South Wales Man's Thai Kidnap Ordeal

[correct]

South Wales man's Thai kidnap ordeal

May 31 2007

by Abby Alford, South Wales Echo

A MAN’S dream of an idyllic retirement in the sun has been shattered after he was kidnapped, dumped in the jungle and stung by a scorpion.

Today, speaking from his hospital bed in Cardiff, former Barry businessman Gareth Pike spoke of his heartbreak at being left penniless and alone in Thailand, believing he was going to die.

He hopes his nightmare experience will serve as a cautionary tale to those who leave Wales to start a new life abroad.

“I literally thought I was going to die,” said Gareth, who turns 56 next month.

“After I was bitten I felt so awful I thought I had about a week left. That’s what spurred me on to find my way out of the jungle and back home to South Wales.”

Gareth, who is being treated for the scorpion sting by doctors on the infectious diseases ward at the University Hospital of Wales, Cardiff, said his dream soured when his 28-year-old Thai wife left the family home in a remote village with her eldest son who lived as a woman, known in Thailand as a lady boy, to find work.

He said:

His wife’s male relatives forcibly evicted him from the bungalow he had built with the last of his money.

They kidnapped him and took him to the jungle.

They left him alone in a tin shack with nothing but the clothes he had on.

Gareth, who once owned a plush apartment in Barry’s prestigious Waterfront development and ran his own double-glazing firm, said: “This shack was in the middle of nowhere.

“I slept on the floor and was forced to drink dirty brown water from a stream that ran through the jungle near the hut. The only thing to eat were mangoes that grew on a tree about a mile away.

“There was nothing to do, except wash my clothes, which I did in the stream, and nobody to talk to. I didn’t try to escape because I didn’t think there was any way out.

“I saw a lot of snakes, spiders and scorpions, but I never thought I’d be stung by one.

“I got up one day and went to put my shorts on.

“They had been lying on the floor because I had nowhere to hang them.

“I felt a sharp pain. Something had stung me on the thumb.

“Then I saw a black scorpion about three to four inches long run along the ground.

“I managed to kill it with my shoe and tried to suck the poison out of my thumb but I was too late and the poison had gone through my body.

“I had a blister come out on my thumb and foot and I came out in a rash. I was in dreadful pain.

“I literally thought I was going to die. I had already lost half my body weight and I felt so bad.”

Gareth, who has two sons, Daniel, 14, and Harry, 10, from his first marriage, went to the Pattaya beach resort with friends for a three-week holiday two-and-a-half years ago.

After falling in love and marrying a 25-year-old Thai woman he met in a bar, divorced Gareth returned to South Wales to sell his business and home so he could return to Thailand and build a new life.

“I built a two-bed bungalow just outside of Pattaya for us and I never thought I would come back to the UK. I had high hopes for a fresh start and a new life,” he said.

“Initially, I was retired. But then I opened a couple of bars in Pattaya – one of which failed and one of which I sold and managed to break even on.”

After the marriage broke down, Gareth began a relationship with a 28-year-old Thai woman who had worked for him as a cashier in one of his bars.

They married and she persuaded him to move to her home village in a remote area outside Pattaya, where he built a new home for himself, his wife and her three children to live in.

He also started another business, a general store, with the last of his money.

“I spent everything I had left on the bungalow and shop,” he said.

“But the shop failed and she left the village with her eldest son, leaving me with her two girls, aged 13 and nine.

“I really don’t know where she went, but she told me she was going to find work as a masseuse.”

That was in January this year and, after four months in the jungle, Gareth said he suffered the scorpion bite on May 17.

Fearing the worst, he staggered for miles until he came across a road, which he followed to a village.

There, a woman who could not speak any English put him in touch with her lady boy son in Bangkok who rang some of Gareth’s friends, who then reached his sister Pam Roberts at her Southampton home.

“It was horrible getting that phone call,” said the 66-year-old, who is also originally from Barry.

“I was given a mobile number at which I could reach Gareth and when I got through he was so ill he could barely speak.

“All he could say was ‘Pam, Pam, home, home’.

“I just wanted to get him home and my husband got straight on to the British Embassy in Bangkok, who were brilliant.”

