Back and truly re-established, we bring you the new and improved, low-fat, sugar-free bartripping. Being stood up and left out to dry by one of Bangkok’s rising celebs, Dan takes newly inaugurated Farang Untamed Travel sales manager Stu out for a night on the tiles.
7:30pm, Café Corner, Samsen Soi 2
Dan: The beginning is a difficult time, so says Pincess Irulan in David Lynch’s Dune. Taking these words to heart, I headed to Café Corner, not far from Farang Untamed Travel global headquarters. As the name suggests, it’s on a corner, screened by potted plants and is a quiet hideaway, far from the madding crowds of Krung Thep. Stu was already waiting for me, a regiment of empties saluting him, and a crooked grin on his face. This was to be the launchpad for the evening, so I found myself a place at a table already crammed with Soi 2 regulars taking on fuel.
Stu: Being Farang’s former gulf island monkey-boy and used to the laid back Thai-time, I wasn’t surprised to see Dan arrive by the time I was half-cut and impatient for more. In the short while I’ve been living in Bangkok, Café Corner has become a regular watering hole. A steady mix of regulars complements the short drinks, but Lucas plays the best music in the neighbourhood – making this place hard to leave but all too easy to return. This being the night to break my bartripping cherry, I was keen to get underway and escape the eccentric locals – a mad Dutch bouncer and a former music-industry heavyweight with an itchy brain. This set the tone of the evening, adopting the maxim “If it ain’t Dutch, it ain’t much.”
9:12pm, The Bull’s Head, Sukhumvit Soi 33/1
Stu: Wow, it’s a pub. But I didn’t waste time looking around. After a long taxi ride with dry throats and bulging bladders, Dan and I hit the urinals. Without the pressure on my bladder and bursting bowels, my vision cleared. Stained-glass windows, kick bars, a polished wood interior and a smell that made up for the lack of spit and sawdust. I was in British heaven. It being a quiet night, we had no option but to join a couple of expat local hacks and discuss the benefits of calorie-counting wrist computers and condo-based treadmills. A truly enlightening conversation. The affable bar manager, Billy, greeted us with East Londoner hospitality and a glass of the finest Scottish single-malt, with water of course. Although the quality of the liquor was superior to the interior, they were both brown, smoky and relaxing.
Dan: “I’ve burnt 2,955 calories in the last 12 hours,” pronounced Greg, a fellow Bangkok writer, putting down his fifth pint and opening his shirt to reveal a heart monitor. Although there are 170 calories in a beer, Greg assures us that 10 percent of that energy is burnt digesting the self-same beverage. “You have to give to get,” as Greg says. I’ve always felt very at home in the Bull’s Head, not too noisy, not too busy and great for chatting with friends while sinking beers, as I was doing with Greg and Dan, colleagues in the world of media. That said, I was a little uncomfortable facing a wall of Englishmen as Greg, Dan and Stu all hail from the isle set in a silver sea. This being a Tuesday night, upstairs was converted to the chess superdome and we were serenaded by their shouts, the occasional scuffle of a tackling and the patter of chessmen from the balcony as they fought for the title of Big True Blue.
11:35pm, Bed Supperclub, Sukhumvit Soi 11
Dan: Bed Supperclub is something of a regular for the Bartripping column, but that’s only because it is a superior venue, and the free journo-drinks are the only ones here I can afford. Surprisingly the place was packed, although PR person extraordinaire, Goy, assures me that Tuesday is one of their bigger nights. Naughty by Nature playing in the bar may have had something to do with the crowd as well. It was Stu’s turn to be popular though, and I found myself facing a wall of citizens of his home planet, the People’s Republic of Koh Tao. Stu also fit the place in his clean white shirt and shoes, so my envy only grew.
Stu: From the best of British to the best of Bangkok via Amsterdam. Being from the Netherlands, Bed Supperclub proves that if it ain’t Dutch, it ain’t much. Being swanky, white and bright, I was unsurprised to meet Octo and Chopper, minor celebrities in their own right. The interior matched the clientele, a club as rounded as its punters. For all the club’s coolness, I was nonplussed to be handed a cold Jack in a warm tumbler. I didn’t want to drink it but reordering was out of the question; our vouchers had run dry and you’d need a shitty stick to beat your way to the bar.
2am, Jey Hoy’s, Samsen Soi 2
Stu: Being suitably slaughtered by now, my catcalling libido got the better of me while divining the destination of three beautiful women in the tuk-tuk next to us when my face became trapped in the jaws of the taxi’s power window. Embarrassment made me twice shy so I persuaded Dan to console me at our regular late-night drinking hole.
Dan: Beer and crunchy pork are what keeps this columnist fat and happy, and Jey Hoy’s has buckets of both. To be completely frank, my memories of this time are at best blurry and at worst, humiliating. It had been something more than a big night, yet the old Dan homing instinct had done its work and I found my feet back where they started in Soi 2, still loosely attached to the rest of me. For all the imported glitz and glam on offer in Bangkok, sometimes it’s the simple, home-grown Thai boozing on a street corner that proves the most satisfying. And through the haze of expensive alcohol, I reflected that, no matter how far you stray from home, it always calls you back.