Trapped in Thailand, and Loving It? Glad You Disregarded Government Warnings to Return Home Immediately? Do you now feel stranded like Robinson Crusoe?

[condobrit001]

7 hours ago, Retarded said:

Being far from Mario Cuomo itself would make anyone feel exuberated. 

Retarded indeed - betting a Trump supporter also?

[Pilotman]

Goodness no, OP.  I feel much more liberated here in Thailand than I would be in the UK, which sounds like a nightmare.  the UK Police have gone all Gestapo and make the BiB look measured and sensible, which as we all know,  takes a bit of doing. No way do I want to go back; ever.  

[BritManToo]

7 hours ago, Lacessit said:

Presumably the wild one that has morphed into a German hausfrau is no longer sufficient excitement. Why don't you trade her off to Logosone?

Yes, the ability of hot wild spinner alcoholic bar girls to 'transform' into frumpy overweight born again tea-total Buddhist virgins is quite amazing.

Edited May 9, 2020 by BritManToo

[natway09]

Bit frustrated like anyone slse, but I am pleased that I am here not in the UK or Oz.

Life is cheaper & better here even with the restictions

[shy coconut]

2 hours ago, moontang said:

He does come across as a smart politician, with some pretty good pr skills, and the media mob behind him.  But, if you think Cuomo did a good job during the crisis, what can you say about Desantis from FL...who comes from the other side, and an even larger state, with many more senior citizens...One is a success story, the other is a catastrophe of biblical proportions.  But, if you only want to compare him to Deblasio, then yes, he is presidential material.

I don't want to get involved in politicians, dead or alive, but the population density

disparities between Florida and New York City probably have more to do with the 

success/failure rates of any plans to combat the virus.

[shy coconut]

1 hour ago, Pilotman said:

Goodness no, OP.  I feel much more liberated here in Thailand than I would be in the UK, which sounds like a nightmare.  the UK Police have gone all Gestapo and make the BiB look measured and sensible, which as we all know,  takes a bit of doing. No way do I want to go back; ever.  

Do you have any examples of the police going all Gestapo?

 

 

[Rando]

I had planned on staying 2-3 weeks, but ended up staying 2 months (so far).  I’ve loved my time and feel safer here than back in U.S.  The number of COVID-19 infected people is less per capital than in my region.  I am fortunate that I have a home here as well.  There were some restrictions that were difficult to understand (shutting down alcohol sales certainly made an impact on my wine consumption), but overall I have enjoyed my stay.

[Pilotman]

32 minutes ago, shy coconut said:

Do you have any examples of the police going all Gestapo?

 

 

picking on a person exercising in their own garden?   Picking up people on bikes, why?, Restricting individual's exercise times, Why?  Picking up single people in parks with no others surrounding them, why? stopping people driving to the countryside, Why? All things not happening in Thailand. 

[orang37]

I cannot afford to look in the mirror in front of me, let alone the one behind me.

 

~o:37;

[khunjeff]

11 hours ago, JohnBarleycorn said:

 

I must admit that it does feel a bit weird, now having committed myself to remain here, under any circumstances, until international flight services reopen.

I'm not quite getting your point. Although international flights are definitely way, way down from normal levels, they haven't closed down by any means - there are flights operating every day, and you and I could fly back to the US tomorrow if we felt like it. The tickets aren't even particularly expensive.

 

Your post uses words like "trapped", "marooned", and "stranded", but very few people here actually fall into those categories. A handful of countries around the world really have cut off all flights in and out, and their nationals are well and truly stuck here. The vast majority of foreigners here, though, either reside in Thailand long term, and so would not really think about returning to their country of birth just because of the virus; made a conscious choice to ride out the crisis here, because they felt it was safer or more comfortable than their own country; intended to stay here for an extended period from the beginning, and are "stuck" only in the sense that they can't extend their stays by leaving and reentering the country; or refused to write off the ticket for their cancelled return flight and buy a new one on a different airline, whether out of stubbornness or excessive optimism that flight schedules would quickly return to normal.

 

So, are foreigners mostly glad to be here rather than in their own countries during this pandemic? Yes, I think most are. But are they marooned here? Mostly no.

[Jenkins9039]

Only downside is the inability to head of to the exotic islands in SE Asia and the Pacific and Indian Ocean for a bolt-hole weekend/long-week holiday every now and again, apart from that i am loving it.

