hojacat

Well, Taipei has quite a few clubs that host monthly dance parties with go-go boys, like C.U.M at Pipe Live Music, WERK! at Triangle, G Star or Candy Land at Studio 9. Pretty much something like this:https://youtube.com/shorts/LxXmutu0_Ig?feature=share Not sure if you meant places where you can actually transact a meeting outside the club with the go-go boys. I don't think many of them do that in Taipei and for those that do, you are expected to fork out way much more than you do in Thailand.

Thanks for the website @PeterRS. It has a pretty good summary with all the info you would want to know especially for saunas and clubs (what kind of crowd, any special event and what's the best time to go). There are some small things missing here and there ( like not mentioning that R3 in BKK is mostly famous for it's O-parties) but overall can be very useful. Reading the descriptions felt more like first-hand notes from a person visiting those venues, so i might be wrong and I know the site is based in London but I think the creator is probably a Taiwanese guy (the site is also offered in Chinese) and the venues listed there are mostly from his personal experience. If that's the case the only essential thing lacking from those reviews is the degree of "sticky rice" or "potato queen" found in the crowd of each of those places. Anyway, I'm surprised I haven't heard of XL Club sauna in Taipei. Probably because it's not really close to Ximending. Have to ask my friends and maybe give it a try since I''ll be there for more than a week at the end of this month for the pride parade.

Yeah, I’ve heard the same thing. Almost all of them from Eastern Europe, especially Russia and Ukraine. A Thai friend of mine who is upper-middle class told me last time that he hired two white mb for his birthday.

As you said the preference for lighter skin is not found just in Thailand, but it’s pretty common all over Southeast Asia, including a good portion of southern China. I think most of the Chinese guy probably are after fair-skin Thais. I’ve known a few darker ones who go with foreigners mostly because the locals look a bit down on them, but they usually go after Westerners, as the success rate is usually much higher than pursuing other Asians. I think the high number of “ foreign only” profiles you see on gay apps in Thailand has more to do with the high presence of xenophilia among gays in there, which is usually taken to more extremes that in neighboring countries. Most of my fwbs in places like Vietnam, Taiwan, HK, etc don’t mind messing around with both foreigners and locals but in Thailand I only know 1-2 guys that play with other Thai guys, The others straight out say that they don’t like Thais and most of them are tall, fair skin guys who wouldn’t have problems getting other locals.

I've been quite surprised in my last 2-3 visits to Thailand of how much popular Chinese guys are on gay apps. Not just on Blued but even on Grindr which tend to be more used by Thais looking for Westerners, I see every time profiles with "Looking for Chinese only" on them. Have to agree though that a large number of Chinese guys coming from big cities from a middle or upper-middle-class background can be quite sexy and attractive. They definitely take care of themselves and their bodies.

It's a tough race to determine who is the most submissive between Thai or Taiwanese twinks. I'm surprised no one has mentioned HCMC so far. I don't really engage into paying sex, but I'm always surprised to see so many mbs profiles on Grindr and Blued when I'm in Saigon, definitely way more than in KL or Singapore. Also, to the best of my knowledge, the rates tend to be even lower than in Thailand.

I just spent around 10 days in HK at the end of May of this year. Last time I was there it was a few years ago and I remembered how great Hutong was. So i definitely wanted to check it out again. My impression is that the facilities continue to remain top-notch and really clean. Crowd-wise though, that allure of exclusivity that Hutong used to have ( and the discriminatory entry policy that came with it) are now gone. Out-of-shape or guys in their 40s and 50s make up a good chunk of the crowd now. (A local twink I hooked up with told me explicitly: "I don't go to Hutong anymore, too many uncles in there"), Having said that, it still attracts a huge crowd, so you can find plenty of cute local twinks, if you're into that. Plenty of group action or just watching in the inner dark rooms. Price is a bit steep, around 258 HKD. Went there on a Saturday night at around 7:45 PM. It was already quite full. Peak crowd was reached around 9:00PM. It got so packed, almost should-to-shoulder. People started to leave from around 10-10:30PM. Had fun with 3 guys in cabins but played with 3-4 more in the dark rooms. Overall, I would still rank it in my top 5 saunas and definitely the best in HK. A note of interest about Hutong: it has one night when guys U-25 can enter for free. I saw the sign at the entrance advertising that. Most of it was in Chinese, so I just assumed that day was actually Saturday. However, I was with a local guy on Monday night and as were on the bed talking, i mentioned Hutong and he goes and says: "well, you should have gone tonight, young guys enter for free" I replied by saying that I saw the sign and that I assumed that was on Saturday. He replies: "It's definitely not Saturday, I think it's Monday" So If I was you I would do more research and then maybe try to also go on a Monday, beside the weekend. The next day after Hutong, I also visited two more saunas in HK, both near Causeway Bay. The first one, My Way sauna, according to what I read online was supposed to be popular with the young and in-shape crowd that weren't happy anymore with Hutong. They recommend to go on a Sunday evening as it's naked night. The reviews also mentioned that it was the most "sticky rice" of all the saunas. I get there around 6:00PM. The place is actually quite small, but what was worse was that there weren't more than 15 people in the whole sauna and around 5-6 of them were definitely not young but more around in their late 40s. Everyone was in-shape at least. Stayed there around 1.5 hours. Only 3 more people came during that period. There was pretty much no action in the whole sauna. Just people standing and walking around. Left a bit disappointed and decided to head to Soda Sauna, 5 minutes walk from My Way. The online reviews for it were also very good. Found the place not much bigger than the previous sauna but there were around 50 people in there. However, I ended up being the youngest guy in there. Mostly were mid-to-late 40s, but you could see some in their 60s. Stayed only around 35 minutes in there. Only when I was all dressed up and handled my key, a cute twink enters the sauna. We exchange looks for a good minute but it was already too late for me. So it's clearly I had the best time at hutong but there is a chance than the other two saunas are also good ( and cheap, in both I paid only 100HKD) and I just went at the wrong time or day so you might want to try them for yourself. I have read that Gateway sauna is also quite popular. HK has quite a high number of gay saunas actually, quite the opposite to Taipei where Soi13 has no direct rivals (Han's Men aims mostly to mature guys). This though sometimes it's not advantageous as it just spreads out the crowd, while in Taipei you know where to go if you are into local young guys. Anyway, if you end up going to any sauna in HK, please write a report on this site, as it's definitely lacking that kind of info for a great city like HK.

