joekicker

"Most Thai people" will be at work on April 18, and the highway is free until noon on the 18th when the tolls resume. .

Laos. And by extension the Thai Northeast. But understood throughout Thailand. .

Well. Er... To be more correct, it wasn't the rock 'n' roll that did it, anyhow. .

You mean where it says "Delete"? Or is there another Red X near there I should look for? The one I saw was kind of orangeish, is that it? heh. One of the (lesser) things I'm grateful for is not ever having to work in "tech support" or similar. .

INSIDE a small area of Pattaya, the 19th is the big day. Everywhere else in Thailand, the Songkran holiday is 13-15 April. Lots of people will take the weekend, but Songkran is completely over for Thailand except a tiny bit of Pattaya-Jomtien by Sunday the 17th. That's why "roads in and around Pattaya" won't be gridlocked, even though in a part of Pattaya they might or might not be. The Songkran holiday for Thailand ends on the 15th, not the 17th or 19th. That's why there will not be a problem getting transportation of your choice at the airport, why there won't be a driving problem TO Pattaya. Once in Pattaya, depends where you're going, and on which day of the 17, 18, 19. There WILL be traffic inside Pattaya, but not everywhere, and the problem -- if any -- will be centered in different places each of those days. Yes. It does not have its Songkran holiday on the 18th. The Songkran holiday is April 13 everywhere. The official Songran holidays are April 13-15 everywhere. Local people have local festivals, as said. It's a tag-on to Songkran but it's not Songkran. The Thai New Year (Songkran) is April 13. .

Thanks jacko. Sometimes I wonder if some of my posts might be taken (wrongly of course) as somehow factious. .

I predict you will be able to get to Pattaya fine. Even the most extended Songkran holiday ends on April 17, and the country will be entirely back to work. There will be some traffic in a couple of places around Pattaya only, for the "post-Songkran Songkran". It won't be gridlocked anywhere but a couple of Pattaya streets/roads at the most. Get a taxi, a limo, a bus, whatever. Tell your usual taxi/limo service you'll never be using them again, and name and shame them here. .

Not to be argumentative and not to encourage you to ruin your eyes with nekkid people - but you can surf pr0n until your palms are much more hairy, and at the same time fill grazillion-gigabyte hard drives with torrent downloads and ALSO know how viruses and adware work AND avoid them. Avoiding porn and torrents is ONE of several really excellent ways not to be attacked successfully. There are other ways (plural) to stay clean, virtually speaking. To be a bit argumentative, the hoary old story about avoiding porn and "illegal downloads" as a way to stay clean is way, WAY too simplistic, way too soothing and too much like the BSA BS. I know you didn't write that, but from what you wrote that's the very first thought that popped into my alleged mind. .

So frosty does not look at pr0n or do (cough)free(cough) downloads. Okay then. .

If you go to immigration they will clear it up, probably with a 7-day extension and the normal 500-baht fine. Waiting for the airport has the risk you state. It's a small risk, but certainly more than zero. Edit: Please note "probably". The only certainty is that for four-five day overstay there's no jail or similar. The EXACT way they will "clear it up" -- as always in Thailand -- depends. .

Hot anyhow, humid building to August-September. It will be, soon enough. I'm getting tired of telling all my friends, "Yeah, yeah, but don't start whining at me next week how hot you are!" After last March's torture, a little nip in the air is a Good Thing, frankly. Nice pics MM, Thanks for that. .

Consider offering the driver a handsome tip if he takes MORE than 1 hour and 45 minutes. Generally speaking, that's what I have done for a very long time, starting with my second trip to Pattaya in 1971 (back then, three hours was my target for safe speeds), and it always works - or nearly always anyhow. .

Probably be a couple more days. Don't worry, you'll be sitting absolutely still and sweating soon enough. .

It's up to you and som nam na. The only thing I recommend for house buying is that you know everything you can about the house and land, and about the business deal. Have a lawyer and a banker, both. Get lots of advice. You have to live somewhere. I settled on a house. I wouldn't dream of a condo, and I think that owning is better than renting. That's me. I paid off the house and I haven't paid anything to anyone for Thailand housing for a long time, bar very nominal taxes. So far as risk, well, risk comes with life. A risk-free world just makes me want to throw up. But that's me. Second, though. There is actually in the real world little risk of owning a home in Thailand. There are horror stories but there are horror stories about everything. Yes of course there is risk, but there is risk of a typhoon or an arsonist or an airplane crash on your house, too. There is LITTLE actual risk to owning a house in Thailand. Be straightforward - do everything on the up and up, nothing bad is LIKELY to happen. If you're going to live in Thailand you have to live somewhere. There are lots of choices. What's great for me may put you off. Up to you and som nam na. .

