Stickman Weekly, August 17, 2025
Mystery Photo
Where is this?
Last week’s photo was taken of the Metro Mall in the Sukhumvit MRT station. About a dozen of you got it right, a fair effort I guess.
This week’s photo might look obscure and you might be thinking that it could be anywhere in Bangkok but believe me, we’re very much in the Stickman zone with this week’s photo.
Stick’s Inbox – The Best Emails From The Past Week
Nana nightlife.
I just had 2 nights on the lower Sukhumvit naughty boy playground which seems to be rocking along. Soi 4 is constant chaos and Stumble Inn always has plenty of punters. Billboard was chugging along but the mamasan needs to tell the girls to make eye contact and not look over their heads at themselves in the mirror as the stage rotates. Less vain girls who flirt are the ones who receive lady drinks and perhaps even a barfine. There’s plenty of talent in Billboard, and it’s a nice place to spend some time. Very good value. The big surprise for me was Spanky’s where I spent several hours and several thousand baht. It has an exciting, energetic, fun vibe with sexy shows, punter engagement and lots of friendly, sexy, slim, young ladies. Definitely the funnest gogo bar in the plaza from what I could see. The only downside was the lovely sitting in my lap who wanted 4,000 baht for short-time or 7,000 for long-time to go with a 1,000 barfine. As much fun as she was – she was also the best dancer there – I had to baulk at the price and told her that Soi 6 girls as young and hot as her went upstairs for only 2,000 baht (the room is another 400 baht). After a couple of hours and quite a few drinks together (she sipped her drinks at a slow pace and there was no double drink nonsense), when I turned her loose not even a wai or a thank you. If only these girls could carry on the act just a little longer. Still, it was an excellent night and Spanky’s is highly recommended! A younger (30s) American in Bangkok for the first time who befriended me had 3 girls over at a time. I peeked at his bin which must have been over 10,000 baht when I left and he was still going strong. An Aussie (mid 30s) who was partying next to me told me that a few years ago he spent 30 nights in a row in Spanky’s! I recommended he read Private Dancer which he’d never heard of.
Weed is here to stay.
I’m sure the availability of weed online at very inexpensive prices compared to what prices the shops are selling is a very good reason why trade is slow. Mind you, people do not linger inside weed stores as there is very little to do. With consumption on the premises is prohibited, you will never see the crowds that one would experience in Amsterdam, where coffee shops are the meeting point for weed smokers. Tourists and the idle curious are likely the only customers these shops see and it is a quick stop, purchase and out the door. But make no mistake, weed is here to stay although probably not as widespread we see now. I’d still prefer to smell weed over cancer-causing cigarette smoke any day.
Bangkok preferred to Pattaya.
I haven’t been to Pattaya for years and despite your recent praises, I’ll stick to Bangkok. I’m a gogo punter who likes to partake, not just window shop so despite the cheaper drinks prices, the cost of the girls’ tip on top of the crazy Pattaya barfines still make it as expensive if not more expensive than partying in Bangkok. And from what I hear from others, the staffing in most Pattaya bars outside the top Walking Street gogo bars is a bit of a horror show. <I thought that in terms of the general attractiveness of ladies in the gogo bars, to my eyes the Pattaya gogo bars have Bangkok beat. And to be clear, I have no skin in the game – Stick>
Reducing visits.
I’ve been making four trips a year to Bangkok since Covid. As much as I still love Bangkok, the long expensive flights, the increased hotel and bar prices, constant flip-flopping and uncertainty on the visa / entry rules every five minutes, the horrible air quality in high season and the current rubbish exchange rate have finally caught up with me, and I’m only doing three trips this year and plan to cut down to two from next year.
Flustered by watch sellers.
I noticed in your column today that there is a guy praising the watch-sellers. Let’s put the record straight. They are criminals who would be arrested in any other country. They peddle cheap shit at x 10 their value. If people want to believe they are buying a Rolex or a Tag Heuer then that is up to them, but take any of those copies to be valued and the valuer will tell you less than 200 baht once he has stopped laughing. <I think pretty much everyone knows these watches aren’t the genuine item, especially as the asking price is about the same as a barfine – Stick> In Pattaya, they walk into the bars and shove them under your nose whilst you’re eating your breakfast. Same can be said for sunglasses too. A pain in the neck.
Coffee, and more.
Is it time for the front of Nana Plaza to get a refresh?
This Week’s News, Views & Gossip
The low season rolls on and it seems like patterns are much the same as when I was recently in town. Soi Cowboy: quietish. Soi Nana: busyish. Patpong: surviving somehow. The low season doesn’t last forever. For naughty boys, I maintain there isn’t a better time to visit than right now.
