Day 1- We arrived at the airport about 2 hours before the flight but we had a problem. One
member of our group had forgotten his passport so he had to go back home to get it so we waited
near the check in counter for him to return with his passport. By the time he returned with his
passport it was already boarding time so we weren't able to use our pass for a visit to the Dynasty
lounge for the 3 of us. We hurried over to the gate after hearing an announcement calling our
names over the PA system. When we got to the gate everybody had boarded except for a few
stragglers like us. I was the only one that upgraded to business class in our group and I was the
last one to board the business class cabin and had to have the flight attendant find me some room
for my carry on in the overhead bin. The plane ended up leaving late anyway. The flight was
rather smooth with only an occasional turbulence along the way. I had pre selected my meals over
the internet but somehow we still had to pick our meal selections before the meal was served. I
was lucky that my selections was still available for me. I selected the omelet breakfast and I was
impressed with the meals in business class as I've always hated eating economy class food. For
dinner I had New York steak and slowly ate my meal in delight. The meals filled me up and I
didn't have to eat any other snacks on the plane. We arrived late in Taipei and by the time we
went through security and rushed to the gate we found out that instead of it being boarding time
the onward flight to Bangkok will be delayed about 20 minutes due to late arrival of the aircraft.
My friend and I decided to make a quick run to the Dynasty lounge in Taipei and grab some
snacks. I had the beef noodle soup which I really liked and I topped it off with a can of Taiwan
beer. I chugged the beer down in 2 minutes as I wanted to get back to the gate before boarding
time and passed on the internet service in the lounge because there's not enough time for that.
When we got to the gate most of the passengers have already boarded the plane so we all went
inside and squeezed into our seats in the full economy class section. This time there was enough
overhead bin space for all of us. The plane left about 45 minutes late. The meal in economy class
was too spicy for me so I just ate the fruit cocktail, dinner roll, and cake. After about 30 minutes
in the air I took off my jacket and a little later I was starting to feel very warm as they must have
shut off the air conditioner to save on fuel. It was getting so warm that I had a hard time sitting
still as I was squirming around in my seat trying to keep myself from becoming too uncomfortable
in the warm environment. That's probably why I couldn't get any sleep on that flight. I just
watched a movie and played games on the small screen on the back of the seat in front of me. We
arrived in Bangkok about one hour late. We cleared Immigration which wasn't as crowded as
before probably due to less travelers because of the global economic recession. We then went to
the luggage carousel to pick up our baggage. We had so much bags with us that we had to use 2
luggage carts. We asked around some of the taxi and limo counters in the arrival area for prices
and we were shocked at the 2500-3200 baht quote for mini vans. After exchanging for some bahts
at the money changers we then proceeded to the public taxi stand near gate 10. We inquired about
a larger car and they asked for 1700 bahts and we accepted the price. We waited a few minutes
for a SUV to arrive and we got inside with barely enough room for our luggage. I rode shotgun
while my other 2 friends shared the back seat. We make a quick stop for LP gas for the taxi and
then we proceeded down the highway for Pattaya. I can see the sky getting darker from storm
clouds and we headed straight for the thunder and lightning which was getting spectacular. The
rain started coming down hard in the thunder storm. The taxi driver had to drive slowly in the
heavy rain. We made to our hotel in about 2 hours and we checked into our rooms with the
bellboy struggling with the load of our luggage. After unpacking and a quick shower we met in
the hotel lobby and then walked over to the Sailor Bar restaurant on Soi 8. They sure fix up the
restaurant there and all the tables were occupied so we then decided to check out the newest mall
in Pattaya. It was a short walk to Soi 9 and Beach Road where the Central Festival Mall is
located. We took the escalator to the fifth floor and went inside Yayoi Restaurant. I ordered the
99 baht chicken teriyaki set meal. Somehow my order didn't look quite like in the window display
outside of the restaurant. After dinner one of our friend went to pick up his regular girlfriend and
my other friend and I caught the songtaew to Walking Street. We went inside Beach Club first.
My friend was looking for the dancer that he had on the last trip but she's not working there
anymore. Our next stop was Happy Agogo. I had to leave my package of goodies with the door
guard before I was let inside. We ordered our traditional singha light beer and sat back watching
the dancers on stage before 2 hostesses approached us. My friend immediately spoke to one of
them trying to cut a deal with her. The other hostess was one that I've seen from several years ago
and she's getting up there in age at 29. It didn't take long for her to suggest to me a short time
proposal. My friend then cut his deal after the girl lowered her price for him. We left after settling
our bar tab and then walked over to Second Road to catch the Songtaew to Soi 7. We stopped in
at the Family Mart to buy some water and I also wanted to pick up a new sim card but they didn't
have any. My friend didn't need a sim card since his is still good after all these years. Somehow
my sim card always expires on me and I always have to buy a new one every time I return to
Thailand. The girl I had was business like and she left shortly after the deed. I then fell asleep after
being awake for more than 30 hours already.
