Gonzo

I have no reason to disbelieve the OP’s report. Breathalizers have been used for a quite some time where I come from. They have changed a way of life in my hometown. We used to go the pub after work, have a few beers with mates and then drive home half-pissed. The pub used to be an important part of social life. Using public transport was a difficult option and taxis were hard to find and expensive for a working class man. Many people now drink at home alone and watch rubbish on TV. The breathalizer, speed and red light cameras, traffic police driving around in their cars, looking out for drunk drivers or drivers breaking other traffic rules have reduced accidents, death and injuries quite a lot. On the negative side, many of us miss the pub culture from the good old days. Most drivers cannot afford to have their driving licence cancelled as it is often a requirement for their job as well. At least the coppers are consistent in what they are doing. Setting up a breathalizer testing station on the corner of Second Road and Pattaya Tai for a few hours during Songkran was probably just a flash in the pan, the idea of some higher up authority in Government or the Thai police. I don’t think we will see many more repeats it. It is not the Thai way. If Thailand would be serious about reducing the traffic toll in, the Thai coppers would have to start trying to enforce at least some of the traffic regulations in place and the authorities would have to start teaching the general Thai public those regulations and teach them how to drive a car or a motor scooter properly and get them to do proper driving exams before handing out driving licences. It would probably take several generations of Thai drivers to change all of those bad ingrained driving habits and would be strongly opposed be the majority of Thai drivers and the Thai coppers collecting underhand payments.

All right then. Here is a contribution from some of the best tenors the world has been blessed with, with Pavarotti being a cut above the rest.

Here he is playing the saxophone. R.I.P.

Chris Ham died in his home in Melbourne today at the age of 59. He was a songwriter and played quite a few instruments. He is the bloke playing the flute in this song.

All Filipinas can sing, probably not all as well as Lea Salonga with her highly talented and trained voice. She is a superstar in the Philippines. +1

The Bee gees wrote all of their own music. According to Wikipedia, only Elvis Presley, The Beatles, Michael Jackson, Garth Brooks and Paul McCartney outsold the Bee Gees. Thanks for finding and posting the early Bee Gees videos.

The smile on the face of Robin Gibb and his happiness near the end of end of the video are priceless. What a great guy.

