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1 - 15 October 2010 Issue 1 www.pattayaone.net
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VISA OVERSTAY: The untold story Starts page 4
Jail time for foreigners Allegedly tired of overstaying foreigners arriving at Suvarnabhumi airport with a valid air ticket and the maximum fine of 20,000 baht in their hands, the Immigration Department is now arresting and jailing people before permitting them to leave Thailand. Anybody who has overstayed a valid visa in Thailand beyond a period of six weeks (42 days) is no longer permitted to simply turn up with the cash and an air ticket and leave the country after filling in a few forms and handing over the wedge. For many years now it has been possible for people on long overstay to simply gather together the maximum fine under law of 20,000 baht, purchase an air ticket, travel to Suvarnabhumi and leave Thailand after completing a few formalities. With a change in the command at the top of the Immigration Department ladder this has now altered and anyone whose overstay is 42 days or longer is likely to be arrested. People on overstay of less than three weeks (21 days) are still able to arrive at the airport with the correct amount of folding stuff, pay the fine due and leave Thailand.
By Staff Writers
The grey area is for those whose overstay falls in the period between three and six weeks; that is, between 22 and 41 days. They can potentially have a problem. It is being suggested anyone whose overstay falls into this time frame should be aware that it will be up to the Immigration officer and his superiors at an airport or land border crossing to decide whether to detain the recalcitrant foreigner or permit him, or her, to leave unhindered, after payment of the overstay fine has been levied. As with many legal situations in Thailand involving foreigners and money, the rules tend to bend with the circumstances, and the mood of the relevant official or officials. Nonetheless, it is being stated quite unequivocally that anyone on overstay exceeding 42 days (six weeks) will be arrested. They will then spend at the very least one or two days behind bars while waiting for the necessary paperwork to be processed. Most will eventually spend some time inspecting the stripy sunlight at the Immigration Detention Centre (IDC) in Bangkok.
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02 Pattaya One
Introduction The question as to whether yet another print publication should be offered to the expat residents and foreign tourist visitors to Pattaya was a resounding ‘yes’ once the criteria for what should be the content was firmly established. The simple parameters regarding this content were that it should (a) be original material by professional writers and seasoned journalists; (b) of relevance to people living in and around the Pattaya area and (c) be as entertaining, informative and as much fun as possible. We believe we have the best combination of local expat writers as well as some well-known names from Bangkok as contributors. Not all are in this first edition, simply because of space constraints. While Pattaya One is produced in a newsprint format, it is not another newspaper. Our columnists certainly write about news-related items but offer either behind-thescenes local knowledge of events or straight commentary about them. Our aim with this publication is quite simple: provide the best, most relevant and informed commentary and interesting information from Pattaya, Thailand and the region and offer advertisers and sponsors the best ‘bang’ for their baht in Fun Town. Our Internet presence is secondto-none: a permanent fixture on the Pattaya One News website and dedicated space on Thai Visa, the biggest website in the country. We look forward to your feedback and welcome any and all constructive criticism. Pattaya One
Local lady snares Thailand Lawn Bowls Championship Phinthong Pearce, who, as her surname might suggest, is married to a foreigner, won the ladies division at the sixth annual Thailand Lawn Bowls Championship, conducted at the Retreat Bowling Club in Pattaya on 11 and 12 September. Mention lawn bowls and many people might conjure up visions of wheezing octogenarians who only play the sport as an excuse to indulge in their alcohol ingestion habits and for whom golf is just a little too strenuous and way too far to walk to the bar. The reality is that lawn bowls attracts a wide range of personalities and across all age groups and genders. Phinthong Pearce is one such person who very definitely does not fit the pre-conceived paradigm. Better known simply as Pin, she is married to an English expat named Brian Pearce. According to Brian, the pair came to live in Pattaya eight years ago. He took up lawn bowls three years ago and Pin, probably wondering what all the fuss was about, started playing just over a year later. She proved a natural. With less than two years playing experience, Pin entered the Thailand Lawn Bowls Championship, and, to borrow a sedentary metaphor, came up trumps. Pin managed to defeat one woman who had played for the Thai national team in her quest to reach the final. Although she did lose one match in the series, Pin eventually made the
Jail time for foreigners
From page one
Unofficially, it is being recommended by those with knowledge of the system that people currently on lengthy overstay contact their embassy and seek advice from consular officials. Pattaya One has been told it is better to clear up long overstay issues by going to Bangkok rather than remain in Pattaya, or going elsewhere. While embassy officers cannot circumvent or interfere in the process of Thai law they can advise overstayers on the best course of action and provide assistance for their nationals while in custody. Informed sources in Pattaya
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are suggesting there are quite a large number of foreigners currently well and truly in breach of their visas and are on overstay periods extending beyond a year or more. It won’t matter where a foreigner may be residing in the country because authorities intend to take a harder line with those on extensive overstays. They feel these people have thumbed their noses at Thailand’s essentially easy visa regulations. That said, it’s not as if Immigration officials are mere automatons, and compassion and understanding is shown in extenuating circumstances.
final and scored a hard-fought victory from another Pattaya resident. Although the score was 21-3 in favour of Pin, which reads like a real easy victory, Brian stated the final was in fact highly competitive. Pin received 20,000 baht and a trophy and an invitation to play in a tournament in Malaysia against members of that nation’s national side who were preparing to compete at the XIX Commonwealth Games in New Delhi.
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1 8 2 By the 6
NUMBERS
7.92 Thailand’s murder rate per 100,000 of population, according to some statistical measures. This rates the country as the 27th most dangerous in the world. Although reliable statistics are difficult to come by and figures, when they are available, are not necessarily compiled in the same way from nation to nation, the fact remains that of the 11 countries which make up South-East Asia, Thailand has the highest murder rate. It’s probably no surprise the Philippines ranks second, but what is astounding is that its murder rate is just 3.82 per 100,000. Malaysia is third with a rate of 2.31 per 100,000. Indonesia 1.05, Brunei 0.50 and Singapore 0.38 are at the bottom of the scale. No official figures are available for Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, or Burma. The latter almost certainly has the highest rate of state-sponsored killings. Another set of statistics places Thailand 22nd, and, of course, still ahead of its South-East Asian neighbours. Best to stay away from Third Road karaoke bars anytime after midnight. 56 The number of deaths by drowning or submersion per one million people per year in Thailand. This places Thailand in second place behind Belize (with 64 deaths per million of population). Just why Belize has such a high figure I guess could only be answered by someone who has been there. For Thai-
land it may have something to do with the proliferation of village streams and creeks and, of course, the deep freshwater wells dug in many villages to provide drinking water for homes not on town water.