Day 2- I woke up this morning to my alarm at 9:00 am. I'm still feeling a little jet lagged but I know there are some things I want to take care of today. We met for breakfast at 10:00 am. The breakfast was a buffet type but not really that fancy but it did have a small selection of food and it was enough for me. I ordered an omelet and then picked out some items from the buffet table. I think they ran out of bacon by the time we got there so I only had the ham and sausage. After breakfast we made arrangements to meet later in the afternoon to visit our friend's girlfriend's beauty salon for our haircuts. I went to the money changers to get my money to pay for the hotel since I had to settle my bill up-front. I went upstairs at Top's and found out that the money changer on the second floor offers much better exchange rates for cash than the one downstairs and even better than Central Road, too. While up there at Top's I bought a new sim card and load for the cell phone. The price of a sim card went up from 100 bahts on my last trip to 200 bahts now. It sure is expensive getting a new sim card on every trip. After getting my cell phone up I walked downstairs to the internet café. After awhile I was starting to get a pop up from another unknown messenger on MSN that was trying to start a chat with me. I don't know who that was but I ended up leaving that internet café and then walked over to Sunshine Café and there I wasn't bothered by that unknown person trying to chat with me. After the internet session I walked back to the hotel to meet up with my 2 friends and then we took a walk to the beauty salon somewhere above Second Road near Soi Buakaow (sp?). We all got haircuts and a couple of the guys colored their hair but not me. My haircut cost me only 100 bahts which is a discounted price when compared to the hair salons at the malls. We hung around the beauty salon for a couple of hours waiting out a passing thunder and lightning storm while eating a bowl of Thai style won ton mein. Can't beat the ones in the Chinese restaurant but hey we're in Thailand. We later walked to Second Road and caught the songtaew to Soi 3. We then took at look inside Sabai Room for a quick peek before entering Welkom Inn. My 2 friends quickly call girls that they knew from the last trip while the old pro of 7 years latched onto me. She's really starting to show her age but she's still can pass for a human vacuum cleaner. I had to give up after an hour of non stop service as I'm still feeling the effects of jet lag and my libido was at it's low point at that time. I took a look at my watch and noticed that it was past 6:00 pm already and we're suppose to meet in the lobby for dinner at 7:00 pm. I decided to walk back to my hotel from Welkom Inn for some exercise. I took a quick shower and got ready to meet downstairs in the lobby of our hotel. We walked over to Central Festival mall again to check out the food court downstairs. We weren't impressed with the selection at the food court so we went up to the fifth floor to look for a restaurant for dinner. We finally settled on Zen which is a Japanese restaurant. I ordered the chicken teriyaki set for 140 bahts and I liked it better than the meal I had a Yayoi the night before. After the satisfying meal we took the songtaew to the Best Friends beer bar complex near Soi Pattayaland. We stopped at one of the beer bars inside the complex with the boxing ring for a drink. We did the usual chat with the girls, bought drinks for them while we played games with them. I was surprised that I won all 3 of the connect 4 games that I played with one of the bar girls. Either she was still new at it or she was setting me up for the kill. Then as usual the girl suggest that I take her short time but I wasn't interested in her as she's more chunkier than I like and it's still early in the evening. We then walked over to Walking Street and stopped at Star Agogo in the Soi Diamond complex. The girls inside Star were dancing topless and even some of the girls not dancing stayed topless so at least you know what you're getting. It didn't take long for all 3 of us to have a dancer with us and we bought them a drink. The one next to me was also a little pumpui (sp?) so I wasn't interested in her even though she was making an offer for me to take her short time. She was nom yai and also her body wiggled when she laughed. After finishing our drink at Star we then walked over to our favorite agogo in that complex which is Super Baby. We sat down next to the girls that wasn't dancing at the time. My 2 friends quickly call their choices while I eyed a dancer that I was interested in. I gave her one of my patented come on smiles and I knew she'll be coming down to sit with me when she finished dancing. We introduced herself and I bought her a drink. After a closer inspection I quickly realized that she had a baby because of the less than obvious stretch mark that I couldn't see while she was dancing further away. She still was very slim with a nice smile weighing in at around 40 kilos. We definitely looked like a spinner. One of my friends and I had our escorts from here. As we left our friend went to pick up his beauty salon girlfriend. We caught the songtaew back to our hotel and then went back to our rooms for our short time. I had better success with my girl this time and my libido was working again. I may try to go back to Super Baby again before the end of my trip.
Day 3- I woke up this morning feeling refreshed since at least on this trip I've been taking the girls earlier in the night like around midnight instead of my usual 3:00 am desperation picks so now I've been getting 6-7 hours of sleep versus the usual 3-4 hours of sleep of prior trips. I took a shower, shaved, and got dressed for breakfast. We met at the hotel's restaurant at the usual time and I ate as much as I could since I'll be skipping lunch and won't eat until dinner time at 7:00 pm. Of course I'll snack in between but it won't be a regular lunch meal. We made plans to meet around 2:00 pm in the lobby to go to the Thai massage parlor for a soothing Thai massage. In the meantime I went to the money changer above Top's and then to the internet café for an hour long internet session. I got back in time to meet my friend in the lobby and from there we walked to Central Road to catch the songtaew to the 99 baht massage parlor. We went inside and requested an hour long Thai massage. The masseuses (sp?) took us up 2 flights of stairs to the third floor. They didn't have a regular massage bed but instead a firm mattress on the floor. It was air conditioned and much more cleaner than the one at Silom on Soi 3. We had our massage and it was rather invigorating. We paid our 150 baht tab for the massage and gave the girl 100 baht tip. My friend and I then crossed the street and caught the songtaew to Beach Road. I got off at Royal Garden while my friend said he'll be staying on until Walking Street. After getting off the songtaew and paying my 10 baht fare I walked into Royal Garden mall and walked around a bit to cool off from the heat, humidity, and strong sun outside. I was craving something cold to relieve my dehydration so I ordered a cone from Dairy Queen. It was refreshing to cool off with a cold treat. I then walked past Auntie Annie's pretzels so I feel into a guilty temptation and ate the indulging pretzel sticks for 35 bahts. Being that I wasn't that far away from South Pattaya Road I decided to walk down Beach Road to the entrance of Walking Street and then up South Pattaya Road. I crossed Second Road and went towards Soi Buakaow. I was looking for the Tuk.com store along the way. I walked past an open market but didn't go inside. I finally made it to Tuk.com which also had a small Top's store inside. There's about 5 or 6 levels of stores arranged by it's specialty. On the lower floor was the food court and it wasn't much to look at. I proceeded up to the levels passing the cell phone shops and then next was the computer hardware floor and then I got off at the DVD/CD and video games level. I browsed around the video shops but didn't find what I was looking for. They didn't have any Mickey Mouse movies there so I took a look up on the top floor which had computer software. I left the mall empty handed and walked down South Pattaya Road to Second Road. From there I decided to walk all the way to Central Festival mall on Soi 9. I took some daytime digital pictures of some of the floors and shops in the mall. It's a really nice mall but somehow there are so many new malls in Pattaya that you wonder if they are overbuilding. This mall is very busy mainly because it's new and it has all the favorite restaurants there. The Japanese restaurants seem to be the most popular cuisine since there are about 4 or 5 of these restaurants on the same floor all nearby each other. I walked back to my hotel on Soi 7 and quickly got dressed and ready for dinner. We met at our usual time of 7:00 pm and we walked over to the Central Festival mall and took the glass elevator up to the fifth floor enjoying the view of the nightlife and Pattaya Beach below. We decided to try the M.K. restaurant but didn't try their shabu shabu style of cooking