PeterRS

Along with all the nighclubs which burn to the ground killing dozens because the owners lock emergency exits and pay no attention to fire regulations!

Thats' a very one-sided comment. I have friends who live virtually above the flight path in Stanmore. I assume you think all those folk in that area are perfectly happy having noisy jets roaring just above their apartments overnight. You call them do-gooders! That's rich given that Australia has really stringent noise pollution levels. Staying with my friends I find the first flights coming in at around 6:00 am bad enough. If you consider these pople selfish, how do you expect them to move, given the enormous house prices in Sydney? WHy not move the parties elsewhere? And instead of adding on to existing airports that have been in use for many decades, why not build new airports away from urban centres like Tokyo, Osaka, Singaore, Hong Kong, Taipei, Beijing and a host of other cities?

Great conversation that will turn out to be, I don't think!

i absolutely loathe loud noise and steer clear of such places. If you wear ear plugs, how can you converse with the boys?

Could not agree more. It seems customer are coming much more for the shows which are much cheaper and very amateur versions of the popular professional boy cabaret shows like Tiffany's and Simon.

I agree. In all my years of visiting and then lliving in Bangkok, I have never been influenced by anything a mamasan has told me about tips. It's my decision, and since I never discussed in advance with the boys it was always what I decided. I always gave more than what I later read was the minimum. But then virtually always i had a great time. Sad to say i also know someone who did the same. Even more sadly he lived in Bangkok. He would regularly visit one bar and the boys knew not only that sitting with him would result in just one drink, one 20 baht note (occasionally 2) and no off. Very rarely he would arrange for one boy to visit him at his home on the outskirts of the city when he'd tip the lowest possible amount of around 1,000 baht and not pay for transport. It was hugely embarrassing and several people pointed this out to him. But he never changed.

Great photos! Many thanks @12is12 and @vinapu

They have to be called tips because in Thailand the provision of sexual services at a fee is illegal. A reality of which a few may still not be aware. I see your point - but do not fully agree with the comparisons. At a restaurant the bill for your food and drinks already includes wages for all the staff. Many waiters hope for something extra in the form of a tip but have no guarantee. And clearly no waiter is in a position to negotiate a tip. But most will still be earning a liveable wage. If they find it's not, then they move on to another restaurant or elsewhere. I do not know what basic wage, if any, the boys get from working in the various types of bar. But I'm pretty sure that it does not compare to most other service businesses as it will be far from a liveable amount. So they are not only expected to generate income for the bar from inflated drinks prices and off fees, they have to earn their own "tips" on top. I also have no doubt that most of the boys discuss what tips they get from customers and this leads to a minimum expectation. But like the waiter, they have no guarantee. Whatever a boy may ask for, it's a negotiable amount dependant on quite a number of factors. As you write, it is merely an "expected" amount but to a considerable extent it is dependent on all the various aspects of supply and demand. Same now with the apps. I do agree that the situation was different 30 - 40 years ago though. In those times all the boys westerners came across in the gogo and host bars were Thais from very poor upcountry families. There were no mobile phones and fancy clothes so much of what they "earned" went back to their families. "Tips" were very much dependent on a boy's attractiveness to customers and how well he performed during the off. In my experience "tips" were never discussed in advance and I can recall only one occasion (of many!) when a boy asked for a bit more than offered. My comments are based almost exclusively on Bangkok because I have little experience of offs in Pattaya.

Isn't that the point? What someone tips is their choice. Naturally everyone - be they rich or poor or more likely somewhere in between - has their own priorities, desires and limitations. If my friend A is happy tipping 1,500 and friend B 3,000, that's entirely a matter for them in my view - not me. If both are happy with the outcome, why should we on this Board keep on all but challenging those who tip higher or lower than we might do? I've read posts about this from guys who say that the offs need to earn a living and X amount is too low, just as I have (much more frequently) other posts from guys who write a larger tip distorts the market! But isn't that precisely what it is? A market. A market for services. And as with all offering services, pricing is dependent on the market. I understand that newbies do like to have some information. But so much has been quite regularly posted, finding it by taking a few minutes of time on the Search engine is surely not an unreasonable request! Or could there be a separate thread limited to discussions on tips and offs?

Thanks for posting the photos. It is beautiful and obviously informative.

I cannot understand why people who have taken bribes for whatever reason then decide to keep large quantities of the cash in theiir homes. It reminds me of the Thai senior civil servant in the Transport Ministry who some years ago summoned the police because there had been a burglary in his house and 18 million baht stolen. Once inside, the police were alleged to have discovered roughly 1 billion baht in cash in the basement. The civil servant was transferred to an inactive post in the Prime Minister's office! Last I heard the case was being investigated by the National Anti-Corruption Commission which had demanded that the Attorney General confiscate 65 million baht of the civil servant's stash.

