Hey Viejo. Im coming over for my second trip, first 2 weeks of December. Last time did BKK and Koh Samoi. This time looking for a different beachy area with decent service. I was thinking maybe a west coast spot like Krabi. What do u think? Maybe do a little scuba diving along with the muff diving? Figure I'll do a few nights in BKK on either side of the beach flights.
I've stayed in Krabi. Very beautiful and seclusive, at least when I was there back in the late 90's.
Thailand is worth the flight time
Thailand is an amazing place with incredible history and geography. For the most part, people are very warm and the society is socially conservative especially the further you travel in-country. Bangkok sort of sucks, but its central location makes it a fantastic jumping off point for any locations in Asia.
The ladyboys are no big deal and you'd have to be super messed up not to know they aren't women. Thai society loves them and treats them with the same respect as other citizens. Many are not sex workers and have regular jobs. It takes a few months to get accustomed to seeing them, but the shock wears off quickly. My biggest issue with living there was the heat...it's unrelenting especially in Bangkok and the countryside. However, Bangkok's entertainment venues, shopping and restaurants are exceptional.
Southern Thailand is beautiful and worthy of your time. Muslims live all over South East Asia and I have never had any issues with them
They are hard working family oriented folks. In a nutshell, you have to keep out of bad area's, respect the culture, and stay far away from drugs and idiots. Some area's of South East Asia including parts of Thailand should be no fly zones for travelers. Better safe than sorry, but we're talking about huge countries with so much to offer, why put yourself in jeopardy with too much to see in a lifetime?
Oh and the women...the women are beautiful. Enjoy!
Thailand is an amazing place with incredible history and geography. For the most part, people are very warm and the society is socially conservative especially the further you travel in-country. Bangkok sort of sucks, but its central location makes it a fantastic jumping off point for any locations in Asia.
The ladyboys are no big deal and you'd have to be super messed up not to know they aren't women. Thai society loves them and treats them with the same respect as other citizens. Many are not sex workers and have regular jobs. It takes a few months to get accustomed to seeing them, but the shock wears off quickly. My biggest issue with living there was the heat...it's unrelenting especially in Bangkok and the countryside. However, Bangkok's entertainment venues, shopping and restaurants are exceptional.
Southern Thailand is beautiful and worthy of your time. Muslims live all over South East Asia and I have never had any issues with them
They are hard working family oriented folks. In a nutshell, you have to keep out of bad area's, respect the culture, and stay far away from drugs and idiots. Some area's of South East Asia including parts of Thailand should be no fly zones for travelers. Better safe than sorry, but we're talking about huge countries with so much to offer, why put yourself in jeopardy with too much to see in a lifetime?
Oh and the women...the women are beautiful. Enjoy!
[ In case any of you are tempted. ]
<header class="standard-image-lede standard-lede lede" style="box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; width: 50rem; margin-top: 4.375rem; position: relative; float: left;">[h=1]Transgender Tourism: For $2,000 a New Life Begins[/h] Jason Gale jwgale
<time class="published-at time-based" datetime="2015-10-26T22:48:03.284Z" itemprop="datePublished" style="box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: subpixel-antialiased; font-family: NHaasGroteskTXPro-55Rg, 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; opacity: 1; transition: opacity 0.5s ease-out; display: block; border: 0px; font-size: 0.8125rem; float: left; margin-right: 0.3125rem; line-height: 1.25rem; padding: 0px;">October 26, 2015 — 5:48 PM CDT</time>
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<figure class="inline-image inline-media" style="box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; display: inline-block; margin: 0px auto 1.25rem; padding: 0px; position: relative; clear: both; width: 800px; z-index: 0;">
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Photographer: Brent Lewin/Bloomberg
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Thep Vechavisit uses local anesthetic and sedatives to block the pain from the two-hour surgery he performs in a cramped room in his Bangkok clinic. It’s possibly the cheapest sex-reassignment operation in the world.
For about 70,000 baht ($1,950), patients’ male genitalia can be reassigned female in a procedure Thep says he does once a week in his Pratunam Polyclinic, a solo practice in Bangkok’s low-rent garment district. By spurning general anesthetic, an anesthetist and hospital operating theater, the surgeon says he can save 40,000-to-50,000 baht in medical costs.
