PeterRS

In those pre-internet days, almost the only gay information for those visiting Thailand was to be found in the thick Spartacus Guide, filled with AYOR against many venues it listed. On a one night stopover from Europe in my first year living in Asia, I had stupidly booked a hotel far from Suriwong. In those days the only way to the city was either a taxi or a THAI minibus. The latter were filled on a first-come-first-served basis And they stopped at the nearest hotel first. As luck would have it, I was the last. And the hotel was prepaid! Thankfully there was a tout outside. Normally I do not go near them, but I just had one night and had no clue where I was! For little more than Bt. 400 total I had a long tuktuk ride to the grotty Stockholm bar at the Lumphini Park end of what is now very upscale Langsuan, a drink, the services of 2 boys upstairs and their drinks. I was staggered both at what I was doing and at the cheap price. Before I returned the following Easter, I had discovered Manila. Coco Bananas was the place to be and I met a delightful Filipino, Armando, whom I was to meet again several times. The true sleaze bar then was 690 Retiro Strip, a barn-like place with catwalks and what usually seemed like 150 boys. When getting a taxi, all you needed to say was “690” and the driver knew exactly where to take you. The lovely Philippine Plaza hotel on the bay was where all manner of gays stayed. Breakfast would be heaving with them accompanied by their boys du jour - or that should probably be boys de la nuit! But it was my Easter that filled all my fantasies of Bangkok. I stayed in the then ultra-cheap Rose hotel in a room accompanied by around 50 cockroaches. Thanks to a quick exit and a can of something, they all met their maker and I was blissfully alone. Armed with my Guide, on my first night I found one of what I always felt to be one the city’s finest gogo bars, Apollo. A small bar with a catwalk located at the right end of Soi 4 on the first level above where the restaurant Sphinx used to be, I absolutely loved it. That was the first of what must have been at least 50+ visits. There were not many boys - if memory is not playing tricks, not more than about 15 or so - but every single one of them seemed to be thoroughly enjoying themselves and forever smiling at the punters. Like many it had a room or two upstairs where I was a regular with most of the boys, often more than once - although always solo. I have never been into the group thing. Whilst I spent almost every evening in the Apollo, I also ventured out occasionally. But all I can recall is one host bar on the upstairs level of Patpong 2 and another opposite an entrance to the Ambassador Hotel. No recollection of either name. As my long weekends in Bangkok continued, I discovered Twilight in the Soi we called by the same name. Utterly different from Apollo, it was sleaze. It was managed by two ageing ladyboys who, I thought, rather strictly controlled their 100 or so young charges. The long bar was to the left as you entered upstairs, with on the right just behind it a tiny stage where four boys would strut their stuff. I always preferred sitting at the left end of the bar. At around 9:30ish, an order would be barked whereupon pants would disappear and dancing would be in the nude. Mind you, that had been true at Apollo as well - the nudity I mean, there was no need for any barking as the boys knew their timetable. Sitting as I did on the left of the bar in Twilight, I could still see the boys on stage, many of whom seemed somewhat shy and covered their assets with their briefs. But crouched behind the bar right in front of me were the next four boys due to hit the stage, and in their nakedness were always doing their best to get a bit of life into their reluctant dicks. After a few minutes on stage, the four boys would parade through the onlookers and take up positions merely standing on a mirrored pillar. The four in front of me would then move to the stage. Not much hanky-panky seemed to be going on within the bar itself, unless you visited the rest room or sat on one of the darkened banquettes around two of the sides. At the weekend there would be fucking shows. These required some agility from the boys who would start onstage, clamber over on to the top of the bar and then wend their way along it. Another reason for sitting at the bar! There would rarely be many customers during the week. At the weekends it was packed. As more punters arrived, a small rather wizened man would be filling the empty floor space with yet more folding chairs. I do not recall when Apollo died, but I expect it was soon after Barbiery opened across Suriwong from Twilight. With 100 boys mostly of the twink variety, as in Apollo but much less so in Twilight, they almost all seemed to be having a great deal of fun. And they were fun to watch, especially in the variety of their show items. Naked boys covered in soap suds, acrobatic displays, ultra violet displays of painting on nude bodies - and more including the de rigeur fucking shows with the coupled moving around the audience. The bar had seating on three sides with as many other seats as possible added at weekends for punters who by and large were Thais. I doubt if anyone left that bar without a smile on their faces. And the boys I offed were all both fun and by and large gave the impression of being experienced.

