today i read up on hostessing in japan. i really can't figure out what this entails, other than lighting cigarettes for boring men who look at me like a sex object. when i think to myself can i do that only for money the answer is no. but i might try it out, maybe it really is tame (?). when i picture myself in a cocktail dress and spiked heels i giggle though. not my thing at all. and i always pay half for everything. it would take a lot for someone to impress me with money. the only aspect in which i care about money is where it relates to travel. we'll see how low i'll get. :)

oh by the way egypt air gave me a new ticket right away for no charge. i leave tomorrow night, saturday morning, one of those.

later tonight i ran into my friends sanya, iris, and jay. separately. but i ended up hanging out with jay (the six foot eight american guy of yesteryore), and smoking a joint. we went later to the soi behind khao san road and listened to reggae and hip hop. it was a dark artsy thai crowd with a protective gangster dog. best place i have been to near here in a while. they had the requisite bob marley hangings but some art too, a resident ladyboy for effect, a gallery next door, and a piercing/tattoo shop across the street. good people watching but on a more mellow level than khao san. nice. too bad jay (being american) and i had nothing in common. i refused his offer to go home with him, with a resigned sigh of frustration with silly men. came home to update my site and chill, but not before running into the poor gum boy, ciao, who looked exhausted and dirty and sad that i was leaving him. i gave him 20 baht.

i forgot the uncontrollable hysteria and stress of leaving. i forgot how hard it is to pack everything i want to take in one small, manageable bag. i forgot that i won't have a cellphone or in-room internet access anymore, no SMS's to 'x' and ot. no cable, no mahboonkhrong, no 7-11. (well maybe that actually i will have). no khao san circus to spin through, no pink lit alleys to sneak down giggling, no noodle soup, no sawadee ka. no massages!!!! no sangsom! no relaxed, random, english speaking travellers to ignore, cranky expats to bait, or smiley sweet thai people to just love. ack! i am extremely wound up this evening. i hate to leave thailand and that is exactly why i must go.

otto finally gave in and called tonight making it even harder- he was sweetly apologetic and a little suspicious. still not sure what happened this week but he blames it on jealousy regarding taka. verdict- justified. but we agreed to be friends til i get back. i am ecstatic that i did not lose him. :) i already can't wait to get back to the islands with him (though i'll have to kick out whoever is there when i get there, i am sure).

tonight was a perfect (next to) last night on khao san. i sat down in the middle at a sidewalk cafe and was tapped on the shoulder by an american guy, 6 ft 8. who lives in tokyo. he invited me to sit with him (jay) and his mexican friend (with blond hair, blue eyes, and an australian accent(?)). rodrigo. we drank and chatted though the three of us had nothing in common. far into the night. then when the hippie american guy (who had good info on japan) left, i let the mexican guy follow me into a another cafe. i didn't realize it was run by the most flambouyant khao san ladyboys, and this is the first night this guy was in thailand- heh heh. the circus did it's tricks for us- the crowd was especially interesting, eminently fashionable as usual, super energetic. (more thais on khao san these days too). two ladyboys encroached on either side of us, making eyes at rodrigo. another one of them came running into the restaurant being chased by a white guy who started hitting her. lots more ladyboys gathered round and there was a bit of the word "fuck" flying and the waving of purses. i was a little nervous but it didn't turn into one of "those" fights tonight... instead they left and we watched a twisted shifty junkie of a ladyboy, who resembled a lady about as much as i resemble william shatner, get kicked out in front of us by the irate manager when "she" squatted on the curb right there and took a dump. the manager made "her" get a bucket of water and clean it up before she slapped "her" and waved "her" off, slinking wavily and moving on to "her" next poor gullible robbery victim. very hardcore night at the chart house (hmmm, somehow i miss san francisco!). anyway by then i was too embarassed to stay and witness whatever grand finale took place. i lost the mexican guy (who kept saying, "you're weird"), couldn't find poor robin (i really regret not hanging out with my happy dutch buddy), glided serenely down khao san nodding to my friends and smiling fondly at ciao the gum boy, the dreadlocked painter, the staff at khao san center, mr. "check it out!" kool. all the cute guys i see everyday.... the grilled chicken lady.

went home and packed in a frenzy.

spent a lovely afternoon at the park along the chao phraya, sunning myself in the brilliant day, reading up on japan, and chatting with a super friendly policeman(!). had a very relaxing massage afterwards at my regular blissout joint.

felt sort of introverted and managed to avoid most conversation despite the crowd on khao san, silently people watching as i ate and downed a few heinekens. after about 4 hours of this i was bored and called up 'x'. i really hadn't planned on going to that expat gathering for the lonely planeteers (as 'x' calls them) tonight, but despite the fact that we would be late and somewhat uncomfortable, we decided we had nothing else to do so we headed over to gulliver's tavern. by that time everyone had left except the same guy i had met before ('professor fart') and his lovely girlfriend. they invited us to join them and the others at another bar, which didn't really excite me as it was named 'the sports bar', but after we finished our spicy chicken wings and cottage pie we decided we might as well, since we had come this far. a few blocks further down sukhumwit, the sports bar was an open air beer bar in a row of identical ones. i noticed the group still accumulated was really small and the atmosphere was not what i expected. i had been hoping out of simple curiousity to be able to scope everyone out from afar and try to match faces with the written personalities. i have to say conversations with people who have quite frankly been total assholes to me for about two years did not especially appeal to me. i felt a bit silly for having come since it was definitely not my scene and i really had no intention of introducing myself. so (a very grumpy) 'x' and i sat in the corner for no longer than ten minutes, had a few peeks at the surprisingly normal and friendly-seeming group (anil -if that's who the thai man was- at least looks like a sweetheart, as he is online), decided against getting stuck there for the evening, and left towards our respective ghettos to drink solo in our own typical fashions.

leaving for tokyo in 2 days!

