Upon reading Charles Humana and Wang Wu’s The Ying Yang: The Chinese Way of Love (1971, SBN 85523 019 3), it’s pretty apparent that the Chinese have been studying the art of love-making for a long, long time. This fascinating book isn’t merely about sex positions, either. Here at WoWasis, we were transfixed and mortified […]
Read the rest of this entry »Archive for the 'Culture & History' Category
WoWasis book review: ‘Japanese Street Slang’ by Peter Constantine
Why buy a foreign language dictionary when one doesn’t speak a word of the language in question? When it’s as fun to read as Peter Constantine’s Japanese Street Slang (2006, ISBN 13 978-0-8348-0250-6), that’s when. First published in 1992, the book has never been out of print, and even has a 2011 edition (we found […]
Read the rest of this entry »WoWasis on Thai nightlife: Texas Lone Star in Bangkok closes for good
Bangkok’s venerable Texas Lone Star Saloon closed its doors this week for good. A Washington Square institution since 1985, the bar actually had its beginnings in the late 1970s, when George Pipas opened the Texxan Bar on Patpong Road. The ‘Lone Star,’ as most people referred to it (it was actually spelled Lone Staar on […]
Read the rest of this entry »WoWasis book review: ‘Common Core: Thais and Americans’ by John Paul Fieg
Westerners in Thailand who employ Thais know what a challenge that can be. And conversely, Thais working for Western expats often find relating to their direct reports is sometimes more difficult than the job itself. The beauty of John Paul Fieg’s A Common Core: Thais and Americans (1978, ISBN 0-933-662-80-7) is that it examines core […]
Read the rest of this entry »WoWasis book review: ‘History of the Mongol Conquests’ by J.J. Saunders
In this relatively short (191 pages) but powerful narrative, J.J. Saunders makes an effective argument that the series of Mongolian invasions of Europe and Asia, beginning in the early 1200s, was a major factor in shaping both European culture and Asian religions for centuries to come. The History of the Mongol Conquests (1971, ISBN 0-8122-1766-7) […]
Read the rest of this entry »WoWasis Book review: Timothy Hallinan’s ‘Queen of Patpong’
How does one really judge the entertainment value of a book? Timothy Hallinan’s book in the Bangkok Fiction genre, The Queen of Patpong (2010, ISBN 978-0-06-167226-2), caused us here at WoWasis to ask, and here’s why. We finished this 312 page book, the latest update in the ongoing saga of travel writer Poke Rafferty and […]
Read the rest of this entry »Thai Prisons: Inside the belly of the beast via the ‘Thai Prison Life’ website
Bangkok’s Samut Prakan Prison One of the more fascinating museums in Bangkok is the Mahachai Prison Corrections Museum, but of course, prisons are only fascinating to those that aren’t living in them. We recently ran into a remarkable website run by Richard Barrow, who has befriended many prisoners in Thai prisons, most notably Panrit “Gor” […]
Read the rest of this entry »WoWasis book review: Longstreets’ ‘Yoshiwara: City of the Senses’ of Tokyo
Yoshiwara was a district in Tokyo famous for adult entertainment options. Formalized in the 17th century, it thrived as a sex center until 1958, when prostitution was officially banned in Tokyo. Published in 1970, Stephen and Ethel Longstreet’s Yoshiwara: City of the Senses (no ISBN) is a history of the district, its culture, practices, and […]
Read the rest of this entry »WoWasis book review: ‘Sarawak’ photos by Hedda Morrison
Hedda Morrison, who died in 1991, was the wife of Sarawak district officer Alastair Morrison. During her 20-year stay in Sarawak, she was able to accompany her husband on official journeys through the country, detailing, through writing and photographs, the lives of tribespeople. Her book Sarawak (1957) is an indispensible record of northern Borneo before […]
Read the rest of this entry »WoWasis book review: Kaowai & Robinson’s ‘In Grandmother’s House’
Visitors spending any time looking into the culture of Thailand will run into thousands of folk traditions and beliefs, and Thais are always impressed when a foreigner wishes to know more about them. Understanding these concepts is empirical, as one thing inevitably leads to another. We at WoWasis are still learning. And that’s why we […]
Read the rest of this entry »
