PeterRS

Another of the assumptions you seem to love to make - and again for the wrong reasons. I visit that site less than once a week but only because it has a huge detailed Asian travel section with posts on personal experiences of gay venues, often with more detail on other cities than one can find here. You will be aware I post frequently about my regular travels in the region. While checking the site I like to see the sort of subjects that attract guys to other chat rooms, especially younger guys because I have several times expressed the hope that more younger guys could be encouraged to join this chat room. It hardly takes more than a few minutes to see who has been posting regularly in the main room. And when one who attracted my attention some years ago for the nonsense he posted, his avatar shows exactly what he posts and how many posts he regularly makes. Satisfied? Please do not make unsubstantiated assumptions in future.

An emergency centre is opened for just 100 cases (or slightly more) of diarrhoea? How strange. With 12 million tourists annually, the island must have its fair share of western and other tourists not used to spicy Thai food which results in some form of stomach upset including diarrhoea. As this is still high season, presumably there are something like 700,00-800,000 or so tourists on the island. An emergency centre is opened for a tiny fraction of these numbers? Odd that the Thaiger article first states "severe diarrhoea". Yet the final paragraph mentions only "mild symptoms". Typical Thai reporting in my view.

And that is pure nonsense of the sort you have resorted to before! Enjoy yourself!

Never been to Dubai but did spend several days in Doha 4 years ago. I believe Doha is even more strict than Dubai. Even so there were quite a number of hits from the apps - including some Filipinos. But I was not prepared to take the risk.

Sorry to say that I have zero charity or zero good feelings for the contributor to that other chat site. Similarly I have precious few good feelings for the owner and moderator of that site. But then I am but one individual. Others obviously do not agree with me, as indeed you may not. With that i have no issue whatever. To each his own. In that sense perhaps I am more like @gayinpattaya who found the individual who is the subject of this thread one who "spouted drivel" and was "offensive" to other bar customers. That's one view. The Pattaya Mail, on the other hand, was "privileged" to have him as a guest speaker. That's another. To each his own.

Indeed, only the future beckons for us all. But if I could not think back and remember a whole host of not just good times but also great times in the past, I would probably be pretty unhappy. It is not just the young guys I met and spent time with in various parts of the world stretching back decades - of most of whom I have nothing but wonderful memories, it has been the opportunities I was afforded (mostly by my work) to travel very regularly to and experience many amazing parts of the globe. In itself, in my case no doubt a result of changing desires and expectations as much as to serendipity!

One sits almost permanently in another Asian chat site (not a Thai one). He was married for at least 20 years, has a son and now grandchildren. Around his early 50s he discovered he was gay, found a South American boyfriend in a "sleazy" bar (his description) and realised he was the love of his life. Wife quickly divorced, boyfriend moved in and they lived happily ever after. But - don't our lives always have 'buts'? - he then had a business trip to South East Asia around 20 years ago. For each summer vacation thereafter, he left the love of his life and flew to Asia where he spent virtually his entire vacations in gay saunas around the region having endless sex with young Asian guys. Meanwhile his lover was ill and getting no better. Eventually he died, probably around 7 years ago. Thereafter he filled the chat troom with the agonies of having lost the love of his life. He gave up his annual Asian adventures to live what appears to be a life of virtual solitude. The insights members receive on this board from those who live around the world are often fascinating, both about their trips to Thailand and sexual adventures in other countries. This bore is 80 years old this year and has lived for the last 30 or more years in a large city in Texas! Now alone, he appears to regard that oter chat room as his one lifeline to some sort of normalcy, almost daily dispensing his wisdom to 20-something Asians about how to grow old gracefully! Hopefully he never discovers this board! 🙏

Reading that article, I started out thinking that most of us probably have experienced changing desires and expectations as we have gone through life. That has certainly been my experience with quite a few more major changes than I ever thought might happen. But then I considered the experiences of my sister and brother. Both doctors, their lives have hardly changed at all as they have aged. I assume many professions are more or less the same. Perhaps one major change that I have seen in some others is a transition from being totally straight to becoming totally gay (insofar as "totally" can ever mean precisely that in a romantic/sexual context). I have friends in Australia, the UK, Austria, the US and various other countries who had been married for at least a couple of decades and have in almost all cases two children who then divorced their wives and quite quickly started living with another man. Most kept in agreeable contact with their children, although not all. The wife and kids of one friend who now lives in Chiang Mai with his partner totally refuse to have anything to do with him even though he continued to pay alimony and for his kids' university education. I also know people who wish they had made changes much earlier and taken a different path in their lives. For many, the social conventions in place 50 and more years ago often dictated a certain course, even though those concerned might have had a deep rooted desire to take a different path. Even if they managed to find their way on to that path later in their lives, I often wonder if they feel they missed out on much that could - perhaps - have given them a more satisfying and meaningful existence.

