Well it depends what you are looking for.

Bangkok is a major metropolis and has everything that goes along with that.

Samui is a sleepy island with a nice beach and a few activities, but basically just a place to relax. A lot of 2+2ers prefer Bangkok because they like to hit clubs every night and that sort of thing. I prefer just lazing about on the beach and taking it easy.

The biggest drawback of samui is that it's relatively hard to get to compared to Bangkok and Phuket. Both those places are serviced by hundreds of international airlines from just about anywhere in the world - to fly to Samui you are basically stuck with Bangkok Airways and Firefly.

Nevertheless it's my favourite place in Thailand.

Hei guys in near future I might want to move to Thailand ( at list for a year ) ... I wasn't there before but I've read/heard so many great things

So here is what I am looking for;

- Beach: I want to be near beautiful beach with many people around Not something like deserted island with 10 natives.

- Affordable apartment : Modern, new, nice but not to expensive apartment for monthly rent.

- Girls : NOT Hookers Lots of real girls

- Good nightlife : A lot of great places and as I said in line above, real girls, REAL GIRLS !

- Internet : Want it fast/stable so I can play big pots without worrying about internet going down :P

- Muay Thai / MMA : I am sure they train Muay Thai pretty much everywhere in Thai... but any real good places where they teach MMA as well??(BJJ)

- Security.. : I don't want to be killed by Thai gangs if I look someone wrong :s

After hearing this what city/place would you recommend me ? It doesn't need to match all criteria ... the closest one ?

thanks in advance

real girls are over rated

NOOO now you killed my dreams

dreams aren't worth having

i don't think the place you're looking for exists.

medium

Any place there is a beach, there are tourists. And any place there are tourists, there are thousands of hookers. That is just the reality of Thailand.

I'm not really sure if you'll find what you're looking for in Thailand. The fact is that "real" Thai girls don't consort with foreigners. I've met quite a few of them in Samui and count a couple as good friends. They are all virgins.

Unless you are planning on marrying them your smooth moves won't get you anywhere - Thailand is a very conservative country.

If you are looking for a place with a nice beach, real girls that you have a chance of sleeping with, stable fast internet and MMA trainers, I recommend Florida, USA.

Thanks for answers anyway yeah I know hookers are everywhere lol ... I think I expressed myself wrong ^^ ( English isn't my first language )
The thing about "real girls", I meant that when you go out you can actually meat some normal non-hooker girls who just live there or something :s ( just like here in EU and in US ... )

MMA isn't really that important as long as there is Muay Thai
But yeah stable internet is probably required for poker player

Does this narrow it down to some point ?

edit: hehe found something pretty funny on other website;

In your opinion, how much money does a foreign teacher need to earn here in order to survive?
15000bt and you would lead an OK life here although you probably would wind up a single dude even if you looked like Tom Cruise.

daniel,

pokerspiv kind of nailed it for you but i just wanted to add that relationships/girls in thailand are nothing like we have in EU/US in many different ways.

A lot of people who have never been in thailand come to this thread and want a place where there "no hookers".

it's one of the things that is nearly impossible to explain so I suggest you come here and as you are staying for a year I suggest you spend atleast who days or maybe a week at each of the bigger places here and you will get some idea what thailand has to offer.

like it's been mentioned 2+2'ers in thailand are mostly divided in to two groups. the first one is the people in bangkok who, afaik, like to party a lot and when they go out they want nicer clubs etc. I am sure it's not the only reason for them living in bangkok but it was one of the most important reason when they moved out of phuket

the 2nd bigger group lives in phuket. we are the people who hate to be in a big city like bangkok that is filled with cars, pollution and nothing but concrete like huge cities usually are. In Phuket you have several nice beaches, nice scenery and one of the most important things for myself is the freedom of moving around on my own motorbike driving around the nice router surrounded by the jungle and the ocean

internet wont be a problem in phuket as there are different solutions for different needs

Sure, you could meet some if they were the adventurous type.

You couldn't sleep with them though, unless you first married them.

And you wouldn't meet them at a bar. If you meet them at a bar they are most likely

a) hookers on their day off.
b) super-rich Hi-So thai girls who do as they please

Good luck telling which is which.

Good, normal Thai girls don't drink and don't go to bars.

That's why pretty much everyone just sticks with the hookers.

Thailand is not the EU or the US. It's a very conservative developing country where women are still seen as second-class citizens. The EU country with a culture most similar to Thailand would be Turkey. That's why you have hookers and virgins (because remaining a virgin and therefore getting a good husband is their number 1 meal ticket) and not much in between.

