Gaybutton

Aha! Now I get it. You're writing an article of your own. Title - "How to Be Evasive" , , , Oh well, since I'm just one of those 'Damned Yankees," you already know I'm not going to post like a refined southern gentleman. Even I don't expect them to update the maps every month. I wouldn't complain if they updated them quarterly or perhaps even semi annually. Meanwhile, I'm still waiting for them to make certain the maps are accurate even once. That hasn't happened. As far as I can tell, Nicky's Gay Thailand always manages to have his maps correct. Why can't Mr. Barnes? I have no feedback about the rest of their magazine. He didn't ask for that. He asked only for feedback about the maps.

Will we? I stand by what I said and the way I said it, Yankee or not. I think the way I said it is entirely appropriate. You seem to want to turn this thread into an "about Gaybutton" topic. It isn't about me. It's about the maps. Instead of worrying about my feedback or way I said it, how about posting your own feedback.

I don't agree with that at all. Not only is that beside the entire point of the topic, but just because you've decided to label my board as a business does not make it so. A business is there to try to monetarily profit. I don't profit at all. As a matter of fact, since I'm the one who pays for my board and everything associated with it, not only do I not profit, but I knowingly and voluntarily operate at a loss. What I do is not a profession, but publication of a profit-making magazine is. If people rely on me, it's because I at least do my damndest to keep my board accurate and up to date. When I'm wrong I admit it and take responsibility for it whether it's my fault or not. Again, that is beside the point of this topic. This topic exists because Mr. Barnes asked for feedback about his maps. I've given my feedback. Will yours be to heap praise and tell him all about the fabulous job he's doing with his maps? My opinion about his maps is they are out of date and inaccurate whether they will continue to appear in the magazine or online. All I see is a bunch of lame excuses as to why that is and I think if he can't take the responsibility to make sure they're up to date and accurate, then he shouldn't be publishing them. None of that has anything to do with me or my board. If you disagree with my feedback about the maps, then I suggest you post your own.

Yes, and I think the nastiness is perfectly justified. I see no difficulty in keeping their maps updated and I see no excuse for failing to do it. That's what they, not us, but they are supposed to be doing. If these maps are the result of relying on their readers to supply the information, then it's not quite working out, is it? I could understand if there were just one or two errors, but these maps are a disgrace. I'll say it again: It's their responsibility. If they can't keep their maps accurate, then don't publish them. That's my feedback, which they asked for, which they got, and which I fully expect to be ignored. If they want to continue publishing half-assed information and continue giving excuses for it, that's their affair.

Your entire post is my idea of a load of horse hockey. You've been appreciating our patience since the day you started your magazine. Visiting every listing personally is exactly what you should be doing or paying someone to do it for you. You're the one publishing the maps. The rest of your post is nothing but excuses for being unprofessional and failing to take responsibility for what you publish. Again, if you cannot, or will not, make sure your informantion is accurate, then since you're a profit making enterprise don't publish information you know to be inaccurate. Who do you think benefits by inaccurate information? You asked for feedback. Now you've got it. What were you expecting?

You won't get any from me. The accuracy of your publication is your responsibility, not ours. You've been told that before too. Your response was, and apparently still is, that you rely on your readers to send you the information. In my opinion that is unprofessional, especially for a profit making publication. You're the one who decided to go into the magazine business. If you are truly interested in professionalism and accuracy, go out and get the information yourself or open your wallet and pay staff to get it for you. I can't speak for others, but as for me, I'm not here to be a de facto free staff member for you.

I think that would be a very good idea for all the magazines that publish maps. Include accurate GPS coordinates for the venues listed - with emphasis on accurate. I'll return Mr. Barnes' "best wishes" once he starts taking responsibilty for the accuracy of what he publishes.