If you haven’t been inside Nana Plaza for a while – as in a year or two – you might be surprised at how so many bars have given the exterior a facelift and how good the inside of the place looks. The once dark, dingy stairways feature street art / murals and most bars have updated their signage. The open-air ground floor beer garden is so much more welcoming than the pokey, dark beer bars which were a feature for so many years. Large LED screens are everywhere and the whole place feels modern and, for the most part, tidy. It wasn’t always this way. With the interior of the plaza looking so good, is it time for the exterior to be refreshed? It’s about a decade or so since the classic old Nana Plaza sign was replaced. The current one is starting to show its age. Time for a change?
Speaking of bars with a bright, colourful frontage, Bad Beach is one of Soi Cowboy’s better bars. But better these days doesn’t necessarily mean busy. When I was in town, I was amazed how quiet Bad Beach was some nights. On one particular night, they hadn’t even turned the music on at 9:15 PM. A staff meeting hadn’t run late and neither were there any technical issues. They just seemed to be on a go-slow. Last Sunday, a friend stopped by Bad Beach a bit after 11:00 PM and there was not a single customer in the bar. The staff applauded when he entered the bar and actually stayed. This is the state of the bar industry at present: even some of the better bars can be deathly quiet some nights.
Walking Street today.
It has been a slow news week in Bangkok’s bars so let’s take a look at what happened this week in Pattaya. Walking Street gogo bar Imperia reopened earlier in the week. I’ve never been inside because it’s a Russian lady bar – and they are best avoided. Oftentimes they are clip joints where you’re presented with a big bill and encouraged to pay by the menacing Russian bodybuilder perching in the corner. Should you happen to stop by, do send a review as I am sure many would like to know what it’s like.
Walking Street’s second newest gogo bar, Atmos, which opened 10 days ago, has a happy hour from 8:00 PM until 9:00 PM. Local beers, house spirits and soft drinks are just 95 baht.
I love the menu at Shark Gogo Club on Walking Street. They are actually about the size of an oversized placemat and are made of a rubbery material so double as a drinks coaster. The entire drinks menu is right there for you to see, making it easy to see what’s available. Even today, plenty of bars don’t provide a drinks menu so you don’t know what’s available – nor how much it costs. And in Thailand today, sometimes it’s best to know the prices in advance lest you avoid bill shock later in the evening.
A couple of days after news broke of a Brit on a motorbike cutting off an ambulance, giving the driver the bird and riding in a manner that slowed it from rushing a drowning victim to hospital, said motorbike rider can be revealed as the manager of one of the Windmill gogo bars in Soi Diamond. “Bald Paul”, as one Pattaya local refers to him, subsequently crashed his own motorbike and required medical assistance himself.
Is it possible for something big to happen in the bar industry and not be reported at all by the mainstream media? With the prevalence of mobile phones and social media, and the currency that many place on being first with a story, if a story is big enough it will make the mainstream news, right? You’d think so…. I ask this question because a post on X this past week claimed a bunch of girls in a Jomtien beer bar stomped a foreign customer to death. The Jomtien expat who posted about it on X claims to have a copy of the video of the incident. A sufficient amount of details were posted to give credence to the story and looking over the fellow’s posting history, he doesn’t come across as a crackpot. When the questions came, the posts were removed. Despite that, the poster remained insistent that the incident was real and a foreigner really was stomped to death in a bar. In this day and age, can a lid really be kept on a story that big? Did it really happen or was someone pulling our leg?
Was a farang stomped to death by a pack of beer bar ladies in Jomtien? Social media reported on it. Mainstream media didn’t.
Last week’s column mentioned a fellow who was driven to his hotel by a lady he had barfined in Nana. That was not an isolated case. I bet there are a few ladies who drive to work in the plaza each night. However, most don’t let on that their million+ baht car is parked a short walk down the road because they like customers to think they’re destitute and get a bigger pay day.
I was reminded by a couple of expat friends in Bangkok that of the many changes in the chrome pole bars, there are no longer any guarantees. Expect the unexpected, a friend who has been a regular bargoer for 3 decades kept telling me. He framed it as a negative. It used to be that you had your choice of who you could barfine whereas today, plenty of ladies choose not to be barfined or are choosy about who they go with. Once upon a time a lady drink meant you had the lady’s company until at least the next dance set, if not longer. These days, it doesn’t even guarantee you about 30 seconds of her time. Guarantees in the chrome pole bars? Not any more.
