Nana Plaza
Encyclopedia
Red-light district
A red-light district is a part of an urban area where there is a concentration of prostitution and sex-oriented businesses, such as sex shops, strip clubs, adult theaters, etc...
in Bangkok
Bangkok
Bangkok is the capital and largest urban area city in Thailand. It is known in Thai as Krung Thep Maha Nakhon or simply Krung Thep , meaning "city of angels." The full name of Bangkok is Krung Thep Mahanakhon Amon Rattanakosin Mahintharayutthaya Mahadilok Phop Noppharat Ratchathani Burirom...
, which is rumoured to be the largest sex complex in the world. It is located on Sukhumvit Road
Sukhumvit Road
Sukhumvit Road , or Thailand Route 3 , is a major road in Thailand, and a major surface road of Bangkok and other cities it winds through. It follows a coastal route from Bangkok to Trat and is just over in length....
Soi
Soi
Soi is the term used in Thailand for a side-street branching off a major street . An alley is called a Trok .Sois are usually numbered, and are referred to by the name of the major street and the number, as in "Soi Sukhumvit 4", "Sukhumvit Soi 4", or "Sukhumvit 4", all referring to the fourth soi...
4 across from the Nana Hotel, within walking distance of the BTS Skytrain's "Nana Station
Nana Station
Nana station is a BTS skytrain station, on the in Watthana and Khlong Toei District, Bangkok, Thailand. The station is located on Sukhumvit Road at Sukhumvit Soi 9, to the east of Nana intersection . It is arounded by variety classes of hotels and facilities for foreign tourists...
". The name originates from the Nana family (with Lek Nana
Lek Nana
Lek Nana was a Thai businessman and politician. One of the founders of Thailand's Democrat Party at the end of World War II, he served as Deputy Foreign Minister and as Minister of Science, Technology, and Energy. A Muslim of Gujarati ancestry, he was a senior member of the Central Islamic...
the most prominent member) who owns many properties in the area and has much influence in Thailand.
Along with Soi Cowboy
Soi Cowboy
Soi Cowboy is a red-light district in Bangkok, Thailand. A short street with some 40 bars, it is similar to Nana Plaza and Patpong and caters mainly to tourists and expatriates....
and Patpong
Patpong
Patpong is an entertainment district in Bangkok, Thailand, catering mainly, though not exclusively, to foreign tourists and expatriates. While Patpong is internationally known as a red light district at the heart of Bangkok's sex industry, it is in fact only one of numerous red-light districts...
, Nana Plaza is one of the Bangkok red-light districts which serve primarily European
European ethnic groups
The ethnic groups in Europe are the various ethnic groups that reside in the nations of Europe. European ethnology is the field of anthropology focusing on Europe....
and American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
customers. However, in recent years more Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
ese men have found their way here due to the extremely high prices in the Japanese-oriented nightclubs in Bangkok.
The Plaza is in the shape of a square, with a single opening on the western side, and consists of a ground floor and two additional floors. It started out as a restaurant area in the late 1970s. During the early 1980s go-go bars began to appear and gradually replaced the restaurants. The composition of those bars has changed over the past few years; the last non-go-go bar in the enclosed area, the Woodstock Pub was sold in 2005 to the Rainbow Group and reopened as "Rainbow 4." A few bars have offered a more pub-like or beer bar format without dancing; as of late-2009 only the Cathouse remained. Three short-time hotels operate on the top floor. Short-time hotels are hotels which rent out rooms by the hour or more for the benefit of NEP patrons to go with their chosen bar-girl (or kathoey) for commercial sex.
Most bargirl
Bargirl
A bargirl is a woman who works as a hostess or dancer in bars to provide company or sexual services to patrons; the exact nature of services and varieties of bar varying by country/region. In most cases, these cater mostly to male clients, although in some cases women are also clients...
s working at bars in Nana Plaza are willing to leave with customers upon payment of a bar fine. While many bars in Nana Plaza do not employ kathoey
Kathoey
Kathoey or katoey is a male-to-female transgender person or an effeminate gay male in Thailand. Related phrases include sao praphet song , or phet thi sam . The word kathoey is thought to be of Khmer origin...
s at all, a few do so exclusively. As of early-2010 these venues are Obsession (ground floor), Casanova, Temptations (middle floor), Carnival and Cascades (top floor). The female staff at these bars are almost all pre-operative, as opposed to the kathoey bars in Patpong
Patpong
Patpong is an entertainment district in Bangkok, Thailand, catering mainly, though not exclusively, to foreign tourists and expatriates. While Patpong is internationally known as a red light district at the heart of Bangkok's sex industry, it is in fact only one of numerous red-light districts...
.
A number of post-operative kathoeys can be found at other bars in Nana, largely at the bars managed by the Crown Group, namely Lollipop, Voodoo, Hollywood Rock, Fantasia, and G-Spot as well as the independently run Erotica.
Nana Plaza is a common setting of the crime novels by John Burdett
John Burdett
John Patrick Burdett is a British crime novelist. He is the bestselling author of Bangkok 8 and its sequels, Bangkok Tattoo, Bangkok Haunts and The Godfather of Kathmandu. His next novel, Vulture Peak, is to be released in the UK in January 2012-Biography:Burdett is a former lawyer who lived and...
.