ChouDoufu

harry, thanks for that. i've found the cmu and wallen websites. it seems wallen has a unique whole-word

method of teaching thai. recognize the cluster of characters, rather than sounding out the word. i'll have to

research that a bit and compare to the cmu program.

nonthaburial, i'm in guangxi province, in the zhuang minority autonomous region. town itself is pretty small,

but the area is mostly agriculture, so air is clean. located in a basin, surrounded by mountains (well, really

really big hills), jump on the bicycle, in ten minutes i'm out of the city, and in the fields and forests. from the

us, but like to wear maple leaves when travelling.

oops! ????????

btw, is there any difference between falang and farang? is that a regional variation?

we of course have the similar laowai and waiguoren labels here. seems to be about the same,

meaning furr'ner, not derogatory except in context.

hi again, thought i'd add some more info and comment on the comments so far....

teacup: i love thai food. that there is almost a good enough reason to move. there's some great chinese food, just not here. this part

of the country has rice noodles breakfast, lunch and dinner.

beentheredonethat: sounds like you've beenheredonethis too. worst part is that for all types of 'forward motion,' the one and only rule is

"what's convenient for me?" 1.3 billion live here, yet each and every one seems to think they are the only person

on the planet. painted lines and traffic lights are merely pretty decorations. i won't get into the stupidity, but you

wonder what the net result is when for a couple thousand years, you host massive civil servant exams, scouring the

countryside for the best and brightest, inviting those who pass to beijing to serve in the court, and then castrating them.

so much for the gene pool.

gungadin: clean air would be nice, since i will be running marathons. bankok i feel is much too large. would prefer a much smaller city

with less traffic congestion, less noise.

birdman: googled had/hat yai. looks interesting, i shall research that location a bit more. seems large enough to host language schools.

wiki says there's a large chinese population there, maybe can still put my chinese to good use.

mommysboy: lack of modcons i can understand and can tolerate to a certain extent. i moved from the big city of 4mio where i'd lived for

two years, to a backwater agricultural city pop 250k. i can usually find the stuff i need, but often must search through many

shops to find certain items. some things cannot be gotten in this town.....western size clothes, shoes, decent bread and cheese

of any sort.

beenthereagain: hospitals here are exceedingly affordable, however the quality is substandard. don't get sick here.

sbk: i'd think after mandarin, anything would be a walk in the park. i've studied about two years, i can get by. some days can hold a pretty

decent conversation, some days have trouble ordering noodles. a lot depends on mood. yeah, the queing thing. after all, since

everyone is the only person on the planet, why not go to the head of the line. i really love it when they come up behind you at

the cash register and put their stuff in front of yours so the salesgirl will ring theirs first. and i'm not necessarily looking for the

'best' language school. location is more important, as i'll learn more outside of class.

bertlamar: writing system. oh, how i miss writing. and spelling. i'm now to where i can 'draw' about a thousand characters from memory,

recognize several hundred more. nowhere near enough. you need something like 3000 to read a basic newspaper, although

that just means you can recognize the characters, you've still got all the combinations. and if the paper has topics more

complicated than the local farm report, they have 90,000 characters to draw from. aaaaagggggggggghhhhhhhhh!!!!

Hello forum members. I'm new here, first post and all. I'm currently living in China, studying Mandarin, but am about saturated.

I'm thinking of a change. Thailand sounds nice. Maybe hop over and study a few years? I've been going through the posts, and

doing some net research, but would like to get some comments/advice from the 'locals.'

For your consideration, I'm 45, single, semi-retired, straight. I'm not looking for sexklubs, nor easy females. Not that I'd beat them

off with a stick though. I'm just not out to go picking up random strangers for acrobatics. I'd like to study the language; a private

school would be preferable to a university, as I can learn more outside the classroom. If those one-year visa and 180 hours of

instruction offers are legit, that would do nicely. Not really interested in working, at least not for now.

I'm looking for a smaller city, 'relatively' clean environment, easy access to mountains and scenery, preferably by bicycle.

Nice weather - hot is no problem, I'm fine with 50 degrees celcius, as long as it's not too humid. For now, I'm looking at

Chiang Mai, but nothing definite yet.

So......what I would like is some comments by long-term ex-pats on living in Thailand. What's the best reason for living there,

and what is it that keeps you there after five or ten years?

And.....I'd also like to know what really drives you insane. This is the stuff that never makes it into the tourist brochures. The stuff

that the folks back home don't believe.

In the interest of this not becoming a thai-bashing party, if there's any comments that would be considered rascist or trolling, etc,

please send to me via pm or email.

aha, found this post.....http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/you-ve-Thailand-long-when-t2373.html&st=50

.....................very informative, and eerily similar to china!!