St Louis Hospital Bangkok

Posted on July 10, 2013 by koomatzu

Some people find the thought of having to visit any of the Bangkok hospitals daunting, maybe it’s the prospect of a confusing language barrier or the association with the vermin filled streets outside! Well, on the contrary, Bangkok hospitals have a pretty squeaky clean reputation and even attract people from across Europe and America, making Thailand one of the leading countries for medical tourism.

Hospitals in Thailand are mostly private and offer a selection of differently priced hospitals to choose from… but this leaves people confused as to which Thai hospital to choose. In rare cases, some of even the most expensive hospitals in Bangkok have been known to delay proper treatment in order to keep patients longer and make more money for them.

Well, I’d say I’ve become quite an expert on Bangkok hospitals during my 7 months living in Thailand and numerous unfortunate mishaps. I’ve suffered torn ligaments, broken toes, infected bug bites, dog bites and much more! Woe is me! However I have loyally used the same hospital in Bangkok, St Louis Hospital, and I’m guessing it’s also one of the cheapest hospitals in Bangkok.

Bangkok Hospital Review

St Louis Hospital Bangkok is a non-profit, Catholic hospital located right next to BTS Surasak in Sathorn. During lunchtimes, you can find a busy little market in the courtyard at the front of St Louis Hospital selling clothes, treats and cooked lunches. When you enter the main doors you’ll find an impressive, huge, shiny lobby with a welcome desk. The staff are helpful and speak reasonably good English to register you and point you in the right direction. You don’t need to make appointments and despite turning up without a reservation, you can usually be seen within 20 minutes of arriving. Amazeballs!

Did I mention how big and shiny St Louis Hospital is? I’ve visited St Louis Bangkok about 3 or 4 times altogether now – Orthopaedics, dermatology and A&E – and every single time, the doctors and nurses have shown compassion, concern and confidence in their own abilities. They are enthusiastic to help, patient with your questions and knowledgeable about the course of action. St Louis hospital is way cheaper than most of the other Bangkok hospitals and I think I trust the staff there more because of the fact that it’s not for profit.

Each time I have visited St Louis Hospital Bangkok, my hospital bill has averaged around 1000 baht (that’s a little over £20 or $30). I have had cheaper hospital experiences in Thailand up north but this is the capital city and St Louis Hospital is quite shiny. My first visit, the doctor gave me a splint for my torn ligament which was 800 baht plus the doctor’s and staff fees at around 300 baht. When I went to A&E I was prescribed antibiotics for a couple of hundred baht plus maybe 250 baht for the doctor’s time. Another time I had to pay 1500 baht for some fancy medicine.

Read about my other hospital experiences outside of Bangkok – Bitten by a dog in Pai and Maharaj Hospital in Chiang Mai.

My review of St Louis Hospital Bangkok: 10/10

Sathorn Saint View Serviced Apartments, Bangkok

Posted on March 15, 2013 by koomatzu

Sathorn Saint View is both a long stay apartment complex as well as a short stay hotel in Bangkok. If you’re looking for some cheaper budget accommodation in a convenient location, then Sathorn Saint View can be a good choice of apartment to rent in Bangkok. Including the more expensive rooms, all apartments in Sathorn Saint View are open plan studios with no kitchen, just a fridge (and microwave in the better apartments). Rooms are relatively cheap and vary from between 5000 (£100 or $150) and 12000 (£250 or $400) baht per month or from 600 baht per day.

The Area Around Sathorn Saint View

Sathorn Saint View is in Sathorn, just a 5 or 10 minute walk to the Surasak BTS sky train station. Just four stops away for 25 baht on the skytrain is the Siam interchange, the hotspot of Bangkok. Alternatively, about a 20 minute walk from the apartments is the central pier, where you can catch a ferry from about 10 baht which will take you to the old district of Bangkok where Khaosan Road and all the main areas for sightseeing are. Also within easy distance, there’s Silom Road which has plenty of choice of restaurants and shops, just about a 15 minute walk away.

A review of Sathorn Saint View serviced apartments

With this convenient location and low price in mind, you can’t have everything for nothing in life.

