Moving to chiang mai

[chrisartist]

To the Original Poster:

If you are 50 or over, you can get what is commonly called a retirement visa. This entitles you to stay for one year and can be extended. You have to report to Immigration every 90 days.

In northern Thailand, there are a lot of Burmese who are kind of lost souls; neither officially Thai nor officially Burmese. They are allowed to stay in Thailand provided they visit the authorites every once in a while (every three or six months, I forget which.) They have a green card that certifies their right to residence. They can speak Thai. It is legal to hire them. A verbal agreement will suffice.

In Chiang Mai city centre, you will find that many people speak a bit of English; enough for you to get by. In the suburbs (and even in one of the major shopping malls, Central Airport Plaza), people generally do not speak English.

On health care, the hospitals are okay. Chiang Mai Ram is recognised as one of the best. You will find that when faced with something that they don't deal with every day, the diagnostic skills of the doctors fall well below that of European doctors. (As a single example, I once went to three different hospitals because I had a rash on both knees and my ankles. All the doctors insisted that I had an allergy. Anti-allergans did clear the problem up, but once I stopped taking them, the problem recurred. I eventually got rid of the problem by changing my diet (eating more green salad.) So, not an allergy, but the doctors were adamant that it was.

On Malaysia: remember that about 30% of the Malaysian population is Chinese and about 12% Indian. You can avoid the Malays almost altogether if Islam is a worry.

If you want high culture (long history, interest in learning, drama, opera, art cinema, strong traditions in philosophy, painting, ceramics, music, etc.), Thailand is not the place to be. It's a kind of low-brow place that's good for hanging out. (I stay here because it's cheap so I don;t have to spend too much money while I'm doing my research. Once I'm ready to start publishing, I'll be off.) If you want more, Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong and South Korea are your best bets (but getting a visa is not so easy.)

On making friends.......I have to reiterate what I said in an earlier post: it is difficult to make friends with Thais in Chiang Mai. I speak as one who has lived in six countries and has made many friends everywhere. Elsewhere in Thailand, I have made friends, as well; but not in Chiang Mai, in the suburbs, where I live.

Most years, the smoke is bad from January to April; four months.

On transport, if you live outside the city centre but not on the ring road, you will find songtaews. You might even find yourself on a standard bus route. There are real buses, not just government-run yellow songtaews (usually 10-20 baht) and privately run red songtaews (for which you need to negotiate a price, but they are not expensive unless you want door-to-door service.)

I have not found Thai people in Chiang Mai to be helpful in times of need. It depends on your relationship with them. If you know them well, they will help you. if you don't, they will just stand around doing nothing. One important thing you need to know: never, ever lend money to a Thai person, even if you consider them your friend. In almost all cases, you can kiss your money goodbye.

On theft, here is my record:

In the UK (many years), house broken into twice, camera and some money stolen

In the USA (two years), not a problem

In Korea (six years), never any problems

In Malaysia (one year) no problems

In Singapore (one year) no problems.

In Thailand, reported by incident:

1) Gold buddha amulet stolen

2) Crockery stolen

3) House broken into: computer, expensive mobile phone, many DVDs stolen

4) Walkman stolen

5) Various household items stolen

6) Attempt made to steal bicycle

7) Gardening equipment stolen

8) Fruit stolen from the trees in my garden

9) Scammed out of money by Thai housekeeper

In 15 years of living in Thailand here is the theft I experienced:

1) English teacher from Finland stole 5k baht

2) Almost scammed out of 85k baht from British-Swedish national, who was my boss at the time.

3) Traditional Thai massage book stolen by an American professor.

All the theft I experienced was perpetrated by Thais. My list is not comprehensive. There are further incidents, involving various sums of money disappearing without my consent into the pockets of Thais. It would just take too uc time to remember and describe everything. My list is representative.

I am sorry to hear about your experiences ans to learn that you were the victim of western people. However, please understand that, in general, the westerners who end up in Thailand are not representative of westerners in general, whereas in Thailand no selection by travel has taken place. Note also that western societies work more efficiently than Thai society because there is a background of trust. (This is very true of northern European countries, but I have data that suggests that it is not quite so true of southern European countries, such as Spain, Italy and Greece.) In contrast, in Thailand, there is a pervading atmosphere os mistrust, whereby Thais do not feel as though they are able to trust each other; and this affects both how they conduct their everyday affairs and the efficiency of the Thai economy as a whole..

...and the Thais that stole from you are not representative of all Thai people.

The problem with a lot of people that try to analyze Thailand is that they make blanket statements over the entire population, and have only experienced one facet of the people.

Hang around educated people and step up your game.

...and the Thais that stole from you are not representative of all Thai people.

----So you would have me believe, but I have mixed with a broad spectrum of Thai people since I arrived here (a long time ago) and I reckon that they are representative.

The problem with a lot of people that try to analyze Thailand is that they make blanket statements over the entire population, and have only experienced one facet of the people.

----Well, that's certainly one problem, but it's not a mistake that I make.

Hang around educated people and step up your game.

----Well, for one thing, you are wrong to assume that I do not mix with educated people. I mix with people from many parts of society, just as I would in other countries. For another, I am not very impressed by the quality of thinking of the supposedly educated people here in Thailand. lastly, and most importantly, education is not a reliable indicator of good behaviour. As an example, consider a lawyer that I know who actually graduated from law school. I suppose that you would regard a qualified lawyer as an educated person. Unfortunately, he does not pass muster when it comes to good behaviour. His avowed ambition is to save enough money to set up business as a loan shark. Another example: a graduate in psychology from CMU borrowed 5,000 Baht from me and swore blind that she would return it. I never saw her again after I had lent her the money. I have more examples. Perhaps it is unwarranted to make a blanket statement about the entire educated population of Thailand, such that they are better people to mix with. In my experience, they are on a par with the rest of the population: some good, more bad, but with the bad ones running more sophisticated scams.

I will make this generalisation: overall, without attributing anything to everyone in the population, Thai people behave much worse than people in Korea, Japan and Taiwan. perhaps you will think that such a generalisation is unwarranted. It is not. Here's an example that shows that profiling with respect to certain traits is possible. I own (but do not work in) a business that has clients worldwide (and, by the way, all the clients have attained the highest possible educational qualifications) and over the past 15 years I have been able to build a profile of good payers and problem payers from a wide range of countries. There are patterns: northern Europeans, Japanese, Taiwanese and Koreans are very trustworthy. Southern Europeans, Brazilians, Israelis< Italians, Spanish, Greeks, and Chinese, as groups, are less so. What that means is that although you can't say anything about particular people, you can identify certain risk factors. There is a massively greater risk of not getting paid by clients from some countries, whereas it is virtually a certainty that you will get paid by clients from other countries. There is nothing magical, mystical or suspect about this. Actuaries use the exact same principles when they are assessing risks for calculating health insurance: populations show trends and the trends provide risks that you have to assume when dealing with individuals. When it comes to honest behaviour, Thais don't come out well. They are a high-risk group, whether educated or not. The risk will be less for people who are not addicts of one form or another, of course, but so what, if the risk is still significant for the rest of the population?

[KRS1]

Ignorance, really is the only word that comes to mind right now.

Carry On

[roger1999]

Having been here for 12 years I find the smog/smoke problem to be an issue only about 4-6 weeks per year on average. March can be bad. One year out of the 12 that I have been here the smog was intolerable, and this was about seven years ago. Some years it is barely noticeable. Last March was about average and it wasn't that bad at all.