A water well in Buriram. Not quite up to required safety standards 4 The number of minutes it takes the average man to reach orgasm. This figure is, allegedly, based on large clinical research. It is doubtful if any of this was undertaken in Pattaya where it is claimed many older men rely on erectile dysfunction pills and gels to ‘crack a fat’. These helpful additions to a stiffer life also tend to make the user perform longer and harder, to the extent a zero could probably be added to the original single-digit figure.
1 - 15 October 2010 Issue 1 This column focuses on one of the most energetic aspects of Pattaya’s busy social whirl: its cyberlife. Much as people loathe (or pretend to loathe) Pattaya, its web boards, websites and Pattaya forums are in demand from readers around the world. Posters write all manner of stories on these web boards (Xrated and otherwise). Apart from having fun, many people also share valuable information about the city on these web boards, and news stories about Pattaya are always a big hit with Internet readers. So, as a useful pulse by which to monitor the beating organ of this fine city, this column is going to review the best, most interesting, topical or simply the most amusing posts - past and present - from Pattaya’s web boards.
I Drugged a Bar Girl A poster claimed to have taken pity on a crone working Beach Road one evening and invited her back to his ‘loom’ for some existential discussions. She looked OK, which by Beach Road standards means she had both legs, all her own teeth, wasn’t hideously deformed and didn’t look like she had grandkids, which is
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ABOVE BAWD
IN PATTAYA
By JOHN THOMAS our Internet Forum Snoop always a bonus down there. In fact she seemed like a newcomer to the coconut bar. But her innocent face masked a dark heart, as our hapless poster was soon to discover. On the way back to the hotel she bought some booze from Seven, deposited her ID at the hotel reception and they made their way upstairs. The guy was extra careful, locked all his valuable stuff in the safe, and tripped off to the shower, leaving her unattended. On returning to the bedroom, where she was now down to her undies, she handed him a beer, which she had already opened, and then took a shower. Being a sensible bloke, he was reluctant to drink from the bottle, but, unwilling to appear impolite and suspicious if he didn’t drink it, he opened the second bottle of
Roadworks taking place on the northbound section of the railway road between Soi Khao Talo and Soi Kow Noi. The road was effectively closed for three weeks during August and early September. The work is now completed but the road surface is awaiting a proper seal.
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beer from the fridge, and replaced the cap on the one she had opened and put it back in the fridge, to give it to her. Then he waited. Five minutes, 10 minutes. Finally, 15 minutes later his lady of the night emerged from the shower in total shock to see him still as bright as a daisy and admirably priapic to boot. He immediately pretended to open the second bottle from the fridge, and handed it to her. So she was now holding the suspicious bottle. He had the safe one. To reassure her, he took a huge gulp of his booze, which made her feel comfortable knowing he would be in a catatonic state shortly, so she had some of hers. He moved in for the thrill and she was reluctant to even drop her towel, which made him even more
suspicious. His suspicions were finally realised when she crashed out cold, totally drugged up, five minutes later. Now he realised he had the problem of dealing with this drugged bargirl thief in his room. He wisely involved the management and porters, liberally dispensing his baht in order to get them onside, and they took her downstairs to the lobby, replaced her ID in her purse and called the police, after which she was whisked to hospital, presumably to have her stomach pumped, and our poster returned to his room, shaken but not stirred. Unfortunately the boot is so often on the other foot, especially now, when so many naïve sub-continental tourists are thronging the streets of Pattaya looking for cheap deals from old hands. For example, there was a recent report of two drugged Indians who had taken one girl to share for the night. She drugged them both then raided their money, gold, and even had time to soap a gold ring off the fingers of one of them. I claim the naming rights for this new audacious form of Pattaya theft – giving a new meaning to ‘getting a soapie’. All comments or Web Board tipoffs gratefully received at jt@pattayaone.net
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Pete’s Peregrinations Peter Lloyd
Pattaya Tales Extreme Indeed Sometimes I get the feeling that, for whatever reason, crimes don’t seem to be reported locally with anything like the frequency they are being committed around the town. This impression was recently reinforced when I was out with a friend who told me he had been burgled twice – in three days. And he also prevented a third burglary in the same week when he heard a suspicious noise and went to investigate.
Thappraya Road This was on a nice, quiet residential estate, where my friend is renting a large house. During both burglaries, he and his heavily pregnant wife were asleep in the bedroom as their house was ransacked, and their dogs did not bark on either occasion. During the first burglary, the burglars stole everything in the house that wasn’t nailed down. My friend thought the culprit might be living in a nearby con-
struction worker’s camp, and the next night, for the first time ever, that camp was a riot of song and drunkenness, for which my unhappy friend believed he had paid. A couple of nights later, another burglary. Again, they slept through it, and again the dogs didn’t bark, and this time the burglars stole everything that WAS nailed down, and even hung around to get drunk on my friend’s whisky whilst raiding the fridge for a meal which they
Walking Street Renamed More Gawk and Talk, less Hawk and Walk In a little-publicised shock move, Walking Street has been officially renamed by City Hall. Keen to reflect the changing nature of Pattaya tourism, and supported by TAT, proud of their success in filling cheap hotels with impecunious sub-continental tourists, poorer than most Thais themselves, it has been renamed GAWKING Street, narrowly pipping “Hawking Street” which reflected the earthy commercial nature of
International Banks I have banked with HSBC in London for well over 20 years so it made sense for me to open an HSBC account in Bangkok, and in the past it has been easier for me in certain respects. For example the Bangkok HSBC ATM card is accepted in many ATMs around the world where my Siam Commercial Bank card is not. This is especially true in African countries.