I want to thank Macaroni21, a-447 and those who agreed with them for their kind suggestion that I return to posting. I had decided about 16 months ago to cease posting (other than one recent post about Myanmar about which I am writing a book). For those who remember some of my posts, you will know that I had a tendency to write at length. This explanation/exploration will be similarly long - very long, and therefore in several parts. So if you are no fan of length, please stop here. I must add that I have written part of what follows in several earlier posts. To those who have read them before, my apologies in advance. I have just returned from a long weekend in one of my regular haunts, Taipei. On the flights I read Edmund White’s recently published latest book, The Loves of My Life; what he calls his final autobiography - after all, this icon of gay literature is now over 80. It is particularly very graphic in the description of his vast number of sexual encounters starting in his early teens. At one point he writes about a friend’s comment that he must have had sex with about 3,000 other men. To which he replies, “Why so few?” As I was reading I was reminded of the number of posts I must have made on this Board. After lurking for a year, I summoned up the courage to start posting (although then under a different name). That must have been around 2004 or 2005. When I left, it was nearly the end of 2023. I have zero no idea of the number of posts I have made. I enjoy writing and trying to convey to readers my travel enthusiasms. Another hobby that has turned slightly to longer writing is history. I love the vast history of Asia – of what we know and the great deal we know absolutely nothing about. One blog series I posted here was a history of Gay Sex in Asia. This covered Japan, China, Korea, Thailand, Singapore, Hong Kong, Taiwan, The Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia and ending with the gay-bashing Brunei. I cannot find it using the search engine but it is on my computer. I cannot even recall when it was written, but judging by the content I think around 2015. Should anyone wish to read it, I will be happy to repost. I have also enjoyed photography and always found that, as in the recent excellent series of posts about the Philippines by @bkkmfj2648, photos can say much more than words. It would not surprise me if in terms of posts I have got quite close to Edmund White’s 3,000+! Which of course means nothing. A post can be one line - as many now seem to be, a jocular response to an earlier post, perhaps. Or it can be of considerable length. I tended towards the latter. Actually I also enjoy sex as much though in my latter years of posting, visiting sex venues in Thailand was no longer my thing, despite having lived much of the last 24 years in Bangkok. Domesticity, work and a committed and wonderful relationship do tend to reduce such desires for external stimulation. But I suppose the point of this post (perhaps I should really say "essay") is to fall back on my memory for, after my first visit to Bangkok when I had moved to first Hong Kong and then Tokyo to work, I became what can only be termed a slut of the first order. Not that I was a total ingenue on arrival in Asia. My previous employment in the UK had introduced me to the temptations of the Reeperbahn in Hamburg, the saunas in Amsterdam where I had my first encounter with a lithe ever-so-willing young Indonesian and the vast Le Continental sauna in Paris peopled by so many young Vietnamese. With one I had the most fabulous time. I said I hoped we could also meet up the following evening, my last before returning to London. After a little kissing and hugging on my 5-star hotel bed (paid for thankfully by the French government), he suggested I spend the night at his place after dinner. Assuming this might be a cheap dive somewhere, the thought of a night with him overruled any idea of grottiness. Imagine then my surprise when the taxi dropped us off at a single house just round the corner from the Place des Voges, one of the most exclusive and expensive addresses in the city. He lived in this utterly gorgeous house with his French lover, conveniently away for 3 weeks in the USA! As with so many such wonderful one-night stands, we were never to meet again. But what a glorious memory remains! Part of the reason for this series of posts is not merely vanity. This Board has lots of new members. While much of my posting is out of date, some perhaps give an inkling of what a city or place or event is like, with a rough idea of gay life and gay venues. That at least is my hope. And that is why at the end of the series, I will add in several photo-illustrated posts from older years of Gay Guides.

