Theyreallrubbish

Just a thought, but if confronted by a car full of people and you're on your own you might decide discretion is the better part of valor.

I'm sure the OPs relatives are lovely people, but we can't know how they reacted and they did outnumber the Merc driver and shootings and other acts of violence over traffic accidents aren't exactly unknown.

Also, the bottom line is that they hit him from behind.  There has to be really clear evidence of extraordinary bad driving by the person in front for it not to be the driver behind's fault, and no evidence has been presented, in this thread at least.

If you're heading up to Chiang Mai on Highway 1, Ayutthaya is an obvious one.  The old capital north of Bangkok and world heritage site.

If you're going via Sisaket then presumably Udon then you might take Highway 12, which goes through some spectacular mountain scenery and Sukhothai is a slight diversion on the way.  The capital before Ayutthaya.  Not as many ruins or attractions though.

Obviously, if you're not interested in history, then ignore this.

The big temple was interesting and I'm usually all "templed out", but this one had preserved a lot of orginal old materials, and it gave a real sense of what temple life used to be like.

One worrying thing is that they have a chedi that is hollow and inside light comes through a small hole and acts as a "camera obscura" and flips the image.

A Thai man I was with told me that this was magic and nobody knows how it works.  I told him its been known how this works for 100s of years, its a camera obscura.  He looked a bit crestfallen that I ruined his belief it was really magic.

The worrying part?  That he's in his final couple of years training to be an airline pilot!

Yeah, I paid 27,000 or so for the V Series Motorola many years ago, and a bit more for the Motorola Microtac Elite a few years before that.

Compare to the Samsung Galaxy S2 I bought last year for 17,900 which does more than my laptop could do back then.

My experiences over several years.

Had a 350 sq meter apartment on Sukhumvit and had a maid live in a room just outside the front door for 4000 a month.  Cleaned every day and laundry.  Old woman probably in her 50s.  Really only working an hour or two a day, plus laundry time.

Had a 3 bed house in the suburbs of Bangkok and had a maid come in for 5 half days a week for cleaning and laundry (She was about 19 and lived with her family nearby and went to school for half the day).  Again 4000 a month.

Had a 200 sqm condo in Chiang Mai and a team of 3 would come in twice a week for 2 hours or so to clean, plus laundry.  They'd also sometimes come in for additional times at no charge to do special jobs such as clean all the windows or check and clean after a big rainstorm.  They ust arrived at the door.  Didn't tell me they were coming in advance, and I didn't ask them to do it, they would just decide on their own to do it.  2000 a month total.  Two were in their 30s and worked seriously and there was one 18 year old younger sister who didn't seem to work but just wore very skimpy shorts and pretended to mop in front of me as I watched TV!

All cried when I left and wanted to move with me, so they were obviously happy with the wage and conditions.

I'd give bonuses of 500 Baht to the Bangkok staff (it was 10 years ago) or 1000 Baht to the Chiang Mai staff (just a couple of years ago, and total, not each) on the big Thai holidays, so another 2-4000 a year.  Only a small amount of money and not agreed to, so I think that it came as an unexpected bonus made it really appreciated and made me look very generous for a pittance!

They rarely took holidays, but I never said no if they wanted to go up country for a week or a few days, but as I said, they rarely asked.

Never had a problem with theft ever.  Do take a copy of the ID card on first being hired.

None of these staff could speak any English.

All the staff were found by GFs at the time, but stayed on after the GFs left with no problems.  (Other than the one in the apartment in Bangkok who was paid by my ex-gf to give her reports on what I was doing!)