I woke up feeling rough this morning in spite of not drinking much. It’s the Chang, said some people, so I vow to stay away from Chang. It’s difficult, it has 6.5 % alcohol, so it’s more for less, I feel.
We tossed the Ultimate disc around a little bit last night before it got completely dark and then sat on Soi Bangla watching people go past. At first we were sitting in a dingy pub called U2 watching pretty made up girls walk past heading to some or other festival on the beach. There were a fair few ladyboys amongst them too. We walked down to the beach a few times, but returned as it started raining, only for it to have stopped by the time we got halfway up Soi Bangla.
We eventually figured it must only be raining at the beach and chose an Aussie sports bar, sitting a little higher than road level with a great view for people watching. Why is there always an Aussie bar everywhere? I curse my countrymen for not opening up South African bars all over the place. Anyway, they had South African Supersport Channels on the big screen, so I guess that’s a compromise.
So back to this morning; I woke up long before Julia, had breakfast and sat working in the downstairs cafe of the Little Budha Guest house. They have a plug point, which I don’t think is meant for guests, but which I used anyway. Bonus.
Spice up your day and go chili all the way
Around lunch time I went up to find Julia awake already and we headed to the No.6 Restaurant for a chili lunch. We had a huge lunch – Tom Yum soup, Kra Pow Moo, Cashew Nut Chicken and rice – all seemingly flaming hot. And we swirled it down with some legendary banana shakes, so really heavy stuff.
I did my thing at Coffee World again (buying a beer for access) and Julia did hers (sans the beer).
The day flew past and by the time she returned for me it was already well past dark. We strolled around the byways and sideways of Patong looking for Mexican (again, it’s not so exotic, but you don’t find a decent Mexican place in Kota Kinabalu, so it’s a treat fo us).
Bananas Tacos is where we had some seriously good food and OK banana margaritas too. The portions where gigantic and the side dishes and sauces were colourful. The food was reasonably priced, but the alcohol was a bit on the expensive side, considering the size of the serving.
On the menu amongst the cocktails, they had a Sweat Sock for THB5 and when I asked what it was the waitress said it is exactly what it says and the owner will come and strain it for you himself. She returned however saying he’s not wearing any socks today, so I had to do without.
Stuffed to the max we went for a long stroll via Bangla Road. On the way through and on the way back we were hassled by dozens of touts asking us to view a Tiger Show, which is probably better known as a ‘pussy show’. We brushed them off, because we were going to save this experience for Bangkok.
Soi Sea Dragon off Bangla Road
On the way back from our long stroll we turned into one of the soi’s (or side streets), called Soi Sea Dragon and we sat at a bar, which looked fun and didn’t have any old, white men being accosted by bar girls – Rock In Dice Bar, it was called and a friendly woman named “Mam” approached us and offered us drinks – I got a Chung at THB90 and Julia got a Bacardi Breezer at THB150.
Turns out the theme of the bar is games and at first we played Julia’s favourite – Connect Four. After I lost as many times as I was prepared to lose, we played Jenga. They also have a game probably called Nails or something. It’s a big slab of wood with four hammers. But the hammer-heads are pointed, rather than round and flat, so it makes it difficult to hit the nail. The game is set up by one of the bar girls who hammers in 4 nails just enough so they can stand by themselves.
The winner is the first person to completely knock in the nail – it goes around and everybody gets a 1 hit, so it takes a bit of skill and and lots of luck to get it done first. I think ideally it would be a drinking game, possibly designed to get the punters to consume more drinks, but the girls were friendly and played with everybody just for fun.
Anyway, as we played we noticed we were sitting opposite one of these Tiger Show places. During the time we sat there throngs of tourists, both men and women, single, in couples and in groups, poured into the small shop, stayed awhile and then came out again, each with a different look on their face – some bemused, some horrified, some indifferent.
Mam urged us to go have a look and explained to us how it works. There is a short ‘pussy show‘ (as she referred to it) during which a woman will do all sorts of things on stage – shoot ping-balls or bananas from her vagina, pull lines of razor-blades from there, stick a pen up there and write things on paper or use a blow-pipe in there to shoot darts and pop balloons – all by using her well developed kegel muscles. The show itself is probably 10 – 15 minutes long and starts when the shop is full.
In between these shows there are 3 pretty girls on stage, just dancing by moving from one foot to the next – nothing exciting. When you pop in to have a look, you are meant to see these pretty girls and assume they are the ones that will be performing. However, once you sit down and you order a drink and the show starts, the actual ‘star’ of the show is a not-too-pretty, stubby woman who is so fat that her vagina is little more than a hairy slit.
It’s true that there is no cover charge to the show (which the touts use to rope you in), but you have to order a drink from a menu and there are two menus. The one menu is given to people who arrive with a tout. The tout gets commission, so the drinks prices on that menu are all THB500 or over. If you walk in by yourself, you still have to buy an expensive drink, but you get the menu on which the drinks are THB300 and over, as no touts need to get paid.
It’s just so-so, she said, but as a tourist probably worth a look. Armed with near-insider information, we waited until the little shop was nearly packed with tourist and then slipped in ourself. And it went exactly as she said. The shop was deep and narrow, probably no more than 5 meters wide. One side had two levels of seats, and the other a stage. It was crammed with tourists, perhaps up to 50, all giggling and feeling awkward – luckily the lighting was fairly dim. We both ordered a beer for THB30 each and sipped it slowly – the whole ‘show’ lasted about 10 minutes and then the crow cleared.
We were prepared to stay for a second round in case we missed possibly more outrageous tricks, but the shop stayed empty for too long and we went back to seats at the bar across the lane. Not long after we called it a night.