A friend broke a story this week about McDonald’s Thailand firing a branch manager because she had worked as a gogo dancer in Patpong. And not only did they fire her, they’re said to be seeking compensation from her. That strikes me as a particularly callous, cruel and totally unnecessary thing to do.
A 7 Eleven branch on Silom Road offers VAT refunds.
I’m all for saving a few baht here and there, but I have to admit that I have never taken advantage of Thailand’s VAT refund scheme for tourists. Make a purchase at a participating store and you can claim the VAT portion of your purchase at the tax office air-side at the airport. Generally, this is available from department stores and shops selling higher end items. So I did a double take when a friend sent the photo above which shows one of the 7 Eleven branches on Silom Road now offers VAT refunds. Generally, stores require a minimum spend to qualify for a VAT refund of 2,000 baht or more. How many tourists spend 2,000 baht in a single 7 Eleven store – and how many will stick around to complete the forms, take them to the airport where they have to queue up to lodge them and claim their refund…..which could be less than 200 baht? In the case of a purchase from 7 Eleven, is it worth it?
With social media increasingly – and often effectively – being used by bars for self-promotion, will more bar managers create an online presence? Of the current crop of bar managers, Mr. Egg, who runs Rum Runner in Pattaya, is perhaps the best-known via his YouTube channel. Also in Pattaya are Nick Dean and Buzzin Trevor who have connections to bars although neither actually manages the venues they’re involved with and in fairness, their videos seem to be more about what’s happening in town than self-promotion. In Bangkok, Dennis, who manages Lollipop on the ground floor of Nana Plaza, has an online profile. He posts on X. If you’re looking for current info from the plaza, stop by Lollipop, hunt out Dennis and he’ll give you the lowdown.
Signs at the Asoke MRT station.
Following on from last week’s column with some amusing signs from Bangkok, here are more from the Asoke MRT station. And, yes, there really are some grotty sods in Bangkok who point their mobile phone up ladies’ skirts.
One of my memories from the early years in Bangkok was the power cuts which happened all too frequently, especially in the rainy season. Things have improved a lot, but they’re still far from perfect. We spent time wih my other half’s sister in a moo-barn in suburban Bangkok. The Internet went down across a large area of the district and it took until the next day to come back on. Fortunately, mobile Internet is very good in Bangkok so we just switched to using our mobiles as a hot spot. The day after we flew out, there was heavy rain and the power went out for a couple of hours. Even in Bangkok, the infrastructure is not that resilient – and it can be worse upcountry. Thailand has come a long way but the infrastructure can still be a bit iffy at times.
While the space at the start of Sukhumvit soi 10 is being used with the SW1 Market, the large plot next to the Sheraton Sukhumvit Grande between Sukhumvit sois 12 and 14 remains empty. It’s been that way for a good few years. It was concreted over some time back, but remains unused. There were rumours 2 or 3 years ago that a large clinic / small hospital would be built with the tourist market in mind. That would work, even if it didn’t sound like it would make the most of such a prime spot. Any large plot in the area comes with the expectation of a new hotel, condo or office building.
The space next to the Sheraton Grande Sukhumvit remains empty.
If you think the ladies in the bars are older these days, you’d be right. In more than a few cases, it’s because some of those older ladies are the beauties you barfined 10, 15 or 20 years ago. On Soi Cowboy, the dirty doctor and I came across a few ladies we used to know in the late ’00s. A couple are still dancing while a couple are hello girls. I am of the belief that the ladies in Bangkok’s chrome pole bars are getting older while customers are getting younger, especially in Nana Plaza where the average age would be, at a guess, a good few years lower than on Soi Cowboy.
Word is that weed sales have tanked. When I was in town, I saw few customers in weed stores. Rents in downtown Bangkok are high, there’s heaps of competition, particularly online, and apparently the price of weed has dropped markedly from what it was when all of these weed shops opened. Sounds like a perfect storm.
Bangkok eateries can be very creative and you come across some really strange combinations. Honey on mango struck me as weird, as did fresh torn mint leaves in an omelette. I asked about it and the server insisted they were not garnish but actually mixed in to the omelette. And it feels like there are more fusion restaurants or fusion dishes than ever. I’m one of those people who shudders at the idea of pineapple on pizza so perhaps I am just fussy?
No-one has offered any insight into what this misting is all about.
Towards the end of last week’s column I included a photo of the misting above the Asoke intersection, and I asked what it was all about. As no-one responded, I’ll take a stab at it. My best guess is that it’s some genius‘s idea to reduce pollution in the area. I know, I know…..but in the absence of any explanation, that’s my best guess.