i really have it bad for thai (if not asian) guys. not sure where this came from really (besides great sex with ot)- before this trip i never looked twice at an asian boy. but some of them are just so damn hot! they have such sculpted, lithe bodies, gorgeous hair, great smiles. anyway nothing to take seriously but i did make eyes at a particularly delectable specimen (long shiny hair with a black bandana, dressed all in elegant black, nice jewelry, dazzling smile) this evening. we played the little game across the room for a couple of hours, but when he finally came over to talk to me, a big fat mouthy lesbian girl plopped down in the only empty seat near me, at that exact second, and started blabbering. argh! unkind fate! he pouted at me, shrugged, and left. i actually am embarrassed to admit i chased after him, but i couldn't find him again. argh. another one bites the dust. :)

i ended up drinking with an interesting australian guy, simon. he was one of those people whom i instantly clicked with. there was no uncomfortable silence, we talked for hours. he grew up in the moscow circus (as a clown) and was definitely anything but typical. he also just came back from motorcycling through india, for 4 years!!!! when i marvelled at his intestinal fortitude, he also berated indian people as being horrible, but he said he still managed to find a lot of "magic" there, even where the people were concerned. (why is it that everyone who loves india uses that particular adjective?)... i don't get it. but i realized we were fairly dissimilar in general when we got talking about the concept of destiny. i think you make your own, he thinks it makes you. really sort of an western vs. eastern concept. it's a fairly huge issue to disagree on, and by the end of the night i was too frustrated to carry on the (to me increasingly illogical) conversation so i left abruptly and went home to sleep it off. the one thing i do hate about people who have spent a lot of time in india is the fact that they become gurus on just about every subject, know what i mean? but i still am happy to have met him, i love meeting anyone interesting and quirky and listening to their point of view, however opposite. that is part of why i travel.

today i made a guilty trip to burger king (i have exhausted myself on the local thai food stalls) and i met a thai man in line. somehow we started talking there over our furtive cholesterol fest, and eventually we moved to a sidewalk cafe on khao san rd. to continue our conversation over some (nonalchoholic) drinks. i really like him- his name is pee and he owns a t-shirt printing and distribution business with his sister. he is a bit older than i am and has been around here for years. it was weird to talk with such a well-travelled thai man though. he has lived in NY, been all throughout europe, and has seen a lot of asia as well. he was very direct and very open, also strange for a thai man. i thoroughly enjoyed his company. hope to run into him again.

i really really, deep in the pit of my stomach, miss ot. 'x' says he just rejected me before i could reject him. probably true- i think we both knew it wouldn't last long term with us but i am the one of the two who would actually say so. maybe he felt it coming after the last disagreement we had (though we had already agreed amiably to be friends), maybe he is jealous that i am going to tokyo (knowing taka is there), maybe he has a new girlfriend (his friends swear that's not true), maybe he was offended that i asked him if he is a rapist and meat cleaver wielding murderer (i never believed it!), maybe he is simply going crazy! all i know is i would never in my life cut off all communication with him (is that a thai thing to do?). i really value(d) his presence in my life, and to an extent i really love(d) him.... anyway, all that adds up to is sad. but i guess there are plenty more fish in the bangkok sea, and i can find one that doesn't play baby games with me.

got a relatively excited (for him) email from taka today promising to show me tokyo, take me to an onsen (hot springs) resort in japan, and even let me stay in his family home for part of the time. we'll see about all that. spent most of the day researching. japan really does seem overwhelming- good thing i have that xanax i mentioned! if it is too overwhelming i can change my ticket and come back any time. my biggest fear is that i will return with no money at all. i don't really want to have to go straight back to the US from japan!

this morning i saw a thai man drive his motorcycle right into the front window of a gas station in banglamphu. his face was sliced to pieces, he kept drifting in and out of consciousness, he was vomiting blood, and blood was coming out of his ears and nose. yikes. another farang guy and i kept asking the crowd if there was an ambulance coming but we were ignored & none ever showed. a coupleof lazy policemen fiddled with their walkie talkies but were of little help otherwise. i left disgusted when i saw them pick up the poor guy, walk him over to his motorbike, and put him on it. i can't believe they would let someone drive off like that. i am hoping it just wasn't as bad as it looked. hope to 'god' nothing like that happens to me in this country of harsh realities.

still no word from otto. he seems to be through with me. i have no idea why or what i did to offend him. but his ceasing to talk to me or explain at all, while rather immature and unfair, does tend to make me completely insane and unable to just ignore it. not sure if that is what he is going for but like i said i am neurotic.

i got away from my room, where i have a tendency to sit and ponder whether or not to call ot over and over for a ridiculous stretch of time, and met up with robin for some drinks. he regalled me with his stories from india for a few hours and took my mind off things. he really seemed to enjoy india, which i do not understand in the least, but he followed the israeli trail most of the way and i am sure the himalayan charris helped a bit. he agrees that indian people might be the most repulsive on earth (they really are horrible people in my experience) but somehow he managed to not let it affect him. i admire that in him and his new, much more openminded outlook on things in general. it's lovely to remember that he is one of my favorite people on earth.

while we were chatting someone tapped me on the shoulder and introduced himself as 'professor fart'. this is one of my fellow thorntree posters i mentioned before, & one of the backslapping buddies who like to gang up on me in response to just about anything i post. i almost had a heart attack thinking he would assassinate me but he really seemed like an ok guy, and he mentioned a lonely planet bangkok expat pissup on monday. hrrrmm. we'll see.

later i found myself on a rooftop bar with robin, watching several of otto's friends from ko chang play digeridoos and jambes in the hot night air. i missed otto horrifically and therefore could not enjoy it as much i normally would have.

i never thought it would really happen but i bought a ticket to japan today (leaving the 30th). ack! japan terrifies me more than anyplace else i have gone, even india. i think because japanese people totally mystify me as a culture- they are one race i haven't yet gotten any sort of handle on. besides there is the fact that japan just seems so stressful and crowded and un-navigable, etc... not sure if it will be my thing, but i want to scope it out for job possibilities as well as see taka and my other japanese buddy masa in osaka.

i was feeling a bit lonely on khao san, which is really getting old to me (but is usually more appealing to me than the other bangkok ghetto, lower sukhumwit). i have this magic ability to think about someone and they appear, though, and my thai friend tom showed up right on cue. he was accompanied by his new french girlfriend celine. they were not a good match and i felt a little bit uncomfortable hanging out with the two of them (especially since whenever she went to the bathroom he would hit on me), but i did enjoy the company. we headed to sukhumwit to look for a bar with an acoustic band. after running all over like chickens with our heads cut off and ringing up a cab fare of over 200 baht (the highest i have ever paid) we finally settled on a place....somewhere. i think the street was thong lor. the place sort of sucked (loud half thai metallica covers and seventies music) but at least we were seated with a pitcher of beer before everything closed at 2.

when i headed back to khao san i immediately ran smack dab into robin(!), my good buddy and ex-travelmate extraordinaire (see nov/dec). he has been travelling through india on an enfield (motorcycle) for the past six months. it is so nice to see him! i forgot how gawky, silly, and funny he is. we sat down to chat and immediately were joined by a group of ladyboys, who kept inching closer and closer to us, trying obviously to steal my bag and to molest robin. after turning down their offer of drugs in their room (do we really look that stupid?-never mind the picture to the left!) for the fifteenth time, we both took off in a huff, making plans to meet tomorrow and going home to crash.