There is a chance you can contract Dengue fever in Pattaya, but you would be one of the unlucky few cases reported each year. Ricktoronto is right when he says Dengue fever should not be treated with antibiotics. I don’t understand why so many doctors prescribe antibiotics for a viral illness like influenza or in your case Dengue fever. There is a lot of useful information on the Internet about Dengue fever. The different varieties seem to affect people in different ways, ranging from a harmless illness to life-threatening conditions. Good luck and hope the result of the blood test are not what your doctor thinks it is and is just a bout of the common cold or influenza. I am not surprised that doctor worked at the Bangkok Pattaya Hospital. At the BPH you will often be sold unnecessary and useless medication at highly inflated prices. I got caught out a couple of times, when after paying my bills for a consultation or treatment. After closer inspection of the medications, I found out that in addition to the required medication, I had paid for Paracetamol and vitamin tablets from their dispensary as well at five times the price from what I would have paid from a pharmacy out on the streets. The main purpose of the Bangkok Pattaya Hospital is to make as much money out of their patients and not the patient's health. Unless you have a serious medical emergency and you need immediate medical help, stay away from the place and visit a doctor in a clinic or a Government Hospital. The Bangkok Pattaya Hospital will not treat you unless they are assured that you are capable to pay for an inpatient stay in their hospital. An insurance policy from your home country is no guarantee they will admit you. They will scan your credit or debit card to make sure there is sufficient money to start emergency treatment. To have least THB 100 000 on your card at all times would be advisable, in my opinion. I felt really crook with food poisoning some time ago and was shitting water only. I thought I would recover by myself with rest and drinking soup and water mixed with electrolytes so I would not become dehydrated. There was no improvement after 4 days and I could hardly walk or talk. I then told the missus to ring the PBH emergency number (1719) to pick me up in one of their cars, not an ambulance. I paid THB 2000 to the driver to pick me up outside the condominium. I saw a doctor in the outpatients department and he said he would like to keep me in a ward for observation. They then asked me if I had enough money on me to pay for the treatment of my problem. They walked me to the cashier and deducted THB 10 000 from my debit card. Only then would they take me to a ward where I was put on a vitamin drip. I saw a doctor once in the ward for a about 5 minutes and a nurse three times to have my blood pressure and my temperature taken. The slow drip wanted to make me piss badly a couple of times. I was unable to use the bottle they gave me, lying in a prone position in a much too small bed, hooked up to the drip. I pushed the button to call the nurse, as I thought my bladder was going to rupture. The unfriendly nurse reluctantly untangled all the wires connected to the computerized drip machine and then walked me to the toilet to have a piss. I did the same twice more with the help of my capable partner, as the nurse was an unhelpful and grumpy bitch. I am not a difficult patient or a whinger when it comes to getting treatment in a hospital. I had a few longish stays in hospitals after work and car accidents in Australia and there were never any problems. I can tolerate pain well, but I want assistance by the staff when I have to piss or shit. I was admitted to the ward late at night and started to feel better during the night, waiting for the bottle from the vitamin drip to empty itself into my system. In all fairness, the vitamin drip seemed to have done the trick and made me feel better. When the bottle was finally empty we called the nurse to unhook me from the computerized setup. Instead she came back with a new bottle to be connected. I told her there was no way I would accept more of the same treatment as I was feeling fine. She ran off with a sour face to get a doctor, which took about one hour. In the meantime I managed to discard the hospital gown and dress myself with my own clothes, including the shoes with the help of my missus, with the drip still attached to my arm. When the doctor finally showed up, he took he took my blood pressure and temperature and said I was fine to go home. Before I was allowed to go home I was once more taken to the cashier and had to pay a further THB 13000, THB 23000 all up for a 10 hour stay in the Bangkok Pattaya Hospital. I have since made contingency plans should I get sick again in a similar way, with friends taking me to a Government Hospital a thirty minute drive from Pattaya, where such a treatment would cost approximately THB 3000 or less. I believe the Bangkok Pattaya Hospital is very good at treating patients with emergency heart problems. I think MM will probably agree. If I had a serious heart condition I would consult the heart department there myself. I had a friend staying here on holidays two years ago and when he got really sick with chest pain, I took him to the BPH, where he had a triple heart bypass operation and a pacemaker/ defibrillator inserted. He made a full recovery and the doctors in Australia giving him follow-up treatment were saying, the BPH surgeons did a very good job. Luckily, he had full insurance and no pre-existing heart problems. I guess the operation without insurance would have cost about 2 million THB. I had some very good treatment from Dr Thitima Vivatanakul, when I had a gastroscopy and a colonoscopy. She removed a couple of small polyps, which can become cancerous if ignored. She works with Dr Somkiat Meteveravong, a radiologist in the Gastroenterologis Department. Dr. Thitima is a liver and kidney specialist as well and I had an ultrasound of my whole abdomen done two years ago, which turned out all right. Those outpatient treatments were expensive, in excess of THB 80 000. The wife has been getting six-monthly checks at the BPH, mammography and ultrasound as she has a couple of small of small lumps in one of her breasts. Again the doctors at the BPH are very proficient treating her problem. Now, after five years of check-ups she has been downgraded to BI RAD 2, which means there have been no changes with her small lumps in her left breast and a minimal chance of getting breast cancer. We might now do her check-ups at a different hospital, probably in Bangkok, where she knows a good hospital her family has been using for a very long time. We had bad and costly experiences with eye doctors at the BPH. I was wrongly diagnosed with conjunctivitis, when it was a case of blocked tear ducts and when they checked the wife’s eyes they wanted to remove a small pterygium for THB 10 000. According to eye specialists in other hospitals, it is not necessary to remove a small growth, unless it becomes large enough and causes the patient vision problems. The Eye clinic at the Queen Sirikit Hospital is excellent, but one has to get there early in the morning around 7AM and then be patient to wait one’s turn. It is advisable to have a Thai speaking person with you when visiting a Government Hospital. The doctors there are often the same you will see at the three private hospitals in Pattaya. To have the wife’s pterygium would cost about THB 400, should it become necessary. I had three small procedures done on my eyelids in the same hospital for a few hundred baht. It would have cost thousands of baht at the BPH. The outpatient department at the Banglamung Hospital in Naklua is actually quite good, if you want to take your wife or girlfriend there and the medicines are sold at the right price. It is the most crowed outpatient department I have ever seen, but the patients and staff are friendly. I walked around the place and would have liked to take a few pictures, but that would not have been very polite with so many Thais waiting to see a doctor. Most Thais seem to be a bit camera shy, unlike the working girls in the bars. The Thais living in the Banglamung Amphur can get treatment and medicines there under the 30 baht scheme. They need to provide the blue house book (Tabien Baan) with their name in it from the dwelling they are living in and their Thai ID card and they will be the put on the hospital’s computer and then be entitled to get treatment under the 30 baht scheme. I had the wife register just in case there is an emergency when I am not around. It is unlikely we will ever use their services, but one can never know for certain. I had a good look at their emergency department as well and it looked like a very good facility to me. I would not want to be an inpatient in the Banglamung Hospital. I visited a friend once a couple of years ago. He had a broken hip and shoulder from a motor bike accident and was kicked out from the Bangkok Pattaya Hospital, when he ran out of money after paying about one million THB. He was transferred to the Banglamung Hospital on the fourth floor until his family repatriated him back to Europe. The fourth floor at the Banglamung Hospital is just one large room with a few partitions and ten rows of beds with ten beds each. The beds were so close together so patients would touch the other patient when extending their arms sideways. My friend was the only Farang patient. In addition to the patients on the 100 beds they were about 50 more patients lying on beds in the corridors and outside next to the elevator. Some of the Thai patients had family members sleeping under their beds or standing at the end of the bed. The nurses were behind a glass wall observing the ward. I did not see any nursing staff attending any patients when I visited about 9PM on that day four about one hour. With the Bangkok Pattaya Hospital there is good and bad like in most other hospitals, but I have never seen a hospital like the BPH where overcharging patients with enormous bills is more important than the treatment provided. The most annoying thing about that hospital is their check-up-packages. Every time you go there, they will try to convince you, that it important to have one, as it gives them an accurate picture about you overall health. Those packages range in price from THB 5800 to THB 40 000 and consist mainly of blood tests, urine sample tests et cetera. I don’t need a BPH package to have my blood pressure and glucose levels tested. I can do that myself at home and I can work out my body mass index in 5 seconds. You can get the same tests done in Government hospitals or the pathology clinics in a little Soi off Third Road near Soi 17 near the overpass near a Minimart and Laundry Express (Tel. 038 488048 or 086 8129397). The place is called Lifecare Laboratory. There is also a good pathologist in Naklua diagonally across the Bank of Ayudhya on Naklua Road (Tel. 038 367326 or 081 8632868). Look out for a small shop and it is called Pattaya Clinic Laboratory. The pathology clinics have also different check-up-packages at a fraction of the price from what you will pay at the private hospitals, especially the BPH. Those pathologists will give you a pretty good idea about your general and sexual health, if you want to check that as well. You can also take your test results to the hospital or the doctor of your choice, where they will be readily accepted and interpreted. Certain tests, if you are suffering from a disease, are done in hospitals only with more sophisticated equipment. I have also noticed another negative thing about the BPH. They will treat you unnecessarily for non-existing conditions. I had a small black mole in the corner of my lower lip and thought I should get it looked at. The dermatologist said a biopsy was needed, to make sure it was not a melanoma. The biopsy report said all was fine and the small black spot was an age spot. That procedure cost me THB 7500. When I saw my dermatologist in Australia for my yearly skin cancer check I told him about the biopsy on my lip in Thailand. He said it was not necessary to have the biopsy done in the first place. It should have been observed for any changes in size, colour or shape for several months and if there were no changes it would be regarded as harmless. My dermatologist had several basal skin carcinomas removed from my face and back over the years, as I worked most of the time in the sun. I am not a hypochondriac. One of the bigger problems living in Thailand is what to do when one gets sick. Health insurance is often useless, as many insurance companies will make every effort not to pay. Read all the fine print about exclusions and pre-existing conditions before you sign up and pay for an insurance policy. I have a travel insurance, which covers me for accidents and third party liabilities only. It is difficult to get good health insurance in Thailand after age sixty. Should I get seriously ill or have a bad accident here I would consider taking the next plane back to Australia, if I am capable to do so. With other less threating problems I will play it by ear. If the problem can be fixed in a Government hospital I will choose one of them near Sattahip, Sri Racha or Bangkok. If someone has any better ideas, I would like to know about them. .