Ok, since you asked here's my feedback. Your maps are still inaccurate and incomplete. Also, if anyone wants to use the maps anyway, how are they supposed to do that if they're not in the magazine? Are you expecting people to come for a holiday and then spend time on a computer to search your maps? I've been telling you about the faulty maps ever since you first started up your magazine and to this day they're still faulty. If you cannot, or will not, provide accurate, up to date maps, then maybe you should consider entirely eliminating the maps from your publication.

There are certainly ways around that. Before even going to the beach, simply ask the boy you want to meet if he will wear speedos for you. You could also buy one or two, place photos of them in your own Gay Romeo profile, and ask the boy if he will wear one of them for you once he meets you at the beach. He can always change into them at a nearby restroom. If he needs coaxing, an offer of a few hundred extra baht can be very persuasive. You might be interested in the "Buy Sexy Underwear" topic on the Sawatdee forum. See: http://sawatdeenetwork.com/forum/buy-sexy-underwear-t31617.html

Have you ever seen his friend? The friend interests me much more than he does.

Here's another photo of him. Nothing wrong with his friend either. You're luckier than I am. I've never spotted him (or his friend), although I sure wish I had. Maybe he doesn't live in Pattaya and only comes once in a while, which could also explain why he's not seen very often. Of course, if I happen to spot either one of them, I'll cross my fingers and hope he accepts my personal "Welcome to Pattaya" offer . . . [

There is a topic on my board that includes several posts explaining how to prevent that from happening. See: http://www.gaybuttonthai.com/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=6998

To answer the questions about transferring money via online banking, it is quite simple to transfer money from your Thai bank account to someone else's Thai bank account, whether within the same bank or a different Thai bank. With most banks it works the same way - with a few minor variations. Once you log in to your account, there will be some sort of tab that usually says "Transfers" or "Funds Transfers" or something similar. Once you click on that tab, in most cases what you do next to set it up is self explanatory. For transferring money to other banks, usually there is a drop-down list and you click on the bank where you want the transfer sent. You'll of course need the boy's account number. Most of the time you won't have to worry about his name as long as you have his account number. It is usually not mandatory, but you should also have the boy's telephone number. When transferring money to someone else's account, most banks will include an option to have a text message sent to his phone that will let him know money has been placed into his account, the source of the money, and the amount he received. In most cases, in order to set up the transfer and to make the actual transfer, there will be OTPs. OTP means "One Time Password." That password is usually sent by text message to your mobile phone. If for some reason the OTP cannot be sent to your mobile phone, such as you're out of the country or you don't have a mobile phone, some banks offer other options and some don't. If your account happens to be in a "some don't" bank, you'll have to contact their customer service to see if some other arrangement can be made. You also can make transfers from your own account to someone else's account, including accounts at different banks, at ATMs, but you can only do that at an ATM from your own bank. In other words, if your bank account is a Bangkok Bank account, you can make the transfer at any Bangkok Bank ATM, but you won't be able to do it from any other bank's ATM. That text message sent to his mobile phone is always an option at ATMs too.

Please do. The Malaysia is my hotel of choice, but I always stay in a standard room. I'll be very interested to know what the premium rooms are like. If possible, I hope you include photos

Also no money boys in the parking lot and not even any money boys hanging around on the soi just outside the hotel - at least not while I was there. Actually, I consider that a negative. I liked having the money boys around.

