About four months ago I was stopped by a police officer in Bangkok while walking to a boat pier! First time in over 10 years of living here that something like that happened. He and his buddy were doing the usual traffic stop (pay us money!) near a U-turn under an overpass. Must have been a slow day extracting cash from motorbike drivers. This idiot cop demanded to look in my bag/briefcase, which I let him do. I patiently waited 2 or 3 minutes while the cop looked at every single item in my bag. He must have been disappointed not to find drugs so he asked to see my passport. I told him, sorry, it's at work, along with my work permit. But I did have photocopies of all the revelant pages, which seemed to satisfy him. But the whole experience was very annoying and left a bad impression with me. As soon as the cop had seen my papers I dismissed myself and kept walking. He seemed surprised that I walked away in the middle of my interrogation, but my patience had run out and I was afraid I would say or do something I would regret if I hung around and gave him time to ask me more questions or search my possessions.
As for this Pattaya bar report, it doesn't surprise me. I would guess similar "raids" will happen soon in Bangkok. The current regime is doing all it can to ruin tourism.
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