sglad

You're hilarious! Sarcasm becomes you. *hugs* I'm still a soldier but in the reserve army. Does that make you harder? I served in the army as part of compulsory National Service, not by choice.

We all go a little mad sometimes. Haven't you?

People always mean well. They cluck their thick tongues, and shake their heads and suggest, oh, so very delicately!

Perhaps Freeguy didn't have any 8" and above on staff and didn't want to disappoint you? Circle Pub is still running as far as I know but I've only been there once. No hands-on action (thank god) but there is nudity during showtime. And I don't understand those mismatched shirts and ties. A body-fitting white tee and jeans would look much better on the guys.

As you should as he created Adam. I should have known you were religious; all that kneeling and bobbing up and down.

Happy Golden Anniversary! Thanks for sharing.

I guess that would depend on the life you lead and the availability and willingness to partake in alternative experiences. This wasn't in reference to you. Sorry if my quoting your entire post gave that impression. I'm not much of a PM person either. I was referring to the tendency by some people to cite private PMs that allegedly support their point of view to buttress their arguments in the open forum. Thank you. My initial introduction to Thailand was many years ago with my family and we made the the usual trips to Phuket, Bangkok, Hatyai and Chiang Mai-Chiang Rai. My first trip as an adult was with my army mates when I was 19 and that was when I was smitten with the Land of Smiles. When I came home I enrolled in a disastrous 30-hour beginners' Thai course at a community centre. It was filled with "uncles" who were Thailand regulars and already had a fair amount of vocabulary and I was trailing far behind. But I didn't give up and have had more than 250 hours of Thai lessons since then, not including a five-week homestay experience in Bangkok last year. I wouldn't say that I have "enjoyed an incredibly wide variety of experiences" but I do make the most of every day I am in Thailand. I'm on summer break now and working on a research paper so I have more time than usual to insert comments here and there as I work through the night, with plenty of youtube, fb and other distractions. But yeah, my learning curve has been pretty sharp; I guess that comes from having a constantly full plate during term time. Classes, sports, volunteer work, excursions, social and night life - it can get pretty crazy but not that different from my life in Sg but with less competition & stress and a lot more fun. And I have learnt a lot in the process, through a combination of life experiences (mine and others'), a natural curiosity and the smarts and sensitivity to process what's happening to and around me. I guess I wouldn't be learning as much if I were to sit around in cafes and bars staring into a beer for two hours and hoping the waiter or waitress would catch my eye and start a conversation with me. I'm not sure that I understand you. Why would I want to be with much younger guys? I'm not a paedo. And you flatter me too much. I think I do OK on the dating and social circuit but I don't know about being "quite in demand". Yeah, taking part in this forum is yet another fun aspect of being in Thailand and hasn't taken too much effort. But I participate on my own terms: how, when and what I post is up to me. Awww stop. I'm not "hot" at all. And the privilege wasn't yours to have as the remark wasn't addressed at you.

It is sad when a mother has to speak the words that condemn her own son. I can't allow them to think I would commit murder. They'll put him away now as I should have years ago. He was always bad and in the end he intended to tell them I killed those girls and that man, as if I could do anything but just sit and stare like one of his stuffed birds. They know I can't move a finger and I want to just sit here and be quiet just in case they suspect me. They're probably watching me. Well, let them. Let them see what kind of a person I am. I'm not even going to swat that fly. I hope they are watching... they'll see. They'll see and they'll know, and they'll say, "Why, she wouldn't even harm a fly..."

I don't see how any attempt at co-relating the level of activity of one poster with the behaviour of another poster can be anything but unscientific. Words like "benefit", "better poster", "troll", and "trolling" are all very subjective and can be easily manipulated depending on what one seeks to justify. "Troll" seems to be the new catch-all phrase to encompass anyone who dares to criticise or disagree with one's post or point of view or worse, not cooing in admiration over one's exploits. Sticking the troll label without engagement in the issue at hand may be easy and convenient but in my opinion it is intellectually lazy and betrays a lack of imagination. Perhaps the reason why we may not be paying attention when a prolific poster goes missing can be drawn from an analogy between me and my favourite TV show Mad Men (read: John Hamm). It was fun when it lasted but now that it has gone off the air, it doesn't really make a difference to my life. Same same when Game of Thrones finally goes off the air. Hard as it may be to believe for some, life will and does go on without trip reports and it is disingenuous to suggest that a private revolution is brewing over this via PM. Fine that your huge ego can't handle a little pressure on the forum but attributing others with the same malaise when a public examination is not possible is not very persuasive. And these incessant threats to stop posting if one doesn't have one's way is getting old; primary school old. Post if you wanna post, don't post if you don't wanna. Just know that as with everything else in life, you can't predict or insist on a particular outcome for your efforts. Keep crying wolf and after a while people will start hoping that the wolf will come eat you.

No pun intended, I'm sure.

I see Amal Clooney is not the only one expecting twins.

Geez, bucknaway, you didn't encourage the guy to aim high, did you? Jokes aside, maybe ThaiAdvisor had wanted to post in the personals section and got re-routed here by mistake? I know I got a bit confused when signing up.

