RAWBangkok

Thursday night was interesting.

Along with lots and lots of other people I attended the Daywalker Birthday Bash at the Big Mango.  The party came alive in a big way, especially in the later part of the evening when a group of bargirls who were at the party got pretty rambunctious.

I had two (relatively) “good” Thai girls with me at  the party, and they ended up a bit offended by some of what went on at the party.  In part they were bothered by the very forward behaviour of the bargirls, and also upset by some of the things they heard from the male customers and some of the things they saw the male customers doing.

Both of these girls have been to the Mango before, so it’s not that they shouldn’t have been in “a place like that”, but rather that the party ended up much rowdier than has been usual in past Mango parties.

Anyway…

Sometime late — I’m guessing it was around midnight — I took out my wallet and paid my meager bill (most of the beer and all the food had been free all night) and decided to go home.  I was in a bit of a bad mood because my two female companions had left a bit unhappy and a few minutes later I got into a bit of a disagreement with one of the girls that works at the Mango.

I hit the street grumpy, and decided that I’d walk home rather than take a taxi.

It seems like nearly every problem I have in Bangkok starts with me walking out of a bar late at night and deciding to walk home instead of getting a cab.  You’d think I’d learn.

Anyway, being in a crap mood, I set a pretty cracking pace.  About halfway to my room a ladyboy stepped out of the shadows and grabbed my cock.

I reached down and grabbed his/her arm and gave him/her an “Indian Burn”.  This is where you grip the person’s arm tightly in both your hand and then twist your hands in opposite directions.  It’s something we learn to do as kids in America (dunno about the rest of the world).  Done right it’s very painful, and I did it right.

The krathoey cried out in pain.  I kept walking, barely breaking stride.

The ladyboy then shouted something at me… I don’t know what.  I stopped, turned around, and took a step towards him/her.  He/She ran away quickly, and I didn’t bother to give chase, just turned and continued towards my house.

When I got to Asok Road I stopped at the outdoor bar where I’d picked up Yu on Friday last week, thinking I might buy her a drink and think about going with her again.  It wasn’t to be, however, as she was just finalizing arrangements with another punter and leaving with him.  I finished my one beer quickly and reached for my wallet.

Which wasn’t there.

Huh?

I’d had it at Big Mango 20 minutes ago when I paid my bill there.  I checked the ground around my chair, and re-checked all my pockets.

No wallet.

And then I realized what must have happened.  The krathoey that grabbed my package was just distracting me while I got my pocket picked.  Someone had grabbed my wallet out of my back pocket then.  At least I assume that’s what happened… I can’t think of any other explanation.

Normally I go out in slacks in the evenings, and my pockets are so tight (and wet with sweat) that getting my leather wallet out is a struggle.  But for some reason I had gone to the Mango party in a pair of baggy cargo shorts with giant pockets.  I might as well have hung a sign from my belt saying “please steal my wallet”.

So, I had been in a crap mood from the last twenty minutes at the Mango, and I’d been really stroppy after the ladyboy molested me.  My mood hadn’t improved when I watched the punter take Yu home with him leaving me to fend for myself, and now I realized I was all alone in the middle of the night with not enough cash to pay for my now-empty bottle of beer, and certainly not enough to pay for a hooker.

Talk about unhappy!

There was some good news in it all.  First, there was only 500 baht in my wallet… not a huge loss.  It was compounded by the loss of my BTS and MRT cards that were worth about 400 baht more, but it’s not unusual for them to be worth over 1500 baht on any given day, so again, not a huge hit.

I’d just gotten a new ATM card sent to me from Bank in America which had arrived on Tuesday.  I used it to withdraw money, but had wisely taken it out of my wallet and put it away in my room just before going out to the Big Mango.

Likewise, I had removed my credit card on Wednesday and put it away in my room, so there were two very important things to be thankful for.

The more immediate problem was that I keep my room key in a zippered pouch in my wallet, so not only was I cash-less, but I was key-less as well.

I pondered what my next move should be.

I didn’t think too long.  One of the two girls who’d been at the Mango party with me is a very good friend.