and instead opted for chef cooked meals. I had red pork with rice and a bowl of won ton soup for 51 baht each. The prices are reasonable even though the dishes are on the smaller size so one entree isn't enough for the average size person. After dinner we all walked along Second Road to Wonderful Bar on one of the Soi 13's but not sure which one since there are about 4 or 5 Soi 13's. We stayed there about an hour and then walked down to Beach Road and then turned left continuing our walk to the Best Friend beer bar complex. We had a drink at stall number 3. The girls were calling us to have a drink there so we sat down and ordered a drink. After we got our drinks the girls turned away and talked amongst themselves. That was the classic strategy of acting friendly to get you to have a drink at the bar and then ignore you after giving you your drinks. That's one of the reasons that I don't like beer bars. You wasted a lot of time with these gimmicks. The bartender even messed up on my drink. I ordered nam daeng and she gave me a bottle of water instead. I wanted the red cream fanta soda. She told me next time to say "fanta" but I remember saying fanta before and they give me the orange one (nam som). I guess it's a case of TIT (this is Thailand). I didn't even bother drinking the water. We settled our bar tab and then one of the guys went to the beauty salon to meet his girlfriend while I went with my other friend to Walking Street. We first went inside Windmill agogo and it's really busy in there but we were able to find a tiny table in the corner to sit down and have a drink while enjoying the raunchy entertainment there. Half of the dancers on stage are doing lesbian shows wearing only their birthday suits. We finally left there after about an hour. We went into Super Girls so I can check on the puying that I had on my last trip but I found out that she no longer works there because she got married recently. I was really looking forward to her company so now I'll have to find a new one at Super Girls. I really didn't see anything I liked at Super Girls tonight and it was getting late so maybe the better looking ones were gone for the evening already. I'll have to check back again on a different night. We then caught the songtaew to Soi 8 and walked toward the beer bars near Beach Road. My friend decided to check out a sexy dressed puying and I didn't see any other girl worth talking to so I parted ways with my friend and went inside Worldwide agogo on Beach Road. It was rather slow inside with very average looking dancers on stage. I quickly finished my beer and then walked to the Silver Star agogo on Soi 8. The club was about half full with so-so dancers on stage but I quickly took a liking to my waitress. She looked much younger than her age of 29. She's slim but not big on top. We hit it off pretty good and I stayed inside until the 4:00 am closing time which means I was inside for 3 hours. I bought several rounds of tequila for the waitress and another waitress as well as the mamasan. I even had 2 tequilas myself. My bill came out to around 1000 bahts. I was going to take the waitress out but she told me to come back tomorrow so that we'll have the whole evening together so I made a date to pick her up at 8:00 pm tomorrow. Being that it was already 4:00 am I didn't bother looking for tonight's shag as all the bars were closed already. I needed to go back to my hotel room and get a little sleep before getting up for breakfast. At least I saved one condom for later use as I always end up running out of condoms no matter how many I bring with me on the trip.
Day 4- I only had about 3 hours of sleep last night because of my late night bar closing routine. I got up to my alarm at 9:00 am and took a shower and got dressed for breakfast. We met downstairs at 10:00 am for our daily morning chow. We ate our breakfast buffet while discussing our war stories of the prior night as well as our battle plans for the day. My two friends went to their rooms after breakfast while I went to Top's to exchange more money to bahts and also my daily internet session. After finishing my e-mails I walked over to Central Festival mall to buy some Thailand chocolates to bring back home. I know it's very expensive for these chocolates but I wanted to bring back home something different. I also sampled the ice cream festival at the mall. They had a lot of different vendors for Italian style ice cream. I haven't had this style of ice cream before so I bought myself a whiskey flavored bowl of ice cream. It was really delicious and I may try to go there again daily until the festival is over and that will be the day I leave for Bangkok. It was really hot today so I decided to get my first foot massage of the trip. I just tried the Sabai Sabai massage shop between Soi 7 & 8 right on Second Road. I took the one hour massage and was so relaxed that I slept right through the foot massage. I went back to the hotel to get ready for our dinner at 7:00 pm but then one of my fiends called me up and said he wants to leave at 8:00 pm because he wanted to watch a singing contest on TV. We met in the lobby and my friend wanted to eat a budget meal at the Sailor Bar on Soi 8. I was amazed at how busy it was over there and with the improvements the tiny restaurant made as well as it's expansion into a larger size and there was a line waiting for seats in there. It's a far cry from the old days when it was a hole in the wall dump but it's a real popular restaurant now especially for the German tourists. After dinner I picked up the waitress I was seeing at Silver Star on Soi 8 the night before. I already paid for the bar fine an hour earlier and came by to pick her up. She was waiting outside for me and then the two of us walk over to Central Festival mall leaving my 2 friends on their own. I took my girl up to the 6th floor where the theater was located but we were 15 minutes late for the 9:10 pm show time so I bought tickets for the 10:00 pm showing. We walked around the mall for a bit and then came back to the theater. I bought a box of popcorn and a coke for myself and a can of beer for her. We got inside the theater just in time for the start of the previews. We had to stand up to pay respect for the king while they played a short video praising the king. I watched the Fast and Furious movie with Vin Diesel as the main actor. I liked the movie but my Thai girl was dozing off for a bit. When the movie ended I brought my empty cup with me trying to find a trash can somewhere as we were led through a maze to get out of the theater and mall. The main mall was closed and we could only exit through some side hallways and then down an elevator that couldn't handle much weight so only a handful of people can go down at a time. We had to wait for about 5 turns before we got our chance to enter the dark elevator. We got off on the 1st floor of the parking garage and had to find our way out of the parking garage which was also maze like. We finally exited to Second Road since the Beach Road way was closed due to night construction or maintenance work. We walked over to Soi 10 and down to Beach Road where we caught the songtaew to Walking Street. We walked into Diamond Agogo which is across Windmill Agogo just past the Diamond complex of clubs in the alley. Diamond Agogo was crowded so the two of us had to sit by the dance stage but at least I had a closer view from there of the topless dancers. I had to put my ear plugs on as the music from the large speakers was overwhelming. After finishing my drink my girl and I left the club and walked to the nearby Super Girls Agogo. It was slow inside and the dancers on stage looked like the leftovers after everybody grabbed the better looking ones. It was after 1:00 am now and the girls that finished their short time were returning to the bar now. I can see the ones coming back were better looking than the ones on stage. We left Super Girls around 2:00 am and we walked to the corner of South Pattaya Road and Second Road where there's a songtaew that's waiting to fill up with passengers before they leave. At least at this time of the night it's better to use this location as the other songtaew's waiting on Second Road will try to rip you off by charging 100 bahts instead of the regular 10 baht fare. We got back to the hotel and ran into some problems. First my girl forgot her ID card at home. We had to talk to the hotel desk for about 10-15 minutes before they let her inside. I had to sign a waiver holding me responsible and the hotel not liable for anything to go wrong. After signing the waiver my girl and I went to my room and we talked for awhile before we took a shower together. This is my first co-ed shower on this trip. She even gave me a satisfying bj while in the shower. We went to the bed and she was really horny and went straight for it like she hasn't had it in a long time. I finished quickly because of my semen buildup from no action last night. We cleaned off and then sat on the bed watching a Thai program for an hour and then she all of a sudden got horny again and went for it. I had to brace down for her passionate fire. I finished quickly again but I can tell she wanted more