Its now tuesday the 20th of November, end of morning. In The Netherlands it is now around 6.30 am. A time at which paperdelivery guys are busy delivering the morningpapers.
At the moment its cloudy but for me as a westerner who has not yet been here long a very comfi temperature.
The previous evening during one of my solo dinners I had made a list of topics I would like to enter in this new experience of mine, to keep a blog like a kind of diary.
After dinner I had a meeting with Pong, a barowner as you find many here, but he’s gay and runs the place I like to visit most. He knows I scout for opportunities as well as escaping from Holland for a while. The place he runs lies in the middel of what they call here “Paradise Complex” after the big Paradise Hotel which lies in the middle of it.. His place is called The More Bar, and is one of those typical Thai bars: An outdoor bar which is allowed to use the indoors facilities of the Karaoke Bar indoors next to and behind it. The bar consist just of the bar and the terrace in front of it. From the terrace one has a beautifull look at all the people walking to and from Paradise Hotel as well al the guys going to the gay places, bars, massage houses, disco’s and cabaret-gogo bars in the streets around it. The big advantage of it al is you only hear one kind of music and no contest between all kinds of sounds like you hear in the next streets al the time and which at times can be very disturing to ones ears ;-).
Pong, who happens also the be a friend of Kiks, wanted to show a new place he intends to open by the start of next month. We walk down the walkway to the hotel and then turn to our right. I see the new big disco they are creating there and also a karaoke place by the look of the sign above the door where a lot of work is still going on around 9 pm. The new disco will be part of the hotel and will also be the biggest in the Paradise Complex, which also happens to be the gay district of Patong Phuket. Next to it you find a little ally and on the corner I see a dark looking building in terrible need of a paint. That building is no part of the hotel, and the ground floor has been the focus of Pongs attention.
In the past weeks I had talked with Pong several times about that most of the (gay)places were all the same and that the area was crying out for something different to add to it.
Now he told me his plans for that spot: A ladyboys bar! And indeed, such a place doesn’t excists here yet in Patong, and would be indeed new, maybe even a novelty for the spoiled western tourists who allways like to try something different and new.
He asks me if I would like to give him input in how to make the place effective for the tourists and not only for the Thai.
He plans to open as soon as he can (still, the place looks like a buildingsite, so still a lot needs to be done there) because this month he still has the place rent free and he already payed a half years rent in advance from december onwards so he needs to earn money quickly. Logically.
Indeed a challenge to come up with some idears new to Patong and possibly attractive for the westerners hollidaying here, or as they call foreigners here “farang”, as being one myself. Hence his question to me.
I like a challenge and I like to discover if I indeed can come up with fresh new idears to make a place work here in Thailand, so I agreed to give it a serious thought!
So, in the next couple of days I have to come up with some idears the Thai haven’t thought about....yet!
By the way Ladyboys are guys who look so much like girls that one would not longer think of them like boys, they have breasts like women and below the belt they are in every way still men. They also tend to look more female then most women I have seen walking around. And you have a lot of ladyboys here in Thailand I can assure you. And many tourist get confused seeing them! Gays or heteroseksuals a like.
Thursday, November 22, 2007
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