You have just made yourself look even more ridiculous! Did not @reader's original post mention "soldiers, weapons, mortar fire, ammunition, drone strikes, civil war for years now"? You may not have heard of the Karen rebels but it was perfectly clear that the OP was about a war. You clearly had no desire to check. Instead you just made up your mind that war is a subject for mirth of the siliest, childish kind! And after my post with details of the absolute horror meted out to two young men who were burned alive, all you can talk about is "high horses"! That is a total disgrace! Shame on you!

So @unicorn compounds his dreadful stupidity by giving my post a laughing emoji. That tells us a great deal more about him than any post would. 8 decades of one of the most ghastly wars against its own peoples is to him just a joke! It takes all sorts!

I congratulate @reader for raising this issue but am utterly appalled at @unicorn's post. The civil war in Myanmar has been going on virtually unchecked for almost 8 decades with successive military juntas involved in the most ghastly crimes. I have been doing extensive research for a book which is the only reason I am responding here. Following yet another democratic election in November 2020, the junta mounted yet another of its regular coups less than three months later. The following are examples of what @unicorn seems to regard as an item for fun. "Reports have provided gruesome details of some of the army’s horrendous atrocities since the 2021 coup, including the bloody suppression of anti-coup groups. Individuals believed to be part of the resistance have also been targeted, whether or not they had in fact belonged to that resistance. In May 2022, military forces entered the Buddhist monastery in the village of Mongdaingbin, forcibly conscripted all the young men hiding there, took them outside and then executed them in front of a stupa. "Torture has been routinely practised by the junta. This is especially true when villagers and others in the local militias are believed to have been responsible for attacks on military forces. In November 2023 two young farmers aged 23 and 22, Phoe Tay and Thar Htaung, who had joined the resistance were captured, interrogated, dragged through the streets in chains, had gasoline poured over them, been suspended from a tree and had fires lit under them. As up to 100 villagers were forced to watch, the silence was broken only by the crackle of the flames and the screams of the two men who were little more than boys. Someone took a video of this horror and leaked it to a local media outlet, Khit Thit Media. Given the triumphal nature of the voice-over, it is assumed the video had to have been taken by one of the junta’s forces. Yet on March 5 2024, the junta was still denying the burning of the two men. Phoe Tae and Thar Htaung: photos from the families "Remarkably, the families of the two men, despite the horror of their sons’ deaths and their unimaginable grief, had not objected to their joining the resistance. Phoe Tae had been especially smart at school where he earned two distinctions for entering university. During an interview with his father for Radio Free Asia Burma on February 19 2024, Myint Zaw told the reporter, “We could not retrieve the body. Nobody could go there because Myauk Khin Yan is a stronghold village of the pro-junta Pyu Saw Htee militias . . . I haven’t watched the video because of poor internet connections. His friends in the village are horrified by it. ‘Is it true? They really did that?’ . . . I told my son that if I was your age I would already have joined the resistance. My son and I had the same opinion . . . I am proud my son sacrificed for the people and the country. But I feel sad. I am devastated.” "Thar Htuang’s father, Soe Linn, appeared more stoic. He told the interviewer, “My son sacrificed his life for the good of the country and I am proud. I would never cry for him.” "By that time the number of atrocities had increased, including the use of civilian hostages as human shields. Myanmar-born American Dr. Miemie Winn Byrd, a retired US Army Lt. Col. and professor at the Daniel K. Inouye Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies, stated 'the Myanmar military is no longer a professional military. It is a criminal gang, a militant criminal gang.' According to a Report at the end of February 2024 the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk described the years of army rule having inflicted “unbearable levels of suffering and cruelty” and as being an “unending nightmare”. Human Rights Watch calls the situation in Myanmar a 'humanitarian catastrophe.' "Two other worrying issues should perhaps be noted. Last month in a court in New York a member of the Japanese yakuza pleaded guilty to attempting to traffic uranium and weapons-grade plutonium from Myanmar. Russia has had a long-term agreement with Myanmar to develop a nuclear reactor. The assumed destination for the materials is thought to have been Iran. As @reader has indicated in another post, Thailand has cut electricity to part of its border area. The reason is that financial scam centres have mushroomed on the Myanmar side of the border with up to 250,000 young people illegally trafficked, mostly from Asian countries, to operate them. By the end of 2023, the United States Institute for Peace estimated these scam activities had netted US$64 billion. Originally they were based in the border of the Shan State further north. With Chinese help these were slowly cleaned out, but the gansters just moved them fast to another area in Kayin State." Having stated over a year ago that I would no longer contribute, I apologise for breaking that vow. I do however continue to read the site which is always of interest.