as she was trying to get my "thing" back inside again but I pulled away since I didn't want all the contents spilling on her. We cleaned up again and this time she got dressed. I was really sleepy since it was around past 4:30 am already. I gave her 2000 bahts for her LT since we didn't discuss prices before hand. She left and then I made sure all the doors were locked (latch on front door and sliding door locked). I made an inventory of my bahts before I put it in the safe. I wrote down the amount I put into the safe in my memo book and also figured out how much I spent for the whole day. I locked the safe before going to sleep at 5:30 am. My alarm woke me up at 9:00 am and I took a shower, got dressed, and then opened my in room safe to get my bahts out for the day. When I opened my safe I noticed that the envelope that I put my bahts into was turned upside down and I know I didn't put it in that way. I immediately counted my bahts and 4000 bahts was missing. I checked my memo book and it checked out that 4000 bahts was unaccounted for. I quickly checked the sliding door to the balcony and it was still locked. I then checked my front door and the latch was still on so I know nobody entered my room during the 3 and a half hours of sleep between 5:30 am and 9:00 am. My safe was locked and my door was locked but somehow 4000 bahts was missing from my safe. I can't figure how this could possibly happened. I met my friends for breakfast at 10:00 am and discussed this event with them and they can't figure anyway it could have happened. The night hotel staff has gone home already so I can't question them. I know all they are going to say is that I made a mistake or misplaced my money or they will say that I signed a waiver last night not holding the hotel responsible for anything missing. There's no possible way to enter my room and my safe unless they have a secret entrance to my room and they have a master key for the safe. If this happens again either I will have to change rooms, change hotel, or move my valuables to the front desk safety deposit box where at least you need both my key and the hotel key to open the safety deposit box. I may have to not take a bar fine for 2 nights to make up the loss. Bar fine is 600 bahts and 1500 for short time and times that by 2 nights and it comes out to 4200 bahts. I really hate to do that since I came here to get laid and not to stay in my hotel room. I hope I can get this off my mind and have an enjoyable stay the rest of my trip.
Day 5- After experiencing my problem during the night or very early morning I met my friends in the hotel's restaurant for our daily breakfast buffet. I told them about my missing money and they couldn't figure it out either. I later went to the money changer at Top's and found out that the exchange rate dropped to 34.99 bahts versus the 35.25 yesterday. I had to replace the missing bahts so I exchanged some cash for bahts. I then went into the internet café to continue my daily log. After the internet session I went with one of my friends to Central Festival mall to eat at the Saigon Express on the 6th floor. We had Vietnamese pho beef soup and they threw in a small scoop of ice cream. My friend went to see Watchmen at the theater there. I also saw that movie a couple of weeks ago so I went down to the Ice Cream festival to have some more of that Italian ice cream. I then bought some pastries from a gourmet bakery near the food court. I then walked over to Second Road across Top's to get a foot massage for 150 bahts. It's cheaper than the 200 baht foot massage that I had yesterday. After the hour long foot massage I went back to my hotel room to eat my snack and then got ready for the evening. We met at the usual time in the hotel lobby and then we walked to the Avenue shopping center on Second Road near Soi 13. This mall is really slow now that the new Central Festival mall took away all their business. Most of the shops in the Avenue have closed and Shabu Ichi is the only major restaurant left besides McDonald's. We then decided to go across the street and eat the 180 baht buffet dinner at the Lek Hotel. I wouldn't call this buffet fancy and most of the food is bland in taste. There wasn't much available in the dessert department. This buffet is in an open air location so it's very warm at the dining tables and you got to chase away the flies while you eat. After surviving the dinner we took the songtaew on Second Road and got off at Soi 3. We went to see one of my friend's girl that he bar fined the previous night. He wanted to pick her up early tonight. We had a drink at Intira Beer Bar and we all had the company of one girl beside each of us. My other friend also selected a girl from this beer bar and she was only 18 years old with natural nom yai and still fresh in the bar scene. I didn't like the girl that was sitting next to me so the 5 of us hopped on the songtaew going down Soi 2. The one friend with the nom yai girl got off and went back to the hotel to have short time with her. My other friend and his girl and I continued on to Walking Street. We got off the 10 baht songtaew and walked to Casanovy Agogo and we watched the dancers on stage and on top of the customer's tables. I couldn't find any possibilities at this club so we then decided to check out Polo Agogo. They had the usual dancing shows and routines. They were looking for 2 volunteers to go on stage with the sexy dancers and my friend was hiding his face as he didn't want to be selected. The 2 sexy dancers on stage finally chose 2 beefy guys and they sat on the chair when the 2 dancers gyrated to the music in what looked like a lap dance. The dancers stripped completely and then they started undressing the 2 guys. Eventually they were down to their underwear and at the end of the song the dancers quickly pulled down the guy's underwear and they were momentarily exposed to everybody. Now I see why the regular bar patrons turn down the offer to go on stage so the dancers can end up only picking the uninitiated. It was midnight already and my friend took his girl and went back to his hotel room while I stayed in the Walking Street area to hunt for my companion for the night. I went inside Heaven Above first. It's busy inside and I had to squeeze into a small cushioned seat near the stage. I'm watching the dancers and searched for some possibilities but they didn't materialize as they were quickly snapped up by other punters. After about an hour or so I had enough so I walked back down the stairs and went into Naughty Girls which is located next door to Super Girls. It was slow inside Naughty Girls and there were lots of choice seats available. It didn't take long for a dancer to sit next to me but I wasn't interested in her. Then the mamasan came by and introduced me to a different dancer and she looked more acceptable than the other one. I bought the dancer, waitress, and the mamasan a drink. The mamasan quickly hinted at a bar fine and I had arranged a 1500 baht short time with the dancer but then the mamasan offered me to have the dancer for 2000 bahts long time which is 500 bahts less than the normal asking price for an agogo dancer for long time. I quickly accepted the discounted long time price as I will be able to get more than one bong with the long time deal. The waitress returned my change from the 600 baht bar fine and she wanted a tip of 100 baht and I reluctantly gave it to her. I then paid my bar tab and tipped the other waitress who served me. I waited for the dancer to get dressed and then we left the bar and headed for the waiting songtaew on Second Road and South Pattaya Road. We got off at Soi 7 and I told the girl that I wanted to go inside 7-11 to pick up some drinks and some small items. It's much cheaper to buy the drinks at a store than the prices in the minibar inside the hotel room. When we got out of the elevator and we were walking about half way to my room I noticed water all over the hallway. I sloshed my way to my room and was shocked to see that the water had entered my room ,too, covering about half of the floor in my room. I called the lobby and had a hard time explaining the water problem to them but eventually someone came up and tried to clear some of the water in my room. He wasn't able to mop it all up and then continued to remove the water from the hallway. I put the bath rug against the front door of my room to block the water from coming in again. The girl and I took turns taking a shower. We got down to business and she gave a decent bj but when it came to putting on the condom my little johnny started to fall asleep. I tried frantically to get it to wake up but it was no use so I threw in the towel for the night and we went to sleep together. My alarm set at 9:00 am woke me up and then my little johnny was standing at attention while she took a quick shower. She gave me another good bj and then when I was putting on my condom my little johnny went down again. My pride and joy failed me twice and then I just gave up, took a shower, and we all got dressed since she had to leave and I needed to get ready to eat breakfast with my friends. I hope I have better luck tomorrow as I'm on my last couple of days here.
