A Great Street Party - Thanks Everyone....

[Guest travelerjim]

Hello Friends,

 

This is an unofficial report on the happenings at last nights "Fab Feb Street Party" hosted by several fine gay businesses in the Jomtien Complex - Pattaya. I say "unofficial" as I a reporting my personal experiences and what I heard said during the night.

 

It was THE BEST party I have attended in Pattaya :-) WOW, what a great night of friendship, love and outpouring of support shown our dear friend - The Gay Pattayan :-)

 

Yes, The "Fab Feb" Street Party Benefit for The Gay Pattayan - Allen, was well attended by (my guess) - at least 250 - 300 guests....maybe more as the night gathered more excitement and the music and show time played on from 9:30pm to the early morning hour of 1:00am ....maybe longer as that is when I headed home to rest! The tables were full of party goers stretching from in front of "Over the Rainbow" Club in both directions....and more joined the party throughout the night - even as the 4 wonderful buffets full of good food served closed at 10:00pm.

 

Monty served as the MC for the evenings entertainment and show time. Indeed he was in his best of spirits and dressed in his white silk blazer - followed later by a change into a bright red silk blazer with white shirt and red silk bow tie, he was ready for the show! Monty the Showman he was last night! Great job Monty!! (The only way he could have made the night even a bigger hit - was for him to do "The Full Monty" with his Cabaret Show ... :-)

 

The ticket price was 300 baht and was good for buffet dinner and one drink. All added drinks were 100 baht each during the night.

 

The food served on the four buffet tables was attractive and good! (though may I suggest in future nights of street parties - that the ticket buyer be informed that they only can choose their food from one of the buffet tables set up - you cannot go from buffet table to buffet table to pick and choose your dinner choices). For info - each sponsoring restaurant set up and served their buffet items from one table - therefore with 4 restaurants participating - there were 4 buffet tables - but once you gave your ticket to one table and your hand stamped - you could not go to another buffet table to enjoy any of their choices).

 

Another suggestion - may I ask you have 2 prices for your drinks - maybe 50 baht for spring and soda water or soda pop (coke, diet coke etc); and 100 baht for alcoholic drinks (beer, wine and mixed drinks). I think many more drinks would be sold during the night with this price setup. I surely would have ordeed more drinks and as I watched many other guests during the night - I believe they were resistant to ordering 100 baht priced drinks for a smal bottle of water or soda pop.

 

The entertainment provided by many of the Jomtien Complex Clubs was very good and showcased Thais with talent galore - song, dance and comedy too. The Thais from the clubs were joined by several talented farang guest entertainers in Drag - great entertainment from them all - and the best was last - with two very talented young Thais - a boy and a girl - I believe a brother and sister - (their Mother was a Thai singer and talented entertainer too) sang and wiggled their dance and sang their songs on stage to the clapping and cheers from an appreciative audience...they are real entertainers already at their young ages of about 7 and 10.

 

A great show indeed!

 

The auction to raise funds for The Gay Pattayan - Allen - accompanied by individual donations which were handed to Boxer and Wally during the night - and announced by Boxer of Boxer Travels, along with the pass the plate donations - raised a sum of about 101,220 baht :-)

 

Including....(approximate totals from my memory of MC and Boxer reports announced)....101.220 baht ....

 

(update - Boxer reported this morning - moments after my posting - that 101,220 baht was actually raised and Wally has rounded it up to 101,500 baht - and has been deposited into the Thais4Life Bank Account for Allen's benefit)

 

Pattaya Properties gave an envelope to Boxer with their donation of 40,000 baht;

 

A guest at The Bondi Hotel & Guest House gave its owner an envelope which he passed to Boxer and in it was a note of Thanks to The Gay Pattayan for all GP had done in years past - he was a reader of the Weekly Report and though he had never met The GP - he wanted to express his thanks for GP's efforts in the Weekly Report. In the envelope was the gentleman's personal donation of 20,000 baht.

 

A third envelope was passed to Boxer again by the owner of The Bondi Club and Hotel - Guest House - from another of their guests and he said likewise - I have never met you personally - but I am adding my Thanks to GP for all you have done for the Gay Community in Pattaya - with a 10,000 baht donation.