Continuing the theme of gay bars and venues in Bangkok of old, although not on topic I think the Moderator will not mind this being posted here. The name Professor Peter Jackson will be known to some as a result of the books he has written about Queer Asia. He is Emeritus Professor of Thai History and Cultural Studies at the Australian National University's College of Asia and the Pacific's School of Culture, History and Language (I wonder how he gets all that on to a business card 😵)! He is also a member of the Hong Kong-based editorial collective of the HK University Press' Queer Asia series of monographs. The histories of Buddhism, gender, sexuality and globalisation in Thailand have been his primary research. His recent books include Queer Bangkok and The Language of Sex and Sexuality in Thailand. He has frequently made the point that rather than being "traditional", the country's queer communities only came into being in the latter decades of the 20th century. One of the posts on the sawatdee nation thread on the Gay History of Thailand has a link to a long academic paper he wrote for the Journal of Gay and Lesbian Studies in 1999. This is titled An American Death in Thailand and subtitled The Murder of Daniel Berrigan and the Hybrid Origins of Gay Identity in 1960s Thailand. The post was made by RonantheBarbarian on August 17 2011. As he introduces the paper, he writes - "One of the best known gay westerners in Bangkok in the post-World War II years was Darrell Berrigan. He was one of the founders of the 'Bangkok World' newspaper in 1945, which was up until the 1980s the main competitor of the Bangkok Post. He was quite closeted seemingly, it is only known that he was gay because he was rather sensationally murdered in 1965, by a male sexual partner, and this became something of a celebrity scandal in the press. "The article can be hard reading, because as with all academic articles Jackson has to spend the firsts few pages spouting theoretical jargon. I would suggest you read from the paragraph entitled 'Expatriate Homosexual men in Postwar Bangkok' From that point on it is fascinating. In the article, as well as giving a lot of information about Berrigan's life and times (he was involved with the CIA, American espionage, etc.), Jackson also talks about Jim Thompson. Thompson was almost certainly also gay, although some who have written about him, such as William Warren, have made an attempt to make him out as straight. However Jackson does not accept that argument at all and according to him, we can take it one of the most celebrated farangs of mid-twentieth century Bangkok was gay." I entirely agree that the first pages should be skipped (unfortunately there are no page numbers but each section is headed in large type and so it is not difficult to find Expatriate Homosexual Men in Post-War Bangkok.) The name Daniel Berrigan may not be known to many now but he became something of a cause celebre as a result of his murder. The history surrounding that event is fascinating. At a time when the new government-to-be (hopefully!) is talking about gay marriage, in the mid-1960s the Thai language media was almost vicious in its declared loathing of homosexuality. The Thai Rath newwspaper referred to Berrigan's "sexual degeneracy"; Siam Nikorn described Berrigan as "having the illness of sexual degeneracy". Indeed the word "gay" had never been used in Thailand until around that time. Kathoeys were accepted. A man with a desire to have sex with another man was not! Berrigan himself had adopted two young men who lived with him. But they were referred to as his sons. Even so, one Thai newspaper claimed it was common knowledge that Berrigan had forcibly assaulted him sexually not once but twice. Jim Thomson features in Berrogan's story. It was always assumed that, like his friend Berrigan, Thomson was gay, although his official biographer threw in suggestions of romantic affais with women. On his last visit to Bangkok in 1959, Somerset Maugham was invited to dinner at Jim Thomson's house. Berrigan was also a guest. The author William Warren, who was to write one of the first books on Jim Thomson's later mysterious disappearance The Unsolved Mystery, described ". . . Thompson, and we might add their mutual acquaintance Berrigan, as resembling characters from a Maugham tale, 'lone—but never lonely—men who find contentment in exotic places': often homosexual men attempting to escape homophobic attitudes and laws back home or on a romantic quest for foreign partners." When Berigan's murderer was arrested, Thai Rath had a banner headline stating the murderer "Confesses He Shot Berrigan While 'Making Love.'" All the while the English language media were far more reserved in their reporting. Other interesting issues Jackson raises is describing how in the early 1950s the police and the army formed two opposing politicoeconomic cliques. https://muse.jhu.edu/article/12116

