PeterRS

Indeed, but thank goodness those of my generation could avail themselves of it. When I first came to Asia and for many years afterwards, Spartacus was the bible. It was far from perfect and it missesd a lot, but my goodness I and i am sure a mega number of other gay travellers to so many Asian countries would have been lost without it. It would be fascinating to find out how many members this Board actually has and how many lurkers. At the foot of the active pages now, there is a list of last logged in members. Without an actual count, it looks like 120. Yet on the members pages it says 207 now on line. Fine. The difference is really immaterial since both are quite a lot. In advertising terms, though, they represent merely a tiny fraction of the gay market even in Bangkok and Pattaya. One key issue that has been raised before is that many gays living in Thailand can not be bothered reading any of the gay chat rooms. Not one of my gay friends reads this site. When I ask them why, they say they have no interest. They have their own circle of gay friends and sources of information and that's all they want. They have no interest in chatting on subjects with people they do not know and are unlikely to meet. I always thought this Board must have the largest readership. I used to get access to gaybutton's Board on my phone. Now I cannot get it on any of my devices using Safari, Chrome and Firefox for some reason. But I seem to remember it included a list and claimed to have vastly more members. Given that the posting membership is a small fraction of that of this Board and almost totally Pattaya-centric, I find it both strange and slightly unbelievable. But that is what was printed the last time I was able to check a few weeks ago. But I seriously believe that if cash has to be paid out advertising a bar or spa in the columns of a Board like this is hardly likely to increase patronage. Besides, the threads on this Board already give a pretty good idea of what are the "in" places. Since we know that probably a majority of patrons now come from other East Asian nations, that is where the message should be spread. I'll be in Taipei again at the end of the month. I'll see if my Taiwanese friends have any ideas. Then again, I really wonder how one host bar where they are so packed in a place like Jomtien Complex can stand out from the crowd? All have (presumably) cute boys, all serve drinks, some have an improvised type of show - but that special "come to my bar" ingredient is just not there. Something along the lines of what was offered at Eros and Happy Boys would surely attract some new parons. But would that degree of nudity be permitted now?

You present facts based upon US medicine. Other countries base their research on similar types of cases. But you in America elect not even to consider that you might - just - be wrong. As for deserving @Moses, I can tell you I'd much rather live in Moscow than Los Angeles. It's an amazing city. I have been in Los Angeles half a dozen times. Apart from the Getty Museum, the Disney Concert Hall and a few bars and restaurants, I have zero desire to return. In fact, looking at lists of things to do in Los Angeles, the few sites I have checked have as many hotels oon them as proper sights to see! It's just a huge freeway choking in car fumes.

Please be careful to avoid the sakura blossom season. Japan is beautiful at that time but everything is a good deal more expensive - hotels in particular. And the main sakura viewing sites like Ueno Park and Shinjuku Park in Tokyo are often packed.

As usual @macaroni21 has hit the proverbial nail on the head. Advertising and marketing really is vital and with 46 years of visiting and living in Thailand, I can say with confidence that this has almost always been way more than lousy - it has usually been non-existent. Why expatriates (and i believe bar owners usually are exaptriates, at least in Pattaya) decide to open up bars to while away their retirement without in some way making sure they are going to have not just customers but a regular flow of customers totally beats me. Little wonder more than a few give up and some of these have no doubt lost quite a bit of cash. The one time when there was advertising - of a sort - was around the 1990s and early 2000s when several different magazines were published and distributed free to gay venues. Each had not only advertisements for specific gay venues, some - especially those in Thai - had interviews with owners, boys etc. One published by an expat in Chiang Mai tried to become a more generally based gay magazine and even had in one issue an exclusive interview with Sir Ian Macellan. Its publisher returned to the UK and it ceased publication. Each magazine had maps at the back with the main venues listed. That was a particular help to quite a number of first timers. But getting that information absolutely 100% correct was never a possibility unless the magazines had reporters on the ground following each movement of the shifting gay sands. I recall reading endless comments on gaythailand.com about a certain bar or other not being positioned correctly. That it might have been 50 meters away was of no consequence to them. If they had to do as they do now and find out for themselves, I doubt if they would have been so picky!! Japan has a large gay publication market. Advertising there would be ideal, but far too expensive for what is likely to be a limited clientele. Hong Kong also used to have a free gay publication but I am not sure if it still exists. Various chat rooms exist elsewhere, including one in Singapore with a travel section. One thing is sure, though. Advertising requires some cash. Fly out a journalist from one of the international gay magazines - or better still, persuade them to use a local stringer - to aggressively promote your bar, is about the only suggestion I have. Whatever, the old song had it right in my view -

