HOLY COW The Russians Are Coming!

Posted: 16 Jul 2011 | 10:24 am

Yes, damn the torpedos, full steam ahead the Russian are indeed here in mass. Ensign Media's Business Report Thailand ran an excellent feature written by Byron Perry recently which is a great read and we are offering a link to readers.....

"On a Wednesday night deep in the jungles of Kathu in central Phuket, a man dressed as a chef is lying on his back twirling a pole with his feet upon which two French maids are sat. Surrounded by bored-looking tourists eating dinner and Russian-speaking Thai staff, the chef is performing in the circus tent of Palazzo Phuket - one of the many recently launched businesses looking to take advantage of Russian tourists on the island.

The tailors of Patong and Karon are learning Russian as well. Touts in front of the countless custom suit shops on the neon tourist trap streets of these two Phuket beach towns have added "privet" to their repertoire of greetings in addition to the "g'day mate" they throw at groups of singlet-wearing suspected Aussies or "guten tag" to Germans. Russian restaurants with signs in Cyrillic are popping up around the island, serving borscht and blini next to pad thai and fried rice joints. And the big white tour busses of Russian tour agency Pegas Touristik - with its now ubiquitous green and blue Pegasus logo - sometimes travelling in convoys of three or four - are an everyday sight on Thepkassattri Road, the island's main artery.

These are all symptoms of a Russian wave of tourists that has washed over the island of Phuket in recent years that is unsettling many in the island's THB100bn (USD3.3bn) tourism industry."

To read the entire facinating article CLICK

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