Day 6- I met my friends at the restaurant as they were all ready eating because I was late in coming down for breakfast. I had to straighten up my room and get dressed after my long time partner left. I just made it in time to catch the last bits of food at the buffet. I'll have to remember to order bacon next time since everybody had some except me. I ate as much as I could since I won't be eating until dinner time because one of our friends will be grilling some food outside his girlfriend's beauty salon. We are to meet at 5:00 pm for dinner rain or shine and right now at 12:30 pm it's raining hard. Luckily I brought my umbrella this time. It's suppose to be the dry time of the year just before the Songkran but there seems to be daily thunderstorms and today it's lasting a lot longer than the previous days. I'm still trying to figure out my budget to see how much more money I need to exchange into bahts. As I've mentioned earlier in my previous trip report I'm short 4000 bahts so this will probably be my highest budget for a trip to LOS. I'm waiting at the internet café extending my session since the rain is coming down fast and furious at this moment and I definitely don't want to step outside even with my umbrella. My foot massage for today might be put on hold depending how long this downpour will last. After a marathon 2 hour internet session the rain slowed down enough to walk across Second Road from Top's to the same massage parlor that I had my foot massage yesterday. I went with my friend inside Lek Lek Massage and we had the one hour foot massage service. I fell asleep as usual withstanding the strong massage techniques form the strong handed masseuse. After our massage our other friend showed up and we all hopped on a songtaew to Soi 3 where we got off and walked down the soi to Welkom Inn in the steady rain. I was the only one that had the foresight to bring an umbrella along so I can stay dry. We sat down inside Welkom Inn and it didn't take long for my 2 friends to go into the short time room. My usual hard core pro wasn't around at the time and I hooked up with someone else this time and she was very proficient in English. She was skilled in the oral delights as most of them here are. I finished off with a shag. I walked back inside the bar and my friends were waiting for me. We left the bar and walked down Soi 3 to Beach Road where we caught the songtaew to Soi 7. While my friends went back to their hotel rooms I walked over to Central Festival mall to indulge on some more of the Italian ice cream festival going on until Monday. I found a booth that had a promotion of buy one scoop get one scoop free. I tried 2 different flavored scoops on a cone this time. After enjoying the refreshing frozen treat I walked down to the lower level to the bakery to buy some snacks and 2 kinds of bread that I will bring to the cookout this afternoon. I went back to my room and got ready for our 5:00 pm rendevous to our friend's girlfriend's beauty salon near Soi Bukhao. When we got there our friend was finishing up grilling the chicken and squid. He already grilled the pork ribs. The feast also included steamed potatoes, carrots, cabbage, and some other kind of sprout like vegetable that I don't know the name of. We stayed there until dusk and it got dark quickly. One of my friends and I walked back to the hotel while our other friend stayed awhile longer with his girlfriend. We met in the lobby at 9:00 pm tonight and walked down Soi 7 to stop at one of the beer bars over there where the girls pulled us into their bar. My 2 friends had a puying by their side but the girl that pulled me in went back to the edge of the bar near the road to hustle for more customers. That's one of the reasons I hate beer bars because they just grab you and act friendly to get you to have a drink at their bar and then the girl abandons you and goes back to being a "hello" girl attracting more customers to patronize their bar. It's like a bait and switch technique and you're all alone drinking by yourself. After paying our tab we walked down to Beach Road and caught the songtaew to Walking Street and my friend wanted to check out Happy Agogo again. Bad move. It didn't take long for one of the hostess to latch onto me and I couldn't get rid of her as she kept bugging me for a short time. I finally relented and paid the bar fine of 600 bahts. She wanted to go straight to the hotel but I sensed that she wanted to make a quick kill so I was able to urge her to go to one bar before going back to the hotel. We all went inside Peppermint Palace Agogo for a drink. It's busy in here and you wouldn't have noticed that we were in a global recession. When we got our tab one of my friend noticed that the bill was wrong on his tab as his cheap draft beer was suppose to be only 55 bahts but he was charged the regular price of 110 bahts for a beer. He complained to the manager and it didn't take long for the bill to be corrected. When I took a look at my bill it was hard to believe that my coke cola light (diet) was more expensive than a bottle of San Miguel light which was 140 bahts for the diet drink versus 110 bahts for the beer. I paid my bar tab and I left with my girl and we walked to Second Road and flagged down a songtaew to go back to our hotel. When we got to my room the girl was quick to take her shower and she wanted me to take a quick shower, too. Now I know why because she just wanted to get the deed over as quickly as possible but my libido wasn't cooperating. After a short period of time she said that I did it long enough and because of that I lost my mood and just shrugged my shoulders and said to myself what the hell. She cleaned up first and then while I was cleaning up she got dressed. I then gave her some gifts that I wanted to get rid of and then gave her fee and also a tip. After she left I went downstairs and walked outside of the hotel to the nearest convenience store to replace the bottle of water she drank. I took a quick stroll along Soi 7 but I was getting tired as it was after 2:00 am already so I went back up to my room to get some much needed sleep.
