Funny old place is Bangkok.

Having recently returned from my umpteenth trip to LOS. I'm sorry to say that it was probably my last.
(Many of you may rejoice at your leisure!)
In the last few (maybe 5) years I have witnessed the people of Bangkok become more greedy, the boys more false AND greedy. The hotels service become pathetic, I stayed in a well known Suriwongse Rd. hotel. (Never again.)
Nature Boys could only be described as the best lit backroom in the world.
Golden Cock is still a dump.
Tawan Bar........I walked out 10 minutes into the drag queens dance routines.....240 baht for a drink too (even water!)
Market stall holders have become incredibly greedy which resulted in them getting nowhere with me at all.
King Power duty Free will not sell you liquor if you are getting on a flight to Australia.....can't understand this, I can bring liqour with me if I buy it DF in Brisbane but can't take it on board if I buy in BKK????????? Go figure!
Several bars were flaunting the NO smoking laws, Dicks cafe has jammed so many outside tables for smoking into there small space that John West would be proud of them.
1 hour 5 mins to get from silom to Wat Pho in a taxi.
Gentlemen....I think I'm over Thailand, or maybe just temporarily jaded?

[Lunchtime O'Booze]

... just temporarily jaded


you need a holiday from Bangkok. Don't worry. A few months back in Sydney at those bars in Oxford street will have you crawling up the walls and ready to get back again. Get outside Bangkok next time and see the countryside.

[TrongpaiExpat]

1 hour 5 mins to get from silom to Wat Pho in a taxi.
Gentlemen....I think I'm over Thailand, or maybe just temporarily jaded?

If you took the Sky Train from Silom two stops to Saphan Taksin, that would be about 6 min. Then the Chao Express boat, about 6 stops, add 10 min and the total is 16min for about 30B total.

Jaded and a little slow, I would say. :cyclops:

Having recently returned from my umpteenth trip to LOS. I'm sorry to say that it was probably my last..............
In the last few (maybe 5) years I have witnessed the people of Bangkok become more greedy, the boys more false AND greedy. The hotels service become pathetic, I stayed in a well known Suriwongse Rd. hotel. (Never again.)


Over the last few years a lot of the Bangkok traders in all the service / retail/sex industries have become aware of just much how they were being taken adavantage of price- wise by visitors. Although bartering is an integral part of Thailand many visitors think they can continue to insist on every price being reduced and the locals have wised up to this.

The cost of living in Thailand is rising and has been doing so for a few years but prices have remained (until now) fairly static. Whereas for many years you have been able eat a decent Thai meal on the streets around Silom for 20 baht you will now frequently find yourself paying 25-30Baht and this goes for both Thai & farang.

I still find that most market traders are willing to barter and give a good price if you act in a courteous friendly manner. I walk home in the evening along Silom Road and some of the antics of farang customers in demanding a lower price and the rudeness that goes with it has to be heard to be believed.

As for the falseness of the boys, well I guess that they are just putting into practice the tricks they have learned from all those farangs who promise the earth and advertise that they will take the boy back home with them then dissapear. Now for them that is a reason to become jaded!

Maybe the 'well known Suriwongse Road hotel' that you stayed in was just reacting to your obviously jaded mood? We book our clients/visitors into a number of the hotels along Suriwong and rarely get a complaint, We have though stopped using the Tawana (Ramada / Tawana Ramada): one day they will decide on what they want to be called, and this is because guests have commented on the lack of staff friendliness and the austere atmosphere that now exists there.

As for your trip to Wat Pho from Silom, did you bother to ask anyone the quickest way to get there? As has been pointed out you can easily do the trip in well under 30 minutes and that is on a bad traffic day.

Most farang don't like to hear that they have been complicit in bringing about many of the changes they dislike over the last decade or so. I have made many enemies simply pointing this out.

Too many come to Thailand expecting a fantasy world that only exists in the farang's mind and are disappointed when what they find fails to live up to their expectations.

For those seeking the Thailand they knew of 20 or more years ago, there is a remedy: learn Thai and move to areas away from the cities and tourist destinations. It's all still there, and quite intact for those who are interested.

"One meets those perverse wizards who, instead of creating the world out of nothing, create nothing out of the world.├втВм

"Familiarity breeds contempt" is a saying that springs to mind.

[TrongpaiExpat]

[quote="RawSugar"]
For those seeking the Thailand they knew of 20 or more years ago, there is a remedy: learn Thai and move to areas away from the cities and tourist destinations. It's all still there, and quite intact for those who are interested.

"One meets those perverse wizards who, instead of creating the world out of nothing, create nothing out of the world.├втВм

Naughty but nice....I agree with most of what you say, especially the sight of some pathetic farangs arguing over a dollar, it really is pathetic.
As for other comments regarding Oxford street in Sydney, I said goodbye to that almost 10 years ago when I moved to the "sunshine state." I agree that Oxford street will leave you just as, if not more Jaded than Thailand.
I don't always stay in Bangkok, I visit Chiang Mai, Chiang Rai and have been to Pattaya once!
Unfortunately the "once' I stayed in Pattaya was at a place called SIAM THANI. (Put me off Pattaya for life I think?)
Please stop laughing! :blackeye:
I guess someone summed it up when they said perhaps I had visited too often and the old saying "familiarity breeds contempt" was certainly applied on my last trip.
I'm off to a nice quiet Pacific Island next month for a week or so, hopefully it will be very relaxing.

[TrongpaiExpat]

OK, come to think of it I do miss going to Babylon when it was first open and being the only farang in the place and I do miss being a 30-something farang in an exotic city. The exotic has faded into familiarity long ago along with my youth.

OK, thanks fatman, I am not as happy as I first though I was, shit.

TrongpaiExpat.

If what one is looking for is good rapid transit systems, upscale shopping centers, movie theaters and metered taxis then he would be best advised to stay in Toronto, London, Amsterdam or Berlin where he can legally have sex with 16 year old boys as well! All of these cities also have great bars, even with money boys, saunas and massages. If one insists on a good climate there is Hawaii where one can enjoy boys of 14 years of age, or Spain where 13 year olds are LEGAL.

Those who pine about the charms of Bangkok TODAY might be looking at it out of the ignorance of youth or of what life is like in other parts of the world.

I stay in Thailand precisely because it has an old culture where life is DIFFERENT from the West. That Bangkok and the tourist destinations look like any other developed place in the world today, and for exactly the reasons you have stated, is hardly what I would call an improvement.

But its hard for me to suppress a smile knowing that Bangkok will be under water in 15 to 20 years.

Bangkok is the fastest sinking city in the world. It is today sinking at the rate of 100mm a year and for a city that 1 to 1.5 meter above sea level you don't even need a calculator to do the math.

Better build a few of those Arks fattman.