since the inception of my site my readership has grown quite a lot. i get all sorts of email- from people who write everyday wanting to be my best friend (and then suddenly drop off the face of the earth), from people who want to kill or maim me, from people who want to offer me jobs or accommodation, from other backpackers who just want to thank me for info and/or meet up somewhere & exchange stories, from people who want to pay me for sex, from people who want to tell me their entire life stories, from people who are locked up in institutions and think they are in love with me, from friends i haven't heard from in months that just want to say "oh, there you are", from people who swear i am just like them!.... after ten months of these exchanges i am simply amused by the bulk of them, but the ones that get to me the most are the people who send me long drawn out analyses of my personal character. occasionally they hit pretty close to the mark but most people just don't get me at all. for instance, my sense of humor does not always jive with theirs... one example- at one point i referred to children living in poverty in cambodia, saying "the little bastards are going to make me go broke!", meaning i was spending a lot of money everyday on handouts. if you take that sentence out of context it definitely seems harsh, but if you knew me at all you would know i was referring to the children affectionately, tongue-in-cheek, because in fact i love children, especially in cambodia.... there are other examples that are continually flaunted at me in my online interrogations, but please people, don't make the mistake of thinking you know me by the paragraph or so a day i write. as honest, straightforward, and thorough as i try to be this is just a small slice of my life and i do not write everything. it is easy to write me off as a typical, manipulative prejudiced spoiled....whatever american girl but i can assure you i am anything but typical and i probably don't fit most of your preconceptions about me, idealized or otherwise. also this journal is an evolution- i am not the same person i was when i started it and a lot of my opinions have changed or been refined according to my experiences. in any case, of course i have my faults but i think people who do know me would say i am truly a nice girl, a good person, and unfailingly honest and loyal. and i don't think anyone would regret sitting next to me on a bus bench. enough said.

i put my ticket for NY off another month today but then i got a whole inbox of rejections from fully booked hotels in japan for the next couple of weeks. argh. so i either have to go and sleep on the street or go and pay $100/night. either way i am going but i haven't figured out those wee details yet. :( or bought a ticket.

my sleep schedule in bangkok is so weird for me. i am usually up by 9 or 10am as a rule, but the past couple of weeks i can't get up earlier than noon or go to bed earlier than 3am or so. i even set my alarm every morning- which mysteriously turns itself off :). last night i tried to trick myself into a normal schedule by popping a happy purple xanax to make me sleep and going to bed early at 10p, setting my alarm for 9 in the morning. mistake!- i forget how strong happy purple xanax's (for which i have a prescription by the way) are! not only did i sleep right through my alarm but i did not wake up until around 2p. you would think 14 hours of sleep would be enough but no... i woke up long enough to stare groggily at a soggy khao san "breakfast" and then crawl right back into bed. those little suckers are nearly lethal! thus i do not remember much that happened today.

i do remember trying again to call otto, and when his friend answered the phone this time i could hear otto screaming horrid unrepeatable things in the background to me. not sure where that came from, i can only assume he was very drunk. or maybe he is insane after all!... most probably it is the thai tendency to hold everything in until they are all backed up and they explode. he has done this once before....i have been trying to get him to discuss the whole attack situation with me for days, but he is so mad at me for even suggesting that he might have been involved that, well, he pretty much ended my desire tonight to ever talk to him again (again). i must say, cultural differences (especially when communicating from a distance) should not be taken lightly- if i had only known what i was getting into that day two thai boys showed up on my doorstep with bandages and medicine for me after my motorbike accident, i would have shut the door and pretended "nobody home"....( well, no, i have learned a lot from ot that i do not regret in retrospect, but sometimes he drives me completely crazy).

i tried to work today on my project but it is sort of futile until 'x' decides if he is staying in thailand to help me or not, and also until a certain third party decides if he wants to hire me (and thus enable my staying in bangkok and doing my end of this project) or not. i ended up playing 'snood' for hours instead- it is a ridiculous little game sort of like tetris but i am addicted to it. i wanted to go to the grand palace because it is one thing in bangkok i have not yet seen and i hear great things about it, but it's closing time is at 3p (grumble grumble). too late for lazy girls. so between reading 'a prayer for owen meany' (maybe my favorite book) and playing that stupid game this was a pretty much unmentionable day.

otto seems to be avoiding me all the sudden. his friends keep answering his phone and trying to tell me he has gone missing but their weak hesitant stories do not add up. i am sure he is glaring at me in the background for some silly thing. i wish thai people would be as straightforward as i like to be.

i met up with 'x' tonight who had two of his cute little "girlfriends" from isaan with him. very naive little farmgirls despite the fact they have been working the bar scene for so long- so endearing and shy. one of them had an air of gloominess about life in general that made me want to save her. sometimes the cold hard facts of that lifestyle become overwhelming, i don't think it is something a man could understand and perhaps that is why men keep supplying a demand despite the obvious ugliness that the girls have to put up with.

one aspect i will mention is that 'x' (who is very paranoid about disease and thus almost overcautious and generally safe) has quite a few acquaintances (sexpats) who patronize the sex scene and refuse to wear condoms. not only is that insanely stupid and dangerous to their own health, but they are potentially hurting the girls as well, by getting them pregnant and more importantly passing around disease. their attitudes on the issue are so cavalier and disgusting. they have all sorts of ploys to get the girls to go without protection, and if it fails they will go so far as to secretly slide the condom off right before they penetrate. what's worse is they have "normal" girlfriends at home that they lie to and pass the diseases on to as well. these people totally revolt me. i don't like using condoms either but i wouldn't want to become a potential murderer because of my own irresponsibility and arrogance.

anyway we had a good time tonight, teaching the girls to eat japanese food (we seem to be addicted), taking them to see a boy bar (must be strange and maybe nice to see that boys are doing the same job), and going dancing. by the end of the night the little girl whom 'x' had targeted was all over me. we were all a little drunk and i didn't really do much to fend her off, and she grabbed onto me in the taxi on the way back to her place and tried to convince me to take her home with me. 'x' was horrified and i was amused. i have never stolen his girl before. :) we all went to our respective beds alone though, like good little boys and girls.

nothing all day, i was very sick and sleepy so other than an hour when i ventured out to eat and chat with my little gum-selling pal ciao, i spent the day in bed.

