Patong - The Wake

[DrDave]

I think Backside Bistro is one of very few recent successful businesses in Patong.

 

The reason they're successful is that they've differentiated themselves from the competition by providing a better product at a lower cost. We've eaten there probably 15-20 times in the last 6 weeks - both lunch and dinner. Great service, excellent food, a nice environment and probably the best prices in town.

[xylophone]

9 hours ago, KarenBravo said:

Backside Bistro!

Bwahahahaha!

Yeah.....the name doesn't do much does it, but think it came from the previous location at the back and side of an establishment and DrDave rates it so I must try it soon.

[billythehat]

12 hours ago, xylophone said:

Yeah.....the name doesn't do much does it, but think it came from the previous location at the back and side of an establishment and DrDave rates it so I must try it soon.

Yep, great name; all it needs is prefixing with ‘Mai’.

 

Hope it lasts until Xmas…those meatballs look pretty good…

[xylophone]

A wet day, so did a little shopping in Big C and it was fairly crowded with the majority of shoppers being Chinese of course and as I peered into their shopping baskets to view the array of absolute crap, I wondered why they would come all this way just for that?

 

But it set me thinking about an article I had seen in a newspaper (the New Zealand Herald) and it stated thus: –  Jane Lu, Australia and New Zealand chief for Chinese real estate business Juwai, said for Chinese buyers, New Zealand ranked as the sixth most popular country globally, behind the United States, Australia, Thailand, Canada and the United Kingdom........

Despite tighter capital controls this year, 57 per cent of Chinese still say they will increase their overseas investments over the next two years, with more than 60 per cent planning to invest specifically in residential real estate," she said.

"Their top goals are risk diversification and their children's education.

 

So Thailand was the 3rd most popular investment destination, mainly for residential real estate and as regards Phuket, there appears to be quite a few Chinese who have invested in the Patong Bay Hill Resort, this especially as it advertises a 7% return for 15 years, obviously hoping for "risk diversification".

 

Now there are some strings attached to this in as much as they can only use the place for one month year and the rest of the time it is rented out on a hotel type basis.

 

So what happens at the end of 15 years? I have been told that the company will offer to buy the apartment back from the investor.

 

But as one successful real estate investor/seller here has said, "what will it be worth in 15 years time knowing the building quality of Thai apartments and the reluctance of just about anyone here to buy property this old?". He then added that it's all very well for the advertising to promote this "deal" however knowing the business like he does he would have absolutely no confidence in them honouring it that far down the track.

 

So risk diversification may be high on the list for the Chinese investors, but then again TIT!

[DrDave]

3 hours ago, xylophone said:

<snip>

 

So what happens at the end of 15 years? I have been told that the company will offer to buy the apartment back from the investor.

 

But as one successful real estate investor/seller here has said, "what will it be worth in 15 years time knowing the building quality of Thai apartments and the reluctance of just about anyone here to buy property this old?". He then added that it's all very well for the advertising to promote this "deal" however knowing the business like he does he would have absolutely no confidence in them honouring it that far down the track.

 

So risk diversification may be high on the list for the Chinese investors, but then again TIT!

 

There's no way that any condominium scheme involving a "guaranteed" annual ROI, and/or buyback is a safe investment.

 

What happens in the event that the tourism market collapses for a period of time (think SARS, Bird Flu, political unrest, etc)? Do potential buyers really think they'll receive their "guaranteed" return? What if rental market rates in the future can't support the operational expenses, management fees and the "guaranteed" payments to the owners - who do you suppose will be the last to be paid, if ever?  What if the real estate bubble bursts? What if the developer/management company declares bankruptcy or sells the project?  There are just so many things that could go wrong, making this a high-risk investment.

 

As for Prab's Patong Bay Hill project, it took nearly 6 years to complete (I'm not sure if both of the final 2 buildings are 100% complete yet, but construction started on them more than 5 1/2 years ago. I'd hate to be one of the people that bought into that project early on, and had to wait years for their unit to be completed. I've often wondered who the "big money" investors were behind that project. The developer and/or backers seemed to have no concept of the time-value of money,  with the project dragging on for years with no ROI.

