PeterRS

I read this with mixed views. In the early days before the arrest and imprisonment of his two partners when the company was named Utopia Tours and was based in the Tarntawan Hotel, I took a tour to Luang Prabang. All the details were excellent. I stayed in a lovely guesthouse by the river run by a gay Lao architect who had just returned after many years in Australia. The night tour with a cute guide was less interesting, perhaps because the eye candy and availability of young men in those days meant visiting the few gayish venues was not necessary to find company. The next year I took their tour to Phnom Penh. I have to add that the regular day guides with me on both tours were quite boring even though their local knowledge was obviously excellent. After the company was suspended due to the legal issues involving the partners, I contributed 5000 baht to the legal defence fund. When it finally got going again, I had started just making my own tour arrangements. I also realised their prices, particularly for hotels, were higher than I could get by booking on my own. Until I read the blog link, I had not realised Purple Dragon was a founder of the Bangkok Gay Pride. Sadly that was never going to work. I attended a couple of their Pride Parades. Far too commercial and virtually the only marchers were bar boys and ladyboys. Bangkok was not ready for a Pride Parade then. There were reports early last year of the Parade being revived lat November. That was then postponed because pf the proximity to the late Kings cremation. That idea now seems dead. The blog makes for dismal reading, despite its more upbeat tone at the end. I feel very sorry for those of his customers who have lost cash due to the company going out of business. I hope every traveller in future heeds his advice by making sure they have travel insurance. But one really has to question his choice of partners, the first two ending up being deported and, like the next one, leaving the till empty! To paraphrase Oscar Wilde, to lose one partner may be regarded as misfortune , to lose both looks like carelessness! Frivolity aside, I wish him better luck in his new life.

I have been in Dreamboys several times over the last few years. I never once saw body painting. Obviously I was there on the wrong nights - or too wrapped up in one of the models! No idea! As for their being fully erect, I actually preferred the Barbiery version where there was no erection. The boys were just totally free and natural. As for being totally erect, I do think that is something of a misnomer. I do not remember when it all started, but getting a dick erect and then tying it off with a stretched condom or whatever so that it will not lose its erection during a show is a major turn-off for me.

Yes, I recall many such shows and I agree they really were artistic. I think they started in Barbiery with one or two boys being painted on each of its small stages. I recall the boys were always nude. Once painted, their dancing under the ultra-violet light was slinky and indeed sinuous. It certainly started in the 1980s although precisely when I cannot remember. A few other bars later began to copy the idea. I remember seeing it in Hotmale after its reincarnation from Twilight around the turn of the millennium. But the painting was more basic and the boys did not have the same artistry - nor did they seem to have the same enthusiasm. Wasnt that one of the great bonuses in Barbiery - how enthusiastic ALL the boys were? I dont recall any of the many dozens of evenings I spent in that bar when even one boy looked bored. There seemed to be a tremendous camaraderie amongst them - and there always were lots and lots of them! I dont know of any bar where this act can be seen today - or even in the last dozen years.

Ive written before that there was nude dancing in some form or another much earlier than 1991 and 1996. In 1980 the old Apollo Bar located at the end of Soi 4 had nude dancing from around 9:30 pm or maybe 10 pm. On my visits over at least 3 years there was never an evening without nude dancing. Soon Twilight (the original version of Hotmale) had nude dancing every night from roughly the same time. fFom the mid-1980s Barbiery, Super Lek and others soon had nude painted body shows and soap bubble shows. All this was in addition to the usual fuck shows. I know some posters are put off by nude dancing. The boys in Twilight never seemed to enjoy being nude, but those particularly in Apollo and Barbiery seemed to really enjoy it and they really did dance. Certainly those of us in the audience did.

Fantastic news! I doubt if any poster will be as warmly welcomed as you, dear Shameless Mack. Once you are settled in, please, please keep up your contributions with your own slant and details of the bars and massage spas. I still have your old body analyses and your proposal for a new go-go bar. Had someone followed your design - and been able to pay the tea money to the BIB - I believe it would have packed in the customers.

