Street of Shame

[Gadfly]

I'm staying in Soi 9 and all of lower Suk has been overun with Nigerian hookers and by my reckoning this evening they were out numbering the Thai's by about three to one.

 

We can thank the new social order for the current mess on the lower (mostly odd numbered) Sois of Sukhumvit. The outdoor makeshift bars started appearing just after the new social order started.

 

The whole scene is a dangerous mess. It is much harder to control than "bricks and mortar" entertainment venue, there a many times more drugs available now than were ever available in the bars and its much more dangerous than the bars. Also, unlike the bars, it's plainly in your face.

 

Thais do notice. I cannot imagine anyone driving by this part of town not noticing (and I have driven it many times - it's necessary to get to and from work in the evening if I don't take the BTS, and the same will be true of many Thais). The Bangkok Post is not the only news outlet that has reported on this change to this part of Sukhumvit.

 

Now take the situation, you describe, namely Nigerion hookers and (not mentioned, but certainly present) their pimps nearby. I cannot see this happening in the bars of NEP or anywhere else, and I hasn't happened in NEP or Soi Cowboy. Why? In a real bar (as opposed to an open air folding chair bar), it's easy to control. The owner of a real bar has too much to lose to allow the sort of stuff that goes on in hte lower sois of Sukhumvit.

 

Outside the bars along the sois of Sukhumvit, there are no such invcentives and everything is much harder to control. The corruption is greater, and so is the danger.

 

The mess we and thousands of Thais (everyday) see along the lower part of Sukhumvit is a legacy of a seriously flawed social policy, the new social order. And many of us here called it for what it was, and predicted, accurately as we can now see, that it would create even more problems and a bigger mess.

[shygye]

... maybe the real street of shame runs by government house.

[gobbledonk]

Isn't the pattern something like this:

 

1. turn a blind eye until the cops can no longer avoid doing *something*

 

2. launch a crackdown with plenty of media attention and maintain that for a few months (or longer for NEP)

 

3. gradually allow the sleaze back in until the cycle repeats.

 

At every point in the cycle, money is changing hands and finding its way into uniformed pockets. Its all very Yin/Yang.

 

 

[Evel_Penivel]

The lower Suk between Soi 3 and Asoke used to be a surreal street carnival, a post-modern Monger in Wonderland as drawn by R Crumb. It was more about people watching gone wild than seeking out temporary companionship. but it was mostly fun. While you had to keep your wits about you - that's true in any nightlife area in the world - there wasn't much real danger.

 

It doesn't bother me that covered ladies shop for tchotchkes at the street vendors' stalls, anymore than I'm bothered by their plain vanilla counterparts from New York, Sydney or Moscow doing the same. If guys in Middle Eastern robes want to pursue chubby Thai girls, that's fine with me. Those girls have to eat too (much), even if it is spice kaek rather than farang meringue.

 

I'm less sanguine about the Uzbek hookers and Africans of both sexes that are increasingly making their presences felt. Any time drug dealers, street pimps and traffickers begin to take over, it's very bad news. The fun atmosphere has been replaced by a much sharper edge. Some of the types that hang around the Suk late at night now are annoying as hell and often aggressive.

 

On my last trip, one of the dusky Mama Jammas had my forward progress blocked in a tiny strip of unencumbered sidewalk between some street stalls. It was like facing the offensive center of the Minnesota Vikings. She was doing her best to solicit me for the facile fee of 5,000 baht (Why me, oh Lord? Do I look that desperate?). Inside my head I heard myself tell her, "Give me 50,000 baht and I'll think about it," or "Is that at a rate of 50 baht per kilo?", perhaps even "I'd rather stick my dick in a meat grinder." But I said nothing, just shook my head "No!" and kept trying to side-step her. Maybe my expression did the talking because she punched me in the shoulder as I finally made it past her.

 

If a street hooker in New York (actually, I haven't seen one in years) ever laid hands on me, I would have immediately called 911 and claimed she had threatened me with everything up to and including weapons of mass destruction. With the right degree of exaggeration, the cops would probably have taken her down felony style. But in Bangkok, I don't have that option. In fact, there's nothing I can do at all.

 

So in the future, I'll avoid the lower Suk by night as much as I can. If I have reason to visit Soi 7/1, I'll arrive by taxi. Now it's not just Suk Soi 3 around the Grace Hotel that's infected, but the whole area up to Suk Soi 7 has become the Hellgate. Sooner or later, something really serious is going to happen and then the BiB will respond. But it be over the body of some poor farang from Cedar Rapids or Vimmerby who hadn't kept up with developments in what he assumed would be pussy paradise.

 

Evel

 

 

[jack_schist]

truth is sukhumvit and pattaya will be given up to the middle east in relatively short order.

[unit731]

truth is sukhumvit and pattaya will be given up to the middle east in relatively short order.

 

 

OK. So where is the destination for all the clean cut, educated, good looking, thin, handsome punters after Sukhumvit and Pattaya ?

[shygye]

The Russians will kick their arse!

[gobbledonk]

unit731, I suspect you know that many longtimers no longer go to Thailand for P4P. Plenty of comments on other boards that the girls are increasingly arrogant and the prices ludicrous - throw in the new arrivals and I dont think those guys will be coming back anytime soon.

[simie]

Gobble, a mate of mine is a typical example of what you mention. He's been to Thailand about 55 times over 20 years, but now goes to the Philippines. Says the girls and beer half the price of Thailand and their attitude like Thailand was 10 years ago.

Simie.

[gobbledonk]

Simie, I still cant bring myself to consider a trip to PI, even though I'm finally on the threshold of setting off for Cambo. Even if the stories of lawlessness are exaggerated, trip reports like SD's from a few months back run the same line - other than beer and cheap sex there is nothing to see.

 

I may live to rue this post if PP is as boring as Jack Schist would have me believe, but at least there will be some French Colonial architecture and a few temples.