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Siam Sam

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Everything posted by Siam Sam

  1. Cheers for the well wishes guys. I had an absolute tear up in Nana Plaza last night and bar fined three girls. Two short times from Billboard and a long time from Twister. I spent 18k baht but had one of the best nights of my life.
  2. This is my experience. Take from it what you want. You'll probably think "well you were just unlucky" or "I've never had a problem with EVA before" but I just want to share my experience to warn others. I too have flown with EVA before and thought they are a great airline but after this experience my trust in them as an airline has been completely shattered and I will never fly with them again. I'm currently sat in the Crowne Plaza hotel outside Terminal 4 of Heathrow and it's more than 40 hours since I was initially scheduled to fly. Here's my story. I had a 2120 flight booked on Tuesday the 22nd with EVA air. I got to the airport at 1730 and went straight through security with no problem. I had something to eat and a few beers so everything was going well. I went to the departure gate about 2000. The flight was initially delayed for half an hour. Then another half hour. Then another. Then another. Finally, just after midnight we were told the flight was cancelled until the next day and we would be taken to a hotel. Apparently it was cancelled due to a technical fault but that was all we were told and they wouldn't elaborate. The organisation was appalling. Only two people who I don't even think worked for EVA air were left to get us on the coaches to take us to the hotel. People were wondering around the airport (that was now closed) not knowing where to go until eventually we were all rounded up and put on coaches to be taken to h otels. Mine was a no frills hotel in Hounslow which I eventually checked in to at 0200. I debated going home as I live quite near but given the poor organisation and the fact we weren't given a definitive flight time for the next day I felt I should stick around. My bag was still on the plane so I had no change of clothes or a toothbrush which meant I had to walk up the shop in the morning in the freezing cold with only a T shirt on. I didn't think I'd need a coat or sweater as I should be in Thailand by now. At this point I'm trying to see the funny side of it. At 1230 we were taken to the airport and went through security again with the boarding cards we'd been given the previous day. I had a few beers and went to the departure gate where we were told at about 1530 that we wouldn't be getting on this plane and we would have to go back through border control and collect our bags. Regrettably I lost my temper and got threatened with security if I didn't calm down which I eventually did and then apologised. Once more we were told it was a technical problem and nobody from EVA air came to speak to us to tell us anything. Then we were told by airport staff we should check in again once we got our bags back as we would be flying at 1800. It was just beyond the joke by now. I went back through security for the second time that day. I debated booking another flight now that I had my bag back but I trusted them to finally get things resolved so I went to the departure gate. We eventually got on the plane at about 2000 and I thought my ordeal was over, until unbelievably at about 2130 we were told that we wouldn't be flying and the flight had been cancelled again. This time we were told it was due to time slots but by this point I couldn't believe a word they were telling us. I'd also gone past the point of being angry and was just drained of energy and desperate to get to Thailand. Some people were crying and some people lost their patience and started venting their anger. Yet again, nobody from EVA air around to tell us what was going on or how we would get to the h otels they'd booked for us. I decided that enough was enough and I booked another flight for today with Thai Airways at 2135. I'm not really a superstitious man but I agreed with the missus in that it seemed like it was a sign not to get on an EVA airplane as I certainly didn't feel safe or comfortable flying with them now. I was taken to the Crowne Plaza hotel outside Terminal 4 which is a nice hotel, the one good bit of luck I've had since this whole debacle started. I've had a good sleep, plenty to eat and I feel refreshed now. I've lost two nights in Bangkok which after almost two years since I've been there means I'm gutted but I'm trying to remain upbeat about things and not to let it get me down, soon I'll be on the way to terminal 2 to fly out with Thai Airways and finally start my holiday. Obviously I will never fly with EVA air again as the way they have treated me has been appaling and my trust in them as an airline has been completely obliterated. The least they can do is reimburse me the cost of the flight but considering eveything that has happened I am going to want more compensation than that.
  3. If you want my advice don't book through a tour operator. Hire a motorbike yourself and have the freedom to do it the way you want to do it. It's much more fun.
  4. The question you presented was: I then gave you an answer which was that this derogatory pronoun is not a good one to use as it is slang. I appreciate that you made no reference to the pronoun "mung" but I thought I would give you another even worse example of a derogatory pronoun that a farang shouldn't use in Thailand, thinking that perhaps you might use it and then experience a bad reaction which would be a lesson learnt for you not to use these words. If you are only ever conversing with bar girls then using "goo" and other similar words is appropriate but I don't understand why you would want to learn a bastardised version of Thai which would indicate to everyone who you come across in Thailand where you have learnt your Thai and make yourself look bad at the same time. Now I'm under no illusions about my position in Thai culture. I married a girl from a poor family of Isaan rice farmers and I'm someone that uses the services of prostitutes in Thailand, which if you didn't already know is going to shatter the illusion for you because that means I'm pretty low down in the social scale. But the truth is I don't give a fuck and I'm happy with my life. I have no interest in climbing the society ladder as I'm comfortable where I am. One of the things I love about Thailand is that the people are, generally speaking, very humble, pleasant people that aren't obsessed with social class like people in the UK seem to be more and more. I'm sick of the materialistic, "keeping up with the Joneses" society that we have in the UK. Having said that, and this is the point that I'm trying to get to - when I am in Thailand I have no wish to advertise the fact I have sex with bar girls wherever I go. For example, If I go into a shop to buy something or a posh restaurant to eat I have no wish to use Thai that would indicate where I had learnt it and put myself at a potential disadvantage with people because sex tourists are unlikely to be treated with respect in Thailand. The bottom line here is - if you want to learn Thai, don't learn it from bar girls! Just my opinion! Nearly all bar girls speak slang as nearly all of them are uneducated. In all the time I've been going to Thailand I have come across very few girls working in the sex industry that are university educated or are working as a bar girl to pay for a university education.
  5. You're not sure? So can you or can't you as I was hoping to use the swimming pool.
  6. 40 days until I'm back in Bangkok......