'x' and i did go see the movie '28 days later' though tonight. i thought it was great. i usually don't get creeped out too easily but this one almost gave me a stomach ulcer by the end. such gorey violence must mystify thai people. even though they show dead bodies on the news etc. (unlike the US), i don't think their movies are prone to such gore.

i bought a lonely planet and spent most of the day reading up on japan. these are days i live for! i have decided not to see just tokyo but to the whole whirlwind tour (all i can afford is a couple of weeks but that's ok). tickets are only $375 round trip on egypt air so as soon as i figure out the status of my project/possible employment here (argh!) i can hop on a plane and go. meanwhile there is a lot of twiddling of thumbs, drinking of mai tais, and daily massages to help relieve stress.

i am horrifically neurotic. just ask 'x'. here's an example. getting back to the hormonal imbalance thing. 'x' and i had another japanese dinner tonight and somehow we got to talking about the "test" you can do on women to ensure they are not katoeys (ladyboys). basically a woman's arm will bend backwards at an angle but a man's can not. same with the fingers. 'x' bent my fingers back to test and i failed- apparently i am a man! i saw this documentary once on hermaphrodites. it said something like 2 of every 10 children are born with both sexes. the doctor then has to decide which one is most dominant and tell the parents (circumcising accordingly or whatever). i have this irrational fear that i might be one of them. to the point where i almost want to call my mom, whom i have not spoken to in about five years, and ask her if i was born a hermaphrodite! haha. okay okay i assure you i am very female and i simply have a hormonal imbalance. but people often tell me i resemble the late kurt cobain....ack! i can not get this out of my head. :)

big ridiculous drama on the thorn tree (lonely planet message board). this happens occasionally- i seem to unwittingly be the instigator of long and winding discussions that inevitably end up bashing me because i am too neurotic/analytical and too intent on getting my point across to just ignore the incendiary threads. i like debate though- i should really have studied to be a lawyer....the issue this time is actually fairly serious so i don't want to downplay it at all or the safety warning that is inherent in it. but like i mentioned there was an incident at the jah bar on ko chang this past sunday where at their monthly full moon party one of otto's (stupid) coworkers got in a fight with a couple of drunk farang patrons and he ended up stabbing one of them with a nearby meat cleaver(!)... ot got stabbed as well trying to help out. one of the farang kids subsequently posted the story as he saw it on the message board... granted this is a horrible, indefensible crime and i do not want to give off the impression that i support the kid who did it in the least. but though i was not there and am obviously unable to prove or disprove anything, i personally spoke to the jah bar staff and customers the night of the incident and daily since then and i feel the farang boy exaggerated the story. he also padded his claims with unfounded rumors along the lines of the jah bar being a generally unsafe place where young vulnerable women are often drugged and raped. that bothers me, though i would have just blown that off with a quick post to defend my friends' reputation, but then a couple of self righteous pricks who are completely ignorant of the situation other than what they have read from this farang kid decided they would help spread rumors about the jah bar by among other things posting warnings outside of their businesses bashing the character of the place. i have spent a lot of time with the people at the jah bar in the past (see past entries) and i know them (all except the new kid who did the stabbing) fairly well. they are not the type of people to be a part of some big evil conspirational gang of rapists and murderers, they are really nice, hardworking, considerate thai people. they all (except ot of course and a fifteen year old kid) have long term girlfriends who live at the bar with them and even if they did not, there is such an abundance of beautiful, willing western girls throwing themselves literally at the bartenders that there is simply no need to drug and rape. this kid had problems, and yes ideally they should have foreseen the possibility of an attack but they are not psychic and they did not... and the fact that the rest of the staff were bystanders in the same vicinity does not automatically incriminate them. the owner's business should not be the victim of some sort of irrational witch hunt perpetuated by people who have never met him or even been to that beach- he should take a certain amount of responsibility, the kid should be prosecuted, and the staff and customers warned about situations in which people are drinking heavily late at night and that is that. the jah bar unfortunately happened to be a site for a random act of violence. it can happen anywhere at any time, and people should always be vigilant, especially solo females.

i have a personal emotional interest in this issue not only because i know the people involved this time but because i was close to someone once who is now imprisoned for having done something very similar (worse in fact), and i have analyzed and re-analyzed the psychology behind it endlessly....argh. it's a fruitless effort to explain this on the thorn tree though when the regular posters on there seem to delight in arguing for the sake of arguing and conveniently ignore any logic i might present to them. suffice it to say i still recommend the jah bar and lonely beach, of course with a certain amount of caution in general, & otto is probably the most sickeningly sweet person i have ever met, and his friends/coworkers are all fun loving, generous, and happy. as a solo female i have never felt threatened (even before i became familiar with it) & i have always had a good time at the bar and on lonely beach.

today i woke up early (or 10am which these days is early for me) and headed to do some shopping at siam center. about halfway there in the cab i started to get sort of dizzy. by the time my driver booted me out my vision was swimming and my knees were so weak i could not walk. i was nauseous and couldn't catch my breath. i got right back in to another cab and spent another 75 baht to get back home, where i collapsed weakly into bed. hrmmmm. maybe a natural defense to prevent my spending money?

the only channel i have that seems to come in consistently is the discovery channel. i am not usually one for leaving the tv on when i am sleeping but since my poltergeist i have done so every night. i start awake in the middle of the night to bone chilling screams and growls in shows like wild attacks (6 year olds being eaten by wolves on a family camping trip) or am disgusted and fascinated by extreme births, in which i can watch a tasmanian devil contort itself in labor pains to shite out 33 baby weirdlings who all scramble to be one of the 4 who survive (only 4 nipples on the mama from which to get milk) before the mama eats the remaining losers. yikes. i should really turn the tv off. now i am listening to an infuriating british narrator say things like "nu-cu-lar" and "NASAr" in a show on mars exploration. ugh.

waiting on 'x' to decide what he is doing so i can subsequently do the same.

i spent today researching tokyo, which alternately seems like a great idea and even somewhat manageable on my budget, and then stupidly idealistic (especially where taka is concerned, because even though i would NOT be going there specifically to chase him i know the fact that he is there is influential in my decision to go), financially impossible, and maybe even boring. i suppose though that i do want to see japan sometime in my life for sure, and now is as good a time as any.

i was still rather morose today and i sulked over to mine and taka's favorite seat at khao sarn center to finish my book and watch travelers traipsing by over a fruit shake. i ended up talking to this adorable kid tao, whom i have met several times but still can not figure out the gender of! this happens fairly often in thailand, but not to this extent. he (or she) has a huge crush on taka and spent the whole time swooning over the recollection of him. he (i'll stick to that for now) is 17 and so sickly sweet and innocent (from isaan no less) that by the end of the 2 hour conversation i wanted to adopt him and take him with me to tokyo to realize his dream. but i just smiled at him over my somtam, gave him a big tip, and sulked back to my room to surf the net for the rest of the still alcohol-free evening.

my french boy friend left early to chiang mai for a visa run so we have plans to go out when he gets back. i couldn't really care less either way, honestly.