The majority of the remainder of Thai women looking for foreign boyfriends are single mothers who have been abandoned by their Thai husband. Thais don't want them, it's very rare for a woman with children to find a new husband in Thailand. Thai men want to marry a virgin.

daniel,

Pretty much agree with PokerSpiv and Lessu about the girl situtaion.

Although I think Spiv is a little too pessimistic about the situation. I do have a couple of friends that have non-ho gf's that they met at clubs (albeit not the touristy clubs where 95% of the girls are looking to bang for money). They are the exception though.

But I just wanna add that the hooker situation isn't quite as black/white as it is in the western world. They are really good at providing the gf experience and you can date them for a while and never know the difference. Some of them might even really like you although trying to discern which is which can drive you mad. You'll also get non-pros going out on the weekends and trying to hook up with farangs with the benefit of getting a little cash on the side.

Mostly it's just assumed in most asian cultures (japan is one exception i know of) that the man is the breadwinner and should provide for his woman so if you get a short-term relationship like a one-night stand you just pay right there and then. Or you go on a shopping trip the day after and pay for everything. Or you splurge on a really nice dinner and night out. In return, the woman takes real good care of her man. I've had one night stands clean up my place and wash my clothes before they go home the day after.

It's just really hard to explain and you'd be better served to try it out for yourself and then see. Just move out here for a month with the option of staying longer. So get a tourist visa with double entry which is good for 180 days of stay.

Regarding costs, it's not as inexpensive as a lot of ppl think. I'd recommend budgeting for 2.5k/mo if you want to have a nice, worry-free lifestyle. That basically means eat out whenever you want, stay at a nice place in a good location and party whenever you want (within reason obv). The two hidden costs out here are girls (you will end up paying for them in one way or another) and travel expenses associated with visa runs.

You can surely get by on much less but then you'll need to start cutting corners.

I should point out though that in the major tourist areas like Phuket, Bangkok, and Samui, you have a pretty good chance of shagging other tourists, most of whom are not hookers.

Personally though I'd rather spend the 1000 baht and go with a Thai hooker, but I'm a jaded old man who's sick of putting up with listening to some German hippie backpacker bang on about Global Warming for an hour before I get her in the sack.

The 1000 baht gets me a better looking girl and a more interesting cultural experience, and I guarantee you most hookers would vote republican.

Just reread this passage.

You wouldn't lead anything near an OK life with 15k baht/mo in Phuket. I guess you could get a busto one-room with no internet for around 6k in Patong, probably not including utilities. Then you have 8-9k left for everything else which is just laughable. That's 300 baht/day. That'll buy you 2 drinks at a club in most places (3-4 in the busto places). If you go out to eat you'll spend about that on a 2 course meal with one beer.

A decent well located apartment will run you 15-25k/mo. A night out for me is usually 2-3k (food+drinks), more if I buy ladydrinks and have fun with girls at the club, even more if I take one home.

Then you'll have transportation costs. In phuket you need a scooter to survive cause the transportation sucks. If you plan to live here for a year you should buy one as it's more cost-effective. If not you can rent one for 3-4k/mo. You'll also have to budget for taxis cause you will want to party in different beaches and they are expensive around here.

You can probably save a ton though by cooking your own food (which I never do), and being money conscious with your partying (warming up at home with a few beers, drinking at cheaper bars etc).

So maybe you can get by on 30k-40k. Idk, i've never tried it

Edit:
And regarding pussy, they have a saying over here. No money, no honey.

lol

no, i think he's right....

no i think hes lol exagerating, theres a lot of girls in between who arent nearly hookers.

First I was convinced my first thai two-night-stand was a non-hooker just because I didn't pay anything apart from like 400 baht for food and transport. My long term Lao girlfriend actually laughed at me like I was some naive chump.

Like mentioned above, she basically didn't believe a single "good" thai girl can go/be seen with falang. She also said that almost all good girls would actually be scared to go with a falang. Although maybe this applies more to smalltown Lao girls but I still believe her point is valid.

One more funny note, according to her in the beginning a lot of girls are actually scared falang have too big d***s, although my girlfriend has come to appreciate it

this 100%. listen to PokerSpiv, some of you might learn something.

ya its totally impossible to meet girls that arent hookers in thailand

cool story bro

thanks for all helpful answers ... I will probably firs try Thailand for month or something and then decide if I want to make it any longer

Anyway the most important question of all that I forgot to ask;

If you get caught playing poker in Thailand what is penalty ?
30yrs in prison or few $$ ?

im glad im not a klaus

klauses be up in the clubs stealing my women