PeterRS

The vdos and photos seem to have been posted over a period of about 6 or more months. From those I saw, definitely not all were twinks, although they were in the majority. What I did find was that as far as the vdos were concerned, all the boys seemed to be having a great deal of fun both with the customers and amongst themselves. The sort of fun that used to be common in the bars in Bangkok a few decades ago and which has all but disappeared now.

Apparently it is not so common to see them in Shenzen. Most people that go there come from Hong Kong and as customers the writer says they can be quite difficult!! But the KTV places can be found in major cities in the hinterland like Chengdu, Chongqing and Hefei.

On the tumblr sites that are now banned, there were some vdos of Chinese KTV karaoke joints where the boys were not just serving. They were totally naked for most of the evenings and got up to some quite naughty things! They were far raunchier that almost any gogo bar in Thailand. I asked some Shanghai friends about these. They told me there are maybe 3 in Shanghai but they are located in the suburbs and westerners would not be encouraged to visit them. Apparently they are also to be found in quite a number of other Chinese cities. If anyone is interested and has loads of time on their hands, an overseas Chinese studying at a University in the Netherlands wrote a long thesis on these bars. This includes interviews with the boys, the mamasans and the owners. The title of the thesis is "Space, Sexuality and Power: Producing a Gay KTV in China" and it was written in the summer of 2016.The website is http://edepot.wur.nl/403488 If only for the interviews, it makes interesting reading. Here is one quote from a foreman (mamasan) which shows that the way they are able to operate is similar to Thailand.

I tried to go during the Christmas/New Year period. The queue for the shuttle boat at Saphan Thaksin stretched back well over 100 yards. I gave up! After New Year friends and I decided to go for dinner by taking a taxi across the bridge. No wrong turns but desperate traffic jams. I guess that is due to the subway construction but when a traffic light takes about 3 minutes to change and immediately thereafter 4 lanes merge into one, it really is a hard slog getting there.

I reckon the problem with the distinction between truth and fiction is not that chat rooms should rely wholly on truth. That would be impossible. As with the bunch of friends mentioned by bucknaway earlier in the thread, there may well be an element of falsehood in a story to ginger it up, to make our friends feel we have more success at sex than they, or we are better at our work coz we got a raise. Thats pretty standard banter. IMO it is different if one of the friends outlines a completely false story. In the telling there is likely to be the odd nudge and wink interspersed with the narrative and eventually it is likely the narrator will burst out laughing before he gets to the end as he sees his friends being taken in. So all ends well. The problem in a chat room where a respected long standing member starts a thread that is totally false - no matter that it is a repetition of old threads or is outrageous in its implications - there are no nudges and winks unless smilies are used. In the OP here, no smilies were used. Without them, what are most members supposed to think? Naturally that it is the truth. Popping white or other lies into an existing thread is perhaps not unusual, but starting a thread that is a total lie is, again in my view, not merely silly. It is dangerous. Dangerous because it opens the floodgates for others to do the same. And then how does anyone distinguish truth from fiction, the more so when it is an established poster? Trip reports depend to a large extent on accuracy from the reporter. If they become fiction, what happens to gaythailand? All chat rooms have their trolls, hydras and others determined to derail these friendly porch side chats. Thankfully Scooby and Michael have done a great job keeping them off this Board and congratulations to them for that. One or two have crept in but with the exception of Beachlover who hoodwinked several Board moderators and owners for a long time, members here are basically genuine. I certainly hope it can be kept that way. Cheers!

Am I the only one to find it extremely difficult reconciling these two quotes? In the first, reader states - not implies - that it is "necessary" to distinguish between fact and fiction. In the second, he states that "fact" may not indeed be fact. So who is supposed to trust whom? The implication is that readers (sic) are not supposed to trust what any poster writes here.

Here is a perfect example of what i was writing just as this post above appeared. I enjoyed the discussion. I thoroughly dislike the deception. Future contributions for both posters now go on a 'suspect' list. That is IF what reader just wrote is true! And for me that is itself suspect, How could concocting a story that has been told and written about several times before take an entire week to dream up? Thats pretty unbelievable!

Sorry reader, but anyone who expects the truth every time they read a gay chat forum is in the wrong place. Truth requires more than a degree of trust and verification. How can 90% or more of what is written in such forums be verified? It cant. All we can do is base what we read on the posting history of the relevant poster and make our own assumptions based on that history. Of course we want to believe that what we read is the truth. But most of us dont even know any of the other posters. Looking at the three main Thailand chat rooms it is obvious that some posters are very far from what they claim. I have written that I live in Bangkok. Do you have any proof of that? If anyone asks if I would like to meet up for a drink and I say Ill be too busy, can that be considered the truth - or an attempt to disguise the truth, that truth being that I actually live in Madison Wisconsin but part of my conscious being wants to be in Bangkok? some time ago a least three Boards put up with a troll named Beachlover for well over a year each. This poster claimed to be a mid-20s successful Sydney-based Asian who suddenly appeared, gingered up discussions for a while with discussions of his luxury trips to Asia every few months, before boring the pants off most readers who eventually realised he was a fake, and then he disappeared into the ether. I dont think Beachlover has every been identified. Whoever he is (or was), I suspect he had a big laugh every day. Other fake personas still exist. That is just part and parcel of Board life. But if a persona is fake, how can his posts be trusted, no matter how genuine they seem? Chat rooms thrive on anonymity. I cant see that will ever change. Thus what is written and by whom it is written will always require more than a generous pinch of salt.