But where the HSBC account is rubbish and where they let themselves down, is by offering local standards of service in their international bank. In fact it is worse than local standards. I recently tried to effect a simple transfer of money from my SCB bank in Jomtien to my HSBC Bangkok account.
much of the “ten-on-one ugly one” new tourist group leisure activities being negotiated down there. “Whoreking Street” was deemed too offensive to the burgeoning freelance trade. As the cheapest entertainment for broke tourists available on Gawking Street (aside from watching beggars beg) is watching teenage kids trying to break dance, these spectacles now attract record crowds, second only to hordes of slavering swarthy
How long is that going to take me. Five minutes? Even sending money to my London bank from SCB only takes that long. However this simple bank to bank transfer took me FORTY MINUTES, and a ton of hassle. Apparently HSBC won’t accept a payment, even a bank-to-bank transfer from a customer, without pre-clearing it first. So this took three phone calls from an increasingly moody SCB teller in the
ate at the kitchen table. Needless to say, they moved out as soon as they could. However one crime that WAS widely reported when I was in Jomtien a few weeks ago, was a theft in a 7-11 by a gang who were caught with something like 200,000 baht’s worth of stolen shop goods in their car. By chance, I had gone into the shop just after the burglary had been committed (err, honest), and saw police, staff and the ubiquitous motorbike taxi drivers huddled around a monitor, where they were watching remarkably clear security footage of the miscreants robbing the shop blind. Next day I read reports of both the crime and the arrest of the thieves, who were quickly apprehended by the police. This was another extremely fast response from the boys in Dongtan police box, who I have said before, have what must be one of the hardest policing jobs in Thailand, from the smallest of premises, with little manpower, covering a huge catchment area with a lot of traffic accidents, tourists and crime to deal with.
men looking at the mannish Russian dancers in upstairs window displays, and ogling, pawing and photographing the girls with placards outside bars like they’re in a zoo (which I suppose they are). Apparently Pattaya’s casualty departments are full of innocent strollers with severely bruised arms caused by the new tourists who barge their way along the street, staring left and right, but never ahead, at the unaffordable wonders of Pattaya. One bar owner lamented “The new broke tourists are even less inclined than Russians to spend money and buy booze in bars. Even the 7-11s are missing the Russians”.
busy bank, who was put on hold on HSBC’s automated menu, and then cut off TWICE. Eventually she got through and in a 15-second conversation, obtained the authority for me to pay money into my own bleeding account. Why do HSBC make life so difficult for their own customers? Contact me at peter@pattayaone.net
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In a Rice Mess “What this?” my true love asked me the other day, pointing to a freshly-purchased five-kilogram bag of rice on the kitchen bench. “Rice, of course,” came my reply as I resisted the urge to be truly sarcastic. “No good,” she scowled and walked from the kitchen. No good? What does she mean ‘no good’? I trudged that heavy bag all the way home from Big C and that’s the thanks I get? It had come to pass that our household was out of rice, a situation unconscionable in Asia. Being the big-hearted person that I am, I unilaterally decided to purchase a rice consignment the next time I was at the supermarket and thus save my petite partner from carrying such a heavy burden. I concluded it would be better for me to get a hernia than for her to be inconvenienced. In hindsight this was not my brightest idea as I’m certain that, as a youngster in her village, she was used to carrying two bags on each hip and one on her head without any problems. So I found myself in Big C with ‘rice’ on my shopping list. For the uninitiated, let me explain large Thai supermarkets. There are only three main items they sell – cooking
oil, fish sauce and rice. Everything else is just there to fill up the space. If you thought of a supermarket in terms of being a city, there would be streets of cooking oils, avenues of fish sauce and an entire suburb devoted to rice. I estimated there were about 250 options at my disposal; different brands, grades, prices, flavours and sizes. Recalling my time spent in the Philippines, there were only five options with five prices. The cheapest rice always contained small stones due to the fact it was dried on the roadside and simply swept up and bagged. The most expensive rice had been cleaned and bleached so much it was snow white and truly tasteless. The trick then was to find a happy medium and life was much simpler. Now I was faced with so many options it was not so simple. To make matters worse, I do not come from what you would call a ‘ricefriendly’ family. As a child we did not have many rice meals as it was considered an ethnic treat and usually only served on our take-away Chinese nights. My mother did cook rice on odd occasions but, trying not to be too unkind, she was the world’s
worst rice cook. She would boil it in a saucepan on an electric stove and one of two things would happen: either she would use too much water with the result being such a gluggy mess that, instead of serving it with the main meal, it would become a rice pudding dessert; or she would forget about it on the stove and the bottom inch would be burnt to a cinder. In the latter case she would scrape the unburnt rice up and serve that, giving the entire meal a smoky, charcoal flavour. I only knew one other woman who made an ordeal out of cooking rice. She would add the rice to a saucepan and almost fill it with water. After it had boiled for a while she would test if the rice was cooked. Once satisfied, she then strained it through a colander. Then she would rinse it with cold water several times and leave it to ‘drip dry’ before serving. What a waste of time and effort. Once I left the culinary excesses of my childhood home and started a family of my own, I actually became very adept at cooking rice in a saucepan. I would cover the rice with about a half inch of water, let it boil under medium heat with the lid off until the water almost disap-
Pattaya One 05 peared and then turn off the heat and place the lid on to allow it to steam. The result was it never burned, never stuck together and never stuck to the pan. But that was way back in the 80’s and no longer necessary. My mother passed away at about the time electric rice cookers became popular and cheap enough so that even we could afford one. And what a godsend they are. Following the instructions there is no reason for anybody to stuff up a rice meal ever again. Pour in the rice, add the water, replace the lid, turn it on and leave it. They are foolproof. Back to modern day Pattaya and my kitchen in particular, I quizzed my tee-ruk about her lack of enthusiasm over my rice purchase. She explained it was the wrong ‘type’ and not suitable for her cooking. I countered with the fact it was not the cheapest bag I could have bought so I assumed it had no little stones in it. She immediately defended the realm by telling me, in no uncertain terms, that Thai rice never has little stones in it. Point taken, with my apologies. I argued it looked the same as the other 249 varieties on display. No, she said, the grains were too long, they separated too easily when cooked and it was more suited to Indian food than Thai. Unconvinced, I gave her the challenge. “Fine, you cook up a batch and I’ll decide whether it is any good or not.” She turned her back in a huff, cut open the bag and fired up the rice cooker. Living with my turtledove in Pattaya is wonderful but one thing really does annoy me; when she is right. I like to think it doesn’t happen too often but, when it does, it is downright infuriating. The cooked rice was more suited to nasi goreng or a saffron rice dish than the local cuisine. I had to accept her “I told you so” look for the rest of the day. Looking for the silver lining, the good news is ‘rice purchasing’ is now off my list of chores.
