The Truth About Thai Ping Pong Shows
We spent Ray’s 28th birthday in Bangkok as part of a 2 week Thailand trip and one of our best travel buddies happened to be with us, so we were looking for something fun and crazy to do to celebrate. We thought a ping pong show in Patpong would be just the thing to fit the bill.
So, what is a ping pong show?
Picturing two humans on either side of a table with a net in the middle, paddles in hand? Well, this post is about to be a shocker.
We theoretically knew what went down at ping pong shows. They’re a bizarre stage performance, mostly found in strip clubs in Amsterdam, Thailand, and other parts of Southeast Asia, in which women shoot ping pong balls — and perform a number of other equally shocking, confusing, and awe-inspiring feats (think balloons, signatures, ribbons) — using just their vagina muscles, all in front of a captive audience of drunken tourists.
Despite fully knowing what a ping pong show was, we still went in very naive, and the experience ended up being super different from what we expected. Although it was actually a fun and hilarious night at the time, it was also strange, uncomfortable, and a shocking view into the reality of sex tourism in Southeast Asia.
Read on for the three biggest things we wished we knew before attending a ping pong show in Patpong, one of Bangkok’s red light districts. A couple things to keep in mind:
1) This post can only capture *our* experience. We can’t speak for all ping pong shows or ping pong bars, but after conducting additional research since, it sounds like our experience is pretty par for the course.
2) We were rather intoxicated throughout this very odd night, which is probably the only reason we found it fun and not altogether depressing.
RayRay on his bday celebration night in the back of a tuk-tuk on the way to the ping pong show. No idea what was in store for him then.
1. Ping pong shows in Thailand are actually illegal under obscenity legislation.
However, as is the case in many countries, police corruption comes into play. Similar to prostitution, as long as there is tourist demand, it’s likely that law enforcement will continue to turn a blind eye to ping pong shows for the sake of profit.
2. “Show” is a term that should be taken very lightly, and the ethicality of ping pong shows is tied to that of sex tourism as a whole.
This was probably our biggest misconception going in.
I’m really not sure why, but our concept of ping pong shows was that they were actual...shows? We’re not talking high production value here, but we thought they would have a start time or a host introducing each new “trick” or something like that. Rooted in our experiences at Western strip clubs, we kind of pictured performers that were happy and having fun putting on a show for the audience, even though their specific talent is far from the norm.
The reality was nothing of the sort. Promoters aggressively recruit drunken tourists off the street. The sight we walked into was this: several sad women half-heartedly dancing on poles looking exhausted, while one woman performed tricks on stage in quick succession with no transitions between and no semblance of happiness.
Theoretically, ping pong show performers have made the conscious choice to work in their profession and are doing so at will. However, the reality behind that choice can be far from simple in Thailand. Women, often under age and in precarious financial situations, are drawn in by the opportunity to make good money for their families by capitalizing on tourist demand for the sex trade. Oftentimes, ping pong show performers are engaging in prostitution as well.
Our experience left us thinking that even if these women are employed at will, their day to day existence appears miserable. And on top of that, we question if these women are really able to make their own choices if they wanted to leave the industry behind.
3. Ping pong shows can be a huge scam if you’re not careful.
Ok, let us break down exactly how our night went down to paint the full picture.
The second we arrived in Patpong, promoters began trying to attract us into ping pong bars. We wanted to work up our liquid courage first, so we stopped at a bar with an outdoor patio for some beers and shots. We hadn’t realized that there would be such aggressive promoters, so while starting to get our buzz on, we read a blog post about how to avoid getting scammed at ping pong shows. We built up a resolve to drive a hard bargain with the promoters to avoid paying a large entry fee.
After several rounds of drinks, we finally felt ready. We wandered back to the main street and talked with the first promoter who came our way. We stuck to our guns and negotiated an entry fee of $5 per person, and based on the blog post we had read, we made it explicitly clear that we would ONLY pay the entry fee plus any drinks that we purchased.
We paid our entry fees, the promoter walked us upstairs to the bar (which wasn’t very crowded yet at that time in the night) and we each purchased one beer and sat down to watch the amazing spectacle.
BUT THEN...the performers kept coming over and setting their drinks on our table. It turns out that you can purchase “lady drinks” as a form of tipping the women. We didn’t actually agree to purchase any, but probably six were set on our table making it look like we did.
We literally watched the “show” for 10 minutes. I didn’t even finish my beer. It quickly became clear that things were getting suspicious, and we needed to get out of there, so we asked for our check.
*This is when things get interestingggggg*
Instead of just bringing a bill to our table like a normal bar, we were summoned to the back of the bar to meet with this older, madam-looking woman. She began frantically writing on a piece of paper tallying our “bill” using line items that no one (including her) could understand. She pulled out a calculator and made a big show of the whole thing. The total came to something like 6,000 baht, or the equivalent of $200 USD...for the TEN MINUTES we were there. Keep in mind we had negotiated $5 entry fees per person, and purchased one $2 beer each, so we couldn’t even fathom taking this total seriously.
Luckily, we were drunk and thought the whole situation was hilarious at the time. We refused to pay that total and the madam kept just sternly cutting down the sum on her calculator and making us “final offers.” It’s as if we were now bargaining for products and services we never purchased in the first place...just bartering for our lives to get out of the bar.
The best part...after probably 5 minutes of this “negotiating,” the madam pulls out her cell phone, shows us a contact called “Mafia Boss” IN ENGLISH and pretends to start calling this person. 😅
Our friend pulled up the bar’s address on Google Maps and countered with “Oh yeah, is this the correct address, ma’am? I’m calling someone too.”
The second best part...all of the promoters / bouncers were rather small women and they were surrounding us during this whole thing. We could have easily pushed past them and left at any moment had we wanted to.
Anyway, after the Google Maps threat, the madam cut our price down to around 1,000 baht and we agreed that about $15 each was a fair price to pay and ran the fuck out of there laughing, warning the other shocked and concerned tourists to GTFO as we were literally *pushed* out the door by the tiny women bouncers.
Again, despite reading a blog post right before we went in, we were still super naive to the fact that the business model behind ping pong bars is just to scam drunk tourists for the highest price they’ll pay. Should you make the choice to go to a ping pong show in Thailand, make sure you negotiate your entry fee, know the prices of the drinks you’re buying, tip the women directly if you want to tip and beware of the “lady drinks” scam, and keep in mind that your final bill will likely still be larger than you expect.
What a doozy of a night we’ll never forget. We were feeling festive that night and in the mood to get into some weird shit, so this whole situation was right up our alley. But in all honestly, what we witnessed in Patpong was extremely sad the second you take off your beer goggles and consider what’s actually going on.
Has anyone had a Thai ping pong show experience that was similar, or totally different? Comment here or on our latest IG post.
Happy travels!
