Alias in Bangkok

Everyone is Responsible for Their Own Emotions????

2005-06-28T00:40:00.000-07:00

Total Stranger: It would be extremely difficult for a total stranger to hurt my feelings. Quite simply because I did not invest my emotion to her/him. Really, the only time most anyone has their feelings hurt by a total stranger is when the total stranger actually intentionally does something nasty to them, like shouting hurtful epithets at passerby on the street.

In this case, anyone who deliberately does hurtful things to total strangers is an asshole... but the people on the receiving end are probably best off keeping their chin up, and thinking something like, "What an asshole," as the nasty comment rolls harmlessly off their back. So sure, in that case, You Are Responsible For Your Own Feelings (YARFYOF).

Admirer From Nearby: Now, this one is a bit of a mixed bag... Say Friend A has a big crush on you. Obviously, if they keep it a secret from you, you can't possibly be responsible that A gets crushed when s/he spots you out on a date with someone else. YARFYOF!

If Friend A actually tells you that s/he likes you however, the burden of guilt depends on how you respond. If you are totally honest with A (assuming the following is true), and tell him/her that you are really not interested in anything more than friendship between the two of you, and that's that, you've maintained the essential YARFYOF balance of the situation.

HOWEVER, if you are non-committal about Friend A's revelation -- perhaps because you are afraid honesty will mean the end of your friendship (in which case, I'd say A ain't such a great friend, and you're better off without him/her around, but anyhow...), or perhaps you're flattered and just want to enjoy the attention (in which case you're being very self-centered, and inconsiderate of A's feelings, and s/he is probably better off without you around...), or whatever other reason -- and you encourage A to continue his/her infatuation, you are now sharing responsibility.

To the extent that you are not directly expressing interest, A is still responsible for maintaining his/her own false hopes. However, to the extent that you are encouraging him/her (going out on 'date-like' activities together, etc.), you are accepting some responsibility as well. Friend A now has specific reasons to believe there might be something more there, because of what you are doing.

Doormat-ism: If someone has repeatedly been a Deliberate Nasty to you, and you have not gone away, you share responsibility for your hurt. As the cliché goes, "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me."
Personally, I do a sort of "two strikes, you're out" version instead, because I believe in people's ability to change... If it happens once, I will give another chance (in most cases), if it happens a second time, you can go to hell. ;-) Or at least, that's how I mean it to work...

Close Committed Emotional Relationships: This is where I think YARFYOF crosses the line from "somewhat flawed theory" to "a deeply screwed up way to approach life." The whole POINT of a Close Committed Emotional Relationship (CCER) is to allow you to be emotionally vulnerable with each other. And due to the two-sides-of-every-coin nature of human emotion, by giving someone the permission to come close enough to make you feel good in ways that other people cannot, you are also giving them the power to hurt you more deeply than other people can.
I believe, when you enter into a CCER, not only you are giving your partner the gift of your trust and emotional vulnerability, you should also be very seriously accepting the responsibility for guarding their trust and vulnerability with your own actions and commitments. By entering into this kind of close relationship, you have essentially made a mutual pact to exchange partial responsibility for each other's feelings. That is precisely the POINT of the relationship.

Now, you could still technically say YARFYOF, in that each party chose to enter into this committed relationship... If you hadn't gotten married, your husband never could have had an affair behind your back. But I think that argument wanders into "cheesy cop-out" territory... And more to the point, to live your life totally emotionally isolated just to avoid pain would end up being a far more miserable existence than the occasional broken heart. Another relevant cliché: Better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.

Everyone _is_ responsible for their own emotions; but the flip side of that coin is that everyone is also responsible for their own actions.

Trust... Could it be asked???

2005-06-27T01:25:00.000-07:00

Trust: (noun) firm belief that a person or a thing can be relied on; (verb) believe in, rely on.

Everyone needs a best friend in her lifetime. She needs somebody that she can trust and go to with her problems. A best friend should be there for you all the time, no matter what the situation may be.

Friendship starts to get into the realm of Relationships close enough to involve trust, and I think part of the point of trusting someone is to trust them not to do hurtful things to you... so if they do, they have betrayed your trust, and that hurts. And it's their fault for doing it.