The only other gay place I recall in that area from long ago is Super Lek. Super A used to be across the soi from its present location. Barbiery relocated into the 3rd floor of a new building opposite Nature Boys after its move from the far better location on Suriwong opposite Soi Twilight around the year 2000. This was a disaster. Hardly any customers and dreadful layout. Having been one of the most in-demand gogo bars for 15 years or so, in the new location It died after little more than a year. I respectfully disagree. I dont think it an ideal gay location. There is no room there for roadside beer bars which have been a key part of Twilight for some years. Also the road going past Nature Boys and Golden Cock is often quite busy with traffic. Over the last 10 years I can recall 3 other bars that opened in that subsoi with Super A. Solid lasted around 5 years I guess. Neither of the other 2 attracted more than a handful of customers and quickly died. Definitely not the old Rome Club in Silom Soi 4. As another poster indicated, it died around 25 years ago!

Compared to today, I was raised in an old fashioned household. As executors of my will I have two close relatives (meaning relations who are close to me personally and know that i am gay). I am not into toys and so the only items of some concern might be a stack of porn vdos. These I keep in a toolbox (sic) securely locked with a padlock that would require a wire cutter to open. Clearly written on the front are the words "Do not open. Throw away after my death." I have no doubts that this is what my executors will do. If one happened to be the prying kind, he or she might decide to take a peek inside. But I will be dead and it will not concern me. The person who peeked will then feel considerable guilt, probably for quite some time, that my wishes were not carried out. But I know 100% that will not happen. If you constantly worry about these things, my guess is you will become totally paranoid - that is, if you have not already approached that state.

I cannot speak about today but it used to be the case that most boys working the bars would do both. I wrote on another thread about one I had met in the old Solid bar who spoke good English, was intelligent and looked like 25. When I asked if he was bottom he said both. I took him home and we had a long fascinating chat over drinks before getting down to the business of the evening. Turned out he was 32, straight, married with two kids - and it was virtually the best sex with any bottom I had had in a great many years in Bangkok.

When I first flew into Singapore, Changi did not exist. Aircraft landed at Paya Lebar which is now a military airport I believe. Obviously there was not much vehicular or indeed aircraft traffic at the east end of the island because whenever an aircraft had to taxi, part of a roadway had to be temporary closed. Even Concorde regularly landed there when it was operated jointly by British Airways and Singapore Airlines. Changi was conceived in the mid-1970s. It required a massive new landfill for it sits totally on reclaimed land and the construction of new access roads in addition to the airports first terminal. Lee Kwan Yew had a vision of Singapore as a major air hub at a time when the number of tourists flying to Asia was infinitesimal compared to today. The only guaranteed passengers would be those on the kangaroo route to and from Australia and those on flights already using Paya Lebar. I do not think any other Asian leader at the time would have had either the vision, determination and ability to obtain finance for what many must have viewed as a hugely risky project. Creating the worlds best airport serviced by arguably the worlds best airline remains an extraordinary achievement.

This may have been asked before, but Macaroni used to be the nick here for Shameless Mack. Would Macaroni21 consider enlightening us if he is the very same and much-missed Shameless Mack? Even the photo seems to be the same as before. Re Candle-T I seem to remember reading probably some years ago that this was a legit massage place and there were no extras. If there are HEs, 500 baht as the tip seems on the low side compared to other massage spas. Anyone else able to confirm their HE policy? Fascinating. Thanks for that info, Pong.