it is (past) time to move on and i know it, but it's like i am in one of those dreams where you know you have to run but everything is in slow motion and you can barely pick up your feet, let alone make any forward progress. today i am just plain too depressed to make any kind of decision. i slept until about 4pm, after which time i wandered out to get something (alcoholic) to drink, to hopefully either lighten my mood or make me drowsy so i could just go back to sleep... but alas buddha was one step ahead of me and due to "buddhist lent" i was turned down at 3 separate restaurants, as they can not offend buddhist sensibilities today by the serving of evil beer (by law). i bought 2 heinekens from 7-11 before they boarded up the beer fridge but as i do not have a bottle opener and i am not talented with a lighter like some people they will most likely remain warm and unopened in my room until such time as i chuck them.

i finally decided to meet up with 'x', who was looking sublimely comfortable and well fed, alone in a chic dark restaurant where he immediately ordered me a glass of beer and fed me some of his exquisite lemon pastry dessert. we wandered to asoke plaza where we noticed there were actually a few beer bars serving alcohol surreptitiously in the dark. we had to empty the beer bottles into sprite bottles just in case the boys in brown happened by, and i felt silly and a little guilty like i used to feel when i would drink underage. 'x' and i were bored with each other and i was glum, and the more i drank the more i talked about taka (whom i can't get out of my head) and he retaliated with stories of (the apparently perfect for him) rosa in cambodia. i finally decided i'd had enough, time to go back and mope in my room again, and caught a cab in the drizzling rain.

otto called as soon as i got home. i had told him yesterday in a fit of anger that i didn't want to talk to him again but of course that didn't last long. i really can't imagine not talking to ot again, he is a positive influence in my life no matter the status of our relationship. he was really freaked out by an incident at the jah bar tonight and his speech was a third thai and a third nonsensical gibberish. apparently he was stabbed with a knife by one of his coworkers who flew off the handle over a dispute over a girl. he also stabbed a foreign guy in the process. it's pretty serious and the police were chasing down the kid as we spoke. i will withhold further comment until i hear more. not a typical night at the jah bar... meanwhile we have agreed to be friends for now.

strange day. i was really sick this morning (a few thai guys designated me as the evening's tequila shot victim last night and i turn into a vomit machine when i touch the stuff). i woke up at 11 but didn't stumble out of bed until around 2p, until which time i just moaned and groaned into my pillow.

it was taka's final day here so i was actually almost irrationally sad as i pouted into my noodle soup and listlessly mulled over my work. i think i really like that boy more than i let on even to myself. we have had a great time with each other, & the past two weeks especially i have spent almost every day with him... but i should know better than to expect anything from a fellow traveller. i do have secret plans to meet up with him in tokyo someday soon though. if he helps me figure the place out it will be worth it, and i would just like to be near him, even if it is a look but don't touch kind of thing :( ....

though a weird thing happened later on. i walked taka and his huge (japanese) closet on wheels to his airport bus to see him off. after the requisite thai ho-i-mean-girl came to jump all over him squealing and scribbling down his email address while i stood patiently (fuming) beside him, i was just about to say goodbye when otto called. he asked to talk to taka so he could say hi and goodbye, and i said no, but he pushed and pushed until against my better judgement i handed the phone to taka and crossed my fingers. i saw taka's face fall and i knew i had done wrong. ot of course said something to him along the lines of "i hope you enjoyed my girlfriend", which was totally uncalled for, as taka has been a complete gentleman with me and has no reason to feel guilty. taka looked crestfallen and gave me a quick, uncomfortable hug, then left me standing as his bus pulled off with a confused look on my face. i immediately called ot and asked him what he'd said and he repeated it nonchalantly. hrmmmm i must say i completely freaked out on otto after that. granted i have definitely entertained thoughts of being with taka, but i have been honest with otto about that and we have agreed that whatever happens happens with either of us. and really, when it boils down to it, i can't take otto's jealous possessiveness and his total dependence on me these past couple of weeks. he insisted it is human jealousy but considering he probably has a different girlfriend every night these days he is not in a position to manipulate my life and relationships over it.... argh!...i love the guy truly as a person, but like i told him tonight i don't think i can handle him as a boyfriend ever again. he of course started sobbing and begging and i felt horribly sadistic but i just told him to give me space and do his own thing for awhile and left it at that. i SMS'd taka with an apology and told him how much i would really miss him, and he sent me back this huge long message saying he loves me like a girlfriend and hopes we can be together again someday soon....?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!???!?!?!???!?!?!???!?!?!?!? ARGH.

anyway so now i have no taka, no otto, a surprisingly and unusually amiable 'x'-friend again, the stalker who recommenced his hang up calls today, a date with a cute french guy tomorrow night, and a completely uncertain future otherwise. stay tuned for more real life in bangkok on the next episode.

'x' and i went to see terminator 3 at MBK today. usually i hate sequels and this one was admittedly weak, but i still rather enjoyed it. i have noticed that a lot of familiar actors are aging very rapidly these days. maybe they just don't make them up like they used to? claire danes, cameron diaz, leonardo dicaprio for instance all have wrinkles, have gained weight, and generally seem like completely different people onscreen than they did even a couple of years ago. weird. probably happening to me as well.

we ate at sizzler afterwards which is inevitably a disappointment. i ordered the salad bar thinking that finally i could satisfy my craving for fresh veggies (i miss real salads) but on my plate were only wimpy, metallic tasting lumps of boring leftovers. 'x' ordered a seafood platter that was more oil than seafood. we left hungry.

i gave 'x' his goodbye pat on the back and headed to see taka for his last night here. it took an hour and a half to get back to banglamphu in a taxi (cursed bangkok traffic) and then an hour and a half to find a tuk tuk driver who could understand where it was i wanted to go and then to take me there. the restaurant (river bar) was a nice, big place right on the river with a decent live thai band which did covers of depeche mode and the cranberries. i arrived around 11:30p to a table full of thai girls and the already semi drunk taka (and totally drunk baby tan). the girls are nice, i'd met them before, but they are all pretty conservative and boring, so we didn't stay long.

headed to bangkok bar, which was cram packed with drunk thai kids dancing and flirting. we stood sipping in corners while taka and i alternately got hit on (he by various thai girls, me by various thai boys and a cute french guy) and tan looked jealous. we decided to go to the rooftop bar near my place and sat reminiscing and feeling sad for a bit. baby tan left after i hinted that i wanted to be alone with taka and we wandered around a bit, silently pouting, until we happened upon a group of thai kids sitting in a circle with a guitar. one drunk boy with tattoos kept doing "cheers" to us, but replacing it with the word "fuck". a very gregarious girl (i think) kept hitting a nearby european kid on the head while she sang loudly, and a shy nervous boy played recorder in the corner. a few swedish people jumped in and a good time was had by all, until the police came and kicked us all out towards home. i gave taka a sad lingering hug in the elevator and went to bed.