For what reason @reader? At my initiative, for which you'll recall you thanked me, we did so before. We came to an agreement. I would not criticise any of the multitude of posts you made by copying and pasting media reports. In return you would not comment on my choice for living in Bangkok when, unlike you and many others, I deliberately choose not to visit gay venues here. I have complied 100% with that agreement. Unilaterally you have totally broken it. You have shown you have zero integrity when it comes to agreements. So no more! I'm delighted that some of the younger generations are now making posting excellent posts. I wish them, the Moderator and other posters all good wishes. Goodbye!

Yet another piece of trite nonsense. Grow up @reader! Not everyone is like your good self. And that is precisely what you wrote when you were attacking my posts a couple of years or so ago by suggesting nobody lived in Bangkok and did not go to gay bars etc. You have obviously forgotten that I sent you a PM and suggested we bury the hatchet - as it were. You agreed and thanked me for suggesting it. But guess what? Now it all comes spilling out again. I am not like you, thankfully, and I do not try to live the sort of life you live! Similarly, although you may not like to admit it, you are not like me. Everyone on this Board is different and we should be relishing our diversity. But you just will not accept it and your method is to attack! So quit the name calling and the incorrect assumptions just because they do not fit your idea of what an older expat in Bangkok should be doing!

Happy to confirm that I did indeed delete the post just after posting as I thought it inappropriate

Another instance involving one of the 10 million illegal guns in private hands in Thailand - I assume!

Perhaps. But more likely a slip of the finger. Or the fact that having at the end of last year purchased a new mac desktop on which I write most of my posts, I find the keyboard dreadful and will soon purchase a different one. The computer and new operating Sonoma system is great but I see on the internet that this particular keyboard gets a lot of mediocre and even downright bad reviews.