That ketamine was used was already widely known through one of the excellent Australian TV documentaries which focussed on a speech given by Craig Challen who accompanied his fellow Australian, the anaesthetist Dr. Richard Harris. I don't think many are aware how much is owed to Dr. Harris. He spent a great deal of time in the cave with the boys, getting to know them and getting them to trust him. As Challen stated, Harris did a fantastic job. The boys had no hesitation in literally putting their lives in his hands as he administered the ketamine to put them to sleep. It was also Dr. Harris who decided on the use of ketamine rather than other more obvious tranquillisers. Ketamine is more regularly used in veterinary surgery and had rarely before been administered to young children, especially children in a very weakened state.. Prior to making that decision, Harris contacted anaesthetist colleagues around the world for their advice. Since the effect of the dosage would wear off some time before the boys were out of the cave, Dr. Harris also had to train some of the other divers on how to assess the condition of each boy and then administer a top-up dosage. Only the Lord knows what would have happened if that top-up dosage had been too little or too much. When we return to this wonderfully uplifting story of great courage, we should never forget that even as the first boy was being evacuated from the cave, not one member of the large rescue team believed all 13 would emerge alive. The rescue was so complex it was assumed that some of the boys would certainly die. One of the crucial American team said the casualties could be as high as 60% - as many as 8 of the group. This information was relayed to the Prime Minister before the go-ahead was given for the rescue to start. Magnificent news (although it took place some weeks ago) that both Harris and Challen were awarded the honour of being the 2019 Australians of the Year.

Rather strange that Solid seems to have been a favourite - it was for me - when there were rarely many customers there. I liked the line up of boys. One especially I took off a couple of times and he was s stunner. On my next visit he had disappeared. The farang co-manager told me he had discovered drugs and so he had to go. I always wondered why it never really became popular. It can't have been the location since Twilight and other bars were close by. Perhaps because most of the guys were twinks. Yet I once chatted to a very handsome guy who spoke very good English. I would have put him as about 25 - a little older than the average of the boys there. When I took him off, it turned out he was 32, married and had two kids. It was some of the best sex I ever had from an off!

I think the small watering hole was run by one of the mamasans from the old Solid Bar which ran for a few years on the corner close to the Mango Tree restaurant. For a while one of his regular boys helped out at that bar but whenever I walked past or stopped by for a drink, there was rarely another customer. How he kept going, goodness only knows! Solid had its attractions and was a fun place for a drink and an off for those who enjoyed it. But it was not an all-out gogo bar and its clientele was small. Another different kind of bar which some may recall was X-treme Bar on the second floor of one of the Twilight shops (was it where Bonny Massage eventually materialized?) X-treme had the usual bunch of gogo boys but it’s main entertainment was provided by real young dancers who gave a great 30 minute show twice a night. No nudity but these boys were cracking dancers, the choreography was good, often titillating and the boys themselves always great fun. It was run by an unusual figure who had either been a member of the clergy of the Church of England or whose work was related to the Church. Always friendly, his young long-haired student boyfriend would sometimes come into the bar. He was a real stunner! With rarely more than a few customers, X-treme can’t gave lasted more than a couple of years. The German across the Soi then employed them for a while before he dropped them and a few ended up in Roxy in Soi 4. The reverend (as many called the X-treme owner) ended up as a consultant at Roxy. I believe he then returned to England. I always wondered if his boyfriend joined him or he stayed behind. If the latter, some farang must have become extremely lucky!

I tend to agree with kokopelli. The days of Thai boys filling the Bangkok gogo bars will soon be over. IMHO a much better economy in the countryside together with a rapidly changing society will mean an even greater dependence on boys from neighboring countries - legally or not. As we know this process is already well under way. Just changing times.

Sorry duplicate post

I doubt if those of us who visited Bangkok all those years ago are stuck moping around with our memories. We are all a lot older now. Some have settled down with long term partners. We have all changed and our interests re nighttime entertainment have changed/evolved over time. We may also have discovered other countries. The scene may not be as vibrant as Thailand but its there in many countries. I for one take life as it comes. I change. The entertainment scene changes. There is still a great deal to enjoy. Theres no doubt that the rise of the apps is one reason for recent changes in the nighttime scene. But internet hook-ups did not start just with smart phones, grindr, hornet and their like. In the second half of the 1990s there were several internet sites where Thai guys put up the same sort of information found on the apps now. There were also gay dating sites like gay.com. I met many guys from those sites. Chatting took a lot longer but the hook ups when they finally happened seemed at least to me a bit more meaningful. I reckon the decline in the bar and nighttime scene actually started around 2000. Blame the first Thaksin government's Social Order campaigns. I think for the first time the existence of male gogo bars, saunas and massage spas was brought home to the average man in the street, especially in the countryside. This was the first time government Ministers were pictured holding up used condoms and hints given about gay farangs coming for sex tourism. Of course Thais had been enjoying their own much larger underground sex scene for many decades. Farangs filling girlie bars were different. That was OK. But in a very conservative society the thought of their country having a reputation as a sex haven for gays was not welcome. The countrywide popularity ratings of that homophobic Minister rocketed. Interesting I think that in the 80s and 90s Thais always seemed to outnumber farang in the bars. Yet from 2000 the Thais began to disappear. Where they went to and why I never thought about till now. Also that bars rarely seemed to bother changing their business model. Owners failed to realise that the general farang customer was ageing and not being replaced by enough younger ones. The only one making radical change was Twilight which completely changed and became Hotmale. Probably the most popular bar Barbiery moved from its ideal Suriwong location opposite Soi Twilight into larger premises close to Mango Tree. The atmosphere was dead, the mostly twink boys became more manly and customers stayed away in their droves. It quickly died. Even though the gay world has got much bigger over the decades there is still nowhere like Thailand. Long may it continue . And long may we continue to cherish memories of so many wonderful times whenever we experienced them.

