A 40-Degree Summer Of Suffering Coming After Songkran

[Coss]

Was that the one in that hotel Siam something?

[Flashermac]

Nope, it was a nice little restaurant behind the old Erewan Hotel. There was a short soi of small gogo-bars behind the Erewan too. As I recall, 1am was the witching hour in the 1970s when all bars and MPs had to close. Any working girls still looking to hook up, plus many of the freelancers, would head for the Thai Yonok. After midnight, the coffee shop was a blast. I remember gals dancing on the tables, putting the moves on guys who were trying to eat, you name it. I considered it the most fun of the three main pickup places, the others being the Thermae Coffee Shop (under the MP) and the Grace Hotel's coffee shop (in pre-Arab days). Moreover, the Thai Yonok really had good food. The entire area was torn down when the big Sogo department store was built on the site.

 

For some reason, nobody seems to remember the Thai Yonok. Maybe it was more of a local expats' place than the others, though the old Thermae was also a closely kept secret. Almost the only references to the Thai Yonok that I've seen in recent years have been by writers who obviously read my old columns in tourist magazines or on Nanaplaza.com. I just googled for the Thai Yonok, and there's not a single photo of it on line. It was an attractive building, quite respectable looking, unless you happened to drop in after the midnight hours. I imagine more than a few hungry tourists got a bit of a surprise when they entered it late at night.

 

It was also one of the few places back then where you could get a decent steak for a reasonable price. Just move fast to keep your waiter from dumping Aram Binyo sauce all over it.

[YimSiam]

Department stores will be the end of everything, and THEN who will they sell to? Just a big, empty, overheated world of out-of-business Sogos and Emporia. I want to go back to when everything was just little mom-and-pops and rows of smokey little beer bars and freelancer joints. That's what heaven'll be like, when I get there.

[Coss]

Nope, too early for me, I'll have to look up Thai Yonok in heaven.

[YimSiam]

Ask the taxi drivers up there - they know everything, and the best way to get there. There's no meter - but that's because you don't have to pay; it's heaven.

 

Unfortunately in the places I usually live there is no Thai Yonok, the taxi drivers are bastards who don't know where you want to go or how to get there, and the meter is irrelevant because their fucking you anyway. At least Bangkok is one step closer to heaven - the meters work, except on Silom at bar-close.