No, I do not enjoy. What is the point of posting that photo of an ageing Shirley Maclaine? There is no point in a gay Board! I agree with @Pete1111. Clickbait! Unless you want to have sex with an older guy what is the point of a thread like this other than some weird form of personal jollification. Some peole age well; others don't. An example of the latter was posted some months ago. Bjorn Andresen was named "the most beautiful boy in the world" when he appeared as Tazio in Visconti's 1971 movie Death in Venice. Some years before his death he looked very different. What is wrong with either photo? They reveal a real person.

I am giving up trying to reason with one who will not listen to reason. And no doubt you feel the same way - although you are almost totally wrong! 😵

Yesterday I wrote an article under Theatre, Movies etc. about the 10 year anniversary of the death of actor Alan Rickman. He died of pancreatic cancer aged 69. If you are a man, do you realise you are one of almost 500,000 who will contract the cancer this year? And are you aware that unless it is caught early and has not spread to other organs, your chance of surviving for five years is just 13.3% according to the National Cancer Institute? I'm not a doctor but I do know something about this cancer. Just over five years ago, my doctor at King Chulalongkorn Hospital in Bangkok had me undergo a full abdominal CT scan for a totally unrelated issue. From the scan, she noticed a small cyst on my pancreas. She understandably wanted to know what might be underneath that cyst. She explained that if one was 5mm or less, normally she would not bother. But mine was slightly larger at just over 6mm. So she had me do an MRI scan. This showed nothing abnormal underneath, but she said she wanted 5 annual scans just to make sure. I have now completed 4. I had heard about quite a number of prominent people dying of this insidious cancer, but before my experience I had no idea even where that organ sits in the body. In fact it is behind the stomach. One reason for so many deaths is that it is frequently misdiagnosed when first visiting a doctor. Many consider it could be a stomach complaint or a mild back ache. So it is frequently caught too late. Hard to detect and hard to cure! That is why Alan Rickman and so many others have died, often much too early. These include Steve Jobs, Luciano Pavarotti, Aretha Franklin, Patrick Swayze, Joan Crawford, Sir Rex Harrison, Henry Mancini . . . That all these were rich and famous did not prevent them from undergoing checks before the cancer became too advanced. Steve Jobs was aware of his diagnosis but he chose not to be operated on. Why, I have absolutely no idea. But he soon realised he had made the wrong decision. I am not listing links simply because some deal only with the USA or other specific countries and others worldwide. Just type in pancreatic cancer and it will throw up all manner of links. From what I have read - and I trust doctors will correct me if this is incorrect - there is nothing one can do to prevent the onset of pancreatic cancer. Generally thought to affect only older people, the really worrying fact is that worldwide rates of this cancer are rising, especially now among younger people. In the USA the rate for those under 50 is around 2 per 100,000 (figure from the Dana Farber Cancer institute).

False Information? Tell that to all the non-American countries which have or are considering banning circumcision apart from for religious or cultural reasons. Their findings are based on false information? What nonsesne you spout! And clearly you do not read earlier posts. Yet again you state ridiculous "facts" which you state as fact. You have absolutely no idea how many boys died as a result of not being crcumcised - not one shred of evidence. You guess! You equally have not the faintest idea how many die during or as a result of the operation itself. Since you are a fan of statistics, one study estimates that 1.3% of male neonatal deaths in the USA from all causes occur as a result of botched circumcisions. In 2022 there were 1.88 million male births in the USA. That results in 24,400 deaths. Fact! Then look at the numbers in The Philippines where admittedly it is a cultural issue and boys are willing to be circumcised but only becauseof tradition and all their schoolfriends are. They do not want to be "different". Although not a cultural issue, the same was true in South Korea where boys at school felt 'different' if they were not circumcised because of the influence solely of American doctors. Without that American influence, circumcision is likely to have remained virtually unknown in that country. And the introduction of circumcision occurred in the immediate post war period long before many of the official studies quoted earlier were conducted. Lastly, the rate of circumcision is declining in the USA largely as a result of mass immigration of peoples for whom circumcision is not practised- those from Chinese speaking, South and East Asian, Spanish and other nations - who make up 15.8% of the US population. What are you doing to encourage these peoples to go against their natural traditions? As those immigrant boys mix with their American friends, more Americans will see that circumcision is not the universal truth they have been led to believe.