I never read The Men of Thailand but I have read lots of posts on various chat rooms about what Bangkok was like in the 'old days'. I also have my own memories of the era. Difficult to know how much views have changed as people have grown older and the spectacles pinker. One thing does seem certain though. The gay bar scene was much more active 20 even 25 years ago. My memories differ a bit from BiggusDikkus. The original Twilight bar was quite dark on entry. It was lorded over by a couple of older trans women who fluttered around behind the long bar. There was also a small guy who always seemed to be rushing around adding extra seats on the large floor area at the weekends when the bar was packed more with Thais than farang or pushing boys to get dressed when they were offed. These are only a small part of my memory. The lasting one is of a large number of amazing boys. Until about 9 pm they would do s rather bored soft shoe shuffle 4 at a time on the tiny stage behind the bar. But one of the mamasans would then bark an order when the short pants would then come off and the boys would dance naked. Many were a bit shy and covered their assets. After each group of four came offstage still naked they would walk round through the customers and stand around one of the mirrored pillars. The best place to sit was at the left side of the bar. Once the order had been given, the 4 boys due onstage would sit crouched behind the bar desperately trying to get themselves even slightly erect. They didn't care that a group of Thais and farang were sitting watching them. Later in the evening there would often be a show (maybe only at weekends - not sure). Two pairs of boys would start on the stage, With a degree of athleticism they would then clamber over on to the top of the bar. Theyd then manoeuvre themselves slowly along the bar and back again. Im sorry BiggusDikkus did not enjoy Twilight then. I loved it same as I loved the better run and more fun Barbiery across the road. Also the various bars like Super Lek and the original Super A near where Mango Tree is located. They were in full swing then. There was a lot of fun there, just as there was in the still young Soi 4 and in the small DJ Station soi. Babylon had opened and offered a myriad of delights . The only problem was having to queue to get in at the weekends. Several other saunas had sprung up along with quite a few gay massage spas. The choice was quite amazing. I agree. I also consider myself so lucky to have enjoyed that era. Bangkok was heaven.

For a beach vacation the island of Phu Quoc seems to be worth exploring according to a poster on another site. Seems Bangkok Airways also flies there daily. Its very close to Sihanoukville so I guess there may also be a ferry linking them. Maybe an idea to combine the two. http://gaybuttonthai.com/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=9574

I can understand why Thailand hits the top spot. Like ggobkk I am surprised that the numbers in Hong Kong are so high. It doesnt seem like a key gay destination since the number of gay clubs, saunas etc, is not particularly high. Would have been nice to see the figures for Taipei/Taiwan. With a bill re same sex partnerships becoming law by the early summer, quite a thriving local gay scene and big increases in gay tourists, it is a more likely gay destination than Japan. I wonder how many tourists fly in just for the annual Gay Pride week-end when somewhere around 140,000 join the March. Perhaps they just don[t spend as much as n Hong Kong, although how anyone knows how to determine who spends what baffles me. Some photos of the last Gay Pride weekend from the gaybutton site http://gaybuttonthai.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=9355

Once that Indonesia poll is over, I wonder if the dreadful homophobic rhetoric of recent years will cease. When the countrys Defence Minister likens gays to nuclear war thats when I decide never to return.

