WinnieTheKhwai

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This is what we were paying for a basic phone, not too long ago.   And who says the iPhone is too expensive..

Does anyone have experience with this?  Do photo shops typically offer this?  Any recommendations?

I found a billion old negatives and may want to get some back as a proper picture on screen..  (Not talking ancient here, they range roughly 1994-1999.)

Here's yet another excellent topic, if I may say so myself.   I was wondering today if Chiang Mai is just growing and being beautified at a regular healthy rate of development, or that it's actually closer to a complete development and population explosion, with expansion increasing exponentially a la Bangkok in the booming years.   It's hard to tell living here all the time, but even so I can't help but notice all thew new housing developments, roads and shopping malls, and that's just in suburban areas;  also in town things are going at break-neck speed.

Here's something nice to do on a rainy afternoon:  Compare Chiang Mai 4 years ago with today.  How?  By comparing the old Mapjack.com site with the recently updated Google Streetview.  There's about 4 years difference between those, so a really short time by city development standards.  And yet, the differences are remarkable.

Sit back, relax and enjoy.   Then see if you can find some other noteworthy changes within the area that Mapjack covered.

Huay Kaew, near CMU

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Moon Muang, the old Kinnaree dump that was completely renovated.  And the addition of the Tiger Kingdom In Town place.

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Siam TV, on the Southern Moat used to be an empty wasteland where sometimes a market was held.

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Airport Plaza Intersection

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More renovation / beautification, near Thapae Gate

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Ratchamankha Road

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Ratchapakinai Road, near the moat

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We're of course restricted to the area Mapjack covered, so can't see all the development along the ring roads and roads out of town.  It did cover Nimmanhaemin and the CMU area, I think there's probably more good changes to be seen there.

This is NOT my project, but I came across a very slick looking ad for refurbished town homes in downtown Chiang Mai.   Have a look at the website first, and click around to see all the (professionally done) pictures.  Click the ' + ' signs in teh bottom part of the page, then have a look around their site:

Website : http://www.baancharo.../townhouse.html



Now get this, it looks nice right..? The asking price is a cool 7.9 million baht for a townhouse.. Okay they're nicely done, a bit taller than the usual and in a good location downtown near the river and the night bazar.  They're nice, but are they 8-million-baht-nice?

So I went to take a look.  I'm not detracting to the work they did, but on the site it looks like it's a single block:



That's however not the case; there are a couple units in there that they apparently don't own, so those are still un-renovated.  That also gives us a look of what the property looked like 'before' and 'after'.  The 'before' is definitely quite mundane.   Also, while the view to the back is apparently nice, the view to the front.. not so much. (Last pic)

The block:

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Old, unrenovated unit:

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Mix of old and new:

 photo 4.jpg   146.53K   29 downloads

After renovation:

 photo 7.jpg   154.84K   26 downloads

But.. the view towards the front, across the soi:

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So.. it's a bit of a mixed bag.  I really like the design, especially the interior design.  But even given the good location I think it'll be an up-hill effort to bag 8 million baht for a unit.  The location is nice, both centrally located and in a somewhat up-market area near Alliance Fraincaise, The Chedi and the Ping Nakhara hotel. Google Streetview Link:  Google

Does anyone think this is good value at 7.9 mil, or would you rent it at.. I don't know, say 0.5% monthly of that amount so 40K Baht?  What price do you think is realistic to purchase/rent?   Personally I would start to get interested at about half those amounts as it provides higher-end in-town living with vastly more space than a similarly priced condominium unit in that area would provide.

A milestone in expat history in Chiang Mai last week.

I was talking to a friend about some girl who's name I couldn't remember. I was able to describe her as "the black haired girl we met here last week.." AND THIS SUCCESSFULLY ID's the girl!   No need even to go into describing tattoos or her inch-long eyelashes.

The old expat joke of "which one..? black hair, about this tall, brown skin?" is officially a thing of the past in Chiang Mai, finally.

Yay for diversity!

This probably requires a picture to hit home the message; all over Asia, black haired women are rapidly becoming a minority:

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