The other night Jamie Parker called me to negotiate a sale of a Soi Six bar. A Belgian fireman was unloading the establishment of bliss to an American drunk. Neither could speak the other’s language. I drove to Bar Zero and successfully concluded the business within an hour. My older brother is a lawyer. His Boston charges would cost 1000 dollars, but this is Pattaya and I was satisfied with earning 3 beers and 1000 baht.

1000 baht is the price of admission to an hour of pleasure on this salubrious street. I wandered past the more well-kept bars and ended up at the Viking. It’s more than a little rundown.

Mint works there and she was happy to have a customer who could speak Thai.

“You want to go upstairs?” I’d been waiting to ask this question for months.

“What about your wife?” Mint knew my story. So does most of pattaya. My wife lives in the north and I live here. Never twains meet, except for two days a month.

“She’s not coming back here.” It was sadly the truth. She hated Pattaya.

“Not go upstairs.” Mint whispered, not wanting the bar manager to hear.

“Why not?” I thought it was something about me. 55 years-old, slightly overweight, three beers. The answer was more simple.

“Room no good. Smell. Like someone die. I work many bar. This room bad. Very bad.’ Mint scrunched up her nose, but I wanted to se and she took me on a tour.

Two rooms. Shabby beyond belief. Even the notorious Sophie’s in Phnom Penh has a more welcoming decor. The sheets appeared to have been unraveled from corpses. The stench was sour like a million beer louts had sweated on the mattresses and the walls flaked as if they had eczema.

“You see?” Mint led me by the hand downstairs.

She was right and I had to be satisfied with drinking another beer.

Cursed by an uncleanliness far from godliness.

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