Sad Retirement Retreat

[hgma]

Just the other day i needed visas for my children...i live in NongKhai so I go to NK immigration.

Its well known to everybody who knows me that its NOT 1 of my favorite trips to see NK immigration.

But that has probably more to to with my personality than incompetence from the NK officers.

Any way.....car park full ...hardly a place to park........so i walk in and to my surprise there was only 1 foreigner inside.fairly quickly my requests were granted but needed to be signed of by sub-supervisor.

he was busy.....very busy....repeating over and over again to the only foreigner that it was impossible for her to stamp anything in a complete full passport with 2 days overstay.

I just wanted my childrens passports back so i stepped forward........and immediately asked to mediate/translate.

so i did, hoping to get my kids passport back asap

The foreigner told me he was an Australian national who claimed to have a son/Thai/whom he supported....somewhere in Ayudhaya area

had "made a request" 3 months ago with an unknown NK immigration officer to extend something.......he was not able to leave the country due to complete full passport........he had absolute NO money in his pockets or in the bank nor any relative who could help him out,the immigration officers really wanted to help him out but couldnt...in the end he produced 2000 bath.........that was all he got.

What a mess...!!!

What happened after i left is anybody's guess.........

But I learned 1 thing

Immigration NK has a very limited ability of speaking English.........that is probably the reason why many people feel

/mistreated at NK...........its not there inability or unwillingness to act its there inability to explain properly in English.

Thank God I almost always have nothing to explain.

HGMA

[spieke]

I can confirm, I was the one served while you were discussing with the Australian.

I agree about the limited ability of speaking English but ... I feel they always do their best to explain to any person who is willing to understand and knows a little about the regulations concerning the matter he's there for.

[moe666]

I can confirm, I was the one served while you were discussing with the Australian.

I agree about the limited ability of speaking English but ... I feel they always do their best to explain to any person who is willing to understand and knows a little about the regulations concerning the matter he's there for.

I think you hit the nail on the head understand the rules regarding what you want to get. We hope when we go to immigration we get someone who speaks a bit of english and can converse with those of us who have limited Thai language skills.

[gamini]

I can not understand farangs who live her make no real effort to learn Thai. If they did so they would never have any problems in this country

[Theo007]

Some of us are too old to learn, I tried previously and gave up.

[saengsureeya]

I can not understand farangs who live her make no real effort to learn Thai. If they did so they would never have any problems in this country

You may have a point there, but on the other hand an immigration-office (and its "inhabitants") deal mainly with foreigners...........wouldn't it appropriate to welcome or deal with foreigners in a general and Worldwide recognized way of communication? As far as I know, English is THE way to communicate Worldwide, isn't it?

[Dag]

I can not understand farangs who live her make no real effort to learn Thai. If they did so they would never have any problems in this country

You may have a point there, but on the other hand an immigration-office (and its "inhabitants") deal mainly with foreigners...........wouldn't it appropriate to welcome or deal with foreigners in a general and Worldwide recognized way of communication? As far as I know, English is THE way to communicate Worldwide, isn't it?

Yes it is....but this place is different and not part of the rest of the world....it is a Hub.

[elwood]

I can not understand farangs who live her make no real effort to learn Thai. If they did so they would never have any problems in this country

You may have a point there, but on the other hand an immigration-office (and its "inhabitants") deal mainly with foreigners...........wouldn't it appropriate to welcome or deal with foreigners in a general and Worldwide recognized way of communication? As far as I know, English is THE way to communicate Worldwide, isn't it?

Years ago used to apply at various Libyan embassies - general attitude was that if you couldn't understand them, tough luck! Agents were in great demand; also having an Arab who could prepare all your documentation.

We are lucky here that most immigration officers seem helpful, apart from the nasty gits that all countries have!

[NancyL]

Yes, this whole "passbook" idea can be foreign to us foreigners. I haven't used a bank passbook since I was seven years old (in the second grade) and one of the local savings and loan branches set up a little operation in our elementary school, which they ran every Friday. We'd line up at their desk, where a really offical-looking bank employee took the deposits from our allowance and updated our passbooks with many flourishes and stamping. I think it was suppose to teach us something about the value of saving.

It was like a trip back to my childhood to open an account at Bangkok Bank and be ceremoniously presented with a passbook. I didn't think they existed in the modern world!

I must admit, I've been very good about running the passbook thru the machine after nearly every transaction. I guess that's what Immigration wants to see.

[theoldgit]

I didn't think they existed in the modern world!

They don't, just in Thailand

[FWIW]

I can not understand farangs who live her make no real effort to learn Thai. If they did so they would never have any problems in this country

You may have a point there, but on the other hand an immigration-office (and its "inhabitants") deal mainly with foreigners...........wouldn't it appropriate to welcome or deal with foreigners in a general and Worldwide recognized way of communication? As far as I know, English is THE way to communicate Worldwide, isn't it?

At my local immigration office, Burmese would be more useful than English.

[billd766]

I can not understand farangs who live her make no real effort to learn Thai. If they did so they would never have any problems in this country

Some of us older people have tried.

However when you are partially deaf and tone deaf as well Thai IS a hard language to learn.

When I speak in my version of Thai to family and friends they can sort of understand what I am on about but in general Thai's who don't know me cannot always understand.

What I think I said and what they thought they heard may be different.

Never mind you will be old and deaf one day.

[watcharacters]

Some of us are too old to learn, I tried previously and gave up.

I agree. My GF and I went over a bunch of things on a thai page last night and I could only laugh at the 5 sounds she was making as i knew I'm a hopeless case. A medium brain injury further added to my language learning challenge. 555

As below...

"Some of us older people have tried.

However when you are partially deaf and tone deaf as well Thai IS a hard language to learn.

When I speak in my version of Thai to family and friends they can sort of understand what I am on about but in general Thai's who don't know me cannot always understand.

What I think I said and what they thought they heard may be different.

Never mind you will be old and deaf one day."

[elliss]

I can not understand farangs who live her make no real effort to learn Thai. If they did so they would never have any problems in this country

many farang are off the opinion ,

their prescence in los , is the best thing that has ever happened to thailand ,

and thai people, should be learning to speak english , in order to join the civilised world .KRAP.

bttopic , only 2000 bht in his arse pocket , poor farang .

thailand not want you , ANYMORE.

:jap:

[Dag]

I want to learn Thai because it is spoken in so many ports around the globe.....this language is the Hub Hub..

[thaibeachlovers]

I can not understand farangs who live her make no real effort to learn Thai. If they did so they would never have any problems in this country

Many of us do, but given our age and the onset of short term memory loss, it's a lost battle.