Nightmarch

[PattayaPete 530]

Beached and Done For: The girls plying that oldest of professions along the Beach Road promenade have consistently and constantly been on the receiving end of bad press, be it in editorials, news items, or letters to the editor in local and national publications.

 

The letters to the editor are usually classics of hyperbole. These correspondents claim everyone taking a stroll along Beach Road will be approached practically every step of the way by disease-ridden, aggressive, ya-bah ingesting thieves who suggest the most outrageous acts imaginable for the price of a few coins. They claim foreign men walking with their wives or girlfriends -be they foreign or Thai- are all fair game. This is all such complete and utter rubbish I often wonder if the people who write this garbage are actually living in the same space-time continuum as the rest of us, or somehow keep finding themselves sauntering unknowingly into a parallel universe.

 

In all the years I’ve spent perambulating about this fair town it’s been my experience the girls on the beach, apart from being well within reach - to paraphrase a Beach Boys tune- are not pushy or aggressive. In fact, if anything, they are less intrusive now than they were a few short years ago. You will almost certainly be called out to or smiled at if you are wandering along Beach Road at a pace that clearly indicates you are looking for company. If you are walking at a reasonable pace and have the air of someone heading somewhere specific then it’s rare for anyone to call out to you, let alone make a physical approach.

 

Since I started seeing these deliberately misleading and grossly exaggerated missives in various publications (Bangkok Post, The Nation, Pattaya Mail, Pattaya Today et al) I’ve made a point of noting my own experiences as I stroll down the Beach Road promenade at various times of the day and night. I’ve also asked everyone I know who possesses the ability to speak the English language without dribbling or making the sort of noises you would expect from just-released mental patients, and all have similar experiences to myself.

 

There is a belief among some people that the Beach Road walkers and sitters are only there because they can’t or won’t get jobs working in beer boozers and ogling dens. Supposedly the majority were all so full of sexually transmitted diseases the area could have been cordoned off as a health hazard. There is almost no doubt some of the girls weren’t clean; yet I’ve known enough people to catch all sorts of unpleasant infections from girls they’ve taken from the most prominent of bars.

In truth, I doubt the numbers of girls carrying a nasty little surprise in the nether regions working on Beach Road is any greater than many of the boozers around town.

 

Chat to enough of these girls and you’ll find many who happen to be ‘moonlighting’ on their days/nights off. Some decided it was far easier to sit around the beach area and attract customers, going to ‘work’ when they chose and stopping at their leisure. Others happen to be working in factories in the province and come down for an occasional dalliance in order to bolster their meagre incomes. Still others are college and university students dabbling in that oldest of professions as a way of making a few more baht for a night out with their friends or to make enough to purchase the latest mobile phone.

 

What really amazes me about the vitriolic letters sent to editors are those from people who clearly live in and around Pattaya. I can only wonder at why these people chose to live here. Jomtien is just over the hill, Ban Chang, Bang Saray, Sri Racha, and Bang Saen are not far away. Why set up house in Pattaya and then complain about an industry that has been operating here for decades? It’s akin to moving to Chernobyl and then complaining about the presence of a broken down nuclear reactor.

 

Short-changed Again: My reader recently sent in an eminently sensible suggestion for all: always count your change, no matter whether you’re buying a drink in an ogling den or beer boozer or simply shopping at one of the many supermarkets or corner stores around town. The reason for my reader’s concern is encapsulated in the following story that he says happened to him:

 

‘I was at Family Mart buying typical stay-at-home supplies for the evening; chips, cookies, a few beers, a few coolers for the lass, ice, and whatnot. Even though I hadn’t kept track, the amount didn’t ‘feel right’, and asked for my receipt, which they don’t normally give. Included was a 50-baht phone card! I pointed that out and he handed me a phone card. I said I didn’t want the card but 50-baht back, which he reluctantly did. The next time I bought a mix of miscellaneous items there I checked, and again was [charged for a ] 50-baht phone card. This time I was more vocal and complained…they apologized but offered no explanation.

 

A week later it happened again! This time I was VERY vocal in a store full of customers. The guy claimed the register was broken and sometimes added these cards by mistake. I told him the next time the ‘register’ made a mistake I would call the police to come check it out!’ Of course mistakes do happen, although it’s amazing how 99.99 percent of the time it’s never in your favour. I can guarantee each night across the bars of Fun Town there are a few dozen punters being stitched up by that time-honoured practice known as bill padding. Anyone who has six or more drinks at one bar is a potential victim of bill padding from unscrupulous cashiers and serving wenches, and even dodgy owners and their paramours.

 

The Price of Thirst Quenching: Interesting point made to me the other day by American Stan, one of the partners in the Cheers laid-back boozer (Pattayaland Soi 2), regarding the price of Singha amber fluid. When they set up shop almost 18 years ago, they were selling a bottle of Singha for 45 baht and the greenback bought 25 baht for one dollar. Now, they sell Singha at 65 baht, but the US dollar will now purchase almost 40 baht. It doesn’t take a mathematical genius to work out that it is now cheaper to drink in Fun Town than it was almost two decades ago. Of course, the reverse is also the case when it comes to the far more important mattress dancing stakes. The Keynesian economists of Pattaya -collectively known as bar girls- were pretty quick to start upping their ‘roll in the rice field’ prices in the period after the Asian crisis of 1997. Most were well aware currencies such as sterling and the US dollar had skyrocketed against the baht and were quick to use that plaintive cry, “small money for you”, in order to extract ever larger sums for their lie-back-and-think-of-som dtam performances.

 

Numbers Keep Going: Concurrent with the growth in nightclub-style entertainment in Fun Town (Players finally opened its doors, after a slight delay, on 8 May), the number of ogling dens continues to hold firm. Although seven chrome pole palaces have already closed their doors this year alone, they have more than been replaced by seven new dens. The latest is Images, the fifth in the Covent Garden complex (Soi 16, off Walking Street), which opened around 3 May. This makes it the 40th of its genre on or about Walking Street. The latest away from the main strip to open is Memories (Soi LK Metro), which has been going since late March and is the 26th den outside of Walking Street.

 

Tales from the Crib: Language misunderstandings are always going to occur whenever you couple a Thai female with a foreign male. Sometimes it’s just an inflection, occasionally it’s whole sentences. In one case it was one word leading to confusion. An English-speaking foreigner on holiday in Fun Town had taken a damsel from a beer boozer for a night of playing hide-the-salami. In the morning the damsel -whose English was limited to the standard ‘what you name?’, ‘where you come from?’ patois- showered and dressed and then said to her paramour, “I’m horny.” Flattered that she was clearly making another offer of intimacy the man duly brought her onto the bed and proceeded to satisfy her every whim. Upon completion she again showered and dressed but once more intoned, “I’m horny.”

 

Although somewhat of a spent force by this time, the man once more rose to the occasion and tried to satisfy his seemingly insatiable partner. For a third time she showered and dressed and for a third time she said, “I’m horny.” By now the man was thinking the demure creature who had shyly accompanied him the previous evening was Pattaya’s greatest nymphomaniac. Taking a line from Shakespeare’s Henry V, it was ‘once more into the breach’ and this time, he fervently hoped, she’d be well and truly satiated. After she showered and dressed for the fourth time she once more stated, “I’m horny”, only this time she accompanied her statement with the standard and universally understood action of rubbing her stomach to indicate she was, in fact, hungry. It was only then it dawned on the man the girl had all along been trying to say she was ‘hungry’ not ‘horny’.

 

Piece of Pith: ‘Everybody’s got to believe in something. I believe I’ll have another beer.’ –W.C. Fields