Bangkok Nightlife is Fun, But Not Crazy

I found myself walking alone down the heart of Bangkok’s red light district one night. The promoters at Patpong, including my taxi driver, were eager to sell me on each of their clubs, and anything else that’s possible in a seedy area of a world famous city like Bangkok. Instead of looking for an infamous Patpong Ping Pong show, I was supposed to be meeting my friend and his girlfriend for a classy evening in an upscale French restaurant. I thought he was joking when he said it’s on Patpong, but sure enough there it was.

Garlic Frog Legs

After dinner the three of us passed many of the bars, even a Sopranos themed strip club.

We hired a taxi and sped to the opposite of seedy, the LeBua at State Tower – Riverside skybar on the 64th floor overlooking Bangkok. The view was just as wonderful as it looks, and the pricy, but not obscenely pricy. The atmosphere made the drinks easily worth it.

The view held us up a while, making us an hour late to meet my group of Thai friends at the hopping club district, RCA. Just because we are in Thailand doesn’t mean going out is any cheaper, as we paid around $180 for our bottle of Smirnof.

I originally met my Thai friends at another disco and they soon became great buddies. We all went out pretty often those few weeks. Here we are at another busy club enjoying the music.

And another club around RCA.

The girls all work in the airport and brought along some more of their coworkers on a different night.

But sometimes you gotta hang out with the gringos hahah. You know, the ones like the arrogant French “filmmaker” Pierre, pictured in the flannel shirt. Pierre was such a caricature of  snobby French/American hipster that he even went so far as to explain that he spends a lot of time at Patpong, talking to the girls. You see, his excuse for going to strip clubs and whorehouses is to speak with the girls, see where their coming from, etc. Come on Pierre, you don’t need to make excuses for wanting to go to a strip club. Just go and enjoy.

But the others pictures were all great people, and I even took a day trip with two of them to visit some temples. In the green is Mike, also from Philadelphia and on a SE Asia backpacking trip till the money runs out. The other guy is Leo from Spain, who i really had a blast practicing my Spanish with.

And I’ll end this post about Bangkok nightlife with a photo of myself with 2 good friends, the kind of locals that reveal themselves as amazing hosts, doing the most they can to make a foreigner feel comfortable and enjoy their country.

So in the end I went to some bars all over Bangkok, exclusive clubs, and backpacker clubs. None were insane but all were fun, good times.