I rang her and explained the situation.  Twenty minutes later she came to where I was and paid for my 80 baht beer, then paid for a cab to her house where she let me sleep.  In the morning when I had to get home, she gave me another 100 baht for cab fare.

It’s good to have friends.

So, all in all it wasn’t disasterous.  I got to my building this morning at 9:30 and the manager gave me a spare key to get in.  I have two spare keys in my room, so that was okay.  The manager says that on Saturday she can give me a new security card to enter the building.

I showered, then went to the bank for a replacement ATM card.  Keen regular readers may recall that I had been at the bank just a week ago getting a new ATM card, so the customer service officer who took care of me last week was actually laughing at me.  Who says that bankers don’t have a sense of humour?

Since my work permit is currently being issued by the Department of Labor, I don’t have my Australian Passport with my non-immigrant B visa.  I took my US passport instead, and the customer service officer who was helping me was mightily concerned about the fact that I had a different passport.  She was insisting that I call my company office and get them to fax a copy of my passport, but the lady from last week, who apparently is the senior supervisor at the branch, said that she’d photocopied it just last week and it was no problem, she would sign the paperwork without the copy of the Aussie passport.

Who says Thai bankers can’t bend a rule or be helpful?

I have to say, my entire experience as a customer of Bangkok Bank has been almost uniformly great.  The service is almost always at this standard, and they have a very useful and functional internet banking system that allows me to take care of all my banking needs with my notebook computer.

By the time I left the bank this morning I was feeling decidedly more chipper.

I had a couple of other errands to run, and I had to work in the afternoon.  I stopped by to see my friend — the one who had rescued me last night — at her workplace.  I repaid the 200 baht that she had spent, and then I came home.

My internet connection had mysteriously stopped working yesterday afternoon and I had to call TOT to find out what was wrong.  Turns out that it’s a faulty connection inside my laptop, so I ended up hooking up a new modem with a USB connection cable instead of LAN; I already had the modem in the house so that was easy, but being fairly un-technical it took an hour on the phone with the TOT help desk to troubleshoot and solve the problem.

Once again, the service was flawless.  The guy on the phone spoke very good English.  He was impeccably polite, calling me “sir” every sentence, but in a way that sounded like he meant it.  He knew exactly what he was doing and managed to help me solve my problem then asked if he could provide further assistance.

He should be given an award for being a textbook example of how to handle a customer on the phone.

I often hear people talk about how screwed Thai service is, and occasionally it is, but more often than not I get exceptional service in Thailand… today I got it twice.

So, I lost my wallet with a little bit of cash, but no real permanent damage done.  I managed to keep my mobile phone in my pocket and I’m back online.  All in all, not too bad.

I’m going out to dinner with very beautiful Thai girl tomorrow night.  She has a European boyfriend, so it’ll just be dinner and conversation, but I’ll get to drink in her beauty for a couple of hours, and I’m usually euphoric after I see her because I have a schoolboy crush on her.  I’ve tried many times to change our relationship from ‘just friends’ to something more intimate, but failed every time.  I don’t mind too much… she’s lovely inside and out and a pleasure to have as a friend.

Sunday I have plans with many friends for an afternoon get-together.  I expect a number of buddies (the Dude, Penfold, etc) and I’ve invited several girls that I know — generally the girls I’ve invited are single, available and attractive, so — who knows — maybe there’ll be some budding romantic relationships started.

Today I went to work and saw one of the girls from my office who I get along with very well.  She’s about 24 years old and a real beauty… slender and well proportioned with apple cheeks and large eyes.  She’s from Bangkok, and she’s soft spoken and polite, but a bit of a “blond” who seems to be just a bit ‘dizzy’ sometimes.  When she saw me she thanked me for inviting her on Sunday and said she would join us for drinks.  I was surprised, frankly, but I’m betting that some of my male friends are gonna be very pleased to meet her.  There’s one other girl from my office — a dark skinned Isaan girl who has a great figure and a gentle personality that I also invited but she didn’t mention today whether she’d be joining.

Ah.. clearly I’m rambling now.  I probably ought to go back and delete the last few paragraphs and work on a proper ending to the blog, but I’m just too lazy.

Let it stand.