Friends can be found anywhere on earth but TRUE friend is like a needle underneath the hays.

To all my TRUE friends, thank you for beingthere all the time.... Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!!

PRIVATE DANCER - A novel about love, betrayal and death in Thailand 2

2005-06-22T04:15:00.000-07:00

NIGEL
It's funny watching the faces of the first-timers when they walk into a go-go bar. Their mouths drop and their eyes go wide, then they try to be all cool as if it's the most natural thing in the world to be confronted by dozens of naked girls. Pete was no exception. He sat drinking gin and tonic, his eyes flicking from side to side, trying to take it all in. I've been in Thailand for more than five years so I'm pretty blasé about it. I've seen pretty much everything here. Full sex, lesbian sex, homosexual sex, sex with a German Shepherd once, and now nothing shocks or surprises me. Pete seemed a nice enough guy. Bit quiet, a bit serious, but a few months in Bangkok would loosen him up. He'd been sent to Thailand to update a travel book, one of those guides you always see in the hands of backpackers looking for a cheap place to stay. It was his first time in South East Asia, so I took it upon myself to show him around the sleazier parts of Bangkok. There are three main red light areas - Nana Plaza, Patpong and Soi Cowboy. The Plaza's my favorite. Soi Cowboy is too quiet, the girls are almost never topless and they don't do shows. Patpong is full of tourists: the shows are good but there are too many touts trying to pull you into their bars. Nana Plaza is where the expats go. It's more relaxed and, in my humble opinion, the girls are prettier. There are a couple of dozen bars on three floors, all overlooking a central area where there are outdoor bars. The outdoor bars are good for a quiet drink, but the real action takes place inside. Zombie is the best, but I'm a big fan of G-Spot and Pretty Girl, too. As soon as we sat down, Pete started eyeing up this girl. She was dancing naked, except for ankle length boots. Nice body, lovely long hair. Face was okay, too, but I never look at the mantelpiece while I'm stoking the fire, if you get my drift. I could see he was keen but he couldn't even get eye contact with her. She was working a big German guy, smiling and flashing her tits to keep him interested. It was driving Pete crazy. He was practically grinding his teeth when she left with the German. I figured he'd get over it. I mean, there are plenty more fish in the sea, right?