That has absolutely nothing to do with issue, the more so when in this forum there has also recently been a discussion about older men walking around with guys very much younger. You can take it that the two are in their mid-20s and are exactly the same age to within about 4 months. 60 years before that I was at junior school! So your question is immaterial! As for my time from university onwards, I have never written anything other than I have enjoyed the life of a gay man to the full. I was never an angel! And having discovered Bangkok and much of the rest of Asia from 1979, I have written qute a few times that I was always a regular in go-go bars, saunas and latterly at host bars in quite a number of Asia's cities. I have never once tried to disguise that. Indeed this forum has many posts I have made not only giving guides about gay venues annd events (my several reports with extensive photographs about the annual Taipei Gay Pride Parades, for example) but also extolling the virtues of certain gay establishments, posts that others have found useful! So, again I ask, what is the point of that question? But when @reader writes - - he is not only making more than one incorrect and demeaning assumption, he knows perfectly well from my previous posts - and he has previously questioned with incorrect asumptions on my decision not to visit gay establishments here - that since I settled down in Thailand with my present partner I have never stepped into a gay establishment in Thailand other than once when with a dear friend from the UK who, following an excellent dinner, wished to see Telephone bar. That is just over 5 years. Given that virtually everyone anywhere close to my age on this forum who visits Thailand heads for the gay venues almost as soon as the plane lands, I suppose those elderly farang find it strange that someone who has lived here for so many years can elect not to do likewise for quite a few years. That I don't fit the presumed sex-starved stereotype here, then I am certainly not going to apologise for it. Insult me if you wish and if you are wrong, I will give as good as I get. But as no one here knows a thing about him other than what I have written, my partner is totally off limits, the more so when others start to assume he will act as they would react in a situation like that which occurred in Balcony. What a totally idiotic statement! You're like @reader in writing words I never stated! When did I ever write that my partner and his close friend were "drunk" or even "exaggerated" what they told me? I didn't! They weren't! And they didn't! They were having their first drink. End of that piece of rubbish. Don't assume @floridarob! And why would you even consider that two young Thai men who are inteligent university graduates making their first ever visit to any bar in any gay street would exaggerate something as disgusting as an elderly farang propositioning them? As I wrote very recently in the thread "Offing a guy from a bar (but not for sex)", many Thais have a natural in-bred modesty. What right does any bar patron have to assume anything about another bar patron - unless it is a specified host bar or go-go bar? No right whatsoever! When they returned to my apartment soon after, they said they felt like pieces of meat! And before you make any other wrong assumptions, my partner's friend sleeps on the sofa bed in the living room when he is here! Lastly I apologise to @revengeboo that the assumptions and comments from @reader and @floridarob have meant I have had to disrupt his thread of truly excellent posts.

Winton Road is an aware-winning winery. But Shiraz will not be sweet. It has a more earthy, spicey flavour.

Deleted

Would these be some of the many apartment blocks built by local developers pre-covid particularly to attract Chinese buyers - and some from Hong Kong and Singapore as well? Very small by farang standards - probably around 30 sq. meters or thereabouts? (There is a thread about this somewhere!)

So your reasoning got it all wrong again! Why should anyone be surprised? Who is the clown here, I wonder?

I have written about this before but I have such happy memories of the ten visits (2 a year) made to Bali in the early 1980s. I remember being surprised - and not a little delighted - at seeing young men strip off around 5:00 pm and wash themselves while completely naked in the water spigot in the garden of my simple hotel. Once I was on a Garuda DC10 flying from Denpasar to Hong Kong. As the aircraft was pushed back and waiting to taxi on the the runway, a young man again stripped off and washed naked in the stream parallel to the taxiway!

I will PM you as I do not think it is correct to name names and such specific events in this forum. But as the case you refer to (which I am sure is the same) has been written about in more than one book, there may be some way to write about it here.

Now you just add insult to injury. I AM NOT "on the prowl for young men" whereever I travel. NEVER! For years I have rarely visited a gay bar anywhere outside Thailand. on my own. I visit when friends take me. Yes, I have been to saunas occasionally. For your information gay saunas are where virtually all customers go to find other guys. For your further information, men and guys in Taiwan would never even dream of going up to others in the Red House bars and cafes (the gay equivalent of Soi 4) with any similar proposition. NEVER! When I meet guys on the apps overseas, they initiate the conversations. I can think of perhaps three occasions at most in the last five years when I have been the one to start it up. So never assume that other posters do overseas what you and others might do here in Bangkok. I would certainly never ASSUME that anyone is in a gay bar like Balcony simply for the purpose of solicitating others into paid sex. In any case, as you know perfectly well, paid sex has not been my thing for many years. I certainy would never dream of approaching any guy in a bar like Balcony. In case you are not aware, it is not a host club! It is a public bar in a public street both of which happen to cater primarily to customers who are gay. That one farang customer should have the gall to ruin the evening of two bright, intelligent young Thai guys is shocking! As @khaolakguy so rightly points out, this is no doubt one of the reasons many Thais no longer visit farang gay places like Soi 4. That is absolutely nothing like what happened to my partner and his friend. You simply have used an example of what actually happened to your twisted narrative. Is it not true that that guy basically took the initiative and proposed to you and you took him up and back to your hotel? Did my partner and his friend do something similar? Nothing like it! They were doing nothing but having a drink. They did not approach anyone. If you are going to quote comparisons, quote like with like - not like with unlike!