Another memory thanks to the friends at sawatdee network. This time a post by dab69 made on August 16 2011. "In its early days Soi 4's nocturnal entertainment was fairly low-key. Except for one bar which was perhaps the most famous and popular of the early gay venues. The Rise of the Rome Club The Rome Club had a number of unsuccessful incarnations before its long run as Bangkok's erstwhile foremost gay/mixed venue; initially occupying a single shop-house it was so popular that it soon quadrupled in size. The club presented a successful mix of extravagantly staged dance shows with a Saturday Night Fever-style disco. The owners presided over the events and the place did not warm up until the DJ strode across the floor, entered his box and played music that many recall as being the best disco selection in Bangkok. From 11 PM to closing the place was buzzing with bodies gyrating to the sounds of Abba, U2, Culture Club, Michael Jackson, Gloria Gaynor, Duran Duran and other pop greats. For the times it was an unbeatable formula. Decline and Fall of the Rome Club The Rome was a kind of Asian Studio 54, attracting a diverse and eclectic global clientele with many of what has been described as Bangkok's "Beautiful People" mixing and mingling with the more ordinary mortals. For many years the Rome Club dominated the Bangkok gay scene by providing what their public wanted and operating an inclusive door policy: if you were gay or gay friendly, bisexual or some other orientation and above all good looking and trendy you were welcomed to enjoy the bar. But in a strange, sudden and inexplicable reversal of strategy the club's owners decided that their gay clientele were no longer welcome heralding the beginning of the end for this particular empire." https://sawatdeenetwork.com/v4/showthread.php?12445-Does-anyone-know-Gay-History/page2 The end was quick. As soon as gays began leaving in droves, the Club desperately tried to survive. But when a good 70%-75% of your clientele has disappeared, survival became impossible. Perhaps after such a success for at least 15 years the owners just had a death wish.

I am sure @macaroni21 will have lots more fascinating anecdotes. As for those interested in the history of gay Bangkok going much further back, I note there is a series of articles in the sawatdee network forum. I'll wade through a few but in the meantime here is one from Brad the Impala dated April 13 2011 about his first Bangkok experiences in 1973. I am sure neither he nor the sawatdee owner/moderator will mind my copying that article here - "I believe that the oldest gay bar in Thailand was the Sea Hag in Silom Road. It opened and probably closed it's doors before I visited first in 1972, when I spent only a few days in Bangkok, before spending a couple of months in Pattaya, just enjoying the beach and exploring the area where there were no gay specific venues. The following year I investigated Bangkok a little further and discovered Silom Soi 4, which had the Lonely Boy, the bar next to it, Tomboy, owned by a working policeman, and the Apollo, which was wrongly thought of as only a Thai for Thai venue." https://sawatdeenetwork.com/v4/showthread.php?12445-Does-anyone-know-Gay-History I have written here before about the small Apollo bar located above where Sphinx restaurant and bar used to be at the end of the right side of Soi 4. It was definitely not a Thai-for-Thai bar although may have looked so because a quick glance inside would have shown there were hardly ever any farang. I had found the Apollo bar by accident in the Spring of 1980 and absolutely loved it. I was a regular on several visits every year, all before I discovered the first bar in Soi Pratuchai, Twilight, around 1983. I believe Twilight had opened quite a few years beforehand in a different location. It certainly seems to have been the first go-go bar in what became known as Soi Twilight. After that, from around 1986 for me it was almost always Barbiery across the road. I'm not sure when Apollo died but I think it was before then. Barbiery was such a fun place to visit and must have had around 100 boys working over the weekends. All the boys seemed to be having a ball, the shows were innovative and the mamasans never pushy. Mind you, you could tell from the attendance board in Twlight that it, too, had a large number of boys. And of course in those days I think every barboy was Thai, not a few from the same villages.

I only remember Roxy because for a time it employed a group of genuine dancers - as oppposed to go-go dancers. This group of 8 or so students had been formed in early 2001 specifically to provide alternative entertainment in the X-treme bar on the first floor of a building in Soi Twilight. Many found it a bit strange that the bar was run by a retired expat who had been employed by the Church of England in some capacity. All I recall is that he had a full head of white hair and his Thai boyfriend who was sometimes studying in the bar was aggressively handsome! The bar also had a dozen or so go-go boys who never seemed very enthusiastic about the dancing part of the job. The boys in the real dance troupe on the other hand were great - mostly very good looking, excellent dancers, generally well-choreographed numbers with a bit of sexiness thrown in, and they happily flirted with customers between their two sets. If there was any problem with their 'act' it was long pauses between numbers. X-treme died about a couple of years later when the German who owned 2 or 3 go-go bars on the opposite side of the soi took the dancers on for his bars. They obviously did little to improve his patronage and so he let them go. Roxy on Soi 4 took them on but there again I think they did not last long. I still have a DVD produced by the bar, although the visual quality is not good.

