joekicker

Right up there with the 4,000 buses for Bangkok, and by the same team from Buri Ram, too. I'd be gobsmacked if they sign one bit of paper in the next year, let alone drive a silver spike. .

You've been told wrongly but you MUST have third party insurance for your car or truck in Thailand, it's mandatory, and you MUST display proof via a sticker on the windshield, it's mandatory. You can get minimum third-party when you get your licence plates, from the government office. There are a tonne of insurance companies that will sell you more, here's a partial list. I use AIA but I've never used/collected so who knows if they're good or not?

It's fine. Bars buy perfectly good ice. But it's like water, even a CHANGE can give you the xhits for a brief spell. .

Government schools generally run from May to March, with a break in September. Most international schools are on a US schedule, August to May. .

Hello Mr dawg. A Woman of Bangkok is a treasure and can't be compared to the Leather book, right as rain. The answers to your questions are yes it's pretty easy to scan a book and put it into PDF, depending only on your equipment and a bit of expertise. You have to feed the book in page by page, almost certainly, so it would take some time. Yes it would be VERY easy to put it online for download. Ethical and legal, you really have to decide. I'm not sure of the copyright but I *think* it's out. I can maybe find out, give me a day or two and then a kick if I haven't said anything. UPDATE: It appears the book is NOT out of copyright but there's other news. DK Books has held the copyright all these years, but the word is (and I don't stand absolutely behind this but I'm checking this credible story right now) the Singapore publisher Monsoon Books is reprinting A Woman of Bangkok and will (re-) release it before the end of the year. .

Quick question. You have 8 seconds. Who said it had something to do with IQ? 7 ... 6... .5.... 4.... (feel the pressure?) 2....

In my experience this type of person, of any nationality, is lying. People who have "been there, done that" rarely need to convince you that they have, and I only say "rarely" because I never say "never". I almost treat such people as liars, i.e. humour them and then move away quickly much as you did. Once in a long while, if bored, I'll work to drill a hole in their silly story, just because I'm in a bad mood. .

The Chinese New Year will be Feb 3, and it is very busy in Pattaya at that time. .

Many of the main roads and the railway in the general Korat area are currently blocked by flooding, without reference to any festivals. The floods are not connected this year to the Mekong, i.e. NKP. The Ping and Chao Phraya basins very roughly down the centre of the country through Chaiyaphum, Korat, Bangkok are the affected areas. You need to check day to day to see what's blocked, what's not. .

Well, the problem moves southward, and peaks at Bangkok this weekend and quite possibly for a few weeks. Beginning at Chaiyaphum, the floods will recede, moving southward, over the next week to one month. It's simply impossible to be more precise, and there is a lot more flooding in store. This is not the place to ask this, though. The Thai newspapers are absolutely packed with information on this. Try the Bangkok Post for example, where you can read and search almost constantly for the latest, frequent updates. .

Thanks. That is very specific that the visa allows a one-year, unbroken stay, doesn't seem any wriggle room a tall. There are hoops to jump through, but no more than a residency visa to North America or Yurp. Inne-resting indeed. My mother used to say a day you didn't learn something is a wasted day, and my mother was right about that. thanks again for that link, which is way more definite than anything I ever had heard before. .

Really rough, but very roughly 56 traffic deaths out of 5 million visitors to Thailand. So very, very roughly one out of 100,000 US visitors. According to those figures, that is. .

I understand. But "leave" is "holiday" - you're charged the time, and you plan what you're doing, where you're going. US military generally get 30 days' leave a year. A US military person taking "leave" in Thailand is on his holidays, subject to no immediate military rules, just like any other tourist. They need passports, for starters. The people you almost always notice in Phuket, Pattaya and sometimes elsewhere are on a break - shore leave. They can't plan it, they take it when they can get it. It's a "half day" in British civilian terms, something like that. They doin't need passports, for starters. So when we're talking tourists in Thailand, it's a distinction with actual meaning. My son will take actual leave (holidays) in Thailand. If he were to come on Cobra Gold, say, he'd have a day, maybe two of "shore leave" (a day off work and subject to various rules regarding hours, where he can go, how far he can travel, etc). In practice, there's quite a distinction. The GIs on "shore leave" are NOT counted in tourist arrivals, they are NOT part of the 60,000-plus US arrivals each month. .

Funny you mention figuring. How IS the score figured, anyone notice? It didn't say how many I got right/wrong, just presented a number which was 25. .

Yes, I remember that discussion. Again, no deaths despite all the plunging going on. Most of the people needed a laundry, apparently. .

Now, now jacko - from the start, I noted there are always exceptions. As there always are. This one-year visa has me very, very curious however, since you've laid eyes on one. And he had never before been in Thailand, you say? . Two different cases. You are absolutely correct about a "permission to remain" stamp. You MUST come back during its validity, and it won't be extended on your entry - you get just what it says. The poster was correct about a multiple ENTRY (not re-entry) visa, allowing him to stay 90 days each time he enters, during the validity of the visa, which is usually one year. .

