History of Soi Twilight

[JayToff]

I first came in 1971 for a long beach holiday in the unspoilt village of Pattaya. .

I remember when Pattaya was a respectable holiday destination and it was the mention of Hat Yai and Chiang Mai that used to lead to snickers and knowing smiles.

Brad, you really must write a history of Soi 4. You have contributed so many fascinating vignettes on here but what still missing is a narrative history of that Soi, and of Soi 2 for that matter. Someone who has actually experienced it from the earliest years needs to put into words how the air on that soi has changed over the decades and how it has evolved from the Soi Katoey of the early days to being the Soi Dining of today. Soi 4 has never been my playground, but its days are numbered, as it has also been bought over for re-development by the same group that bought Soi Twilight, and its history is worth recording. I can't think of anyone who could do a better job of it than you.

So are Tawan and Super-A the only surviving Gogo bars, in the location from the 1991 map ?
Plus from 1999 map, Screwboys ?

(Question based on map observations, since I didn't visit Thailand until about 15 years ago)

Tawan has been in the same place since that map was published, but had only moved to Soi Tantawan around that time. It was previously just off Suriwongse Road, a little bit further down towards the New Road end. In its old location, it started-out as more of a twink bar.

Screw Boy is now back in its original location, which is the location on the map. Bear in mind that it moved to Soi Twilight for a while though. It moved first to the back of the Soi, into the Five Star building and then towards the front of the Soi into the X-Boys site. So, while it is back in its original location now, it can't claim to have been its original location throughout. Before Screw Boy opened on Patpong II, the site was previously the Princess' Castle girlie bar, which was owned by the KIng's Group, which also owns Screw Boy.

The bar with the longest run at its original location would be the Golden Cock, which was in the same place from the time that it opened in the 80s until it moved across to Nature Boy in September 2020.

Why did the chicken finally cross the road? To save on the rent, I assume.

[Patanawet]

Soi Katoey[/I] of the early days its days are numbered, as it has also been bought over for re-development by the same group that bought Soi Twilight.

Screw Boy is now back in its original location, which is the location on the map. Bear in mind that it moved to Soi Twilight for a while though. It moved first to the back of the Soi, into the Five Star building and then towards the front of the Soi into the X-Boys site. So, while it is back in its original location now, it can't claim to have been its original location throughout.

.

Ye gods -- I'd forgotten 'Soi Katoey' (in Amsterdam, the little street with many gay bars was known by the straights as 'rue de Vaseline').

A slight correction --- wherever did you get the idea that soi4 has been bought by a development company?
It is still owned by the same family that reside at the end of the soi and have owned it since the very beginning. I can hazard a guess about where you got that info from. Not true.

And Screw Boy's original location, before Patpong 2/Twilight etc., was in the square (I forget the name) just before soi Twilight.. When it moved to Patpong it had a semi circular bar surrounding the stage. 2 boys behind the bar (one the owner's son) guarding two bottles of spirits. Often the sound of music was drowned out by the sound of rats scurrying in the ceiling void. I think one of the original waiters/mamasans, Lek, is still at S.B. now.

[Oliver2]

Screw Boys has an interesting history, as well as the most indecorous name in Bangkok. I recall the circular bar but also a period before that when sex shows were produced in the centre of the bar. It was the first time I'd seen such a show.

Then it moved to Soi Twilight for a short period; the shows continued but the premises (ex-Chardonnay, perhaps?) were devoid of decoration apart from numerous balloons. It moved back to Patpong quickly suggesting that its stay in Twilight was temporary.

The "Screw Boys" name may be indecorous but the original choice was even worse...."Schoolboys". This is according to Michael Notcutt's (spelling?) guide to the gay scene- my estimable companion during my first few visits.

[Armando]

Does anyone remember Apollo, the gogo bar at the end of Soi 4? It was definitely there in 1981 and I am reasonably certain a couple of years - if not more - before then. It was located where Sphinx used to be but on the floor above. Quite a small bar but with great guys.

Again if I remember correctly, the manager opened a spa/sauna type place in a residential district named Grey's Athletic Club probably around 1983. It had a number of boys working there, mostly from the bars. It seemed more a place for rent boys to meet customers than a proper sauna. Volt off Asoke was the first sauna I can remember probably around 1985.

[StevieWonders]

Does anyone remember Apollo, the gogo bar at the end of Soi 4? It was definitely there in 1981 and I am reasonably certain a couple of years - if not more - before then. It was located where Sphinx used to be but on the floor above. Quite a small bar but with great guys.

Again if I remember correctly, the manager opened a spa/sauna type place in a residential district named Grey's Athletic Club probably around 1983. It had a number of boys working there, mostly from the bars. It seemed more a place for rent boys to meet customers than a proper sauna. Volt off Asoke was the first sauna I can remember probably around 1985.

