BigStar

This and the nonsense about local attitudes towards territorial p!$sings represent typical forum bigotry. Hardly just Thais, sorry to <deleted> that little balloon. Yes, the OP would do the same. It was a Brit thug bar owner on Soi Yamato who came out and threatened that if I didn’t move my bike from in front of his bar, I’d find it on the ground when I came back. I moved it. Happily, not long thereafter the GBP (Great British Peso) fell against the baht, his yob and baked-beans-on-toast customer base disappeared, and his bar quickly went out of business. I then parked in front of his decayed frontage as often as I wished.????

No such photo exists. If it does, upload it. Nor could it have been in the least “typical.” So, you made that up as a dishonest beginning to this little bash. No same photo exists. You made that up too. Even if it did, it doesn’t support any point about Thais generally. Really just a troll post that should be removed except for its great appeal to our bigots, bolstering their most cherished "Thais are stupid" narrative. And of course our countless ace TVF Driving Schoolmarms always love to point the finger. Better just get over your provincialism and gain self-confidence so that you don’t need to feel superior by pointing fingers at Thais and making absurd blanket generalities. That said, our TVF Driving Schoolmarms have indeed sometimes noticed Thais driving on the wrong side. These are very poor, uneducated Thais who are nonetheless conscious of the danger and stay well over to the side. The purpose is often to avoid a long out-of-the-way detour to the next U-turn. Those U-turns tend to dangerous as well. And Thais understand and accept the convenience. It’s a cultural thing. No one ever gets stopped or ticketed. There's no righteous outrage when encountering an instance. In fact I don't recall hearing of any accidents owing to that specific practice, have you? Some drunk or speedster on the wrong side of the road is a different case. Yeah, no one thinks anything of it EXCEPT arrogant bigots on TVF. I do personally know educated Thais who’ll sometimes do the same. In fact, I do it myself sometimes. Suck it up, pal. Typically it’s for a short distance and beats getting out in traffic, fighting to the next U-turn, and fighting on the way back. You wanna feel all Dudley Do-Right about never doing it yourself, go right ahead. But worry about yourself, rather than what some poor Thai family is doing, usually in a rural area. Maybe you start on India. Far as helmets, there are in fact a lot farang opponents to helmet laws and don’t wear them. Evidently you’re unaware, so Google must be your friend. I see often quite a few helmetless farang riding around on the outskirts of Pattaya. Sometimes I cringe to picture that old bald noggin hitting the street. Mostly on the outskirts--but it’s entertaining to sit at a bar near the Soi 9 for a couple hours and watch the police pull over helmetless farang. SHOCK. Been doing that since forever. In this case, the farang merely think they're somehow privileged in Thailand. Gon' be hard fall to learn the truth. Will Farangs Learn? Moreover these poor people can only afford some cheap plastic helmet anyway. Our Helmet Experts have always known it’s no protection. Thais know it. Why don’t you buy them Shoei or AGV? Oh—now it’s not your business. And you could better spend your time trying to help the vastly overweight farangs in wifebeaters who’ve been disgusting Thais for the last 30 years or walking around shirtless in business areas, sometimes with an open bottle. Maybe grabbing the butt of some bargirl they've rented. Will Farang Learn? So far no. No wonder The Authorities have tightened up visa and extension rules. They need to do more. Then will they learn? Will YOU learn to observe and focus on all the negative farang behavior and try to change THAT rather than trying to feel superior by pointing the finger at uneducated, very poor people of a different race and culture and suggesting therefore any person of that nationality can't learn.