The downside of Sathorn Saint View:

Some of the staff are quite nice but a lot of them aren’t particularly helpful and just aren’t particularly enthusiastic or welcoming for some people’s tastes.
The professional images on the hotel website are very deceiving. The gym is somewhat ill-equipped in comparison to the these images. Personally, I’ve completely written off the gym. It comprises of a rusty old, dirty weights bench, 3 treadmills and an even rustier pull down cable bar machine. And maybe the odd dead cockroach. It’s real grubby… and to top it off, not only is it located in a boiling hot, green house stylee room on the rooftop but it’s got no aircon either. It’s pretty unbearable during midday in Bangkok. The swimming pool seems okay but it’s just a bit on the small side.
The cleaners don’t really do their jobs so well and the dirt can really accumulate after a while. They also tend to skive off on the roof and perv on any of the female guests either sunbathing or using the gym.
Directly outside the building, there are some dodgy alleys you need to walk through to get to the main road. Being a lady, I felt a bit nervous on my own after dark.. Maybe a more seasoned traveller might scoff at this and survive just fine.. but for those of a more nervous disposition such as myself, you might want to bear this in mind. Bag snatchings and crime can be a more common occurrence in the sois around here and this is particularly bad for tourists who are bigger targets and more at risk of falling victim to this.
The internet can be frustratingly slow. If you need internet for anything important, then bare this in mind. It was a big problem for us. There doesn’t seem to be a limit on the internet usage so even though you have to pay 750 baht per month for wifi in your apartment, you may still be sharing it with somebody downloading ten movies a night.
The food in the restaurant is rather greasy. The sandwiches are the only thing on the menu that I could eat. I am not a fussy person at all, but let’s just say eating here has put me off fried rice for life. Every time I think of that greasy meal I feel nauseous…

On a more positive note though!

There is a a really cool looking temple and grave yard behind the apartments – it’s nice to hear the chants from the nearby mosque and the birds singing throughout the day. It’s a peaceful area compared to staying on a main road.
The more expensive apartments are also quite nicely furnished, with a nice lobby area downstairs and a roof top garden.
There is an awesome little restaurant directly next door which is lovely and cosy, and on top of this you can buy a really tasty meal from about 40 baht to eat in or take away.
In terms of location and size, Sathorn Saint View is decent value for money for long stay residents being within easy walking distance of the BTS.
You do not need to sign a long contract. You can pay monthly to stay there and just give two weeks notice when you wish to leave.

Sathorn Saint View has so much potential, it just seems a bit neglected. For apartments to live long term in Bangkok, you can find cheaper and better value for money if you don’t mind staying further from the centre. However it is not a bad price really when considering the convenience and closeness to the BTS and Silom. If you don’t mind basically living in a hotel room then it’s a good bargain. However, if staying in Bangkok on holiday, I think that there are much better value for money hotels in Sathorn. The charming youth hostel, Saphai Pae down the road looks better value. Or Eastin Grand, complete with it’s own walkway to the sky train station! How I envied those tourists…

Rumpuree Dance School – Pole Dance Classes In Bangkok

Posted on March 8, 2013 by koomatzu

Rumpuree dance studio Bangkok

Rumpuree is a fitness and dance school in Bangkok with two branches, one situated in Silom and the other at the top of Amarin Plaza, BTS Chit Lom. Pole dancing is a lesson taught at Rumpuree among many others dance classes such as flamenco, hip hop, belly dance, salsa, zumba and, a favourite of mine that I would love to try at some point, swing dance. If you are looking for a pole dance class in Bangkok, choice is quite limited, your only other option being the ‘xxx pole dance’ lesson at some of the California WOW fitness centres. Dance classes at Rumpuree cost 500 baht for an hour or if purchased in 10 session blocks, 4000 baht.

The dance studio at Amarin Plaza is actually relatively small; there is a rather smart, wooden floored reception area complete with leather sofas, sweets and magazines to entertain yourself while waiting for classes. This opens into the changing area, of which there are three curtained booths with ample lockers to keep your belongings safe. The pole dance studio itself is quite cool – two of the walls are covered top to bottom with mirrors (very useful when trying to perfect moves) with another graffiti decorated wall to brighten it up nicely. There are four static poles altogether, with an extra separate pole at the front for demonstration.

