torrenova

I knew when I wrote it that it had to be you ! Can I send a taxi to pick you up for a moderately inconsequential lunch near the JW ?

Always thought there was more chance of repopulating the world through 2 for 1 than 1 for 1.

I'd have killed them all, all their families, every friend, every acquaintance and given them the same reason the muslims would do to us. KS you deserved better but you gave us free speech. Thank you.

MPOX = Covidbollocks = bullshit = scam

Quite possibly. We thought you were dead long ago. Missed you !

Yep, same disease that gives up 100 YouTube arsewipes arguing that you can easily live in Thailand on 50k a month.

Perennial argument for 3+ decades I can recall. Younger folk today are basically fuckwits. No house, no pension, all on credit cards, cannot save, etc. There MUST have been a greater temptation to hugely overpay when we were getting 70/80/90+ to £1 but we didn't, respectful of where that £1 came from. It is all fucked now, just some places less fucked than others.

So just send one of the younger generation as a puppet then. North Korea et al

Never had much time for homos telling others to understand or do what they want to do. Much prefer a couple of naturally large breasted bisexual ladies and myself personally.

From tourist to expat to back to Europe to part time LOS to months in LOS to now. I'm not dead yet.

It was the death of someone else that caused me to come back here today. I've sadly been away more than too long. We were not close or even friends but in decades past, post the Nanapong board, here as Nanaplaza, I met more than a few when being "in love" with Bangkok. We shared a table, a laugh, never enough. I am now 55, I was early 30s back then, less than that in the earlier days. Perhaps because of the age, similar to mine and a discussion with my daughter about mortality this evening over dinner, I am more taken back by this than I can adequately compute right now. I shed a tear to another one gone too soon and I wish his family every condolence.

I left for my daughter's education with a view that I could drop back 3 or 4 times a year at will almost but though the relationship with her mother barely survived the birth, I put my daughter first and pushed thoughts of retiring again into the longer, if not quite the long grass. Today I am a single father to a teenage girl whose mother abandoned her to return to the village and "marry" the local rat catcher. Honestly, you couldn't make it up. So my holiday plans went up in smoke as did my realistic hopes of moving back to Asia full time. I've lived in other Asian countries but I wouldn't go back to live in Japan as I've forgotten what language skills I had and without a Japanese partner or a corporate life, it is a hard place to integrate into. Singapore is pretty much the same though I prefer it to Tokyo. Hong Kong is lost these days. Of the rest, I haven't spent long enough in Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia or Burma to give an opinion and in truth, I'm not sure I really want to pick a country and give it a chance when I could waste 2-5 years finding out it wasn't for me. Having spent so long in Thailand and been attached to it for 3 decades, I know where the boundaries are and they are different in those other countries. The appeal of Thailand is thus perhaps my own inertia, the security of familiarity and though I can't go back to my unspoilt Andaman Islands, sometimes it is better not to try to retrace the past, though forging ahead into completely new territories might be a step too far.

For a decade I loved Bangkok. To me, it was Mallorca on steroids and it took the unlawfulness of Magalluf and added spices and lime juice to create a cocktail that was as much hedonistic as it was addictive. That was the 1990s. Since then, I have been in a sort of love / hate relationship with Bangkok, loving it for weeks, months and even perhaps years before swinging about turn and needing to get out. Once I was out however, that feeling of desire for old Bangkok came slowly or sometimes quickly back. And so my world turned. I have the opportunity, perhaps, to spend the UK summer in Bangkok. I cannot change the dates as I am a single parent to a teenage daughter (16) who will accompany me and though she may go and see her mama in the jungle for a week or two, it would mainly be us alone. We've done beaches, lots of beaches and more luxury hotels than you can swing a a cat at but self catering in Bangkok for just a couple of months is stupid or I think it is. I used to live in the JW Marriott and I know most decent hotels can conjure up a monthly figure which is a huge discount against the normal rate and we'd have a combined 4 months of booking to leverage. My guess is that I'd get a decent room, breakfast and lounge access, 25% or more off everything bought and free laundry etc. for around 150k to 200k a month for 2 rooms. Or I rent a large apartment and forego the on site room service etc. But what to do with my time and how to entertain a 21st century internet connected teenager in Bangkok ? Malls and cinema are good for a bour 2 days then we are both done, save the cinema, which can be repeated. I know Bangkok has 1000s of things to do but I'm out of touch and I couldn't care less about another bloody temple. Equally, I no longer desire to sit in Soi 4 bars every day. Help me with some ideas to see if Bangkok can inspire me once again.

I have no property in Thailand now. I was last there for a month in August 2022. I loved the warmth and the food of course but I quickly lost interest in the people or what they were doing and rather counted the dates until my return flight. I was intending to look at a new place, a couple of places actually. There is a very beautiful house and land outside Hua Hin which reminds me of Spain with the view of the mountains and memories of a happier life. In a relative sense the house is not hugely expensive and is certainly more than I would ever require but I feel it would be a prison of sorts and I would either have to fill it with a partner I don't have or suffer the isolation alone. Or at least until Somchai decided he'd rather have what I have. Built it and they will come or so the saying goes but in Thailand, setting up a life for a family without first having that family can mean poor decisions swiftly follow. I know I could get lucky and find someone who swapped their time and affection for security and so forth and I am not delusional to think that is not the same the world over but it isn't enough to put me into house ownership once again. So I read this latest saga about being able to buy land if you do this or do that or qualify this way or that and I turn the page because I have heard it all before. Same same but different the locals say, or at least they used to.

As an extension of the Friday night where nigh on no-one might actually turn up to scheduled meetings in pre mobile phone days when you'd have to return to the internet cafe to check a message to see if or why someone from overseas hadn't turned up etc., it would take a lot to bring people together now, age and other shit aside. In truth, technology may make working together easier but it drives people apart because you can do so much without ever meeting. Back in the day, merely 20 years ago, you had to be there and people crossed continents on the back of a promise not lightly given and not likely broken. Today, you couldn't get 5 guys living in London to meet up in London so what hope is there for a meet in Bangkok. Strangely enough, I'm one of the daft loons who might well turn up. Trouble is, I might be on my own !