Johpa

SInce when do elephants suffer from the weather?  Better to help the elephants in the various camps by making donations for food.  The elephant camp business, especially the "sanctuary" business,b is not particularly viable from a financial perspective and some of the largest are bleeding money.  There are just too many pachyderms chasing too few tourist dollars.

Yes, invite the neighbors as luuk kop are quite the delicacy to many Knon Muang .  At least it will greatly reduce the numbers and they will return the following year.

You can often find the GT-Rider maps at Mr. Mechanics in the big city or also up at the Xcenter in Mae Rim.  They are an excellent complement to using online maps.  When I pull out my GT-Rider maps those with only online maps always crowd around me asking where to get them.

Try taking the back road to Mok Fa Waterfall off the 3009.  Just after you connect with the 1095 is the Suan Mok Fah restaurant, a good lunch spot.  

Both my kids were born in the US and both have Thai IDs and citizenship.  They should be placed on the house list.  Then they need to go to the Amphoe office, and yes sometimes it takes some tea money.  And it also takes some time and repeated visits depending upon the Amphoe, but it can be done.  You might need to contact your local headman or kamnaan to act as "phu yai" and grease those wheels as well.

Thais in the city tend to get married in the hotels which usually have pre-paid plans where they arrange just about everything.  It is also common for the wedding party to rent traditional Thai garb.  There is a small shop behind Wat Singh on Ratchamanka Soi 9 that does such rentals.  A couple may visit a temple to make merit but it is not mandated for a Thai wedding ceremony.

On 4/28/2023 at 11:41 PM, Mac Mickmanus said:

Did the hill tribes move into the area quite recently ?

Moved from China and Burma after World War 2 ?

 

Many of the "hill tribe" villages in the Mae Chaem area are Karen who are indigenous to the region.

On 3/19/2023 at 6:47 PM, CM Dad said:

Why do so many people think it is funny to post what they see as amusing or clever remarks when there is a weather-related disaster like what happened in some areas of Chiang Mai on Saturday.  Childish, asinine remarks are inappropriate and are not appreciated by those whose homes and  businesses were damaged by the storm.  

Perhaps you are just relatively new to ThaiVisa to ask such a question as childish and asinine remarks have long been the norm.  As for clever remarks, well those are few and far between.

Sounds similar to the case of the purported missing millions from the Mae Sa Elephant Camp bank accounts.  Odd that a major bank would not have records of those withdrawals and perhaps even have video of the withdrawals as I doubt that amount of money was taken via an ATM, which also often have videos of transactions.

On 6/21/2022 at 10:45 PM, CMHomeboy78 said:

Dental care in Chiang Mai isn't the third-world <deleted>-shoot it was not so long ago.

There have been very good dentists in Chiang Mai for decades.  There was a Seventh Day Adventist Clinic on Chang Puak Rd,  close to where Bangkok Bank is now located, that was headed by the legendary Dr. Lamberton for decades.  Not that one could encounter lower quality dental care, but good quality dental care in Chiang Mai has always been fairly easy to find.

13 hours ago, easydoor said:

I allways wonder why people, what ha been 'many times' in Thailand, don't konw anything about immigration.

They don.t know from october, you get 45 days excemption, they don't know you very easy can extend a visum excemption... I won der what they know.

I think they just want to let us know they are commimg to Thailand ......

 

Uh, I have not had any issues getting an appropriate visa in decades and usually got a Non-O 90-day visa.  And I have family and friends up towards Mae Sai so extending a visa via a bridge run was always an easy option choice.  Alas, this upcoming trip I will be pressed for time more than previous trips due to a family wedding.  I believe the 45 day visa on arrival is a relatively recent change that needed confirmation.  And rest assured, before covid I had either been living in CNX or visiting annually for a few months at a time for about 40 years and never bothered to notify others about my impending arrival and in fact have been totally absent from ThaiVIsa for about a decade until yesterday due to some imperial entanglements that kept getting me banned.  As for what I know, well I have probably forgot more than most people here know and so now I do have some holes in my knowledge which need to be filled in.  But I see ThaiVisa has not lost its cantankerous charm.

It has been many. many years since I have had a need to visit Thai immigration to extend a visa or for any other reason.  Alas the Thai e-visa system failed me over a trivial typo and they just took my money and told me to reapply.  So I will arrive and get a 30 day visa on arrival but will need to get an extension as I am intending to stay for about 60 days.  Am I able to get a 30 day extension at CNX immigration?  Is there any word on the bridge at Mae Sai reopening for visa runs?  Also, I read that Thailand would be granting 45 day visas on arrival but can't seem to verify that.  Thanks in advance.

And yes, after nearly a decade, I am back.

Happy Trails

Johpa

7 hours ago, connda said:

You're incredibly over sensitive.  People take pictures in our wat all of the time.  Considering I live in the sticks, none of those taking pictures in the wat are foreigners or tourists.   They're all Thais taking pictures of Thai <and one village farang> at our wat.  Some of them even praying!!!