Review

Despite there being a huge lacking of pole dance schools in Bangkok, there still don’t seem to be many students who attend classes here, meaning that the classes can be quite small and private. Generally at the times that I have been, pole dance class sizes have ranged from being just me on my own to about six people maximum. Some people might find this a little relieving and less intimidating to know when first starting out.

Also, the poles used in the studio are all static. In case you are new to pole dancing and unfamiliar with this pole dancing term – there are static poles and there are spinning poles, the static poles being harder to use and at times more painful on the skin due to friction. I find that the spin poles tend to just spoil you too much and impede improvement though. If you really want to get good at pole dancing, in my opinion using just the static poles is much better for you in the long run.

Now on to the pole dancing teacher. There are a few different teachers who teach the pole dance classes at Rumpuree but I have only ever had the pleasure of being taught by one of them. When it came to technique, she was very thorough and vigilante to point out any bad habits or mistakes. Pole dance moves were broken up into detailed and specific steps – this is definitely the important to learn many complicated moves pole dancing, however sometimes I found very simple moves could be a little over-complicated by this overthinking and also… less fun. Personally, I generally perform better by just watching and copying without thinking about something too much. And I enjoy it much more too; but then hey I do have really bad pole dance technique apparently.

Most importantly of all for me though, I found the atmosphere at Rumpuree dance studio in Bangkok to be a little cold and unfriendly with no sense of community. The other dance students were very distant, most days nobody speaking a word to eachother throughout the whole of the pole dance lessons. I don’t know if this is just unfortunate and down to those individual people, or if it’s because of the style of teaching not pulling people together and opening them up to eachother. At the pole dance school I went to at home, the teachers tended to encourage students to share poles and spot eachother, making the whole vibe of the pole dance classes much more close-knit and relaxed. I think it’s really important to have a social side; a close, friendly community when taking part in activities like this.

Pros

+ The teacher(s) is very good – particularly observant in reinforcing good technique and habit

+ At 500 baht per lesson, although I think the price is a little steep even for Bangkok, the classes can be very small, meaning more attention and help per student.

Cons

– Lessons tend to neglect fundamental strength and grip conditioning – crucial in buiding a good foundation for advanced pole dance moves

– Not very sociable and not as fun or varied as pole dancing has the potential to be

Saxophone Pub Bangkok

Posted on March 8, 2013 by koomatzu

The Saxophone is a pub/ restaurant specialising in good music and good food, located at the Victory Monument, Phayathai, Bangkok. If you love live music, especially jazz & blues, Saxophone pub is a definite must on your to-do list in Bangkok. The relaxed and chilled out atmosphere combined with the cozy surroundings and awesome music, make thie Saxophone Pub just perfect to hang loose with a good beer or two in Bangkok. Last I visited, there was a cover band playing old school jazz tunes such as covers of Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra to the more constrasting music of Amy Whinehouse, Adele and Wild Cherry.

The style of the Saxophone pub itself is very reminiscent of an old, dimly lit, English style pub, with an array of kooky decorations and paintings filling any possible remaining bareness, and breathing yet more character into the spririted and cheery Bangkok bar. You can purchase cooked food at the Saxophone Pub, typically costing from around 120 baht to 300 baht for a meal. The pub menu offers a selection of dishes including Thai food, curries, salads, steaks, sandwiches and even german cuisine.

The portions are not always so generous but nonetheless the food is very delicious. Soft drinks are expensive, costing from 90 baht upwards, making it more worthwhile to order alcohol instead. Beers cost from 120 baht and cocktails from 180 baht – the selection of cocktails is huge.

How to get to get to the Saxophone Pub in Bangkok

Take the BTS to the Victory Monument station and then head towards the Victory Monument itself from there. Just before you get to the large roundabout you will notice a small road veering to the right from the main road. With it’s many lights and smoking patrons hanging in the doorway outside, the Saxophone Pub stands out enough to notice it from the main road if you look for it anyway.