Day 7- I woke up this morning to my 9:00 am alarm clock. I took a shower and then got dressed for breakfast at 10:15 am. I did my budget check to see if I will need to exchange more cash to bahts for my final 2 days in Thailand. It's a little tight now as long as I stick to my normal spending habits but if I start to buy some expensive souvenirs or take an extra service like a full service soapy then I may come up short and have to exchange some more money but I'll just play it by ear for now. We met in the restaurant and I finally ordered bacon for my first time since I finally figured out that the trays in the buffet line only had ham slices and sausages for breakfast meats. There wasn't any pancakes or french toast this morning unless it ran out. We were one of the last customers for breakfast so maybe when they run out of entrees they might not make anymore to the ending time of the buffet at 11:00 am. After breakfast we went over to Top's for an hour long internet session. After the internet we met at the hotel lobby at 1:00 pm. After meeting in the lobby we then walked over to Central Festival mall to sample the ice cream festival. We found a booth that was offering buy one scoop get one scoop free for 40 bahts. The name of the ice cream booth was called milky ice which I was a little hesitant to try but I ordered the banana strawberry & run with raisins for my 2 scoops. The ice cream was really rich just like the Italian style ice cream is suppose to be. We then walked over to Lek Lek massage but the girl my friend was looking for was off for the day so he opted to go to Silom massage instead on Soi 3. We caught the songtaew to Soi 3 and stopped at Big C shopping center first to take a quick look around. We then walked to Silom and all 3 of us went into the same room for our hour long Thai massage. It was nice to relax the body and release all the tension building up in our muscles. We then walked back up to Second Road and went across to Sabai Room. We looked at the fish bowl with the girls on display. They were dressed to kill with make up that made them look like A list models. We decided to check out Sabai Dee across the street to make a comparison before choosing our afternoon scrubbing and happy ending. One of my friend took a girl from Sabai Dee which had more girls but not as dressed up as at Sabai Room. My other friend and I walked back to Sabai Room and made our selections. My friend had a really pretty girl with a perfect face. Just as I was about to pick mine another girl just walked inside the fish bowl. I immediately made her my selection as she had nice looking nom yai. We paid our 1700 bahts for full service and we went into our own private rooms. The girl that I selected had the perfect body that I like with nom yai and slender curvy body. She had a butterfly tattoo on her lower belly. She was sweet and very accommodating. She gave me a thorough bath with me coming out squeakily clean and shiny. I watched her rinse herself off and it was driving me over the edge. She had me lie down on the air mattress covered with soapy water and she did her slippery slide motions on me. That part of the massage was the best as her body rubbed every part of mine. She rinsed me off in the bathtub and then dried me off with a towel. I laid down on the bed while she washed some of the soap suds away from the floor. She finally came over and started to begin the process of getting me ready for the happy ending. She put a condom on my stiff rod and she proceeded to give me a bj. She then got on top of me and slid in. We did it in that position until she got a little tired and then I got on top. We reversed direction a couple of times. I finally was able to finish up just in time for the 90 minute massage period to end. We washed up and then got dressed. I slipped her a small tip and we thanked each other. I left the massage parlor clean and refreshed. I might go over budget for the day if I get a bar fine tonight but then again it's my last night in Pattaya and I want to make the most of it. I'll suggest to my friends that I would like to have a meal at a nice restaurant tonight as it's tradition that the person on his last day gets to choose the restaurant for the night. I walked back from Sabai Room along Beach Road all the way to Central Festival mall since I wanted to quickly pick up some items before heading back to my hotel room. I picked up some pastries at my favorite bakery in the basement level. I then bought another 5 boxes of Thailand chocolate for 500 bahts to bring back home. By the time I got back to my hotel room it was almost 7:00 pm. I quickly got dressed not needing a shower since I was thoroughly cleaned at Sabai Room. We met down in the lobby at 7:30 pm and walked around Soi 7 at first then we headed for Central Festival mall to have our dinner. We looked at all the restaurants on the 5th and 6th floors before deciding on Fuji's Restaurant on the 5th floor. It would have been my choice to eat there anyway since we haven't tried that restaurant so far on this trip. I ordered my regular beef yakiniku set priced at 150 bahts while one of my friends ordered the pork yakiniku and the other one ordered the Fuji sushi set priced at a reasonable 190 bahts. We enjoyed our dinner while discussing our battle plans for the evening. After dinner we walked back to Soi 8 where we strolled by the beer bars getting cat calls from the yings wanting us to drink at their bar. When we got to the end of the soi at Beach Road we boarded a waiting songtaew to Walking Street. We walked down this famous Pattaya street closed to vehicle traffic to Beach Club Agogo. I put on my ear plugs due to the blasting of the music to unbearable volume levels. We left that club with ringing ears and walked to Star Agogo. It was rather slow inside but the girls are topless and sometimes bottomless the entire time on stage and off. There's a lot of flesh to see but not in the 10 category. We then walked over to Polo Agogo to watch their shows. When we first got there it was nearly empty but it filled up quickly after 11:30 pm. I've seen most of the show routines but then there were a few new ones that was worth watching. The fire eating show was really boring. I went through my wad of 20 baht bills as the dancers came around looking for tips while giving you a peek at their love hole. I think the dancers make more on tips than on wages. We left Polo Agogo with one of our friends leaving to pick up his girlfriend at the beauty salon. My other friend and I went into Super Girls next. Since it's after midnight I noticed that the same left over dancers were in the club. We never got there before midnight so there's no telling what the girls that got bar fined earlier looked like. I gave away the rest of my candy to the waitresses there scanning the stage for any dancer worth taking out. It was after 12:30 am already so we headed back to Soi 8. We walked down Soi 8 eyeing out all the yings looking for any that might be of bar fine quality. My friend stopped in one of the beer bar and I told him that I'll check out Silver Star Agogo to see if my waitress that I had earlier on my trip is available. I went inside Silver Star and had to sit on the opposite side of the bar because there were no seats open on the side the waitress that I wanted to see was working at. I ordered a drink and then chatted up with a couple of waitresses that I saw the last time. The waitress I came to see stopped by only for a quick chat as she had customers to take care of on the other side of the bar. When my favorite waitress came back around she wanted to see me drink a shot of tequila so I ordered for myself and her plus the other 2 waitresses at my table. We all toasted and then downed the shot glass