We’re all familiar with the whole Ladies Who Lunch concept.

Rich, housewives who go out for fancy meals with fellow rich housewives while their husbands are out making more money for them to spend.

But in Bangkok, there’s a whole other culture of these ladies.

Ladies who do…nothing.

Just pick one: Siam Paragon, CentralWorld, Central Chidlom, The Emporium. They are all there. Not during weekends. Not in the evenings. But during weekday afternoon while us commoners are confined in our cubicles, crunching numbers/penning copies.

Who the hell are these bitches?

And they’re not like 40-50 years old. They are my age. Twenty-something Thai females, all dressed up, carrying the best in designer goods and just walk around. In packs.

Loaded husbands? I doubt it. And even if they have loaded parents, what kind of parents would just let them out spending their money? My loaded friends are working with their parents at least.

And every girl my age I know all have a day full-time job. And ones that don’t, they stay home and slave over their computers. They’re not out and about shopping, drinking Ventis in Paragon all day long.

And then there’s another type of ladies–ladies to sell. They don’t own a store. They are not working in a company that imports these stuff. But they’re online, constantly updating their forum posts, selling not common items like makeup or clothes but Chanel, Louis Vuitton, Gucci, YSL bags.

Siam Brand Name

These bags are not selling for a few thousands of baht. And they don’t only sell only one or two at a time. These girls have a whole series of forum posts where they put up at least 5-6 items a post. All brand new items.

Seriously, WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE?

And most importantly, HOW CAN I BE ONE?

Today Club Culture turns into a makeshift flea market.

Well it’s not really a flea market as most of the stalls here are from local brands like SuperrZaaap and the Diet Pills. If you’re into Soma and Dudesweet style and love indie rock and electropop music, then this is your heaven.

What is the most interesting is how different Club Culture looks.

If you missed this one then don’t fret. It looks to be quite a popular event so there will be one again soon.

You gotta love the level of service in Thailand. I know I do. They just keep making my life so colorful and help me release my bottled emotions. This edition of Thai Service rant is starring two female staff of Siam Paragon, 3rd floor gift section.

Earlier in the evening I had my eyes on a computer bag at a craft shop in Siam Square where you can decorate it with their iron-on felt characters. Unfortunately the shop didn’t have the color of the bag I wanted, so they suggested that I checked at Paragon, one of their department store booths.

So I did and there it was my beautiful cloth laptop bag in brownish cream with touches of grayish blue. I picked out a cute retro cat design, a few flowers and a letter K just to spice up its boring housewife look and headed to the shop girl.

I gave her my Paragon Prestige Platinum card, which should automatically give me 10% discount.

She: “We don’t accept that card anymore. We have a new policy now. You can get discount only if your purchase is B1,500 or more. Please go upstairs to the members lounge to change it.”

We recently received a letter from Paragon regarding this matter. I was aware of it. But the letter also said we did not need to replace the card.

Foolishly, I followed her instruction, dragging myself, my 2kg MacBook and my oversized handbag to the 4th floor.

With my suspposedly defunct card in hand, I fetched me staff who said,

“You don’t need to replace the card. It can be used with the new policy”

“But the shop girl downstairs wouldn’t accept it for discounts. She said I had to change it.”

“You can go down there and tell her the office said so. If she still refuses, tell her to call us.”

An effective display of authority right there. I was impressed. Well not for long.

I dragged myself down to the corner of my dream laptop bag again, headed to the girl and told her I didn’t need to change it. I showed her the card, and she gave me this response,

“Oh sorry. The old and the new cards are similar. This one doesn’t have gold stars.”

“ขอโทษค่ะดูผิด บัตรใหม่กะเก่าหน้าตาเหมือนกัน เออใช่อันนี้ไม่มีดาวสีทองๆ”

OK, I wasn’t so heated just yet. I waited at the shop while she went off with my debit Visa and my Prestige card. She came back a few minutes later, handed me the slip to sign and that’s when hell broke lose.

The price on the slip says B1,672.

Not only that they forgot to give me to 10% discount (as my total was over B1,500), the price for my stuff BEFORE the supposed 10% discount was B1,625. Tax is included in retail and they don’t charge service. How the hell did it even increase??

I confronted her. She gave me a blank look. I told her this was impossible and sent her back to the cashier to get it fixed.

Five minutes passed and there was no sign of her. So I went to the cashier myself and found her bickering with the cashier girl.

“Why is this total wrong? Can you cancel it?” I asked the cashier. No answer from the girl. She didn’t even look at me.

“Can you please get someone to check this? A manager?” Still no look or response from the girl. So..

“Get me the damn manager, could you please your highness?”

“ไม่ทราบว่าท่านจะกรุณาไปตามผู้จัดการมันมาหน่อยได้มั๊ยเพคะ?”

Yes I shouted that to her face.

After over 30 minutes of clueless discussion between the cashier and the shop girl, none of whom ever informed me of what was going on, when I asked I simply got a Please-Wait-A-Moment from these wonderfully nonchalant staff.

“We can cancel the purchase but we cannot cancel the payment from your card. We can’t reimburse you either. Please contact your bank. Here’s the number.”

“คือเราแคนเซิลให้แล้ว แต่วอยออกไม่ได้น่ะค่ะ ทางเราก็คงคืนเงินสดให้ไม่ได้เหมือนกัน คุณต้องติดต่อแบงค์เองอ่ะค่ะ ทำให้ไม่ได้”

“I’m sorry let me get this straight. I have wasted my time, and energy, for 30 minutes just to have you say that I have to fix YOUR problem myself? Get. Me. The. Damn. Manager.”

The manager came, picked up the phone and made a few calls.

