Feb
19
Okay, Okay, I’m Alive!
February 19, 2008 |
Taking some time off blogging seems like it’s impossible with folks from all over the worlds demanding news from the Isaan Countryside. But despite living in a sleepy village, we have been really busy lately.
First off it was to solve my pass port and visa hassles. On the 6th of February we took off for Cambodia to get me another 30 day breathing space, and time to go to the Norwegian Embassy in Bangkok to get me a new passport, something that became necessary after Nan decided my old one needed a good run trough the washing machine.
We completed our Bangkok sortie this Saturday, and now I have a brand new passport, and my visa on arrival stamp was graciously transferred at the immigration office in Korat. Where they also advice me that a good spanking for was in order for Nan.
Next up we came home, and have now embarked on the next project. A new fence and wall to keep the rats with feathers off the property (bloody chickens). So for two days now we have hacked, slashed and burned away at the assorted barbed wire, bamboo poles, torn brushes, corrugated iron bits, that constitute our current perimeter barrier.
We have also taken delivery of 80 meters of chain link fence, and enough concrete fence poles to give me nightmares (guess who has to dig the holes, as nan is to cheap to pay a kid 100 baht a day to dig them). The rest of it will be simple cinder-block wall out front. Well it will be 20 meters long. And covered in stucko cement and painted…well you guessed it…pink!
Tomorrow I will have a short respite though. I need some work gloves before we continue. I have blisters on blisters in my hands…well the part of the skin on them that is not cut to shreds on barbed wire, thorns and sharp bits of bamboo. Same goes for my legs.
In between all of that I have embarked on another web project, and found some time to fly my RC plane model. Well, I am pursuing that hobby with a passion at the moment. So that’s been eating up all my blogging time.
Okay, that’s it!
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Comments
13 Comments so far
Flat Leaver!!! >:oD
Hej Rune,
Good to hear everything is ok with you and Nan. How considerate of the immigration office to suggest a good ol’ spanking =D Sounds like a good idea - or as my wife would say: “Good idea for you, not good idea for me!”…
Ah, they’re back!
How long can you run this “30 day visa” game?
Thank God !!!
Don’t scare us like that again……
“I have blisters on blisters in my hands…well the part of the skin on them that is not cut to shreds on barbed wire, thorns and sharp bits of bamboo. Same goes for my legs.”
Yeah, seems worth the foregone 100 baht per day. Be a man… you’re the one with the money for God sakes. Sorry for the tough love, but you live in a pink house…
And soon we will have a pink wall on the street side to go with the pink house…
Onkel Dag, the 30 day stamps are not really a visa, it is a visa excempt stamp. You can stay in the kingdom for a total of 90 days over a 180 day period. But each stay can not exceed 30 days. Hence you have to cross the border and return every 30 days.
So next month we go to the Thai embassy in Laos to fix me up with a tourist visa. Those do not count against your 90 days. If I get a double entry visa, I can stretch that out for up to six months…
I think you are going to find that you will only qualify for a 30 day extension on top of the 60-day tourist visa. This method gives you 360 days per year in Thailand.
Most people on the OLD 30,30,30,30, etc, switched to 60 tourist, 30 extension and repeat. Maybe you should look into that method as well if you don’t have a non-imm B, which by the way is not that hard to get.
I am aware of the 60+30. But with a double entry
entry Visa you can do the following. A tourist visa is valid for use for 3 months (90 days). That is, you have to cross a Thai border within 90 days of it being issued.
So if you cross the Thai border and stamp into Thailand the same day it is issued at the embassy, you have 60 days. Then you get a 30 day extension.
Before the 90 days that your double entry visa is valid for, you cross the border and stamp out again. You can then use that same Visa to enter Thailand (double entry) provided it is no more than 90 days since it was issued…and you get another 60 days that can be extended for another 30. Hey presto, you stay in Thailand for 180 days.
The clue here is to get a double entry tourist visa, and time your entries correctly.
Since I am married to a Thai, I could get a non immigrant “o”, but have to prove income of 40K baht a month…I do not have an income stream, so can not document that. I would probably get the visa, but would not get it extended…as far as I have understood it.
Am I reading this right; I fly in to Thailand, on the plane they give me a visa form thats good for 30 days.Before or when that 30 daze is up, I go to the embassy ask for a double entry visa thats good for 60 days,I ask for a 30 day extension on the 60 day double entry visa,when I leave the embassy Im good for 90 daze, I head straight for the border and stamp out then in, get an extension and im good for 180 daze??? OR do I wait until the 90 daze is up, make a boarder run and get another 90 daze?
PS: are you going to post pictures of your PINK wall??? LOL,LOL,LOL
You bet I am!
Yes Dago, you ask for a double entry visa at the embassy. The rule is you have to spend your visa within 90 days. That is you have to stamp into Thailand within 90 days of it being issued.
On first arrival they give you 60 days in country. This you can extend to 30 days at an immigration office.
When your 60+30 is spent but BEFORE the original visa expires it’s validity (you exit Thailand, then enter again, you will be given another 60 days…which can be exyended another 30 at an immigration office.
The clue is to spend both your entries within the 90 days time frame that you double entry visa must be used.
Good to have you back!
hi rune! we have the same problem with the chickens of the people next door. he raises fighting cocks, and of course has a swarm of support troops. my wife is always throwing rocks at them, i kind of cringe, because i LIKE chickens. but they do eat the plants and crap on the porch. so i have to keep my cool. there has been talk of a fence here also, but a fence not only keeps the chickens out, it keeps US in too. we like our next door neighbors, they are distantly related (like most village thai’s)it’s just the people back of us that are annoying. and i would get to dig the holes also. gotta have gloves. i brought some good work gloves from the states with me last time. the kind that fit my big falang hands snuggly, made of good leather, and not a bunch of different colored scraps sewn together.
what is your web project?
everytime i try to get the visa thing figured out, my head starts going round in circles. well be broke by the time my 90 days are up anyway. so i have to go back to USA for work.
do you work with de-mining groups? your name appears with those listings when you google it.
hey, i have a rude shower rigged up with a submersible pump, some hose and a 100 liter stone water jar. i’ll have to send you photo.