at the same time sucking on the lime to kill the after taste of the tequila. I ordered another tequila for my waitress before he customers finally left. It was now after 2:15 am so I paid my bar tab and her bar fine which came out to a whopping 1300 bahts. Prices have slowly risen earlier this year but what haven't? I walked out with my waitress back to my hotel after stopping at a mini mart to buy some beer for the night cap. When we got to the hotel we talked a few minutes before she started undressing and waited for me to get undressed, too, so we can take a shower together. She was passionate and she gave me a bj in the shower again. After drying off she was beyond horny. She didn't waste any time getting down to business. After the deed we cleaned off and I wanted to get some sleep because it was past 3:30 am already and I set my alarm to wake up at 8:00 am to leave me enough time to pack up, eat breakfast, and check on e-mails before checking out at noon for my taxi ride to Bangkok. Just as I was about to fall asleep she got horny again and did the driving getting my member down below to wake up. She was like the Energizer bunny and kept on going and going. We finally changed position and I took charge with her moaning rather loudly so I think the guests in the adjacent rooms heard sounds. I finally pooped out and I cleaned up afterwards and got a couple of hours sleep before she got up at 6:30 am and said she had to get going to meet her sister. I searched around for things that I wanted to give her to lighten my load for my trip back home. I was able to fill up one of those small paper bags with handles for her to take. I gave her the same tip as last time. I went back to sleep for another hour before the alarm woke me up. I took a refreshing shower and then headed out to the internet café but instead of going to the one at Top's I went to the one in the All Day Café by Sunshine Hotel on Soi 8. I think the computers there are more secure than the ones at Tops. At Top's I keep getting messages on the computer screen that the firewall is off, the computer is unprotected, malware is turned off, and etc. I was worried about going into sensitive websites on those computers as they may be compromised. The All Day Café charges one baht a minute but if you go during the off hours of 11:00 pm to 8:00 am then the rate is 30 bahts per hour. At Top's the rate is 30 bahts per hour all the time. After about 2 hours in the internet café I walked back to the hotel to join my friends for breakfast in the hotel. We ate our breakfast buffet while exchanging our stories of the night before. We even discussed plans for our next trip in October. After breakfast I went back up to my room to finish packing up before I check out of the hotel. While I was checking out my in room safe I noticed that there was three 500 baht bills missing from my safe this time. Now this is getting ridiculous as someone has access to a locked in room safe. This is not good as there's a thief in the hotel and you don't know how safe your valuables are with the in room safe. So far it's only affecting my safe and no one else. I didn't check my dollars yet but only my bahts this time. The last time I counted my cash was at 7:00 pm last night. I didn't check my safe again until check out time. I came downstairs at 12:00 noon to check out and pay for my mini bar tab. I had already pre paid my hotel room bill earlier in the trip. My friends waited in the lobby with me for my taxi to arrive to take me to Bangkok.
Day 8- Today's my final night in Thailand and I'll spend it in Bangkok. The taxi arrive on time at 12:00 noon. I parted with my friends feeling a little envy as they still had a week more to party in Thailand. The taxi ride took longer than normal due to the heavy rains that started around 11:30 am. Beach Road was flooded out during the pouring rain but it was still driveable along the left side. The taxi driver then went up Soi 8 and then turned onto Second Road before proceeding to the highway going to Bangkok. The driver collected the tolls from me even though the person at the taxi booth that I reserved the taxi for 1000 bahts on Soi 7 said the toll was included. Everything was written in Thai so I couldn't prove my case that the toll charges was included. I prepaid the 300 bahts deposit and then I was only to pay 700 bahts to the driver. Instead I had to pay the 60 baht toll fees plus I gave the driver 100 baht tip for a total of 1160 bahts for the ride to Bangkok. I arrived at Nana Hotel around 2:50 pm which came out to about a 2 hour and 50 minute trip by taxi. I checked in and tipped the bell boy 100 bahts for carrying my bag to my room. I then unpacked what I needed for the night and then I counted my money to make sure I had enough bahts for the night. I already knew that I was short 1500 bahts this morning but I got an even bigger shock when I finally checked the envelope with my dollars. I was in disbelief when I found out that I am short five $100 bills (US dollars). I'm so pissed off now that I found out how much I got ripped off this time. My dollar bills envelope was untouched the last time when my 4000 bahts went missing but this time in addition to the 1500 baht loss I also got ripped off $500 US dollars. That's a grand total of the equivalent of 23000 bahts stolen or $657.14 in US dollars when using the 35:1 exchange rate. I'm still furious at this moment at the internet café where I'm at now located in Times Square on Sukhumvit Rd. I vow never to stay at Eastiny 7 again as I may get ripped off a lot more the next time if the thief is still there. I think this theft happened in the wee hours even with the doors locked and the safe locked. I still can't figure how the thief entered the hotel room and how the thief got into the safe. Now I need to exchange for more bahts because of the theft and I'm down to only small bills since I don't have anymore $100 bills left since it was stolen. They must have know this was my last night and decided to go for the home run. They didn't touch my traveler's checks but then again they got enough cash from me to make it worthwhile. I left the internet café and exchanged my small dollar bills for the bahts I will need for the night. I picked up a couple of DVDs from the street stalls on Sukhumvit Road. I went back to my room not making it to MBK because I lost my interest in going anywhere after I found out about my big loss. After factoring the $500 loss and 5500 bahts loss I calculated that I spent $1500 plus the loss of $657 which comes to a grand total of $2157 expense while in Thailand. This is a record amount that I exchanged on any trip there so far. If this happens again in Thailand I may never want to go back there again. I got ready for the night out even though I really don't feel up to it. I had my free welcome drink in the Nana Hotel bar at 7:00 pm. After drinking my mai tai I walked over to Foodland on Soi 5 for dinner. After my meal I just walked to NEP for some bar hopping and to see if I can pick up a ying if the price is right since I'm running low on funds due to being ripped off. I decided to give the new bar Spanky on the second level a try. It was slow inside with only a few dancers on stage so it was a sign of how bad the economy is affecting the tourist industry. The bars here in Nana Plaza are really slow compared to last year. It seems that all the business has moved to Pattaya as the popular bars there are packed especially the ones with the raunchy shows. There's no exposing of private parts (even the boobs) at Nana Plaza so that could be a reason it's losing it's popularity to Pattaya. After being bored in there for 45 minutes I walked in Fantasia where the Katoey (lady boy) mamasan greeted me. There was only