This is just a suggestion (I'd like to see if anyone takes it up though)

Most people visit Chang Mai and dont really know what there is to do or see in Chang Mai, and as there are a lot of students around and some with a bit of time on their hands, couldnt some of them advertise to show the real Chang Mai, rather than the tourist reps, the students seem to know the best and cheapest places to eat and some really intresting places to visit, and they know the real places,

I was at at what to do and see while I was there, a student saw us poring over street plans and offered a bit of advice as to where do go and what do (Wats and religeon are not top of my list to vist) but he was helpfull and refused offers for payment, all he would accept was a coffee, (I was prepared to pay more, but I got the impression he would have been offended if I offered cash)

But if some students offered their services to show tourists around for some sort of payment, I'd be more than happy to pay THEM rather than the hotel reps or so called guides

Any Offers ?

Seems to me that you have been very lucky.

My wife is Thai and when we stay in CM with her family/friends,nobody does anything for nothing.....

Having said that they are all on poor wages so we don`t mind "helping them" as my wife puts it....

I dont mind paying, its just that temples are not my favourite places to visit, and I really cant see a student passing up a way of making a few notes, just for wandering around his home town and showing a few of his favourite haunts, lets face it the tourist will be gone in a few days any way and most oof us have got money to burn (what seems a little to us is a lot to the locals)

So is any enterprising student going to put a note up offering trips around GM ?

Students, or others doing so would fall foul of the boys in brown. To formally offer this type of servicethey need to be qualified and registered guides.

In the past, we have even found ourselves in the ridiculous position of having to hire a professional guide to sit in the car with us when we have hosted private tours here, despite not requiring their service for anything else. The boys in brown always insist on speaking to the guide at checkpoints etc and can get quite nasty if the guide has no qualification ID.