Again, you're conflating stuff that doesn't go together. 2,000 people isn't a lot, no. The flights from the US that end up in Bangkok in some way carry WAY more people than that - because many of them make connections. Planes from the USA carry a lot more than Americans. Planes NOT from the USA carry Americans - from Japan, say, or France, or Australia. 2,000 Americans a day don't necessarily come on a direct US-Bangkok flight. 2,000 Americans a day arrive in Bangkok from somewhere. Older and more mature than......????? Than Malaysian sex tourists, probably. Than Japanese or Chinese, maybe not. Than Europeans, I bet it's close to a wash. The young English make it to Pattaya, sure, but we're talking all Thailand here. Try Khao San Road in Bangkok or central Chiang Mai for a very different profile. .

Sorry but you've now dug yourself a hole you weren't even in. You cannot get a visa from immigration. Nor is that 30-day stamp at the airport a visa. Good for you to confirm my uncontroversial statement that you cannot get MORE THAN 90 days at the airport. Good for you to get immigration to give you a year's stay. But what you got at the airport is not a visa, and what you have from immigration is permission to remain. The ONLY place you can obtain a visa is outside the country -- except in very rare cases when the Foreign Ministry itself in Bangkok is authorised to give you one. According to you, you got a stamp at the airport, and a permission to remain at immigration. Neither is a visa. The fact that "most people" call them visas is not relevant. .

Yes you were (un)lucky with the military guys. They do come to both Phuket and Pattaya, once, maybe twice a year and only for a few days. There's a large military exercise every year - generally April but February this year - that dumps a bunch of them in Pattaya. Ships from the Gulf sometimes get to do Phuket. It's not "leave" but "shore leave". Very few military come to Thailand on leave, apparently, although they're certainly welcome by both the US and Thailand to do it. My son will be one of them if he ever gets out of the xhit he's currently in out in the desert. He and his girl friend are going to do Thailand for a month early next year. His unit is fine with that, absolutely no problem. And yet, as I keep posting over and over and over again, there are more than 60,000 of them arriving every month. .

Yes, and the baht's strength builds import revenue and injects the savings into the economy. It's very close to a wash. The thing is that the oil importers and the car-part importers and the machinery importers don't want to advertise their windfall, and the exporters want to whine (and I don't blame them). So what you hear is very skewed one way, it's all about the strong baht, the strong baht is a killer, the strong baht is horrible. Thailand would like to have a weaker baht. The strong baht creates problems, no doubt. But while it's strong, it's not all that bad for the macro economy. It's not the greatest, but it's not the worst by any means. The absolute most horrible worst was then the baht was 45 to a dollar. And the best of times, really, were when it was 20 to a dollar, not to brag about "the good old days" which weren't perfect. But 20 WAS better than 45. .

Yes. That is precisely what I wrote. Why do you claim it is "not true"? You can get into Thailand for UP TO 90 days, but to stay for a year, you have to go to immigration, just as you report you did. The Thai embassies and the Thai consulates and the people at the airport will NOT give you a one-year visa. What is "not true"? EDIT: Oh wait, I get it. The "30-day" part. Yes, well, that's not what we were discussing. My point is that you cannot get ONE YEAR without a trip to immigration, which is what you also say. Your main point is something quite different. You are correct, what you say can happen. I am definitely, absolutely correct, as you proved. All I wrote was "90 days OR LESS" (my emphasis). I keep hearing this. But I've never seen one, never heard anyone say they have one. I hope someone can chime in about it, but I think this is an exaggeration. If you've been in Thailand, and you get a job in Thailand and you then have to exit Thailand to get the proper non-imm visa, they give you the visa type that you need for working. But you still have to take that to immigration when you come back. At least that's my experience and understanding. Maybe someone has got a one-year visa that didn't require a trip to immigration??? I doubt it, but I have an open mind. But FOR SURE you have to have been in Thailand, no no0bie can walk in and get a one-year visa unless he is ... well, I can't immediately think of such a case, actually. See, here's the thing jacko, and it's the same for your country and all countries including Thailand -- the people who stamp the visas (embassy types) are NOT the same people who enforce immigration. The procedures vary country to country, but there's no actual difference between how the Thais, the US, the Australians, the Cambodians, the UKers do this. Thais do not station immigration-department people at foreign embassies, so you can't get "residence"-type visas and have to visit immigration in Thailand. The US (say) has immigration people stationed in their embassies, quite different from the people who give tourist visas, so you CAN get a green-card residency visa stamp -- but its not from the consulate. Same thing, different working-procedure details. .

On an average day, there are almost no US military people on leave or whatever in Thailand. But there ARE around 60,000 or more Americans who come to Thailand every month. Why do you have to find Thailand on a map in order to travel there? The airline pilots need help during the flight, or what? Nope, you've got that backwards. "An armed society is a polite society". Look it up. .

Yeah, good one. I doubt you could tell much difference between highest and lowest, not as a visitor, that is. A businessman knows of course. .

Yes. And while I don't know what DID happen, I know for certain that this lift with the kids on it did not "plunge" six stories to the ground/bottom. That did NOT happen. Otherwise they'd still be scraping the body parts. There a lot of things that might have happened here, but for sure there is one thing that didn't happen. .

Old joke. I'd rather die peacefully in my sleep, like my grandfather, than screaming in terror, knowing in seconds you are going to die, like the passengers in his car. .