Ive been twice to Brazil. I got mugged in Rio but I was probably as much to blame as the mugger. It was on a Sunday morning and I was just walking around the very empty centre of the city. All the churches seemed packed to overflowing, fortunately for me. I had just passed one when I heard the sound of someone running towards me from behind. Before I could even turn around a hand was clasped over my face and I felt something pulling on my neck. That was where Id been stupid. All the guidebooks say when you go out take off anything that might be of value including watches and rings. For a couple of decades I had worn a gold chain around my neck. Never removed it even in a sauna because the clasp was tough and difficult to open and close. It was just became part of me. So when I put on a T shirt and shorts I did not even think about it. In any case it was covered completely by the T shirt. The T shirt was thin. I did not realise that part of the chain would glisten under it in the bright sunshine. A guy had noticed it and was trying to rip it off me. As best I could I shouted for help. Some guys who were standing at the doors of the church heard me and came running over. As they got close the thief ran off. As he did so, the chain trickled down my back on to the ground! With only a few words of Portuguese I thanked the guys for their help. It then amazed me that a cop car arrived within only about 30 seconds. With only a sore neck, a ripped T shirt, a slightly damaged neck chain and a loss of dignity i walked off and soon got a cab back to my hotel. The city itself is amazing and well worth a visit. Just leave ALL your valuables in your bnb or hotel safe.

I think his name was John Booth. At one time he had been an English teacher so there was no reason for him to write as he did other than he was having a bit of fun. Sadly he died in very unfortunate circumstances. He had been treated for some form of cancer and thought he was cancer free. Then it returned but he had no cash left for a return to hospital. I seem to recall friends in Bangkok looked after him as best they could and he died in their home.

Incorrect. In the main Priority Lane (whatever the actual title but I believe it is "Premium" or "Priority") the same entrance caters for first and biz class passengers with passes from their airlines, over 70s, APEC Business Travel Card holders, diplomats, air crew, Privilege Pass holders (which I believe means the Thai Elite programme members).

Some airlines have withdrawn their priority service for business class passengers. This is because airlines have to pay for each passenger using those priority entrances. Check directly with a Vietnam Airlines office otherwise you will probably get the runaround with different people saying different things. Seems there is definitely a Fast Track Service within the East Immigration Hall specifically for THAI passengers. This photo was posted on the ThaiViss forum some months ago - As for the names given to the Fast Track lanes, I understood = and asI have seen for some time now - that the other dedicated channel between the east and west Immigration areas uses Priority Lane for both outgoing and incoming flights. But irrespective of name, it will either be Priority, Premium or Fast Track. As with the above question, why don't you just call THAI Airlines and ask them to find out for you. No guarantee, of course, that someone with actual knowledge will answer you. But the ground staff at the entrance to the aircraft as you disembark will.

There seem to be dozens of maps of the arrivals area but none is accurate. Seems to me the Fast Track is closer to D5, so let's just say it is between D4 and D5. Perhaps the easiest way to recognise it is that it is - - between the two main Immigration Halls - very close to the visa on arrival channel, so there will be lots of passengers filling forms close to the Fast Track entrance. However, from what other posters have been writing, it seems there may be another THAI only Fast Track. I have never heard of this or used it. Since THAI issue e-boarding passes, if you do not have a physical ticket perhaps best just to use the general dedicated Fast Track lane. I have never once had to show any physical ticket there - only the Fast Track coupon. Admittedly these are issued by each airline and that is obvious on the coupon. In dozens of arrivals (including on THAI) these have always been handed out on the aircraft and never by the ground staff on arrival. Unless the whole system has changed since my last arrival a couple of weeks ago, there is no notice at the entrance advising that it is not for use by TG passengers. Besides, TG flights do sometimes arrive at the west gates. It's a much longer walk to the East Immigration lines, and I cannot believe THAI passengers have to go all that way for a dedicated THAI biz class channel. But I stand to be corrected on that.