[KarenBravo]

Unless the "guaranteed return" is in the form of a legal document, then, it's unenforceable.

[LivinginKata]

33 minutes ago, KarenBravo said:

Unless the "guaranteed return" is in the form of a legal document, then, it's unenforceable.

 

I have to laugh ... you really think a 'legal document' will assure a guaranteed return  ... I think not. 

[observer90210]

On 25/06/2017 at 0:25 PM, Monkeyrobot said:

Full of Chinese, one of them walked up to me and started taking a photo of the shrimp yellow curry I was eating, strange people and the tuk tuk drivers don't like them either, they really haggle on the price, 

I see your points fully....but allow me to have a sub minus 0 level of sympathy for the Thai tuk tuk/taxi crooks!

[NamKangMan]

On 8/27/2017 at 7:36 PM, xylophone said:

A wet day, so did a little shopping in Big C and it was fairly crowded with the majority of shoppers being Chinese of course and as I peered into their shopping baskets to view the array of absolute crap, I wondered why they would come all this way just for that?

 

But it set me thinking about an article I had seen in a newspaper (the New Zealand Herald) and it stated thus: –  Jane Lu, Australia and New Zealand chief for Chinese real estate business Juwai, said for Chinese buyers, New Zealand ranked as the sixth most popular country globally, behind the United States, Australia, Thailand, Canada and the United Kingdom........

Despite tighter capital controls this year, 57 per cent of Chinese still say they will increase their overseas investments over the next two years, with more than 60 per cent planning to invest specifically in residential real estate," she said.

"Their top goals are risk diversification and their children's education.

 

So Thailand was the 3rd most popular investment destination, mainly for residential real estate and as regards Phuket, there appears to be quite a few Chinese who have invested in the Patong Bay Hill Resort, this especially as it advertises a 7% return for 15 years, obviously hoping for "risk diversification".

 

Now there are some strings attached to this in as much as they can only use the place for one month year and the rest of the time it is rented out on a hotel type basis.

 

So what happens at the end of 15 years? I have been told that the company will offer to buy the apartment back from the investor.

 

But as one successful real estate investor/seller here has said, "what will it be worth in 15 years time knowing the building quality of Thai apartments and the reluctance of just about anyone here to buy property this old?". He then added that it's all very well for the advertising to promote this "deal" however knowing the business like he does he would have absolutely no confidence in them honouring it that far down the track.

 

So risk diversification may be high on the list for the Chinese investors, but then again TIT!

 

I think you will find the Chinese are doing everything / anything they can to get their money out of China these days.

 

It's not that Phuket is a good investment for them, it's because other countries are tightening up on foreign investment laws, particularly in the real estate sector, and particularly in relation to Chinese investors.

[xylophone]

Out and about on Friday night and nothing really different than the other nights I have described apart from some idiosyncrasies which I observed…………..

 

•    Soi Eric was knocked down and a new one built which exactly resembled the old one with the same style bars, same style layout. So millions of baht were spent on this and it looked just the same as the previous one!

Despite the promises of the owner, he doesn’t pay much attention to the pleas from some of the bar owners with regards to improving the “traffic flow” into the Soi and some bars are empty.

 

Then much to my amazement on Friday evening I noticed he had put a little stall/stand at the front of the Soi, which was selling beer and spirits……..not very popular with the bar owners who really want the punters to come into the Soi, rather than walking by and buying a beer!

 

•    The Italian restaurant just after the derelict building which juts out into Soi Banzaan has closed and is up for sale, which doesn’t surprise me because I’ve rarely seen anybody in there.

 

•    Work continues after the demolition of the “white elephant” building next to new Tiger which never really got used anyway and it will be interesting to see the outcome of this endeavour.

 

•    Why did 70% of the Indian men I saw in Bangla on Friday night have large guts, equivalent to a very large farang “beer gut”………….surely can’t be just rice?

 

•    How come the turnover at Patong’s largest supermarket last month was equivalent to that in the same month three years ago? This despite the influx of Chinese – – perhaps they are buying fewer and cheaper goods?