Sunrise Tacos, Mexican Cuisine In Bangkok

Posted on March 5, 2013 by koomatzu

Where to go for Mexican food in Bangkok?

Sunrise Tacos is a colourful new restaurant located in Bangkok’s Silom area, specialising in Mexican cuisine. You can find Sunrise Tacos close to the BTS Sala daeng station by following signs to CP tower, then heading towards Chong Nonsi along Silom Road from here (silom soi 4). Outside, the Mexican restaurant draws in passers-by with it’s quaint outdoor sitting area of brightly decorated tables, cushioned chairs, lanterns and imitation turf. A meal at the Bangkok Sunrise Tacos typically cost between 150 and 400 baht.

Here, the portions are quite substantial and filling and they serve fajitas, grilled meats, nachos as well as some very delicious looking cakes. However the great thing about the nachos at Sunrise Tacos, is that they have a whole selection of dips to choose from from the large and impressive dip counter that extends throughout the middle of the restaurant.

A basket of nachos and dips at Sunrist Tacos costs 59 baht. I opted for the healthy choice of grilled salsa chicken with mediterranean vegetables and mexican style rice priced at 195 baht. The chicken was perfect in texture; slightly crispy but moist on the inside, subtly flavoured from the spicy salsa. The chicken fajita was also full of flavour and just the right consistency and crispiness.

The staff at Sunrise Taco are not particularly cheerful or friendly but they are still very attentive and quick. I didn’t have any dessert as the rest of the food filled me up enough, but that looked pretty damn good as well. All in all, for two of us to dine at Sunrise Taco in Silom, Bangkok, it cost a total of 660 baht.

Some people may find the garish, brightly coloured sign off putting when passing, but if you’re a fan of Mexican food, do not let this sway you. The food is very good, well cooked and not greasy, with plenty of choice. And it is quite pleasant to sit in the outside ‘garden’ to do some people watching on the busy and energetic Bangkok road of Silom.

You can find another Bangkok branch of Sunrise Tacos in Asoke as well, just across the main Sukhumvit road from Terminal 21. It’s very close to the Asoke BTS station in Bangkok. Asoke Sunrise Tacos has large beer gardens set back just off the main road.

Clark Hatch Thaniya – A Review

Posted on March 4, 2013 by Happy

Before coming to Thailand we did a little research online regarding good gyms in Bangkok, most of what we found was actually quite off-putting however since coming to Thailand we’ve found a few good gyms so do not be put off if you are having trouble research online before moving.

Back in January 2013 we posted an article listing gym locations and prices in Bangkok as a guide to help people find a gym in Bangkok that best suited their requirement, be it weight training, getting fit, fitness classes and so forth. At the time we had not yet joined a gym, since writing that post we have joined Clark Hatch Thaniya, which is in Sala Daeng, Bangkok and here is our review of the place.

The Gym Equipment at Clark Hatch Thaniya

The equipment in Clark Hatch is all pretty good. There are plenty of treadmills, bikes and cross trainers, assisted weight machines as well as a generous free weight section that is home to two large racks of dumb bells ranging from 5lb through to 70lb. There is also a smaller rack of dumb bells ranging from 1kg to 10 kg.

The weights room also has every bar you will ever need, long bar, short bar, Z bar … you will also find some great frames to help you deadlift, squat and chest press.

Benches; also lots, I’ve never had to weight for a bench to become free. That being said, there are no good angled benches – They do have a type of bench that angles however its not flexible enough – I struggle to get a good angle for dumb bell chest presses without moving more of the weight than I would like to my shoulders.

Only downside to the gym area is that there is no air conditioning, just fans. For weight training, the fans seem to be just about right though for cardio the lack of air conditioning really makes it harder. Clark Hatch is not the cheapest gym in Bangkok, air con doesn’t seem much to ask.

The Swimming Pool at Clark Hatch Thaniya

This is a real bonus. Clark Hatch have a restaurant on the pool side and sitting by the pool at the end of my work out, drinking a protein shake makes training at Clark Hatch a really enjoyable experience.

The swimming pool is big enough to exercise and has a pleasant decking area for snoozing. I’ve never really seen the pool with more than 1, maximum 2 people in, which is great.

