number one average spenders, not just in Thailand but globally.

Who ever said anything about average? There is nothing average about someone who spends $4,000 a day on a vacation. I had some friends visiting Samui, and they stayed at a $1,200 a night resort. His wife was spending money in the spa, like there was no tomorrow. He invited me to lunch, and it was 29,000 baht for our group. I asked him about his habits. He told me they make millions a year (he was an attorney representing primarily Russian oligarch families, in London) and that they only took two vacations a year. Average 10 days to two weeks. This was a ten day trip. He told me for them, everything had to be first class, and there was no room for problems, issues, or things going wrong. He also told me in his mind, he had already budgeted $75,000 for the ten days, including business class airfare, etc. His hotel bill alone was probably $20,000, or more, with meals, spa, etc. So, that left $4,000 a day to be spent on the ground. I knew others like him. Thailand used to attract some of them. Very few these days. There are too many alternative countries, that work alot harder to cater to tourists of his caliber.

In terms of the Chinese spending alot of money, that is cumulative, not per person. Big difference. They are the largest group of tourists in the world these days. On any given day, there are 150,000,000 Chinese tourists traveling around the world. A very small percentage of them spend more than $100 a day. Very small. 

Amazing. Someone in a position of authority spoke the truth? Astonishing actually. 

I think perhaps a few decades from now, they will have tourism classes at university, where they will discuss how Thailand lost the golden egg of Western tourism. Those tourists, unlike most Chinese tourists, spent anywhere from $100 a day, to over $4,000 a day. They brought real money into the country, and in exchange, were treated with utter and complete disregard, scammed, disrespected, and abused. Eventually, most said no more. Thailand thought the country was something very special, and that nobody would ever say no, or find alternative places to visit. The fact is that there are countless other spots, many in this region, that offer better service, more expertise in food and beverage (especially wine service and selection at fair prices, which rich tourists demand), reasonable import duties to sustain a luxury goods market, better training, and far better english skills. Thailand simply lost sight of the big picture, and had very little vision, with regard to big spending tourists, who need to be catered to, instead of scorned.  

 So, what happened? The Western tourists started to decline in number, and the genius minds at the TAT decided it was time to "lure" the Chinese. They came. They came in droves. But, they did not spend much money. Hotels, restaurants, gift shops, jewelers, galleries, spas, massage shops, bars, and countless other businesses suffered, and will continue to suffer from this extreme myopia, on the part of the officials in charge of tourism. Oh well. Can't say they were not warned. Zero baht tourists are perhaps the majority who visit Thailand now. Sure, they spend some money in restaurants, and in 7/11. But, that is about it, for some of the super low budget Chinese tours. Not many rich Chinese are not visiting Thailand, for a dozen good reasons. They have too many other options.

There are countless things the government could be doing, if they wanted to attract the high quality tourists. The very first thing would be to repeal the anti faring wine bill, that was passed by a few very corrupt senators way back when, to protect an anemic local wine industry. They are losing billions of dollars a year in revenue, that would be had from a 100% wine duty, instead of 460%. The five star hotels would have major wine events, and the entire industry would flourish here. 

I was recently with a group of friends, and we wanted to order a bottle of wine, at of one of those high end restaurants in the EmQuartier complex. It was Bella Rocca Restaurant. I asked about a 2011 Chianti they had on the list. I was told they were out of stock. I asked about a Barbaresco, at 2,600 baht. Again, out of stock. How about this Nebbiolo? Do you have the 2010, as stated on the list? No, we only have the 2015. OK, what is that wine like? Is it drinking well now? I do not know. Is there anyone here that is familiar with this wine list? No. Sorry sir. Wait a minute. You have 100 bottles on this list, ranging from 1200 baht to 10,000 baht per bottle, and NOBODY who works here knows anything about the wine? Are you serious? We all just looked at each other, and got up and walked out. We realized the restaurant was a pretender. And more than likely the food was marginal at best. It was all dressed up to look like a very nice Italian restaurant. But, it appeared to be only window dressing. High end tourists have little patience for that lack of quality and lack of service. 

But again, the lack of vision, combined with a naive, surly, silly, churlish, and ignorant sense of nationalism, bites the country in the butt. And again, who is the loser? The Thai people. 

The entire country is suffering from a declining tourism industry. And that will not change. It is a permanent declining trend. For a hundred valid reasons. 

Good on Phil. Tiger was a great golfer. He lost his mojo the moment Erin cracked that windshield with the gold club. He had no business conducting his affairs with so little discretion, and he brought on his own downfall. His injuries did not help either. He has one or two minor titles left in him, maybe, at the PGA level.