cosceguinhas

Looks as if the tax on imported booze has gone up, but not by that much.

https://www.reuters.com/article/thailand-taxes-idUSL4N1LX03R

38 minutes ago, Siam Addict said:

Thanks guys, I'm not getting in till nearly 8pm so I've booked a taxi and I need to change money at the airport when I arrive.

Remember you need to go down to the lowest level and into the train station concourse.  The exchange booths that give the best rate are between the ticket machines and the ticket barrier.  The booths before the ramp leading down to the station are part of the airport cartel.

4 hours ago, Nightcrawler said:

I wish there was a way of getting the current rate for cash whilst still in UK. I don't have a Thai bank account. Sods law is that by the time I come out in September it will be back down to 40 ish. The long term forecasts suggest that it will remain around 44 or 45 but I don't take much notice of those, because things can change very quickly according to financial situation here and abroad including interest rates. 

Let's hope it stays as it is for a while or better. 

If you just want to monitor the current rate on the street, TT post their rates at start-of-business here

https://ttexchange.com/

They don't update it through the day, so you wouldn't catch minor fluctuations, but it might be enough for those of us outside  the country.

Is this what your wife was thinking of?

https://phuket-go.com/phuket-news/islands/sea-horse-ferry-launches-blue-dolphin-service-between-sattahip-and-koh-samui/

11 hours ago, Golfingboy said:

Who else got this? Damn I was on of my “employment breaks” at the time, I should have stayed until New Year’s 2009! 

Well, I was there at the time.

We flew out of Suvarnabhumi six hours before the airport was shut down

This was with Jet airways, so a transit in Mumbai.

We left Mumbai four hours before the terrorist attack shut down the airport there.

1 hour ago, Nightcrawler said:

Yes, I have used the downstairs exchanges before. 

The booths at arrivals know that most people are arriving with no baht. I take a few thousand baht with me, that covers my taxi etc so that I can get out the airport as soon as possible. Everything is generally more  expensive at airports. That said, the difference of 30 satang when changing a couple of hundred quid doesn't make a huge difference, I guess.  I only change up money every couple od days as we never know whether its going up or down 

In my experience (admittedly pushing three years old), the booths in the railway station concourse, past the ticket machines, will give you a rate similar to TT in Pattaya.

I would guess that being in the railway station rather than the airport proper, they don't pay airport rents, and don't have to belong to the airport cartel.

Pre-Covid, one could go down to the basement in Suvarnabhumi and into the railway station concourse.

Three booths (I think) were sited between the ticket machines and the ticked barriers.

These offered a rate similar to the Pattaya TT rate.

I assume that this was possible because they were in the railway station, not the airport, and did not have to belong to the airport cartel.

Does anyone know if they are still open?

2 minutes ago, Freee!! said:

Read the report, high speed and airborne I got, but with the front of the remains pointing straight at the tree, I just don't understand the direction of the cut.

Without doing the maths, it seems to me that once the car was airborne, the gyroscopic effect of the spinning crankshaft/flywheel/gearbox etc and also of the spinning drive wheels would cause the car to twist in midair, so hitting the tree sideways would be qiite possible.

As for believing it, I'd believe anything of a seventeen-year-old driving a fast car.

It is indeed an absolute tragedy.

1 hour ago, Kathmandu said:

Yeah, this guy! Didn't they call him glitter man or something similar?

That's right - Glitterman.  Pre-Covid, he could be seen ocasionally cycling around the Wimbledon/Merton area in South West London.

33 minutes ago, Jambo said:

......She particularly pointed out that nobody from the Thai authority had made contact with her to see how she was.

Or, for that matter, whether she had actually gone to a quarantine hotel or just vanished into a bed-sit sonewhere on the island.  
That's seriously slack.  

The interviewer suggested she contact the German embassy and the local consul-general.  
I wonder what will come of that.