  7. Learning to speak Thai from bar girls is the worst way to learn Thai. The vast majority of them are uneducated and speak poor Thai which is characterised by lots of slang words and phrases that someone with a good command of the language would rarely use. If you learn to speak Thai from bar girls it will be obvious where you have learnt to speak it and you'll be treated with more disdain by educated Thai people. If you're determined to use derogatory pronouns use "mung" instead of "khun" for "you" and let us know how you get on with that.
  8. Yes exactly why I'm staying there because at just over £100 for three nights that is great value and of course it's right on the door step of NEP which is very handy and means there's no need to pay for short time hotels.
  9. At the start of my upcoming trip I'm staying at this very popular mongers hotel. I haven't stayed here for about eight years so I was wondering what it's like these days and whether or not is has been refurbished since I last stayed there?
  10. I love Krung Thep and I could easily come up with a hundred but these are my ten personal favourites: 1) Visit Wat Traimit in Chinatown. This is one of my favourite temples in Thailand because I love gold. Wat Traimit houses the largest solid gold object in the world and weighs 5.5 tons. Yes really, it is solid gold. No matter how many times I go to see this temple I'm always left in complete awe at the magnificence of this statue. 2) Visit Lumphini Park. The park is beautiful and a great place to chill out for a few hours. It's always a hive of activity too and worth going to just to see the many monitor lizards that live there. 3) Visit Chatuchak market. This place is immense and there's so much to see including some very beautiful paintings in the art section. 4) Drink cocktails in one of the city's many sky bars. You really are spoilt for choice in Bangkok for sky bars and I love sitting in one in the evening drinking cocktails and enjoying the views. My favourites are the Sky Bar at the top of the Lebua State Tower, Red Sky Bar at the top of the Centara Grand Hotel and Above Eleven Bar in Sukhumvit Soi 11. The views from these bars are amazing. 5) Visit the aeroplane graveyard in Bang Kapi. This place is bizarre and what makes it even more inexplicable is that it is miles from any airport. Here there are discarded parts of aircrafts including almost the entire fuselage of a 747. I don't know if you can still get inside the 747 because I've not been for nearly four years but when I went I managed to get inside it which was fascinating. 6) Go to the top of the Baiyoke Sky Tower. Until the construction of the MahaNakhon building this was Bangkok's tallest building for many years. At the top there is a revolving observation deck and from there the views of Bangkok are awesome. 7) Get to the top of the Sathorn Unique building (Ghost Tower). Another quirky addition from me. This building is the world's tallest empty and abandoned skyscraper. It's 49 floors high and it was abandoned in 1997 at 80% completion when the construction company that was building it was bankrupted by the Asian financial crisis. It's been empty ever since. This place has achieved much infamy by people uploading their videos to You Tube, including myself. So many people were climbing to the top a few years back that the owner eventually had to lock the place up and ensure nobody could get in there again because it's obviously a very dangerous place, although totally fascinating and the views are amazing. I managed to get to the top when I was living in Bangkok in 2015. Unfortunately it's now doubtful you can get to the top as it has finally been secured and we couldn't manage to access it when myself, Bryan (co-owner of the forum) and a few others tried to access it in October 2016. However, I hear that people are still somehow managing to get to the top and if you can I highly recommend it as this is a truly fascinating place. 8) Take a river boat taxi from Sathorn Pier to Bangkok's old town. Yes the water is filthy but this is a great experience and you'll get to see some of Bangkok's best buildings including Wat Arun. 9) Try the street food and the thousands of simple restaurants. One of my favourite things about Thailand is the cuisine and in Bangkok the diversity and ubiquity of street food and small, nondescript eateries is quite overwhelming. For me, there's no better way to experience the cuisine than doing it this way and very often the simple restaurants like the one in Boat Noodle Alley serve the best food. 10) Get a sak yant tattoo at Wat Bang Phra. They're painful but it's a great experience. Sak yant is one of the world's oldest styles of tattooing and here they are done by Buddhist monks before they are blessed. These tattoos are revered in Thai culture and an authentic one can only be given by a monk.
  11. I'm interested in researching large warehouse outlets in Bangkok that supply the shops and businesses in Thailand. The places that the smaller shops buy their goods from whole sale for cheaper prices. I'm particularly interested in ornamental and hand crafted Thai items. Any information would be appreciated. Even names would be a start. My Thai wife has told me the name of one wholesaler she remembered called (phonetical translation) "bow bay" but we can't find it. Which are the largest ones and what are their names?
  12. The pros and cons of staying at the Nana hotel have been discussed to death on every mongers forum. I have stayed there and I quite liked it but many say it is a shit hole. Each to their own. I'll tell you the pros and cons: Pros Huge rooms Cheap for the location Right on the doorstep of NEP (ridiculously close) and not far from Soi Cowboy No joiner fee (so yes you can take two girls back if you wish) Only have to walk to the car park for a FL Cons For the same price you can get a better hotel elsewhere Archaic facilities in the rooms It needs to be refurbished
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