kola

Thank you very much proximity for this information, I would have never found out since I never ventured to this place, always turn the road to jomtien beach. I went today and I confirm it's still not opened, but the door was open so I had a look inside and took a few pictures to show the current state:

Hello, and what about in the jomtien area? Imagine living in view talay 1 or 2 (has a small gym inside) or near jomtien beach, and wanting a decent gym with aircon and equipment within taking the baht bus to pattaya for Wow or others at such location?

Do you know if there are new gyms opened recently in the jomtien area?

Hello and thank you all for your answers. It's true that the 24h foodmarket next to VT1 is very convenient and I've been to tesco twice only because of the initial needs for home shopping, like bed clothing, cleaning tools/products and much more, I liked the choice of a big mall, but for everyday uses, the foodmarket is excellent.

As I said, before 8pm I have been able to take regular baht bus to tesco both times, so I suppose they are also coming back, but only up to a determined time. It's true that I sleep most of the day and I'm only "active" from afternoon to early morning :-)

I'll probably discover other big malls such as Big C and carrefour in the next days, I already went to tukcom to buy a few computer related products, here too the baht bus from vt1 to pattaya was very handy.

Why do you think there is no official timetable for baht bus routes? Is it because they change often or because there is no company to manage and centralize the bahtbuses and this information? I thought bahtbus were just like standard public buses with routes and opening times, but now it looks more like individual taxis drivers, I'm still not sure :-)

Thanks again for your information.

Hello all, I finally settled down in pattaya and I would like to ask you if you know where I could find baht bus routes and the opening times?

I live in view talay 1 and I noticed that it has not been possible to find a baht bus back from tesco (I went both time about before 20h via a normal baht bus, but came back a few hours later before tesco's closing time at 11pm) and have been only able to find baht bus drivers who charge 100 bahts to get me right to my place (it's ok, but I then realized that it would be nice to have a place to read about official baht bus opening hours and routes). I noticed that normal baht bus from view talay to pattaya central run all night, but not from view talay to tesco. (theprasit road)

Cheers,

James

Thank you all for your welcome and advices/recommendations, they are appreciated.

@Musongman: when I say a 6 months trial it's because I have a double entry tourist visa which I'll both extend for one month after the 60 days.

After that, I may try again a double entry visa or if I get the red stamp I've read about on this forum, then I'll go the education visa route, since I'm not a native english speaker I'm entitled to get a one year education visa to learn/improve my english, so perhaps I'll do that initially before having to learn the thai language.

At least that's what I loosely planned it, but things can change as it happens, perhaps I'll see immediatly a benefit in learning thai language for everyday life, maybe I'll be too lazy for that and will take english instead. And honestly my very strong french accent would need to be corrected, for better communication in english.

One thing in Pattaya I'd be curious to know (I haven't yet searched the forums for that) is a club/bar/restaurant with live jazz music, because when I was in BKK I hapenned to meet by random a talented thai jazz guitarist and I was following him in places where he was playing / had gigs, like every saturdays at this restaurant, every friday at this bar, etc.

So I didn't look further for a live jazz venue in BKK, but this time in Pattaya I'd like to find one, because when it's well played, I find it very enjoyable.

Hello all, I'll be coming to Pattaya in March for a 6 months trial in march. I'll be living in Jomtien instead of pattaya center.

My only experience with Thailand has been a 3 months vacation in Bangkok 3 years ago, but I didn't leave the city during that time (hardly left my area anyway). It was a very good time, I enjoyed it.

From reading the interesting titles of the three last pages of the pattaya forum here, I get the impression that there are a few bad sides of pattaya compared to bangkok (like the taxi system, the situation in main pattaya city, noise pollution, some problem with scams, etc.)

I think I'll be living in View Talay 1 or 2, I've checked the prices of rentals, it seems for a studio the average would be 10-15k for view talay 1 and 15-20k for view talay 2.

I'm not in for the parties or night life, but I like sea-side cities and a friend is living in Jomtien already.

May not be the best choice for me, but that's all I can do right now, but I'll try to move around more than on my first trip to thailand 3 year ago and will visit other cities to see if Pattaya is really that bad compared to others.

I'll post again threads if I have questions about the life in Pattaya, thank you for the reading I've had here so far, most helpful.

Why don´t you double check the hearsay and send the Thai Consulate or Embassy in the other countries (you were talking about) an email and just ask ?

I did it for Laos and here's their answer:

"The Royal Thai Embassy in Vientiane only gives Tourist Visa to Chinese citizens who are resident in Laos (e.g. working or studying in Laos). You have to apply for visa at our Embassy in Beijing or Consulates-General in Shanghai, Kunming, Chengdu, Xian, Nanning or Xiamen."

So I'm guessing the answer will be the same in all other neighbooring countries. So the only real solution is language schools, because I'm sure visa-runs will not be trouble free if she has to go back to china everytime. China administration is known to be slow if you don't know any insider. It won't be like visa-runs in laos for a few days to get another double entries tourist visas.

Thank you for your time answering my questions.

Cheers,

I've read that most language studies offer student visa for 3 years (one year at a time, we need to renew it every 3 months during the year) studying thai.

And then 2 years for english, if we're not native english speaker.

Also, for my original question, I've been told that thai ambassies will probably not deliver tourist visas to a chinese national if she's not asking it from her country of residence (france) or from china. That's where is the difference with farangs, we can ask for tourist visas from laos and other countries near thailand, it seems chinese can't. (don't know if it's the law or if it's custom officials)

Thank you for your answer, I'm also interested in student visa for myself. I need to research more about thai visa as a chinese. It seems immigration laws are moving often.

Any update on this agreement between china and thailand? It's very surprising, but could be interesting for my gf as I'm looking into ways for her to live with me in thailand as a tourist.

Hello, I'm french and I'd like to live in thailand, I know what to do in terms of visa runs as a french national, but I don't know what to do for my girlfriend who is chinese. She looked on the internet to no avail.

I know for sure that she should always do a visa before coming to thailand, because she doesn't have a 30 days without visa like me, but I've also read that one should not count on the 14 visa on arrival that is in theory delivered to chinese nationals.

So I'd like to know if thai ambassies in laos, malaysia, and such, can deliver visas to chinese nationals, and if the process can be done long enough to live in thailand permanently as a tourist?