The family's story shows an extremely heavy handed approach, and I can see many cancellations once the story hits the western press.  No family is going to risk being treated like that.

5 minutes ago, lazarus said:

Makes it a double whammy as how will the ever get a handle on it w/o vaccinating migrant workers?

In the US they'll give it to anyone...no questions asked.

Exactly.  The present system of registration is likely to create a permsnent pool of infection and generate new varianth because those who do get sick will try to tough it out at home. Worst case scenario, of course, but....

16 hours ago, lazarus said:

...... Yet, there are a lot of migrant undocumented folks working in Thailand and it's doubtful the Thai gov't will give the vaxx for free to a revolving door of Cambodians, Burmese, Laotians and Chinese.

I can't see any of the undocumented/illegals coming forward for the vaccine, anyway, for fear of being identified, arrested and deported.

I've seen that somewhere - I think it's on the steps at the beach road end of Mike's Mall, outside the coffee shop.

There may well be a demand for woolly hats in a few months time when the temperature drops.

I can remember a coach tour from Chiang Mai when at sunset the temperature in the coach dropped from impossibly hot to merely too hot, and the guide and driver both put on woolly sweaters,

and there was a long-tail boat trip from Phuket where the thai companion on one of the other falangs was well wrapped up, including a woolly hat.

It looks as if the latest plan is one step further forward but still far from definite - it still has to get past fhe Center for Covid-19 Situation Administration and their policy seems to be No Risk under any circumstances. 

From Pattaya News (note the final sentence)

From Britain's New Scientist magazine web-site:

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2237475-covid-19-news-astrazeneca-vaccine-not-linked-to-blood-clots-says-who/

The above may be behind a paywall, so here's an extract from the article

"
Covid-19 news: AstraZeneca vaccine not linked to blood clots, says WHO

The latest coronavirus news updated every day including coronavirus cases, the latest news, features and interviews from New Scientist and essential information about the covid-19 pandemic
Health 12 March 2021

By Michael Le Page , Clare Wilson , Jessica Hamzelou , Sam Wong , Graham Lawton , Adam Vaughan , Conrad Quilty-Harper and Layal Liverpool
New Scientist Default Image

Latest coronavirus news as of 5pm on 12 March

Countries should continue using Oxford/AstraZeneca covid-19 vaccine, says WHO

The World Health Organization (WHO) has said there is no evidence that the Oxford/AstraZeneca covid-19 vaccine causes blood clots and is urging countries to continue using it. “It’s very important to understand that, yes, we should continue to be using the AstraZeneca vaccine,” said Margaret Harris, a WHO spokesperson, at a briefing on 12 March. The WHO’s global advisory committee on vaccine safety is reviewing reports of blood clots in some people who received the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine. A number of countries, including Denmark, Norway and Iceland, have suspended its use as a precautionary measure, while Thailand has delayed its rollout of the vaccine, originally scheduled to begin on 12 March. There have been 30 cases of blood clots among the 5 million people in the European Union who have received the vaccine as of 11 March, according to the European Medicines Agency (EMA).

More than 11 million doses of the Oxford/AstraZeneca covid-19 vaccine have been administered in the UK so far, said Phil Bryan, MHRA vaccines safety lead, in a statement, adding: “Reports of blood clots received so far are not greater than the number that would have occurred naturally in the population.” The UK’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) said people in the UK should still go and get their covid-19 vaccine when asked to do so. “There is currently no indication that vaccination has caused these conditions,” the EMA said.

Harris said WHO data shows that more than 268 million doses of covid-19 vaccines have been administered worldwide and no deaths have been found to have been caused by them.

"

11 hours ago, fygjam said:

Uh-oh.

NSW Health has confirmed a hotel quarantine worker has tested positive for coronavirus.

It is the first locally acquired case in New South Wales in 55 days.

Stephen Conaty from NSW Health said the person had worked in two Sydney hotels with returned overseas
travellers.

