wynzlo

My wife and I are setting out to adopt a child here in Thailand and are desperately seeking advice from those who have been through the process.

So far getting clear information from government offices has been difficult. We have been to the DSDW in Bangkok, contacted various U.S. government offices, and have spoken with a Thai adoption lawyer.

Our situation is a little unusual because we are living here and want to adopt a specific child. Most international adoptions begin overseas with an adoption agency matching you with a child.

Here's our situation:

- Both U.S. citizens living in Thailand

- Want to adopt a particular child who we have fostered from an orphanage

- Plan to move back to the U.S. after adopting

If anyone here has gone through an international adoption in the past few years, could you please share the process you went through?

Royal D is good stuff. I used to buy it at the 7-11 across from Dunkin Donuts where they have it on the rack next to the registers. Been off the bike for a few months, so no guarantees it's still there. I've seen it at other 7-11 locations too, just don't recall exactly which.

According to my doctor in Chiang Mai, no, T3 only medication is not available in Thailand.

GNC has L-Tyrosine but it's obviously expensive. In Chiang Mai 60 x 500mg for 750B.

Yeah, something's going on with iHerb shipments. Waiting for two orders over a month now. In the past they took two weeks max and never had any disappear.

Found this "Nin Maejo Chicken Sausage" the other day at Tops Kad Suan Kaew. Tastes pretty good, and I feel like uni products are less likely to contain nasty stuff. But who knows.

Anyone seen Maejo products elsewhere? Do they have a shop somewhere?

Success...?

Have you seen thyroid-s.com? Admittedly it looks sketchy on first glance, but seems to be run by a man in Bangkok who exports the medication. I recall reading somewhere on the site that he will deliver within Thailand via courier.

What you're looking for is usually called a "trainer".

Velocity has some higher end Kurt trainers. Jacky Bike carries CycleOps.

Last year I lived in Jed Yod, now I live a bit south of Baan WangTan. Had 3BB in both places and it's been shockingly reliable. Around 1000B/month. The bandwidth isn't super high, something like 10-12Mb, but reliability is far more important to me. Can recall only one outage that lasted more than an hour.

Having a backup connection is the key, and ideally it's a 3G data connection. Personally I just use a 400B/month prepaid data plan for my phone with DTAC. Power goes out, tether my phone to the laptop, send out that important email while sitting in the dark.

Last week I spotted some handmade blocks at Ban Tawai. Pretty sure it was the "Jarruk Idea" shop at the far end of the main strip where I saw them. Call and check first. Map: http://goo.gl/maps/o5IrJ

Thantakit did a pretty good job replacing my two fillings. It is clear they offer the safe removal procedure due to demand rather than belief in the importance of the procedure. Some of it was a bit rushed. At one point the dam hadn't been placed properly and water was leaking through. Also, I probably should have had something covering my nose like the previous poster mentioned.

Overall they were professional, efficient, and didn't try to sell me anything I didn't need, which I truly appreciated after encountering some less-than-honest dentists in the U.S.

For someone who thinks they might have mercury issues already, it might be worth looking for a holistic dentist that offers extra safe removal practices. For someone just looking to get their fillings replaced as a precaution, Thantakit is a good bet.

+1 for avoiding TRUE

Although they have very good infrastructure, they're a horrible company to deal with. Not to mention their advertising and constant spam, which gets very annoying.

Much happier with DTAC for mobile and 3BB for home internet.

For anyone who loves old film cameras, stop by and visit Khun Gai in the powder coating shop at the east end of the Nawarat Bridge. He has his personal collection on display inside the shop. I don't even think he's selling any of it, just a personal hobby.

Try either XL For Men in Kad Suan Kaew (on the left just past Apple store through the main entrance) or 71 Export on Huay Kaew Road. Both have inexpensive farang-sized jeans, most of which seem to be overflow and/or rejects, but are often perfectly fine.

You'll have to judge for yourself whether they contain the right species of cotton and satisfy your baht-per-use requirements.

