Stickman Weekly, November 2, 2025

 

 

Mystery Photo

Last week’s photo was taken from inside the Nana Hotel, looking down on Soi Nana. Shame on those of you if you got it wrong! The Nana Hotel would have to be the most popular hotel amongst Stickman readers.

This week’s photo is, as per usual, very much within the Stickman zone.

 

Stick’s Inbox – The Best Emails From The Past Week

Nothing lasts forever.

Good for you for pulling the plug on the column and moving on with your life. Nothing lasts forever, and it’s best to call it quits when you feel it is right to do so. Ironically, I came to a similar conclusion on my last trip. I spent one week in Bangkok for the first time in three years, and realized that the magic that used to exist in the gogo bars has pretty much disappeared for me. I decided to call it quits for the most part. I’ll still visit Bangkok from time to time, but it won’t be for the gogo bars or any other components of the nightlife scene. While it’s possible I’ll partake here and there, it would be as an “add-on” and not the primary purpose for the visit as it always was in the past. My first visit to Bangkok was in 1998, giving me a lengthy frame of reference to compare the current state of the gogo scene to past states, and wow, things today fare very poorly when contrasted to previous eras. I feel I have aged out of the scene at a good time, and will always have the memories to enjoy. Time to move on, just like you.

Visiting and living there are different.

I get your point of being able to go to Thailand in the future, and just do the things that pop up in your mind, instead of gathering news and taking photos for the column. If you live in Thailand this almost goes automatically, but it’s a whole different story when you’re there for just 2 or 3 weeks and your time is limited.

Reflecting on 25 years.

25 years ago my NASDAQ-listed company sent me to Hong Kong as CEO Asia. I focused on our important markets of Japan, China, and Australia, and to a lesser extent our fast growing markets in India and Korea. South-East Asia I pretty much left alone until, one night when I was in Tokyo, my CFO called to say our Thai partner had just utilized $1 million of company money for her own purposes. Upon firing her and her husband, and having one-third of the staff walk out in her support, I found myself having to spend time in Bangkok, a city I barely knew. One night, someone suggested we go to a place called Soi Cowboy, which I had never heard of. To me, Bangkok was temples, good food, and the spa in the Sheraton on Sukhumvit where I stayed and happily paid 3,000 baht for a massage. One thing leading to another, I found myself spending time with a 41-year-old bargirl who gave the old-fashioned girlfriend experience until she went to Holland to marry a gay postman. Knowing absolutely nothing about the bar scene, how much to pay, to tip, how many drinks to buy and for who, I found myself frantically searching the internet for any type of information. Which I didn’t find. This was 2003/4 when there wasn’t much available. I finally stumbled across a website with a strange name where readers posted stories about their experiences. I voraciously read these and found them to be the best explanation of the hows and whys of the Thai bar scene. Eventually I found myself in a relationship with a 20-year-old lady not from the bars, and now 20 years later she is a few months shy of 40 and just gave birth to our first child, a beautiful baby girl. Had it not been for that website, I might not have known how to handle a young Thai lady, and I might not have ever had my little daughter. We may be coming to the end of the StickmanBangkok website, but the joy that it has brought to many will never be forgotten.

Music over madams.

I liked what you said about going out to girly bars, and then ending up in the ones with the best music, not with the best-looking ladies. Sexy Night is a nice example of it, and it once was the main reason Tim’s Bar became my favourite bar in Pattaya.

At Checkpoint Charlie, farangs get a pass.

I will add my two cents to the thoughts on the security at Nana Plaza. I sat at the railings at Stumble Inn a few nights last week from about 7 PM until 9 PM, right at Checkpoint Charlie. I love watching the parade of girls going to work. In some ways, more so than the nakedness on stage. Anyway, I can say a pretty good bag check is done on everyone, both customers and workers. And the official Nana Plaza security staff take an extra step with the individual bar’s security guys. They get a pat down, I assume looking for weapons of all types. I like that they seem to know those types can get out of control and might enjoy the beat down too much. The worker approaches the worker line, shows an ID and then gets a UV stamp that could be displayed later for traipsing in and out. It seems like some of the old mamasans just get waved through but pretty much everybody gets an ID check. I was sitting close enough to see the real picture of the ladyboys on their ID. Ha! On the customer side, White farangs get waved through without an ID check. Indians are definitely made to present a passport. It seems like a copy on your phone is acceptable. And then ID checks for other Asians are done according to how well they are dressed. The Japanese are mostly waved through.

Hong-nam attendants.

In bars where there’s a bathroom attendant, I always tip 20 baht. A friend once asked why I bother tipping someone whose presence feels intrusive and who did nothing more than hand me a paper towel. I responded that I can’t think of a worse job than having to work in a bathroom.

Only in Patpong.

A mate visited a Patpong bar for gays. My mate is straight but he was with a gay mate who wanted to visit a bar with boys. They sat at a table, the place was busy and 2 naked lads got on to their table and were going for it on their table. My mate walked out as it wasn’t his scene but the guy who was with him stayed behind. Before my mate left, the gay guy with him took photos of my mate in a gay bar and posted on Facebook. My mate has never spoken to the other guy since.

