The doom and gloom scenario in Pattaya amid the near-total collapse of international tourism in the wake of coronavirus is everywhere to be seen. The “for rent” and “for sale” notices on business premises, the piled up post and unpaid bills littering the floor, the food queues – well, it’s all been exhaustively reported. But as Bing Crosby reminded us in the famous song, you have to accentuate the positive, eliminate the negative and don’t mess with the mister in-between. It’s not all bad news.
Some Pattaya businesses are showing real initiative in coping with shrunken customer numbers. Nightclubs in still popular districts such as L K Metro alley and Soi Buakhao, which once sported prices of 200 baht for a beer, are now offering bottles for as little as 60 baht and even 49 baht if you don’t expect too much exciting entertainment.
One go-go bar has diversified to offer free “delicious” pizzas in addition to pole dancers, whilst a gay bar in the Jomtien Complex hosts a bingo game once a week. However, no Pattaya nitery spot has yet imitated a Phnom Penh watering hole which is currently trying to recruit customers by promising not to water their drinks in future. That’s a step too far.
Other businesses are inventive in various ways. Some restaurants report that they have boosted their take-out orders by 50 percent, largely by identifying with food delivery services such as Grab and I’m Hungry Now. It may be that Covid has changed eating habits indefinitely, although restaurants which offer 30 percent discounts for in-dining are still doing well.
Several Pattaya-based expat food depots are now offering to deliver nation-wide, using air freight if necessary. Meanwhile parcel delivery services such as Kerry are booming like never before as the attractions of online shopping across the board take hold.
For the future, there is plenty of international confidence in Pattaya. The Chinese, as you might expect, are major property buyers locally and a Thai consortium, Asset World Corporation, has just bought a 14-storey Jomtien resort for almost 2 billion baht.
The Eastern Economic Corridor, the area’s hi-tech industry and export center, offers tax incentives to local and international investors and has given discounts of around 80 billion baht in the last couple of years. When you talk investment, you’re talking gigantic sums.
An irritating feature of Pattaya at present is the large number of road repairs, drainage schemes and cable laying going on all over town. For example, the major road works at Pattaya South Road and at Jomtien Beach Road are many months behind the original scheduled dates. But the opportunity to reshape many of Pattaya’s main thoroughfares, whilst traffic is light and tour buses practically an extinct species, was always tempting to civil authorities.
Looked at positively, these projects are an investment for the future. Meanwhile, building initiatives are continuing apace on the condominium front, whilst a large area of empty land on Third Road is currently being replaced by new colourful structures which, we are told, will be a 21st century retail and entertainment complex aimed at Thais and Asian visitors. Fish and chip cafes are unlikely.
The Pattaya slowly emerging will not please everyone. Some European expats on social media clearly want Pattaya to remain as it used to be: a playground aimed almost exclusively at themselves. Terms such as “neo-Pattaya” or “satellite city” fill backwoodsmen with dread, whilst acronyms such as EEC (Eastern Economic Corridor) or TBOI (Thailand Board of Investment) are not a favourite topic of conversation over an evening beer in the pub. On the other hand, ongoing change has been familiar to Pattaya over the past half century. It won’t stop and, if you don’t know where you are going, a map won’t help.
