A New Year’s trip to the City of Love took a scary turn for one Thai man whose harrowing night on the town turned into a police adventure.
He described being scammed and mugged in the red light district before turning the tables and joining a raid on the joint in a made-for-Pantip drama he recounted Tuesday night to the tune of nearly 1 million likes on the popular web board.
“I almost died in Paris,” wrote Pantipper Skeleton18PE, who had been traveling there solo during the holidays.
Though there was no immediate way to corroborate the details of his story, the man said it was Jan. 3 when he traveled to the Blanche Metro Station and began surveying the La Machine du Moulin Rouge club. That’s when an employee from another club called La Diva approached him and said that he could see a show there for 10 euros – discounted from 20 – while drinking a free Coke.
“I was naive. I thought it was a cabaret show,” he said.
Once inside, he asked for the Coke, but servers told him other drinks were also free, so he ordered champagne. To his professed shock, the waitress who brought his drink suddenly exposed her breasts.
“I was flabbergasted; I never go to places like this! She started rubbing all over me. I swear, I wasn’t okay with it, and in less than two minutes I tried to leave,” he wrote.
The woman then gave him a whopping bill for 750 euros (over 27,500 baht). After that, he said a “two-meter tall, very thick white farang guard” told him he couldn’t leave without paying up.
The guard then pushed down the 172-centimeter man and roughly searched him, taking his bag containing his money and phone.
“He choked me. With extreme fear and adrenaline, I pushed him away and ran out of the place,” he wrote.
But Skeleton18PE wasn’t taking it lying down. He had escaped without his backpack.
The next day, after filing several reports to police, he accompanied armed officers from the 122 Rue Marcadet station on a morning raid of the club. He explained to officers that he could use a function to emit a siren from his phone, which worked. He found his bag by the door with everything intact, save for 20 euros missing.
He shared on Pantip a photo of La Diva’s exterior, a pinned map location and a photo of his police complaint.
Online reviews for La Diva club suggest the alleged incident wasn’t a one-time thing. Many one-star reviews include similar stories of tourists being mugged and ripped off.
Google guide reviewer Shreyansh Piit wrote that he and his friend had to pay 700 euros (25,720 baht) for one beer, with a bouncer threatening him and accompanying him to the ATM.
“I had to sleep empty stomach [sic] for 2 days as they took all my money,” Piit wrote.