[Pedrogaz]

Yes I am glad I stayed here. I get letters from the embassy every day asking me if I need help arranging flights or need a loan....but 55 dead in Thailand vs 30,000++++dead was an easy choice to stay.

[Toscano]

I live in rural northeast Thailand , I have not heard of any COVID-19 cases in our vicinity . I have little doubt that Thailand is the best place to be right now . Our rural community has taken the precautions very seriously without any pressures to do so . Our greatest fear was of people returning from Bangkok to their rural roots .My wife told me some people came for Songkran and were made to stay in a school .

[Enoon]

 

Anyone who is properly setup in Thailand should not really be in any hurry to get home.

 

By that I mean anyone with access to medical treatment which is as good, or better, than they could expect to get if they returned to their place of origin.

 

I was not, the small print revealed that my travel insurance only covered treatment in state hospitals.

 

Thus I was not too pleased when my April 1st flight (ending my usual 6 months stint) was cancelled.

 

Back in the UK now and all is well.

 

Around here it's mostly "happening" in the "News".

 

"Horror" in the media and inconvenience on the streets is what it amounts to.

 

Nobody knows anyone who has, or has had COVID.

 

I spoke, on the phone, to a friend in Camden Town (London) yesterday.

 

No mention, from him, of anything other than the economic impact, or the effects on the sport that he is professionally involved in.

 

Deaths are about 1 in 2128 of the population and, as a surgeon told me, "the numbers are moving in the right direction".

 

We'd all be as happy and complacent as "pigs in ****" if we didn't get told about the +30,000 dead, because there is no more evidence (of the illness itself, of all those deaths) around my streets, than I saw in Thailand.

 

Without press freedom and the generalised freedom of  information, discussion and opinion in the UK, without the absence of gagging laws and decrees, we could be told that less than a 100 had died.......and we would know no better.

 

We would enjoy the bliss of the ignorant.

 

 

 

 

Edited May 9, 2020 by Enoon

[SiSePuede419]

13 hours ago, JohnBarleycorn said:

What do you think it might be like for tourists to be stranded here in Thailand.  Do you think they feel trapped?  Or, do you think they have quickly adjusted and become enamored with the culture to the extent that they might just never return home, unlike that ungrateful girl, Dorothy?

 

 

1. There are no "tourists" stranded in Thailand.  Only people who intentionally ignored warnings to leave.

 

2. Choices have consequences.  It doesn't matter what they "feel".

 

3. It's a worldwide pandemic.  What does Thailand's "culture" have to do with that?

 

 

[Thingamabob]

Yes. Much better than being in the USA or Europe.

[steven100]

7 minutes ago, Thingamabob said:

Yes. Much better than being in the USA or Europe.

and a heck of a lot better than being locked in Australia .....  how depressing that would be ..

[moontang]

3 hours ago, shy coconut said:

I don't want to get involved in politicians, dead or alive, but the population density

disparities between Florida and New York City probably have more to do with the 

success/failure rates of any plans to combat the virus.

When the dust settles, the focus, and lawsuits, will be on the elderly care facilities throughout New York state, which has far fewer seniors to care for than Florida.  That may be the end of Andrew's run in 24.

Edited May 9, 2020 by moontang

[JohnBarleycorn]

11 hours ago, Puchaiyank said:

It really does not matter where you are...many people are without hope...desperate...their once manageable live now filled with angst and chaos...

Yes, and they are the luckier ones.  Some others on respirators.

[kingdong]

When ever the bars shut in pattaya for 24 he's ( or more ) for Buddha day,elections etc it always struck me as what a dump it was,suppose that's my chance of winning the " coverted " quality tourist of the year " gone for a burton.

[papa al]

7 hours ago, Sujo said:

11 hours ago, Walker88 said:

Is your name an admission of reality?

 

Mario Cuomo is no longer with us. It was in all the papers.

Maybe he means the crooner perry como. Though he is also expired.

Super Mario still fine.

[papa al]

5 hours ago, shy coconut said:

I don't want to get involved in politicians, dead or alive, but the population density

disparities between Florida and New York City probably have more to do with the 

success/failure rates of any plans to combat the virus.

