Panang, Phuket Island

We had visited Phuket Island in 2019, just before the pandemic, and we didn’t have fond memories of it. So, for once, I wasn’t overly enthusiastic about seeing much of the island again.

Just to give you an idea: we’d stayed in a small hotel not far from the beach (it had very good reviews), and when we entered the room, there were literally hundreds of small bugs in the bed. Reluctantly, they changed our room. That evening, we discovered the nearby main streets were a massive tourist attraction, full of massage parlours and sex workers. I may be a bit of an old fart, but it makes me a little sad — it’s just not my thing. I kind of look at it as a father and realise that every girl is someone’s poor daughter.

We came out of a bar and walked the streets, where the girls were sat on the the pavements one after the other. Then I saw a couch with a grandmother and daughter sat side by side, offering themselves — and there, playing next to them on the arm, was the granddaughter, maybe four or five years old, about the same age as mine. I asked myself: how long before the cruelty of fate offers her up for cash?

We’d seen enough and returned to the hotel, which wasn’t too bad — for a few hours, at least. Then all hell broke loose: fighting and arguing in the hallway outside, and someone tried our room door. We barricaded ourselves in with chairs and waited until morning, when it was safe to leave. As we walked through the corridor, it was plain to see the hotel was a brothel. As I passed the last room, the door was half open, and there, sitting on the end of the bed half-naked, was an exceptionally young girl, sobbing from whatever she had gone through. I will never forget that image.

This was not for us. We said goodbye to the other two days we’d paid for and went to the Starbucks at the bottom of the road to use the Wi-Fi and find somewhere to stay in a different town. While searching, a young English girl collapsed from heat exhaustion in the coffee queue. The staff took one leg each, placed her out on the street, and got back to work. Clearly, she wasn’t good for business.

2025 And we are back at the Island!

I had not taken so much interest in this leg of our cruise so I wasn’t sure where we were in Phuket — we’d moored out in a bay, so it was a drop-off by tender. It was actually a brilliant twenty-minute trip to one of the piers: wind in your hair, across the water on a hot day.

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We decided to explore the front esplanade and a few side streets. After about thirty minutes, I started to walk up a seedy street, with Wendy asking, “Why are we going up here? It’s a dead end.”

“It kind of looks familiar,” I replied, then pointed. “Oh my God — that’s that shit hotel we stayed in.”

Neither of us had even realised we were in the same town.

“Well, I don’t even want to look at it! I can’t believe we’re in the same place,” she said.

We explored a little of the very famous Bangla Road, which was quite dead during the day. Just a few yards in, on a pile of trash, was the emaciated body of a woman. She was only half-conscious and in a dreadful state. Nearby, in the gutter, were her worldly possessions in a single shopping bag — with a pink teddy. Even the teddy looked dirty and sad. I left her some money for her picture, if only to highlight the harshness of our world — whether it be home in the UK or here in Thailand. It seems everyone has a shelf life before they’re dispensable, or in some eyes, “trash.”

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No matter where you travel there are always interesting things to see. Little things like a street vendor selling cleaning equipment from a Tuk Tuk, a mass or electric wires tied up like spagetti from a telegraph pole or even just a row of hundreds of scooters parked up on a street. It may not all be nice but boy the world is an interesting place! 

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We did have a pleasant day, including a cold drink on the beach and a superb meal in one of the front-line restaurants. We walked barefoot along the shoreline all the way back to the pier, and by mid-afternoon, were back on the tender boat.

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On the ship, we bumped into two new friends who suggested we meet up for a few beers back in town that evening. I agreed but explained my reluctance to hang out too long in the seedier areas.

“No problem — we just want to experience Bangla Walking Street.”

“No problem. End of the pier, 7:30 p.m.”

We entered Bangla Walking Street at about 9 p.m., and nothing can prepare you for the sheer scale of bars, clubs, street food, and sound. We’d been to Khao San Road in Bangkok, and this was like that on steroids — no, that fails to describe the indescribable.

It literally goes on for miles and is a sea of humanity, bombarded with deafening sound, flashing lights, hawkers, and, of course, the smells of every imaginable street-cooked creature. Every step is met with someone thrusting a laminated sheet in your face, insisting they have the best Happy Hour, best food, best Ping Pong show, and of course, best girls for you.

I stopped to take a picture for my blog, and a laminated sheet (shit) holder chased after me, clearly showing me in big letters: “PICTURE 100 Baht.” If you don’t know what “Ping Pong” is, I can’t describe it here — Google it.

You have to accept that this place is a reflection of humanity, as it’s almost certainly one of the world’s top tourist destinations. I keep telling you I’m an old fart and don’t get it — but there you are.

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Just off Bangla Street, we happened upon a side street that was just fish street food. Instead of laminated cards to avoid, it was actual fish and giant lobsters thrust in front of you.

“Table for four — which fish you want?” they pleaded, one after the other.

It was interesting — I saw prawns the size of large bananas and lobsters as big as your arm.

We decided to move on, and after street after street of girls for sale, we found a small, quiet street market with lots of tables and chairs. We were all keen for a quiet beer but couldn’t see where to buy them. At one table sat a massive guy in shorts, tattooed from head to toe — including his face — and looking rather like a "Baddie Biker" in a movie.

“Where’s Paul going?” a concerned Joseph asked Wendy.

“Excuse me, mate,” I said, approaching the man. “I noticed you had a couple of cold beers — did you get them from one of these stalls?” I asked, looking toward the closest traders.

“No, no — right down there,” he said, then stopped mid-sentence, got up from the table, and added, “I’ll walk you up there. It’ll be easier, mate — come on, I’ll show you.”

A full 50 metres down the market: “There you go, mate. He’s got them reasonable, really cold — and look, you’re in luck, there are four empty chairs just there.”

“Cheers, appreciate that,” I replied.

“No problem — my pleasure, mate,” he said, walking away.

A valuable lesson: Never judge a book by its tattoos.