 

•    The owner of a 65 room hotel in a good position here is keen to sell and although they did cater for the Chinese market early on, they don’t have that many visitors now and others seem to have taken up the slack. Unfortunately the price the owner wants is far too high and will ensure that anybody who “invests” in it won’t make any money.

 

•    About 18 months ago a long-standing massage parlour closed and opened up again as a restaurant, this about 10 mtrs away from a similar restaurant which they once part-owned, but which closed because of lack of business. This restaurant closed because of lack of business and has now reopened again as a……massage parlour!!

 

Patong doesn’t seem to stand still, whether it be for better or for worse, and I think that’s one of the things which makes it such a “vibrant” place (as described by another poster). Like it (which I do) or loathe it, there’s always something going on!!!!
 

[DrDave]

A few observations to add to xylophone's excellent post (above)...

 

The closed Italian restaurant on Nanai formerly known as LoScoglio (and Sutin before that) has a new sign with the name name Valerio & Antonio. They've had a sign on their pizza oven near the street advertising for a "pizza man" for a couple of weeks now - apparently no luck finding someone who can make pizza?

 

The Welsh Bar, which had moved from humble beginnings in what is now a Thai burger stand, was closed some time ago. They had relocated to the building next to the 7-11 at the corner of Nanai and Hasip Pii, but seemed to have been open less than 6 months.

 

I've noticed 3 different small guesthouses currently under construction on Nanai. One would think with the glut of empty rooms, and rock-bottom rates, the last thing someone would do is build another guesthouse.

 

Work has resumed on the medium-sized apartment/condo building just up Hasip Pii from Nanai. This was started 8 or more years ago, and has been dormant for almost that long. It looks like they've just added the final story on the top. Hopefully work will continue, and it won't rejoin the ranks of the never-to-be-completed eyesores in Patong.

 

Contrary to the beliefs of the numerous naysayers regarding the future of Patong (and Phuket in general), there's been a tremendous amount of tourism-related property development going on over the past year. The route 4010 corridor (the road that connects Prince of Songkhla University to ChaoFa West near KingPower) is now one new tourist trap after another. Add to that, the expansion of Central Festival and the construction going on west of SamKong (BluePearl?) These are huge (expensive) enterprises. Someone has invested hundreds of millions of baht (possibly a billion?) on those latex and gem businesses on 4010, let alone the billions for Central and BluePearl. I have to believe that the people behind these projects are a lot smarter than me, and have a good deal of insight into the future of Phuket, as compared to us expats standing on the sidelines.

 

Finally, what's going on with the Higher restaurant in the Seduction building on Bangla? Their website indicates that the Seduction Complex is still closed "for renovations", after the minor fire there quite some time ago. I think xylophone mentioned in a previous post that the Seduction nightclub was open, but I can't help but wonder if that building might be the next to drop in order to make way for the new development going on behind it.

[madmitch]

17 minutes ago, DrDave said:

 

Contrary to the beliefs of the numerous naysayers regarding the future of Patong (and Phuket in general), there's been a tremendous amount of tourism-related property development going on over the past year. The route 4010 corridor (the road that connects Prince of Songkhla University to ChaoFa West near KingPower) is now one new tourist trap after another. Add to that, the expansion of Central Festival and the construction going on west of SamKong (BluePearl?) These are huge (expensive) enterprises. Someone has invested hundreds of millions of baht (possibly a billion?) on those latex and gem businesses on 4010, let alone the billions for Central and BluePearl. I have to believe that the people behind these projects are a lot smarter than me, and have a good deal of insight into the future of Phuket, as compared to us expats standing on the sidelines.

 

 

I'm sure you are right. There is method behind this investment and it seems to me that nearly every baht being spent on tourism-related businesses at the moment is aimed squarely at the Chinese market, whether the busloads or the independents. 

 

The question is when will the Chinese hordes, together with a not insignificant sprinkling of Russians, totally drive away the remaining Western travellers?, 

[xylophone]

29 minutes ago, DrDave said:

The closed Italian restaurant on Nanai formerly known as LoScoglio (and Sutin before that) has a new sign with the name name Valerio & Antonio. They've had a sign on their pizza oven near the street advertising for a "pizza man" for a couple of weeks now - apparently no luck finding someone who can make pizza?

