Hotels That Are Gone.

[unit731]

February 1991 coup - the military overthrew the openly corrupt government of Chatichai Choonavan. The military appointed a civilian PM, Anand Panyarachun, whose anti-corruption campaign made the government very popular. However, after an election the next year, the new coalition government appointed one of the coup generals as PM. This touched off huge protests.

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Interesting. Was there too at this time. More walking back then.

Didn't know what was going on.

Viewed some gatherings/groups on street. Near/at an intersection/square/circle/roundabout.

Didn't have a clue why locals were in groups with someone getting - all - worked up about something.

 

Finally walked back to hotel and asked front desk person. "No worry for you" was answer.

[WorldFun]

tipping taxis???

when 'meter' saYs like 103bt so i pay 'only' 100bt sure! no hab small money sorry

 

now for hotels gone by...is nana and grace still there?

um uncle rays? guest house just behind NEP via a small lane?

most guest houses on khaosan also disappeared in the last 10-20 years~

[Flashermac]

The Nana is still there, with the same freelancers in the lobby. The Grace has never gone away, but in the early 1980s the Arabs took it over. The whole area around the Grace is nicknamed the Gaza Strip. Some good ME food if you like it. I've never been bothered going through there, even when wearing a VFW shirt. I've been told non-Arabs get dirty looks in the Grace Coffee Shop though.

 

Khao Sarn went sort of upmarket. It has also spread to the west. A lot of the visitors now are former backpackers returning with money to visit their old haunts. The cheap guest houses have moved up to Thewet, a kilometer or so further north.

[Guest]

Unfortunately, we never ate at the dining room at the Intercontinental but we had a driver who took us to an outdoor restaurant and after we finished our meal, we would walk to the curb and the driver would take us wherever we wanted to go. That was my first taste of life in the orient. I have dined at the restaurant at the Oriental hotel. Fine food, with cognac and cuban cigars afterwards. It was nice to be on expenses where the company picks up the tab! Back in the day, I met

the son of the CEO of Bangkok bank who succeeded his father as CEO and his pretty assistant at a meeting at the Erawan hotel.

 

My first experience at Thermae was late 90s or 2000s, prices were in the 1000 baht range. I recall the girl worked as a salesgirl in a dept store in the then World Trade Center and went to Thermae for extra income. Today, the ladies at Thermae are asking 2,000 or more. I also met a nice girl at Thermae who i saw a few times. She was from Issan.

 

I also wanted to meet regular girls and I got to know two, one a graduate of Chulalongkorn and the other a graduate of Thomasat. I am not in communication with the Chulalongkorn girl but I still communicate with the one from Thomasat.

 

Another interesting story is every time I come to Bangkok, I have been going to a local dentist to have my teeth cleaned. I have been doing this for more than 10 years. About two years ago, the dentist asked me, "you have lived in Bangkok for so long, how come you can not speak Thai?" I had to break the news to him

that I do not live in Bangkok. He then asked," how come you come so often? My reply was I love Thailand. lol

 

Prices were still 1,000 up until about 2006. But sadly, no more.

[Guest]

tipping taxis???

when 'meter' saYs like 103bt so i pay 'only' 100bt sure! no hab small money sorry

 

now for hotels gone by...is nana and grace still there?

um uncle rays? guest house just behind NEP via a small lane?

most guest houses on khaosan also disappeared in the last 10-20 years~

 

I ALWAYS round up a few baht on taxi fares (though yeah, when it's like 102 or 103 and I don't have a 5 baht coin, they almost always insist on just the 100). If the guy's really nice--which is quite often--I tip even more; as much as 20-50 if they've taken me out to Suvannabhumi, it can be hard to find a fare back from there.

 

Those guys do not make much per day, they have a tough job. Don't be a cheap charlie (read: ASSHOLE) with them. 5-20 baht extra is not gonna kill you.

 

I'm truly mystified by all the complaints I hear from farangs in their dealings with Bangkok taxi drivers. My experiences with them (over 14 years) have been OVERWHELMINGLY positive. Sure, I've run into some jerks, but they're very much the exception. I suspect that bad experiences with Thai taxi drivers are directly proportional to the farang in question's inability to converse in Thai. I have a friend who has been punched twice by taxi drivers, and is always getting in arguments with them. He's lived in Thailand over 10 years and speaks barely a word of Thai.

 

One basic rule of taxis--and this applies the world over, any person whose really a traveler and not a newbie dipshit knows this--is NEVER, ever get into a parked/stationary taxi (with the exception of managed legitimate cues like at the airports). Real, honest taxi drivers are always moving, and pick up their fares that way. The ones who are parked and "hail" YOU are the scam artists who refuse to use the meter. When I see these douchebags, say, lined up at the mouth of Sukh 7/1 at night or the mouth of Patpong, I completely ignore them, step past them (often standing right next to them) and hail a moving cab on the street. The moving cab ALWAYS agrees to use the meter.

[Guest]

The Nana is still there, with the same freelancers in the lobby. The Grace has never gone away, but in the early 1980s the Arabs took it over. The whole area around the Grace is nicknamed the Gaza Strip. Some good ME food if you like it. I've never been bothered going through there, even when wearing a VFW shirt. I've been told non-Arabs get dirty looks in the Grace Coffee Shop though.

 

Khao Sarn went sort of upmarket. It has also spread to the west. A lot of the visitors now are former backpackers returning with money to visit their old haunts. The cheap guest houses have moved up to Thewet, a kilometer or so further north.

 

Actually, the Grace coffee shop (as an after-hours place to find a freelancer if you didn't find anything at, say, Nana Disco by 2 am) was still pretty decent around 2002-2003 (I know I'm not remembering wrong, because I only first started coming to Thailand in 1999). But yeah, shortly after that, it totally got Arab-ified.

 

Speaking of which, there are many Thai girls--freelancers--working Sukh soi 3 who just went with the flow and adapted to the new customer base. Gotta give 'em credit, they're real troopers...as one knows, the Thais do NOT take kindly to body odor. Frankly, I don't know how they get close to those guys...let alone naked with them.

 

There are two prerequisites for working the Arab crowd, though, for a Thai freelancer (this is information I've gotten personally from freelancers who work Soi 3 whom I've known): 1) you gotta have a big ass and 2) you've gotta take it up the ass...if not, you have no business trying to get those guys as customers. That's their number one sexual preference, according to the girls.

[radioman]

2) you've gotta take it up the ass...if not, you have no business trying to get those guys as customers. That's their number one sexual preference, according to the girls.

 

It reminds them of their childhood!

[Flashermac]

Ditto on the taxi drivers. I seldom have a bad experience with them. I usually end up chatting with them about whatever they feel like, and they seem surprised when I tip them. A few drivers have flat out refused to take a tip, even handing the money back to me.

 

You are right about language ability. Yet I know people who hae lived here for decades and refuse to learn the language. For fuck's sake, why not? If I were to go and live in Malaysia, Cambodia or anywhere my first priority would be learning the language. I do not like being unable to communicate.

[WorldFun]

um flasher,

how much is a 'cheap' guesthouse in thewet these days then? as i recall the going rate was ~100bt circa 2000ad

[Flashermac]

No idea, but I remember signs saying you could have a mat on the floor for 100 baht a night.