somehow 4 days have passed and i honestly can not remember what i did. i remember my cable tv flickering and stuttering like a recurrent nightmare and my mp3 player dying a slow sad death. 'x' saying he sure wishes he could sleep with me again (ugh) and in the same breath saying he misses his cambodian girlfriend. otto being insane and jealous and calling me fifteen times in a row at 5:30 am to make certain i am alone, after he stupidly did something "he thinks" was coke but made him sleepy and apparently sleepwalk, as he now does not remember calling me at all. taka and i hang out but though there is no more uncomfortable silence i secretly resent him for his perpetual mysteriousness and the fact that he is seemingly impervious to my charms. somehow whenever i bring the subject around to why he doesn't like me he manages to change it without my realizing until too late- we are discussing the flickering candles or the bartender's smile or the peculiar angle at which the nearest drunk bar patron seems to be leaning off his chair. i edge closer and closer to him as the night goes on and he doesn't pull back but that is as far as it goes, as i am not in the least aggressive- or used to having to try. sigh- i don't want to lay him so much as just be close to him. bangkok is so bright and so redundant that after i coaxe a bowl of noodles out of the grim noodle vendor lady who begrudges every farang breath i take, i spend most of my time in my room, debating on whether to work or to lose myself in other peoples' problems on message boards- i have an annoying habit of thinking i am ann landers, telling people what they should name their puppies, where to find a good travel agent, how to move on with life after the boyfriend comes home with the traces of yet another girl on the shirt collar. i have attempted to at least exercise so not all is lost in my slothful delerium but after 50 squats and a few sit-ups i pass out panting on my tiny bed.

oh wait! i did have a very awkward night with 'x' and taka. 'x' moved to a place nearby my new favorite japanese restaurant, and i convinced taka to come with us and translate the menu for a free dinner. mistake. 'x' does not share in my culinary adventurousness, and taka is just shy. he forgot all of his english in his nervousness and 'x' kept comparing himself physically to taka (silly) and feeling insecure. i tried to mediate the conversation but failed. we ate in relative silence until 'x' escaped to his place, leaving taka and i alone to go to bed. (haha) bed is a supperclub/bar. another one of those hyped up places with great design and good drinks but overpriced and pretentious. we left to go find a smaller quieter bar in banglamphu, and talked until 3am or so while i tried and failed to coaxe his sexuality out of him once more.

'x' and i met with an american expat businessman today to discuss the increasingly overwhelming project we are working on. i am infectiously positive about what 'x' and i are doing but underneath i fear i simply can't afford the start up. the fear of the big bad US keeps me in idealistic denial though so forward ho- we asked the spectacled, sweaty, socially awkward man (who in true entreprenurial spirit immediately forced several different business cards on me) to handle our billing for us and he agreed. we ate at the old dutch, which is a surreal parody of a dutch tavern, tulips, poffertjes and all. outside we could see the working girls going about their real daily lives sans-makeup and high heels on soi cowboy (kind of funny as they are not so attractive as they appear in the dark). i could barely hold my head up (sleepy) and i shivered in the air conditioning until 'x' finally got frustrated and we left to wander around sukhumwit's stalls. i noticed a row of thai porn next to powerpuff girls slippers and bags and raised an eyebrow. we somehow ended up at nana, where after we realized the classic theater where you choose your own movie from the stock of dvds to watch in a private booth was no longer in existence (pity as it is one of the only original ideas in this city) we sat drinking at a weird stuffy bar while two thai policemen eyed us greedily, a humongous fat cockroach played chicken with our feet, and the thai waitresses snubbed us. 'x' informed me he had an interview for a job in NY which pays a ridiculous amount of money for not much work- and i was suitably jealous as usual, and felt afterwards rather hopeless about our project since i can't exactly do it alone. taka and i met up later where i ended up giving him an irrationally stunned silent treatment when i noticed he had a couple of hickies on his neck. he insisted it was a joke from a friend but my natural instinct to distrust and my inexplicable jealousy forced me to go to bed early, leaving him to drink alone. ot called me being clingy to the point where i almost told him that was that, but then i remembered i like him and don't want to hurt him so i settled for a brusque hangup which i later blamed on the connection.

it was a really hot day so i kidnapped taka early in the afternoon and made him go get an air-conditioned massage with me (the massage girls were beside themselves, scrambling to be the one to massage him- ack). i think if i were to get a thai massage every day i would have no health problems for the rest of my life. i in fact plan to test that theory. it's not so similar to western massage (which focuses more on the muscles), but it is very powerful and healing. they bend and twist you in several nearly impossible positions as well as using their elbows and knees to pummel you.

later taka and i spent the entire night with just each other, talking and drinking. he told me some funny things about japan, ie. there are vending machines where you can buy pet birds! you just put in your coins and out pops this little live bird in a box! by which i was impressed. i also read that the japanese have invented a laptop which runs on methane. funny to think that someday we might just need to put "gas" in our computer before we do our work. we ended up watching fashion tv at bangkok bar, which is always full of thai college kids and was pretty entertaining, if crowded. one thai ho-i-mean-girl thrust herself immediately onto taka's leg so i turned and oogled the little bartender, who had the most beautiful and dynamic smile. i kept thinking up little tricks to get him to flash it at me as he poured my sangsom.

otto seems to be going insane on ko chang. i have always liked him but the one aspect of him i consistently can not deal with is clinginess. after talking to several resident expats i am realizing it's possibly an asian cultural thing- thai people are sometimes emotionally like children. i have been very honest with him about who i have been hanging out with and the nature of those relationships, but he doesn't trust me and calls me suspiciously at 4 or 5 in the morning to make sure i am sleeping alone and that i still love him and only him forever and ever amen... and on and on. the past couple of nights i didn't feel like answering the phone as i was dead asleep, but tonight he called a grand total of fifteen times in a row. i finally answered and he was freaking out, breathing heavily and almost sobbing, accusing me of not being alone. aaarrgh. maybe it's the old "a liar doesn't believe anyone else" thing, or maybe he really is just worried, but i am far too independent to constantly have to defend myself to someone who apparently feels he owns me. poor frustrating kid.

really felt like i was in asia today, which makes me happy. i should really leave my room more often these days. i saw a happy thai father pulling his grubby little girl down khao san road in a cardboard box tied to a leash- sort of a makeshift wagon. very cute and typically thai. i was in a taxi and the pickup next to me was filled with huge smiling golden buddha statues taking in the view (wish i'd gotten a picture of that). i saw that the sad child who sleeps on the corner by the wat with a begging bowl is now accompanied by a newborn litter of homeless soi puppies. hrmmmm.... the "orange juice 10 bahhhht" girl, the hot, polluted air thick with rain, the shifty loitering men, the smoking stalls hung with unidentifiable animal parts... i sure love this place.

