Trans Travelin' to Thailand

Pattaya certainly wasn't like this in 1973 when the B-52's were flying over heading for Hanoi.

More than Meets the Eye

Certainly most of us are enamored with the glamour and glitz of the ladyboy culture in Thailand. Very seldom though do we get a glance of the day to day transgender culture there.

I have mentioned here in Cyrsti's Condo the year I spent in northern Thailand close to the Laotian border -back in the Vietnam non war days. I do get a chuckle when I tell someone I lived in Thailand for a year and they start asking SRS questions. If you weren't careful you could be a candidate for SRS and much more!

I was lucky. My occasional brush with danger during my AFTN days was when I had to drive the unit truck on Thai roads.  Forgetting I was navigating on the opposite side of the highway where the only rule was survival of the biggest could be dangerous.

So during my stay in Thailand, I was able to learn first hand the mix of Thai and Laotion culture. I found the people to be accepting and friendly of us and I loved the culture and religion. (For you trans vets, I had separate rations and lived off base.)

So when I'm able to find a bit of a different look at the transgender culture in Thailand, I can't wait to pass it along to you.

This YouTube international trailer is from a film called "It Gets Better":

 While I am on the subject of countries half way around the world from me, I received an email from a follower in Sri Lanka who wrote a piece about the blog. As soon as one of us can get it translated from Sinhalese I will pass it along. In the meantime, take a quick peak here to see a beautiful example of how the word Sinhala looks.

This brings me to another point. What is scary to me is my grand kids have not been taught any cursive writing since the second grade. The two oldest academic over achievers show it. My daughter is very diligent in insisting they write hand written thank you notes for gifts. Bless their hearts but I guess their schools figure they "don't need no stinkin hand writing!"

Thailand Transsexual

As I followed this through, it does have a link on YouTube to a blog that seems a little too commercial for my tastes. I don't particularly like the "ladyboy" tag but I will leave the judgement to all of you.

The Thai Transgender Winner!

The Thai's do it again with the prettiest transgendered women in the world! Check out this transgendered contestant in a talent contest!
Follow this link to see for yourself!
[Photo <http://bit.ly/gNmCv3> ]

Beautiful from the beginning, but the magic really begins at (1:04).

Watch, AFTER THE JUMP...

[Video <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ablNcskmvL4> ]

This is a translation of the judges that was offered in YouTube
comments. If anyone can offer corrections, or a better one, please do:

After the performance:

Judge A: You have been deceiving me all along. It's impossible.

Judge B: He's beautiful, isn't he? (Asks the crowd) I was dumbfounded
when you started the second verse.

Judge C: Initially, I was certain that you were a transexual, but
once you began singing, I was fooled to think that you were female.
After you started the male verse, I should have trusted my gut
feeling.

All judges gave the thumbs up.

Judge C: Continue the deception.


Posted 7:11 PM EST by Andy Towle in Music, News, Thailand, Transgender