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Pattaya Focus on ...... How to Build a Road (Part 1) By Tar Mack This is what happens if you don’t get the drainage right. Pattayaland Soi 2, on the morning of 23 June 2003, the night after an extremely heavy downpour.
Flame window, furiture, row price. Sometimes a little knowledge can be a bad thing as the saying goes. Seen in Soi Siam Country Club.
This feature will help anyone who is planning to build a road. Properly. Happily, whilst none of the problems I mention below have ever happened in Pattaya, for this series of articles, I thought I would use some photographs to illustrate my points about road building, choosing at random from the Thappraya Road project, which, some small tweaks aside, is a fine example of Pattaya road building, and one which is coming along speedily, to the complete satisfaction of road users, nearby businesses and inhabitants.
Own The Land Of course, rule 101 of road building is to ensure you actually own all the land the road will be built on, preferably before you start work. Some people don’t, with disastrous results, huge inconvenience and massive delays.
A used whitegoods sale or perhaps an artistic installation at the side of the Pattaya Railway station. Available at a row price!
Draw up a Professional Specification Your first job should be to employ some road consultants who know what a road is, what it’s for, what it should look like, what is needed on it, and how it should best be built. Have them draw up something called a specification.
ever you do, don’t do anything at this stage that might compromise the ‘integrity’ of your road.
Negotiate a Proper Contract Now negotiate a contract. Again you should use people who have negotiated road contracts before and know what should go in them. Do not use some teenage layabout you are giving work experience to in the office to negotiate this important document. In the contract, ensure the company agrees to build the road strictly to the specification you have set out. Then only agree to pay them at stages of the project when they demonstrate they have built to the specification they have agreed on in the tender. Do not foolishly give them all of your money upfront, or in huge lump sums without checking the road is being built to your specification. This is a mistake a child wouldn’t make. The company can run off with all your money without building a road at all, or build a grossly substandard road for you, then go bust and there is nothing you can do about it.
Open and Fair, Competitive Tender
It’s not just Pattaya, even somnolent Sungai Kolok in the south of Thailand has its street dumpers.
Ask a number of road construction companies to tender for the job, strictly based on the specification, in an unbiased, fair and competitive way, asking them to actually prove they can build a road of the quality you desire, and that they have done so before. When you have the tenders, look into them closely, check their work, visit the roads they say they built. If you are happy, decide who wins the tender strictly on price and previous performance. What-
Men at work - sometimes Make sure the main contractor cannot subcontract the job to other
companies without your express consent. Otherwise, once they take your money, they may subcontract the whole construction to an inappropriately unprofessional firm, without paying them anything, before disappearing, leaving the subcontractor to half-build a shoddy road grossly below the specification needed. And the subcontractor still expects to be paid by you. I know, surely this could never happen. And you’re right. Or at least, thankfully, not in Pattaya.
Time Limits and Penalties Commit the builder to a time in which to finish the project. If he doesn’t do it in the time you agree, you make him pay YOU big financial penalties for late completion, which stops the project dragging on for years, annoying everyone who lives, works and uses the road. This is such an utterly basic commercial point it is embarrassing how often this seems to be left out of contracts here. Make sure you don’t make the same mistake. However even if the main contractor does build the road, if you haven’t done your homework on their skills, or you didn’t produce a proper specification (or you actually didn’t own all the land needed in the first place), things can still turn out very badly. In the following series of articles I will be showing you the results of failure to adhere to the above basic road building rules using Thappraya Road as the Gold Standard for what a new road should look like when it is built the right way, in a speedy fashion and to the highest international standards.
Next Edition – How (not) to build a proper road surface.
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Living Healthy in Pattaya By Khun Dee It’s estimated more than 80 percent of older people suffer back ailments—a figure even higher among smokers. Back pain can result from something as simple as lifting a heavy object, as complex as anxiety, or as multisyllabic as spondylolithesis--a condition in which one vertebra slips over another. Naprapath Patrick Nuzzo tells Pattaya One that “Stress, injuries and life-style are the leading causes of back and neck pain.” Nuzzo, who calls the body “a natural health-care system that can and will heal itself,” says most back pain resolves itself in six to 12 weeks, with or without treatment. However, many sufferers must seek medical treatment and often need surgery. In fact, back pain is the third most frequent reason for surgery.
What To Do In Pattaya, most health-care practitioners first recommend conservative techniques, such as overthe-counter anti-inflammatories, muscle relaxants and physical therapy that incorporates stretching and strengthening exercises to support the spine and improve flexibility. Furthermore, promising results have been seen with use of certain anti-seizure medications or anti-smoking medications (smokers
By Tim Gladwin, Managing Director of Sallmanns I spent a recent weekend in Ho Chi Minh City on a stag party/wedding. Amazingly, in what amounted to yet another reminder of just how fast time flies, I realized it was about twelve years since I was last there. A small, quiet place, more like a town than a city in which the streets were packed with bicycles has now turned into a sprawling, albeit still charming, city in which you fear for your life whenever you step foot on the road, due to the thousands of motorbikes hurrying from every imaginable direction. I don’t think I have ever before been to a place where the road users make Pattaya drivers appear considerate and safe. The incredible changes that have taken place there over the last decade or so made me think of Pattaya. So much of modern Pattaya is unrecognizable from what was here twelve years ago, although of
No Need to Live With Back Pain have a higher incidence of chronic lower-back pain). When conventional techniques fail, many seek alternative measures such as acupressure or acupuncture, believed to promote healing by stimulating the release of painrelieving endorphins. At Bangkok Pattaya Hospital’s physical therapy clinic, Dr. Komwudh Konchalard, MD, sees frustrated back-pain sufferers who have tried multiple therapies. “Some patients are skeptical,” he says, “and they turn to acupuncture because they’ve used everything else to no avail.” The physical medicine and rehabilitation specialist, who also operates the Dr. Komwudh Clinic in Sriracha, allows that acupuncture “is not a cure-all. But combined with life-style modifications, we have a success rate of 70-80 percent of acute back pain and about 60-70 percent for chronic back pain, without the side effects often attributed to drugs.”