i worked with 'x' on our project most of the day today. later on i met taka and our irish/japanese friends trevor and kanako for dinner. they took me to an excellent japanese restaurant called hanako near soi 20 or so. we sat on the floor of course, it was very authentic, in fact i was the only white person there. the menu was all in japanese so i let them order for me. it was so damn good! i think i have found a new favorite food! amongst the weird things i tried were whole sardines rubbed with radish and some sort of spicy sauce (these are swallowed whole- head, stary eyes, poop and all! but really yummy), and something called suzuki which is thinly sliced raw fish dipped in an oniony plum sauce-mmmmm. my mouth is watering thinking back on it. it was very expensive but totally worth it, and i really like hanging out with kanako and trevor so it was a good night. we had some drinks at the scottish pub afterwards where i noticed grumpily that taka turns into a blabbermouth when he's amongst his own kind (=japanese speakers). he's also a pretty good artist (he was doodling on brochures at the table)- are all japanese people great artists and do they all have enviable style or is it just the ones i meet? i flipped through his modelling portfolio while he and kanako tried to explain japanese writing to me. (apparently it's a mixture of three different alphabets as well as occasional chinese characters... i never in my life hope to learn it). i leaned drunkenly on taka's shoulder in the cab on the ride home, wanting to be close to him and frustrated with his... non-ness as usual.

the thai boy who is stalking me woke me up with several consecutive hang up calls starting at about 7am today. ugh. i called otto and told him to tell him to back off but ot just blew it off as usual. :( i was working at 'x''s pad again today so later on when gun had been calling all morning and i hadn't answered, i finally handed the phone to 'x', who got the message across in his best gruff 'x' voice. didn't get a single call after that! yippee!

i did some reading up on a disease i have (polycystic ovarian syndrome) and learned that my skin problem (not so bad but i still get zits and i am freaking 27) is due to the fact that i produce too much testosterone. technically i should be hairy and obese as well- lawdy- thank my lucky stars i am not! anyway i started a new anti-androgen medicine today to counteract the testosterone and clear things up. but i have to wonder- is my bisexuality possibly because i am more man than most women? yeeesh what a freaky thing to consider. 'x' called me names like 'he-woman' all day- i was not amused. well maybe a little. :)

i seem to have a poltergeist in my hotel room. i am very meticulous about my air conditioner. i set it at 19 degrees during the day and at 21 when i go to sleep. but lately i have been leaving my room to come back late at night and find it all the way up or all the way down. very strange. but wait- there's more! sometimes i go to sleep with the dial set at one temperature and wake up freezing my teets off the next morning to find that it is turned all the way down! how is that possible i ask ya? i am very interested in parapsychology so i welcome any ghosts that might be around, however it still makes me feel a bit weird. it is not the maid, as it happens at night long after the maids have left, i put my 'do not disturb' sign out, and i also leave money and my laptop sitting around and come back to find them untouched. hrmmmm.

had a somewhat boring night with taka, baby tan (whom we learned tonight is actually 18, not 19, eep), and a group of taka's very conservative thai girl friends. tan predictably drank way too much whiskey and he eventually joined the line of 4 or 5 thai boys leaning over the ditch outside and puking. they all passed out one by one, but tan did a bit of sobbing and drooling before he actually hit the pavement. taka and i ended up babysitting him the rest of the night. we forced him to drink water, carried him back to khao san road, and tried to find him a guesthouse room, but khao san has a STUPID, RACIST law that no thai people are allowed to stay in most of the guesthouses, so we ended up just leaving him to find a cab home.

i got out of my hotel room today which was nice, even if it was just to go work with 'x' in his hotel room. he is staying in his coworker's place for a week while he's gone- it's a great place overlooking soi cowboy (a disneyesque sex street), with a luxurious pool and hot tub, a gym, a big bathtub, a kitchen, cable tv, high speed internet etc. etc.... just nice to hang out in a place that feels so homey (if i were a rich executive) for once. i spent more time raiding 'x''s fridge for drinks, ordering lavish room service, calibrating his air conditioner to a perfect temperature, and flipping through his software & mp3 collection than i did actually working. i also met his girlfriend, or one of them, who is visiting from pattaya- a very adorable thai girl name jaoa. she ran in and was instantly all over him, which was very weird for me to see. i excused myself immediately to avoid any discomfort while he giggled slyly at me from across the room.

later on it became one of the fucking craziest nights of my life. i always say i am open to absolutely everything, i want to see it all.... tonight i considered revising that opinion! i was hanging out with taka and we were bored, so when 'x' called me up and invited us to go with him and jaoa to a boy bar near patpong to see a show (good research for our project), i agreed and taka and i raced over. the place was dark and very crowded but we managed to find seats right along the stage. the show started out fairly tame- a few naked boys making out in a shower behind steamy glass. jaoa was really drunk and giggly and i was more focused on her wiggling around in 'x''s lap (while he focused on taka, who is always disgustingly refined, demure, and enviably unreadable) than i was on the boys at first. she kept telling me how in love she was with 'x' and how frustrating it was since he didn't seem to feel much of anything at all (like i didn't know!!!)...weird. then the second act started. i don't know if i should go into details or not!!!! i find men making out very seductive, but when they progress to *assfucking* in large groups (to put it quite bluntly) i am rather turned off. they literally piled on top of each other in a big train, and were very violent (really hardcore, beating one another with rubber hoses as they slammed into each other) and acrobatic about the whole thing (there were swings and uneven bars from which they hung and manouvered themselves into varied and seemingly impossible positions- including twirling around 360 degrees while remaining inside...rather talented actually!)... taka and i had been to this bar before, and one of his little friends was actually in the act. we couldn't look at him the same after that! the show just got more and more hardcore, until taka started chainsmoking nervously and trying impossibly to look invisible, 'x' was hiding behind jaoa, and jaoa herself and i just sat boggle-eyed, downing drinks as quick as we could and completely shocked at what we were seeing. later on there was an act with several of the very surprisingly huge(!) boys wearing cockrings, who came right up into our faces and played with themselves as they tried to catch our eye and hopefully our pocketfuls of baht.... and there was one boy dressed in a huge penis costume with a water pump inside who kept dancing around and squirting people in the crowd (that part was really funny to me but i was sort of slaphappy and hysterical all around by then).... it ended with a show with the boys dressed in g-strings and masks and dancing slowly with candles, dripping wax on each other and the crowd, followed by another soapy shower scene where they very thoroughly cleaned each other up. yowza!!! we hauled arse out of there as soon as it was finished. :) if i was at all innocent before tonight, i am no longer! bangkok is such an insane place!