This is definitely going to be a hit with the gay crowd of the Atlantis cruises. They usually use the Oasis-class ships of Royal Caribbean for their cruises from Fort Lauderdale/Miami in early February. It's definitely their most popular one. It gets sold out months in advance.

As a slim guy in my early 30s who loves going to gay saunas all over Asia, I would consider guys between 45-60 yo, in-shape and well-endowed as my main competitors in there when it comes to scoring on bottom Asian twinks. I find myself on the losing side or waiting longer for my turn more often that I would like to admit, so there is definitely a demand for sexy Western daddies in Asia. I also see every time I go saunas like soi13 in Taipei or R3 in BKK, 2-3 guys clearly over-70 and in what can be considered bad physical shape. Not sure how successful they are in there. I always assume they just go for the atmosphere and the great eye candies offered in those places, but who knows.

That's actually a great. Personally, I always found CX to have the best food among the 5-stars airlines, even slightly better that the gourmet meals you can order on ANA. There is also this: https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/transport/article/3231306/hong-kongs-cathay-pacific-offer-100000-discounted-tickets-reveals-nearly-hk293-million-dividends I guess a good reason to visit or revisit HK, if all the reasons we mentioned above weren't enough.

I agree. Returned over there in May for a week after a few years and still had a great time. The city, the landscape, the food and definitely the guys are all amazing. focused more especially on the new venues in West Kowloon which were still under-construction when i last visited HK. You will end up paying the same as in Singapore, but I prefer HK over it. If you choose the right time of year the weather is also much more pleasant than in Singapore.

That's pretty sad. Seems like he had a pretty aggressive form of infection. I hope this event encourages his friends and others that knew him to get tested more often and take care of themselves.

I would consider Mania as pretty farang-friendly for what is worth it. Being in Silom, there is always a good number of westerns and I always found the local guys always being pretty welcome to them. It's kinda small, though and the facilities are a bit subpar. I think it's only worth it during their event-nights.

Wouldn't though in this day and age be safer to have bare sex with a farang than with a local guy? You would assume a farang that can afford to travel or live in Thailand, has the wisdom and can afford to get tested, take prep or get medications and become undetectable if he is already HIV+. However, it's also true that in some farang groups, like Ukrainians and Russians, who have a big presence in Pattaya, HIV+ rates tend to be high as the stigma associated with homosexuality and HIV in their countries make them less prone to get tested or treated. I guess it's even more difficult for non-Thai guys, with sometimes not fully-legal immigration status. They can't access the free or subsidized Prep and treatments that Thai nations can. I wonder if there is any NGO on the field that does community outreach and offers free services to everyone? Since gay saunas were mentioned, I remember both Soi13 in Taipei and Hutong in HK offering free rapid HIV tests in their rest areas during the busiest evening hours. Haven't seen something like that in any gay sauna in Thailand but I don't go that often in those kind of venues in Thailand. Maybe some of the more regular customers can tell if it actually happens.

Thanks @PeterRS for this long reply. Btw, here is an article about the author I mentioned above talking about Obelisks and its closing. It's pretty much the same as what he describes in his book. It contains some of the points you talk about like Obelisks being far, Purachai's campaign etc. Overall an interesting reading: https://dooneyscafe.com/a-spanking-for-sin-city/.

Wasn't a police raid what caused the closure of the gay sauna called "Obelisks" in Bangkok, though I think it happened a few years earlier than the raid Of Babylon you're talking about? I just remember reading about it in a book called "The Rice Queen Diaries" by this gay Canadian author that worked 3 years in BKK for The Nation. He was there the night of the raid and describes it in one of the chapter of his book. Seems like "Obelisks" was one of the highest-ranked gay saunas of the time, probably on par or even higher than Babylon. wonder what was the reason that Babylon survived the raid and Obelisks didn't? Was it the perseverance of its owner, his political connections or just that the advent of the internet had already transformed Babylon into an institution for gay tourists? Because of my age I don't remember hearing or reading about any of this events. The only police raid in Bangkok of a gay venue that I know is of G.O.D, which was closed because of the high activity of drug use happening in there.

