trainman34014

About an hour ago the news reader on TV was talking about a bomb. So I guess we can now rule out the "gas explosion" theory?

It smells a bit like the local government trying to do damage control and keep the tourists coming in for songkran celebrations. Also it looks like to much of a coincidence to have this happen at the exact same time as the attacks in Yala. To me, it looks like the style of bombing we had a few years ago in Hatyai, except a bit bigger bombs this time around...

Yes, and also be aware that, and I don't like to bring it up, but 9/11 bombs were placed in the basement of those buildings.

It is to be established whether or not this blast came from McDs or the basement, and if it was the latter then basic or advanced terrorism mimicks what was already known. Go from the basement up with a car bomb. Sorry to put a downer on this, but this could be more organised than originally perceived. Only a thought.... as we don't know much yet. However, there is no terrorism in Thailand - this is the 'amazing' land 2012.

-mel.

You're not up to date; this is now 'Miracle Thailand' according to TAT and Politicians. Seems to me the only miracle here is survival !

Raining in Hang Dong for the last 10 minutes. May it continue.

This country couldn't open an Umbrella and get it right, so how the hell are they going to prepare an F1 circuit and get that right in the foreseeable future?

To generate the kind of numbers that Yingluck is spouting, they better do something about the airport as it is at capacity now.

Perhaps if she were to click her heels together three times and make a wish, her dreams will come true.

Where did she get her degree from.

I believe it's called 'Cloud Cuckoo Land'.

How about this?

You can buy shipping containers and put them together; the possibilities are endless. I saw some photos of one made from like 4 X 40' containers in Isaan and it was very beautiful with different levels, stairways from one to the other, beautiful garden, etc. Can't find the photos at the moment.

Cripes; reminds me of when in my past life I went looking for missing containers by the dozen in Nigeria. You can probably guess; I found a lot of people living in them, no mod-cons,just holes cut in the sides for windows and a hole in the roof for the fire stack. My later report read....$3 million loss of containers and contents unrecoverable !

One day they will fall of their high horses and it´s going to hurt.

Not at all; they will be saved by their own inflated ego's !

'Transferred' meaning 'Promoted' of course......or he sings like a bird about the accomplices.

Hard to believe that someone regularly hangs around in banks just waiting for a customer to draw some cash and put it down on a desk whilst checking his pockets (how often does that happen?) then accuse the customer of stealing the cash.

What could he possibly gain? CCTV cameras would inevitably show the truth.

My guess would be that this was some sort of misunderstanding, language or otherwise.

Brings to mind Douglas Adams 'biscuits' story - worth reading if you don't know it already:-

This actually did happen to a real person, and the real person is me. I had gone to catch a train. This was April 1976, in Cambridge, U.K. I was a bit early for the train. I'd gotten the time of the train wrong. I went to get myself a newspaper to do the crossword, and a cup of coffee and a packet of biscuits. I went and sat at a table. I want you to picture the scene. It's very important that you get this very clear in your mind. Here's the table, newspaper, cup of coffee, packet of biscuits. There's a guy sitting opposite me, perfectly ordinary-looking guy wearing a business suit, carrying a briefcase. It didn't look like he was going to do anything weird. What he did was this: he suddenly leaned across, picked up the packet of biscuits, tore it open, took one out, and ate it.

Now this, I have to say, is the sort of thing the British are very bad at dealing with. There's nothing in our background, upbringing, or education that teaches you how to deal with someone who in broad daylight has just stolen your biscuits. You know what would happen if this had been South Central Los Angeles. There would have very quickly been gunfire, helicopters coming in, CNN, you know… But in the end, I did what any red-blooded Englishman would do: I ignored it. And I stared at the newspaper, took a sip of coffee, tried to do a clue in the newspaper, couldn't do anything, and thought, What am I going to do?