Actually DrDave, Valerio who is now a part owner according to the sign, has owned and part owned several Italian restaurants in Patong and he can make pizzas!!! 

 

I wonder if he will be able to lift the fortunes of this "dead in the water" restaurant, this especially as one just opposite it has recently closed.

 

"I've noticed 3 different small guesthouses currently under construction on Nanai. One would think with the glut of empty rooms, and rock-bottom rates, the last thing someone would do is build another guesthouse".

 

I do know of a couple of smaller buildings which are under construction, however they seem to be the small apartment/Thai style accommodation, maybe for locals and farangs living on a budget?

 

 

[xylophone]

35 minutes ago, DrDave said:

I have to believe that the people behind these projects are a lot smarter than me, and have a good deal of insight into the future of Phuket, as compared to us expats standing on the sidelines.

But then again............. those in the know with regards to stocks and shares didn't see the stock market crash coming and those in the know with regards to property didn't see the property market crash coming!

 

Come to think about it, nor did those in the know with regards to tulips!

[xylophone]

Well, the wake can wait, at least for a while in Bangla Road at night, whereas during the daytime, it’s pretty well dead anyway.

 

Friday evening and Bangla Road itself was busy with the usual venues being full (mostly those with live music as I’ve said before) and many of the bars on the left-hand side of the road heading down towards the beach were doing good business.

 

Got to thinking about this and I do remember when I first came here that the term “bar mongers” was used and as I recall it referred to the farangs who came here in search of bars where they could pick up a girl for a small bar fine.

 

There were plenty of sois where this was the big drawcard, including Sois Eric, Crocodile, Lion, Tiger, Easy, Gonzo to name but a few. Then the demographics changed and that along with the GFC, or because of it, meant fewer bar mongers and more bars closing and more sois closing, which is the case now.

 

Now the bars on the left-hand side of Bangla are doing very well, namely the likes of Kangaroo bars, Sunset, Shipwreck, sometimes Blue Lotus, Heroes bar and another whose name escapes me (also the Aussie bar on the other side).

 

I don’t know whether I’ve got this right or not, but I don’t believe any of these bars have staff who are available on bar fines. Perhaps an after-hours dalliance might be on the cards, but the girls are not on offer the same way that they were in the old sois.

 

So the days of the bar mongers driving the bar trade seems to have died off and that would explain why Soi Freedom has been so poorly serviced by these guys and indeed there were probably more “ping-pong and live f@cking show” touts out on Bangla than there were punters in Soi Freedom on Friday night!

 

I was pondering that as I sat in a bar opposite the Lion bar (a very large bar/space) which had a live group in it, but was only playing to a handful or two of punters, and whilst that was going on I observed a balcony above that bar which advertised “Moulin Rouge” and a solitary Russian lady (because that’s the main drawcard for this place) walking round and round a pole.......... no dancing, no acrobatics and she was fully clothed, but she had a look which suggested that she would rather be somewhere else, or should be carted off to a home for the bewildered!

 

She was replaced by another woman of exactly the same ilk and in the 30 minutes or so that I sat in the bar talking to friends, I observed absolutely no one going into the entrance to that place. It was then that my friend reminded me that we had been to the very first one that opened up alongside of old Tiger about eight years ago and we chuckled at the experience as we recalled it………….a small group of us went into the original Moulin Rouge and were extremely surprised to be charged 250 baht for a small beer, but decided to stay anyway.

 

About five minutes after we arrived a girl came out from behind some curtains, climbed up and down a pole a few times and gyrated a little, doing some sort of gymnastics and then came over to us and spoke to my friend asking for a 100 baht tip from all of us (don't forget this was eight years or so ago).

 

My friend replied something along the lines of well the beer was expensive enough and you were only there for five minutes so no. So she replied, “well then you can just <deleted> off”, so we did.

 

At a guess I would say the Russian influence here at the moment is nowhere near what it used to be, but then again I could be wrong.

[xylophone]

On ‎05‎/‎09‎/‎2017 at 12:31 PM, DrDave said:

Work has resumed on the medium-sized apartment/condo building just up Hasip Pii from Nanai. This was started 8 or more years ago, and has been dormant for almost that long. It looks like they've just added the final story on the top. Hopefully work will continue, and it won't rejoin the ranks of the never-to-be-completed eyesores in Patong.