Bone Cement For many who suffer from spinal or vertebral fractures every year (think osteoporosis-induced breaks, not
car-crushing blows), back pain is a daily inevitability. Though most will not require surgery, the persistent pain can overpower medication. For these patients, the answer may lie in a procedure called percutaneous vertebroplasty—or bone cement. Surgeons in Thailand and abroad inject the toothpaste-like substance directly into the fracture area. After 10 to 15 minutes, the cement solidifies, giving more support to that fracture site. It increases the structural integrity and helps with overall pain. Patients can stay awake, though sedated, and a local anesthetic numbs the area. No incisions are needed; the needle is similar to that used in blood donation and is guided with X-ray machinery. If it works, results are excellent. Vertebroplasty, often requires no more than an overnight hospital stay, affords instant pain relief.
Surgery When all else fails, patients with persistent back pain may turn to surgery. Thanks to the refinement of a host of minimally invasive spinalsurgery techniques, surgeons can
fuse or remove discs to strengthen weak spines and relieve pinched nerves. Surgeons can perform many spine operations through tiny incisions with no muscle dissection. The result is less postoperative pain, faster--sometimes same-day-hospital discharges, less pain medication and a quicker return to work, family and life. The able Dr. Komwudh says in his experience, “where spinal instabilities are at issue, most Thai orthopedic surgeons prefer more extensive procedures which involve opening the lamina of the spine [in cases of spinal stenosis and disc herniation] and using metal instruments to repair the problem.”
Talking Real Estate course it is never so dramatic when the changes take place gradually over time. The fact that both places have changed so much in recent times is an indication as to how relatively immature both cities are and thus how immature their real estate markets remain. From the perspective of an investor, an immature market tends to equate to opportunity. The more mature a market, the more established prices become, such that there tend to be few holes in it that can be exploited for capital gain. Of course capital gains are still possible in Pattaya, but they tend to be quite uniform, or alternatively a result of improvements made to a particular property. The simple reason is that, the more mature a market, the better and more efficiently it works. This means all sellers have easy access
to tools to determine the true value of their property at any given time. For example, it is relatively straightforward to obtain information on recent sales in any given area, and it is similarly easy to find out the asking prices of other properties for sale in the same area. In a more immature market such as Pattaya, while there is far greater uniformity than there was even five or six years ago, the market does not tend to work so efficiently. It is virtually impossible to find out accurate information as to the prices at which other deals have been done, unless you know someone well who was intimately involved in the deal. Furthermore, it is often hard to know exactly which property is for sale, never mind what the asking price is and whether the same price is being given to all prospective purchasers.
The net effect is that holes in the market still exist here, i.e. deals are still around which are out of sync with the market and thus very cheap. It is also true that some other properties are for sale at prices significantly higher than one would ordinarily expect to pay. Thus, while there are certainly some outstanding opportunities, there are also pitfalls for the unwary. Accordingly, for those without detailed knowledge of the market, plenty of research is very important along with, ideally, some good, honest advice. If you have any questions or queries in relation to the above, or if you would like to discuss any other matters related to the local real estate market, please call me on 087 137 0392 or email me at tgladwin@sallmannsthailand.com.
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Boob-Blockers Thanks to a lousy cold, I spent a day with my wife in front of the TV. In the early evening on a showbiz news programme we watched a beautiful woman entering a show, or concert, in a low-cut evening dress. However, the censorship watchdogs had greased over her cleavage, so as she walked the blob was covering her chest and, while being interviewed, from breast to neck was just a blur. But during the day, every soap my wife watched featured violent fight scenes where the punches and kicks, on women as well as men, were completely uncensored. Isn’t it a strange idea of censorship where harmless cleavage is banned, but graphic life-threatening violence is allowed, even during the day? Gordon Jennings Censorship of television in Thailand has no rhyme or reason: alcohol, tobacco and boobs are devilish things that innocent Thai viewers must be protected from, but extreme violence is perfectly acceptable at any time of the day. According to the greasers and the snippers, a woman mustn’t reveal flesh anywhere even remotely near the naughty parts, but it is alright to watch her brutally scratching, bat-
Fun Town’s most vibrant
Kris & Noi’s
Private
Do you have a question about customs or culture, or perhaps just a general comment on life in Thailand? Email Kris & Noi at: knprivateposts@gmail.com tering and kicking another woman. One of the worst things about the Thai portrayal of violence is that it doesn’t show the horrific effects of a beating; very often the victim is shown later with just a couple of bruises and plasters on the stillhandsome/pretty face, whereas in real life they would be hospitalised or dead. Thailand appears to have even more censors than it has generals—unfortunately they are not likely to be moved to inactive posts, so we will just have to suffer as they wield their weapons of mass obliteration.
