Yes it's true, most of the money I earn comes from AdSense, I would say a good 70% Thanks to online earnings in general, I'm always on holidays and playing the game of online money making. So I'm flying to Thailand and will find an accomodation, get internet, and start playing again. Are you also living in a foreign country with online earnings? It's cool isn't it? Of course it is not legal since as a tourist you can't be working in the country, it requires another visa and some company setup, but hey, if you follow all laws, life is dull and complicated by those who would like to see you stay all your life a slave of some boss or corporation. So I don't care much about those issues, I enjoy having no boss and no customer to talk to for money. So a big thank you to 8 years old AdSense and also other ad networks and affiliates programs. In fact thank you to the internet to exist since I wasn't born from a rich family and I'm not a star or an athlete, thanksfully there is the internet and I love computers.
You are right it's cool to earn your living online without caring about a boss that will use your work force to get the money that he give you from you!
Congrats. That is what we all want, to be able to make a proper income on online earning alone. Enjoy Thailand!
I've already lived there, it's nice ok, what I like the most about it is the fact that you get services for money. This notion of service has totally disappeared where I live in Europe, they still say hello and thank you, but that's about it. In Thailand I pay a bit less money and get proper customer service. Also for instance in europe if I don't want to clean my home, I would have to pay at the very least 10 euros for one hour of work by someone, I'd have to provide the tools and cleaning products. In Thailand for about 10 euros I had 4 women come to clean my room in one hour with all the tools and products. They were doing an excellent job, cleaning everything from the floor, bathroom, kitchen, removing the dust from everywhere, tv and sofa, etc. and even cleaning the balconies, even changing my bed sheets. Same for the laundry, in europe there are places where you can do it yourself with washing machines, well I can have mine in my room, otherwise there are overpriced laundry places where they wash your clothes, they are few apart and that's overpriced as I said. In thailand, there are many more and the prices are ridiculously low, so low that I don't even think about it when I collect my clean and ironed stuff and pay the bill, it's nothing to think about. So already I don't clean my room, don't wash my clothes. For eating it's the same, it's cheap to eat good food in thailand, so I nearly never cook. Just go in the street and buy food from a street vendor or sit in one of the many restaurants. I could go on, with transportation, taxis and such.. Also accomodation, I'm planning to pay a little bit less monthly rent but for a much nicer accomodation with sea view and high floor and space inside. I'll be looking for it when I arrive as I'll be living in a nice hotel for 10 days first, the time to find something good. Do I need ot mention that it's VERY easy to find accomodation in Thailand, because they don't have laws protecting the tenants such as in europe, so there is no risk of not being paid for the landlords, so they don't ask for salary and warranties, you simply pay and it's fine, if you don't, well I don't want to know.. In the supermarket, in europe they don't give plastic bags anymore, they pretend it's for the environment, so they make you pay for them, but they also increased their advertisement (spam) magazines paper they distribute in your mailbox, talk about ecology! So you've got to pay for the plastic bags, and you have to put the products in the bag, you pay and you go. There are even machines so you scan the products barcode yourself and pay and go. In thailand, they still give plastic bag and the cashier put the products in the bag for you! That's normal for them, it's part of their job! Same in china. In europe it's becoming crazy, you pay, you pay more and more for less and less service. That's what I really feel. Another exemple in the restaurant, you can bring your bottle of wine, try to do it in a french restaurant! Also in the restaurant, you buy a beer bottle, the waiter comes and refill your glass when it is nearly empty. In europe you buy your drink, you pour it yourself until it's done, the waiter will never come to refill your glass, they have better things to do like picking up their nose! It's just the feeling to pay an honest price (in my european opinion of course, not from a thai salary point of view) for a real service, done with smiles most often. So I can live very confortably while spending the exact same money. Of course if you're ill or have children to send to school, then thailand may not be as cheap as staying in your european country, but otherwise that's a no brainer. About VPN, I will think about that, but Thailand is not as bad as china, they don't censor as many sites, it's mostly porn sites involving thai or stuff against their king. In china it's much worse, I've stayed 4 months there in the past and not having access to blogspot, facebook, youtube and much more, means I often get the "not available" censorship. In thailand it's not the case, it's not happening daily.
Where do you prefer to live in Thailand? - Have you been to Phuket? and what is your total monthly expenditure?
Thailand is a nice place to settle, Thais are friendly. What i'd like about thailand is i find this place safer than other country. Been here for 11 years now
I like to know this too. Just you know for your day to say stuff like rent,water,gas etc Thailand is great place to live. Also I heard Malaysia too.
Wow great to hear, congrats good stuff. I wanna relocate somewhere similar soon but I'm not sure yet, Holland isn't all that horrible. Sounds good though, enjoy yourself.
Taxes are not the issue at all. Of course you can argue about taxes and the way they're wasted in europe, or the corruption in Thailand. I don't care about that really, I have only one life to live, I don't want to bother about other people's stupid beliefs or thinking, as long as they don't abuse me personally, it's not my problem. Anyway everybody is paying taxes everywhere, VAT for instance, another example, in France it's about 20% on most products, in Thailand 7%. But honestly I don't care much about paying taxes, it's just part of the cost of life, it's institutionalized/state mafia, if you want no problem, just pay what they ask and that's it, don't bother more about it, don't ask questions. As for those asking about cost of life in Thailand, it very much depends on where you live, what you do everyday and how many and which sort of people you have to support You can find different answers with more details in thailand forums such as thaivisa.com
I'm allergic to islam and religion in general, so I had a bad image of malaysia, indonesia and such countries. In fact I've never been there, and perhaps I will discover them later and maybe like them. I choose thailand because I already have friends living there, the country is mostly boudhist which is ok to me as far as religion goes. Anyway, I didn't pick thailand really, it's nothing definitive, but it's easy living, except having to go out of the country every 3 months on a tourist visa. So I might get a student visa for a one year visa, but then I need to go to school to learn something, like english language or thai language, several times a week, that's not holiday life anymore.
I've arrived, now I'm in a hotel room, 16th floor, directly facing the beach/sea, 2 rooms, one bedroom and one kitchen/living room with a large balcony. I'm here for 10 days and in the meantime I'll try to sort out long term accomodation somewhere nice too. The trip was tiring as always, it's about 24hours between the time I left my city to the time I'm in the hotel room. I booked it via agoda and paid with paypal. Of course there's wireless internet in the room and on the balcony, I've checked this first and eliminated some hotels because of that, not providing complimentary wireless wifi in the rooms is a big mistake for any hotel in 2011 OK not everyone is an internet junkie like me, but still, I'm sure many people appreciate internet connection in their room and not only in the lobby or in special lounges/rooms.