I love the story and all the comments. Like others, IF it is true and both parties were happy, then good on them. But this sentence gave me pause. There is clearly a reason for anyone who has fallen out with a life-long friend. And that could well lead to stories being spread which are embellished at best and false at worst.

Lol x 2! Kind of you even to mention it ceejay.

It was Reader whose post mentioned Han Wang. I think Lee Ayu Chuepa from the tiny village in the far north mentioned in my post above is exceptional. This is an excerpt from a media interview he did last year. He talks about the young people in the villages who in the past would have had little future - https://www.bangkokpost.com/lifestyle/interview/1445578/the-5th-wave-of-coffee Lee's priorities are less commercial than they are social, although both more or less go together. His is such an extraordinary and lovely story.

This thread from last year has some interesting and inspiring info re excellent coffee from north of Chiang Mai.

Great new layout. Wish you lots of luck and more posters in future.

forty 123 if you go to Cambodia and miss Angkor Wat and several other temples in that amazing complex, you will kick yourself for a very long time! I would spend two full days in PP and then three full days in Siem Reap making 6 in total to include travel. So what if Siem Reap does not have a large gay scene? You will make up for it in Patts I am sure.

It is not only Thailand immigration you have to worry about. All airlines know the rules and some implement them. I have twice been asked at my departure airport for a copy of my ticket out of the country. After making a bit of a fuss and showing the agent the number of previous Thai short stay entry/exit stamps, I was told airlines run the risk of a passenger being denied entry to Thailand. Then they have to fly the passenger back and pay a fine to the Thai authorities. The second time this happened was in Sydney on the return portion of a biz class ticket. I did in fact have a ticket out of Bangkok but the flight was a couple of weeks later and I had not taken the ticket with me. The local airline manager said he had to see the ticket before he would allow me to board. He finally permitted check-in to be completed only after I had signed a waiver and given him a credit card imprint.

Sorry but I find absolutely no difference with the A350 or 787s compared to the old 747s and more recent A380s. I have done several long flights on each. Not one bit of difference for me. The one I dont like is the 777 because many airlines are now cramming too many seats into coach.

According to this year's World Bank figures, Botswana has the third worst income distribution figure of 149 countries! Only South Africa and Namibia are worse. Thailand is listed as 69th worst. https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2018/04/02/598864666/the-country-with-the-worlds-worst-inequality-is

There are almost 200 countries in the world. This poll looks at only 20% of them. How then is it possible to state with any degree of accuracy that Thailand is the most unequal country. It isnt! Sure, the spread of wealth is lousy I know. But is it worse than the Congo, Botswana, Nicaragua, Honduras, Syria, Haiti and so on? I doubt it.

I think that is the early Wednesday evening drinks for guys only at the W Hotel on Sathorn. Frankly unless you already have friends it may be a waste of time. The drink prices are reasonable - 400 baht for free flow prosecco for 3 hours for example. But the Thais tend to come in groups and do not mix. The farang also come with at least one other, look around but likewise rarely mix. If you are a gregarious type of guy you could always introduce yourself as a way to starting a chat. The advice always given here is never buy a condo unit until you know the city well and are certain you plan to stay for a longish time. This is especially true since your retirement seems some years away, Rentals are not expensive. Same with areas. Suanphlu recommended by Faranglaw is a great area but it is not ideal for public transport. And being just off Sathorn the traffic can be terrible at rush hour. On the other hand if you are prepared to take motorcycle taxis, then you can live almost anywhere and get quickly to the subway or Skytrain. My last piece of advice would be to remember that your nocturnal wanderings will only take up about a quarter of your day, probably only a few days a week or less. So you might find living in or close to an entertainment district could be pretty limiting.

I have done the 12 hour time change a few times. Sadly it never gets any easier. If I can make it fit in to work schedules, I try to start the time change over the previous three days, going to bed progressively later each time. On the day of travel, I switch my watch to destination time as soon as I am awake. That might mean I get a bit hungry and tired that day but it is all my way of trying to beat jet lag. On the flight, again I try to eat/sleep at destination time. Most frequent flyers say not to drink alcohol but I need something! So I will have one scotch and then one glass of wine with the meal. Since service at the back of the bus depends on the airline, I often either make or buy at the airport a tasty sandwich and get a piece of fruit. Absolutely no caffeine which can undo all the good you are trying to achieve. Medical advice seems to be to avoid sleeping pills. On such a long trip, I have to take one so I can at least get some sleep. I watch movies, try difficult crossword puzzles and the most difficult sudoku puzzles to while away some time. The end result is that I usually arrive with a near empty stomach. So I eat as much as I want the day I arrive The hard part then is trying to stay awake as evening draws near. But again avoid caffeine as it does strange things to the body clock. Arrival is obviously better at the Thai end when you have the bars to look forward to. After the trip back home I am a wreck because I lack the discipline I have on the outward journey. I figure I will recover eventually.