I stayed at the Malaysia just two weeks ago. LoveThailand's post is spot on. A standard room is 850 baht. For me, the Malaysia is my hotel of choice. It is rather spartan and kind of dumpy, but that's fine with me. I'm the type who couldn't care less about luxuries. I'm only in the room to sleep and . . . well, you guess. All I care about is whether the room has air conditioning, a decent bathroom, and a TV. The Malaysia has all those, plus their restaurant-bar is open 24 hours. That is not the case at the Pinnacle unless they've changed since the last time I stayed there. The Malaysia is more laid back and friendly, kind of a family atmosphere, whereas the Pinnacle is more "all business." The rooms in the Pinnacle have safes. The rooms in the Malaysia do not, although they have individual lobby safes behind the front desk - no charge for their use and you have 24 hour access. The Pinnacle is much more luxurious than the Malaysia. If you decide to stay at the Pinnacle, instead of booking through the hotel or a hotel booking company, book through Jimmy. Jimmy is Thai, but his English is fluent and his office is in the Pinnacle. He will get you your room at a substantially discounted price. When you arrive at the hotel, you simply tell the desk clerk you registered through Jimmy. You'll pay Jimmy, not the hotel itself, although the front desk may require a room key deposit. In my experience, sometimes they do and sometimes they don't. Jimmy's telephone number is 01 859 6585 Email: jimmyfirst@hotmail.com A few tips: 1. I advise calling Jimmy, even if it has to be an international call. He has a reputation for either taking forever to respond to Email and sometimes not responding at all. Call him between 10:00am and 3:00pm Thailand time. 2. You will know exactly how much to pay Jimmy before going to the hotel and you will know his room number. Instead of entering his office and paying him directly, put the exact amount of cash in an envelope (there will be one in the room desk), write your name and room number on the envelope, and slide it under his door - even if he is open. He'll get it. Why? Because Jimmy will talk your ear off and keep you waiting forever while he's busy taking telephone calls. If you want to put the money directly in Jimmy's hands, be prepared for it to take at least an hour or so before you can get out of there. 3. If you intend to bring "guests" to your room at the Pinnacle, book a room for two. It doesn't cost much more, but there will be no hassle about bringing anyone to your room. If the "guest" spends the night with you, booking a room for two will give you a breakfast voucher for him too. There is another option. Directly across the street from the Malaysia Hotel is a fairly new hotel - The Ibis. They forbid any smoking on their premesis at all - even outdoors. Smokers have to go off their property to light up. I don't have an Email address for the Ibis. Telephone number: 02 610 5188 Fax: 02 610 5189 I've never stayed there, so I don't know their prices or whether they're gay friendly. Christianpfc, do you know?

Maybe they will for Chinese New Year. I've never heard of mandatory dinners for Chinese New Year before. But Christmas and New Year - good luck getting them to back down for those.

Next logical question: In Thailand, if they put on these mandatory dinners for Christmas, why don't they do that for any Buddhist holidays? In a predominately Buddhist country wouldn't that make more sense if they were concerning themselves about honoring religion? I believe the only thing they are really honoring is profit.

The trick is to do your "this time of year" booking early, months in advance if you can, both with accommodations and flights. At the time of booking, unless you know with certainty your accommodation doesn't put on these kinds of dinners, I'd ask about it. If they say they don't do these dinners, I'd try to get that response in writing. While I realize it's not possible for everyone to make bookings far in advance, the sooner you can the better your chances are of not ending up stuck in an accommodation you don't want. The closer you get to Christmas, the more difficult it becomes to find vacancies where you want to stay, sometimes difficult to find vacancies at all, and more difficult to find flights. If you can't find hotel space, one idea is to try to book a condo for a month. Most condos require a minimum of one month. You might not be able to stay for a full month and would have to pay for a full month, but depending on how long you're going to stay, that can still be less expensive than staying in a hotel and a lot better than ending up in some dump far away from where you want to be. If you're going to stay for more than two or three weeks, renting a condo might be a better "first choice" than a hotel. You'll usually pay half the price, or even less, than you would pay in a hotel and you for sure wouldn't have to worry about mandatory dinners or bringing a 'guest' to your room. Some have maid service and some don't, but it's not very expensive to hire a maid to come in a couple days a week. Of course, perhaps a good alternative to a maid might be hiring a, shall we say - less than modestly clad young gentleman to do the room cleaning . . . By the way, despite the collapse of the ruble, Pattaya is already starting to fill up with Russians anyway.