On that note, DrDave, and as you previously mentioned, there is still some building going on around the place, seemingly oblivious to the unfinished and abandoned places which now litter Patong.

 

I came across this one a few days ago, called, "The Crystal Patong" and it is completely empty and has been for some time by the looks of the building, yet it is a fairly substantial and completed place, but no occupants at all and some of the fittings showing signs of age.

 

Not 100 m from it is the shell of another would-be apartment block, taking its place amongst the other derelict/rotting follies of Ace Condominiums, The Park, Dinso (and to be fair to this one, there does appear to have been a small amount of work done on it over time, yet it has been three years or more since started, and still not completed) and other places in a similar state of dilapidation.

 

On the subject of The Crystal, does anyone have any idea why it has remained empty, or the history behind it?

[xylophone]

On 27/08/2017 at 8:08 PM, DrDave said:

What if the real estate bubble bursts? What if the developer/management company declares bankruptcy or sells the project?  There are just so many things that could go wrong, making this a high-risk investment

 

It’s been a while since I spent an evening in Bangla Road, so thought it was about time to do so.

 

There were plenty of people around and that always has been the case, but where they frequent and why is a different matter.

As before, the larger bars/venues with live bands in them were doing well, and at 1:30 AM in the morning people were still queuing to get into Illuzion, so not clear about their closing time and will get onto that shortly.

 

The bars in both new Tiger and resurrected Tiger complexes were scarcely populated, and what is probably related to what which I’ve mentioned a few times before with regards to the demographic changing, Soi Freedom was all but devoid of customers. If ever there was a mirror to how the demographics have changed then this Soi could probably be it, although that may well change in the high season/bar mongering season, but for now I would be very surprised if there were more than 20 people in a complex with around 30 bars in it!

 

Having said that, the Soi owner has to take some responsibility for this because he won’t listen to what the bar owners have been suggesting, there is no signage at the end of the Soi to let people know it even exists, and to exacerbate that problem even further, for a couple of hours in the evening, a group of about four or five lady boys in their costumes stand in front of the Soi entrance posing for photographs with passers-by, all but blocking off the entrance to the place, which I’m sure adds to its problem.

 

As if to reflect the dissatisfaction that the bar owners have, there are now around six empty bars in the place.

 

Now onto a couple of things which have been discussed in other threads; namely the closing time fiasco and how it stands with the “law”. Smiley bar was absolutely humming at 1:30 AM in the morning and the owner told me that he had decided to ask the band to stay playing past their 1 AM finish time because he and other bar owners had been informed that closing time that evening was 3 AM – – and who could blame him for wanting to stay open to gain extra revenue, and it was obviously working.

 

Not only that the place was at least 40% occupied by younger Chinese and they were swigging back the Chang beer like there was no tomorrow, whereas earlier the bar had only been about 50% full in total.

 

It would appear that some folk are coming out a little later and it would also appear that the place was attracting younger folk, couples and groups of friends. Perhaps another nail in the coffin for the old-fashioned monger beer bars and that also helps to explain the fact that other similar bars with live bands are throbbing until the wee small hours.

 

So beer bars, as has been said by others, in the main are not doing so well, whereas the live venues and larger bars are; closing times are flexible depending upon what the law says and in this case the law being the local BIB; certain segments of the Chinese market seem to be keen on music bars and spending time and money in them, so Patong is obviously a drawcard to some and despite the fact that we have had threads with “Patong is dead”, “Patong the wake” and “how can Patong reinvent itself” running, Patong and in particular Bangla seem to be capable of mimicking the Phoenix when necessary.

 

Finally, I am pretty well sure I have seen black folk here who are up to no good and who really shouldn’t be here – – let me explain; last night I was propositioned by a short but fairly dumpy jet black female with hooter’s like black melons and looking like she had a couple of small footballs stuffed down the back of her shorts. Now she was as black as the ace of spades, so there is absolutely no way that she comes from Thailand, not only that the facial features shouted “Africa”. So here on a working holiday?? Go figure.