 

 

 

This Week’s News, Views & Gossip

The Stumble Inn Group has exhumed the Hot Lips brand name. The beautiful Showtime sign on Soi Cowboy has been taken down with the ladyboy cabaret concept abandoned. In its place will be Hot Lips, a brand new gogo bar with ladies, not ladyboys. Stumble Inn Group seems to have come to terms with the half million baht monthly rent – which they cited as the reason for pulling the pin on their previous bar in that space, Stumble Inn Soi Cowboy. Hot Lips was the name of a decent gogo on Nana Plaza’s middle floor, popular 10+ years ago. Hot Stuff @ Hot Lips, Stickman photo essay, 2014. It seems that the brains trust at Stumble Inn have actually put some thought into Hot Lips, luring high-profile and widely respected bar manager RJ, AKA Captain Hornbag, back to Bangkok. He’s been at the helm of Heaven Above in Soi Boomerang in Pattaya for a few years where I understand he is the highest paid foreign bar manager in all of Pattaya. This all happened quickly with RJ’s farewell party held this past Friday night. With RJ at the helm, I’m confident this bar will work. He’s quite possibly the best manager in the business. Hot Lips is expected to open within the next two months.

I’ve been giving Stumble Inn a fair bit of grief in the column for a while so perhaps it’s time I said something nice about them? In fairness, the original Stumble Inn beer bar out the front of Nana Plaza is the prime spot on the soi to perch at the railings and watch the show. Stumble Inn’s happy hour runs through until 8:00 PM with local beers priced at a very reasonable 90 baht. After 8:00 PM, the price jumps to 140 baht which is still a decent deal.

In the wake of the announcement of the passing of the Queen Mother, some bars cancelled scheduled events and parties. King’s Castle in Patpong and Dollhouse in Soi Cowboy each cancelled their Halloween parties. At the same time, social media was absolutely flooded with posters from other bars which went ahead with their Halloween party.

 

 

Down in Pattaya, I am told that the Beach Road, AKA the Coconut Bar, has competition. This week, freelancers were spaced out along stretches of Soi Buakhao. A friend described it as being like the Coconut Bar without the coconuts.

Bars in Maggie May’s Beer Bar Complex, behind the Myth Night Bar Complex on Second Road, are opening up. An interesting feature of the complex that the owners are hyping is what they are terming an advanced directional sound system. They claim that each bar operates inside its own “precisely-tuned sound bubble” allowing each bar to play its own music without clashing with music played in other bars. Will this work? Good on them for trying to overcome the problem you get in most beer bar complexes where bars try to outdo one another by cranking up the volume and the music becomes impossible to enjoy in any bar. If this works as they say, each bar will be able to play music from its own playlist which is very much part of a bar creating its own identity. The first bars should be opening around now and it is expected all bars will be open by the middle of the month. Bars in the complex will be open from 6 PM through until 4 AM. There will be an official grand opening party on Saturday, November 15.

There’s a new bar in Pattaya called Nasty Boom Boom, and the bar has a byline, “Let’s get nasty”. Not infrequently, I wonder about the choice of name that some bar bosses come up with.

 

 

Times have changed and even in the bar industry, what was acceptable in the past might not be ok today. This seems to be lost on some bar owners, particularly foreign bar bosses, when it comes to the duty of care of their staff. Sadly, even today, some foreign bosses scoff at the idea. It was not unusual in the past for some girls to drink so much that they would be on the verge of needing medical attention. 20+ years ago, everyone thought it was a great laugh when a lady got wasted in a bar and made a fool of herself. The world has changed and even in Thailand there’s an expectation in all workplaces that management will put the staff’s welfare first. The memo never made it to many bars. Today, there are foreign bar bosses who don’t just allow some of their girls to end up in a right state, they actively encourage it. And in some cases this ends up online. Images are bad enough but you can see some examples on YouTube too. This has not gone unnoticed by some punters who are not impressed. It seems to have been exacerbated by bars which do live-streaming, something that was particularly popular over Covid. Stuck at home and bored in Farangland, punters missing Thailand would tune in to live streams from bars and engage with the ladies. They could buy the girls alcoholic drinks and the girls would down them on the live-stream. More guys would buy drinks and ladies would drink and drink until they could drink no more. They’d fall over, throw up, pass out and be in a hell of a state, while the bar owners would be cheering them on. For some, it was great entertainment. I really don’t want to sound like a party pooper, but there’s a big difference between getting merry, loosened up and having a good time, and getting plastered to the extent that you end up vomiting uncontrollably. And I’m not the only one talking about this. It’s become a topic of contention for quite a few. Some of these girls are tiny and it doesn’t take much alcohol to knock them out. And it always seems to be shots. The best bars have a fun vibe, but do you really want to see some of these ladies totally wasted? Some bar owners might like to take the idea that they have a duty of care with their staff more seriously.