Just noticed this thread. Yes, Cathay Dragon is the new(ish) name for Dragonair. I reckon the comparison between Air Asias passenger numbers with those of Cathay and Cathay Dragon is pointless. Both the Hong Kong airlines are full service carriers offering in most cases an extensive business class in addition to coach seating, and on some aircraft first class. So relatively it can not pack as many seats into a plane as a low cost carrier. Emirates has recently got rid of first class and about 16 business class seats on some of its A380s. Presumably the old configuration was not selling well. That drop of 38 premium seats has been replaced by 130 coach seats. So those A380s now cary 615 passengers. Air Asia flies probably 90% of flights short haul. CX flies some short haul, some medium and a great deal of long haul services. You can pack around 700 into a 777 for the 2x16 hour legs of a flight to n from New York. In the time it takes for that one aircraft to make the round trip (including its turn around time), one Air Asia aircraft will probably have completed at least 12 flights with over 2,000 passengers. Im not sure about flights ex HKG. But CX flights ex BKK are not necessarily much more expensive than the budget carriers provided you book well ahead. And if you want a full service flight to HKG, there is still the daily Emirates A380 with a fare of 7,760 baht return. That fare gives you a great aircraft with a full 3 course meal and a full baggage allowance at no extra cost. Take Air Asia and the price including baggage and a one hot dish meal selection and the price is 7,290 baht. CX and TG fares are higher, since they have many daily flights covering the route. Both along with Emirates and other full service carriers are part of the international alliances and many fares offer miles and loyalty points. Again, little comparison.

Great restaurant that has maintained its high standards for years. Lovely atmosphere, great staff, wonderful fusion cuisine. Sadly it has become very expensive now. Have eaten there many times. Always had diners at other tables. The restaurant is extremely good with great ambience and medium prices. In a totally different league from the hotel. Smart casual is probably advised. Shorts are OK but I expect flip-flops and T shirts might be frowned upon.

I always take a large cheap towel to put on the bed when using silicone gel. Never had a problem with the hotel sheets. Always prefer silicone to KY.

I really cannot remember what was in the building Jupiter 2018 now occupies before Jupiter took it over. That particular site has frequently been empty for years at a time. Rome Club was located there in the 1980s and a huge success when run as a gay dance club. When the owners at a stroke changed it into a straight club, it died very quickly. Roxy in the early 2000s cannot have lasted more than two years. Anyone remember what was there last year?

I agree the article contains inaccuracies. Stickmans main problem, though, seems to me to be that such a huge development basically covers a block from Rama IV to the Bangkok Christian Hospital on one axis and Silom and even across Suriwong on the other. That is a massive chunk of land, He mentions the possible reluctance of the mega rich family which owns Soi Thaniya. I would like to know who owns the rest of that area. We know that much of the land was purchased by the Patpongpanich family after World War 2. I know it owns the area around Patpong 1 and 2. Does that same family own Soi Thaniya? How about Silom Soi 4? I believe that is owned by the family which still lives on that soi in a mansion behind the gates at the end. Are these members of the Patponpanich clan? The main reason why I think this is mostly pie in the sky is the nearby 41 acre One Bangkok development. This happens to be mostly on the other side of Rama 4, another massive area currently under development encompassing the area between Rama IV, Wireless Road and the expressway entrance. It is this development that will see the demolition of the Dust Thani. One Bangkok has already announced it will include 5 office towers each incorporating a luxury hotel (one being a new Dust Thani), 3 mega luxury residential blocks and a vast area for upmarket retail outlets and additional green areas to complement Lumphini Park.. It is impossible to believe that the developers of One Bangkok will take over a similarly large chunk as suggested by Stickman on the other side of Rama IV for the purpose of building yet more hotels, tower blocks and retail spaces. One Bangkok will come on stream over a period of years finishing in 2025. In my book it is equally impossible that a separate group of developers will take over the Stickman area for the purpose of erecting precisely the same type of facilities. Even though One Bangkok will have a 2 or 3 year head start, it will take years before so much space is fully purchased and rented. Does anyone really believe the market could stand so many new but similar facilities so close and coming on to the market very soon afterwards? I dont. Someone is developing Soi Twilight. If the leases on Soi 4 and the two Patpongs are just for one year, something may be about to happen. But what? And if all the leases are just for one year, why are some businesses still moving in?