 

Add to that the fact that I took my backup computer into a shop to be fixed and on two occasions there were a couple of black guys in the shop trying to get iPhones or the like “unlocked”? My addition of two and two might not make four, but I’m pretty sure that they hadn’t managed to lock themselves out of their own two separate iPhones – – maybe making a living by “acquiring” these from unsuspecting tourists??

 

In summary, Patong won’t die, and following on from that, I doubt whether Bangla will as their futures seem inextricably intertwined; closing times will continue to be administered by the local BIB as and when it suits their pockets; the place will always be a magnet for those nefarious activities which have made it famous in the past and this will include visitors from overseas trying to get in on the sex trade and because of the amount of visitors, and lowlife thieves will also be drawn to the place, whether they be local or from overseas.

[SooKee]

XP said: "Not only that the place was at least 40% occupied by younger Chinese and they were swigging back the Chang beer like there was no tomorrow, whereas earlier the bar had only been about 50% full in total."

 

Drinking like that would make me wonder whether they were in fact Chinese and not Malaysians.

[schlog]

Is it only me or maybe my memory isn't more that good? 

 

I can't remember when there were so many tourists in a october in Patong.

Like today the beach is full with Pakistani, India, Arabs, Chinese......

Normaly October/November are my favorite month of the years with only small number of tourists. But this year not. 

 

Stumbled today over an old pic from Patong when it was Paradise on earth. Sigh sigh.

 

[DrDave]

52 minutes ago, schlog said:

Is it only me or maybe my memory isn't more that good? 

 

I can't remember when there were so many tourists in a october in Patong.

Like today the beach is full with Pakistani, India, Arabs, Chinese......

Normaly October/November are my favorite month of the years with only small number of tourists. But this year not. 

 

In the past few years, I noticed an increase in the number of tourists in mid-October. I think this is due to people trying to beat the high-season rates that go into effect on Nov 1st at most hotels.

[xylophone]

4 hours ago, SooKee said:

XP said: "Not only that the place was at least 40% occupied by younger Chinese and they were swigging back the Chang beer like there was no tomorrow, whereas earlier the bar had only been about 50% full in total."

 

Drinking like that would make me wonder whether they were in fact Chinese and not Malaysians.

Hello Sookee, good to see you back!!

 

Get your point, however they were Chinese as I spoke to a couple of them and have seen this before in Smiley Bar........maybe because the singers in the band know a couple of Chinese songs and word gets round?

[xylophone]

2 hours ago, schlog said:

Like today the beach is full with Pakistani, India, Arabs, Chinese.....

Most of them "cheap Charlies" I would warrant, and not the sort that are going to lift the monetary fortunes of Patong or the local businesses!

 

On that subject, two days ago I noticed that three food cabins (for want of better terminology) on the Banzaan side of Jungceylon, just outside of Starbucks, had been closed. It wouldn't surprise me if the Jungceylon management had decided to close them because they offered competition to their newly built row of food stalls, just round the corner??

 

Will be interesting to find out what's going on there?

 

 

[xylophone]

On 11/10/2017 at 4:38 PM, DrDave said:

In the past few years, I noticed an increase in the number of tourists in mid-October. I think this is due to people trying to beat the high-season rates that go into effect on Nov 1st at most hotels.

Is it, “Patong, the wake” or is it, “Patong comes awake”?.............

 

I say this because although not much has changed in Bangla Road since my last visit, apart from a lack of customers in the bars that really do need them, i.e. in Soi Freedom, and Smiley Bar being surprisingly lacking in customers despite there being a good band playing, there are things stirring elsewhere……….

 

A small guesthouse in Soi Banzaan which closed a couple of months ago has now reopened and the ground floor has become a Chinese restaurant, and it looks like the rooms are being let and the place has been renamed Phuket Live, along with the equivalent Chinese signage – – so new Chinese owners?

 

One of the bars in OTOP has just sold for not far off 1 million baht and there is another for sale in this predominantly Aussie owned enclave for 1.4 million baht (and I hear others are for sale as it’s been a very quiet low season, following the quiet-ish high season). But the prices???

