Russians affair with Phuket

[Patanawet]

Sorry, not meant to be nasty at all nor to reflect my views.
I was was really reporting my memories from Pattaya of the locals when a few years ago, there was a large influx of Russian tourists.

[Moses]

==== I guess many of the speedo boys are outside their country in order to avoid conscription. ====

Looks like you have no idea what is going on in Russia. It is criminal by Russian law to use conscripts in any military conflict. Conscript servicing in training camps on territory of Russia. 1 year.

There was mobilization in September'22. Condition for mobilization was: person should already has military service in his past 5 years. Total here were mobilized about 300K. Mobilization ended on November 1st 2022.
Maybe you meant Ukraine? There is forbidden for males 16-60 yo to leave country, borders are locked. In Russia borders are opened.

Russian army use contracting service. Over 400K signed contracts within past 1.5 years so army don't need mobilization anymore. This job is good paid: about 4 times higher than average salary in Russia.

====One other reason for the Russians' decline in Thailand is likely due to the crash of the ruble.===
At past 2 days ruble got stronger about 6% just in 2 days because Central Bank made some decision about key rate 2 days ago.

Also it is wrong about "declining": Russian diaspora is growing back after COVID - if you will read news you will see: Russians are main buyers of property in Thailand within foreigners now. Again. The same in Turkey, Montenegro, UAE, Bulgaria.

[litefoot2]

Much needed caveat. Tourists from mainland China tend to be aggressive and sometimes antisocial from my Pattaya experiences. That definitely cannot be said about most visitors from Taiwan and Hong Kong. (Taipei is my favorite stopover when coming to Thailand.)

You may be able to make tentative behavior predictions from geographical regions but clearly not based on ethnicity. We all know where that leads.

[aot871]

It isn't "invasion", it is returning. Before COVID there were 72 direct flights to Phuket from Russia weekly at time of high season, up to 96 at Christmas time. Right now only 28. Yet. Low season. But prices are very affordable: $165 one way from Moscow, economy class.

Maybe Moses can explain why the fares are so low , and what airline is offering those prices?