josephbloggs

Absolutely correct on all points. The anti-Chinese propaganda just gets swallowed up by all the right wingers / Trumpists. Thailand has actually played this pretty well, although not without a share of blame for delays.

True, but they got phased out after a couple of years. So "downscaled" rather than "fired"...

But but but all the gammons say they do get whatever they want, 5 star luxury, houses, benefits - it was in the Daily Mail so it must be believed!

I just got back from the Bangkok Motor Show. Highlights: The MG Cyberster looks fantastic in the flesh, and very nice on the inside too. @JBChiangRai you will be happy. The Ioniq 5 is also great. Xpeng G6 and G9 very interesting, the P7i was pretty wow. I hadn't heard of this before but there is a Neta GT and it looks great inside and out. Could be a real Seal challenger. GWM Tank is a beast and very cool. Volvo XC30 feels superb inside but unfortunately a bit small for my needs as I am tall and there's hardly any room behind if you have your seat right back, but otherwise a fab car. The Xeekr 007 and Xeekr X look interesting if a little quirky. The other Xeek'rs were a bit weird for my taste. The Lumin actually feels like a really solid little city car. The interior feels well made with very good quality switch work, everything felt very solid for a car of that price. BYD Sealion feels good too. In short the future is clearly Chinese and their products are very high quality. Wandering round the legacy automakers was like looking back in to the 90s, except for Volvo and Audi - especially the eTron which look gorgeous. Very expensive though at 6m and 8m for different trims levels although there is a 1.2m discount on offer during the show. Annoyingly hardly any cars had pricing information and I couldn't be bothered to ask at each manufacturer as I would have been there all day. Not sure if it's because this was the press day and the prices will be transparent for the public days, not sure. Finally, it looks like BYD will be launching four new models, including one hypercar type shape (they were all under covers). Oh, and Tesla are not even there. Photo dump below (sorry, not very well sorted).

Bobby's Arms.

"Suicide toy". Dude, that accident happened 13 years ago. How many fatal HSR accidents since? Zero. And this despite the fact that China has more HSR lines (45,000kms) then every single country in the world combined - and by some margin; China has more than two thirds of all the global HSR. In fact China is clearly one of the safest high speed railways in the world by accidents vs distance travelled. Try reading about it, you would be impressed. Or try riding on it - you'd be immensely impressed (although I am sure you wouldn't admit it).

Bring back the Empire too, coal mines, steam railways, racism and bigotry, and free gammon for all! Ra ra ra!

What a load of absolute nonsense. Yeah, I am sure they are planning to catch a train to invade Thailand, that'll be the thinking behind this. I imagine that would only give the Thais around 8-10 hours' notice, how on earth would they find a way to stop a train in that time? Impossible right? Do they construct the rails from special indestructible material? Bridges too? And the electricity supply will also be indestructible. Just swallow your western propaganda without questions, good boy. Oh, and how many countries have been invaded by train before? Ever thought about why they normally begin wars from the air?

This project is not funded by China in any way. Thailand is just buying the technology and know how, they are not borrowing from China.

Yes, but it is not the points. It happens between Ramkhamhaeng and Hua Mark but only on the Express trains. It comes from the toilets and is some sort of pneumatic release valve but never found out exactly what it is, but it's definitely toilet related.

Yeah, the last few times I've been on it I've noticed the Express ones now have seating in all four carriages. Unless maybe they've only done one and I've just happened to get that one each time, not sure.

They did that quite a while back.

Well the thread title was "any great beaches on the mainland". And anyway I was replying to a different poster who went off on a tangent saying the only decent beaches are on islands more than 40kms from the mainland, hence Phuket being an example in my reply.

My sentiments exactly, spot on.

Here's an interview with him: https://coconuts.co/bangkok/features/night-prowl-legendary-lechery-bernard-nite-owl-trink/ Interesting story in there about the 10 baht hooker with leprosy. Sadly he totally lost the plot when he started preaching that you don't get HIV from unprotected sex. I mean how can you have someone saying that in a national newspaper? So irresponsible. And it wasn't just a blip, it was a constant theme. He said use condoms to prevent pregnancy or other STDs, but don't worry about HIV - it's a myth. He also had some very dubious encounters with underaged girls. Maybe he was a nice guy in person, but for me he should have been fired from the Post years before he actually was - he was actually pretty creepy.

Never understood the Trink worship. His column was an abomination, just cut and pasted rubbish from emails, lame jokes, and silly cliches. Even his book reviews were poor. He was a talentless man who somehow made a living from it (kudos to him for that), and I never understood why the Bangkok Post kept him for so long. But no, never met him.

Well that's a bit silly. Phuket has some great beaches and that is a few hundred metres from the mainland. Koh Samet has stunning beaches and that is maybe 3kms from the mainland? Koh Chang also and that is 5kms max. Anyway I agree the beaches on the mainland are mainly disappointing (not that I've been to every beach mind you), but to say you have to go 40kms offshore to get a good beach is just nonsense.

Yes, they were on their way to a landfill. Genius.

I passed a transporter truck full of these on the 7 motorway this afternoon. Quirky looking little things.

Fair point, taken, but seriously - made up guff like this??

Best of luck to you, hoping for the best.

Eight pages of people feeding the troll, the management must be very happy with the clicks. I remember when this forum used to be slightly useful, now it has become this, but as long as the clicks and views keep coming....

I feel sorry for you and whatever happened to make you go through life with such a bitter attitude. There is help out there, I think it starts at the airport.

It never ceases to amaze me - the level of nonsense dreamt up by people on this forum.

Yes, it's become a very sad and bitter place.