Uniformity Sometimes when I collect my young daughter from school it’s hard to
recognise her amongst the crowd of kids all in identical uniforms. Seeing all the children at assembly looks like a clone factory. I know that Thais seem to have a passion for wearing uniforms—even civil servants sit around in military-style gear—but why force the young kids? Uniforms deny the children their rights to show their personal identity and develop their selfexpression and individuality; they should be allowed to wear what they want. Draco Certainly agree about the Thais loving to wear uniforms—have you seen the politicians when in best bib and tucker, dressed like
Pattaya: One Rainbow A Mixed Up World By James Barnes
A fierce argument has been raging on the Internet recently. Indignant feet have been stubbornly stamped and pearl necklaces have been shaken fit to break. The subject that has caused this incandescent mass debate: ‘Is attraction to ladyboys a gay thing?’ The city of Pattaya has more than its fair share of these transgendered ‘Lola’ folk who seem to evoke envy from Thai women and much confusion generally. So who is attracted to ladyboys? An Internet poll registered 4.11% of gay men, 10.27% of bisexual men and a whopping 31.51% of straight men have had their boats floated by katoeys. Nearly half the male population! In addition, this does not include those men who have had sex with a ladyboy and not known it- more than one inebriated Russian has been seen negotiating short time fees with a Beach Road ladyboy of the night. So, it seems that most gay men are not attracted to ladyboys but more men
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who identify themselves as being straight, are. Do straight women know of this? Of course, the gays, bi’s and straights cling to their tribes and love their labels but does it all really matter? Especially in Pattaya. The confusion and blurring of sexual identities is a good thing. It results in a license to be free. Free from the constraints of western Christian guilt and taboo. Free to try new experiences and explore, without hang-ups or judgements born of prejudice. Free to be yourself. Those garish and not so subtle ladyboys who adorn bars and massage parlours like bright baubles on a Christmas tree – sometimes tasteful and interestingly beautiful, sometimes gaudy- are human too. In Pattaya, they also have the freedom to be who they are. There is no need to discuss ‘plumbing’- pre op or post op. What goes on behind Pattaya’s closed doors between consenting adults,
the nature and detail of the sexual acts, does not matter a jot. What matters is that we human beings are a delightfully diverse bunch and, in Thailand, we have the opportunity to celebrate our individualism and take our desires where they lead usremembering all the while that in Thailand it is not what you do but how you do it that matters. In the West, a construction worker may wear his pink lace panties under his overalls. Here, he can wear full drag, enjoy and be enjoyed! So, ladies and gentlemen, next time you are in the audience enjoying the glam and glitter of a ladyboy show and there’s a familiar stirring in your loins, forget the labels. Remember the lines from the old Kinks song, ‘Lola’: ‘Girls will be boys and boys will be girls, it’s a mixed up, muddled up, shook up world, except for Lola.’ James Barnes is Editor of Thai Spice Magazine.
rear-admirals? However, we feel that school uniforms are a good thing. The parents pay for the uniforms and that’s it; if the kids could wear anything then parents would have the expense of buying more clothes, as for sure the children would want a stylish and varied wardrobe. Everyone is equal in a uniform, whereas you would have the more well-off parents kitting out their little darlings in expensive clobber, so they would stand out from the others. Then you get the poorer kids leaning on their parents to try to keep up with them. And isn’t it a charming sight, seeing a bunch of uniformed little kids forming a crocodile when on a school outing?
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THAI Lite
Starting off on the Right Foot By S. Tsow
A warm and hearty welcome to the readers of this first issue of Pattaya One. This column is called “Thai Lite,” and it takes a light-hearted look at Thailand and the world. It may not make you guffaw, but I hope it will at least make you smile. (If it doesn’t, I’m out of a job.) To start off this first issue on the right foot, I’m going to write about feet. One of the first things a foreigner learns in the Land of Smiles is that feet are bad. Thais regard them with disgust. They are the lowest part of the body, and they are in constant contact with the ground, which is not only low, but also dirty. Therefore feet are considered low and dirty. The opprobrium associated with feet has inspired many taboos. In Thailand it is forbidden to point with one’s foot, or to sit with one leg crossed over the other so that the sole of the foot is pointing at somebody, or to step over somebody else’s body (especially, heaven forbid, his head), or to wear shoes inside a temple. And there may be other taboos I don’t know about. Now, the feet have many noble qualities. I believe that the prejudice against them is old-fashioned, irrational, misguided, and unfair. We ought to consign it to the trash heap of outmoded superstitions. But in Thailand this proposition is going to be a hard sell. Why,
Thais will ask, should we redeem the feet from the ignominy in which they have languished for so long? I’ll tell you why. My personal feet are such an integral part of me that I have fondly named them Righty and Lefty. This is so that I can remember which is which. They have carried me around all my life without complaint. Without them I wouldn’t be able to go anywhere. As I’ve grown fatter, I’ve inflicted more weight upon them to carry. But they bear it all manfully—feetfully, I should say—and never utter a murmur of reproach. If my feet were Sherpas, carrying loads as heavy as my elephantine body up Mount Everest, they would surely demand more baksheesh for their labors. But my feet have never asked me for so much as a single satang for their lifelong service. Silently and stoically, they bear their gross and bulbous burden without thought of recompense, and seek only selflessly to serve. Indeed, if they were Catholic, the pope would have canonized them long ago. No, these lowly limbs, these execrated extremities, these abhorred appendages, perform far nobler service than more lofty body parts, and reap only scorn and contempt for their efforts. The heart is extolled as the source of love, the brain as the locus of intelligence; but the feet suffer constant vilification merely for being the lowest item on
the body’s totem pole. How would the heart and the brain be able to function if they didn’t have the feet to chauffeur them around? Indeed, all the other limbs and organs would quickly starve to death if the feet were not gracious enough to carry these leeches and parasites out to the soi to enjoy an occasional bowl of noodles. “Well,” the anti-feetists will object, “the feet are in constant contact with the earth, which is dirty.” Dirty? The earth is our mother. She cradles the seas that spawned our ancestors, the earliest life-forms; she brings forth from her womb grain, vegetables, and fruit to nourish us. We would be in a fine fix without the earth. Say not that Mother Earth is dirty; say rather that she is holy, and she imparts a portion of her holiness to the feet that tread upon her. “Well,” the anti-feetists will whine, vexed at being so eloquently refuted, “the feet are ugly—possibly the ugliest part of the body.” Really? What of those internal organs which are so grotesque that nature has chosen to hide them from public view? What about the liver? The kidneys? The gall bladder? The pancreas? And the large intestine, with all its hideous contents? Anybody want to nominate one of those
Pattaya One 13 suckers to be the body’s beauty queen? When it comes to ugliness, the feet have plenty of company concealed beneath the skin. Then there is the question of temples. Note, please, that we remove our shoes before entering a temple, but our feet receive the honor of walking on hallowed ground. If the temple floor is holy, may we not reasonably infer that some of that holiness is absorbed by the feet that walk upon it? Finally, the principle of equality, which has been extended to include all human beings, logically applies to their body parts as well. With the possible exception of the appendix, every part of the body is essential to its proper functioning. Strike one part, and the rest immediately falls ill. To discriminate against any single part of the body thus violates the law of nature, and might conceivably bring down upon its perpetrator the wrath of nature and of nature’s God. Let us therefore bid adieu to this irrational bias against the feet, and bestow upon them the gratitude, honor, and esteem that are their rightful due. Ardent foot fetishist S. Tsow can be flamed for his deviant views at s.tsow@ymail.com, except when he’s rewarding his feet for their selfless service by treating them to a foot massage.