Idiotic comment!

Name those ultra-distinctive male voices from stage and screen and the numbers are few. Richard Burton is arguably the first name that will come to mind. Sir John Gielgud. James Earl Jones and perhaps Sean Connery for his Scottish burr! In our more recent times, unquestionably at the top of my list would have been Alan Rickman who died ten years ago of pancreatic cancer. A stalwart of the British stage before his breakout movie role as the villain in the first Die Hard movie, from the Judge in the Stephen Sondheim musical Sweeney Todd, Ang Lee's Sense and Sensibility, Love Actually, the bewitching Perfume; the Story of a Murderer, with the young gay actor Ben Whishaw, through the role that most around the world will recall, Severus Snape in the Harry Potter series, his voice was unmistakable - a deep, rich, glowing, sometimes growling voice with, whenever required, a hint of menace. What we did not know was much about the actor himself for, like many, he preferred to remain in the background. In today's Guardian there is a lovely article with comments from a number of actors and others who worked with him including Sigourney Weaver, Brian Cox and screenwriter Richard Curtis (Four Weddings and a Funeral, Bridget Jones's Diary). It paints a portrait of an extraordinary human being. I think his last performance in Eye In The Sky one of his best. A world weary British army general utterly torn between his men seeking to kill terrorists far off in Kenya by means of drone strikes and his political masters who cannot make a decision. With the objective finally obliterated although with the additional cost of civilians, as he leaves the cabinet room one parliamentarian tells him the casualties were just part of war. To which his character turns and stares equally wearily at the lady before his final line. It could have been said angrily, menacingly in any number of ways. Rickman says it in an almost matter-of-fact way but you can hear the hate lurking in that voice. "Never tell a soldier that he does not know the cost of war." He was literally dying when he completed that movie. A few comments (deliberately unattributed) - - Whenever he’d ring me on speakerphone in my car and someone else was with me their eyes would nearly pop out of their head. That amazing voice! The depth and richness and enunciation. - Alan elevated friendship to an art form. His friends grew in number throughout his extraordinary career but he never dropped his old pals in favour of more starry ones. - He taught me a great deal about charity [said by one of the boys in Harry Potter]. He would often have half a dozen people visit the studio each day, and would claim they were his cousins or friends. Really, he was offering terminally ill children and their families a chance to see behind the curtains. - His death was such a theft from us; this brilliant, gorgeous actor, who had so much more to give, was suddenly gone. Although I was one of the close friends who was privy to Alan’s illness and visited him as he faded, I could not reconcile myself to his absence . . . Alan was undoubtedly one of Britain’s greatest actors. His distinctive languid voice and his sublime ability to embody the characters he played made him truly exceptional. - The most loving, generous man in the world, with such charm he made everyone weak at the knees. Such wit, such a sense of humour and kindness that surpassed anything I had ever witnessed before. https://www.theguardian.com/film/2026/jan/14/i-fell-in-love-with-him-on-the-spot-alan-rickman-remembered-10-years-after-his-death

The basic concept may have come from Japan but if you are used to Jomtien host bars, don't go anywhere near one in Japan. The reason is twofold. First the best known Tokyo ones are in Shinjuku's Kabukicho district where they are virtually all for young girls. More importantly, you'll need several credit cards and thousands in the bank - of $$ not ¥! The whole point of these bars is not to get close to a girl outside the confines of the bar and not to have sex with the customers - although both occasionally happen. The aim is to develop a relationshp with a girl who will come back to spend time and oodles of cash on booze with you as often as possible. As a host on one youtube video says "These bars are creating Disneyland for customers and they end up believing they need to revolve their whole lives around this Disneyland." This vdo below has been included in these columns before. So it is slightly out of date. It features the No. 1 host in Japan about 7 years ago, but the principle is exactly the same today. The video starts off with the host arriving at his bar in a new white Lamborghini, a present from a customer. Cost? Probably around US$370,000! He makes tons of cash every month from commissions on the huge mark-ups on premium booze. One 19-year old girl who technically cannot drink alcohol in Japan gladly tells the camera that the most expensive bottle of booze she bought in the bar was a Magnum Decanter of Louis XIII Cognac. For this she paid US$110 - in cash!