“When you were trained in the past, they always tried to teach the doctor that you have to provide a good service at a reasonable price, and not make the patient pay a lot of money,” Thep says over a can of Pepsi in his office, a partitioned space barely big enough for a desk and a few chairs. “This is still in my mind.”
Thep is unapologetic about his no-frills approach, which he says makes his services more affordable for the increasing numbers of transgender patients who come to Thailand from across Asia for surgery. With societal prejudices against trans people waning, more people are seeking to transition to the opposite gender, bolstering demand for gender identity services.
While governments and insurers in Western Europe and North America are recognizing the need to pay for the treatments, Asia is lagging behind, Thep says. That’s disadvantaging his patients, who increasingly are coming from China, Cambodia, Vietnam, Myanmar, Malaysia, India and Nepal.
[h=2]Transgender Friendly[/h]“Society is more generous to accept these kinds of people, especially in China,” he says after finishing a male-to-female operation late one Friday evening in September. “In the past, a doctor could not open a clinic like this -- if you did this surgery in China, you’d be killed. But now I think the world’s changed. People are much more generous to accept transgender.”
<figure class="inline-image inline-media center " style="box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; display: inline-block; margin: 1.875rem auto 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative; clear: both; width: 740px; z-index: 0;">
<figcaption class="inline-media__info" style="box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; position: relative; padding: 0.9375rem 0px; z-index: 1; margin-left: 1.25rem; line-height: 1.125rem;">Thep Vechavisit performs a sex change operation in an operating room at Pratunam Polyclinic in Bangkok.
Photographer: Brent Lewin/Bloomberg
</figcaption></figure>While Thailand boasts upscale hospitals with marble floors, chandeliers and giant floral arrangements in their foyers, Thep’s clinic is no-frills. Boxes of surgical supplies are stacked in front of the reception counter and loose wires hang from uncovered fluorescent lights on the ceiling in the waiting room.
The 63-year-old, who trained as an ear, nose and throat surgeon, does almost a dozen operations in a typical 12-to-14-hour work day, with gender-affirming procedures usually done at the end. His nurses don’t like him doing them, he says. In the few hours it takes him to reassign a patient’s genitalia, he could insert eight or nine breast implants, earning 500,000 baht.
“My staff always try to reject the case because they think it’s not worth doing,” Thep says. “They always say, ‘Doctor, you are stupid!’ I say, ‘No. You have to understand, some people need the surgery. You cannot say no.”’
[h=2]Tried and Tested[/h]He got into gender surgery after correcting a botched operation more than 20 years ago and thinking he could offer a better service. Thep now counts more than 1,000 cases, using a technique he learned at a workshop conducted by the late British urologist Peter Philip, who performed gender reassignments at London’s Charing Cross Hospital last century.
“You have to find a technique that’s safe and effective and that you’re skilled enough to do,” says Thep, who operates with the help of four or five nurse assistants in a third-floor room lined with boxes of surgical equipment and consumables.
Wearing surgical magnifying glasses, green scrubs and flip flops over bare feet, Thep deftly slices through tissue and zaps bleeding bloods vessels with a thin welding rod-like cauterizer between his patient’s splayed legs.
The transgender woman, who has come from Australia, appears to be in a deep sleep, thanks to an infusion of sedatives such as ketamine, propofol and morphine. The operation is finished in exactly two hours. Toward the end, the groggy patient asks for the time and an update on how things are going.
Thep says she will stay overnight in the adjacent nine-bed recovery room before being discharged in the morning, necessitating a walk down three flights of concrete stairs. She will need to return for an antibiotic shot each day for a week.
[h=2]No Fancy Hospital[/h]“You cannot do it in a fancy hospital,” Thep says, before listing off a half a dozen ways in which he keeps prices low -- from the non-mechanical operating table and the use of tube lights instead of a surgical lamp, to the analog wall clock bought for 500 baht ($14) 15 years ago.
For post-operative care, patients are required to regularly dilate their new vaginas so they don’t shrink as they heal. Some Thai centers charge 15,000 baht for the dilation device, says Thep, who proffers a cheaper alternative: a wooden stick.
“I can give it free,” he says.
It’s not about cutting corners, Thep says. It’s about equality.
