TALES from a GAY LIFE (mostly in Asia) – Part 3

[PeterRS]

My view is that it was the opening of gay saunas that led to a certain sameness in most of the gogo bars. Of course that took a while - 2 or 3 years or more - by which time Soi Twilight was seeing a few more gogo bars open, but being naked and hands on in gay saunas was relatively new in Thailand by the mid-1980s. The first I visited was Volt in a side Soi off Asoke. Fairly basic, its novelty lay in the total nudity, I guess. I recall meeting one guy there in 1986 who was the receptionist at a top hotel. We had a fling for a while and I got tickets for us for the 1987 Royal Barge Procession which celebrated the King’s auspicious 60th birthday - a magnificent almost religious occasion. We also spent that New Year’s Eve there. Obelisks soon opened but was less popular with farang, perhaps because it was a tiny building on 10 floors. It did have one lift but you could wait ages for it to reach your floor! And the 10th floor was worth reaching because it had a jacuzzi and some goings on in the dark.

But when Babylon opened at the top of Soi Nanta off Sathorn Soi 1, the game changed. Here was a sauna beautifully decorated and laid out specifically for young Thais in the first instance. At the entrance was a glass case filled with antiques. On the first floor was a restaurant with gentle live music by a guitarist or a flute along with another instrument at the weekends. Western classical music was piped through the building but at a very low level. Elsewhere there were the usual private rooms which were almost always occupied. On the rooftop there were showers at one end, a bar in the middle and many tables and chairs. It was one of the most cruisy spots in the city. On Fridays and Saturdays there were always queues to get in.

Almost as part of the restaurant but curtained off was a room with a largish bed to be used for massage. It was manned by a sweet-faced boy named I believe Gun or Goong. Enjoying a massage there before eating was a joy. 

Eventually an additional part was added with more rooms and a second staircase down to a pleasant coffee shop.  But I suppose it was inevitable that the wealthy owner would seek larger premises. And as we all know, around the turn of the century he opened the bigger sauna with many more facilities in the family compound further down the Soi. I’m not sure why I never enjoyed it as much as I had the earlier version.

By this time I had come to know Heaven - the sauna, that is - when on my first visit I met Thun who was to become a boyfriend for a couple of years and whom I took to Hong Kong for a week. We remained good friends for the rest of his life, enjoying monthly lunches and going occasionally to movies when he was not tied up in a serious love triangle that despite my advice he just would not abandon. He had a small shop in Terminal 21 with the lovely name ‘Happy Closet’! I was so sad when he died in a house fire about 7 years ago. He was a very dear friend.

Soon after Heaven, Chakran opened with its Moroccan theme. It became my new favourite after the Babylon move. To the side of its small pool, there was a bar. I loved sitting with my drink on one of the loungers watching the Thai boys descend down from the floor above on the stairs on the other side of the pool, their towels slung low over their hips. It had the biggest dark room at the time, I believe, which opened out on to a very large square jacuzzi. It was here that Bangkok’s first naked zone was created. The Thais - and initially they were almost all Thai - who patronized it were somewhat shy at first, but soon got used to it, although unlike Japan and Taiwan (and perhaps some other countries) Thais have never been keen to be totally naked as hands will normally be strategically placed. Having just returned from one of my regular Taipei long weekends, it always seems strange that total nudity in the hot springs there is so totally natural whereas in Thailand modesty is more the name of the game! I am even surprised that in the Japanese hot spring on Sathorn Soi 14, Yunomori in its second incarnation, black shorts are actually provided - and worn by quite a few of the younger patrons. These should not be permitted in a hot spring IMHO!

[macaroni21]

Looking back, I feel quite conflicted over saunas. On the one hand, some of my most memorable encounters with strangers were in saunas. In Bangkok saunas, two such encounters (and we're talking decades ago) I still remember with great fondness. What was outstanding in both cases was the pillow talk that followed the already heavenly erotic exercise. One was an airline worker; the other was an executive in the financial sector. They had a fairly good command of English because of their professions and in each case, we must have spent an hour or more just chatting after juice than been spilled.

None of the hundreds of gogobar or massage parlour encounters have ever come close to this level of satisfaction. I guess it's mostly because of the language gap.

There have been other memorable sauna encounters,  but they were not in Thailand (e.g. they were in Hong Kong, Singapore, Amsterdam and Paris), so I'll leave them out for now.

