Thai Life
Thailand guides, travel tips, cultural insights, and essential local information—discover everything you need to know about living, visiting, and experiencing the Land of Smiles. Get the latest from The Thaiger, your trusted source for Thailand guides.
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Sponsored Planning to extend your Thai visa? Why health insurance is more important than ever
If you plan to stay longer in Thailand, having health insurance is now more important than ever. Thai immigration often asks for proof of medical coverage when you apply to extend your visa. This applies to many types of visas,...
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Blazing saddles: Cycling to Sunday brunch
PHUKET: Ahhhh! At last it’s Sunday and Phuketians can kick back, relax a little and start to enjoy all the glorious things that living in a tropical paradise is supposed to offer. The trouble is that in these febrile times of traffic hassles, construction, road works and economic and environmental decline, many Phuketians find themselves increasingly stressed and time-starved. Sundays…
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Excuse Buster: Obesity may be more complicated than we think
PHUKET: ‘The cause of obesity is eating too many calories and not exercising enough’. That’s still the current theory and what I was taught 20 years ago. It was the focus of my work with clients until I began to look beyond the physics and delve into other factors. These included the role of hormones such as thyroid, insulin, leptin…
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Profile: Sriya Yongsakul – Building her own empire
PHUKET: Born and bred in Phuket, Sriya Yongsakul is a well-known boating personality on the island. Hailing from the family that runs Phuket Boat Lagoon, Ms Sriya is a businesswoman, mother and sports enthusiast. After spending her childhood in Phuket, she left for Bangkok to earn a bachelor’s degree in accounting at Chulalongkorn University, and then to England to obtain…
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Looking back: Always there for his own people
PHUKET: Last month, on October 13, 2016, His Majesty King Bhumibol Adulyadej passed away. As the royal procession brought his body from Siriraj Hospital to the Dusit Maha Prasat Throne Hall in the Grand Palace, a surreal gloom blanketed the city of Bangkok as hundreds of thousands of people lined the streets to pay their respects. The most vibrant city…
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On Deck: His Majesty was an inspiration to sailors
PHUKET: In a recent column, I wrote about a sailing dinghy called “Vega 2”, which was built by His Majesty King Bhumibol Adulyadej and which in 1967 he raced to gold medal success at the 4th Southeast Asia Peninsular Games (now the SEA Games). Much has changed in Thailand since I wrote that column (story here). His Majesty King Bhumibol…
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Profile: The man who met the King
PHUKET: Ngeem Damrongkaset is a member of Rawai sea gypsy community. Now in his 70s, he had a chance to meet His Majesty King Bhumibol Adulyadej when he first visited Phuket in 1959. “I was about 12 years old at the time,” says Mr Ngeem. “I can still picture it clearly. Every person in our community had gathered together and…
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By The Book: Renting a villa in Phuket
PHUKET: Renting a villa or apartment long term is very popular in Thailand, especially in resort areas such as Phuket, Pattaya, Hua Hin and Koh Samui. Many would-be buyers are deciding to hold off and rent for a year or more while they get to know the area and learn the ways of Thailand without so much risk. Renting long…
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Keep It Green: Mangroves – a vital eco-system component
PHUKET: Coral reefs attract far more publicity than mangrove swamps. After all, coral is spectacularly beautiful, and affords protection to some of the world’s most spectacular fishes – clown fish, parrot fish, wrasse and literally hundreds of other species. From the air, mangrove swamps also look appealing, but close up are muddy and turbid with unsightly roots and often have…
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Law, Life and Society: Beggars to get registered
PHUKET: The Thai government recently passed a law revising the country’s rules on begging in public areas. The law replaces the Beggar Control Act of 1941, which punished gangs and individuals for trafficking in people to work as beggars. People who wish to beg for money on the streets are now required to obtain licenses to do so. This not…
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Cycling to raise funds for tsunami victims
PHUKET: Charitable organizations all over the world receive thousands in aid to keep their operations running smoothly. However, advocates of one such organization, called the ‘Happy World Tour’, that represents an orphanage in Phuket, takes funding to the next level via projects across nations and continents. This year, three cyclists have decided to cycle around the world. The orphanage in…
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Profile: His Majesty through foreign eyes
PHUKET: In surveying the scope of achievements made by His Majesty the King, the incalculable benefits he wrought for Thailand and its people rightly take precedent. But no picture of his 70-year reign can be complete without appreciating the central role he commanded in Thailand’s foreign relations. His Majesty not only set the tone for warm ties with foreign leaders…
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Phuket graced by four royal visits
PHUKET: Phuket was graced by four visits of His Majesty King Bhumibol Adulyadej during his 70-year reign; the first was 57 years ago, on Sunday, March 8, 1959, accompanied by Queen Sirikit. The royal couple took a car ferry across the Pak Pra channel from Phang Nga to Phuket, arriving at Tah Chat Chai at 4pm, where they rested for…
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Property Watch: Impact of weather on the property market
PHUKET: A lot is said about the negatives and positives of the business and economics of the Phuket property market, but it seems that less is said about the realities of the weather here on our green and often wet island, and how that impacts on property. What is said is often encapsulated in a sugar-coated cloud of positivity –…
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Profile: Rich Cramp – Keeping our beaches clean
PHUKET: Rich Cramp is the Phuket organizer of Trash Hero, an organization dedicated to solving the global garbage problem. He has a degree in English Literature and currently teaches at HeadStart International School in Phuket. He spent part of his childhood in Thailand, before moving to Hong Kong, then Taiwan and finally settling in England. “I moved back to Thailand…
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Gardening: A flowery conundrum