Better hope that Bali's Governor does not change to a more strict individual.

As one who loves attending hot springs in Japan and Taiwan, I have always meant to try the Yunomori Spa on Suk Soi 26. So far I have never done so but hope to change that very soon. The baths area is segregated and entrance is 550 baht. Not cheap for those used to gay sauanas and looking for sex. But Taiwanese friends of mine went there at the end of last month and very much enjoyed the facilities. On a week-end afternoon they told me there were probably around 80 guys there, most young and virtually all seemingly gay. Better still all were naked!! As with all such spas, absolutely no hanky panky is permitted. But rules can't dictate what eyes are seeing or contacts made! I see that a second Yunomori has opened on Sathorn Soi 10 just round from the W Hotel. https://www.yunomorionsen.com/sathorn/gallery/ https://www.yunomorionsen.com/sathorn/contact/

There have been quite a number of posts in the last couple of years or more about boys from the apps not looking like their photos. Suggestions have been made that a 'live' chat should be requested, even if it is only for a few seconds when the guy speaks little English. Apart from one occasion, I always asked to meet first outside my apartment, usually in a coffee shop close by. That worked well apart from one time when we met at Coffee Society (near the top of Silom - but it died some years ago) and it was obvious the guy was a good dozen years older than he claimed. I paid for his coffee, we had a small chat and I left alone. It was less the fact that he was much older than he stated and much more than he did not look remotely cute!! 👎

I think this is a geat idea - in principle. My concern is that the entrance in the photo has no cover. To incorporate one would require the sides to be more than a little higher. During heavy monsoon rains, a considerable amount of water is going to pour down directly on to those escalators. I have no idea where it will drain to, but I hope there is no chance some will find its way to the wiring or power sources. Or could it lead to a build-up of water on the walkways? Hopefully someone has considered that and incoorpated solutions. It reminds me of the time when the first lines of Taipei's then relatively new subway system had recently opened. Its entrances were not high enough to stop flooding from very severe typhoons and the system had to be closed down for some time. Entrances were then all elevated allowing for several steps up from sidewalks.

I fully realise that coffee has its fans of which I am one. But I cannot imagine trying out different coffees or providers of coffee on a beach! As we constantly see in these forums, it takes all sorts . . .

I have tried to work out the attraction for locals and visitors of having 60 coffee bars on one patch of beach. I can't!

I am sure we all have many memories of that marvellous aircraft. My first 747 flight was on an Air France 747 from Paris to Kong Kong in March 1979. As the -100 and -200 series could not make the flights from Europe to Asia in one go, refuelling stops were necessary. British Airways had exclusive rights for London/Hong Kong with a daily flight that had one refuelling stop in Bahrain and then went on to Sydney after Hong Kong. My Air France flight stopped in Dubai, Bombay and Bangkok before an extra long final sector to Hong Kong. This was a result of Vietnam's airspace being closed as it had only weeks earlier fought a border war with China. That meant an extra hour to detour around the foot of Vietnam. But I loved every minute of that flight. Like @vinapu I was twice on 747s with virtually no passengers. Just before a flight from Hong Kong to Melbourne, I slipped a lower disc in my back. As I knew the secretary to the company chairman, I cheekily asked her if there might be any chance of an upgrade to first (business class had only recently been introduced and was not much better than economy seating on Cathay Pacific in those days). It so happened I was upgraded and it was the eve of Chinese New Year. No one was flying! There were 23 passengers in total! The other occasion was during the first Gulf War on a Northwest flight from Tokyo to Hong Kong. Once again there were few people travelling. As you left Immigration at Narita you could see into an Immigration office which had a large chalk board on the opposite wall with all the departing flights and the estimated passenger loads. i could not believe it when I saw that my NW flight had around 30 passengers. The worst flight was on Air China between Beijing and Hong Kong in 1985. There was only one flight between the cities in those days and it left at 7:30 am. So my colleague and I had to be up early to check in by 6:00. Reaching the departure island we saw our flight was a 747. But it had a problem as a two-hour delay was announced! This became 4 hours as we noticed men in overalls using a rickety set of stairs and rather large hammers and spanners to work on an engine. I soon decided I'd prefer not to take that plane, but there ws no choice. By 10:30 we were allowed to board. 30 minutes later we had to disembark again. Over the tanoy we learned that the flight had been cancelled. We were informed we would eventually be informed how we were going to get back to Hong Kong. As lunch time came and went, the small cafeteria was very quickly out of small eats. Around 2:00 pm ladies came round distributing small boxes of rice and chicken. Still no news of how we'd get to Hong Kong. I would have loved to go back into the city to relax in a hotel, but our visas had been cancelled on check in. At around 5:00 pm another Air China 747 arrived and disgorged its pasengers. We soon discovered this had come in from San Francisco with an intermediate stop in Shanghai. By 6:30 we were finally allowed to board that plane, taking off around 45 minutes later. Our relief soon turned to concern when chatting to one of the flight attendants. She told us the entire crew, including the pilots, were those who had arrived from San Francisco! By this time they must have been on duty for at least 20 hours. Ahead of them would be another 6 hours before the plane had returned to Beijing. We were delighted when that plane landed safely! Many passengers seemed to dislike Northwest for their Pacific flights. I was the opposite but then I was lucky to be in business class for my several dozen flights. I always loved their small 16-seat business class on the 747's upper deck. After dinner, the flight attendant would leave the drinks trolley parked at the front of the cabin. I always unashamedly would go up to it and tke a few small bottles to refresh me at my destination!

