http://www.immigration.go.th/nov2004/2notice/newpro.html Now you can only have 3 30 day visas in a 6 month period. Looks like they are trying to get rid of the long termers.
You can hardly blame them, to be honest. All these westerners coming over, churning up beautiful locations and taking advantage of the Thai economy.
You mean helping the Thai economy, they just want get rid of the hippies and get a load of rich tourists in.
I suppose it is helping their economoy. However... Why do people feel the need to go to such beautiful places and then destroy them with concrete. 5 years ago Thailand had a lot more spirit and individuality in the south. Now it is just concrete and Western perverts with 12 yr old rented ladies.
It's the way of life unfortunately, everywhere is getting concrete, plus it's tha Thai people putting it there to accomadate richer tourists and make the country more westernised. Look at the whole coast of Spain, it's the most horrible eye sore ever. Thailand will no doubt be like that in 20 years time.
Tourism accounts for a huge part of Thailands economy. I remember seeing a story on BBCnews a couple of months ago that was talking about how Thailand was beginning to switch from 'backpacker' budget tourism to be more geared towards package holidays. It seems a new 5 star hotel goes up everyday. I suppose the change in the visas rules reflects this. We can't blame them though, they know they can get more money from the package holidays, so it's now an inevitability. People are still poor in comparison to the west even though Thailands much more developed than it's neighbours. Now they just want to take it to the next level. To be honest I don't really care because I loathed Thailand from the moment I got there; the "western perverts" is just one of a long list of reasons. I hate the sleaze, sex obsession, beer louts, the police (really, they are macho dickheads/proper fascists), the whole place just attracts the type of person I try to get away from when going travelling! The only reason I think these visa rules are a bad thing is because Bangkok is the cheapest air route in the world (or one of) and the gateway to the other countries in the region, plus Thailand has become the free visa-run haven (malaysia-Thailand being completely free) and now people are going to have to start to plan ahead a bit more and not just cross over the border willy-nilly...Not really a big deal though in the grand scheme of things from this point of view...I think the people its going to affect the most is the English teachers in Thailand who are teaching without permits or work visas. They have absolutely no choice now but to apply for work visas or permits. Big problems for long-termers in general. Infact long-terming in Thailand wont be an option anymore, I think this was obviously the idea the government had in mind when they made these new rules. I don't think this bodes well for the neighbouring countries in SE asia. Cambodia has well and truly swung open the doors to package tours (see Angkor, to an extent Sihanoukville, though I dont think Sihanoukville is anything on some of thailands developed beach areas) but still has a long way to go. Even Laos has begun with the package tours and development (first high rise building in the capital)...But now i'm fearing that these countries are now going to be swamped by the backpackers who have rejected Thailands development...And the same will inevitably happen in these countries (though I think we are talking tens of years now). Nevermind though, to be honest i'd rather it happen sooner rather than later and get it over and done with! I think this is the beginning of the end for Thailand as a backpacker destination. It's going to continue to die a slow painful death! No problem though, countries rise, countries fall, wars happen, governments collapse, the landscape shifts...20 years time the next generation of backpacker/long-term destinations will probably be the undeveloped African countries...but fuck knows. It's the impermanent nature of reality
There is a way to get around the new visa rules. If you apply ahead of time, you can get a 60 day tourist visa which then can be extended an additional 30 days without leaving the country when it runs up. After that you go to the 30 day entry stamps that the first poster was talking about, but you have to cross the border to get restamped every 30 days and you can only stay 90 out of 180 days on the entry stamps. Using a combination of these 2 types of visas a person can stay here for 6 months no problem. cc