 

The dingy looking Italian restaurant in Nanai road, just past the Banzaan intersection, which was very often closed in the low season, and eventually closed completely has now reopened as a cafe, so let’s hope they can attract more business than the Italian restaurant did. The road works currently going on outside it will not help, nor will the mud which often gets almost ankle-deep immediately outside of the steps leading to the cafe.

 

Amigo bar is undergoing a transformation, but into what I’m not sure, but someone always seems to buy/lease this dead duck, at least for a few months before it closes and transforms again.

 

Rooms are being advertised for 399 baht a night, so still cheap as, if you want to look for them and on the subject of guesthouses, there are two for sale in Nanai, both with 12 rooms, although they seem to have had very little in the way of interest over the past couple of months that they have been on the market. There is hope because I have noticed quite a few Chinese frequenting these type of guesthouses in Nanai, but their tenure could be short lived if they continue to walk four abreast along this narrow road!

 

The shutters are down on quite a few shops in Soi Nanai 8 and a couple of small guesthouses there have undergone transformations and one is empty.

 

So some signs of a metamorphosis amongst the closed shutters and for sale signs, but then again this could be just another one of those cyclical events which have been happening in recent years.

 

Having said that there are new condos/apartments being built on the new middle road, there is a Sheraton going up just back from the empty white shop-house-type buildings on the beach road and a large hotel going up in rat-u-thid road, so some money is being spent here and no doubt Patong will have its share of good spenders, and I saw some of these in the Diamond Cliff Resort and they are a million miles away from the cheap Chinese which inhabit the likes of Big C.

 

Mixed signals here, however I do believe that we are getting more than our fair share of the zero baht tourists and cheap Chinese than we should, and it’s not really helping the economy according to the shop owners I know (not the bars) and I don’t suppose the smoking ban/food ban/umbrella ban/deckchair ban coupled with the lack of fully trained lifeguards on the beach will help much.

 

Some tour operators are still managing to get small parties of Chinese into the rented apartments/condos for a few days at a time and although this is not supposed to happen, it’s still pretty rampant.
 

[xylophone]

On 22/10/2017 at 6:01 PM, xylophone said:

the place has been renamed Phuket Live,

Sorry it is now called "Live in Phuket".

 

And other snippets:

 

--The Backside Bistro seems to be getting a good following and last night it was about 75% full.

--Don's Pool Corner "bar" which has had very few customers is up for sale and wouldn't be surprised to see the bar further along Nanai, which he fairly recently opened, go the same way as almost always devoid of customers.

--On that note the vacant lot next to it which has been turned into a couple (or more) bars has had little to no patronage, and the singer cuts a lonely figure perched in the middle playing to no-one.

 

At one time Nanai was home to a thriving expat community of Brits, Aussies, Italians, some French and a few Kiwis with the likes of the Offshore Bar, Dons BBQ and even the Nanai Sports bar, pulling in the punters and restaurants such as Capannini bustling.........but all changed now with the GFC and poor exchange rates, change in demographics and even a few long termers swapping it for Pattaya, Cambodia and Vietnam.

 

 

[xylophone]

Hopefully this will attract some other posters as I don't really want to be a lone "observer" of things Patong!

 

Out and about on Tuesday, despite the heavy cloudburst around 8 PM, but by 9:30 PM it had all but cleared, so life was back to normal on Bangla Road, well as normal as can be expected and nothing much has changed. 

 

Many of the beer bars in Soi Freedom are desperate for custom and a couple who have had a bar in there since its opening are lamenting the lack of business, this with about six other bars empty does not bode well for that whole Soi unless the owner decides to do something positive about the situation.....which he has failed to do thus far.

 

I did meet a few groups of Russians out and about and there seem to be more of them than in the past and although I have often seen small groups of Chinese around, they were notable by their absence last week and the week before?

 

Which leads me onto the Chinese guy on the ground floor of Jungceylon, where the gift shops are, who decided to clear his nose on the floor of the place. This almost in front of me, so I loudly exclaimed, "dirty bastard", but I don't think he understood.