That I would have "fun" starting a very important discussion for men on the very serious subject of circumcision rather illustrates how you go about writing your frequently barely intelligible posts. You're clearly having fun in your own little world.

Yes, it's bad in Thailand but it is not confined to the rich and powerful. It is endemic. Go around the country and you will discover examples almost everywhere. I doubt if you can divide corruption into the bad and the less bad (is palming a few red bills to an underpaid traffic cop to avoid a traffic ticket corrupt?) but throughout much of Thailand's history those in villages have more or less had to look after themselves. A dependency grows among communities. Put at its simplest, I guess, almost an I scratch your back, you scratch mine mentality develops. Wth democracy it has got much worse amongst the elite and the mega-rich. Against that you have sometimes amazing acts of generosity. It hardly feels like more than seven years since those 12 young boys and their soccer coach were trapped in a northern cave for 17 days. In order to attempt to free them, a massive amount of water had to be pumped out of the cave system. The only place it could go was into the fields of local villagers thereby destroying their crops. The government offered the farmers compensation. All refused it. So many people from all over the globe were participating in the hoped for rescue, they said. The farmers also wanted to help. But Thailand is only one Asian country where corruption is rife. Economically speaking The Philippines has been repeatedly raped by a clutch of ruling families who have become mega-wealthy. Endemic corruption has ruled for decades at the head of Japan's supposedly squeaky-clean government. Hong Kong was virtually a cess-pit of corruption until the government introduced a fully Independent Anti-Corruption Commission (ICAC) with its own police and judiciary in the mid-1970s. Suddenly some of the big players fled the city, including a Chief Justice whose nickname was Brenda, top lawyers, high-placed police officers and civil servants. It quickly cleaned up Hong Kong. Not squeaky clean since major corruption cases still feature in the headlines - but only very occasionally. At the turn of the century when a local newspaper did a poll of Hong Kong residents asking them to nominate the ten best things to have happened in the territory during the previous century. The establishment of the ICAC came in around 6 or 7.

There has now been a second fatal crash, with yet another crane crashing to the ground. This time on an expressway construction in Samut Sakhon not far from Bangkok. This time a crane collapsed on to a highway. Two dead so far. Death toll in the earlier crash involving the train stands at 32 according to the BBC website as of about three hours ago. https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c20g7n7yd9do

Oh, my goodness! Who would have known? Do you now expect us to bow before you since you are obviously so clever - but clearly just amongst a certain specified group of people! Rabbit away!

That's bullshit! I listed continents merely for convenience as is perfectly obvious to all except @Riobard. If he wants a list of all countries he'd be the last person to read it! The vast majority of doctors in the USA is going to continue to prescribe circumcision for various reasons, medical and otherwise, and then lining their pockets when they issue the bills for their services. Earlier you write - And you had the gall to quote proportionality! When a President or some other person wins a vote involving hundreds of millions of people, the winning percentile is usually in the 0.5% to 5% or so, rarely higher. Yet with a propoortion of over 20% against circumcision worldwide and with at least one million of those in the "pro" camp electing for the procedure on religious or cultural grounds, you consider this has yet to yield a consensus? Well! Well! Well! Better advise the dictionary compilers of the new meaning of concensus!

Haha! @Olddaddy on the vengeance trail! It will become a predictable pattern.

Allegedly it's already started. The Construction Company came out quickly and said compensation would immediately be offered. But what can compensate for the loss of a young life? And how much will be offered. Pretty much a pittance is my guess. It reminds me of that hit-and-run murder of a traffic policeman on Sukhumvit at 5:00 in the morning. He had ben driving at over 100 kph and found to have drugs and alcohol in his system. The driver was eventually apprehended after his mega-rich Yoovihaya family had ried to persuade the authorities that one of the family's drivers had actually been at the wheel - of a Ferrari? Estimates are the car was being driven at 174 kph. The policeman's body was dragged for over 100 meters. The driver was Vorayuth Yoovihaya whose grandfather had been in at the start of the Red Bull empire and was one of Thailand's richest men. For 8 years he failed to turn up to scheduled court hearings on his arrest warrant, yet at the same time was seen galivanting around the world by means of a private jet. He was even seen in Thailand more than once. 12 years after the event, the Justice Department finally got around to jailing just seven functionaries. As a Bangkok Post article wrote on 1 April 1917 - The boss walks free. The boss is the boss. The boss dines in France and snow­boards in Ja­pan. The boss rules the road and tram­ples the law. In the pyra­mid of priv­i­lege, the boss stays on top. In the food chain of in­jus­tice . . . The degree of corruption in this case is mind-boggling. It had Thai social media up in arms several times. But this is Thailand - one law for the rich, one for the poor and tourists. The statute of limitations on all of those crimes has long passed. Freedom for that family was a matter of pennies! And Thailand's rich look after themselves. That is why inner city expresways are carved up amongst several companies. Not for the sake of economy - not a bit of it. Purely so that more poiticians and others can get their hands on a decent chunk of the profits. As for the poor widow of the murdered policeman, Wichian Klanprasert, and her children? The maximum the family was prepared to offer was Bt. 3 million, this for the life of a 47 year old Police Sergeant Major and given on condition the grieving widow did and her children not bring any form of criminal charges against members of the Yoovihaya family - yet another mega-injustice.

