From todays PPP.

Goodbye to Phnom Penh’s ‘sleaziest bar’


Fri, 6 May 2016
Audrey Wilson

When the metal gates of the Walkabout Hotel on Street 51 were closed for the last time on April 21, it was one of the few times they had been shut in nearly 20 years.

The hotel and bar – known for its seedy crowd, Joker Draw tournament and abundance of sex workers – had operated 24 hours a day, including national holidays, since it opened in 1998. The closure marks another lost Phnom Penh expat institution, and a nail in the coffin of the city’s “Wild West” image, according to longtime foreign residents and business owners.

“Phnom Penh is not the same – it never will be,” said Adam Parker, the editor of Bayon Pearnik, a foreigner-friendly magazine distributed for free since 1996. The publication’s offices were once located above the Walkabout, with a front-row view into the din below.

“The office looked down into the bar, with a wall of glass windows,” Parker said this week. “It was like a spectator sport, looking down on the menagerie downstairs . . . The world’s strangest zoo.”

For years, that “zoo” involved fairly usual suspects: foreign men and the Cambodian sex workers they came to meet. Patrons were free to rent the rooms upstairs. But in a city where prostitution wore a thin veil, the Walkabout still stood out in its upfront operation.

It also contrasted with the growing number of hostess bars nearby: the sex workers were “freelancers” – there was never a bar fine, according to Parker.

“Simply, it’s a place that lots of women went to meet men,” said Mike Hsu, the owner of Sharky Bar, which opened in late 1995. The Walkabout was once the last stop on a well-worn route that included Sharky and the old Martini bar, he added.

After a law that cracked down on prostitution – and associated activities (advertising, transport, accommodation) – went into effect in 2008, commercial sex work was rebranded as “entertainment” and relocated: to karaoke and hostess bars, a move critics argue put women at greater risk. Remaining brothels were shuttered, and bars like the Walkabout – or, at one time, Sharky – fell into a grey area.

http://www.phnompenhpost.com/post-weeke ... aziest-bar

I never really spent any considerable time in the walkabout and think in the 9 years I have been here only went in a handful of times. However it is a shame that such an iconic place is gone for good.

With Cathouse and Martini closing, what would be the longest serving bar now? Sharkeys? When did Shanghai open?

Good point, i forgot about that. I guess it really is a ''secret'' bar.

The place was always very laid back to me back in 2009-10, and Fridays were packed for the card game. Some of the chicks were pretty OK looking, good parking, even got a free beer one time.

I first went in there in 2007 when I arrived in Cambodia, was told it was a ''must see''.

The woman back then were a lot better than when I last went there circa 2011 (rugby world cup year) while waiting for Score to open. In fairness it was 5:30 am and I had just left pontoon so my memory could be cloudy. As far as I can remember that was the last time I went to the Walkabout.

Username Taken wrote:My first visit to Walkabout was in March 1999. It was a hot afternoon, and I just wanted a coke to dampen my throat. I picked up the menu and saw that a small bottle of coke was $1.
I left without ordering, and bought a small bottle of coke from a street vendor for 700 riel.
Sorry, I don't remember the price of pineapples at the time.

seriously it was 700 riel that time? I guess if mr potato was in Cambodia that time, he wouldn't complain about the pineapple price as it might cost only 100 or 200 riel if the coke costs 700 riel.

i havent been to walkabout yet

bolueeleh wrote:i havent been to walkabout yet

[img]http://i64.tinypic.com/9sfe44.jpg[/img]

And you never will be able to now.