The restaurant has a range of Thai dishes for a reasonable price. Protein shakes will cost you 100 Baht, which may seem a little high however protein in Thailand still seems like a sellers market. Also, back in England I’ve never had a protein shake anywhere near as tasty as these’s bad boys at Clark Hatch.

Does it Get Busy as Clark Hatch Thaniya?

We tend to go in the week and weekends anywhere between 12:00 and 16:00 and it’s never really busy. I believe it gets a little busier in the evenings as most gyms do.

The Boxing Gym and Clark Hatch Thaniya

On the floor below the main gym is Clark Hatch boxing gym. It spans the whole of the gym area and has bags, pads and other gear. You are free to use the boxing gym alone when classes are not happening or you can join the Thai Boxing class at Clark Hatch for free. In fact, there are a heap of classes at Clark Hatch such as Yoga, Fitball and so forth. They are all free for members.

The Facilities at Clark Hatch Thaniya

The changing rooms and showers are good. Enough room, spacious lockers (bring your own pad lock) and the showers kept clean and offer complimentary shampoo and shower gel.

There is also a Steam Room. The steam room in the male changing room is in serious need of restoration. Big gaps under the door mean it gets cold quickly and when the steam clears, you can see the walls are cracked and stained yellow. The lights do not work that well if at all. Either because the mold and rust has won or the bulbs are gone, either way – The steam room seriously needs attention. That being said, I use the steam room around three times a week, I’m just not that fussy.

Free Gym Clothes!

Now this is a really nice plus. I’ve never seen a gym do this before. Each time you come you are offered optional free gym clothes.. shorts, shirt or vest and shocks (Towel as well, of course). At first I thought this was a bit of an odd concept, but not having to carry dirty clothes around with you is great. You can come to the gym with nothing but your member ship card, work out, have a steam, have a shower and walk out in fresh clothes. Cool. (Some of their gym clothes could be chucked out now though I think, some are super new and others are super old).

Friendly, Helpful Staff

The staff here are very friendly and welcoming and will help without hesitation if you need it. Many of the staff can provide personal training too, though I’ve not taken this up so I’m unable to pass comment.

How Much does Clark Hatch Thaniya Cost?

You can pay daily (500 bath), monthly (3500 baht), every 6 months (12,500 baht) or annually (21,600 baht). We did not haggle but I bet you could trim a little off, if you were that way inclined.

Click here to see our post on prices of other Gyms in Bangkok.

Pros

Loads of gear, not overly busy, friendly staff and customers, great roof top swimming pool.

Cons

No air con in the gym, steam room is gross.

The Verdict

I love this place and am going to seriously miss it when I leave Thailand. I look forward to going to the gym thanks to this place, which is half of the battle.

Thaipod 101 Review

Posted on March 1, 2013 by koomatzu

Thaipod 101 consists of a range of conversation lessons in varying difficulties, video lessons and a dictionary of the 100 most used Thai words (or many more depending on the package you purchase). The conversation lessons run for roughly 10 minutes in length, they will play a conversation first at normal speed, then slowed down and lastly alongside the english translation. After playing the conversation three times at the beginning, the two Thaipod 101 hosts then go on to talk about interesting facts about the culture and go into more detail about the content of the conversation. This breaks up the Thai lesson quite nicely and gives it a little more of an informal feel.

There are some other smart learning tools with Thaipod 101, for example tagging any words that you might be having difficulty with and then using them as flash cards. They also have PDFs you can download to supplement the lessons. The basic package costs around $8 for one month (N.B the longer you sign up for, the cheaper it gets) and you can sign up for a free 7 day trial to see if you like it first.

Thaipod 101 Review

The downside

I did find that the hosts on Thaipod101 spoke quite unnecessarily quickly – in the beginner lessons they spoke a little fast for someone new to the language but don’t even get me started on the intermediate lessons! Way too fast and mumbly… I always used to think they must just be warming us up because Thai people in real life must speak super fast. Well no, actually they don’t! A lot of Thai people speak really quite clearly, so it is completely unnecessary!