If you read my postings about Vietnam , you know I recommend big international chains when it comes to hotels because some of the smaller local boutique ones end up having strange rules for guests, close reception after midnight, etc. It's also worth noting that because there is a smaller presence of international hotel brands in HCMC sometimes their rates might end up being even higher than BKK, even though overall HCMC is cheaper than BKK. I would recommend Intercontinental in Saigon or if you want to stay close to the river, then Le Meridien. Wouldn't recommend walking around too much around that area at night though. Have heard bad stories from some of my friends.

Both Krubb and R3 (and sometimes Mania, which is owned by the same people as R3) throw Orgy parties which usually go for 1-2 hours on a regular schedule. In both cases the price of entrance covers the entrance to the party and the right to have sex with performers, though the performer can say no to a paying guest if he really doesn't like it. I think Krubb put more on their website about which models they are having a given night. For the ones at R3, I guess you can ask the staff. I asked once a performer if he wanted to exchange line accounts, but he said no and if I wanted to see him again, I should have to go to R3 again. I'm kinda young though and don't pay for sex. I guess if you mention that you want to pay him, the answer might be really different. Personally, I prefer the o-parties at R3. I've only been to Krubb once, in August of last year on an orgy night but felt that their party was a bit disorganized, plus you don't have mattresses where to have sex on like you have at R3. On a side note, what's the mask situation at BKK's saunas at the moment? When I went to Krubb, 95% of guys was wearing a mask inside. It was better when I went to the o-parties at Mania for NYE, but even there you would see about 25-30% with a mask on, even when going into a foam party where you could hardly breathe. In May, I saw way less people wearing a mask on the streets and malls of BKK, but didn't go to any sauna. Hope using a mask in a sauna is a thing even in BKK now. At the saunas in Taipei and HK that I've been this year, you could only count 2-3 guys in a total that were still wearing a mask.

Which makes that list even more difficult to comprehend, as a lot of those destinations can't really be associated or considered destinations attracting high net-worth individuals. I mean you would imagine to see St. Bart's or the Cayman Islands instead of Oaxaca and Guadalajara, with all due respect for those two places. Personally if I have to come up with this kind of lists, I would definitely have them divided by category: big cities, small towns, big natural park/attraction, big historical/cultural site as you can't really compare Petra where you would spend at the most 1-2 days with a place like Paris and Tokyo. They are just two different things. A bit like comparing a poem with a historical saga like War and Peace.

Reminded me of this:

Judging by the high number of Mexican destinations, I would conclude most the voters were Americans and/or Canadians. Personally in Mexico, I only enjoy CDMX. Other places and I've been both on the Pacific and the Atlantic coast, don't appeal much to me. Maybe because I'm not really into neither Mexican food or guys. Plus safety is always a concern. I have been to 20 of the places mentioned in the article, but only I would consider only 2-3 of them in my personal Top 25 and I think there is a universal agreement among the people of this forum that BKK is in the list of each of us.

Gardasil works best when administered to a person who hasn't become sexually active yet. It's efficiency diminishes a lot when given to a person already infected with HPV. Yes, it's supposed to lower the frequency and severity of the warts outbreak, even on a person already infected with HPV but not that significantly and works differently from person to person. That's why I think it's a bit of a hard sell for most of the Thai guys we meet (including those that don't engage in transactional sex). To the best of my knowledge, there is no Asian country that offers Gardasil for free to adult males. It has to be bought privately and the price can be a bit steep.

I visited Koror and Tivat in 2021. As Russians and Ukrainians used to make the biggest portion of that country tourist base, Hornet was the app to use. Remember meeting this cute Russian couple but who were living in Germany. Not sure where the tourists are mostly from now with the war going on.

This is also my favorite version. It's actually a French/Italian co-production, something very common between the 60-80s. Tognazzi is one of the biggest name of Italian comedy, even though he is not much known internationally. Some of his characters like Il Conte Mascetti from the movie Amici Miei are universally known in Italy with movie quotes still used in everyday language. The soundtrack is from the great Ennio Morricone and the beautiful cinematography from Armando Nannuzzi who also did work on Visconti's Ludwig and Zeffirelli's Jesus of Nazareth. The translation and the Italian dubbing is also of very high quality. Italians have one of the best dubbing schools in the world as up to the late 70s they used to dub not only foreign movies but even Italian ones. Great masters like Fellini, De Sica will only add sound and voice in post-production. Plus, the cast of actors tended to be very international, so even later one dubbing in Italian movies was deemed necessary. Just a Youtube video from the dubbing of Fellini's Casanova. Just to show the intense work that used to go into it (sorry, it's all in Italian):

The restaurant in there is also very experience, much more than other 3-stars restaurants in cities like Hong Kong and Singapore. I guess being the only one in Taiwan with that recognition lets them go away with it.