Even if a joke, I don't think that's funny!

I have also been to that pigeon restaurant and enjoyed fine meals there. But I've never even had the pleasure of tasting a Grange Hermitage, sadly. As for the man who ended up in prison, I have an idea I might know who he is. Without naming names, was he known as gay and imprisoned on a gay charge? If so, then I do know who he is and he has an amazing story. Sadly not to be repeated here as I believe the aforesaid gentleman now lives in Bangkok.

Agreed, but there surely are what we could term red wines that are sweeter than others - Beaujolais Nouveau, Rosso Dolce and Zinfandel perhaps. A Ruby Port would be ideal, but whether that is termed a red wine or a fortified wine, I'll let an expert advise!

With few exceptions I usually agree with most of @macaroni21's posts which are well thought out with considered arguments. But the first one above seems to me to have many flaws. 1. When it comes to tourism to Thailand, frankly the average wage of a country basicallly means virtually nothing. Of the vast number of Chinese tourists who used to visit Thailand, it is fact that the majority were on these cheap zero-dollar packages, travelled around in groups and stayed in cheap hotels. Sure they pumped cash into the local economy, but on a per capita basis it was not high. Naturally there were some wealthy Chinese who were on individual packages. Some even purchased apartments and generally spent a great deal more in the up-market shopping malls. But the situation now has changed very dramatically. Within China, there has been considerable negative publicity given to the murder of four citizens and wounding of others in Siam Paragon in October. One Chinese tourist was killed. According to the Bangkok Post, 60,000 Chinese then immediately cancelled their trips to Thailand. Chinese put a big premium on safety and Thailand generally had the reputation as a very safe destination. That has all quickly changed. The Chinese are avid social media readers and that frequently exerts a great deal of influence, especially in the rural areas whose population tended to feed into the zero-dollar tour market. The Paragon murder was very high on the list of posts on several major sites. Now hoteliers and tourism entrepreneurs in Chiang Mai have called for the government to enact stricter gun controls. For along with the murder in Paragon, the Chinese media has been giving a surprised public the facts about the huge number of guns in private hands in this country (some 10 million), by far the highest of any country in S.E. Asia. Suddenly Thailand seems a less attractive destination for many Chinese. And as the article on the OP states, making entry to the country easier will do precisely nothing to change that perception. Then there is the present economic situation in China which is very bad and due to get much worse. Youth Unemployment figures are so disastrous China has stopped updating them. In the 16-24 yo bracket, the numbers were 21% earlier this year - and that was before this year's roughly 10 million university graduates were added in the summer. These young people were not on any list of regular travellers pre-covid. But now they are increasingly having to depend on family members to keep them financially afloat while they try to find jobs that no longer exist. These were kids born during the one-child policy. So naturally lower-, middle- and upper-class families must help. Many family budgets are now stretched as never before in recent years. Yet it is the economic woes of the property market - an industry which used to employ huge numbers and was one of the key drivers of China's economic growth as it amounted to approximately 29% of GDP according to the National Bureau of Economic Research - that are now so massive that all the main 30 - 40 developers have defaulted on their local and overseas debts. Worse, though, many millions of individuals who paid for apartments have discovered they are still incomplete because the developers have no cash. In China roughly 90% of properties are bought during construction. Throw in all the losses from this for all manner of contractors and the ending of the vast amounts of cash developers pumped into local authorities and you have what is already a near-perfect storm. It is estimated that local governments alone are now sitting on US$12.6 trillion of debt according to the IMF. No one yet knows what the central government will do. But the total amount of accumulated debt threatens the wealth of tens of millions - if not many more - of Chinese who no longer have the sort of cash reserves to travel as in pre-covid years. 