“Your money will be put back in your account by tomorrow.” I asked for their names, the name of the person they talked to on the phone, and for my receipts and cancellation proof. But then I still had to ask, why on earth wouldn’t the cashier, or heck, the machine even realize that the card gives 10% discount? Why are the staff clueless about this change? How can you people work without communicating?

The manager went and fetched the cashier girl, who was asked to bring along the registry log. The manager took one look at the log and asked her, “You didn’t swipe the card twice and press that button did you?”

Looking totally emotionless at her boss and said, “Oh is that how you do it?”

“อ๋อ ต้องทำอย่างนี้ด้วยเหลอ ไม่รู้นิ”

I had the urge to take my G10 out and take a picture of her. Heck I wish I could video the whole thing.

And funniest thing, this whole time they still expected me to buy their stuff. The shop girl put everything in the bag and was just waiting for me to pay for it. Again.

“I really don’t think I want to give my money for that anymore.”

*Planning on translating this. It would be more effective in Thai. If all else fails, there’s still Google Translator.

I recently had to cover this market for one of my freelance pieces. I heard of its reputation for quite a while already, about it being the new shopping spot in Bangkok and I was told by many of my friends, for a person who’s into vintage and old school stuff like me, I would really need to go there.

So I dragged my mom onto the MRT at 8pm one fine Saturday and headed to Ratchadapisek Station. The market is actually this vast dirt space between two stations so you can get off at Ladprao if that’s more convenient. A little walk on an infamously hazardous Bangkok sidewalk and then you’re there. At what seems like a huge parking lot of motorcycles it is actually the market.

When you think of a shopping market, an image of Chatuchak or Suan Lum probably comes to mind. You know clean concrete floors with designated booths for each vendors to set up their shop. At Ratchada Night, it looks more like a ngan wat, or a temporary market set up at temple fairs, with only tents and straw mat as their only tools of the trade. The goods are laid out on the floor here, so you will need to do some serious squatting before hitting the place to strengthen your leg muscles. Some vendors who are less lazy would bring their own racks and tables and actually make their shack a little more decent that others.

The vintage things that you see here aren’t just the goods. These guys are also retro at heart judging from their rides, from classic convertibles to hippie VW vans. And some of them creatively use these vehicles as their shop, laying out tshirts and antiques right on the hood.

I was in heaven. There are also some original and new stuff, like smuggled Onitsuka and B199 bags and shoes as sold everywhere else, but the highlights have to be the retro stuff. Vintage clothes, old books, old tin toys, old cameras, old furniture, old lamps, old radios, old every fucking thing you can imagine. Some people even kept newspapers with famous events on the first page and sell them in a nicely sealed folder. Other weird old things I found were cocoa/coffee cans, Cokes, cigarettes, gums, and other old consumer goods that probably have expired decades ago. I don’t know who would want to buy this though, except maybe for those with vintage-theme stores in town to authenticate their retro cred.

And yes I got myself another camera–1978 Kodak Ektra 100. Mom said she received something similar as a kid for her birthday and it was a new groundbreaking camera at the time.

Honestly, I am quite disappointed at the camera collection here. I expected a little more branded ones and all I saw were no-name point-and-shoots and several Chinese and Japanese knock-offs of famous German or Russian models. Well for B200-500 a camera you can’t really complain.

The market is super crowded with teenagers. When I say super crowded, think concert. The best time to go there is at 8pm when all the vendors come out but unfortunately, it’s also the time when all the shoppers come out. The market is also huge, with many rows to cover. It took us almost two hours to make the round. Good thing that it is a night market otherwise we would have died of heatstroke and suffocation.

I will definitely go there again as a shopper and not a writer so I don’t have to lug around a camera and jot down everything I see. Maybe when the weather cools down. Or maybe when the old camera itch comes back again.

Edit: Market opens every Fri-Sun night but busiest on Saturday night. Thanks keatix for spotting.

There’s a week left in May and I have already spent my last month’s paycheck. On what? Besides incredibly expensive Chidlom food, my money went to the almighty Yashica TLR, a secondhand Nintendo DS for somebody’s birthday, a work jacket for when I want to add a few years to my looks and a leather case for my G10 from eBay.

I have exactly B872 left in my spendable bank account. And what did I do today after work? I bought a handbag.

Not just any handbag I must say. This particular handbag can hold my wallet, my iPhone, my planner, a card case, an umbrella, a makeup pouch, and the items I have just mentioned above, including the TLR, and still leave room for more crap.

The bag here can fit TWO 17″ Macbook Pros easily, if only the straps could handle the weight.

Besides the size, another reason that convinced me to squeeze out the cash was its price. This faux leather monstor of a bag can be yours for only B250.

I’ve been buying handbags from this streetside vendor since I was still working at BK. A colleague at BK was the one who showed me the light. Without her I wouldn’t have come to know the after-work haven called On Nut Square and without her I wouldn’t have become the proud owner of three of these bags.

Mind you, you get what you pay for here. After a few months of extensive use, one of the straps on my first gave out and prompted me to revisit the shop for a replacement but I admit I had definitely used it beyond its potential.

I found my third today. Black and beautifully nondescript, which is hard to find at this price range considering its counterparts always either comes with extensive stitching and studding or ostentatiously printed designer logos.

Frugal fashion

Pretty eh?

I wanted to be selfish about this I really did but this kind of things just needs to be shown to the world. The vendor dude is super friendly and would give you discount in a blink but seriously who would be so heartless enough to bargain down this incredible deal? His collection, which he claims to have designed them all himself, ranges from pouches and purses to these humongous carryons. Some are dubious in designs but for each ugliness there’s always a pretty one waiting for you to take it home.

The “shop”, or a mat more like it, can be found on the sidewalk under the BTS On Nut station, right in front of the underconstruction condo called Ideo Verve, next to On Nut Square. Can’t find it? Come back again the next day. He isn’t always there.