I also maintain an abode "in the sticks" and am used to near chaos at the local temple or at Buddhist ceremonies in homes with kids running around, and adults coming and going, and yes of course endless cellphone pics because, well because everything must be documented on Facebook.  I can't fart in our village without someone posting a message to my wife.  But embedding in rural Thai culture can have consequences in the big city.  Last year I had visitors and took them to Wat Phra Singh and was admonished for talking too loudly (I was speaking softly) by a Farang who imagined that I was disrupting some imagined solemnity.

Just keep an eye out if Rasamee, she of Isaan Soul fame, is playing anywhere in town.

Well maybe you and the wife should avoid tourist temples. Your wife can always make merit at a local wat where there are unlikely to be tourists taking pictures. Making merit (tham bun) is not dependent upon location. And merit making is not diminished by others taking pictures. If that were the case then the Buddhist activities now taking place down in Bangkok would all be for naught.  But I understand, you and the wife would prefer not to have people taking pictures and thus you suffer.  It is the perfect scenario to practice Buddhist mediation to extinguish the forces of desire (daap khilet) that are causing you to suffer thus.

36 minutes ago, ilostmypassword said:

Somehow I read an article about Austrian Catholics who call Austria home. Bizarre.

Bizarre indeed as I could find no mention of Catholics or even Catholicism whatsoever.  But thanks for confirming my point!

Moderate Islam is a possibility but it will face serious resistance from the Salafists who have been bankrolled worldwide for decades by, of all people, the descendants of Ibn Saud and their oil money. It would take generations at best to now reform Islam and lead it away from Salafism. The Saud dynasty may collapse before that happens and be replaced by another Wahabi backed clan. Of course the other clan supporting the Saudis is that led by King James the Baker in Houston.

On 10/23/2017 at 8:59 PM, jobwolf said:

It is high time the Jews stop interfering. They should look what is going on at home and clean the dung of their own doorsteps. Austria and Germany have been paying far too much to them already 

to make up for the war. It is time they start working and make their own money instead of begging and blackmailing. They can go and tell Trump what to do but not us Europeans.

Somehow I read an article about Austrian Jews who call Austria home. What did you read that got your panties bunched up, Jews??  Apparently the Mendel Beilis meme lives on.

Let me know when they begin to investigate the murder of Kamnan Seng (T. Thaton) decades ago over the orange grove land up there.

Most Thais are Buddhist and thus are not particularly receptive to the concept of a soul. The Buddhist concept is a-atama. Contrast this with the Hindu title for Mohandas Gandhi, the maha atama (Mahatma Gandhi), great soul.

On 10/18/2017 at 2:49 AM, TimTang said:

I'm not sure about the Thai but in English the "yet" is redundant. Proper English would be "have you eaten." But in North American English there are many redundancies that can be attributed to Ebonics like "where're you at." Proper English would be "where are you", the  AT is redundant because you ARE obviously where your are AT. Adding redundancies makes the language less efficient. I guess in Thai the rue-pow is necessary because it reduces it from the infinitive "to eat." My Thai is weak so I'm only speculating.

 

The English language is an evolving language but lately it seems to be evolving backwards. I'm not English but I agree with them (the true English speakers from England).

<deleted>.  "Where are you at?" simply indicates a more specific response is desired and certainly predates the influence, if any,  of "ebonics".  (Not to mention that redundancy is the core of information theory.)  If we were talking copula deletion among some of the younger generation then maybe we might be talking about the influence of Black English on Standard American English.  But "where are you at?" is a ridiculous example to advocate your prescriptive grammar preferences. As for languages evolving, the overwhelming historical trend is towards simplification.  I am sure there were those back in the day who moaned about the loss of case structure in English as well.

And if you want some imagined true English speakers then move to Boston where they retain traces of 17th century English accents, as far flung colonies often retain older phonetic traits.

Great, so he attempts to destroy the Republican healthcare system that Obama backed as a compromise to the healthcare insurance sector to prevent discussion of a national "single-payer" plan.  As the ACA was the Republican alternative to single-payer they, the Republicans, of course have no alternative plan.  The only rational alternative is single-payer. But the Republican party is too deeply embedded within and beholden to the health insurance industry so the alternative Trump plan is to offer more Mickey Mouse plans to the Trump hillbillies that won't really cover major hospital or major illness expenses. So those costs will inevitably be covered by the tax payers just like the costs of the fourth, fifth, and sixth kids of those ridiculous full quiver hypocritical evangelical families who support El Douche Bag Trump. And apart from Mickey Mouse insurance plans, Trump care also raises the rates on independents like myself to the point of being unaffordable, and I already pay around $1,400 a month for me and the wife with a high deductible and no dentistry.  And all this not because of some ideological concern about a plan, the ACA, that forces everyone to obtain insurance from the private sector, the Republican agenda, but because Obama was a Black man and these racist a-holes are hellbent on erasing what they perceive as the stain upon their white world where any and all actions by Obama must be nullified, even if that means destroying their own health plan, the ACA.

3 hours ago, Trujillo said:

It's a shame that dogs are not allowed to be taken along camping. 

Most Thais who would (1) go camping and (2) own a dog tend to own little yappers that would make and excellent meal for an alpha male mountain soi dog.

As one who does not yet qualify for Medicare but who has a rare cancer with very pricey treatments options, I have at long last changed my avatar dating from, well from forever, to that of my new hero, Kathy Griffin, the only person who had the balls to speak the truth of this total douche bag of a human being.