Some years ago I saw a tv programme about the possibility of a mega-tsunami hitting the US East Coast. Apparently one of the islands in the Canary Islands chain has a major fault line and the western edge of the main active volcano Cumbre Vieja could collapse into the sea. Much of the Canary Islands coastline is made up of massve steep cliffs. Were a collapse to happen, 1.5 trillion metric tons of earth would crash into the ocean. There is a paper about it in the Penn State/University of New Orleans site - "models suggest that if it were to collapse it would generate a tsunami 1000 m high that would be 50 m when it arrived in Europe and along the eastern coast of the US. Because this scenario would be devastating to cities including New York, Boston, and Miami as well as coastal real estate in New Jersey, North and South Carolina, and Florida, it has been rigorously investigated by scientists." The tv programme estimated the height of a tsunami reaching the US East Coast as nearer 100 m. Whichever it might be, the site does point out that not all scientists are in agreement, but it is one of any number of natural disasters that might just happen. https://www.e-education.psu.edu/earth107/node/1609

All the experts seem to suggest this. What concerns me as much as the physical heat in our cities and countries is the melting of the polar ice caps. The inevitable rise in sea level will soon start causing havoc in our coastlines. Bangkok is just one city at risk and that's before we consider it rate of sinkage. We have already seen in several years bad flooding in the October period when flood waters from the north flow down the Chaophraya river and meet the annual rise in sea levels coming up from the Gulf. When you see sandbags not only at the riverside of the Shangri-La Hotel but also around its pool, you know something is wrong. If I were much younger and had the funds, I wouldn't consider buying an apartment in much of coastal USA, Australia, Japan and a host of other countries. Even with its massively expensive coastal defences already in place, even The Netherlands would be far too risky. And the frightening thing for the next generations is there seems to be little evidence that the world if doing anything to enable it to cope.

I have never used the commercial bars but have friends who have. They all tell me the system and the service works very well and they have usually had a great time. These boys seem to know exactly how to please you. But one suggested that when making appointments it sometimes helps to give the bar an indication of your age/fitness level (i.e. are you very overweight?) I think the boys have a duty to go with customers whoever they are, but a slim 20 yo may find it difficult being with a very overweight 70 yo! Just a thought.

I find the price reductions peanuts! Early last year BNH on Soi Convent was offering 65% off joint packages - colonoscopy plus gastroscopy; heart MRI plus carotid artery ultra sound; and others. The year before, Bumrungrad offered a reduction on a colonoscopy for 44,000 baht incuding an anaesthetist. The BNH joint price was 36,000 baht. Although with my lifestyle I have always had a slight concern about heart issues, I was delighted when the doctor told me the scan showed absolutely no problems whatever. We then spent the rest of the consultation talking about whiskies!

Totally endorse @a-447's comments. Compared to pre-covid years and despite a rush of tourists, prices are historically still pretty cheap. All Japan rail passes at US$225 for 7 days or $359 for 14 days are great value (and include many of the bullet trains) if you can plan some of your trip in advance. Details here. https://japanrailpass.net/en/purchase.html Also stunning. The only problem is if you have just a few days, you can never be certain exactly when the sakura will be out. Understandably it appears earlier in the warm south and then works its way up. But it is the most delicate of petals and one shower of rain will see many disappearing. There are many internet sites telling you exactly when the sakura will bloom in each part of the country. The problem is that these are only posted at literally a week or so notice. And with all prices tradtionally rising in Japan for the sakura season, that's not great for cheap deals in hotels. On the other hand, if you can go for at least 5 days and be flexible in your itinerary, there is a very good chance you will see it in full bloom somewhere.

Showing my ignorance I have not been to Soi 4 since about 2015. Am I right in thinking that Jupiter is where Roxy used to be? For those with longer memories, that space was for years occupied by one of the great Bangkok gay Clubs, Rome Club. In some year, I believe around 1990, the owner decided to make a complete change. He ruined it by turning it into a straight club. That lasted all of a year before it closed. Another go-go bar Roxy then took over but it was not much nore successful, I suspect because Soi Twilight was then entrenched in visitors minds as the home of gogo boy bars. I cannot now recall what it became in the roughly 2 decades bewteen Roxy's closure and Jupiter's re-opening.