one customer inside and he already bar fined a dancer and he was getting ready to leave the bar. The mamasan sat next to me helping me choose between the dozen or so dancers inside the club. She (or he) showed me a young 18 year old dancer that was OK but not a stunner. I bought the dancer and mamasan a drink. After some persuasion I finally paid the bar for the 18 year old dancer. I had to tip the waitress and the mamasan 100 baht each since the business was slow. I left to go to my hotel room but the girl suggested that we can just go upstairs to the short time hotel. I finally agreed and paid the 300 baht charge for 1 hour rental and had to buy a condom for 20 bahts since all my condoms are in my hotel room. We go inside the room and then she had to go back quickly downstairs to pick up her cell phone and then she came back in a few minutes. After a shower we got down to business and then I guess the beer that I was drinking was affecting me so I didn't have my happy ending. We got dressed and she went back to her bar while I went back to my hotel room for a few minutes to pick up something and then I headed back to Nana Plaza for one more drink. I walked around looking in a few bars and most of them were slow but it was busy in the central beer bar area. I finally walked into Rainbow 1 and it was very slow there so I went to Rainbow 2 which is also on the first floor. Inside Rainbow 2 was much busier than any of the other bars. The stage was full and so was the bar. I guess this is the bar to go to tonight. I really didn't bother with any dancers and just enjoyed my Singha Light beer and the eye candy on stage. I just have barely enough bahts for pay for my hotel room in the morning and for the taxi ride to the airport. Good thing there's no departure tax now as it's already factored into the price of the airplane ticket. I went back to my hotel at midnight and didn't get to sleep until 1:00 am. I had arranged for a 5:00 am wake up call. After the wake up call woke me up. I showered and started packing up my miscellaneous items in my suitcase. I went down to the breakfast buffet in the coffee shop at 6:00 am. I was the first one there and quickly filled my plate up with the breakfast selections. I had to eat quickly as there's only 2 hours left before my flight and I don't want to miss my flight home. After wolfing down the food I immediately went up to my room to grab my suitcase and then headed back down to the lobby to check out. I then hurried to the hotel's taxi stand to arrange for my ride to the airport. I know it's cheaper outside on the street but I was in a big hurry to make it to the airport on time. I left the hotel at 6:30. The ride to the airport took about 30 minutes and I arrived at the airport departure level at 7:00 am. I paid the driver 800 bahts which includes the 680 bahts fare plus tip. I went to the check in counter and I was the next person in line. The check in agent offered me a different aisle seat near the middle of the plane. I rushed to the VIP lounge to grab some quick snacks before I headed to the security check. I arrived at the gate and most of the people have already boarded the plane. After boarding the plane and taking my seat I found out that I have the whole 4 seater to myself but as usual another passenger came by after the plane's door closed and sat on the other seat of my row. At least I still have an empty seat next to me in economy class. The flight left almost on time. When the meal came I got a little nauseated from the spicyness of the economy class food. When we landed in Taipei I hurried to catch the train to the other terminal. After security I walked toward the gate but stopped along the way to visit the Dynasty lounge. I had about 20 minutes to have a bowl of beef noodle soup and a Taiwan beer. I did a quick check of my e-mail in the internet section of the lounge before I headed to the gate for my flight. When I got to the gate everybody boarded already but since I upgraded the flight from Taipei to home I shouldn't have to worry about overhead bin space. The business class section was about half full. I sat in the aisle seat of the middle 3 seater of the plane. There was a passenger sitting on the other end of my row in the aisle seat. The middle seat was open so I had a lot of elbow room. The leg room is ample but not quite as much space between seats as on the airbus planes. The Being 747 that I on now also has smaller individual screens than the ones on the airbus and also the movies run on a cycle on the 747 while the movies start from the beginning on the airbus. I had pork tenderloin for lunch on the flight to Tokyo. I savored every bite of the business class meal. Now I know why I hate economy class meals especially when they are too spicy. The meal I had in business class was delicious and I ate all my food. We landed in Tokyo and then I picked up my transfer card and then went to security. I ran into a problem at security as they wanted to see my ticket and I showed them my transfer card and my boarding pass stub but that wasn't enough. The agent took my passport and my boarding pass stub to her supervisor and then after a couple of minutes I was allowed to proceed through security. I'm not sure what was wrong. After going through security I looked for the Dynasty lounge and walked around in circles looking for it and after several attempts I finally saw the cutout of the CAL flight attendants in the hallway. I went inside the lounge and it was pretty good size and very much void of customers except several of them that would be on the same flight with me. There isn't too much to choose from but there's more snacks than the one at my home airport. I was disappointed that there's no beer at the lounge but had an assortment of hard liquor. I went to the internet section of the lounge and struggled with the keyboard as there's a big difference from the standard keyboard that I'm used to using. I kept having problems typing since the hiragana and kanji kept on going on my screen and some of the keys are different than a regular key board. I was finally able to write a short e-mail but then it was time to head for the gate. I walked over to the boarding area and I just entered through the transit line instead of the dynasty class line. I was really surprised to find out that the lower business class cabin was pretty much barren. There were only 4 passengers in the business class section and that's counting me, too. I saw a bunch of Japanese tourists go upstairs to the upper level but I think that they will only have economy class service up there as the regular economy class cabin is full. I could have sat in almost any seat in the cabin but I just stayed where I was at since nobody was near by my row. The dinner was excellent as I had beef tenderloins which was really indulging. The only meal that I didn't like was the breakfast because I took the quiche instead of congee. I still have to acquire a taste of the finer foods but quiche is a little too much for me to handle. We arrive to our destination ahead of schedule due to the strong tailwind we had on this flight. After landing I got out cleared immigration and then went to the baggage claim carousel minutes before the baggage starting coming out. Just as it should be the dynasty class luggage come out first and I grabbed my bags and went to the customs agent and he asked me a couple of questions and then told me to walk the green line out. When I got home I unpacked quickly, did my laundry, and then fell asleep for 4 hours. It would have been a really nice trip if it weren't for the theft incidents with my in room safe in Pattaya. I'd better stick to the old fashioned safety deposit box in the hotel lobby the next time I visit Thailand.