Plus in NY if you die of

heart attack, motor wreck, stroke, whatever,

they count is as c19.

ha ha

[taninthai]

15 hours ago, JohnBarleycorn said:

What do you think it might be like for tourists to be stranded here in Thailand

In reality there is very few tourists stuck here there has always been flights out available and there is still flights out now.

[bwpage3]

11 hours ago, Walker88 said:

Been out of the US since university, save for family visits. Chose not to go 'home' now, particularly since I knew that if someone could do something terribly wrong, the US had the perfect person in charge to mess up. I was in the US in January, when 'nobody' thought CV-19 would spread. I guessed it might, so prepared like a Boy Scout. I ordered and packed for my trip a bag of surgical masks, a couple of N95s, and a giant jug of Purell. At that time, despite warnings in the President's Daily Brief, 'that guy' chose to ignore the warnings and do nothing. 77,000 deaths and counting later (vs 55 in Thailand, or 256 in South Korea, who suffered its first CV-19 infection the same day as the US---2,210 on a population-adjusted basis) show how badly US 'leadership' handled the pandemic. Of course, getting rid of the Pandemic Response Team and the Pandemic Response Manual, which the Obama Administration had formed and which worked beautifully during the Ebola outbreak, did not help.

 

Staying out of the US was the logical move. It lessened the chance of being infected, and has the added benefit of not having to face endless news of the ongoing idiocy of US 'leadership', though I think I have the intelligence not to think drinking bleach or shooting up Lysol would be wise. Also, if one is to believe the bald faced lie that such comments were 'sarcasm', it sickens me that at a time of horrendous loss and death, a 'leader' would feel it appropriate to make jokes about it. I can watch from afar the descent of the country of my birth into a Failed State where everyone is equal under the law, except for those who are above it, and where a sizable number of my fellow 'citizens' are subscribing to Dark Age beliefs at the expense of science and rationality. The nation intended by the Founders, who were wise enough and honest enough to admit their own human failings and set up a system whose endless work-in-progress aim was to move toward enlightenment and total human equality, no longer exists. The Founders assumed---or perhaps they just hoped---that the various checks and balances would work, because there would be people of character and integrity who would occupy each branch of the govt the Founders created. They might have feared, but maybe knew there was nothing they could do to completely prevent the rise of clowns like the Freedumb Cockups or the rest of the "R" Party that has totally abandoned its role of being a check against imperial power, as if Article 1 never existed.

 

I'm happy to be far away from that Failed State, though my heart goes out to those who served and sacrificed to make the nation something much better than it currently is. My friends and colleagues I lost in service...to them I feel I owe an apology for not doing more to stop the decay that is the US today. I do not think I could stroll through Arlington National, or walk into the lobby of a building on the edge of McLean, and not feel shame.

 

In the meantime, I can enjoy things that the OP noted---I'm a great admirer of the beauty and 'attitude' of myna birds. I can also indulge in my penchant for spicy foods, particularly a well-made Panang Gai, and for reasons of competence, heat and humidity, or just dumb luck, live in a country that has been relatively unaffected by CV-19.

The US has more millionaires than any country on earth.

 

Any one that ever refers to the US as a failed state, is a failed person who could not manage to financially survive in their own country.

 

Your own post contradicts itself.

 

You have not lived in the USA since Uni?

 

Yet you barrage on and on and on about the US?

 

A person would think that if you never lived in the USA, you would sing the praises of where you did live, not continually barrage the US?

 

How does anyone handle a pandemic? Is there a guidebook? What a foolish uneducated comment to blame one person.

 

When people contradict themselves, they are not telling the truth.

 

Simple as that, from your own comment.

 

If you haven't lived in the US since Uni, what drove you out way back then? Was it blaming everything on Richard Nixon?

 

 

 

 

 

 

[bwpage3]

7 hours ago, nightbird said:

Those two factors, money and no responsibility in your country of origin are assets with no equal. Cherish them, nurture them, and live freely anywhere you choose. I am also in that position and have been here for many years. The USA is no longer a thought of home. It's hard to imagine being back in the USA especially with this crisis playing out the way it is. I don't think the US is coming back from this. it will get worse with economic collapse and you know how that will go. If you can stand the heat of Thailand, you can live an interesting life here. 

When a person spends their life believing what they read on the internet, they don't have much of a life. Seriously.

 

 It's hard to imagine being back in the US? How do you know? Because you read it? 330,000,000 people live in the USA.

