My mother and the Indian newbie by On Nutter
Posted by On Nutter | Blog, Reader Submissions | Posted on March 26th, 2008
Imagine the scene. You are sitting at an outside bar at Nana Plaza with your 72-year-old mother. Outside a nearby go-go bar, service staff in school uniforms take a fag break. Your mother turns to you with a quizzical expression and asks with the innocence of old age: ‒Why are those girls wearing school uniforms?”
It is at such moments that you question your sanity in inviting your mother to spend two months in Thailand and escape the British winter, but I believe I rose to the challenge. ‒They must be on a school trip, mum,” I told her. She nodded in agreement.
My mother is no shrinking violet – her childhood was marked by the Luftwaffe reducing her home to rubble – but I decided before her arrival in the Land of Smiles that it would be better if her perception of me as a latter-day saint was preserved. Like most people, she knows something about Thailand’s risqué nightlife, but she also knows her precious son would never consort with women of negotiable virtue. So I decided to give her a sanitised tour of Bangkok’s entertainment areas and tutted in disapproval along with her when farangs almost her age disappeared into the night with Isaan’s youthful ambassadors.
She is a sociable type and enjoyed the banter with the bar girls. There was one scare when she got into conversation with a drunken Canadian who announced that ‒all these girls are hookers”. I told her to disregard the words of a drunk. ‒I have been living here for three years and it’s the first I have heard of it,” I assured her.
There was another alarm when a former go-go dancer of my acquaintance spotted me walking along Sukhumvit with mother. She ran over and gave me a big hug. ‒What a friendly girl…where did you meet her?” asked my mother. ‒Yes, Thais are very friendly. She was the receptionist in the hotel where I used to stay,” I replied sheepishly.
Anyway, after a few days in Bangkok, I packed her off to the relative tranquility of a seaside bungalow, where she stayed until I took her to Suvarnabhumi Airport for her flight home. That’s where I met The Newbie From Hell, a man who knew so little about Bangkok that he made my mother seem like BigBabyKenny arranging a threesome.
Ravi was an Indian making a two-day stopover in the City of Angels. I saw him having a pointless conversation with the driver of a shuttle bus about which bus he should take into town. It was pointless because the driver could not understand English. ‒Where do you want to be near – the nightlife, the temples or the backpackers?” I asked him. His eyes lit up. ‒The nightlife. . .yes, the nightlife!”
As I was thinking of having a few beers to celebrate my mother’s departure, I offered to be his guide. On the bus into town (I avoid the airport taxi mafia), he told me that he was 36 and had never made love to anyone but his wife. He had heard there were massage parlours in Bangkok where ‒sexy things happen”. I confirmed the rumour and told him there were also go-go bars, beer bars, discos and clubs where the hostesses would undoubtedly find him handsome. He seemed shocked but excited.
After finding him a cheap hotel on Sukhumvit Soi 4 and taking him to an exchange (he had assumed he could pay for everything in US dollars), I sat him down in the Golden Bar and gave him a crash course in P4P basics: bar fines, mamasans, short time, long time, rates, lady-drinks, etc. ‒Let’s go,” he begged. ‒I cannot wait any longer.”
First stop was Rainbow 1 in Nana. Ravi’s eyes were bulging. ‒Is this allowed?” he asked incredulously as he eyed the scantily clad shufflers. He disappeared to the toilets and came back shaken after an encounter with the lurking masseur. ‒He got angry when I wouldn’t give him any money,” he said. Welcome to Bangkok.
Then it was across the way and up the steps to the revamped Erotica. I took him to the bar’s almost empty upper level, where the coyotes were waiting to devour him. 36 years of sexual repression came flooding out. He grabbed every girl that passed and, without introducing himself, molested them in a way I had never witnessed. He was simultaneously French-kissing them while groping their breasts in a frenzy. The girls looked uncomfortable but seemed prepared to tolerate it as long as the 190-baht ‒special lady-drinks” kept coming.
I warned him that his bin would rapidly resemble India’s national debt if he kept on being so generous, but he wasn’t listening. I bailed after taking his business card. I texted him the next day to ask if he got back to his hotel OK, but I am still awaiting a reply. If you see an Indian wandering around Nana Plaza with a glazed expression and an empty wallet, tell him I was asking after him.
27 Responses to “My mother and the Indian newbie by On Nutter”
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Recent Comments
Translator
The toilet attendant in Rainbow 1 annoys me too. A tip – for what?
View all comments by Brewster
you took your mum to a slut bar!!
View all comments by MSB
Nice story.
The airport taxi mafia is easy to avoid, even if you want to take a taxi.
Grab one at DEPARTURES. Never have I had a driver there who did not use his meter.
View all comments by rick
My mum had the nightlife all worked out in 1974 which explains why she wouldn’t allow the old boy to take me to Thailand in 1986. Sigh. She eventually realised what I was about & in 1989 paid for a considerable part of my airfare & accom for my 1st trip.
View all comments by Wombat
At the official taxi stand they use the meter and don’t rip you off.
I am surprised your mom doesn’t assume you are banging a different girl every night. Even though I tell everyone I have a GTG in Bangkok (which is true), I estimate that 99% of all my friends and relatives still think that I bang as many girls as I can when I travel alone to Thailand. Which is basically also the truth, but I never admit that back home
View all comments by Phoenix
I’m surprised the girls of Nana wanted to have much to do with an Indian in the first place, you know “kaak men”.
Probably he has fallen deeply in love with a lady boy by now though and is soon to be considering divorce from his wife.
I would hate to be there at the moment he finds out his new Thai wife-to-be used to be packing some wood too. Well the photo of the expression on his face would be worth 1,000 words though.
