Hua Hin Tourist Cops: Protect, Serve and Post Whack Pics

The cops fool around at Venezia’s 3D Art Gallery, where visitors can take photos with backdrops that seem to bring one into a whole new world.

PRACHUAP KHIRI KHAN — One cop sits, Princess Jasmine-style, on a flying carpet. Another poses in an upside-down house with some plaster cows. And a whole group of officers pose with Santa to greet the internet.

Far from more sordid beats on the Gulf coast, tourist police in the quiet enclave of Hua Hin are bringing A-game charm to a social media feed that challenges the idea the bureaucracy online must be unintelligible, unfriendly and archaic.

They’ve gotten notice for trading tough-guy grimaces and posturing for disarming and self-deprecating humor in years of photos promoting local tourist destinations. Senior Sgt. Maj. Yuwaret Khunnasak spoke to Khaosod English about their social media mojo.

“All of us are froong-fring,” she said, using a slang term for all that is effusively girly and glittery.

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Yuwaret said her commanders wanted to promote local tourism spots and gave the job to two policewomen and two policemen who have “absolutely no problem” making thumbs-up gestures next to plates of krapao.

“We want to present tourist spots like cafes, restaurants and so on. There’s so many places in Hua Hin, we haven’t even presented them all yet,” Yuwaret said. “We think really hard about the places we want to promote.”

But enough cop talk. Here are our favorite pics posted by the Hua Hin Tourist Police.

‘Have you been here? It’s an Upside-Down House that makes everything around you turn upside down,’ reads the caption. Photo: Hua Hin Tourist Police / Facebook
A dapper young officer hams it up in the upside-down house …
… before cuddling with some teddies.
The tourist police station itself seems to be a tourist spot on its own – especially for this Santa in a photo posted on Christmas Day in 2015.
All aboard! Three cops ride the mini-train Sept. 4 at the Huahin Samphannam Floating Market.
Buddy cops have a sunny day hanging out at a Venetian-themed attraction on Sept. 20.
Sept 12, the cops visit Hua Hin Safari and say hi to a blue-and-yellow macaw.
The staircase group pose lives on at the Wat Bang Ka Pom, in one of the cops’ sojourn Sept. 19 to Amphawa in Samut Songkhram.
Four cops sip colorful drinks, including a rainbow-hued one, at Nha Baan Kafae Sod cafe on Sept. 9.
Hey, buddy: A Hua Hin tourist cop greets a friendly farang visitor carrying crocs in a photo posted April 6 captioned, “Whether hot or cold, Hua Hin tourist police will serve Thais and foreigners,” and in English, “We serve, you’re safe.”