Passing Time with Bangkok Guy

[CurtisD]

The last year has flown by with no time to put pen to paper, but also less inclination as Bangkok Guy and I have begun to fit into a routine in each other’s lives.

Business brings me to the region more frequently and Bangkok Guy now joins me for the weekend wherever I am. We have also enjoyed a couple of longer trips to Thai islands and to Japan.

Tokyo, it turns out, is not just shopping, although he did a lot of that, finding great deals on clothing. Bangkok Guy has wanted to live in Japan since he was a child. It has both natural beauty and Tokyo. It is clean, it is efficient, he likes the food and the people are polite. The hotel staff bowed to him which made a big impression. It ticks all his boxes. He had a blast. We will return.

However, this note is not a travelog. Rather, it is an observation on some of the realities, particularly the financial realities, of a relationship begun in a bar.

The short term reality is that, for very logical reasons, a relationship is a lot more expensive than bar hopping.

Like every other bar guy Bangkok Guy worked in a bar to meet financial needs. As he straightforwardly puts it ‘I am poor person’. Over the years I have known him I have come to understand how difficult it is for him to maintain a steady income, let alone to grow his income.

He is economical and careful with money, including my money. I visited his apartment, a studio in a well kept building in a less convenient location distant from public transport.  Clean, tidy, crammed in an orderly manner with his market stock. Microwave, hot plate, modest sized TV, shrine. Nothing expensive or flashy.   

When I first agreed to give him an allowance we made a spreadsheet of all his expenses and his income. He was at best breaking even and, given down time for bad weather, more likely net negative. Initially the allowance covered half his expenses.

During covid the unstable nature of his income became very obvious, so I increased the allowance to cover all his expenses.

However, given the Thai family structure, his responsibilities extend beyond just looking after himself. Since his father left he is responsible for his mother and younger sister, particularly his sister. This puts huge pressure on him, which he does not like to bring to me but he has no other solution. So I have agreed to cover some of these family responsibilities. I have seen enough documentation that I am pretty sure that the money goes where I think it goes. Also, after six years, I trust Bangkok Guy.

An allowance which was originally a little more than I would spend in the bars during a couple of trips each year is now about three to four times that amount. Not an amount that will cripple me, but now enough to notice.

Despite the greater expense, I get more out of spending the money this way. Helping Bangkok Guy makes me happy.   

The long term financial reality is the same as that for any relationship where the financial gap between the partners is large. To retire and maintain my lifestyle with Bangkok Guy will be more expensive than doing it solo. For starters I intend to travel a lot and I will need the resources to cover travel for two. More enjoyable, but more expensive.

Bangkok Guy and my goal is to be living together in three years’ time. I need those three years to improve my finances so that I can have my cake and eat it too. To be with Bangkok Guy with no diminution of lifestyle.

It’s good for me. I now have a lot of motivation as I head down the final stretch.

 

[floridarob]

1 hour ago, CurtisD said:

More enjoyable, but more expensive.

A lot more....then, look what's happened recently....crazy inflation. People that are on fixed pensions or Social Security, really have a dent put in their lifestyle 😔

[Boy69]

I am in similar situation like you. I met a Colombian guy through Chaturbate what started as regular private shows keeping my identity anonymous grow to love affair with deep feelings I finally met him last December  for a month and it was very interesting experience,we had a great time.

he's in early 20s  poor boy from small town and didn't like his work as a model in Chaturbate and in order to allow him quit doing it and start studying completion of a matriculation certificate and English course I am giving him monthly allowance, luckily Colombia is very low living costs country so I can afford his current lifestyle however it's not a negligible amount ,he is a modest guy live a very simple life and very happy with the current situation and that makes me happy too, He wants more serious relationship and to come living with me but it's not so simple as he thinks ( getting long term visa, culture difference) he's a bit childish and naive and can't understand the complications of moving to another country. I am not sure at the moment what direction our relationship will goes  and it's not a simple situation for me.

[PeterRS]

24 minutes ago, floridarob said:

A lot more....then, look what's happened recently....crazy inflation. People that are on fixed pensions or Social Security, really have a dent put in their lifestyle 😔

So true. You just have to look at Brits. Once based outside of the UK, our National Insurance pension (kind of like Social Security) is frozen. Whereas those on a state pension in the UK have enjoyed annual increases, those who happen to have retired here for, say, 15 years are still stuck on what His Majesty's Government decided they should be able to llive on 15 years ago. Inflation was very low for much of that time, but recently it has been in double digits. Who can survive on that without other financial resouces?