PETE
I went back several times to Zombie but she was always busy, usually with overweight Germans. They'd sit next to her, paw her, buy her drinks, pay her bar fine and take her off to a short time hotel. Eventually, on my fourth visit, she was free. I smiled at her while she was dancing, and she smiled back. She wasn't a particularly good dancer, she just stood by a silver pole, holding it with her right hand, the
little finger extended as if she were drinking from a tea-cup. From time to time she'd reach up with her left hand and brush her long hair away from her face. When her dancing shift finished she scuttled off the stage and wrapped a leopard-patterned shawl around her waist. She came over to me, glancing down shyly and extending her right hand. We shook hands, the formality almost ludicrous considering that she was still topless. "Hello," I said. "How are you?" "I'm fine, thank you," she said. "And you?" I smiled at her stilted English and patted the seat next to me. She sat down, her leg pressed against mine. "What's your name?" I asked. "Joy," she said. I asked her what she wanted to drink and she said "cola." I nodded and she pulled my chit from its holder and went over to the bar, returning with a small glass of Coke. The chit kept a running total of the drinks I'd bought. "Cheers," she said, and we clinked glasses. Her English wasn't good, but it didn't seem to matter. We sat together for almost an hour, watching the dancers. Then she stood up. "I must dance now," she said. "How about I pay your bar fine?" I offered. "You want go short time with me?" she said. It wasn't what I'd meant - I'd just wanted to keep her next to me for a while - but I didn't argue with her. Besides, if I didn't pay her bar fine, I was pretty sure someone else would. "Okay," I said. She held out her hand and I gave her 600 baht. She went over to the cashier, handed over the money and then mimed putting on a shirt and pointed to a door that I guessed led to the changing rooms. Ten minutes later we were in bed. To be honest, the sex wasn't that good. I mean, it was great being with her, she was drop dead gorgeous, and she did everything I asked, but she wouldn't initiate anything. It was all too passive. I shouldn't really have been surprised, I suppose, because I'd only known her for an hour or so and there we were, naked in a short-time hotel. The hotel had been her idea. It was on the first floor of the Nana Plaza complex, less than a hundred yards away from Zombie. I was staying at the Dynasty Hotel in Soi 4 but I didn't want to take her back there as I knew that the staff would only gossip. There was an old guy at reception reading a Thai comic book and he charged me four hundred baht for the use of the room for two hours and ten baht for a condom. He didn't even look up as he took my money. Joy took the key and went straight to the room. She'd obviously been there before. Afterwards, when it was all over, she rushed into the shower, and when she came out she was wrapped in one of the two threadbare towels that the hotel supplied. I wanted to lie with her, to hold her in my arms and talk to her, but she seemed more interested in getting back to the bar. I could understand why - she was working and I was a paying customer - but I wanted to be more than that. I wanted her to care about me, the way I cared about her. I asked her about her family, about where she went to school, how long she'd worked in the bar, but her English wasn't good and my Thai was virtually non-existent, so mainly she just smiled and nodded, or smiled and shrugged. She sat on the bed and waited until I'd showered, and we went back to Zombie together. I didn't want to go inside the bar, so we sat outside and I bought her a cola. I explained that I was going to Hong Kong the following day. I had to see the regional editor of the book I was updating. She looked suddenly concerned. "So I not see you again?" I was touched. Maybe she did care, after all. I told her I'd be back in a week or so. She shrugged. "I not believe you," she said. "I think you not come back." I had an idea. I took off the gold chain I was wearing around my neck. It was worth about a hundred pounds. I put it around her neck. "There,” I said, “now you know I'll have to come back, to get my gold." She grinned and threw her arms around my neck, and gave me a Thai kiss. Not with her lips, that's not the Thai way. She put her nose close to my cheek and sniffed. She smelled fresh and clean, like she'd been out in a field, but I knew that it was the cheap soap that had been in the bathroom. "I hope you come back to me," she said.

JOYTo be honest, I never thought I'd see him again. He was a bit drunk, I think, and even though he gave me his gold chain I thought he'd forget about me as soon as he left Bangkok. A lot of farangs are like that: twenty minutes after they've met you they start saying they love you and want to marry you. They say it but they don't mean it. A Thai man would never say he loves you that quickly. I don't think my father ever told my mother that he loved her, right up until the day she died. I'm not saying he didn't love her, he did, but he never actually said the words. Farangs are the opposite. They say it, but they don't mean it. He looked okay, I guess. He said he was thirty seven but he looked younger. He wasn't fat like most farangs who come in the bar, and he wasn't losing his hair. He wasn't especially good looking but he had a kind face and really blue eyes. It was his eyes I remembered most, I think. They were blue and soft. He was a bit drunk when he left, and I guess I figured he'd forget about me as soon as he got on the plane. I remember being disappointed that the chain wasn't bigger. The sex? I don't even remember doing it with him. I try not to think about what I'm doing when I'm in bed. I blot it out, just think about the money. It's not making love, it doesn't even feel like sex, if you know what I mean. I'm there, on the bed, and there's a farang with me, but I just let them do what they want. Tender or rough, it doesn't make any difference to me, I just want it to be over. Ten minutes is the most it usually takes. Some of the girls moan and groan, they reckon that makes a man come quickly, but I don't do that. I don't want to do anything, I want it all to be their doing. Usually I just lie on my back. I hate it when they want me to go on top because then they expect me to move, to do the work, and I don't like that. He didn't ask me how much he was supposed to pay, and before we left the room he gave me a thousand baht. I told him it wasn't enough. He looked confused. I suppose one of his friends had told him that a thousand baht was the going rate. Most of the girls will do it for a thousand, some will even go short-time for five hundred, but I never do it for less than fifteen hundred. And if they want me to stay all night, that's three thousand. Anyway, I told Pete that he had to pay me fifteen hundred, and he did.