Why is there little news from Phuket in this column where once it used to get more coverage than Pattaya? I used to love Phuket and my original plan in 1998 was to move there. Bangkok was never actually on my radar and my first visit to Bangkok didn’t impress me all that much. But Bangkok grew on me and the rest is history. I haven’t been to Phuket in 12 or 13 years, and feedback over the past several years is that many of you have also lost interest in Phuket which just doesn’t seem to have the following with Stickman readers it once did. 25+ years ago, Phuket was particularly popular with Scandinavians, Aussies and Americans. These days the impression I get is that it’s particularly popular with Russians and Middle Easterners. Maybe that is part of the reason many of us lost interest in it?
A friend has a novel nickname for Immigration HQ at Chaeng Wattana – “Anxiety Central”.
The Tax Office on Sukhumvit soi 11. Being renovated or being demolished?
Finding a decent lawyer to represent you in Thailand can be tough. Many Thai lawyers are not geared up to deal with foreigners. This is a big problem because when it comes to legal matters, you don’t want a language barrier or communication issues. It’s further complicated by the fact that there are some foreign lawyers in Thailand who are not actually lawyers at all. They are not qualified to practice in Thailand, even if they give the impression that they are and actually call themselves a lawyer. It’s best to think of them more like a “legal consultant” than an actual lawyer. It’s not all bad news, though, and there are firms with lawyers with the language skills who are happy to work with foreigners. I mention this because I was recently made aware of a farang legal firm which a friend contacted for assistance. Said friend had worked in Thailand in the past and has lost his Thai tax number. He inquired with a law firm to help him get his tax number. They could do it…..for 10,000 baht. With something as simple as a lost tax number, keep that 10K in your pocket! You can simply rock up to the local Revenue Department office, show them your passport and ask for your tax ID number. I bet you’ll have it within 30 seconds. While some think of the taxman the same way they do the bogeyman, for general inquiries I always found Thai tax officials to be very helpful. You might like to take a Thai speaker along with you – but you should be able to do just fine in English. Like so many situations in Thailand, present yourself well, have an easy manner and a ready smile and you’ll find locals happy to help you. Of course, 10K baht might be pocket change to you and if that’s the case, by all means engage a lawyer to assist you.
Speaking of farang lawyers, I don’t think I ever wrote about the wacky things that happened at one of the big-name farang law firms in Bangkok. The foreigner who headed up the firm was known to be quick to anger and when he got really angry, he would lock one of the farang lawyers legal consultants in a cupboard in the office. I’m joking, right? No, I’m not. This really did happen, and on more than one occasion.
Online shopping has become so big in Thailand that for some condo staff, managing deliveries has become a time-consuming part of their job. In larger condo buildings with hundreds of units there can be a similar number of parcels delivered each and every day. Notices are frequently posted in common areas or on residents’ LINE / Facebook groups requesting that parcels be collected promptly as they are taking up space in the office / delivery area. I saw this with my own eyes when I was in town and I couldn’t help but feel that things must go astray.
On this note, some condo buildings have a Grab Locker, a novel piece of infrastructure provided by Grab where food deliveries are placed in lockers. The person who made the order can use the Grab app to open the locker and retrieve their order. Great concept!
Grab Locker, at a downtown condo.
Thailand-Related Links & News Articles
Quote of the week comes from a Thai working girl, “No Thai lady will love you like your mother does.”
Reader’s story of the week is from Orde Wingate, Another View Of Billboard.
YouTube video of the week is from Integrity Legal, More Bad News Regarding Banking in Thailand?
A British motorcyclist is arrested for cutting off an ambulance in Pattaya before crashing into another motorbike.
In Pattaya, an Indian is arrested after presenting a fake payment slip for a 90,000 baht food and drinks bill.
More dramas in Pattaya after a Korean and a Frenchman suffer in disputes with their Thai girlfriend, in separate incidents.
A once wealthy, now destitute, retired Aussie seeks help to get back home to Australia.
A Pattaya bar lady files a complaint against her abusive British ex-boyfriend.
Time Out Magazine names Bangkok as the best city in 2025 for Gen Z.
McDonald’s Thailand is suing one of its branch managers after it was revealed she had worked in Patpong as a gogo dancer.
Legendary Bangkok street food vendor Jay Fai is embroiled in an overcharging row.
How can you not have a great time in Bangkok?
Closing Comments
It was a bit of a struggle writing the column this week with very little news coming in from the bar areas. Was it really that quiet around the traps or did I miss some stuff? Maybe everyone was having fun elsewhere, away from the bars?
Your Bangkok commentator,
Stick
Stick can be contacted at : stickmanbangkok@gmail.com