On the other hand, there was also a lot of time wasting in saunas. As I grew older with a reducing number of other suana-goers even giving me a second look, this became such a serious issue that I hardly ever go to saunas nowadays. I know of friends of similar vintage who love the dark rooms where looks don't matter, and they still go regularly to saunas, but dark rooms are not my cup of tea.

I think it also has to do with personality. There are those who enjoy the thrill of the chase (some members right here on this board), and there is me who is a bit of a stickler for efficiency and value-added (you may have noticed that every time I criticise Thai businesses).

I also have two unusual anecdotes. There was one time (in Obelisk) when I was in the top floor jacuzzi, and who would show up but a guy I had been dating in my home country. We weren't fully an item yet (we would soon be, after) but there had been plenty of signals between us that we were becoming serious with each other. Even so, I didn't tell him I was going to Bangkok. He didn't tell me he was going to Bangkok. We only found out when he stood at the edge of the jauzzi with one foot down on the steps leading into the water, and me sitting amidst the bubbles on side opposite him, and him saying "Mack, what are you doing here?" He depolyed a somewhat accusatory tone in his voice. Like my mother!

The other anecdote I have was in a dark room; alas I can't remember which sauna. There was this friend (from my home country) who had a month or so previously told me he was leaving for some place -- I can't remember where now, maybe the border areas of Burma where there are Christian communities -- to spend a few months as Christian missionary. I said goodbye and best of luck, tell me about your adventures when you get back. Sure, will do, he said. 

A month later, I was in a dark room of a Bangkok sauna, and it was one of the few occasions when I indulged in some unsighted groping. Got into heavy petting and much torso-rubbing with someone. This someone then felt we should take things further and in a more conducive environment such as a cabin. "Let's go to a cabin, shall we?" that unseen figure wrapped around me said. I recognised that voice. Quickly applying superglue to my own lips, I unlocked myself from that embrace. You can't imagine how agile I was in rushing out of the dark maze, ducking, twisting and weaving past other bodies with arms reaching out to grab my body parts as I made my way through the crowd. Hmmm... maybe that's why I have not been fond of dark rooms ever since.

[macaroni21]

On 2/18/2025 at 6:34 PM, PeterRS said:

unlike Japan and Taiwan (and perhaps some other countries) Thais have never been keen to be totally naked as hands will normally be strategically placed. Having just returned from one of my regular Taipei long weekends, it always seems strange that total nudity in the hot springs there is so totally natural whereas in Thailand modesty is more the name of the game

I have noticed this too in my travels and bathhouse experiences in China, Korea and Japan.

The really interetsing one was Tbilisi. AFAIK, there remains just one traditional bathhouse, operating in the same way as a Turkish hammam (Georgia was once part of the Ottoman empire). I have been to hammams in several ex-Ottoman countries, as far away as Morocco. All of them give out these red chequered tea-towel-like hip wraps, and it is just not the done thing to expose one's pubic region. In the steam rooms, everybody wears those towels. Even when they do a body scrub, the wrap stays on. They will not reach into the buttocks, lower abdomen or groin (hey, those areas need scrubbing too!)

Except Tbilisi. Everything about that place -- and it's rather wretched, be warned -- said Turkish hammam, except that patrons walked around stark naked. Influence from Russian sauna?

 

On 2/18/2025 at 6:34 PM, PeterRS said:

black shorts are actually provided - and worn by quite a few of the younger patrons. These should not be permitted in a hot spring

+1

[Keithambrose]

On 2/18/2025 at 10:34 AM, PeterRS said:

 

My view is that it was the opening of gay saunas that led to a certain sameness in most of the gogo bars. Of course that took a while - 2 or 3 years or more - by which time Soi Twilight was seeing a few more gogo bars open, but being naked and hands on in gay saunas was relatively new in Thailand by the mid-1980s. The first I visited was Volt in a side Soi off Asoke. Fairly basic, its novelty lay in the total nudity, I guess. I recall meeting one guy there in 1986 who was the receptionist at a top hotel. We had a fling for a while and I got tickets for us for the 1987 Royal Barge Procession which celebrated the King’s auspicious 60th birthday - a magnificent almost religious occasion. We also spent that New Year’s Eve there. Obelisks soon opened but was less popular with farang, perhaps because it was a tiny building on 10 floors. It did have one lift but you could wait ages for it to reach your floor! And the 10th floor was worth reaching because it had a jacuzzi and some goings on in the dark.