Thanks @vinapu for your report and photos. It reminds me of my trip to Angkor 18 years ago, especially those stone steps with no guardrail as you climb up to the top of the main temple at Angkor Wat. Those steps are incredibly steep with big distances beween the steps. I thought i was in pretty good physical condition and had happily spent the previous three days climbing over many other ruined temples. The main temple was to be the highlight of our visit. But on the last set of steps my thighs just gave up! Half way up I found I just could not move even using arms and legs. I decided I'd have to go down, but when I turned around and looked down, I knew my legs would never make it and I'd fall. After pause of a minute or two, I summoned up the courage to clamber up to the top as best I could, all the while fearing I might not make it. I was then delighted to realise that for the way down there were the other wooden steps in @vinapu's photo with the bannister that makes getting down much easier. Later in the evening climbing up the small steps on to the Bangkok Airways plane, my thighs had still not recovered! I must have seemed 30 years older than my age!

About time, too! The disparity between those at the top of the earning ladder and those at the bottom just gets wider and wider. It's time those who earn massive profits in Thailand finally begin to accept that a tiny portion of those obscene profits should be shared with those who help generate them. The elite need to learn that Thailand exists not just for them.

John Thomson's collection of more than 650 negatives were purchased by the American Henry Solomon Wellcome shortly after Thomson's death in 1921. Wellcome had made his fortune in the pharmaceutical business. He had earlier moved to the UK and became a British citizen. Having sold Wellcome to the company now known as GlaxoSmithKline, on his death he left all his wealth to the Wellcome Trust, a charity which he had established. It seems there is no permanent Exhibition of Thomson's work at the Wellcome Trust's headquarters. What better than to make digital reproductions of his work for permanent exhibition in the countries he visited?

Mid-afternoon certainly used to be a ghastly time to arrive. I was once in the west Immigration area when the crowds spilled back as far as the small Duty Free area. It got so bad some a couple of drunk passengers got into a fist fight over queue jumping. But any indication of good and bad times can only be just that - and indication. It just needs an A380 and a 777 to be late arriving at the same time for that indication of a good time to be very wrong. For years I was able to travel on many flights in business class and thereafter had an APEC Business Travel Card. Both give access to the Fast Track lanes. Now if I'm travelling economy I'll just pay for fast track.

I beieve this was the title for an Exhibition of some of Thomson's mid-1800s photos exhibited at the National Gallery in Bangkok for several months a few years ago. Thomson's photos are a true treasure. An adventurous photographer, he left Scotland to visit Singapore. Over something like a decade, his travels took him from India through much of South East Asia and an extensive trip around late Q'ing Dynasty China. It's a pity there cannot be a permanent exhibition in Bnagkok of some of his many Thailand photos.

Look what happened in Indonesia yesterday. It is now illegal to have sex with any one other than your legal wife (which, being a Muslim country, means sex between legally married a man and a woman). The law applies not only to all Indonesians, all non-Indonesians not living in the country but also to all tourists! Even though the religion practised in Bali is based on Hinduism, the law applies there as well. So if any gay couples or pairs have plans to visit Indonesia, stay platonic because these crazies will certainly have their own version of Iran's morality police. Penalties can be up to one year in prison.

Just look what happened in Indonesia yesterday. It is now illegal to have sex with any one other than your legal wife (which, being a Muslim country, means sex between legally married a man and a woman). The law applies not only to all Indonesians, all non-Indonesians not living in the country but also to all tourists! Even though the religion practised in Bali is based on Hinduism, the law applies there as well. So if any gay couples or pairs have plans to visit Indonesia, stay platonic because these crazies will certainly have their own version of Iran's morality police. Penalties can include up to one year in prison. Ironically Idonesia is not a dictatorship and its leadership seems not to be failing. It is, however, onbiously unable to fend of those determined to introduce more forms of sharia law similar to Aceh Province where it is the norm. Since this is of interest to tourists, I am also posting part of this in the Gay Asia forum.