Bob

Went out last night to a quiet cafe/bar here in Chiangmai to chat with some friends and saw the first christmas tree of the season (I'm already tired of the "sawatdee bpee mai" posters all over the 7/11 stores up here). I looked at the tree and gave it one of those "kinda weird to see that in Thailand" lookz but I almost cracked up when one of the waiters, seeing me eye the tree, said: Melly Clitma!

Nope, but I don't have a lot of experience in too many other countries. Here (Thailand), it's nothing to them. You can be standing up at the urinal and they just walk in, mop around your feet, whatever. Doesn't even bother me any more. What's more interesting are the bathroom attendants at a few places who'll come up behind you and start massaging your neck or back. I've only had it happen a couple of times here, the last time at a fancy disco in Bangkok. The first time it happened it kinda freaked me out - especially the guy who had his left hand on my right shoulder, his right hand on the urinal flusher, and he was leaning over eying my business so he'd know when I was finished so he could flush the urinal. That was interesting....(a bit of an understatement).

Ah, after cozying up to Hun, "Tacky" isn't inappropriate either.....

Huh? Actually, glad to hear that. I know about the 90-day address reporting deal but I had no clue you had to report a new address if you move during one of the 90-day time period. If you're right, problem solved.

I'm doubtful the government will let any of the major banks fail. For example, the King (or the Crown Property Bureau) owns a chunk of Siam Commercial Bank and I'm extremely doubtful that the government would let that bank fail. Kasikorn is a big bank and I would think there's little to worry about (but, on the other hand, if you have a large chunk of money there, why not park it at 2 or 3 banks to lower the risk?).

That's what I've been told also but I have no clue if it's correct. My problem is that I'm going to last register an address in Chiangmai but I'll be living in Hua Hin when the time to renew comes up. Based on what I've heard and what you're saying, it appears I have to come back up to Chiangmai to renew the visa (which is what I didn't want to have to do). Oh well, I'll figure it out.

Sorry if this is already been answered (I'm too lazy to look through all the posts). My one-year visa (some call it a retirement visa) was issued in Hua Hin. I know you have to report your Thai address every 90 days (at least while you're in country) and my "last reporting" before I have to renew the long-term visa will occur here in Chiangmai. So: Can I renew the long-term visa anywhere in Thailand or do I have to go to either Chiangmai or Hua Hin to do it?

And they're the same group that claims the US planned and executed the attacks on the twin towers, that there were more shooters on the grassy knoll, etc. And, of course, they believe the entire story about the "wolf boy" headlined in the National Enquirer cause, as you know, enquiring minds just gotta know! (geez, sounds like something Palin would say...)

It was shown several times last year in the press. It still doesn't satisfy the nuts.

Lol. I'm not sure why but I used to really like some of the old westerns where somebody would blow somebody away for just looking at them stupid. Maybe it made up for the subliminal urges I got many times a day. Same feeling (pleasurable) that I got when John Belushi in Animal House, on ascending the stairway where some nerd was playing kumbaya or the equivalent on his guitar, grabbed the guitar, smashed it to bits, and then calmly walked on.

Hehe. We've got way too many stupid people and stupid politicians.

Read the article that Beer Chang linked. Here's one quote from that article which is a bit illuminating (and puzzling at the same time): As Judith Doctor, a 69-year-old spiritual therapist, told The Washington Post’s Jason Horowitz at Palin’s book signing in Grand Rapids, Mich., “She’s alive inside, and that radiates energy, and people who are not psychologically alive inside are fascinated by that.†[Now, I have no clue what a "spirtual therapist" might be or why a supposedly educated newspaper reporter would quote her....but there it is, for what it's worth!] The bottom-line for me is that Palin appears to be woefully undereducated with respect to the realities of the nation and the world and she even has trouble putting together coherent thoughts at times. I would have guessed she was a "valley girl" from California.