 

Monty announced his donation of 5,000 baht (amount included in pass the plate donations);

 

The Auction raised about 18,200 baht and the pass the plate raised another 12,420 baht (including Monty's 5,000 baht donation).

 

Maybe more...I am sure the event sponsors may add their report during the day to mine. I hope I have got the numbers correct...but do know the announced total was 101,000 + baht - a great night for The GP!

 

At 9:37pm...I got a telephone call on my cell phone and missed it. The music and show time was on and I did not hear the ring. But at 10:30pm I saw the phone had 1 missed call.....it was from Allen - The Gay Pattayan. During the day - in the afternoon I had tried to call Allen hoping to have his bf answer to get an update on Allen's condition. But got no answer.

 

Allen was operated on at 9:00am to relieve the water on the brain which had reoccured since his brain surgery of last week. Following surgery he was placed in ICU - Intensive Care Unit at Bangkok Pattaya Hospital. Then ...to my wonderful surprise - Allen calls me to say he is now back in his hospital room and doing fine :-)

 

I quickly rushed over to Wally - seated several tables over from me - and said to him "Allen is on the phone". Wally - with very surprised look - chatted with Allen - walked with cell phone in his ear up to the stage front - and told Monty "Allen was on the phone".....Wally told Allen many of his friends were enjoying a street party being held in his honor.

 

I passed the phone to Ken - Allen's bf and Ken - with tears of joy rolling down his face - upon learning Allen was on the phone - rushed to a quieter place inside a business to better hear Allen speak his words of thanksgiving to him and others for coming out to the street party...Allen asked we pass his thanks and love to all in attendance for their support and prayers.

 

Again, my friends, what a party! ...and a great night of good food, fun and music to be enjoyed by all in honor of our dear friend - Allen - The Gay Pattayan.

 

Thank you for your attendance and donations being sent in from all over the world.

 

Prior to yesterday's surgery Allen's share of hospital and surgery costs have already passed the 200,000 baht mark! The surgery yesterday I estimate will cost Allen an added 30 - 40,000 baht. And we are early into this year of 2007 with 3 surgeries within a month.

 

I now believe we will need to raise over 300,000 + baht to be able to cover Allen's medical care costs...with a margin for safety.

Hopefully the surgery yesterday is his last.... We all hope so....

Please Get well soon Allen !

 

Special thanks to the Jomtien Gay Business Community of the Jomtien Complex who sponsored the night for The GP. I realize there are those among us - myself included - who are critics of the manner by which it seems the gay business community conducts their charitable events without true transparency, but I do believe last night's Fab Feb Street Party was great - and hopefully you had a great night too :-)

 

I am proud to have had the opportunity to share in the "Fab Feb Street Party" and had great fun all night long :-)

 

I look forward to the Cafe Royale Dinner and Showtime - benefit for The Gay Pattayan - being held on Saturday night Feb 10th.

I have booked my reservation and have my bf and 2 added farang friends seated at our table to enjoy the night at Cafe Royale.

 

The cameras were clicking - so I am sure soon there will be photos from Boxer and others to share :-)

 

and yes..Boxer has posted his photos..Thanks Boxer for the great pics:

 

http://www.boxertravels.net/allen1/index.htm .

 

And thanks to all who attended and have donated to our dear friend The Gay Pattayan - Allen.

 

TravelerJim

[Guest Boxer]

Great report Traveller Jim can I correct the figures just in case of later questions.

To my knowledge the total was 101220 baht. 40000 from Pattaya Properties, 20000 UK anonymous,

10000 UK anonymous, 5000 baht Monty. Raffle made 18800 and pass the bucket was 12420 baht INCLUDING Monty's 5000 in my bucket. Hence the 101220 total not 106000 baht as you quoted.

Our thanks go to the Jomtien Gay Community business's, for organising the event and all their help, without them we would not have had a benefit. We also thank the Take Care guys who sold raffle tickets and collected cash. We are glad to have so many 'good guys' around us.