In the end I thought Nothing for it, I'll just have to go for it, and I tried very hard not to notice the fact that the packet was already mysteriously opened. I took out a biscuit for myself. I thought, That settled him. But it hadn't because a moment or two later he did it again. He took another biscuit. Having not mentioned it the first time, it was somehow even harder to raise the subject the second time around. "Excuse me, I couldn't help but notice…" I mean, it doesn't really work.

We went through the whole packet like this. When I say the whole packet, I mean there were only about eight biscuits, but it felt like a lifetime. He took one, I took one, he took one, I took one. Finally, when we got to the end, he stood up and walked away. Well, we exchanged meaningful looks, then he walked away, and I breathed a sigh of relief and sat back.

A moment or two later the train was coming in, so I tossed back the rest of my coffee, stood up, picked up the newspaper, and underneath the newspaper were my biscuits. The thing I like particularly about this story is the sensation that somewhere in England there has been wandering around for the last quarter-century a perfectly ordinary guy who's had the same exact story, only he doesn't have the punch line.

-Douglas Adams, The Salmon of Doubt

"Biscuits"

Classic! Haven't seen that one long time...

@ GrahamF:

"You mean a possible lese majeste violation?"

Very possible. Sole of foot (unclean), on coin bearing the image of His Majesty the King. I've seen similar offence taken at banknotes folded lengthways (so that the crease cuts through the King's image). Same for notes that have been crumpled-up into a ball. Shows lack of respect and awareness.

I believe it may also explain why Thai banks and businesses are so reluctant to accept any note that has the slightest damage or tear in it: all notes and coins are seen as Royal Images and must be treated with due reverance and care.

Anyone else have an opinion on this?

My opinion is that if they want pristine notes they should issue new ones daily as a lot of the notes I get given are in a disgusting condition. I recall once when changing Sterling into Baht that the girl would not accept two of my 20 pound notes because they had writing on them and were, in her words, 'dirty', She then proceeded to dish me out two very dirty and one slightly torn 100 baht bills. I told her I would not accept them as they were 'dirty' and made her change them. She went as red as a Beetroot !

In addition, the prime minister said that the government will invest more in the development of basic infrastructure to facilitate travelers to the many attractive destinations throughout the country.

Great - looking forward to those new tuk tuks and jet skis.

No.....Basic Infrastructure means Pavements with big holes in, and where there's no big holes there will be Tree's, Phone Boxes, Electrical Transformers, Litter and Dog Turds.

The sheer scale of moving all these people will not have been thought out properly, and where will they be re-homed? Perhaps they have plans for a million or so to 'vanish'. After all, a lot of the Hill Tribe people don't even have ID cards as the Government only partly acknowledges their existance, rather like the slums in BKK. Surely education is the answer but we can only dream of such a sensible way forward in 'Miracle Thailand'.

Look at the way what looks like a metal pole has bent at the bottom. Sub-standard steel most like and as for the concrete poles, well probably not into the ground deep enough, and without enough concrete on a sloping footing next to what looks like a Klong. Marvelous bit of survey work by some unqualified twerp to allow them to be erected there.

Not metal poles but standard concrete with stel cable support who is the unqualified twerp now?

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The same twerp who allowed these poles to be erected so close to a Klong (ditch), or the twerp who allowed them to dig the ditch so close to the poles.....take your pick !

Having lived here a good few years I simply cannot trust anything a Thai has been involved in manufacturing/producing.

.......or erecting !

I stopped in the middle of the road because of laos khao.

I stopped in the middle of the road because of laos khao.

I stopped in the middle of the road because of laos khao.

I stopped in the middle of the road because of laos khao.

I stopped in the middle of the road because of laos khao.

I stopped in the middle of the road because of laos khao.

I stopped in the middle of the road because of laos khao.

I stopped in the middle of the road because of laos khao.

I stopped in the middle of the road because of laos khao.

I stopped in the middle of the road because of laos khao.

I think you mean............

I schlopped in the miggle of der road becosh of lao kao.