Pam wired money to Thailand to enable Gareth to buy a plane ticket and, with the assistance of embassy staff, Gareth flew into Heathrow from Bangkok last Wednesday.

Today, a Foreign Office spokeswoman confirmed Gareth had been given “consular assistance” and was advised to get medical help.

Pam said: “I didn’t recognise him when he was wheeled out into arrivals at Heathrow. He looked so ill.

“The embassy staff had advised us to take him straight to a hospital, but Gareth wanted to come back to South Wales so badly we drove straight down the M4 to the A&E department at the University Hospital of Wales.”

Gareth, who is now undergoing tests and has been put on antibiotics, said: “I have absolutely nothing except two pairs of trousers and about three T-shirts.

“I don’t know how long I’ll be in here, but when I do eventually leave I’ll have nowhere to live and will have to rebuild my life.”

Gareth said he has instructed a lawyer in Thailand through a friend who will be informing police about his ordeal.

--------------------

Edited July 11, 2007 by Maestro
added link to news article

[November Rain]

Oh, c'mon. He sat in a shack washing his clothes because he didn't think there was anywhere to go? He wasn't exactly here on a 2 week holiday.

Whatever.

Either this guy is trying to pull some sort of scam; he's the saddest loser on the planet; there's something going on that he hasn't disclosed; or this is British media sensationalism at its best. My vote is a little of all options...

[lannarebirth]

Oh, c'mon. He sat in a shack washing his clothes because he didn't think there was anywhere to go? He wasn't exactly here on a 2 week holiday.

Whatever.

Either this guy is trying to pull some sort of scam; he's the saddest loser on the planet; there's something going on that he hasn't disclosed; or this is British media sensationalism at its best. My vote is a little of all options...

These were my very thoughts too, when I read it. It stretches credulity.

[Skyline]

Is he 16,or 56 years old?....hard to tell really.

Hope he stays in Wales now.

[darkside]

shocking if true

[scousemouse]

If the story is true , what a tosspot.

P.S - the british embassy is only "brilliant" if you have the money , if not you will rot in a thai prison.

[lannarebirth]

Smart bloke. Goes on holiday, marries a whore, tries to run a shop in the country and get's kidnapped by his realtives, dumped in the jungle and bitten by a scorpion.

Answers to the name of lucky.

It's as if someone took every Thai Visa thread they'd ever read and rolled it into one story.

[Soph]

Jeeez! Cant beleive he just stayed there and did nothing - surely if hed been in Thailand so long he would probably know that there would be some kind of civilisation not too far away, probably even a 7/11 somewhere within walking distance Its not like he was dumped in the middle of the Amazon. Oh dear me, what a silly man (if the story is true). Perhaps he's better off finishing his retirement in Wales from now on.

[Guemlum]

Blimey, I thought it might have been "Thaicoon" for a moment, untill i scrolled further down and it revealed a name. He should have eaten the scorpion...it would have saved walking to that mango tree every so often. Shocking story if true though. It does happen.

Guemlum

[Rhys]

hmmmm

[blizzard]

he wore out his welcome in the village when he ran out of money.............say it aint so!

[qualtrough]

Sounds like something you would read in The Onion.

Do they all come to Thailand, or do some of the idiots stay back home?

[dave111223]

Is it just me or does the story read:

1) He married a 25 year old bargirl after a 3 week holiday

2) Pissed away most of his money

3) Divorced bargirl 1 and then got together with another 28 year old bargirl (who had 3 kids)?

4) Pissed away rest of money

5) Sat in a jungle for a month eating mangos and making no attempt to escape?

What a *****

I love how the article is written in a sympathetic tone; are we actually supposed to feel sorry for him?

[keebone]

Sounds a bit far fetched but then he is Welsh !

[torito]

This story looks and sounds stupid. Nevertheless, looks like stupidity has no limits anyway. This what you get from an equation that contains an old bloke, a whore and a city like Pattaya.

all the ingredients for a good movie..

Edited May 31, 2007 by torito

[alexth]

This story looks and sounds stupid. Nevertheless, looks like stupidity has no limits anyway. This what you get from an equation that contains an old bloke, a whore and a city like Pattaya.

all the ingredients for a good movie..