I'm not saying we should now be quaking in our flip flops. Merely that we should be aware of surroundings at all times. I suppose that actually applies to every situation but especially if you are in a place likely to be filmed by some and you do not want others to see what might just go somewhere on the internet.

In the meantime, the camera still has your face on it prior to your noticing it and going up to put your hand on it. In fact it is likely to have a close up of your face! Not concerned? Unless you mean outright sex, given the developments of the last ten years, is it not likely that some click-bait idiot is going to extend the boundaries and eventually start a more detailed "expose" of the gay business? Sadly I'd put money on it!

Yesterday afternoon a construction crane working on an overhead railway collapsed and fell onto a moving train below. The train was en route from Bangkok to Ubon Ratchathani and was quite close to its destination. Passengers were mostly students and manual workers. 32 were killed and 66 others injured. After being crushed, some carriages caught fire. 171 were aboard the train. Local outlet The Nation reported that the incident occurred while the crane was lifting a large concrete section which dropped on to the train, causing several coaches to derail . . . "Accidents like this can only happen due to negligence, skipped steps, deviations from the design, or the use of incorrect materials," [Prime Minister] Anutin said. The crane was being used to build an overhead railway that is part of a US$5.4bn (£4bn) China-backed project to link Bangkok with neighbouring Laos, where a Chinese-built high-speed line is already running to south-western China . . . It seems that the Italian-Thai Development company was in charge of that section of the overhead railway construction. Typically in Thailand major infrasructure projects are farmed out among various companies as a number of politicians are always involved in parcelling out the land. Corruption has always payed its part! One of Thailand's biggest contractors, the company was responsible for the construction of a Bangkok skyscraper that collapsed last March during an earthquake. Last year the company's president and several designers and engineers were charged with professional negligence over that incident. Some have denied wrongdoing. The Chinese embassy in Thailand said that no Chinese construction companies or workers were involved in the collapse, Chinese state media reported. https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/ceqz7v1507ro

I'm not going to do any heavy lifting for anyone, particularly @Riobard whose posts seem to require some sort of parallel understanding of English to understand what they mean. It's all very well posting what seems like a form of gibberish when in fact, once you dig down - do many posters have that available time? - there is more than a modicum of sense. Africa can do what it wants when it comes to circumcision. The USA can do what it wants. It tried circumcision colonialism with South Korea and that is now dying on the vine. A very considerable majority of the world remains uncircumcised and for @unicorn even to suggest that those countries where it is not practiced and whose health authorities have made concious decisions after their own research not to promote it as indulging in BS is - well, quite frankly - BS of a pretty high order. Is any of these countries complaining? Only @unicorn complains.

I believe this is the case with this Board. Ten posts? That used to be the case and just asume it remains so.

I'm wondering if there is much difference between the Soi Twilight in Bangkok of old and JC in Pattaya now. I recall sitting at Dick's Cafe or after it closed outside one of the host bars near the entrance to Soi Twilight seeing people taking photos and no-one being concerned about it. Admittedly I'm talking about 6 years ago. I guess the main difference is that many of the venues in Twilight were indoors, but near the entrance to the soi there were several host bars. I sometimes saw tourists taking pics of the soi from Suriwong and not venturing inside. I assume they could then just show the photos to friends as Bangkok 'sights'. Is it more that JC has more volume? Why would a tourist be more concerned being seen with a boy in a JC bar but not seen in roughly similar circumstances in a Twilight bar a few years ago? There was quite a lot of fawning of customers in those host bars.

I'm not! And not just for the advent of mobile phones LOL.