i was a little embarassed with taka, thinking he'd write me off as a freak after all that, but he thankfully saw it as a good experience and even suggested he'd be having good dreams tonight. (i sure wonder about that boy.) we had some late night pad thai with our little friend tan at khao sarn center while we both sort of wandered into our own little freaked out worlds in our head. finally went to sleep around 4 or so.

i spent all day coding my new site. back in the swing of things with programming, and i now remember how much i really do love my work. i get a huge sense of accomplishment when i produce a functional finished product. also, my project is interesting and i am making all the rules, have creative control, and don't have to deal with irritating personalities- other than 'x'. :) actually i must say i am loving being 'x''s friend. funny how that works. after months of feeling close to suicidal over the loss of our relationship i sudden have realized it wasn't a loss at all, it's just changed it's nature. we get along better than we ever have and we work well together too. he tells me about his girlfriends and i tell him about my boyfriends, and not a twinge of noticeable jealousy rears it's ugly head. really! it makes me feel a little better about people after all. i guess things aren't always as black and white as i make them out to be.

my reggae shop friend, a thai boy named gun, has been sort of stalking me lately. i didn't start to notice the switch from casual friend to obsessive freak until this evening. he called me up and said he'd really like to see me before he goes off to the south to see his friend become a monk tomorrow. i met him at the airway bar on a rooftop nearby. gun is really quiet and definitely starey(!) so i sat rather uncomfortably with him and a group of thai friends in silence, examining my fingernails for about an hour. they spoke mostly in thai and i could tell they were making sexual jokes about me so i didn't stick around for long. gun is otto's friend so the fact that he's calling me, asking me out, etc. is pretty irritating, especially when i have explained to him the nature of mine and ot's relationship. both 'x' and ot say i am too nice to people, that i need to say no sometimes. ot insists thai boys think that anything that smiles at them wants to sleep with them regardless of their relationship status. i personally think that's pretty stupid. ugh....anyway i did meet a nice older thai man who just divorced his american wife and was rather depressed. he made movies of himself making sad faces with his video camera. i tried to cheer him up by telling him there are plenty of gorgeous thai girls in the bangkok sea, but he explained that thai girls only want money (true), and the majority of thai men are totally uncool with the fact that if you date a thai girl for any extended period of time you are expected to marry her and pay a large dowry to her greedy parents. he insisted he'd stick with farang girls, thanks, even if they are rather crazy. i suppose i would too if i were him.

i stumbled across a website today for one of bangkok's hospitals, with detailed information on and before/after surgery pictures of katoeys (ladyboys). thailand is the number one destination for people wanting sex changes, and they have the top doctors in the world for that sort of thing. if i hadn't seen it with my own eyes, i wouldn't believe the extent to which people go to change themselves. i find it hard to understand that mentality. it's not just taking a chunk out of your ass to make boobs and growing your hair long- they actually chop out the adam's apple, modify the voice box, ingest various hormones and steroids, reconstruct the genitals... i mean basically they fully switch over. sometimes it's funny, they make really excellent women (almost too perfect you know), and i have seen several men fooled for extended periods of time by them. i guess if it is a complete changeover it doesn't really matter- does it? i am of the opinion it changes their personality as well, though. ladyboys in general are funny and entertaining, but are also very superficial, insecure, and SKETCHY! they are widely known for being thieves, many of them are addicted to yaba (thailand's notorious methamphetamine), and they are more likely to take up careers as streetwalkers than anything else. i wonder if this is a genetic thing or an environmental thing. and i wonder why it is so prevalent in thailand? there are hundreds of ladyboys present in every aspect of everyday life. are they really gay? surely these boys can't be so desperately poor that they find turning themselves into female prostitutes to be the only way to financial security--- can they? thailand is really a fucked up place.

here is a good article on this topic by the way.

someone recently wrote me with the comment that no one cares to read about my social life and my seemingly perpetual drunkennness. possibly true but my response to that is why bother reading then, and even more mystifying, why bother writing me a passionate response? hrmmm. i think someone somewhere once said it is better to incite a negative response than no response at all. (if not i will take credit for that. :) ) anyway i am 27. when i am at home in my "real life" i am much more sensible. i do smoke a lot of pot :) for which i am unapologetic, but i only drink maybe a glass or two of wine on weekends in the US. in thailand my tolerance goes up quite significantly (it's weird actually- maybe one's metabolism is higher here?). but still, i drink maybe one drink for every 3 drinks that my drinking partner downs, enjoying the drinks rather than letting them enjoy me!, and i rarely get really "drunk" (as in the high school definition)- just a bit tipsy. i definitely do not want to glorify drinking on this site. i grew up with an alcoholic and i have seen how it destroys lives. & i am not one nor do i desire to become one myself.. BUT, i am a no holds barred kinda gal, on a trip of a lifetime (though currently sort of stuck), and instead of going to bed early i like to go out drinking with my friends! i really don't think i am alone in that... don't like it? there is a little thing called a scrollbar to the right of this sentence, you are welcome to use it to move right on past.

this evening the beautiful and aloof taka returned from london to stay another couple of weeks in bangkok. that's a relief to me, as now i have a pal to go out with again. taka is quiet and shy and sometimes irritatingly passive, and i still can't figure out his sexuality (he claims to like me but there is no evidence of it)! but he is up for anything and we always have a good time together. tonight i took him to the gas station outdoor bar (literally a makeshift bar outside a gas station), and we caught up on things over some cocktails.

my thai friend tom coincidentally happened by with his pretty, quirky german friend iris, so we sat drinking for a bit and decided to head to the blues bar in banglamphu later on. the blues bar is a great place to just relax and meet people. they really do play surprisingly good blues for thailand (adhere the 13th, if anyone is interested). the big fat thai girl singer, georgia, has just returned from her first ever trip abroad and was in good spirits, which translated to great energy and tunes. tom was weird to me all night, refusing to look or talk to me because he didn't want to make the girl he was with jealous. kind of silly as i had no intention of stealing him away, but i did get a little jealous of her in reaction. he got pretty drunk again, as before when i met him. after his girl begged off without so much as a kiss he turned back to me and was sweet as pie, telling me he felt a connection to me the first time he saw me, etc. etc... maybe that's true, there was something in the air between us that first night we met, even before we said a word to each other, but his saying so then (especially considering he is leaving for chiang mai tomorrow to work on a film) was somewhat transparent and wrong. boys are frustrating and weird. taka and i left him sitting on the curb and made a 3am 7-11 run, then went to bed, separately.

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