Nice and that is indeed surprising. I can't speak for others, but in my short life, I've met all sorts of people, some good, some not so good and each encounter, each experience goes into my personal social skills repository that I can draw upon if need be to better manage subsequent encounters both virtual and real. Upbringing and army training have helped too. I don't have perfect encounters, the people I meet are not perfect and I'm not perfect. Every experience is a learning one and I still have a lot of fun. That is life.

It's OK, Norm. We know a boy's best friend is his mother. Is that tote bag a hand-me-down from your mum too?

a447a has raised some good points. I joined because I thought this board was thriving. The turnover of posts on this board is quite fast and the front page rarely looks the same for long, unlike the other forums where they can remain quite static for days and weeks. So who are these members who have now become shy of posting because of alleged trolling, resulting in a loss of "helpful, practical and usable information" (all subjective)? If they had been substantial contributors who had made some kind of impact, their absence would be very noticeable and long-time members would be able to name them easily. I'm no jet-setting world traveller who can afford to travel half way across the world four or five times a year but I stuck it out when I didn't exactly receive a warm welcome when I first joined. You would think all that travel, hard partying and meeting all sorts of different people would result in a thicker skin and tolerance for all sorts of different personalities in real life, let alone anonymous characters on the Internet so I don't get this all this drama; to me, it doesn't match the man-about-town personas being described in the reports. My impression is a lot more people enjoy these trip reports than those who don't as expressed verbally on the open forum, through 'likes' and via PM as repeatedly claimed. If so, what's the problem then? How much more encouragement is needed? "No holes spared" report you mean.

I don't know how far this is true but one of the boys I play football with is Shan (Tai-Yai) and he says those who have come into the country illegally (or came in legally but overstayed) can leave the country with the help of contacts from within the immigration police itself. They pay between 2,000B and 5,000B per person to ride in this contact's car which gets waived on at checkpoints right until they reach Tachileik on the other side.

Welcome to the board, ThaiAdvisor. I hope you find what you're looking for.

I have never been to Free Guy and don't know anything about it but don't take offence when you are told by a Thai venue that a "place is not for farangs". It could simply mean that they do not have the resources to cater to someone who doesn't speak Thai and you would thus not enjoy it as much. If it's a karaoke venue, it would usually start very late and Thais would invariably come in groups and make their own entertainment (singing, snacking, shouting, generally being silly and groping a karaoke host in the process). They wouldn't know what to do with a farang who comes alone and expects to be entertained. However, if you can get a group going, things can get really wild in a private karaoke room. I went to this place somewhere near the Airport Plaza with Thai friends and a couple of Japanese girls and the two hosts who served us were practically stripped down to their underwear as night turned to morning, happily showing off for tips and letting the girls grope them. Unfortunately the all-out orgy didn't happen but I was pretty happy with all the cross-groping, tongue-slipping and inappropriate touching.

Wow, so much drama! Glad that you're alright and nothing untoward happened.

I know three so-called "100% gay" Thai guys who are married to women, one of them is quite fem and all three have kids. People get married for various reasons and from reading these boards and getting to know real-life couples over the past year, love and sexual attraction often have little to do with it! New My Way and Circle Pub have full frontal nudity as well during showtime, at least there was when I went. You say there are only "a few gay bars left in the area". Were there more than three before? I was under the impression that the numbers haven't changed much over the years. Somebody told me there's also a very late-night karaoke joint very close to Circle Pub called Barroco but I've never been. Transport should really not be a problem. All the bars will have a regular tuk-tuk they can call upon. Or just Uber it.

The king was in his counting house, counting out his money... The queen was walking past, waiting to lick his honey...

You were??? Which board was this? I'm surprised you still took the risk of going to Pattaya after all that - I guess contrary to what you said in the Chiang Mai update thread, the cock does come first, you James Bondage you.

Agreed. If I were to throw in the towel everytime I got a bad grade after putting my blood, sweat and tears into an assignment or, a flop performance after having rehearsed for weeks and months or, lost a match after having put in my heart and soul into the game, then I might as well just go live in Barbie's dollhouse and play with my imaginary friends who all love and adore me. If you publish something in the public domain, there are bound to be people who like it, those who don't like it and a lot of people who simply don't care or have an opinion about it. And somebody who liked something I wrote last week, may not like what I published this week or disagree with aspects of it, and that's normal. Disagreeing with something is not trolling and one can either choose to ignore the criticism or address it. I didn't know baobao had a blog but after reading his sensible post above, I'm definitely going to check it out. Goes to show you can be successful at something by doing it bao bao without this constant need for "stroking" or "fishing for compliments".

Depends on what you mean by 'gay' bars? If you mean bars with boys available for pay there are a few. Go go bars: Adam's Apple, Circle, New My Way. Bars with freelancers: Orion, Secrets. Not sure about Pandee and Ram. The thing is freelancers come in a variety of forms. The tattooed guy playing snooker could be a freelancer but so could the guy in the business shirt or the student with a backpack.

"Done with aplomb". Nice. I have never heard anyone use "aplomb" in contemporary usage and you did without sounding pretentious. I think the late Mrs Lee Kuan Yew used it to describe her husband as a young man - the man she fell in love with - but she's from a different world/era.