But while I’m on the subject of the Intermediate lessons… I really did not enjoy these lessons. They replaced one of the hosts, Ryan, with a new guy who just had absolutely no character, or life in him for that matter, whatsoever. I really don’t mean to be personal, but his voice was just so tired and mind-numbing… it sounded like he did not want to be there doing his job, he just sounded depressed. Not particularly stimulating when you’re trying to learn a language from this voice. Apart from the dreary tone of these intermediate lessons, I found them to be a little useless in content. Maybe not so much grammar wise, but as for the vocabulary – it was all a little too specific and useless for everyday conversation. It would have been much better to be learning more commonly used words instead.

Another problem I found with Thaipod 101 was that they tended to gloss over and neglect some of the grammatical abnormalities in conversations which sometimes left me a little confused. I think this is a common problem with most Thai learning resources though, Thai is a complex language, full of abnormalities. I guess they were just focusing on the main grammar points of that lesson though, and they did explain and break down those points quite lucidly. I used to be a member of Japanesepod 101 and found these lessons to be much more interesting. I think Thaipod 101 just needs some stronger characters to host it, some more enthusiastic acting and more interesting conversations like they had in Japanesepod 101.

Pros

I enjoyed the Absolute beginner and the Beginner lessons and found them to be particularly helpful for extra listening practice. They were all set in everyday settings applicable in most tourist and expat situations, so were full of useful phrases and vocabulary. It’s nice to have the lessons broken up by the chit chat of the hosts as well, it makes it all a little bit easier to take in, more enjoyable to listen to and not so daunting. The downloadable PDF also summarised some of the rules and points covered in lessons very concisely and straightforward, making them easy to look back on at a later date and review.

The learning tools such as the Flash cards are also quite useful, particularly for those who maybe aren’t so organised and co-ordinated with their studies. The dictionary is great for improving your vocabulary as it comes with pictures, thai script and recordings and example sentences to help you learn. I have heard a lot of people confused and wondering if Innovative Learning (aka pod 101 series) is some sort of scam because they have a tendency to send a lot of emails and the prices quoted on the front page can be misleading. In all fairness it does seem a little bit dodgy! But I have found them to be a very honest and trustworthy company, for example when I forgot to cancel my yearly membership they were very understanding and refunded my money for me.

Membership is so cheap for Thaipod 101 and for the price, it is very good listening practise to supplement any other studies, not to mention some of the useful phrases covered. Personally, I think listening practise is vital to improving in a language, it helps reinforce what you have learnt and train you ears to recognize the sounds and words. The downfall of learning from books, is that you aren’t associating words with the way they actually sound. Give it a try, for $8 you’ve got nothing to lose!

Secret Garden Cuisine Bangkok

Posted on February 13, 2013 by koomatzu

Secret Garden Cuisine is a cafe/ thai restaurant in Bangkok famed for it’s cakes (particularly it’s special ‘crepe cake’). Secret Garden Cuisine is situated in the Northern end of Sathorn Road in an old, white colonial English style building with huge bay windows and a pretty fairy-lit garden. Inside, the restaurant part is decorated with green walls, pristeen white furniture and twining plants and ivy. The cafe area of Secret Garden is very cosy, with comfy sofas and natural daylight streaming in through the large bay windows. Meals cost around 150 – 600 baht plus tax and service and cakes cost around 120 baht plus tax and service.

Is Secret Garden in Sathorn any good?

After having heard so much about Secret Garden in Bangkok before I went, I had high expectations for it. Especially the cake which is supposed to be absolutely amazing… Well, for me, it didn’t quite meet my expectations but the food was still good, and good portions as well as quality for the money. I ordered Green curry with pandan rice and papaya salad for 250 baht, and for this I got two generously sized plates of food, and very delicious too. I ordered the recommended Secret Garden crepe cake with strawberry sauce and it just wasn’t quite what it was hyped up to be. It was a little creamy and sickly about half way through. And the brownie cheesecake tasted quite strange, with a slightly rubbery texture.

I have had better cakes in Bangkok, for example Secret Recipe. However, I would consider going to Secret Garden for cake again sheerly for the pleasant ambience and décor of Secret Garden – especially in the cafe and garden areas. It would be a good restaurant to take visiting friends and family. The staff were very dilligent and friendly with quick delivery of food and excellent customer service. They may be construed to be a little pushy at times, like pushing to order starters and dessert, but sometimes this is not necessarily a bad thing if you just need a bit of a push to make decisions! In total, for smoothies, a decent sized, tasty main course, cake and coffee – this costed 600 baht each. Not too bad considering.

If you want to try some delicious and authentic thai cuisine with a twist, if you are or a great fan of seafood, or if you just want somewhere to take your night-club-loathing friends who are visiting for the week, then give Secret Garden Cuisine a try – daytime or night time for a cozy sit down in a charming environment.

LTP Learn Thai Podcast Review

Posted on January 22, 2013 by koomatzu

Learn Thai Podcast is the best home learning Thai language course I have found yet. You can download a free demo from their website www.learn-thai-podcast.com to try it out. It costs $197 to downoad all the content and have a years support from the staff atLearn Thai Podcast. Although it states on the website that $197 is their current promotional price, don’t feel like you need to hurry up and buy it before the offer ends – it has been $197 for at least the last two years ;p

What you get:

There really are enough lessons with Learn Thai Podcast to keep you occupied for years: The beginners section contains an ever-growing selection of 300+ vocabulary lessons, 40+ of each Grammar, Review and Conversation lessons. The vocabulary lessons only last a few minutes, while the grammar, review and conversation lessons can last between 10 and 20 minutes.

In the Intermediate section of Learn Thai Podcast, there are 70+ lessons of each Vocabulary, Grammar, Review and conversation lessons. And then there are even more lessons in the advanced section which I can’t comment on so much as I haven’t got there yet! As well as these lessons there are also some writing theory lessons. Altogether, there are something like 800+ video and audio lessons on Learn Thai Podcast, all of a reasonable length.

Is Learn Thai Podcast any good? Review:

The downside of Learn Thai Podcast

The vocabulary lessons in Learn Thai Podcast tend to cover a group of about 8 – 10 new words from a specific topic. I found I never really used these lessons so much as they tend to be quite boring and repetitve… literally just one word repeated after another, and I personally find that kind of learning to be a complete waste of time as my brain does not associate the words with the meanings if I just learn them from a meaningless list.

The conversation lessons on Learn Thai Podcast, I also found to be a little useless. Conversation lesson 1 for example, was a clip from a Thai movie; the dialogue was very complex and the speakers talked very fast and slurred. It was not a good lesson for a complete beginner let alone someone with a reasonably good understanding of Thai! I found all of the conversations to be like this – too fast and of low quality recording. Jo, the speaker in all the other lesson recordings, consistently spoke very clearly and concisely, so it was just way too big a jump in speed to be able to understand. They also just seemed haphazardly slapped on the end of the other lessons, completely unrelated in content. It would have been so much better if they had been in some way connected to the other lessons and vocabulary to reinforce everything already learned, but instead I found these Learn Thai Podcast lessons to be quite frustrating and demoralizing.

Last but not least, the monotonous tone of the Learn Thai Podcast speaker, and the methodical sometimes soulless approach did get a bit much sometimes and I got really quite bored with it. Sometimes I needed to take a break for a few weeks before I could go back to it. My boyfriend couldnt even cope with 1 lesson, he found it to be so dull. So if you need something a little more fun and colourful to help keep you motivated, Learn Thai Podcast might not be for you.

The pros of Learn Thai Podcast

Well despite the vocabulary and conversation lessons being a wee bit useless to me, the other lessons of Learn Thai Podcast were so useful to me and so plentiful that it totally made up for this! The grammar lessons introduce grammar rules and put them into example sentences, breaking down each sentence structure word by word. They are very in depth and cover a wide range of useful words and sentences. The review lessons are basically just a recap of the grammar lessons. The first half, you will hear sentences and be given a chance to translate what was said. The second half, you will be given a sentence in English and then be given the chance to say it in Thai.

What I love the most about Learn Thai Podcast is the structured and thoroughness of it’s syllabus. No details are left out of the grammar lessons and everything is explained from scratch. If you are a methodical and structured learner, these lessons will be great for you. I find other courses and books to just gloss over some rules and leave you scratching your head wondering why it is the way it is. Even going to my Thai school, I found Learn Thai Podcast was much more useful and in depth than my lessons there and I see a lot of other students becoming frustrated at that sort of thing all the time.

Although I could not understand much of the conversation lessons from Learn Thai Podcast, the ones I did do were actually quite useful in that they focused on real Thai speech – slang and casual speech patterns, ending particles and that sort of thing. Most learning materials don’t seem to cover this. Lastly, for tones, it is also incredibly useful. There are just 2 x 20 minute lessons at the start which cover the tones, but I listened to them and practised them over and over again until I could recognize them and they really did help a lot. In fact, I get told quite often that my pronounciation of the tones is very clear! I still can’t hold a conversation in Thai but I can pronounce my tones that’s for sure!

$197? Best $197 I ever spent. I’m still not great at Thai, I’ll be honest… but that’s mainly down to my own personal problems with my squirrel-like brain… I would no way have come as far as I have with my studies if it was not for Learn Thai Podcast. If you can do a Learn Thai Podcast lesson everyday or as often as you can, it will help reinforce your understanding of Thai so much that it will become more natural and ingrained into your mind. So unless you are the kind of person who easily loses enthusiasm and interest (especially if you don’t have pretty pictures and colours to mix things up a bit), then go for it. I think Learn Thai Podcast is the best course out there by far.

Yoga Elements Bangkok

Posted on January 19, 2013 by koomatzu

I’ve tried yoga on and off over the years back in my hometown but never really stuck to a yoga class for too long… the last couple of years I mainly followed a Rodney Yee yoga dvd once a week every week to subsidise my other exercise regimes. When I moved to Bangkok, I found Yoga Elements on google – apparently they are rated as the 11th best yoga studio in the world! And as you pay for a set amount of yoga classes per month, it seems you’re much more likely to improve and take part in it a little more seriously and regularly.

About Yoga Elements Bangkok

Yoga Elements is situated in Bangkok, just a 5 minute walk from BTS Chitlom in the Vanissa building just down the road from Central Chitlom shopping mall. The studio itself is very impressive – it’s clean, nicely decorated with amazing views over the city of Bangkok from the actual yoga studio itself – which is definitely a cool environment to do exercise. You are provided with towels and a locker with free use of the showers too which really comes in handy if you want to do some exercise before work or uni etc.

Yoga Elements Review

As for the actual yoga classes, I found them to be a little hit and miss. I found some of the yoga classes to be a little too focused on breathing and relaxation – not particularly much of a workout. Now, I know breath and relaxation are fundamental to yoga but in all honesty, I’m much more interested in the physical side of it, so the classes at Yoga Elements Bangkok just didn’t keep my motivation up.

Cerissa’s classes were very good, and if she taught more lessons there I would have definitely considered sticking with Yoga Elements… I ached the next day after her yoga classes. Don’t get me wrong though, I don’t rate Yoga Elements badly, as I think it is more to do with my own taste that I did not gel with it… but I would recommend that you try elsewhere if you’re just after a more rigorous workout. If you are serious about yoga or the more spiritual side of it, then this Bangkok yoga studio will likely be most awesome for you!

You can purchase your first month of 15 x 90 minute yoga lessons for just 2000 baht which is the cheapest yoga studio in Bangkok I have found so far. You don’t need to book either, just drop in to one of the beginner ‘Elements’ yoga classes 15 minutes before the start – you can check out their website or Facebook page for a schedule or take a look at my guide on yoga in Bangkok.

Where can I buy a yoga mat in Bangkok?

You can pick up a cheap yoga mat in Bangkok for about 300 or 400 baht from most Watsons pharmacies –usually in a container near the till. Otherwise Sports World on Silom Road just off the Saladaeng BTS has a selection of yoga mats between 300 and 1500 baht. For a better quality yoga mat in Bangkok, try Siam Paragon sports section on level 2 – the ones for 960 baht are much better quality and less slippy than the cheaper yoga mats mentioned above… although you can buy budget yoga mats here too.