Good luck winning that lottery. Owners can't properly vet a file clerk, let alone a genuinely good manager (would he be some *teerak's "brother?" ????). They don't know how hiring is done in Thailand for responsible positions (security deposit, bond money take out of salary), vetting witnesses to vouch for the manager and getting them to sign off on a bond, trial work period etc.). How long would any good manager, knowing the law, condo issues, maintenance, English, and people management--who would have other opportunities--take being picked apart by crude farang magpies daily? Complaints are legion here from farang business owners about being unable to retain staff. It's the Thai work ethic! He'll probably be voted out at the next AGM anyway. There's always an owner who thinks he could do that job better and has a faction of friends ready to let him take over, if only by proxy. As for supervision by the committee, it's going to be quite lax. The members may or may not be present to make a decision. They aren't motivated. Many came to Thailand to enjoy a relaxed retirement, not hassle around with condo management, have their vehicles keyed, and receive threats. Woe be to present members who go ahead anyway. The absent members, visiting their old council estate, working in Madagascar, or off on some oil rig, may feel that they, personally, own the manager. Yeah, one Thai guy on the front line having to waste hours daily dealing with all those demented co-owners who can't understand the law OR the accounting system, demanding personal tours through the books, also trying to spy on other owners. Farang in Thailand are very jealous of other farang--we see this a lot right here, often taking the form of sour grapes or snide remarks. Co-owners whinge even more more than TVF posters--'cause they think they're better entitled to and have a captive audience. And what might the accounting system be? Oh, Quicken. ???? And the staff? He'd probably want his own, of course, properly vetted (see above). Would they be relatives? How would any co-owner know? This doesn't sound so bad. It takes a mafia to fight the mafias in the condo and get something done. Their staff are properly vetted, so the pretties currently in the office will need to go. Thais understand company uniforms, too. Previous staff might have come in short shorts, which many co-owners love of course. The maintenance people will be vetted, mostly competent, and supervised by the lead manager, full-time in the office. On the other hand, the co-owners can insist the company hire any good staff previously working at the condo. Seen that done. But "good" can be relative. That might a congenial, well-liked security guard who performs well on the day shift. On the night shift, unbeknownst to the owners, he may sleep like a baby right there at his desk. The management company will quickly find that out and sack the guy. He needs day work only. Controlling the data is actually good, as co-owners will try to use it against other co-owners. Give out everyone's email address and suddenly anonymous untraceable emails are sent to all the co-owners digging up dirt and whinging over trivia--which a lot of co-owners are naive enough to take seriously. Lot of nonsense will go out that reflects some abysmal misunderstanding. Whispering campaigns and naming and shaming of those who didn't pay their annual fees start. At the next AGM, the old committee members may be voted out in favor of "our guys." Who will be worse. ???? Changing the locks on the office door is a good security measure. Who knows who had keys to the old locks and were ready to use them? If you bought a used property, wouldn't YOU change the locks? They could steal the computers, steal all the money in the money drawer, and trash the office. Has nothing to with "can't change the management company." The company can be changed at the AGM IF the stupid co-owners haven't signed an absurd guarantee of perpetual employment. The fact you think they might do that means you have about as much faith in the co-owner's expertise as I do. Yet changing the management company shouldn't be a trivial matter that any of the little condo mafias can easily control. There needs to be serious dissatisfaction across the majority. And yes, one good thing is a good management company have specialist lawyers to help fight with deadbeat co-owners and for other legit issues. The AGM/EGMs are conducted according to law and the Land Office will agree. The accounting system is also adapted to property management in Thailand. Meanwhile the co-owners vote on what auditor they'd like to use. This acts as strong check on the management company. But yes, sometimes a good Lone Ranger manager can be found. Yes, some management companies aren't as good as others. No surprise there. Owners should ask around at well-managed properties to find out who's behind them and take bids and compare offers. Yes, really. Just the usual caveat emptor.

No, the co-owners are too mentally deranged and stupid to manage a building themselves, as you might expect. They aren’t motivated, since unpaid, and lack expertise, though as on the forum all claim to be experts. The JP and committee members happen to travel around at will, may not live in the building, and aren't available when needed for meetings and paper signing. When you got a ready buyer for your condo, but the JP's visiting his old council estate in Luton, you really won't be happy with co-owner management. And they’re too bigoted and arrogant to deal with Thais effectively. Imagine an old fat co-owner getting out the pool in his Speedo, huge belly hanging out, and then coming directly to the office and plopping his big wet a_rse on the corner of the Thai office manager's desk to demand from her a copy of his last electric bill. Yep. Never underestimate how low expats and farangs will go in Thailand. They won’t and can't vet staff properly, either, and, accustomed only to bar girls, install pretty favorites in the office who "passed" the interviews. Hee hee. And the girls will steal from petty cash at any opportunity. Nobody bothers to check the safe. By the time it’s discovered in the audit, they’ll have absconded. Pro tip: never keep much at all in petty cash. Do all transactions online at least. Of course the co-owners elect the stupidest and loudest to be Juristic Person. One of JPs installed a big beer fridge for himself in the office. Others were corrupt and used condo funds to improve “their” common areas around their condos. And they “lost” the condo bankbooks. You’d never suspect: some of the most corrupt are ostensibly the richest in the building. And the co-owners quickly divide into factions and start a war with each other, taping scurrilous attacks in the elevators and around the building.. The faction in power tapes up dark warnings against any attempt to carry out a “putsch.” They start keying each other’s cars and bikes and even destroying common property just to get back at the ruling faction. They’ll go to the Land Office and try to make problems about the regulations approved in General Meetings. If a fee increase was approved, they’ll certainly fight that and refuse to pay. Then the condo has to take them to court, which takes years. Soon whatever sane members there were on the committee resign and the inmates run the asylum. Poorly engineered, money-wasting projects proposed and approved by Committee “engineers” start to spring up. Later, they’ll all have to be redone right. In short, it seldom works. If it does, it will likely be temporary. The crazies will create conspiracies and vote out any good managers to take power for themselves. Why? They all like each other and drink together and have all sorts of monkey business going on, which I won't elaborate. It may be necessary to have a police presence at the General Meetings. Seen it. It’s quite a circus and lotsa laughs, ‘cept it’s partly your building and your money. Hence most condos will eventually realize that a relatively competent, reputable management company really is the only way to go to get out of the mess. And the co-owners are pretty happy thereafter, esp. in retrospect. The company's well able to fight with the wannabe "condo law experts" among the co-owners and keep good track of all the figures. They're always there to handle problems, mostly well, too, as they want to keep the business and have a reputation to protect.