“If you are poor, if you are rich,” he says. “It’s got to be equal.”
--With assistance from Suttinee Yuvejwattana in Bangkok.
</section>
<header class="standard-image-lede standard-lede lede" style="box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; width: 50rem; margin-top: 4.375rem; position: relative; float: left;">[h=1]Transgender Tourism: For $2,000 a New Life Begins[/h] Jason Gale jwgale
<time class="published-at time-based" datetime="2015-10-26T22:48:03.284Z" itemprop="datePublished" style="box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: subpixel-antialiased; font-family: NHaasGroteskTXPro-55Rg, 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; opacity: 1; transition: opacity 0.5s ease-out; display: block; border: 0px; font-size: 0.8125rem; float: left; margin-right: 0.3125rem; line-height: 1.25rem; padding: 0px;">October 26, 2015 — 5:48 PM CDT</time>
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<figure class="inline-image inline-media" style="box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; display: inline-block; margin: 0px auto 1.25rem; padding: 0px; position: relative; clear: both; width: 800px; z-index: 0;">
<figcaption class="inline-media__info" style="box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; position: relative; padding: 0.9375rem 0px; z-index: 1; margin-left: 1.25rem; line-height: 1.125rem;">Dr. Thep Vechavisit aims to perform the cheapest gender-reassignment surgery in Thailand.
Photographer: Brent Lewin/Bloomberg
</figcaption></figure></header>
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Thep Vechavisit uses local anesthetic and sedatives to block the pain from the two-hour surgery he performs in a cramped room in his Bangkok clinic. It’s possibly the cheapest sex-reassignment operation in the world.
For about 70,000 baht ($1,950), patients’ male genitalia can be reassigned female in a procedure Thep says he does once a week in his Pratunam Polyclinic, a solo practice in Bangkok’s low-rent garment district. By spurning general anesthetic, an anesthetist and hospital operating theater, the surgeon says he can save 40,000-to-50,000 baht in medical costs.
“When you were trained in the past, they always tried to teach the doctor that you have to provide a good service at a reasonable price, and not make the patient pay a lot of money,” Thep says over a can of Pepsi in his office, a partitioned space barely big enough for a desk and a few chairs. “This is still in my mind.”
Thep is unapologetic about his no-frills approach, which he says makes his services more affordable for the increasing numbers of transgender patients who come to Thailand from across Asia for surgery. With societal prejudices against trans people waning, more people are seeking to transition to the opposite gender, bolstering demand for gender identity services.
While governments and insurers in Western Europe and North America are recognizing the need to pay for the treatments, Asia is lagging behind, Thep says. That’s disadvantaging his patients, who increasingly are coming from China, Cambodia, Vietnam, Myanmar, Malaysia, India and Nepal.
[h=2]Transgender Friendly[/h]“Society is more generous to accept these kinds of people, especially in China,” he says after finishing a male-to-female operation late one Friday evening in September. “In the past, a doctor could not open a clinic like this -- if you did this surgery in China, you’d be killed. But now I think the world’s changed. People are much more generous to accept transgender.”
<figure class="inline-image inline-media center " style="box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; display: inline-block; margin: 1.875rem auto 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative; clear: both; width: 740px; z-index: 0;">
<figcaption class="inline-media__info" style="box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; position: relative; padding: 0.9375rem 0px; z-index: 1; margin-left: 1.25rem; line-height: 1.125rem;">Thep Vechavisit performs a sex change operation in an operating room at Pratunam Polyclinic in Bangkok.
Photographer: Brent Lewin/Bloomberg
</figcaption></figure>While Thailand boasts upscale hospitals with marble floors, chandeliers and giant floral arrangements in their foyers, Thep’s clinic is no-frills. Boxes of surgical supplies are stacked in front of the reception counter and loose wires hang from uncovered fluorescent lights on the ceiling in the waiting room.
The 63-year-old, who trained as an ear, nose and throat surgeon, does almost a dozen operations in a typical 12-to-14-hour work day, with gender-affirming procedures usually done at the end. His nurses don’t like him doing them, he says. In the few hours it takes him to reassign a patient’s genitalia, he could insert eight or nine breast implants, earning 500,000 baht.