 

Jumping around a bit here and the roadworks (replacing/installing new drains) at the junction of Sois Banzaan and Nanai have been held up for a while now whilst they try and sort out the problems, causing much traffic chaos around the 5 PM mark when every man and his dog decide to try and get through the mess which has been created, as it seems they really don't know what they're doing!

 

As I said jumping around a bit, however if there is anyone on the forum who has used a lawyer called Mr Vithaya (a very good lawyer in my opinion) and who have been unable to get in touch with him, it's because he has been sick with what seems to be a head injury which has affected him greatly, so he is off work for a while. I managed to trace him through friends near his office and spoke with his mother who had been looking after him, and I will arrange to visit him within the month to see how he is progressing, not only because I wish him to get well, but because he has been handling my affairs and I really need to know if he can do so in the future. If anyone wants any more information, then by all means send me a PM.

 

And finally, what a lonely life the musicians (a duo now) must lead in the new bar "complex" on Nanai, because on four occasions over the past week, I have driven past in the evening and they have been playing to an audience of......no one.

[NamKangMan]

On 10/25/2017 at 11:29 PM, xylophone said:

Sorry it is now called "Live in Phuket".

 

And other snippets:

 

--The Backside Bistro seems to be getting a good following and last night it was about 75% full.

--Don's Pool Corner "bar" which has had very few customers is up for sale and wouldn't be surprised to see the bar further along Nanai, which he fairly recently opened, go the same way as almost always devoid of customers.

--On that note the vacant lot next to it which has been turned into a couple (or more) bars has had little to no patronage, and the singer cuts a lonely figure perched in the middle playing to no-one.

 

At one time Nanai was home to a thriving expat community of Brits, Aussies, Italians, some French and a few Kiwis with the likes of the Offshore Bar, Dons BBQ and even the Nanai Sports bar, pulling in the punters and restaurants such as Capannini bustling.........but all changed now with the GFC and poor exchange rates, change in demographics and even a few long termers swapping it for Pattaya, Cambodia and Vietnam.

 

 

"Nanai was home to a thriving expat community of Brits, Aussies, Italians, some French and a few Kiwis" - "but all changed now with the GFC and poor exchange rates, change in demographics and even a few long termers swapping it for Pattaya, Cambodia and Vietnam."  - I would also add the visa crackdown that turned many away to the neighboring countries you mentioned.

 

I would also suggest many Brits here will struggle, post Brexit, when the GBP takes a hit.  So, Phuket can expect to lose a lot more of them in the future.

 

[LivinginKata]

6 hours ago, NamKangMan said:

"Nanai was home to a thriving expat community of Brits, Aussies, Italians, some French and a few Kiwis" - "but all changed now with the GFC and poor exchange rates, change in demographics and even a few long termers swapping it for Pattaya, Cambodia and Vietnam."  - I would also add the visa crackdown that turned many away to the neighboring countries you mentioned.

 

I would also suggest many Brits here will struggle, post Brexit, when the GBP takes a hit.  So, Phuket can expect to lose a lot more of them in the future.

 

 

Exactly correct. Other than the GBP already took a 10+%  (near 15%) hit You saying it will get worse. 43 Baht to GBP today, and that's really bad.

 

[NamKangMan]

7 hours ago, LivinginKata said:

 

Exactly correct. Other than the GBP already took a 10+%  (near 15%) hit You saying it will get worse. 43 Baht to GBP today, and that's really bad.

 

 

IF Brexit happens, and if it does, there's every chance it will be a "hard Brexit" then yes, my prediction is the GBP will be hit harder. 

 

Of course, this is not the fault of the Thai tourism industry, but it certain will not help the Phuket economy, which is already in decline. 

[LivinginKata]

This end of the universe link might be appropriate  ....

 

 

[NamKangMan]

13 minutes ago, LivinginKata said:

This end of the universe link might be appropriate  ....

 

 

 

Ahhhh, remember all the posts ridiculing the "They are killing the Golden Goose" posts?

 

I ask, where are all those ridiculing posters now???? 

 

There was only so long Phuket could get away with putting lipstick on the Phuket pig. 

 

It's lucky for Phuket that the Chinese currently like pigs wearing make up, but when they no longer continue to do so, where to from there for Phuket????