bkk_mike

It's still a bit of an embarrassment to be selling land that was originally gifted to the UK for building an embassy on. It wouldn't have been gifted to us if they'd known we were going to turn around and sell it for a profit.

Japan is getting rid of their instant tax rebates and switching back to having to get the tax back at the airport. That would suggest there has been some fraud. Presumably either individuals approaching tourists to buy something tax-free, or shops using the tax free forms with locals rather than just with tourists.

Doge stopped publishing what the savings were, i.e. stopped linking to the project that the saving was from. Because it made it too easy to look at the project, and realise that the project ended already, so there was no spending left to save. Or that they triple-counted the same saving... And overestimated it before triple-counting it. But we'll maybe see the real numbers. It depends if anyone able to audit the numbers hasn't been fired.

Have done it once when my wife was in London and I was in Thailand. It is a bit of a pain. Wife had to do the forms at the embassy which needed to be submitted to the passport office. But it was literally 20 years ago. I took my daughter to the passport office first and got a reference number for my wife to use at the embassy, but I can't remember if that was just something obvious like my daughter's ID number.

As opposed to the good old-fashioned fascists like Trump. And with Trump's 76% tariff on Thai goods, getting the Thai population pissed off with foreigners is bad for all of us, not just you Americans.

The markets are down 10% in a week. The Nasdaq is down more than 20% from it's high which means it's officially a bear market. People are losing money, including people that supported Trump. And even if you only get your news from Fox News, they can't logically explain his tariff rates. The drop in the markets will be a problem for anyone getting close to retirement. Because their pension will mostly be invested in the stock market. The idea that Trump is remaining popular is bull<deleted>. His popularity was dropping almost as quickly as Elon Musk's before "liberation day" hit the markets.

GM pulled out of Thailand a few years ago. They sold their factory to GWM (Great Wall Motors). They pulled out of all right-hand drive markets globally. I think the only US brands for sale are Tesla and Ford. People do like the look of the Ford pickups... Unsure about Jeep. Not seen someone I know driving one in Thailand in years. Tesla were doing OK. But I don't know if they're going to get the same anti-Musk backlash that they're getting in Europe and Canada.

Chinese hybrids will be restricted to the companies that have factories in Thailand (GWM's Haval, BYD, Geely, etc.) This is because only full EVs avoid the import duty if built in China. Personally, I think hybrids are a stopgap if you drive a lot in cities, but drive long range often enough in a country with a bad charging network, that you can't go fully electric. Because you get increased complexity and higher servicing costs than regular diesel, but only better mileage in stop-start driving in cities. If you drive in the city all the time, and can charge at home, fully electric is a no-brainer. If you never drive in cities you might as well just get a regular diesel.

I take it you didn't follow the cladding issue in the UK after the Grenfell Tower fire. If lenders won't lend on the property to a new buyer, the price drops pretty badly. Add in the issues in England and Wales with leaseholds and...

1. If he's got family in the UK, he probably wants to live near them most of the time. 2. The UK will freeze (as in stop increasing in line with inflation) the state pension of UK pensioners who live in Thailand. If you only go there for holidays, you keep getting the increases. 3. If he's still working at 72, that's either through choice (because he genuinely likes his job) or because of financial necessity, which would tie in with option 2 4. To you he looked healthy, but maybe he has a medical condition such as diabetes where he's getting free treatment in the UK, but if he moved to Thailand, he'd have to pay for treatment. But the real answer is. He doesn't want to live in Thailand full time.

Not at the moment it's not. Have you seen what the US has been doing the last 2 months...

Does this mean all those places with NIMBYs that blocked wind farms can be given a fast-tracked nuclear reactor instead?

That's BA - they want to fill their planes at Heathrow with people flying business. And couldn't give a toss about anyone else. And as much as Thailand may wish it, they're currently a tourist destination far more than a business destination. It's fine, BA has a pretty terrible economy class. (At least for anyone over 6ft tall). I try to avoid flying with them if there's any better choices available. And if they're only flying from Gatwick, every choice will be a better choice (House in London is 1 tube stop from the Elizabeth line, so Heathrow is the obvious choice if I can't fly from London City... - but I've only ever done one return flight to Bangkok starting at London City - KLM - change at Schipol...)

Locked safe in a hotel room (or Airbnb) can be reset and opened by the owners. It protects your belongings from "guests" or the cleaning staff. It wouldn't protect them from the people that have the user manual and know how to reset the safe when a guest forgets the combination they used.

It's the Daily Mail. A "newspaper" that prints lies so often it's banned from being used as a reference on Wikipedia. And the same pictures appear to have been used on another article about an overstayer. So either this story, or the original one, also in the Daily Mail (no surprise), are complete bull<deleted>. Or given it's the Daily Mail, quite possibly both stories are complete bull<deleted>.