I absolutely agree there (although there might be some issues there with the constitution with respect to the freedom to travel issue). If we're legally allowed to have sex offenders register for the rest of their life, maybe one additional protection would be to require notification of that status on their passports. In any event, the whole theory behind registration is to let people know that a sex offender is in their midst and that supposedly gives them more information to help protect their own children; given our concern should be for all children (not just US children), some type of passport notification ought to pass muster. That being said, there's no excuse for a country admitting any person convicted of a serious felony in another country. If I owned the country, I sure as hell wouldn't want them visiting. [Of course, the basic background problem here is that pedophiles generally have a serious history of serial/recidivist predation of children, i.e., somebody that rapes a child is very likely to do it again and many experts claim that there is no treatment which will substantially reduce that likelihood]

It beats the hell out of me, it really does. Everybody I know thinks she's a shallow bimbo and we find it difficult to understand why she has any significant popularity. On the other hand, seeing how people answer Jay Leno's "Man on the Street" questions and knowing that Rush Limbaugh is the #1 radio show in the US and that the National Enquirer is the #1 selling newspaper, maybe US citizens are a lot dumber than even I suspected. My US home is in a small (65,000 people) rural county in Michigan and I was dumbfounded to learn years ago that several hundred people in our county were tithing 10% of their gross earnings to Jim and Tammy Bakker. My first look at those two led to what I thought was the very easy conclusion that they were simply con artists pedaling bullshit for money......but enough people in the US alone bought into that nonsense to send them hundreds of millions of dollars a year. Go figure. I do believe, at least scientifically, in Darwin's theory of evolution; however, it doesn't seem to be working very well...hehe.

Almost every time I see an article in the Thai newspapers about the arrest of some foreign pedophile, it turns out that the creep has a record for sex offenses against kids in his home country. That really pisses me off as it raises the question as to why the Thais would ever allow a convicted sex offenders (or, hell, any convicted felon) into their country. To get into this country, they swipe your passport and there should be no reason at all why the computers can't have adequate information from the criminal data bases from the foreigner's home country. You stop those bastards from preying on Thai kids at the immigration desk (presuming you want to stop them from entering). I'm not so sure they give a rat's ass and that's rather sad to me.

Well, I'd guess I'd have to say that anything a 61-year-old tries to learn is a bit difficult because one's retention ability at that age is rather poor (that's why it's easiest for a 8-10 year old to learn a foreign language). On the other hand, I'd guess that English is a hell of a lot harder to learn than Thai! Thai has much more logical and consistent grammar and pronunciation than English ever hoped to have. I am learning quite a bit and I've really kicked in using the proper tones (well, at least most of the time). I finish the Level 1 course this coming Friday and then start in on Level 2 three days later. I did try to learn a little thai on my own over the last decade or so and actually can speak it (and read it) better than most falang I know (but, of course, that's probably not saying too much). But I find that you enjoy the experience of living here in Thailand and interacting with Thais a hell of lot better when you try to speak the language (and, if occasionally you're out in the boonies, it's rather necessary to know some thai).

God, I hope not. If I had a choice of spending a weekend on an island with a welder from GM or some rich dude, I'd put my goggles on any old day. Not all the rich are shallow bastards, of course, just most of the ones I've met.

I'm not sure where the term comes from either but one online dictionary accurately describes it as follows: Tea money: –noun (esp. in parts of China) a bribe used to facilitate any business dealing.

Taking classes. Level 1 is 3 weeks (3 hours a day, five days a week) and that'll finish next Friday. I start Level II the following Monday for the next 3 weeks. I've rather enjoyed it so far and have learned a lot (although half of it is helping me remember what I've forgotten in the past).

Yep, finally a story with a happy ending....hahahahahaahahahaahaha

Sorry, I'm one that doesn't believe that. Sounds like an interesting theory but I don't have any factual basis to actually buy into the concept. The current dispute still centers around the failure of Thailand to fairly recognize the World Court ruling of 1962. Thailand participated in that case for 3 years, soundly lost the decision, and a bit of nationalistic pride by the yellow shirts and the current government (perhaps designed to divert attention from what they stand for and/or what they haven't accomplished) is a rather poor attempt to help "forget" they lost the case.

Ugliest people?!? Whew, I thought Wino was going to talk about me....

Yea, so what - the creep gets no sympathy from me. If I had been the Judge when the jerk made that statement, I would have answered: "It's all about you, isn't it? And what about the lives of all those kids you screwed up forever? Get out of my face and go to jail, you slimeball."

Now, the only (Thai) logical way to improve Thailand's rankings is to pay a little tea money to Transparency International. I wouldn't doubt if it's been tried....hehe.

This past Tuesday, 3 or 4 of the falang students in the Thai language class at CMU didn't show up for class and I later found out that they went out to the habitat project to see Jimmy Carter, Jet Li, and others. Wish I would have gone as I would have been honored if I was lucky enough to get a photo taken with President Carter.