Chrome Pole Report

The plans for last night originally included a birthday party at the Cherry Bar, but I never made it. I called Rick at Margaritavilla and he (and his aide-de-camp, Robin) had just welcomed the arrival of three new students to Thailand, and they were going to be taking them out on the town for the evening. (Rick runs an English teacher training school here in Pattaya.)

So I went over to Margaritavilla and met up with Rick, Robin, and their 3 new students: A guy from California, a guy from North Carolina, and a girl from Australia.

We went out to Mike's Mexican for dinner. (Strawberry-banana margaritas — pretty good.) I had had Burger King delivery for late lunch, so just had a couple of tacos.

From there, we went to Walking Street. For the first time in my life, I got to hear (while standing in Pattaya) somebody say, "What's Walking Street?" This was from California guy... who had arrived in Thailand only 5 hours earlier.

The first place we went was TQ2, which was quiet enough to talk for a little while. We had one drink there and then went to Living Dolls Showcase where California guy went kid-in-candystore nuts and barfined the first two girls to latch onto him.

After that, Robin and the three students (and 2 bargirls) went to Lucifer disco which Rick didn't want any part of. (It is jet-engine noisy in there, so I wasn't too keen either.) So Rick and I decided to go to Angelwitch, which I still had not managed to find my way into at this late juncture.

Angelwitch certainly is a nice enough place, but it is more concept than gogo bar. Actually, that's not a bad thing. There is a big oval stage in the middle, with seats banking up arena-style for 3 or 4 concentric rings. The area above the stage is open so that the chrome poles vault up 2 stories, and a stage/scaffolding up high for girls to walk out onto from which they grasp a pole and slide down to the stage.

The concept is this: Put on a show. People will stick around and drink. That's what Angelwitch does. Instead of shows like Coyotee or (especially) Living Dolls Showcase, where the girls come out in a cute/sexy outfit, and then proceed to take off that cute/sexy outfit as quickly as possible and then grind and gyrate in a provocative (from the neck down, but bored from the neck up) fashion, in Angelwitch, there is distinct choreography, moves, movements, and synchronization among the showgirls, and the main goal of the show is not to get men horny, but to give them something sexy to look at.

It works... this concept. Some of it gets a little pretentious at times, but I would rather see showgirls (and bar owners) trying too hard to be sophisticated than not bothering to attempt any sophistication at all. It is the kind of place where I can go by myself and sip vodka tonics and watch four girls frolic under mosquito netting, do acrobatics on the tall poles, do a spastic tribal mating ritual in outfits that look like torn garbage bags, or bang coconut shells together rhythmically while they laugh hysterically, dressed in cute mini-skirted versions of Thai traditional dress.