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13 Girl Who said 13 was an unlucky number, not so in Angelwitch
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Postcard from Bangkok by Stickman
Nana Plaza work continues at a snails pace. Photo by Stickman Evening downpours and soldiers patrolling central city skytrain platforms aren’t doing anything for Bangkok’s nightlife as operators wait for the low season pain to end. Those that have built up a brand name may be faring ok but even the most popular venues have at least one bad night each week, with Sundays and Mondays particularly quiet. After Soi Cowboy has had it all its way for the past couple of years, it and Nana Plaza are battling it out for the title of Bangkok’s most popular bar area. Touristy Patpong draws first time visitors to the city and few locals gravitate to the oldest farang bar area. In these times of austerity, pricey Sukhumvit’s soi 33 has almost fallen off the map and the bars scattered around soi 22 fight for the few passers by. Soi 7/1 was said to be an up and coming lane, but some venues report selling less than a dozen drinks on a bad night. It’s not only Pattaya that has a flying club. A 30-something American joined the Bangkok Flying Club, departing from the upmarket Long Table, the bar/restaurant some 25 floors up in the sky that can be seen from the Asoke intersection. Tragedy struck in Nana Plaza, when the he-once-was-a-she mamasan of Hollywood Rock tripped and fell, striking her head and it was lights out for good as the fall knocked the life out of her, literally. Intimating that you saw a ghost in the bar has girls screaming in genuine terror.
Progress remains slow on the ground floor in Nana Plaza where brick tiling is being laid where the destroyed beer bars on the ground floor once stood. Rumour has it that it will be followed by a framework over which a canopy will be draped. A joint venture between two long-term farang bar bosses, it doesn’t look as if drinks will be served until the end of the rainy season, still several weeks away. Down the road in soi 12, construction is moving much more quickly at the Bangkok branch of Insomnia - and it has to if it is going to be ready for the scheduled early October grand opening. On the recently reopened mezzanine floor of the Dollhouse, imbibers get a ringside view and a complete eyeful. It’s even better downstairs where one of Cowboy’s best selections can be found. Taking a leaf from the original Dollhouse in Clinton Plaza, the downstairs troop don the skimpiest of denim jeans, a good look with so many shapely cuties in the bar. You'll only see this treat on Thursday night so now you have good reason to go out before the weekend. Local TV might carry the Premier League but with Supersport out of South Africa no longer available, British pubs are scrambling for alternative satellite sport solutions. Crossbar on Sukhumvit soi 23 and the Robin Hood on soi 21 are testing various options, from Astro out of Malaysia to screening Internet broadcasts, well aware that live sports are a magnet for punters.
Stickman runs a popular Bangkok site at www.StickmanBangkok.com
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1 - 15 October 2010 Issue 1 Lucky Seven? I have the best/ worst occupation in the world: wearing the hat of a nightlife journalist (as well as the rainbowcoloured one that looks like a helicopter). Under the pseudonym ‘Nightmarch’ I’ve been writing a regular column about the night bar scene in newspapers and magazines in Pattaya since June 2000, and still have a functioning liver (probably because, contrary to popular belief, I’m merely a social drinker). In a peripatetic writing career the Nightmarch column has appeared in practically every fish and chips wrapper worthy of the name, eventually moving on for a variety of reasons, some personal, others financial. The column is also translated into German for Hallo Magazin. Other than this I have no further night editorial ambitions. This will be the seventh Englishlanguage publication to take Nightmarch and even before this issue hit the newsstands I feel as though Pattaya One is its natural home. Given the people and the writers involved in this product -not quite a newspaper and not really a magazine- I feel it will slot neatly into a gap in the marketplace and I look forward to a long association. The deckchairs have been neatly re-arranged: The moveable feast that is the nightlife scene in Fun Town is always in a state of flux, and recent openings and closings show just how much. The following is hardly a comprehensive list of the changes that have taken place in the last couple of months, but they should serve to give an idea of just how fluid the nightlife scene happens to be, and not just between the sheets. Two of the longest established go-go’s on Walking Street, Paris and Carousel, both on Soi Diamond, closed their doors between June and July. Due to their perfect ground floor locations it wasn’t long before there was interest from various quarters in taking over the leases on these dens. Paris reopened in early September, under new management and ownership while Carousel is set to kick back into life as well in the near future after having apparently been taken on by the people who have Happy, Peppermint, Beach Club and, well, the list is getting too long to mention. Not sure if anyone is taking much interest in other closed down places such as Mirage (Soi Diamond), the strangely tagged K Wonder Girls in Soho Square, at the southern end of Walking Street or the former Coyotee’s go-go site in Soi Marina Plaza. Certainly no one with a modicum of cranial matter is bothered with the former Wet N Wild go-go and rumoured happy weed supply factory inside Center Condo, off South Pattaya Road. On the main drag itself, the nev-
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N ghtmarch By Duncan Stearn er-opened but incredibly hyped Pleasure Dome sits like a dinosaur looking for a master. It may prove to be a concrete reminder of what can happen when you try to swallow a T-bone steak while your jaw is only wired for baby food. In time for the high season the Moulin Rouge go-go on Walking Street re-opened. Considering this only employs East European wallet emptiers it’s no great addition to the market. Just why anyone would bother with these over-priced, hard-faced women (although many do have very fit bodies) is beyond me, unless you are of Arab or Indian extraction and the thought of getting close to a white-skinned hooker gets the testosterone juices flowing. Another joint not worth bothering with, unless katoeys are your preferred bed partner, is Cat’s Place. Located in the lane between Soi Day-Night 1 and 2 (off South Pattaya Road) near the highly praised Bordeaux munching house is, Cat’s Place used to be a hideaway about a decade ago for the dancing damsels of the old Soi Diamond Gletcherkuss go-go. I wandered past recently and there was one forlorn looking customer sitting outside nursing a bottle of amber nectar, no music, and a crotch-itch of quite unattractive ladyboys sitting outside. Pattayaland Soi 1 is now completely bereft of lady go-go bars after the wrecking crews started demolishing the site of the closed Betty Boum (formerly Spicy Girls and Papillon) dancing den as well as the old Montana Hotel and the building on the corner with Beach Road. This has now become a 7-11 franchise while I must admit it does look as though some kind of new bar operation will open on the Betty Boum site, especially since the neon sign out front has yet to be taken down. Further afield, the Blue Lagoon coyote dance den didn’t survive at the back of the Best Friend beer boozer complex on Beach Road. It struggled as a go-go by that name and didn’t make any impact as a coyote dance club. The entire joint is now in complete darkness. Down on Soi LK Metro in central Pattaya yet another attempt has been made to turn one of the city’s ‘black holes’ into a viable nightlife business. The Office go-go opened with a private party in mid-August. Formerly operating as a go-go under the name Memories, then by