Born and bred in Munich, Germany, went to school in Vienna, Austria for 12 years and then went to live mostly in Darwin, Australia at age 18 and have never been back to Europe since. Worked mostly in and out of Darwin in various jobs in the shipping industry for 35 years and spent most of my free time in Bali for 20 years. Retired at age 53 and have lived most of the last 11 years in Pattaya/ Jomtien and have now been living happily with the same lady for the last 7 years and do yearly trips back to Australia for a couple of months each year to keep in touch. I have mentioned all of this to you before, but you seem to get a bit confused after having your drinks in the evening. As for being a sad old retiree, you are only a few years younger. I am a content and happy retiree who prefers to live in Jomtien and I guess my living expenses are quite a bit higher than yours, having to pay for expenses for a couple of properties in Darwin and one in Vienna, which is probably more than what a lot of people's income from abroad amounts to, especially a lot of your pensioner friends from England, whom have been unlucky with the decline of the British Pound and their pension not being indexed here in Thailand. I don't get a pension and I will never get one, as Australians have to pass an income/asset test when they apply for a pension and have to live in Australia for 2 years permanently before being able to apply. Unlike the Brits and other Europeans I have been lucky with the Aussie exchange rate for the last few years, which cancelled out a lot of the damage done to my liquid assets in 2008. This could change anytime soon of course and I would then have to adjust my spending pattern and my portfolio. I still consider this conversation as harmless banter. There was no need for the reference to lady boys, as I am not that way inclined and never will be. I think you should post when you are sober and I will not hold your hostile post against you, but as a slip of the tongue, when you were under the influence of alcohol and a bit angry. Have a good sleep soon, so you will be fresh and ready for another day on this good message board early tomorrow morning. The subject of mosquitoes on higher condominium floors is a lot more interesting than throwing insults at each other