A new thai soap opera maybe?

[torito]

This story looks and sounds stupid. Nevertheless, looks like stupidity has no limits anyway. This what you get from an equation that contains an old bloke, a whore and a city like Pattaya.

all the ingredients for a good movie..

A new thai soap opera maybe?

it will need an old soaping brit, and a lady boy....where to find them?

Edited May 31, 2007 by torito

[Lickey]

Just googled South Wales Echo and the story is there, wether they are partly owned by the Sun or Star newspapers, gawd knows, but eating mangoes and drinking muddy water for a month?? If i eat an unripe mango and drink the village tapwater here thats it for 3/4 days, im on the throne non-stop and need medication quick, even mrs family who very often eat raw pork, when they eat unripe mango, they are on toilet within 2 hours, I cant really believe the jungle story part, cos if he survived, he would look like a stick insect.

[chaiyapoon]

There,but for luck,good judgement, commonsence,and Thai visa go all of us??!!

[2long]

None of it's true. Stop wasting your time.

[mcd]

Sounds a bit far fetched but then he is Welsh !

seconded.

a total daft git, if true.

[Globeliner]

It wasn't Weho by chance, on cutbacks?

[the gent]

Hilarious story and probably all the better because our hero is a gormless Taffy. You can hear it now, that whining self indulgent misery bewailing his interminable diet of mango and nothing to do but to watch the slithering beasties whilst languishing in his jungle bothy imprisoned by circumstance guarded by the watching heathen.

Poor bugger, probably thought he was back in Pontypridd........

Anway, where on earth would be that remote country spot near Pattaya? Surely not Jomtien?

[Lucifer]

He's been to Thailand, lost his money on women and other stuff I wouldn't know about, and had to go back to Wales, with a good fable.

Nothing wrong with that.

[kebabman7]

Just googled South Wales Echo and the story is there....

Also found on google:

Thai Skorpion News - Fri 31-May-2007

Brutal Slaying Of Beloved Father in Pattaya Jungle

A beloved father of 78, grand father to 874, was brutally murdered last week in Pattaya. The hideously mutilated corpse of Bumpy, so called because of any unusual bump on his back, was found last week by a shocked millipede. Police were called to the scene which was described as one of the gruesome they have seen for some time.

Forensic scientists discovered a pair of huge soiled humans shorts at the scene, which is believed to have been left as bait to entrap the hapless Bumpy who was foraging for food. It is thought that once inside the shorts the muderer pounced on his victim. An autopsy confirmed that Bumpy did not give up without a fight as his poison sack was half empty, although some of this may have been discharged when he was crushed to death. The force of the attack left few remains of Bumpy's exoskeleton in tact.

A large white skeletal human figure was seen fleeing from the scene early on Sunday morning. Police are appealing for witnesses. The prime suspect in the murder investiagtion, who cannot be named for legal reasons, is believed to have fled the country.

The remains of Bumpy were released to his relatives on Wednesday, for a traditional Skorpion ceremony in which his remains were devoured by his family. One of his daughters said "Bumpy was such a fun loving figure and loved by everyone he met. It was such a brutal and senseless killing, we are all still very shocked. Oh yes, and he tasted like chicken."

[Charma]

Did I read that his 28 year old wife left the village with her eldest son, who lived as a woman? These ages have to be stretched at both ends to make sense. Perhaps the local rag in Wales got a bit carried away with the story here. Seems to have every possible ingredient that could be drawn from Thai stereotypes. God knows!

[sutnyod]

Hm. I am told such tales quite often, seems like Thailand abounds with them. Foreign granny marries young Thai wife that transforms immediately after marriage. There are stories of ripping the husband off and then incarcerating him, also holding his passport, etc. Interestingly, the main 'actors' in the stories I hear are British.

[kankaroo]

Sounds a bit far fetched but then he is Welsh !

:D

[steves_the_1]

Sounds a bit far fetched but then he is Welsh !

and what is that suppose to mean

[johnh101]

He only left the "Jungle" cause he couldn't find any sheep !