Look at the way what looks like a metal pole has bent at the bottom. Sub-standard steel most like and as for the concrete poles, well probably not into the ground deep enough, and without enough concrete on a sloping footing next to what looks like a Klong. Marvelous bit of survey work by some unqualified twerp to allow them to be erected there.

So; now the Ombudsman has made this 'winning position' official, what does the Thai Government intend to do about it? Call in Thaksins brother and fire him, along with every other high ranking Police Chief, depriving them of any pension entitlements and all the other privilege's these crooks have come to expect? Somehow I think that they will be 'too busy' to worry about such trivial matters.

At least it was in a sensible place; yesterday they were stopping Cars and Bikes right in the bottleneck at Hang Dong outside the Police Station, causing tailbacks as far as Sanpatong to the South and Makro in the North.

There are more than those which are mentioned in the article. In the 70's and 80's I used to do London-Tokyo regularly via Anchorage or Moscow. The quickest you could do it was 17 and a half hours and on a bad day it would be in excess of 24. Just to add to the fun I used to get to my final destination of Hiroshima on the Bullet Train about 6 hours after reaching Tokyo. Hey Ho; such fun remembered !

RIP the sad victims of yet another senseless 'accident'. Chances are, if the driver had stopped at the checkpoint and paid a few bucks in Tea Money these poor soul's would still be alive.

Try looking in the mirror. If you see a bag of <deleted> looking back at you then you have found the problem ! Sadly, I see all too many Farang in Thailand looking like the aforementioned and I know from comments made by my wifes family that Thai's find it hard to understand that Farang who are supposed to be so much better off than them look so scruffy or poorly dressed.

Seen about 3 different types in Big C in cans but don't know what they are exactly.

In 1985 I was 35 and had 5 kids from 2 wives; the first died of Cancer at only 26. After the fifth was born I decided that was enough as the cost of bringing up kids and running a home, even then, was horrific,even though I had a much better job with a higher salary than most people I knew.

After a chat with the second Mrs, who had had blood pressure problems with the last two babies and spent a considerable time in Hospital, off I went to a private Nursing Home to have a Vasectomy. 10 years later I was divorced and by 2000 I was looking to quit Blighty and find myself a decent place to retire to, hopefully meeting another woman of the right 'ilk'. I planned carefully and made many trips to China, Korea, Malaysia and Thailand, where I eventually met a professional woman I considered to be of the right type for me, and less than 20 years younger than me. We have been married since 2008 and we are settled in our own home and very happy. It's my personal idea of bliss and being married for the third time in my life matters not. I am very happy that I am not able to spawn any more children and my wife, who was a Widow for 9 years before we met, has never had the desire to start a family that would damage her career, so we had a lot of common thoughts when we met.

Sorry if none of this sounds like the kind of spontaneous 'love' that seems to be found in Thailand but I've always been a planner, rather than leave life to chance. Each to his own I guess.

Most Thai's I know are not interested in day to day politics. The only time they muster is when the 100 Baht bills start flying around along with the red flags. Feeding the family and themselves gets priority on a daily basis. Like Wifey says...'only thing you can do is vote, no chance to do more after so they have to do politics themselves'.

High winds and bucketing rain in Hang Dong for about 25 minutes. Saves me watering the garden for a day or so and cools the house down nicely for the evening. Quite unexpected but very welcome.

What is amusing, are the posters trying to find fault with linking Thailand's capital (and biggest city) to Thailand's second biggest city.

Surely the logical basis for the start of any proper national rail network and undeniably a necessary trade and tourism route.

They can find fault with it and argue over it forever because they will not live to see it completed, or will be too frigging old to ever use it. The cost estimates for this project are way below what it will really cost as the 'expertise' and a lot of the materials required to build a truly high speed rail link will have to be imported, and that will be a lot more expensive than they imagine. Add to that the rising cost of the project not being started right now but 'sometime soon', and the whole thing looks more impossible, or improbable, at every moment.