PRIVATE DANCER - A novel about love, betrayal and death in Thailand

2005-06-22T01:47:00.000-07:00

PETE
She's dead. Joy's dead. Joy's dead and I killed her. I can't believe it. I killed her and now I don't know what I'm going to do. I don't know what I'm going to do without her and I don't know what's going to happen to me when they find out she's dead. They'll know it's my fault. I trashed the room, my fingerprints are going to be everywhere. The manager of the building saw me storm out. The guy in the room, he'll remember me, too. Her friends knew that we were always arguing, and they know where I live. The taxi driver keeps looking at me in his mirror. He can see how upset I am. I have to keep calm, but it's difficult. I want to scream at him, to tell him to put his foot down and drive faster but we're sitting at a red light so we aren't going anywhere for a while. Ahead of us is an elephant, swinging its trunk at a guy carrying a basket of bananas. A group of tourists give the guy money and he hands them fruit so that they can feed the elephant. "Charng," says the driver. Thai for elephant. I pretend not to understand and keep looking out of the window. A typical Bangkok street scene, the pavements lined with food hawkers and stalls piled high with cheap clothing, the air thick with fumes from motorcycles and buses. I see it but I don't see it. All I can think about is Joy. It's as if time around me has stopped. Stopped dead. I'm breathing and thinking but everything has frozen. She's dead and it's my fault. They'll see my name tattooed on her shoulder and they'll see my name carved into her wrist and they'll know that it's all my fault. I'm not worried about what the police will do. Or her family. There's nothing they can do that can make me feel any worse than I do right now as I sit frozen in time at a red traffic light, watching overweight tourists feeding bananas to an elephant with a chain around its neck. I know with a horrible certainty that I can't go on living without her. My life ends with her death because I can't live with the guilt. Joy's dead and I killed her so that means that I have to die, too.

BRUCE
I always knew it was going to end badly. Joy was a sweet thing and whether or not she'd been lying to Pete, she didn't deserve to die, not like that. Sure, she was a bargirl, but she was forced into it, she'd never have chosen the life for herself, and I know she wanted Pete to take her away from the bars. I was in shock when I heard what happened. Now I don't know what's going to happen to Pete. It's like he's on autopilot, heading into oblivion. I've got a bad feeling about it, but it's out of my hands. He's going to have to come to terms with what he's done, her death's going to be on his conscience for the rest of his life. To be honest, I don't know how he's going to be able to live with himself.

BIG RON
Joy's dead, huh? Can't say I was surprised when Bruce told me. Do I care? Do I fuck. I'm not going to shed any tears about a dead slapper. It's not exactly a long-term career, is it, when all's said and done, what with the drugs and the risks they take. Slappers are dying all the time. Overdoses, suicides, motorcycle accidents. And the way Joy fucked Pete over, I'm surprised he didn't top her months ago. She was a lying hooker and she deserved whatever she got, that's what I say. As for Pete, I don't know what'll happen to him. If he's smart he'll get on the next plane out of Bangkok.

PETE
I don't know if it was love at first sight, but it was pretty damn close. She had the longest hair I'd ever seen, jet black and almost down to her waist. She smiled all the time and had soft brown eyes that made my heart melt, long legs that just wouldn't quit and a figure to die for. She was stark naked except for a pair of black leather ankle boots with small chrome chains on the side. I think it was the boots that did it for me.
I didn't know her name, and I couldn't talk to her because she was already occupied with a fat, balding guy with a mobile phone who kept fondling her breasts and bouncing her up and down on his knee. She was a dancer at the Zombie Bar, one of more than a hundred go-go dancers, and between her twenty-minute dancing shifts she had to hustle drinks from customers. I kept trying to catch her eye, but she was too busy with the bald guy and after an hour or so she changed into jeans and a T-shirt and left with him. They looked obscene together, he must have been twenty stone and old enough to be her father. I was with Nigel, a guy I'd met in Fatso's Bar, down the road from the go-go bars of Nana Plaza.