Having lived in the Northern Territory for most of my life, I know a fair bit about mosquitoes and the diseases they can spread. To you I recommend tropical strength RID repellent made in Australia, as you live in a shed down the track a fair distance from Pattaya. I can let you have some of my supply of repellent, as it is no longer needed on my high floor A bar of soap to wash out your mouth would not be a bad idea as well. As far as the floor nine discussion goes, well, I could have worded that a bit better. Maybe I should have said mosquitoes can be a problem on the lower floors and are not much of an issue on a higher floor. I used to rent on floor nine and got bitten a few times. The people on the lower floors said it was a lot worse down there. Anyway, mosquitoes are not a great deal in Pattaya, unless there is a lot of water lying around after heavy rain in low lying areas with poor drainage.There is a swamp and a small lake behind the JBC condominium complex with its 5 buildings and its 3600 condo owners and the mosquitoes can be an irritation at times. it is nothing compared to Darwin, where I come from, where one has to stay indoors often after sunset during the wet season. Crocodiles, sharks and snakes are only the cause of very few mishaps. It is mosquitoes and the box jellyfish, which are responsible for unaware people getting sick or injured, if they go fishing or swimming the ocean during the wet season. It is amazing how many new condominium buildings are getting built along the new Second road in Jomtien and all the new bars near the market at the end of Soi 7. I would not be surprised to see you visiting the bars and massage places in Jomtien, when the missus lets you off the leash once in a blue moon, sooner than later, as a lot of the new bars have more to offer, than what remains in Pattaya with the exception of Walking Street, which is mainly a place for tourists these days, if you want to have a good holiday. Reply if you wish, but do not try to become another Joe Kicker.

I think you have fallen in love and want to stay with your new lady as husband and wife. Forget about the 51/49 company ownership and buy from a Falang only and buy the condo in your own name only. I would never feel comfortable buying a condo using a company name, no matter what your Thai lawyer will tell you. I bought a condo in the JBC complex seven years ago from a Scot friend and I am still very happy having done so. The trick is to buy a condo within a condo complex in the best area away from a noisy location, like next to an elevator, a noisy street or a low floor. I bought my end unit facing Sukhumvit Road. The mugs buying condos on the other end of the building cop a lot of heat from the afternoon sun and heaps of noise from the new Second Road in Jomtien. Never buy a condo on the top floor as the heat from the sun coming through the roof will make the condo a hot and unpleasant experience. The floor below the top floor is the best option. I used a compass when I looked for a condo seven years ago to work out the sun's position during the year as it changes by a few degrees between high and low season. The sun only hits my end unit in the morning and disappears well before midday altogether. The owners at the other end of the building cop the hot afternoon sun and sweat like pigs. Being a previous owner of condos in Jomtien you already know all of this, but I thought I mention it so other potential buyers will be aware of what to look for, if they think of getting their own place. By the way, there are lots of new condominiums getting built along the new road in Jomtien within your price range. Go and have a look. Just because you owned condos in View Talay 2 before, does not mean it is the best option. Your place is right next to the bus stop to the airport and has a good European style Mini mart, with the best fresh bread in Pattaya early in the morning. I often drive there to buy some. Another good thing about buying a condo on a high floor is that you won't have any problems with mosquitoes in condos higher than floor 9. Living on floor 14 I was able to remove all the mosquito screens, which made the place even cooler. I never use air conditioning. The two ceiling fans in my 45 sqm place are all we need.

Thailand is hot most of the time. It is better than being miserable in a cold place. Actually, May and November are my two favorite months of the year here in Pattaya.

The Beatles and their music belong to Hamburg and not Liverpool.

Grayray, Your Skyhooks video is unfortunately disabled from embedding by the person who uploaded it on You Tube. Here is another song from our generation, which might bring back memories. I had a drink with Normie Rowe in the Berrimah pub in Darwin in 1973, where he gave a rather good performance. Don't let Jacko convince you that song is only a rubbish cover of the original from Porgy and Bess. Normie Rowe's version is far superior to the original.

I think this lot would beat anything Thailand could throw against them in a week, all of the Thai armed forces, Red shirts, Yellow shirts, all of them. They could most likely wipe out all of the Armed forces of all ASEAN countries as well.

B.B King is probably the best guitarist of all time. He can even make Eric Clapton look ordinary at times, in my opinion. Notice Phil Collins on drums in the background.