 

READ THIS: In 2019, there will be an estimated 1,762,450 new cancer cases diagnosed and 606,880 cancer deaths in the United States

 

How come you never panicked with all those deaths? How come the USA never fails each year? Those are facts, not you trying to predict the future.

 

Don't think the US is coming back from this? Really? Based on what facts? Something you read on the internet? Your life abroad revolves reading on the internet. You are not in the US therefore you have at best second hand information that cannot be validated. Yet you panic?

 

Here is a fact. In Florida where I live, this whole pandemic has not bothered me one bit. Went to the store 30+ times as usual, drove around town, the beaches, you name it. Now the restaurants are all re-opened for sit-down service, all services to re-open on Monday.

 

Never wore a mask at all. Never had difficulty finding groceries. Gas prices the lowest in years. Get to work from home which is a total luxury.

 

Did I read something on the internet and panic? Did I panic when 606,880 people died from cancer? Of course not.

 

People die in huge numbers from all sorts of things year in and year in.

 

If you buy into the panic due to everything you read on the "For Profit News", well, not the life I want to have for sure

 

The US is not going to collapse economically. 

 

You might however, like to read up on the Thailand Financial Crisis of 1997.

[moontang]

3 minutes ago, bwpage3 said:

When a person spends their life believing what they read on the internet, they don't have much of a life. Seriously.

 

 It's hard to imagine being back in the US? How do you know? Because you read it? 330,000,000 people live in the USA.

 

READ THIS: In 2019, there will be an estimated 1,762,450 new cancer cases diagnosed and 606,880 cancer deaths in the United States

 

How come you never panicked with all those deaths? How come the USA never fails each year? Those are facts, not you trying to predict the future.

 

Don't think the US is coming back from this? Really? Based on what facts? Something you read on the internet? Your life abroad revolves reading on the internet. You are not in the US therefore you have at best second hand information that cannot be validated. Yet you panic?

 

Here is a fact. In Florida where I live, this whole pandemic has not bothered me one bit. Went to the store 30+ times as usual, drove around town, the beaches, you name it. Now the restaurants are all re-opened for sit-down service, all services to re-open on Monday.

 

Never wore a mask at all. Never had difficulty finding groceries. Gas prices the lowest in years. Get to work from home which is a total luxury.

 

Did I read something on the internet and panic? Did I panic when 606,880 people died from cancer? Of course not.

 

People die in huge numbers from all sorts of things year in and year in.

 

If you buy into the panic due to everything you read on the "For Profit News", well, not the life I want to have for sure

 

The US is not going to collapse economically. 

 

You might however, like to read up on the Thailand Financial Crisis of 1997.

Hats off to the Florida Governor..Cuomo couldn't carry his jockstrap.

[Burma Bill]

For me, not trapped in Thailand, thank God! I could see the changes slowly appearing in LOS during the last six years since the coup. For nine years I was a volunteer with the Thai Tourist Police and I could see changes in policy etc. during the last 2 years, with all the bureaucratic rules and regulations being introduced, Chinese students from the local  "Issan" University were being enrolled in "job experience" positions. Us "farangs" were being asked to attend only VIP salutes ( a load of BS). For me, enough was enough and I left Thailand for a neighboring country just before the Thai lock down commenced. All you foreigners in Thailand have my sympathy because the Chinese will be dominant in time. 

[Canuck1966]

15 hours ago, cmarshall said:

I thank my lucky stars that I live in Thailand that has a competent public health bureaucracy, not the US which is becoming a failed state.  Were I still living in New York City, I might have succumbed to the Trump virus.  We are much safer here in Bangkok.

What on earth is Trump virus?

Safe in BKK?

Sounds like you have something incurable btw

[Mama Noodle]

Im just <deleted> off that Im stuck here living off of my savings that ive been stockpiling for a move back to the USA with the wife. 

 

Lucky in a way that everything in Thailand is paid for so my savings will last a long time if Im moderately frugal, but annoyed that the whole world went into a panic and shutdown with no end in sight. 

 

Thailand is ok, but my area is BORING and the idea of being stuck here for the indefinite future sucks. 

[Canuck1966]

8 hours ago, Andyfez said:

Thailand is the safest place I can think of at this time.

I never felt isolated here - even in self-isolation.

And there I was thinking only the locals were brainwashed by the government propoganda

Dear me!