Nigel was a good-looking guy with a shock of black unruly hair and a movie-star smile and a pirate’s eye-patch. First time I met him I thought he was wearing it as a joke and I kept teasing him about it, but then it turns out that he lost an eye when he was a teenager. Stupid accident, he says, climbing through a barbed-wire fence on his parents farm. He’s got a false eye but he still wears the eye-patch. Reckons it gives him an air of mystery, he says. Makes him look like a prat, if you ask me. It was Nigel's idea to go to Zombie. It was one of the hottest bars in Bangkok, he said. It was my first time, I'd only been in Bangkok for two days, and I hadn't known what to expect. It was an eyeopener. Two raised dance floors, each with more than a dozen beautiful girls dancing around silver poles. Most of them naked. Around the edge of the bars were small tables, and waitresses in white blouses and black skirts scurried around taking orders and serving drinks. "She's beautiful, isn't she?" I asked Nigel as the girl walked by holding the bald guy's hand. "They're all beautiful," he said, winking at a girl on the stage. "No, that one's special," I said. "And I don't just mean the boots." Nigel drank his Singha beer from the bottle and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. "Pete, let me give you a bit of advice. From the horse's mouth. They're all hookers. Every one of them. Pay their bar fines, take them to a short-time hotel, screw your brains out, then pay them. But whatever you do, don't get involved. Trust me, it's not worth it." I watched the girl and her customer disappear through the curtain that covered the exit to the plaza. I asked Nigel how it worked, how you got to go out with one of the girls. He explained how the bar fine system worked. You paid the money to the bar - it varied between 400 baht and 600 baht depending on which bar you were in, and the girl was then free to leave with you. What you did was pretty much up to you, but usually a customer would take the girl to one of the numerous short-time hotels within walking distance of the plaza. How much you paid the girl depended on what she did and how generous you were, it could be as little as 500 baht, as much as 2,000 baht, more if you wanted to spend the whole night with her. Nigel waved at the two stages, crammed with girls. "Go on, pick one," he said. I shook my head. There was no one there I wanted.

Sino Nga Ba????

2005-06-22T01:42:00.000-07:00

sino ba ang mas mahalaga, ang
taong
mahal mo
o ang taong gusto mong mahalin?

ang taong kasama mo buong araw
o
ang
taong
iniicip mo bago matapos ang araw?

siya bang kasakasama mo sa lhat
ng
ginagawa
mo o siyang dahilan ng lahat ng
galaw
at
ginagawa mo?

sino ba ang mas mhalaga...ung
taong
nais mong
makasama habang buhay o ung
taong
hindi mo
makita ang halaga ng buhay kapag
wala
cya?

cno ang mas matimbang...ung
taong
pag kasama
mo'y parang kay bilis ng oras o ung
taong tuwing
iniicp mo'y parang kay bagal ng
oras?

ano ang susundin mo...ang
dinidikta mo
sa puso
mo o ang dinidikta ng puso mo syo?

sya ba un laging pumapasok sa icp
mo
o cya un
laging laman ng panaginip mo?

cno nga ba...ang taong nagpaluha
syo,
o
ang
taong nagpunas sa minsang
pagluha
mo?

cno sa kanila...... ?????

Life is a Struggle to Survive continuation……

2005-06-22T01:41:00.000-07:00

25th of May, 1990, this youngest girl in the family which was being called as Baby, experienced a terrible pain in her stomach. For that whole day, she just stayed inside her room. Not to be bored, she tried to do something while sitting in her bed. She made names from cut outs of letters. She completed the names of all the people living in their home. Nobody can see to her face that she was suffering from a terrible pain. She still talked casually and even laughed to all the jokes being told by the members of the family. At late night, she felt as if she can not bear what she felt. That was the time she decided to ask for a help to bring her to the hospital. At first, the diagnosis was a Urinary Tract Infection. After one night confinement, she checked out from the hospital but still did not feel better.
Until she can not bear the pain, she was brought to another hospital and the doctor decided for an operation. Before the scheduled time for an operation, she was amazed with her doctor because he wore a complete operating gown and accessories. She wanted to be a doctor someday but her parents could not afford sending her to a medical school. She just instilled to her mind that if she could not be a doctor, she will strive hard so that one of her children will become a doctor someday. Without any specific diagnose, they opened her stomach and the doctor found out that her two ovaries were full of abscess. He told her mother that the ovaries and the fallopian tube must be extracted because there will be a tendency that it will occur again if he will just scrape it. Half conscious, she overheard what the doctor was telling that she can not have a capacity to bear a child anymore after the extraction. It made her so depressed after hearing those words but she can do nothing so doctor extracted both ovaries and the fallopian tubes. Her family would like to keep it from her about the operation but she knew everything. She told them about it and she cried. They felt sorry for her but she tried to be strong. They asked the doctor if what is the cause of her illness and he told them that something hard hit her internal organ. She remembered that sometime during their coed softball game practice she was hit by the ball in her stomach. It was her boyfriend who pitched the ball while she was the batter. It was not so painful during that time that made her to alarm about it. The effect went out after several months.
Her mother decided that she must rest for sometimes so she will stop schooling not until she will be fully recovered. The idea of not attending school for a year made her sick more. She told her mother that she wanted to continue her university. One day, while lying in her private room, her boyfriend came. He asked what the cause of her operation was. Reluctantly, she explained to him about the practice game and she noticed that it made him worried.
After seven days of confinement, she checked out from the hospital. The next day she went to the university to enroll. She was admitted at the College of Education and availed the valedictory scholarship for a full semester.