Sphinx was opened in 1991 if I recall correctly - it was founded by the same American (“William”) who founded Telephone Bar in the late 80s and then sold it to Richard St L in 1989. Once his non-compete clause in the sale agreement expired he opened Sphinx. It was once my favourite go-to restaurant but the only thing upstairs that I recall was some ghastly karaoke joint (ghastly in the sense that all karaoke is ghastly). The only gogo bar I recall was on the Telephone Bar side of the street, opposite (but upstairs) the current Jupiter. I never visited it, preferring to bar-hop in Soi Twilight where there was more choice once go-go took over from the host bars in Soi 2.

However a Google for “Apollo gogo Bangkok” will give you slightly more information. It predates me but Brad may have been.

[Patanawet]

Screw Boys has an interesting history,

Then it moved to Soi Twilight for a short period; the shows continued but the premises (ex-Chardonnay, perhaps?)

It also had a short time (no pun) above a straight ground floor restaurant/bar/karaoke on the bend of soi Twilight diagonally opposite to (and before) Classic Boys.

[Armando]

Sphinx was opened in 1991 ...

However a Google for “Apollo gogo Bangkok” will give you slightly more information. It predates me but Brad may have been.

Apollo was certainly dead long before Sphinx opened. I have checked on google. It throws up an excerpt from a book titled First Queer Voices from Thailand: Uncle Go's Advice Columns for Gays .. by Peter Jackson. The relevant section states this -

"In Thailand in the 1960s and 1970s, host bars were called "partner" bars and, as the name suggests, this type of venue provided dance and drinking partners to accompany male customers. Phan Thathorn then named a number of gay bars in Patpong – Tulip, Apollo, Tomboy, Siamese Cat, Twilight, Garden and Harry's – and described the scene at one unnamed gay bar where the male sex workers had numbers attached to their clothes in the same way that female sex workers in heterosexual brothels wore numbers for ease of identification by clients. He reported that these male sex-workers were more expensive than female sex-workers in Patpong, with an "off" price of between 100 and 500 baht for Thai customers and a much higher price of 500 to 1000 baht needing to be paid by Western customers for the privilege of taking a male sex-worker off the premises to spend the night."

I believe much of this is pure speculation. Most of the bars were not in Patpong, but that may merely have been stated to give an idea of location. Would bars that morphed into what we know as gogo bars have ever been just dancing bars where a Thai boy would dance clothed with a westerner? Surely these had to be go-go bars. Certainly Apollo and Twilight were. 1000 baht off fee for an overnight was also very much on the high side even by the mid-1980s. This Khun Phan often used the magazine Plaek to put forward his views. Its first edition was in 1975.

Trying to find out who Khun Phan Thathorn might have been, another google search throws up another section from the same book. His name was Pratchaya Phanathathorn. Although heterosexual he was an early advocate of gay rights and by 10975 was suggesting that Thailand should copy the west to develop "a sexual model for Thailand to follow."

There is also the suggestion that it was not Western gay residents and tourists who encouraged the development of Thailand's gay culture. He reckons it was much more Thai gay men returning from overseas. So Thailand's gay culture is not an implant but one seeded by better-off Thai gay men who had travelled outside the country.

This view is repeated in another article Reinventing Sexual Identities: Thai Gay Men's Pursuit of Social Acceptance. On page 20 it states -

"At least in Bangkok, the first generation of gay bars and night clubs along Silom Road were said to be frequented by young Thai western educated gay men who had had first hand experience of Western gay lifestyles abroad."

[StevieWonders]

My earliest experiences are of Telephone Bar (independent money boys), Harry's & (New) Garden Bar (semi-independent host "bars"), both in Silom (Sois 4 & 2 respectively), and Barbeiry (gogo - Suriwong opposite Twilight). Those were the days before the Western do-gooders came along when if a boy was in a bar there was no question of any "age of consent" and the age of patrons or workers in bars certainly wasn't policed (although I saw only teenagers and above). I never thought to ask. In Harry's and Garden Bar I don't recall there was even an "off" fee after you'd bought the guy a drink. The first guy I ever "offed" (my first night in Bangkok) was from Barbeiry Bar - 500 baht and I don't recall whether there was an off fee but there probably was.

After that I focused my attention on Soi 2 for sex and Soi 4 for socialising with other ex-pats.

[Smiles]

Socialising???? You???? Hahahaha

With other ex-pats????? You????. Hahahahaha

5555555555555 ????????????

[christianpfc]

The bar with the longest run at its original location would be the Golden Cock, which was in the same place from the time that it opened in the 80s until it moved across to Nature Boy in September 2020.

Why did the chicken finally cross the road? To save on the rent, I assume.

I haven't been in Thailand since April 2020, so I cannot check in person. But both sides of Nature Boy were already occupied, and the place Golden Cock is in looks pretty cheap.