“My staff always try to reject the case because they think it’s not worth doing,” Thep says. “They always say, ‘Doctor, you are stupid!’ I say, ‘No. You have to understand, some people need the surgery. You cannot say no.”’
[h=2]Tried and Tested[/h]He got into gender surgery after correcting a botched operation more than 20 years ago and thinking he could offer a better service. Thep now counts more than 1,000 cases, using a technique he learned at a workshop conducted by the late British urologist Peter Philip, who performed gender reassignments at London’s Charing Cross Hospital last century.
“You have to find a technique that’s safe and effective and that you’re skilled enough to do,” says Thep, who operates with the help of four or five nurse assistants in a third-floor room lined with boxes of surgical equipment and consumables.
Wearing surgical magnifying glasses, green scrubs and flip flops over bare feet, Thep deftly slices through tissue and zaps bleeding bloods vessels with a thin welding rod-like cauterizer between his patient’s splayed legs.
The transgender woman, who has come from Australia, appears to be in a deep sleep, thanks to an infusion of sedatives such as ketamine, propofol and morphine. The operation is finished in exactly two hours. Toward the end, the groggy patient asks for the time and an update on how things are going.
Thep says she will stay overnight in the adjacent nine-bed recovery room before being discharged in the morning, necessitating a walk down three flights of concrete stairs. She will need to return for an antibiotic shot each day for a week.
[h=2]No Fancy Hospital[/h]“You cannot do it in a fancy hospital,” Thep says, before listing off a half a dozen ways in which he keeps prices low -- from the non-mechanical operating table and the use of tube lights instead of a surgical lamp, to the analog wall clock bought for 500 baht ($14) 15 years ago.
For post-operative care, patients are required to regularly dilate their new vaginas so they don’t shrink as they heal. Some Thai centers charge 15,000 baht for the dilation device, says Thep, who proffers a cheaper alternative: a wooden stick.
“I can give it free,” he says.
It’s not about cutting corners, Thep says. It’s about equality.
“If you are poor, if you are rich,” he says. “It’s got to be equal.”
--With assistance from Suttinee Yuvejwattana in Bangkok.
</section>
Bangkok in Freeze-frame The story of our city's transition in pictures, from 1900 to now 16 Dec 2015 at 03:30 6,353 viewed2 comments NEWSPAPER SECTION: LIFE | WRITER: STEVE VAN BEEK Like...
Like any modern city, Bangkok constantly renews itself. Buildings are demolished and new ones rise in their place. Thirty years ago, the scale of the development was modest; a building here, a building...
Stupid article won't let me cut/paste:
http://www.bangkokpost.com/lifestyle/social-and-lifestyle/796180/bangkok-in-freeze-frame
Like any modern city, Bangkok constantly renews itself. Buildings are demolished and new ones rise in their place. Thirty years ago, the scale of the development was modest; a building here, a building...
Stupid article won't let me cut/paste:
http://www.bangkokpost.com/lifestyle/social-and-lifestyle/796180/bangkok-in-freeze-frame
A friend of mine is currently visiting Thailand again and has had some trouble with his girlfriend over there...he got a hold of me a few days ago and asked me why these Thai girls try to drain their wallets constantly....I told him that the word "love" is not in their vocabulary...
I explained to him that they are not trying to hurt you but all they want is to take care of themselves and their families...They will be nice to you whenever you are with them but they are not trying to hurt you....I know of several women who get money sent to them every month by two or more men....it is just the way it is....I can count one one hand the number of women in Thailand who fall in love just for the sake of love...
It is part of the game when dealing with women 20 to 40 years younger than you...you can never win but. The gist of the game is to have fun and avoid the pitfalls...I personally enjoy the game....just a part of living here in the land of smiles...
I explained to him that they are not trying to hurt you but all they want is to take care of themselves and their families...They will be nice to you whenever you are with them but they are not trying to hurt you....I know of several women who get money sent to them every month by two or more men....it is just the way it is....I can count one one hand the number of women in Thailand who fall in love just for the sake of love...
It is part of the game when dealing with women 20 to 40 years younger than you...you can never win but. The gist of the game is to have fun and avoid the pitfalls...I personally enjoy the game....just a part of living here in the land of smiles...
ointer:
