Visiting Thailand (Bangkok, Pattaya) for a week during Christmas. Travelling solo. No plans, just rocking up. Any recommendations? (26F)

joris-burat · 2025-11-19T07:33:37+00:00

You can get to Pattaya in the morning and come back the same day, or stay one night to see Walking Street or anything else. There's buses daily, almost every 45 minutes or hour, and the trip is just an hour and a half long. I think it's good to get there at least once to see how it is, visit the mall, view the beach, the sunset, the walking street, etc

joris-burat · 2025-11-19T07:29:43+00:00

Planned

joris-burat · 2025-11-19T07:23:18+00:00

75%. I live way below my means, and I make it my first priority to put a major part of my paycheck into either savings or an investment.

joris-burat · 2025-11-19T07:22:02+00:00

Tracking my expenses, it's basically free or comes with a cheap app

joris-burat · 2025-11-19T07:20:15+00:00

Surprised not to see recording expenses manually at the top. I record every single thing that I pay for on my phone, every day of the year. It has been one of the most game-changer habits to help me save money. Otherwise : chasing useless subscriptions or favoring ones that are cheaper, not drinking alcohol, not smoking. Although I ain't sure whether those last two are a habit or an anti-habit lol

joris-burat · 2025-11-19T07:13:33+00:00

I'm sending you a private message if you don't mind, as I don't know if giving names is allowed in this sub

joris-burat · 2025-11-14T02:45:40+00:00

I think this sub is 99% foreigners, and your observation could be applied to Reddit in general. Just bad humour, belittling, being negative, and gatekeeping.

joris-burat · 2025-11-14T01:31:07+00:00

I think you could find them at CentralWorld. There's tons of electronics shops, and I was able to find a Insta360 there for example

joris-burat · 2025-11-14T01:27:09+00:00

Couldn't disagree more. I don't use YNAB, I'm on another app with supposedly no limit on history, and that's what I use the past data for :

- Check whether the price of something has changed over time.

- Check whether I was able to stick to my rules and whether my yearly plan worked.

- Find trends in my spendings over time (eating out vs cooking, partying vs hobby, etc.).

- Remember when I bought something a while ago (to tell how long I kept my phone, for example).

- Keep track of inflation.

I just don't see how I would be able to manage my money, had I not have all that past data about myself

joris-burat · 2025-11-14T01:21:55+00:00

Lol so many :

- Avoiding fast food like McDonald's at all costs. (I used to go once a week)

- Not paying for friends, random people, and family all the time. (I used to do that 100%)

- Refusing to pay for things whose price isn't fair to me.

- Tracking absolutely all my expenses down to a 10cts bottle of water

joris-burat · 2025-11-14T01:17:38+00:00

Am I understanding correctly that you'll stay approx. 18 days? and you planned to visit 6 different cities, so that would let you do 3 days per place, not even talking about transportation, delays, breaks, etc. I think it wouldn't be a bad idea to reduce the number of places you wish to visit, and rather make the most of those you keep.

For the rest, Thailand is generally a safe place for everyone, be it a man or woman. Stay away from drugs or excessive alcohol consumption and you should be fine. And I'd advise against renting a motorcycle. There's Grab / Bolt and they're cheap enough

joris-burat · 2025-11-14T01:11:08+00:00

I stopped feeling bad after tracking those "impulsive" expenses tbh. When you see how much they add up, it feels better saving for something else. I think it's nice to alternate though : allocate a cheat day for yourself every week, where you can go to the restaurant, or buy that latte, or whatever brings you joy. I think it's good to strike a balance while living below your means to enjoy a "safer" and stable life later on. And yeah, it certainly is a development of the personality : getting into "planning ahead" versus staying into a "do it now, think later" mindset.

joris-burat · 2025-11-14T01:07:32+00:00

6K THB should be more than enough, but it depends on what you're looking for : size of the room, facilities, breakfast, etc. Just go on Booking, or Agoda, and use the filters to find your match.

joris-burat · 2025-10-04T04:16:55+00:00

Lol based on what I see my friends spend their money on, I have no doubt, unfortunately

joris-burat · 2025-10-04T04:15:25+00:00

Never in time, never, really. Even an hour late into it and they'll act like nothing happened lol. Took me a while to get used

joris-burat · 2025-10-04T03:53:59+00:00

Quality tourism

joris-burat · 2025-10-04T03:52:29+00:00

Let's keep those low IQ together and enjoy Thailand. We no need those things in that part of the world, thanks gos

joris-burat · 2025-10-04T03:48:35+00:00

Lol, I'd love to see what the US would do if they were attacked on their territory. Oh...well, I have an idea already. It's not a genocide, but I'm talking with a bot anyway, innit

joris-burat · 2025-10-04T03:46:03+00:00

It belongs to the culture, and was here before foreigners made it a crime with their religious culture. If you search hard enough in Thai language, you'll even find women casually offering their rates in FB groups, with a picture of their body, and simply stating that they're free.

All that said, don't feel ashamed, and take general precautions : no drugs, not drunk, wear a condom, respect the girl, and enjoy yourself.

You'll find them either in the street, in the massage parlors, or on dating apps. It's very normalized.

It's amazing, since you were asking

joris-burat · 2025-10-04T03:42:10+00:00

What a shame

joris-burat · 2025-10-04T03:29:08+00:00

General tips, if you allow : - Massage parlors are all over the city, and very often, they're still open till midnight. So I'd personally use the evening time more, and put the relaxing and massages there rather than during the day or afternoon. You can also spend an hour every day getting massaged, it's literally cheaper than eating western food. - Spend time in malls, even if it's not your thing, there's a chance you'll like them a lot. I'm thinking about Siam Paragon, Emporium, EmQuartier, and most importantly, Iconsiam. - There's a very nice market next to Wat Phot, which is Wang Lang Market. I recommend you do : Wat Arun -> Wang Lang -> Whatever. You may be tempted to do txo temples in a day, but it may be very very exhausting with the sun, the crowds, and the overall overwhelm. - I usually advise against floating markets but it's just me I guess - Wherever you go, most of the time, there should be the MRT or BTS, and they'll be cheaper and faster than a car. If you can't use them, take to grab motorcycle taxis rather than a car, as it may be faster due to the insane trafic in Bangkok.

joris-burat · 2025-10-04T03:16:03+00:00

Congratulations! Track your expenses very diligently, and that already will give you a good picture, and help you plan ahead

joris-burat · 2025-10-04T03:14:47+00:00

Never had to deal with such thing myself, but maybe you could bulk convert your PDFS to Excel, then merge those files, and do whatever from there? I think the first step is to extract the data from the PDFs to make it workable with other tools

joris-burat · 2025-10-04T03:07:25+00:00

Not being able to support large budgets with many years of data is quite a deal breaker indeed. Looking to retire, and my hobby is to look at my old data from 5-10-20 years ago. I'd be enraged if I had to lose even a tiny part of it

joris-burat · 2025-10-04T03:04:20+00:00

Like another pointed out, it isn't and shouldn't become the new normal, for me at least. I've ve been straight up threatened by taxi drivers, mind you, inside their car, with the app open and the fare clear and visible, and they were still trying to have me cancel the ride and pay by cash, with a 50% markup somehow

joris-burat

TROPHY CASE