PHUKET: A good friend of mine once had a roof garden in Phuket, with trellises completely covered in a vigorous climber replete with lush green foliage and masses of golden trumpet-shaped flowers. The growth was so dense that it was home to at least thirty pairs of nesting sun-birds. Its name? That’s easy. Knowledgeable gardeners among you will be saying:…
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Blazing Saddles: The bias against e-bikes
PHUKET: Like many cycling enthusiasts, I have long held a prejudice against electric bicycles. Somehow the whole idea of adding a motor of any kind into the primal equation of man, muscle and machine seemed just plain wrong and indeed a bit akin to cheating. Surely the whole concept of the bicycle is of a wonderful enhancement of man’s ability…
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Profile: Sebastien Tronchet – No stranger to the land of smiles
PHUKET: Hailing from Marseille, France, 38-year-old Sebastien Tronchet is the General Manager of the Grand Mercure Phuket Patong. He is no stranger to the land of smiles; he took his chances in Thailand 15 years ago and never looked back. His only regret is that he didn’t take the leap 10 years before he did. With a bachelor’s degree in…
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Across the Land: In the Departure lounge to Damascus
PHUKET: On the 16th of September, Phuket officially opened the much anticipated and delayed new Phuket International terminal. The terminal is expected to accommodate up to 5 million international passengers a year while, the old terminal will accommodate 7.5 million domestic passengers. Firsthand experience arriving at the new international terminal two days after the official opening left me a little…
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Looking back: Crisis at the Front Palace
PHUKET: Toward the end of the year 1874, Siam was heading for a crisis that threatened to plunge the kingdom into civil war. The roots of this crisis dated back several years when King Chulalongkorn’s father, King Mongkut, proclaimed his brother as ‘second king’, with rank and title equal to that of his own. King Mongkut’s brother became known as…
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Excuse Buster: Unclogging your body’s blocked pipes
PHUKET: “Don’t put paper down the toilet or the pipes will get blocked and it will get messy and costly.” This was one of the first messages from our first landlord upon arrival in Thailand. Not a good situation for the body either – also messy and costly on our health. So how often should you have a number two?…
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Regional tourism growth dominated by Chinese
PHUKET: Continuing growth in the region’s tourism industry is being driven mainly by China, according to the latest CBRE ‘Hotel Megatrends’ viewpoint report, released in September. The total number of Chinese outbound tourists rose by 10 per cent year-on-year to 128 million in 2015, while spending grew by 26 per cent over the same period to reach US$292 billion. China…
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Profile: Edwin Wiek and his love for animals
PHUKET: Edwin Wiek, 50, is the founder and director of Wildlife Friends Foundation of Thailand (WFFT). WFFT is based in Petchaburi and Laos, but Edwin has been involved in several animal rescue cases in Phuket. The latest case is that of Milo, an orangutan that was freed from the Phuket zoo and found abandoned in a forest. In 2008, Edwin…
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Thailand’s largest property portal
property.thethaiger.com is Thailand’s largest property portal, in six languages, covering the Kingdom’s hot property areas, mainly in Bangkok, Phuket, Pattaya, Koh Samui, Chiang Mai and Hua Hin. The real estate market in Thailand, with all its bumps along the way, has proven itself to be robust with genuine growth over the past 20 years, especially in the main property markets…
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By The Book: Opportunities abound as island grows
PHUKET: Anyone living in or visiting Phuket will notice the amount of construction work going on around the island. From property development to schools, hospitals, marinas and roads – all types of infrastructure on the island are undergoing development. For several years now Phuket’s residents have grown used to the traffic diversions around the construction of Phuket’s underpasses at Darasamut,…
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Law, Life and Society: Understanding the Thai concept of dowry
PHUKET: A misunderstanding of a Thai marriage custom nearly broke up the relationship between two of my clients. I represented an American in his application for a fiance visa for his Thai fiance. After successfully obtaining the visa, the Thai fiance requested 200,000 baht for her family before going to the United States to get married. The American became outraged…
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Diving: Mermaids spotted off Phuket
PHUKET: There are real mermaids out there. It’s a profession that some freedivers have found themselves slipping into. Phuket-based PADI scuba diving instructor Kate Gray, who was crowned Miss Germany 2010, made a big splash here a couple of years ago as ‘Mermaid Kat’ and opened Phuket’s Mermaid Kat Academy in 2012.“I first started ‘mermaiding’ as a hobby but it…
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Southeast Asia’a climbing capital
PHUKET: Contrary to popular belief, Phuket is not the place to be for rock climbing. The island’s jungled interior peaks rise in an almost Appalachian profile, with relatively tame gradients to their summits. For all the international hulaballoo it receives, Phuket is almost a complete contrast to neighboring Krabi Province, whose limestone columns rise vertically out of impenetrable jungle and…
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Profile: Sirirat Rattanasuanjig – it’s all on the cards
Fortune teller Sirirat Rattanasuanjig, or ‘Adina’ as she is better known, had a near-death experience when she was a child. She was a bystander as a couple were quarreling. One of them had a knife which ended up embedded in her chest. She was rushed to the hospital and nearly died from her injury, but eventually pulled through. The near-death…
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Phuket public health system goes digital
PHUKET: With the aim of utilizing IT and innovation to improve the healthcare sector, and public healthcare services in particular, the Software Industry Promotion Agency (SIPA) linked hands with the National Electronic and Computer Technology Center (NECTEC) to develop the Personal Health Record (PHR) system. The system has initially been launched at government hospitals in five provinces, including Phuket, Nakhon…
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Advice for first time triathletes
PHUKET: While the trend in sports and fitness is on the rise in Phuket, many people are still struggling to be fit. The Phuket Gazette caught up with Pruth Kulprasit, a first time triathlete in Phuket, to get some fitness tips for beginners. “I first started cycling in order to lose weight. About a year and a half ago, I…
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