Been doing research into this myself lately and found that Thantakit Dental Center in Bangkok can do safe removal of amalgam fillings. See here: http://thantakit.com/safe-amalgam-mercury-removal.html

Haven't been before, but I have an appointment in a couple weeks to get 3 filings replaced. Will report back on how it goes.

WeTV cable service carries Eurosport. It's cheap too - something like 350B/month for the whole package. We've been able to catch all the big cycling events this season.

Just to be clear here, Richco did a nice job on the frame, as I wrote in a previous thread. The issue with the price was a little strange - I was quoted 1500B, when I went to pick it up they said 3000B because of the time it took to mask everything (wasn't a surprise, we discussed the masking). We negotiated down to 2000B, which was fine.

Steel and powdercoat is easy to screw up. Its common to get spider web oxidation and flaking due to the porous nature of powdercoat. That's even with a clear top coat. Some companies do it well but its not so commonplace or easy.

For steel its better to use a primer and lacquer followed with a clearcoat.

My frame is steel and that "spider web" oxidation is exactly what's happening all over the frame. Maybe it could have been avoided with some kind of primer. Maybe the matte finish I picked was a poor choice because it's extra porous.

Richco contacted me and said they're willing to refund and/or redo the frame, so I plan to bring the frame in to see what can be done.

Tried emailing but it bounced, any idea if this CSA is still going on and how to contact? Thanks.

CSA is definitely still active. Was it the Fair Earth email address that bounced? You can probably contact Jeff directly via Facebook. PM'd you the address I have.

powdercoat it

Richco Powdercoating on Whuali Rd does excellent work

I had the frame powder coated there last year. The result looked nice, but now rust has surfaced all over the place from underneath the coat. I also didn't appreciate the cost doubling from the original estimate when I picked up the frame.

Three years ago I had a car paint shop just before the Banana Tree restaurant on Canal Road do my aluminum Klein Mantra. I thought the car paints would be too brittle but it has held up much better than custom bike paint jobs in the USA. They did a fabulous job even around the many drop outs and fittings which are tough to paint. I went with Toyota silver and the total cost was 900 baht with a three day turn-around.

Thanks for the tip! I'll see if they're still around. That toyota silver came out great. Did you strip the original paint yourself before you brought it there?

Looking for a place that will strip and re-paint my steel touring frame. Not looking for anything elaborate, just a solid color and a clearcoat. Anyone have experience with this?

I'm thinking about continuing Thai language studies with a one-year course, so I've started researching options. Here's what I've gathered so far...

AUA

http://www.learnthaiinchiangmai.com

Payap University

http://ic.payap.ac.t.../thai/about.php

Pro Language

http://www.prolanguage.co.th

YMCA

http://www.ymcachiangmai.org

Walen

http://www.thaiwalen.com

There are past threads on this topic, but some schools seem like they might be gone. For example, do Cornerstone and Talk Talk still exist?

CMU has a new website for their program (http://www.cmutefl.com), but I'm quite wary after last year's fiasco. Like the last one, this new website is not hosted on a legit CMU domain. Anyone actually attending classes there?

Anything missing from this list?

Has anyone come across a legitimate comparison between smoking cigarettes and breathing smoke like we're seeing in Chiang Mai?

Obviously cigarettes have lots of extra fun chemicals in them, but I'd love to have a ballpark figure like:

"Breathing this smoky air at (certain particulate level) for 24 hours = smoking two packs of filtered cigarettes in 24 hours"

Yeah, Bicycle Thailand website has a solid list of shops. One place not on there is Crouching Tiger Tours, which is on Mahidol Road -- left side if you're heading from the moat to Airport Plaza. They stock some Giant road bikes and sometimes a few nice hybrid bikes.

Hi!

Sorry to hear you are having a bit of run-around. I would take it to the Apple shop on Soi Siri Monkalajarn, off of Hui Kaow Road.

Go NW on Hui Kaow Road from the Old City.

Turn left on Siri Monkalajarn.

In about 250 meters, you will see the Apple service center on your right.

Pretty sure Mac Zone moved their service center to Kad Suan Kaew. It's buried in one of the darker corners of the mall, so you're best off getting one of the people at the Apple shop near the entrance to lead you there.