And I agreee there are benefits from both options. Usually I'm a fighter for my rights. Presently I have a continuing problem with my bank in the UK. I have not been able to access the account since November 30 last year because my Thai phone account and service provider (which has not changed in more than 8 years) can no longer receive the 6-digit PIN codes required as the final step for internet banking. PINS from no other service providers anywhere have been affected. The bank says it has checked and it is not its fault. AIS here have had its technicians check three times with my attempting to gain access, and received no PINS for my phone. Result: impasse! I am one of those who refuse to use phone banking. I know too many people who have had phones hacked, lost or stolen. There is a much more complicated way to access my account but I have not used it yet. Instead, I have written a long complaint with full details and copies of correspondence to the UK's Commissioner for Banking. I've asked for £5,000 comensation. I know I won't get it but I might just get something. In the meantime the Commissioner for Banking has told me it will take 4 months to investigate my complaint!!! 12 years ago I had another major problem with the same bank. That time it provided £1,000 in compensation. So perhaps the time and effort making the complaint may generate something. And if anyone thinks I am a bit of a miser - bang on!! LOL At Tops supermarket on Friday I checked and discovered that two items had been overcharged by 3 baht! When I last complained about overcharging at Tops, it had a policy of refunding not only the overcharge but the full price of the item. So I went to the counter to point out the error. Sadly, the policy has changed and I was handed 6 baht! Not even enough for a tiny cup of weak coffee! All that said, though, if I'm on holiday I'll only complain about major problems. It's just not worthwhile disturbing the holiday for lesser amouns - like 6 baht 🤣

WIth the US$ still high against the Japanese ¥ it is as good a time as any to book a trip Japan - although the heat and especially the humidity in summer can be stifling. Late autumn in November can be stunningly beautiful with the trees changing colour. At US$1 = ¥140 this is a lot better than the average of ¥106.76 it was in 2020.

Let me start by saying how much I really enjoy @macaroni21's posts and longer comments on the shamlessmack site. I still have copies of his guide to masseur types and the ground plan he posted years ago about his ideal Bangkok go-go bar. if only someone could have taken him up on his suggestion! As for Bali, I agree with his comments about Ubud. I now find it much overrated but then my memories go much further back, although not nearly as far as @Marc in Calif. My first trip there was in 1981 when I stayed in the Campuan Hotel just over the bridge at the end of town on the way to Sayan. It was merely a large wooden building which incorporaed the admin offices and an open dining room. Each accommodation was a simple hut on the hillside with gauze for windows and buckets with holes in the base for showers. The hope was you could raise the bucket high enough to get some water before it emptied! Yet I loved that hotel and its wonderfully friendly staff. There was a western style bar nearer the bridge and just over it Murni's Cafe with superb honey drenched yoghurt with fruit! I returned 10 times over the next five years. Wandering through the rice paddies you could make out the sound of gamelin playing in several villages. There was virtually no sex but it was the culture of the island that totally gripped me. Yet it was starting to become clear that more and more tourists were visiting. So I stopped going. The charms of Bangkok had won me over some years earlier and so I concentrated my future visits in Thailand. I did return in with my bf in 2005 as he was desperate to see Bali. I was reluctant but gave in. I found the island almost overrun and the peace I had enjoyed two decades earlier had all but disappeared - even in Ubud. But then that is just how tourism works. I was saddened by that visit, but remain thrilled at my meories of earlier times.

There are several. I used to see quite a few advertised in one of the large monthly magazines but have not been in Tokyo since pre-covid and no longer have a copy. The problem you will almost always find is that the mamasans and big boys will have little if any English. Point taken. Surely the easy answer is just to call the bar and find out. They obviously speak some English and I am sure will answer your questions.

Almost always it means Not Available. Not a question of being shy or eventually persuaded. Just plain fact.

So the withdrawal of Kaohsiung was clearly political. Just as athletes from Taiwan are stated to be from "Chinese Taipei" and airlines no longer use the name "Taiwan" as a country, the powers that be in the Executive Yuan would surely have been concerned at the use of Taiwan in the title. Whatever the reason, it was surely more than stupid of the Kaohsiung World Pride organisers not to have compromised. They have denied their city a place on the world gay map and a galaxy of visitors who would have spent a fortune on flights, hotels, food etc. I would happily have joined @hojacat but will aso now be stuck with the Taipei Pride Parade (not that that is anything but a great pleasure!)

If I recall correctly - and I am not at all convinced that I am - John Goss was associated with Utopia. Indeed he may have started it. The copyright on that site starts in 1994 which was certainly before Utopia Tours started. I only know because a friend of mine who had moved to Asia went to visit him off Sukhumvit (on one of the odd numbered streets after Asoke) from which the original Utopia was based. I suppose there could be an association with the Utopia-Asia site, but that has a ton of information which must have taken a great deal of time to collate over the years. John Goss seems to have restricted his publications to Thailand. That site is still far from perfect, but can be very useful especially if reports from readers are up to date.