No worries though, he’s got you to blame for it all and if you get into any heat you always have your mum to vouch for your innocence.
View all comments by Cheapolay
ON: Great piece, very funny! The Newbie From Hell must have been a sight!
You took your mum to nana plaza, awesome, I’ll have to think about that too! I’d take my dad there without a thought but I guess it’s different…
View all comments by mart
Ah Ah ! No, sorry, I can’t imagine the scene (‘sitting at an outside bar at Nana Plaza with my 72-year-old mother’). I would definitely avoid the place, then
View all comments by Suk Psycho
I had a friend who lived here last year.. since gone back to the US.. who took mom & dad everywhere. I mean EVERYWHERE. They had a blast.
My mom’s dead, but if she were alive I’d show her Nana… Doubtless she would have commented positively on how pretty and sexy the girls are.
My sister may come visit this year. She’s a 58 yr old, white, upper middle class suburban DINK. I reckon she’ll have a much harder time dealing with what I’ll show her than my mom would have.
My dad died before I came to Thailand, but he served in the Viet Nam War, so doubtless he plowed the fields here long before I ever knew they existed. Pop was no saint.
My favorite story I ever heard from him was about going down to the hotel restaurant one Sunday morning for brunch leaving his girl from the night before asleep in the bed. He had a few drinks at the bar, picked up another girl, and took her to the room — having forgotten about the first girl. He said the fireworks were impressive.
View all comments by werewolf
You got some cojones my friend. I’m not sure I would ever invite my mother to BKK unless she was in the care of The Oriental 24/7.
Sounds like you had fun, though.
View all comments by The Asian Badger
At the official taxi stand they don’t use a meter unless you ask.
View all comments by Young Royal
YR: I already arrived twice at the new airport and (same as at the old one where I arrived several times before) they always used the meter at the official taxi stand without me asking for it. But maybe I was just lucky
View all comments by Phoenix
the reality is many times they will try to get away with not using it. I have about every other time noticed he does not start it and is waiting to see what I do. If I notice it they almost always turn it on. However this is the bullshit one would not expect out of the metered line and that the unsuspecting tourists could do without.
View all comments by smitty
I’ve never had the taxis at the official line in the airport fail to turn on the meter. Sometimes they drive 50 meters or so before flipping it on, but I’ve never had to say a word or scowl to make it happen. Except for the length of the line and slow loading speed, I have no complaints about the meter taxi service at Golden Land airport
View all comments by werewolf
Why do so many feel the need to show their parents the underbelly of Bangkok? So many things here they would appreciate much more and enough stuff to fill a few weeks time withouth dragging them through all the filth. I don’t get it, but then again if you think that stuff would/does interest your parents, one has to wonder.
View all comments by Cheapolay
c – my parents did not know that bkk had either sukhumvit or silom road when they spent time with me here.
View all comments by smitty
When I met my mum at the airport on her arrival, one of the officials at the desk at the public taxi rank quoted me 450 baht plus expressway charges when I said we wanted to go to Sukhumvit Soi 1. When I refused his quote and said I wanted a meter taxi, he looked embarrassed and instantly backed down, but I imagine a lot of first-time tourists are victims of this scam. These days I would just rather avoid the hassle and get an air-con bus for 35 baht.
Werewolf: You are right. My mum thought the beer bar girls were lovely and really enjoyed having a laugh with them. She was quite upset when that Canadian described them as hookers. I know she always defends me when her friends and relatives tell her that I am probably banging everything in sight, so I did not want to spoil my saintly image. I also took her to dinner with a GTG to reinforce the notion that I am only interested in ‘proper relationships’ and my excursions to Nana are purely to drink beer and have fun.
View all comments by On Nutter
nutter – I think u hit the nail on the head. the taxi wonks will try it all the time. I think locals and experienced people walk with an air and the confidence that they won’t stand for it but I think tourists are first timers are getting scammed all the time on this. even in the official line . If they were not why would these guys try it so much?
View all comments by smitty
Isn’t the taxi talk getting boring yet? I have been here many years and they still try it on with me quite often too. It’s the nature of the beast. Taxi drivers are some of the lowest of the food chain. Survivalists from the lowest echelons. Many x-cons drive taxis too since they are not employable elsewhere. How could you expect any more from them and you get them like this in every city of the world, but people act like they just can’t believe how awry the taxi drivers are. I just hate them and get pleasure out of hating them. Simple and easy. Nuff said.
View all comments by Cheapolay
Or maybe we should just commiserate about it together some more. Smitster can even start a whole blog entry about how to navigate getting a taxi from the airport into town and each person can add in about their near getting ripped experiences. Then I can tell about mine where I got driven back to the airport by one taxi driver and switched cabs after I refused to pay the extra service charge he wanted to hit me for. Sheesh!
View all comments by HoeNoMo
“Sheesh!” ???
Where have I heard that before?
Is someone logging in with two user names just so he can say twice exactly how much this topic bores him?
View all comments by werewolf
Gosh, this stuff about taxis sure is a boring subject. Sheesh!
View all comments by poledinkey
The more common taxi scam is to try to tell you the place you want to go to is closed. I got in a taxi next to the Westin and the clod tried to tell me Poseidon was closed at eight o’clock at night. I tossed him a few choice curse words and got out.
View all comments by cruiserPimp
Alas, another exciting taxi scam story worth documenting…
View all comments by Cheapolay
I know it’s boring but next to the taximeter stand, they put up a sign stating that a ride to Bangkok costs approximatly 400 Baht. Exactly the price the taxidrivers are asking nowadays. But when you force them to put the meter it’s just under 200 Baht.
View all comments by hanuman
So. Your mum. Is she hot?
View all comments by Pants Elk
Surely not as hot as your dad!
View all comments by Poledinkey