A shame? Sounds like any oilfield trash to me. Sounds like a geek at Google or Microsoft. Many military guys (gender imperfect case there) would, AHEM, kill for a job with that few hours. Sounds like a long-haul pilot, except he doesn't actually WORK the 80 hours, but he's sure away that much. You can make anyone sound like a victim. I'd like to make some BBC producers victims, though. .

Good advice, that. Hua Hin is on the shortlist of places with very dodgy, very violent "real estate agents". It's not the worst but it is one of the worst. And one of the real danger signs is if a foreigner is involved in any manner in the deal. Be VERY chary about that sort of stuff in Hua Hin, Samui, Phuket. .

Jeez, how could I forget the drugs? There were no drugs in Thailand before the GIs came. .

The reason that the Americans lost the Vietnam was that they spent so much time inventing prostitution, hanging bells in bars, insisting on having fast food all the time, enforcing new customs about tipping.... What else am I missing here that those clever but war-loser Vietnam GIs did? Oh, porn, I forgot they introduced Asia to porn, Asians had never seen that before, either. .

He didn't ask if it was a good investment, though. He asked if it was a good DEAL. I've never bought a house as an investment, although the ones I sold, it turned out well for me. That was just incidental, not something I planned or cared about when I bought. I've only ever bought a house to live in it. I care about the neighbourhood, the flooding, the noise, the Internet service, the road-paving, the building quality ... and a lot more things WAY before I care about whether the house will increase in value in 5 or 25 years. To me (in general, not every case for sure because people make their living buying/selling houses, and that's fine) buying a house for investment is like buying a Volvo because of how well it crashes. I don't PLAN to sell my houses any more than I plan to be in a car wreck, thanks very much. .

So my Uconn is sitting pretty. Although if anyone made a bracket with this I'll bow to him. VCU is very, very good with another one of those 14-year-old coaches, like Butler. I'll obviously stick with Uconn, they haven't done a thing wrong so far. .

Please stop making this thread into something that it isn't. No one has suggested they made any such suggestion. I didn't suggest but stated that some whingers are natural whingers whether it's about drink prices, tips, toilet charges, girl-quality or bar fines. And if all of the above is perfect, the whingers will whinge about something else. They can afford 5 baht, and 500 baht and 5,000 baht but they don't want to pay it under certain conditions, even... no ESPECIALLY ridiculous and "who cares?" conditions. I agreed with others, and stated myself that a serious discussion over whether 5 baht was out of line for access to a toilet proves me right. Lots of silly stuff gets discussed, which makes it interesting, but that doesn't mean it's not silly - because it is. .

Gee Zeus wept! The law (and common practice) in Thailand is that the bar must provide PUBLIC access to the toilets. Now. You either can disprove that simple, positive statement and be right, or you're wrong. I don't mind being wrong, go ahead and show I am. .

Thais who make $40,000 a year are in the middle class. That is NOT the same as saying all middle class Thais make $40K, any more than all American "middle class" make $40K. But IF you make that much in Thailand, you are middle class. You certainly are not in the running to be hi-so. For that kind of money, you're reporting to The Man every day and doing his bidding. There are lots of Thais who make $100,000 a year and they are middle class, too, just like in the US also. By definition, if you know what you're going to make this year, you're not hi-so. Hi-so do not make a certain amount a year. They don't have a salary. They don't get regular income. They have millions and millions, often by working for it, but there's no pay slip, no telling what they'll make this year. .

I had to bite my tongue (so to speak) to keep the peace when someone wrote how happy he would be to pay the high prices of Soi 7 and 8 if only the quality of girls was higher. I call Bee Ess - whingers are whingers. Prices for them are ALWAYS too high. A thread about 5 baht for toilets proves that. If it wasn't this group, I'd suspect it was satire, but I know they're serious. .

Funny, I was just talking about this the other day. I have some land in Hua Hin area and have been thinking about the advantages of not living in Bangkok in the future. The word is that property down at town level is losing value, because people see a lot of coming floods from various factors -- over-building, government policies on land use and other. So property values up the hill are increasing. You might want to factor this in, or consider it. .