It’s the longest-running bar in Pattaya and it’s open for business 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. There are no lady drinks to be bought and neither are there barfines to be paid. Not one of the girls working there receives a single baht of salary and there are no uniforms. The girls can wear however much, or little, as they wish. Crackdowns happen from time to time and sometimes there are few girls to be found. It’s Pattaya’s Beach Road, often referred to as the Coconut Bar.

The 3 kilometre crescent of Pattaya Beach makes for a pleasant walk and it’s a walk I make every day of every visit to Pattaya. The sea breeze and the relatively fresh air make for a change from the pollution that’s so hard to escape in Bangkok. You can’t make the beach road walk without noticing the ladies you pass. Working girls. The catch calls of “Hello, handsome man”, “Where you go”, or “I do go with you” are heard dozens of times if you walk from one end of the beach to the other.

Make the walk often enough and you notice the same girls. In the same places. The Beach Road is their workplace. Many have been working the beach road for years and some look like they could have been around way back when GIs were pouring into Pattaya for R & R.