But when Babylon opened at the top of Soi Nanta off Sathorn Soi 1, the game changed. Here was a sauna beautifully decorated and laid out specifically for young Thais in the first instance. At the entrance was a glass case filled with antiques. On the first floor was a restaurant with gentle live music by a guitarist or a flute along with another instrument at the weekends. Western classical music was piped through the building but at a very low level. Elsewhere there were the usual private rooms which were almost always occupied. On the rooftop there were showers at one end, a bar in the middle and many tables and chairs. It was one of the most cruisy spots in the city. On Fridays and Saturdays there were always queues to get in.

Almost as part of the restaurant but curtained off was a room with a largish bed to be used for massage. It was manned by a sweet-faced boy named I believe Gun or Goong. Enjoying a massage there before eating was a joy. 

Eventually an additional part was added with more rooms and a second staircase down to a pleasant coffee shop.  But I suppose it was inevitable that the wealthy owner would seek larger premises. And as we all know, around the turn of the century he opened the bigger sauna with many more facilities in the family compound further down the Soi. I’m not sure why I never enjoyed it as much as I had the earlier version.

By this time I had come to know Heaven - the sauna, that is - when on my first visit I met Thun who was to become a boyfriend for a couple of years and whom I took to Hong Kong for a week. We remained good friends for the rest of his life, enjoying monthly lunches and going occasionally to movies when he was not tied up in a serious love triangle that despite my advice he just would not abandon. He had a small shop in Terminal 21 with the lovely name ‘Happy Closet’! I was so sad when he died in a house fire about 7 years ago. He was a very dear friend.

Soon after Heaven, Chakran opened with its Moroccan theme. It became my new favourite after the Babylon move. To the side of its small pool, there was a bar. I loved sitting with my drink on one of the loungers watching the Thai boys descend down from the floor above on the stairs on the other side of the pool, their towels slung low over their hips. It had the biggest dark room at the time, I believe, which opened out on to a very large square jacuzzi. It was here that Bangkok’s first naked zone was created. The Thais - and initially they were almost all Thai - who patronized it were somewhat shy at first, but soon got used to it, although unlike Japan and Taiwan (and perhaps some other countries) Thais have never been keen to be totally naked as hands will normally be strategically placed. Having just returned from one of my regular Taipei long weekends, it always seems strange that total nudity in the hot springs there is so totally natural whereas in Thailand modesty is more the name of the game! I am even surprised that in the Japanese hot spring on Sathorn Soi 14, Yunomori in its second incarnation, black shorts are actually provided - and worn by quite a few of the younger patrons. These should not be permitted in a hot spring IMHO!

Indeed, in my experience,  in Japan, nudity is usual. Apart from a small towel to put on your head...

[khaolakguy]

12 hours ago, macaroni21 said:

None of the hundreds of gogobar or massage parlour encounters have ever come close to this level of satisfaction. I guess it's mostly because of the language gap.

Perhaps also because of the "status" and educational gap.

[PeterRS]

23 hours ago, macaroni21 said:

On the other hand, there was also a lot of time wasting in saunas. As I grew older with a reducing number of other suana-goers even giving me a second look, this became such a serious issue that I hardly ever go to saunas nowadays. I know of friends of similar vintage who love the dark rooms where looks don't matter, and they still go regularly to saunas, but dark rooms are not my cup of tea.

I wonder if the fact that I enjoyed sauna-going for much of my career lies in the fact that I came from a country where individuals could still be thrown in jail for gay sex. No, not England where the law changed in 1967! I felt I was missing quite a lot in my late teens/early 20s. Then suddenly I had a job requiring travel within Europe and this whole new world of naked men seeking sex in saunas opened up. It additionally had an element of excitement - who might be waiting around the next corner, as it were? I agree that with age one's own attractiveness to many is diminished. I have not been in a Bangkok sauna for many years but until quite recently I still occasionally ventured into one when in other parts of Asia (never elsewhere). There is defintely a group of young Asians with a primary interest in being with older westerners, although I have never tried to work out the reason. And as long as I have been prepared just to hang around looking at eye candy, most times good things have happened!