Some of these ladies have had a rugged upbringing. Bar work isn’t easy and plenty turn to drugs. Just what percentage of ladies in the bars are users? I really don’t know, but what I will say is that back in the day when bars received advance notice that police would be visiting and carrying out drug / urine testing, the bars would make an announcement before the bar opened and say that all girls who had used drugs in the past few days should go home. Anywhere between 25% – 35% would pack their bags and head home. That’s just the number who had used in the previous few days. If I was to guess – and it is only that, a guess, based on my observations – it would be that in Bangkok gogo bars, around 20% of ladies are using drugs at any given time, around half have used in the past month and the majority tried drugs. And we’re not talking weed. These girls favour something much harder.

 

 

I hear that the walkway known as the Green Mile is still closed.

The rainy season isn’t over yet. It rained heavily some nights this past week with both Friday and Saturday nights seeing downfalls. It would be nice to think that it might finally come to an end this coming week but a glance at the weather forecast online suggests that’s being fanciful.

If you’re chatting with a Thai lady and she says she wants black cock, don’t assume the obvious. There is a local drop of liquor with the rather dubious name of Black Cock. One imagines those behind the product must have been aware of the other meaning?

 

 

Do short-time hotels fill up like they used to? With fewer ladies being barfined these days, do you get queues at the short-time hotels like you did in the past? I always used to find it amusing when I walked past a short-time hotel and there was a lengthy queue waiting for a room. Back in the day, many punters would barfine more than one lady per night. Often they would barfine a lady early-evening, take her short-time and then the rest of the night they could hang out with their friends without any pressure to find a lady. If they were lucky, they might end up barfining another lady and take her short-time or even long-time at the end of the night. The mentality of many was to barfine early, do the business, and then they could go out and enjoy the rest of the evening. With fewer ladies being barfined these days, what does that mean for trade in short-time hotels? Are there fewer such hotels these days? Do you have to wait for a room as was often the case in the past?

On this note, while we know that plenty of ladies choose not to be barfined these days or are very selective about who they go with, what about ladyboys? Are they similarly choosy or do they still go?

 

 

For some, the word farang is divisive. They don’t like this word being used and consider it anything from derogatory to a slur. I personally don’t mind the word and have no problem being labelled as farang by Thais in Thailand. I know not everyone shares this view. Fair enough. But when I hear Thais using that word here in New Zealand to describe white people, for some reason it grates and I really don’t like it. I am not sure why I feel that way, but I do. Speaking of the word “farang”, why is it that when it is written, it is not usually capitalised? Shouldn’t it be Farang with a capital F, and not farang with a small F?

If you’re looking for a professional real estate agent in Bangkok, whether it be to find a condo to rent or buy, or to list a property, I recommend Gerwin Van de Velde. The engaging, friendly and knowledgeable Dutchman has run Amazing Properties for more than 15 years. Gerwin is the guy I used to find the last condo I stayed in – and he found me a really fantastic place. Alas, it’s no longer available for long-term rentals as the building has been converted into a hotel. The service Gerwin provides is free for renters / buyers. You can contact Gerwin via his Amazing Properties website.

There’s been much in the press about how visitor numbers to Thailand are down on what they were prior to Covid and how it looks like this year’s visitor numbers will be down on last year’s by something like 7%. So what do you do when business is down? You advertise! And where has Thailand chosen to advertise? Times Square. No, not the Time Square building, next to the Sheraton Grande Sukhumvit Hotel, and also connected to the Asoke BTS station, but the real Times Square, in New York City. This week, one of the biggest LED screens at Times Square was cycling through various ads for Thailand. There was the obvious one, Thai Airways. There were also ads for Thailand Privilege (AKA the Elite Card), the Loy Krathong Festival and even Central department stores.

 

 

Thailand-Related Links & News Articles

Quote of the week comes from a reader, “In 2003, Thailand was like a cult band with a select following, but as the hits made the charts and the popularity exploded, the attraction faded for the initial followers.”

From The Stickman Archives comes Cyberbullying And Karma, the longest weekly column opener I wrote, and some say the best.

A young Frenchman dies after falling from the balcony of his Pattaya hotel.

A New Zealand woman was found dead in a hotel room in Phuket.

Thai police dressed as construction workers arrest a bunch of Africans accused of selling drugs in Sukhumvit soi 11.

Badly behaved Israelis feel the wrath of the Thai law

In Pattaya, police stop a Nigerian suspect from swallowing cocaine.

Police made two major busts this week in the crackdown on call centre scammers operating inside Thailand.

There are claims that the former prince, Andrew, had 40 working girls brought to his hotel on a trip to Thailand.

A Ukrainian is stabbed and a Pakistani is beaten in two separate attacks on visitors to Pattaya.

 

 

Closing Comments

It has been suggested that I said I was calling it a day as a ploy to negotiate a better deal and continue to write this column. That’s not the case at all, and that would not be my style. Let me be clear to the doubters: this really is the end. Come the end of the year, my involvement with this site finishes for good, 100% sure! On related matters, I have not heard back from the owners about what they wish to do. I mentioned this to a friend and what he said was kind of funny. “Would they even notice if I actually stopped writing the column?” Funnily enough, I am not sure they would.

Your Bangkok commentator,

Stick

Stick can be contacted at : stickmanbangkok@gmail.com