2. I have absolutely no idea how the Indian economy compares. But from what I see in Bangkok, there are many more wealthy Indian tourists now than I have ever seen before. Go to Central Chidlom as I do weekly and you alweys see many Indian couples with several large shopping bags between them. Even though the average wage may be a fraction of that in China, it has to be a fact that there is a sector of rich and very rich Indians around the country who have both a desire and now an opportunity to travel. They also have money to spend. My guess is that like the Taiwanese mentioned in the OP, this group is certainly not going to stay in cheap hotels. They will opt for 4- and 5-star hotels. THAI alone now flies from 7 Indian gateways, with additional flights from 4 of them over the holiday period. These flights all seem to be on wide-body aircraft. And that's only THAI. Naturally in terms of numbers, there is no chance of India overtaking the numbers which used to come regularly to Thailand from China. But in terms of average spend, I am more than reasonably certain the average Indian will spend vastly more than the average Chinese. 3. I absolutely cannot agree that Thailand does not have the infrastructure for high spending tourists. I do wonder where @macaroni21 gets that idea. It's true that outside the main tourist hubs, the hotels may not have similar 5-star offerings. But the number of high quality hotels in the main destinations is certainly very high. And the manager of no 5-star hotel would ever consider employing staff unqualified for such a position. In fact, it is the quality of the staff in Thailand's top hotels that for decades has made them the envy of many in other countries. So the suggestion about too many low-paid unskilled workers simply does not come into the equation! 4. Ah! Pattaya! I wondered if that was what your post was basically about. As has been stated in posts on several forums, Pattaya is not a destination for high spending tourists. Yes, some may go to the Hiton or the Dusit, but for those seeking some time at a beach I am more than certain the travel agencies catering to these high spending tourists will be proposing Hua Hin, Phuket, Krabi or more out of the way destinations like Khao Lak rather than Pattaya. All have 5-star and luxury hotels. There is very little in Pattaya to attract high spending tourists. And mass market is definitely not what the Thailand government is concentrating on. 5. I believe @macaroni21 is being extremely unfair on Taiwanese tourists. In a Paper issued in September last year, HSBC estimated that as a proportion of the population the number of millionaires in Taiwan would be the fourth highest in Australasia, reaching over 10% by 2030. Nearly 25 years ago I was engaged by the Hong Kong Tourist Association to work on an event project specifically targetted at the Taiwan market. Even in those days when the average wage in Taiwan was a great deal less than today, there were still many high spenders. For just one event promoted in Taipei by three travel agencies, roughly 10,000 visitors arrived from Taiwan over a week and spent more than the average tourist spend (which in Hong Kong was already quite high), with many staying in the 3-selected 5-star hotels - the Mandarin, Peninsula and Island Shangri-La. 6. Just to repeat, high-end spenders have absolutely nothing to do with mass markets. They are a niche group which in many developing countries is getting considerably larger. @macaroni21 suggests concentrating on richer Asian markets, markets like Japan and Korea. The problem there is that in both countries you have a population where the work ethic is so strong the vast majority only receive what to us would be very short holiday periods. If you want a large regular flow of tourists from either country, it's not going to happen until the Japanese, as an example, start to give employees more than the short May Golden Week, August Obon Week and a week or so around New Year off. There will still be more regular rich Japanese toursts. but just because the Japanese are wealthier certainly does not mean they are going to do much for the Thailand tourism economy.

When I heard about it, I was probably more appalled than they were at the elderly farang's behaviour. To assume that two guys in a bar for a drink and to people watch were money boys, to say so to their faces and then suggest he'd pay for their company for the night is disgraceful. I told the guys they should just have thrown their drinks over him!

A discussion about some pest and then others who drank red wine impying it was a "substance influence!" Now that I could not let pass unremarked 🍷