To pay or not to pay, that is the question.  No, I am not misquoting Shakespeare but referring to the dilemma of being a womanizer in Bangkok.  Do you look for a regular girlfriend, or just pay for short term relationships?  Worse yet, do you pay a lady for short term love and then pay her a “salary” to be your constant companion?  Living in Bangkok means that you have so many choices when it comes to female companionship that it boggles the mind.  Herein lies the dilemma.  With so many choices it is necessary for the guy to know exactly what kind of life he really would lead if he could do it anyway he wants.  We men don’t have the best reputation for being introspective and understanding our inner most feelings.  In Paradise you can do it anyway you want.  You can have a regular girlfriend and do short time ladies on the side.  You can stay single and have a string of one night stands.  You can have several “special” arrangements with ladies and occasionally bring a new one into the picture just for the hell of it.  There are literally dozens of other combinations and possibilities and I must say many guys end up running around like a crazy man the first year or so in a total manic state.  We just aren’t used to being able to do anything that we want, at anytime we want, with anybody we want. 

The men who seem to get into the most trouble are the one’s who think they want to have fun, but deep inside they are really looking to be loved.  Obviously the ladies in the naughty nightlife are for fun, and the other 99% of the population you can explore looking for that special love.  Problem is, this group of guys take naughty gals for fun, then try to turn them into a “good girl” by buying her out of the bar (yes I know that is an awful way to put it but that’s what it is called here) and lavishing her with money and gifts.  It blows up in their faces nearly every time and then they blame Thailand for all of their problems.  It really is nauseating to hear one of these morons drone on and on in your local pub about how his special little go-go gal turned out to be nothing but a gold digger.  It is free entertainment but after hearing the same story (but with different characters) a few hundred times it really does get old.  I have a personal theory about this phenomenon that I call “modern day natural selection.”  I am sure you are all familiar with Darwin’s theory of natural selection that basically says the strongest animals survive and mate and produce offspring.  Well, in this modern day it is not how physically strong one is that determined success and failure in life but how intelligent or mentally strong.  These guys who send money to bargirls are at the bottom of the evolutionary ladder. 

We local lads do benefit a lot from these “sponsored” gals as they end up having plenty of money and almost unlimited free time.  My best English mate has really exploited this to his advantage better than anyone I know.  Flash (changing his name to protect the innocent) has a string of gals who used to work the streets and bars but now have sponsors and are often willing to sleep with him for free.  Fair enough as this is very common here.  One thing that is consistent with all the gals is that they need to have at least one guy in their life that they sleep with for fun and not for money.  More often than not this is a Thai guy, but it is becoming increasingly common for this to be a western guy.  So if you have a gal on salary, I guarantee that she has at least one guy (probably more) that she sees when she actually wants to have fun.  Makes perfect sense to me as the gal is working when she spends time with her sponsor, and certainly everyone needs to have some sort of social life outside of work.  Flash has a few very impressive freebies, but he has taken this fortuitous situation one step further.  He washes all of his clothes before they come over and stacks them up on the sofa.  Then the day after love making tells them that they are expected to do his ironing!  I can just see the gal’s eyes now when she walks into his place for some fun and frolic and spots the huge stack of un-ironed clothes.  “This guy is going to pound me all night and then in the morning when I am totally exhausted I will have to iron all his clothes! “ Cheeky bugger but I do love the guy. 

My favorite quote this week comes from a guy I met in Nana Plaza who travels the world selling medical devices.  While staring and drooling at one particularly sexy lass in Angel Witch, he said “there are entire countries that don’t have a single girl that good looking.”

Read Khun Lee’s other WoWasis columns for more advice on navigating the adult dating scene through the backstreets of Bangkok