Phuket Gangs Shoot It Out In Patong

[cdnvic]

just another nail in yhe tourist coffin

It didn't make any foreign news.

[JetsetBkk]

Yes what I did was to agree to the price raise.. Get to the destination, get out and give him the previous money..

He of course flipped, pulled a stick tried to get threatening, etc.. But I got home at the agreed price..

Not a solution without risk.. But I would rather the risk than look in the mirror after getting screwed..

That sounds a pretty good solution! A slight adjustment to it, might be to get him to drive you further up the hill, not to your actual house, let him rant a bit after you give him the correct fare, and let him drive off so he thinks you live where he stopped. Then you walk back down to your house when he's out of sight.

[xylophone]

Even more worrying should be the recent shooting and stabbings in the very heart of Patong's nightlife, neither of which have been reported by the Phuket Gazette or any other newspaper for that matter, almost certainly due to a clampdown by the MIB.

A Thai man shot the security guard at a go go bar, then followed him into the bar firing off another couple of shots, hitting one of the girls. He went outside and waited for the police to come, and when they did they just took him away. No handcuffs, nothing, leading to speculation that he was known to them/was formerlly one of them.

Just a few nights later and no more than 50 metres away a security guard was stabbed 18 times (and one report stated he had been shot in the head), however he died and the police closed down the bars and venues early.

Nothing has beeen reported in the newspapers, and this is not surprising as the venues involved were ordered not to say a word by you know who.

It was supposedly all to do with a turf war between the touts, who provide revenue to the people who are supposed to look after our welfare. Once things get as corrupt as they are now, there is no going back, and despite the posts suggesting that you "stay out of it/stay away from it/look the other way/ignore it, it won't be long before one of these incidents involves some poor unsuspecting holidaymaker.

Sadly, not the place it was.