A future for Soi Pratuchai?

[bobsaigon2]

Without reference to the GI's who used Thailand for R&R: Thirty or forty years ago (my first arrival was in 1972), most of the foreigners coming to Thailand for an extended stay were teachers, advisers, engineers, researchers, in short, people who were needed, people who could be utilized to improve the country in some way. Thus, farang were treated respectfully simply because they could be employed either for the greater good, or for the good of particular Thais. Then came the backpackers and no one felt compelled to give them much respect. And then, thanks to reduced air fares and to Thailand's growing reputation as the sex capital of SE Asia, there came a rather large percentage of foreigners who had not the slightest notion of contributing to the betterment of Thai society. So the Thai media chastise farang now because they are no longer "untouchable" (and because some deserve it), or simply because the Thai media don't have the freedom to chastise khon Thai. IMHO

[Manforallseasons]

Without reference to the GI's who used Thailand for R&R: Thirty or forty years ago (my first arrival was in 1972), most of the foreigners coming to Thailand for an extended stay were teachers, advisers, engineers, researchers, in short, people who were needed, people who could be utilized to improve the country in some way. Thus, farang were treated respectfully simply because they could be employed either for the greater good, or for the good of particular Thais. Then came the backpackers and no one felt compelled to give them much respect. And then, thanks to reduced air fares and to Thailand's growing reputation as the sex capital of SE Asia, there came a rather large percentage of foreigners who had not the slightest notion of contributing to the betterment of Thai society. So the Thai media chastise farang now because they are no longer "untouchable" (and because some deserve it), or simply because the Thai media don't have the freedom to chastise khon Thai. IMHO

This might be the most intuitive post about farangs in Thailand that I've read to date.

[AsDaRa]

Thirty or forty years ago (my first arrival was in 1972)

My God, I was born in 1972. So you already visit Thailand for 44 years. Life has been kind to you, very kind.
I hope life awards me so many decades of sex tourism also. I am however afraid it will already end for me in my 3rd year (if I loose my job, which is not that unlikely to happen in one of the coming years).

[fountainhall]

My God, I was born in 1972. So you already visit Thailand for 44 years. Life has been kind to you, very kind.
I hope life awards me so many decades of sex tourism also.

I have to agree with Latin that too often your outlook is too negative. Life is a great deal brighter and more fascinating when you banish those thoughts and be much more positive about the future.

I can recall some time around 1987 when I became similarly negative. AIDS had started to take its toll in Thailand and it was announced in the Hong Kong media that bar owners here were talking about banning guys from Hong Kong because more cases had developed there (where I worked). Gay sauna owners in Japan were also on the point of banning non-Japanese in the belief that this would prevent AIDS from spreading (a forlorn hope as AIDS was already taking its deadly toll). Selfishly I thought my sex life would all but come to an end - and I was younger then than you now.

As things turned out the Thai bar owners did not ban anyone, although the Japanese saunas remained closed to foreigners for many years. And there was still lots of gay sex to be found almost everywhere in Asia, even in Singapore and Malaysia where it was - and remains - technically illegal. So my concerns were totally unfounded. But if you are worried about the future of your sex life, please be very, very thankful you never had to live through those dreadful early years of AIDS when infection meant death.

[fountainhall]

. . . Then came the backpackers and no one felt compelled to give them much respect. And then, thanks to reduced air fares and to Thailand's growing reputation as the sex capital of SE Asia, there came a rather large percentage of foreigners who had not the slightest notion of contributing to the betterment of Thai society.

One short anecdote. I vividly recall arriving in Bangkok from Singapore in 1989 and seeing an Air Europe 747 from somewhere in England (I will not offend sensibilities by naming the departure airport) disgorging what appeared to be a full planeload largely made up of cheap package tourists who looked like a caricature of louts from a 1960s move - slightly fat women in too-tight floral miniskirts and beehive hairstyles, groups of unshaven drunk young men, beer bottles in hand, ruffled shirts out (decades before it became the fashion) and singing vaguely pornographic songs etc. . . As I walked to Immigration, I thought "What have the Thais done to deserve this?"