Email: duncan@pattayaone.net
the strange cognomen Gorkle and lately as a coyote dance bar called Ice, The Office is operated under new management who no doubt believe they can succeed in a location where others have failed. There is still 73 go-go bars across Pattaya, although 51 of these are in or around Walking Street. So what changed? As mentioned above, the Paris go-go bar in Soi Diamond closed and then was taken over by new owners and re-opened in early September. Apart from the dancing damsel line-up nothing seems to have changed. I wandered in early on a Saturday night and there were about 16 dancers in various stages of draped apparel, none of whom were much above average. The music was standard car alarm. Lolly water is 90 baht and lady drinks 120 baht. Paris will really need to lift its game to Eiffel Tower heights if it expects to again draw the punters in numbers. Partners in crime: Stories about the short-term avariciousness of many Thai-run businesses in Fun Town are legion. Don’t worry about nurturing repeat business and regular customers, get as much as you can while you can and then move on to the next victim. OK, this attitude is not confined to just the Thais, there are plenty of foreigners who operate under the same business model, but thankfully many of them seem to eventually go broke or come a cropper in some other way. A friend of mine who spends the majority of his nocturnal emission trading in Soi 6 recently was somewhat shocked when he discovered he had been ripped off the previous week to the tune of 300 baht. In fact, he is now of the opinion
the rip-off has been taking place quite regularly at this same bar for some time. As he wrote to me, ‘The system is you pay for everything downstairs in advance of your [copulating] session…’ He handed over 1,500 baht in two notes. The bill would have been 60 baht for his drink, 300 baht for a room with not much of a view, and 700 baht for the lady to engage in a game of hide-the-salami. Being more interested in his dinner date he left a 20-baht tip when the change came and trousered the rest without checking the sum proffered. A week later he noticed his bedmate sitting in front of the bar and, ‘I told her of my suspicions and she blithely & shamelessly confirmed it! Her share was 100.’ As he noted, over the past three years he has spent a reasonable sum in the bar, but he has now sensibly placed this joint on the banned list. Fortunately, he still has a choice of 40 or more other places in Soi 6 where he can unleash his pent-up emotions. Rising to the occasion: Just to change tackle from the above item, another disconcerting factor that has crept into the Soi 6 pot over the last few years are the number of places where the majority of knob fondlers are female but a ladyboy or two has managed to sneak into the frame. In the darkness of some of the joints it can be akin to finding a trapdoor spider in the beer esky if you haven’t taken careful note of the size, shape, and unusual bulges prior to inviting a damsel to your side. As Doctor John, a Fun Town regular of many years standing, says of Soi 6, “Do I go for the easy pink or the tight brown?”
wishes Pattaya One every success SOI 15 Walking Street www.babydollspattaya.com
16 Pattaya One
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The day the government of Siam recognized the Republic of Slovakia…six decades too early Historical Feature By Duncan Stearn deliberated on the request. Clearly Slovakia had successfully seceded from Czechoslovakia, which had been created just a decade earlier at the conclusion of the First World War from the charred remains of the old Austro-Hungarian Empire. Since the President of Czechoslovakia was Professor Masaryk, the Thai ministers came to the conclusion the Slovakian secessionists had also chosen a professor as their first elected leader.
Reply
Foreign Minister Prince Traidos Prabandh
A few weeks later the postmaster in Trencsen received a letter emblazoned with the Royal Coat of Arms of Siam and addressed to His Excellency the President of Slovakia, Professor Mihalusz. The postmaster went post haste to see the mayor. He opened the letter and read with mounting concern the contents in which His Majesty King Prajadhipok declared himself graciously and inexpressibly pleased to accord full recognition de facto and de jure to the Sovereign Republic of Slovakia. The mayor of Trencsen quickly drafted a letter to be sent as quickly
as possible to Bangkok. He explained Slovakia had not seceded from Czechoslovakia, the capital city remained as Prague and not Trencsen, and the President was still Professor Masaryk and not Professor Mihalusz.
Hiding Out The mayor went on to explain that some time in the early part of 1928 a group of Slovakians held a mass meeting led by Professor Mihalusz, an old botanist of minor renown, at which they issued a ‘Declaration of Slovak Independence’. The mayor wrote that the whole exercise was more academic than revolutionary and was easily suppressed by the local police. Professor Mihalusz, obviously frightened by the police interest in him, later fled Trencsen and had not been seen for some time. He was believed to be hiding out in Vienna from where he had probably written the letter that won Slovakia recognition from Siam. Slovakia eventually achieved independence from Czechoslovakia, in 1993.
King Prajadhipok
>
When a letter written on parchmentlike paper and bearing a large cerise seal arrived at the Foreign Ministry in Bangkok in early 1929, Thai officials naturally handled the missive with great care. Once the contents had been translated, officials noted that it requested the Royal Siamese Government formally recognize the new Republic of Slovakia. The letter was signed by a Professor Mihalusz, who claimed to be the new President of the Republic of Slovakia, with its capital at Trencsen (modern day Trencin). Naturally, King Prajadhipok (Rama VII) and his senior advisers, led by 46-yearold Foreign Minister Prince Traidos Prabandh (a former Siamese ambassador to the United States),
Published and Edited by Singhanart Rullapak for Napasingh 108 Co. Ltd., 353/62 M.9, Nongprue, Banglamung, Chonburi 20150. Printed by Pattaya Printing Solutions, Jomtien, Nongprue, Banglamung.