I agree. When I check into a hotel, I'm not there to be forced to pay for a dinner or anything else I don't want. I can't imagine that the hotels doing this don't get a lot of complaints, especially if they are deceptive about it or don't tell their 'guests' until they're checking in. In my opinion, that is sheer fraud. And they're doing it during the season when their room prices are inflated to start with. I think one of the worst jobs at these hotels must be the desk clerks. They're the ones stuck with dealing with the complaints and telling the 'guest' you're going to pay for the dinner whether you eat it or not and whether you like it or not. Do these hotels think this practice pleases their 'guests'? Does it please anyone reading this topic? My message to these hotels: Don't do me any favors. I repeat my rhetorical question: Who asked them to put on these mandatory dinners in the first place? There are some aspects of the holiday season where I think Scrooge had a good point. Many hotels do things for the 'convenience' of their guests, most of which to me is nothing more than a disguised rip-off. Room refrigerators come to mind. Many hotels stock the refrigerator with snack items, and if you take any of them you'll pay around ten times the price you would pay if you walk across the street and buy the same thing at a 7-Eleven. Tiz the season to be jolly, fa la la la la, la la la la - especially if you're a hotel owner raking in the seasonal price profits and most likely pocketing all of it without giving the staff a single extra baht.

I don't know whether there is a downside, but I took a look. You have to download and install their own movie player. I don't trust that. If your friend did install it, maybe you can check for viruses or trojans and let us know. I also noticed that many of what appear to be movies are not quite what they seem at first glance. If you take a close look you'll see that a lot of them are only trailers, not the full movie. You are able to view some of the trailers without downloading their player. They are voice-dubbed over in Thai. That, of course, would work well for Thais, but probably not so well if you want to view the movie yourself.

"I don't believe Courtyard by Marriott has a compulsory dinner nor charges for anything similar." In that post Michael didn't say anything about it being optional. He said it is required. That comes across as compulsory to me. If it isn't, that line still generates and justifies discussion of hotels forcing dinners on people, doesn't it? I'd say we're right on topic. I also see no point in a discussion as to whether we're on topic or not. As I said, if the moderators say we're not on topic, then we're not on topic. I think it's ridiculous for us to be arguing about it. That, for sure, is not on topic.

Seems to me we're precisely on topic. Whether we're on or off topic, isn't that for the moderators to decide?

I agree about booking somewhere else, but it may not be easy to avoid. All too often people don't know about these dinners until they arrive at the hotel. Not everyone knows to ask and often the hotel doesn't volunteer the information. I wonder how many people reading this topic didn't know about the existence of these dinners until we started posting about it. Until I started coming to Thailand, I had never heard of this sort of thing. These dinners are usually "offered" for Christmas and New Year's Eve. I've never seen them at any other time of year. Meanwhile, that's right in the middle of the highest part of high season. Finding a room elsewhere may not be so easy. And if you used a credit card to make a deposit for the room, if you go elsewhere you can kiss your deposit goodbye.

The larger issue is the fact that many resort hotels in Thailand do force a holiday dinner on their 'guests.' Many of these hotels charge their guests for it whether they want to go or not. You can eat somewhere else if you wish, but you'll still be charged for the mandatory dinner. That's not necessarily all bad. I stayed at such a hotel one time. The dinner was mandatory, but it was also excellent and the price was very reasonable. But since I was not aware of the dinner until after I had checked in, because of it that was the last time I ever stayed in that hotel. The problem is when you find yourself staying at such a hotel, but you were not informed in advance about the dinner. Not many people appreciate that little surprise and knowing nothing about it until after they've checked in. How would you like to be someone who has friends in Thailand, had planned in advance to have your holiday dinner with them, and then discover you're in a forced dinner hotel? What if it's a dinner you can't even eat? Maybe you become ill and can't eat at all. Maybe for religious reasons you can eat only kosher or halal food. Maybe you're on a diet. Maybe you simply don't want a big dinner. If the hotel informs you before you commit to a booking or offers a holiday dinner, but it isn't mandatory, then no problem. But when a hotel fails to inform its guests in advance, only one word comes to my mind: SCAM. After all, who asked these hotels to put on such a dinner in the first place?