"The source of the new infection reported overnight is under investigation and urgent genome sequencing is
underway," Dr Conaty said.

NSW Health would not provide any further information on the hotel worker, however Prime Minister Scott
Morrison said the individual had received their first dose of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccination.

Hotel quarantine workers were among those considered high priority for vaccination which commenced 22nd February although the date of the individual's vaccination has not been released.

 

Update. The worker had his first dose of Pfizer on 2nd March.

 

 

Apparently it takes ten to fourteen days for any real immunity to kick in, and four weeks to get the full effect.  The unlucky victim must have been infected in the waiting period.

56 minutes ago, Nightcrawler said:

Thanks for the link and interview

One thing that comes to mind with virtual bar feeds, is, how do customers know what drinks they have paid for? Or should it matter?. In a real situation in some bars, a lady drink at around 120 baht can be a glass of cola poured from a jumbo bottle costing 5 Baht. 

It's not my cup of tea personally but I can see the attraction for some, during this period of few real customers due to flight and immigration restrictions 

What is missing is the "Virtual bar fine" 😁

That could be awkward

 

Seems to me that the only logical reason to buy drinks online would be to give a small subsidy to a favourite girl or bar in the hope that they will still be there when it is finally practical to return.

In which case, it shouldn't matter whether the drink bought is top-shelf tequila or just tap water.

Goes to show that you *REALLY* need to know what you are doing when you ride a big bike in Thailand.

Many years ago, I was an instructor on a motorcycle training scheme.  We always tried to teach defensive driving, including the danger of the slippery surface of wet manhole covers.

In Thailand, I've seen so many that were mis-aligned that I'm leery of even stepping on one.

The trouble is, It's all up in the air - the proposals change daily, which causes a lot of confusion, and there's no guarantee that the Prime Minister will accept them.

The timetable for the latest I've seen (the "Phuket Model") seems to be:

1. Book flight and hotels in advance.

2. Arrange Covid-19 health insurance for Thailand.

3. Take Covid-19 test 72 hours before departure (for me, a deal-breaker - if positive, I would have to write off the prepaid cost of flight and hotel - my travel insurance doesn't cover this)

4. Another test on arrival.

5. 14 days quarantine confined to the grounds of the chosen resort (I know a few people who would go for this, but not many)

6. 7 days free to travel within Phuket.

7. Another Covid-19 test.  If negative, free to travel around Thailand until your visa runs out.

8. Leave Thailand.

9. Repeat

This model might be applied to Koh Samui, Chang Mai and other tourist areas, but Pattaya was not on the list.

Some people might be able and willing to go for it, but IMHO very few.

2 hours ago, Nightcrawler said:

 

That's great fun.  Thankyou for that.

I don't usually bother with draught in Thailand.
I've had the occasional one that was OK, and many that I didn't like.
As for watering it down, well ....
Many years ago, a few of us were chatting in the local after work and the conversation turned to a scandal about watering the beer.  
The guvnor took each of our half-finished pints, added about an inch of tap water and challenged us to tell the difference.  
We couldn't.

Even with modern systems, the barman could easily put half an inch of water in the glass and then top up with beer.

The other issue is with bottled beer.
Can you be sure that the opened bottle contains what's on the label?
I can only remember one place (now long gone) where the bottle was uncapped in front of me.
I'm sure I've been served bottles of Heineken or San Miguel which had been topped up with Chang - I know what Chang tastes like and it's nothing like San Mig or Heineken.

Ultimately, though, is it that big a deal? 

The apparent disrespect on the part of the management is annoying, but if I like the general ambience (not too crowded and interactive ladies) I might want to stay, and if I don't like it, I'll be on my way anyway.  If I just want to get drunk, I can do it for much less in my room.

1 hour ago, boydeste said:

Ditto on the pictures from me.

I was thinking it might be tidal. @Sherlock

You're right - that part of the Thames is tidal as far as Teddington Lock (Teddington=Tide End Town)