PeterUK
August 20th, 2008, 12:59
Sometimes of an afternoon тАУ perhaps once a month тАУ I go to a small, rundown sauna in north Pattaya. Amid its faded walls, broken-tiled floors and leaky pipes the staff go listlessly about their business and the few customers go lustlessly about theirs. ItтАЩs one of those old-fashioned saunas where thereтАЩs not a condom dispenser or lube container in sight and the only тАШhot actionтАЩ is of the sweating-off-those-extra-pounds variety. I usually go with a couple of younger Thai friends who, though good-looking, attract few lascivious glances from the regulars, a mixture of Thais, farangs and arabs. ThatтАЩs the way we like it. We go just to relax and enjoy the health benefits. DonтАЩt sneer, all you sexual adventurers out there тАУ a hundred million Scandinavians canтАЩt be wrong.
IтАЩm familiar, of course, with the тАШother kindтАЩ of sauna and have been many times to Babylon in Bangkok, though not for a while now. My routine there is always the same: I undress discreetly, have a sauna, work out gently in the gym, swim and read by the pool while sipping a refreshing fruit juice, dress discreetly and leave. I humbly accept that I am possibly the only person in the history of Babylon to treat its facilities with such decorum and reserve. I am well aware of all the machinations and manoeuvrings going on around me and indeed take a Proustian interest in them, but I have little impulse to participate. I occasionally see a young Thai I fancy but the signals I send out are so faint and ambiguous that he would need a satellite dish strapped to his head to receive them and another powerful device to decode them.
IтАЩm shy in such settings, you see, or, to put it another way, fucked up. IтАЩm certainly not disdainful of the behaviour going on around me; I envy people who can act directly and decisively to satisfy their appetites. ItтАЩs all too free-form and fluid for my liking. I feel threatened, undone by the possibility of rejection, alarmed that events might get out of my control. DonтАЩt even get me started on dark rooms! The thought that the person running his hands all over me might be about as physically appealing as the sight I see in my own mirror repels me. Sex as pure sensation doesnтАЩt work for me. I have to know that my partner is a dish. All in all, go-go bars, with their cosy simplifications of the sexual transaction process, might have been designed with someone like me in mind.
I am reminded of a joke I once cracked in a sauna which, in its way, sums up my failure to connect in such places. Up in Chiang Mai I think it was. Anyway, as I entered the hot room I said to the solitary, thirtyish, blond-haired farang occupant, тАШPhew, itтАЩs like a sauna in here, isnтАЩt it?тАЩ His brow furrowed in puzzlement, he scratched his head and thought for a bit, then replied, тАШBut it ISS a sauna.тАЩ From his accent I guessed that he might be German.
IтАЩm familiar, of course, with the тАШother kindтАЩ of sauna and have been many times to Babylon in Bangkok, though not for a while now. My routine there is always the same: I undress discreetly, have a sauna, work out gently in the gym, swim and read by the pool while sipping a refreshing fruit juice, dress discreetly and leave. I humbly accept that I am possibly the only person in the history of Babylon to treat its facilities with such decorum and reserve. I am well aware of all the machinations and manoeuvrings going on around me and indeed take a Proustian interest in them, but I have little impulse to participate. I occasionally see a young Thai I fancy but the signals I send out are so faint and ambiguous that he would need a satellite dish strapped to his head to receive them and another powerful device to decode them.
IтАЩm shy in such settings, you see, or, to put it another way, fucked up. IтАЩm certainly not disdainful of the behaviour going on around me; I envy people who can act directly and decisively to satisfy their appetites. ItтАЩs all too free-form and fluid for my liking. I feel threatened, undone by the possibility of rejection, alarmed that events might get out of my control. DonтАЩt even get me started on dark rooms! The thought that the person running his hands all over me might be about as physically appealing as the sight I see in my own mirror repels me. Sex as pure sensation doesnтАЩt work for me. I have to know that my partner is a dish. All in all, go-go bars, with their cosy simplifications of the sexual transaction process, might have been designed with someone like me in mind.
I am reminded of a joke I once cracked in a sauna which, in its way, sums up my failure to connect in such places. Up in Chiang Mai I think it was. Anyway, as I entered the hot room I said to the solitary, thirtyish, blond-haired farang occupant, тАШPhew, itтАЩs like a sauna in here, isnтАЩt it?тАЩ His brow furrowed in puzzlement, he scratched his head and thought for a bit, then replied, тАШBut it ISS a sauna.тАЩ From his accent I guessed that he might be German.