Had the same problem yesterday. The problem is that the next screen doesn't come up with the dialog to send the verification email and let you input the received code. Though it pretends to offer you another method, in fact there is no other method. Unfortunately the product I wanted was more expensive at Shopee. I called support (you'd have to login to use the live chat) and they said that a lot of customers have been having the same problem and tech was working on it. This morning the problem was fixed and I completed my order. So maybe it's a kind of rolling blackout. Tomorrow's another day.

I used the new online 90-day reporting system to file my report on Saturday. Jomtien's my office. I used Chrome and filled in only the required fields. On Monday I got the confirmation back to print out and put in my passport. It's great! The old system never worked for me 'cause I'd had to renew my passport and hadn't left the country since. In theory this should relieve some of the suffering of our hapless expats.

I almost always get the draft for B99, I think, if I'm there at night. More often I hit it in the afternoon at happy hour when I'm downtown anyway. One tradition is to stop by after a visit to Immigration and relieve the pain, ha ha. Around B150 seems likely for a regular beer at non-happy hours. I suggest you verify for yourself. I'd regard it as reasonable considering the costs to provide the whole experience right there on Beach Road. 'Course our shrewdest ace Economists will observe it ain't the whole experience it was pre-COVID, but then the owners' costs haven't gone down that much AND there's the issue of back rents. Some landlords around town have cut deals w/ the owners to pay less but still pay something anyway during the downtime. So, it is what is. No intent to ripoff anyone. One poster here found a way to avoid all beer bar markups and achieve happiness by just buying beer at 7/11 and sitting on the beach with his music playing from a small portable speaker. That's certainly one option. ???? Now the TQ also pays the staff well, and so they're totally honest, loyal, and pretty hard-working, esp. during a crunch time like last night; and they lend a kind of familiar congeniality. When you're known to your fave waitress, you often get a friendly greeting, escort to your fave barstool, and your drink's already being ordered. You're home, LOL. Bit of a contrast to the surliness you commonly encounter elsewhere around town.

Quite a fine party it was, great opening night for the TQ, filled to standing room only in the back. Sufficient waitresses this time, the great old staff, including the parking lot attendant, whom regulars know well. Wimmin come and go, but the TQ staff abides to "take care."???? Almost like old times w/ of course a huge difference: no poles or hanging ropes, no dancing except for the random girl getting up on stage and gyrating minute or two. Girls, mostly new, were dressed in standard beer bar attire, no bikinis. Not a large number of free ones, either. Some guys packed their own. Shockingly, I saw no food in evidence. Tom said they're "working" on getting the dancing back of course and hoped it would be in 2 weeks. Good luck. Hopefully TQ can limp along and break even until better times. It was breaking even before the last lockdown, so there is a chance. I’ll be trying to stop in a couple times a week. I leave you with the song of the night: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Fulz4ytZ54 PS: Sad to report the brewmeister of the Hops, Tim, a notable TQ regular, passed away about a week ago. At his home, of heart attack, age 54. So he just missed the reopening. “I’m part of the furniture,” he used to laugh. Good guy w/ a great sense of humor, well-liked; will certainly be missed by his many friends. His ceremony will be at Wat Chai, South Pattaya, when the arrangements are complete. I trust there’ll be an announcement in the Pattaya Mail or here near the time.

As @aussiexpathas noticed from the sign outside, it appears that after a couple of false starts the Tahitian Queen will reopen on Feb 11. Details are on the TQ's homepage: https://tahitianqueen.com/ Says “start.” Wonder whazzat mean. The place was mobbed at the last reopening, quite a blast, but it was full on. Now, though? Will there be daincin’? Dunno, one must hope. Food? Before Covid, the TQ served food (“TQ food is good food”).???? They didn’t during the last Covid re-openings; no doubt they’ll revive the kitchen for obvious reasons. Kudos and good luck to management and staff. It won’t be easy.