I can remember the 1970s when the average rate of annual inflation over the decade - average over 10 years! - was 13%. In 1975 alone it was 25%. The 1970s was 'special' in that most of the world was shaken when the price of oil more than quadrupled. But that was followed in the early 1980s by the USA's tight monetary policy. in December 1980, interest rates were hiked to 19%.  By late-1982 they were down to 14%.

These rates might have been 'special'. But who is to say other 'special' occasions will not arise again in future? Did any of us ordinary mortals foresee the Russian invasion of Ukraine and its effect on the world as a whole? I have made a mess of my finances more often than not and so I am the last person to offer advice. But I will just say one thing. Please save in one form or another a good deal more than you think you might need.

[CurtisD]

17 hours ago, Boy69 said:

I am not sure at the moment what direction our relationship will goes  and it's not a simple situation for me.

I wish you and your friend the best. I know I don't need to remind you to only commit funds that you can spare. 

[CurtisD]

19 hours ago, floridarob said:

People that are on fixed pensions or Social Security, really have a dent put in their lifestyle

 

18 hours ago, PeterRS said:

Please save in one form or another a good deal more than you think you might need.

Since the financial crisis in 2008 we have been living through one of the most difficult investment environments in my life.

Responding to the GFC the Fed, ECB and PBOC pumped out money and lowered interest rates, which saved the banks and the LBOs but made it very difficult for savers to earn a living income from low risk bonds. So people put more of their savings into higher risk assets.

However, the lower interest rates and greater liquidity lead to asset valuations rising to speculative levels.

Then, just as the Fed was beginning to gradually and judiciously unwind the situation we get clobbered over and over again by alternating waves of stupidity and misfortune.

Trump begins it by disrupting trade, leading to higher prices which risk higher inflation expectations. Then Trump cuts taxes pro-cyclically, pumping more liquidity into the system when the Fed is trying to reduce it. When you are sitting on the largest stock of base money as a % of GDP since the financing of WWII, you do not do things which might awaken inflation expectations.

Then Covid hits and (i) sends prices higher by disrupting supply chains and normal demand patterns and (ii) causes the Fed, the ECB and the PBOC to pump even more liquidity in and lower interest rates to close to 0. US base money, already at the highest % of GDP since the financing of WWI goes stratospheric. It is no longer possible to live off the yield on less risky bonds and asset valuations climb again.

Finally, the combination of massive liquidity, zero rates and rising prices from supply chain disruptions wake inflation from its thirty years of slumber and the Fed, the ECB and the PBOC, staring at the specter of inflation 1970s style, jam the brakes on and begin what turns out to be the most rapid rise in interest rates-relative-to-the-starting-point seen in anyone’s lifetime.

Investors get whipsawed as the value of both bonds and equities falls.

But that’s not all folks!

It turns out that V. Putin has a Dream of Legacy so moronic and out-of-step with reality that it beggars belief.

And also beggars us as it adds further supply chain disruptions and an oil price shock.

Now inflation is out of bed and at the bar knocking back the bourbon.

People get another whipsawing as rates rise and consumer prices accelerate away from earnings.

Right now I have no idea where to invest. The valuation of equities is still high – the P/E ratio of the S&P is around 25 versus an historical average of 16 – and inflation and further rate increases are still a risk.

My only solution is to (i) work more and (ii) spend less. Spending much less and saving much more.

I have seen genteel poverty. To escape its death-by-one-thousand-cuts-of-dreariness-and-embarrassment much older friends here recently downsized to Florida. I want no part of it.

I told Bangkok Guy I need to make more money to retire.

His very sincere response was ‘Not problem, when you no make money anymore I work and make money for us’.

He is very sweet and sincere. I am lucky to be in caring hands. Alas, those hands are not capable of making enough to cover my martini bill, LOL.

Mine own hands need to get busy.

[Boy69]

7 hours ago, CurtisD said:

His very sincere response was ‘Not problem, when you no make money anymore I work and make money for us

Yes he seems very sweet guy