In Januari I arrived in Bangkok to buy a motorbike. The idea was to drive through Thailand and Laos and sell it back in Bangkok two months later. Since I feel my experience might be useful to others, I decided to post my experience.
BUYING A BIKE AND GETTING SCREWED
I had found some adresses of motorbike shops on internet and went to look for some of them. Coincidentally I ran across a Thai motorshop. Apart from their large collection of small Thai bikes (Honda Phantoms and the like), they had a great Honda Bros 600 cc. I took a test drive and it drove very well. The price was very reasonable: 50.000 Baht. I knew I was taking a risk, but couldn't resist the temptation of taking the chance (part of the fun of travelling is taking risks) and the sound and looks of the bike. My mistake was to leave the bike at the motorshop for a few days. It took three days to get it registered in my name, which I thought was necesary to take it across the border of Laos. I didn't want to take the bike into the traffic jammed city and thought it would be better to pick up the bike a few days later and drive straight out of Bangkok. When I came back a few days later the bike didn't nearly drive as well and eventually I didn't even make it out of the city before it broke down.
Lesson 1: Be very careful to deal with a Thai motorshop. Try to resist the temptation of a seemingly good deal
Lesson 2: If you do business, don't leave the bike with them.
GETTING OUT OF A BAD SITUATION
Now I was facing a problem: I paid 50.000 Baht for this bike and it didn't work. How did I get out of that one? With a bit of luck. The shopowner offered me a Honda Phantom in return. I figured it wasn't worth 50.000, but he had me by the balls. I decided to go to Siam Superbike, the well reputed shop of New Zealander Peter Reid. I offered to hire one of the mechanics to give a professional judgement on the bike I was offered. Since Peter wasn't around, I had a lot of trouble explaining the situation. Two Thai guys eventually came with me for free, which was extremely nice of them. Especially since they didn't really understand what we were going to do. To cut a long story short: once they understood that the defect Honda Bros was mine, they insisted on buying it from me. So I ended up selling it to them for the 50.000 Baht I had paid for it and got out of a tricky situation. The next day I bought a Honda Super Four from Siam Superbike.
REGISTRATION
So now that I had a good bike I only needed to fix the registration. I read on internet that you need to have a bike registered in your name to get it into Laos. This seemed easy but turned into a bit of a nightmare. I will not go into details. The important thing is that in the end Siam Superbike provided me with forms that said I had bought the bike at their shop. These forms got me in and out of Laos without problems. So if you buy a bike in Thailand to take it into Laos, you can save yourself the trouble of registering it in your name and instead arrange some forms:
1. a form that says you bought the bike from that shop
2. a copy of the green registration book
Don't lose your temper with the imbeciles at the Laos border. Just smile and be patient.
BARGILS
What have bargirls got to do with buying a motorbike? When I was doing business with the Thai shop, there was a big language problem. I went to Sukhumvit Road and found myself a bargirl that spoke pretty good English. Paid her 100 Baht per hour to come with me to the shop and translate. That worked really well for me. So my advice is: if you are dealing or having trouble with Thai people, hire a bar girl to help out. A good place is in or around Gulliver's Travellers Tavern on Sukhumvit Soi 5. It's a big pool cafe where many Thai girls hang out to pick up western men. Just ask some of them which of their friends speaks the best English. Their translation services can be invaluable in tricky situations. For those who are wondering: no, I didn't make use of any other of her services -
Cheers,
Maarten
BUYING A BIKE AND GETTING SCREWED
I had found some adresses of motorbike shops on internet and went to look for some of them. Coincidentally I ran across a Thai motorshop. Apart from their large collection of small Thai bikes (Honda Phantoms and the like), they had a great Honda Bros 600 cc. I took a test drive and it drove very well. The price was very reasonable: 50.000 Baht. I knew I was taking a risk, but couldn't resist the temptation of taking the chance (part of the fun of travelling is taking risks) and the sound and looks of the bike. My mistake was to leave the bike at the motorshop for a few days. It took three days to get it registered in my name, which I thought was necesary to take it across the border of Laos. I didn't want to take the bike into the traffic jammed city and thought it would be better to pick up the bike a few days later and drive straight out of Bangkok. When I came back a few days later the bike didn't nearly drive as well and eventually I didn't even make it out of the city before it broke down.
Lesson 1: Be very careful to deal with a Thai motorshop. Try to resist the temptation of a seemingly good deal
Lesson 2: If you do business, don't leave the bike with them.
GETTING OUT OF A BAD SITUATION
Now I was facing a problem: I paid 50.000 Baht for this bike and it didn't work. How did I get out of that one? With a bit of luck. The shopowner offered me a Honda Phantom in return. I figured it wasn't worth 50.000, but he had me by the balls. I decided to go to Siam Superbike, the well reputed shop of New Zealander Peter Reid. I offered to hire one of the mechanics to give a professional judgement on the bike I was offered. Since Peter wasn't around, I had a lot of trouble explaining the situation. Two Thai guys eventually came with me for free, which was extremely nice of them. Especially since they didn't really understand what we were going to do. To cut a long story short: once they understood that the defect Honda Bros was mine, they insisted on buying it from me. So I ended up selling it to them for the 50.000 Baht I had paid for it and got out of a tricky situation. The next day I bought a Honda Super Four from Siam Superbike.
REGISTRATION
So now that I had a good bike I only needed to fix the registration. I read on internet that you need to have a bike registered in your name to get it into Laos. This seemed easy but turned into a bit of a nightmare. I will not go into details. The important thing is that in the end Siam Superbike provided me with forms that said I had bought the bike at their shop. These forms got me in and out of Laos without problems. So if you buy a bike in Thailand to take it into Laos, you can save yourself the trouble of registering it in your name and instead arrange some forms:
1. a form that says you bought the bike from that shop
2. a copy of the green registration book
Don't lose your temper with the imbeciles at the Laos border. Just smile and be patient.
BARGILS
What have bargirls got to do with buying a motorbike? When I was doing business with the Thai shop, there was a big language problem. I went to Sukhumvit Road and found myself a bargirl that spoke pretty good English. Paid her 100 Baht per hour to come with me to the shop and translate. That worked really well for me. So my advice is: if you are dealing or having trouble with Thai people, hire a bar girl to help out. A good place is in or around Gulliver's Travellers Tavern on Sukhumvit Soi 5. It's a big pool cafe where many Thai girls hang out to pick up western men. Just ask some of them which of their friends speaks the best English. Their translation services can be invaluable in tricky situations. For those who are wondering: no, I didn't make use of any other of her services -
Cheers,
Maarten