Life is a Struggle to Survive

2005-06-22T01:37:00.000-07:00

Eight days after her family gave thanks to the Creature for giving them a cute little girl, her father died. No image of a father registered in her mind as she grew old. Being the youngest in the family, she received care and love of all the family members but because they have only their mother to fed and sent them to school, it was obvious of a scarcity of all their needs. The elder sisters and brother helped their mother to be able to meet both ends for the family.

At the age of five, their mother got married again to a man they rarely knew. It was the beginning of more struggles because there were three grown up girls in the family and having a stranger inside the house could mean a strange atmosphere. At first, they thought it was just a negative impression to him but, they were not mistaken. So many times they caught him peeping in the room of the girls. Afraid of something might happen to them, they went to live to the house of their other families. The youngest girl was left at home together with their mother and step-father. She experienced some molestations from their step-father. Their mother knew nothing about what was happening inside the house because she was threaten not to tell anybody especially their mother.

The youngest daughter started schooling at the age of six and showed her best in academic and extra-curricular activities. Inspite of what was happening to her, she ended to be number one in her class since her kindergarten up to grade 4 during her elementary grade. Their mother and step-father decided to move to another town during her grade 5, so she transferred to another school too. Being new to a school was not a difficulty for her to show up though. She was still the number one in the class. The best thing happened is that she lived in her elder sister in the same town where the school she was studying was located. The eldest sister got married after she graduated in college just to went away with their home and to avoid their step-father. Even the next two elder sisters got married too after they graduated in high school with the same reason. Having a step-father means having someone who can help their mother to find resources for the children. Unluckily, it was the opposite that happened. During weekends, the little girl helped in the store of their grandmother for an allowance at school. She finished her elementary grade with honors.

She continued her schooling in a high school of the same town. Even then, she continued to be on the top of her class academically and in sports. She went to a sports competition around their town and even as far as regional wide. In her junior year, another junior student tried to win her attention. She hated him so much without any reason. She did not want that somebody is following her all the time. One day, while she was watching a soccer game in their public plaza, she was impressed with one of the players. He played very good in their team. She screamed loud to cheer up with his team even she did not know who was that player. After the game, she just knew that he was the same guy she hated most. Since then, they became friends because they have the same interest. After a year of being always together, there was a confusion in her mind. He treated her as more than a friend but he did not say a word about their status. One night, she went to watch a basketball game in their local gymnasium not knowing that he was playing with one of the teams. Upon knowing that she was there, he decided not to play because she was embarrassed to play while she is watching. On the next day, she did not talk to him because she was upset about that night which he did not join the team. He asked her why she is not talking to him. She told him that she was expecting to see him playing that night but he did not play and that made her so upset. She asked him his reason why he did not play, he told her that he felt so embarrassed playing while she will be watching. She told him that he must not be ashamed because she is his friend. That made him shock because he said, he treated her more than a friend. She asked him if what kind of relationship they have because he never said anything to her. With struggle of telling what he felt, he told her that he loved her more than a friend. He wanted her to be her girlfriend and not only a friend. That was the beginning of their love life officially. They graduated together and she managed to be a valedictorian of her batch and at the same time the most outstanding athlete of the year.