Do We Miss Bernard Trink?

[dfwbkk]

Am I the only one who still looks up the RT section of BKK Post and still kinda expects to find The Night Owl back in action?

His little tidbits lost their originality many years ago (-94 springs to mind), but nevertheless, it was part of the weekly routine.

Where's he now?

Anyone?

[dfwbkk]

Posted in wrong forum, I've asked Dr PP to move it...

Sorry 'bout that

[ka12345]

Am I the only one who still looks up the RT section of BKK Post and still kinda expects to find The Night Owl back in action?

His little tidbits lost their originality many years ago (-94 springs to mind), but nevertheless, it was part of the weekly routine.

Where's he now?

Anyone?

He continues writing on his own website, www.idontgiveahoot.net

In today's column he states that he was naive for listening to his reader's assurances that they would follow him to the web when he was handed his walking papers and that "few did".

Buy a subscription ($12 per year) and you can continue reading NiteOwl every Friday...

[dfwbkk]

Thanks KA,

I just read his first web-posting regarding how his "retirement" was planned for quite some time (by the editors) but not communicated until it happened.

Too much free information available out on the web still for most people to sign up for any type of pay-service. Albeit only 500 bath per year I would imagine (if nothing else due to the lack of "new" material) that few would do it. We'd all happily spring for "another round for me mates" late at night though...

Funny how that works.

Btw, what part of Sweden you from?

/// DFW

[ka12345]

Too much free information available out on the web still for most people to sign up for any type of pay-service. Albeit only 500 bath per year I would imagine (if nothing else due to the lack of "new" material) that few would do it. We'd all happily spring for "another round for me mates" late at night though...

Yeah, normally I wouldn't pay for something like that but I signed up half out of curiosity (to see if his column would get more interesting w/o censorship) and half as a "charity" thing...

[ka12345]

Btw, what part of Sweden you from?

Oslo

[PvtDick]

I don't miss him a bit. Half of what he said was misinformed, the other half just stupid. I must admit, though, that I did read his column every week for almost fifteen years...ending up shaking my head almost every time.

[maerim]

Did you miss Mr. Trink?

Try ajusting the telescopic sight next time , you might have better luck.

Try to get him off guard when he is "Moseing on down" to "Swiss Pete's" for some

"Suds" but "TiT" "huMANnatURE"

In my opinion the only good thing to come out of the Bangkok post for years when he left, good riddance.

[Jamie Dodson]

I really miss all those fascinating bits about Burma Shave and L.M.Boyd! Oh, and those places that really weren't giving him free drinks but just so happened to be getting lots of mentions. NOT!!! What was with the guy to quote week after week some bloke in San Fransisco or wherever who was obviously so right and knowledgable that the whole world had heard of him. According to L.M.... don't get me started.

I have to admit that I did read it most weeks but only to #1 check things that may be factual and apply to me, but mainly #2 make sure he's quoting Boyd and Burma Shave.

And being married for who knows how long yet still having a finger on the pulse of the prostitution scene is either hypocritical, deceitful or out of touch.

idontgivea****

[Boon Mee]

I don't miss him a bit.  Half of what he said was misinformed, the other half just stupid.  I must admit, though, that I did read his column every week for almost fifteen years...ending up shaking my head almost every time.

My sentiments exactly. His Burma Shave dittys were amusing the first few times but his style of reporting always seemed condescending. Especially given the fact he's lived in LOS forever and never learned Thai well enough to do interviews w/out dragging his wife along to translate...

[dfwbkk]

Btw, what part of Sweden you from?

Oslo

Btw, what part of Sweden you from?

Oslo

Nice place, I lived there myself between the ages of 3-6.

[dfwbkk]

Too much free information available out on the web still for most people to sign up for any type of pay-service. Albeit only 500 bath per year I would imagine (if nothing else due to the lack of "new" material) that few would do it. We'd all happily spring for "another round for me mates" late at night though...

Yeah, normally I wouldn't pay for something like that but I signed up half out of curiosity (to see if his column would get more interesting w/o censorship) and half as a "charity" thing...

Well; did it change at all? His non-censored style more interesting?

You find those 500 bath well-invested?

Me, even though I did look his column up every week on the web, don't miss him enough to sign up for the pay-service (might reconsider if you tell me otherwise...)

///DFW

[meadish_sweetball]

Do We Miss Bernard Trink?

Nope.

[dfwbkk]

Do We Miss Bernard Trink?

Nope.

Peter?

[sonthaya]

I always thought Oslo was in Norway

[Phil Conners]

Btw, what part of Sweden you from?

Oslo

Btw, what part of Sweden you from?

Oslo

Nice place, I lived there myself between the ages of 3-6.

What a load of bull. Oslo is the capital of Norway, not Sweden, which anyone from any of the two countries would surely know.

[dfwbkk]

Btw, what part of Sweden you from?

Oslo

Btw, what part of Sweden you from?

Oslo

Nice place, I lived there myself between the ages of 3-6.

What a load of bull. Oslo is the capital of Norway, not Sweden, which anyone from any of the two countries would surely know.

Well, if you back-track a little bit you will find that Sweden and Norway was actually in a union for close to a hundred years. The union was dissolved in 1905. Norway was at that point "reporting" into the Swedish King.

Check out: http://www.stavanger-web.com/17may/

To this day Sweden and Norway enjoys a big brother/little brother type sibling rivalry which is course is only masking the true love between the two nations.

I was fortunate myself to be born a Norwegian, but my family relocated to Sweden when I was 6.

Replying Oslo to my question is as factual as is answering the same question: What part of Greece are you from? with "Melbourne". Spot on.

/// DFW

[OldAsiaHand]

In my opinion the only good thing to come out of the Bangkok post for years when he left, good riddance.

Cheers to that. He was not only a witless fool, far worse, he was a terrible embarrassment to most every foreigner living in Thailand. His perpetuation of the stereotype of the sort of lowlife foreigners most people assume are the only kind who are attracted to this place was a gross disservice to most of the real people who are living their ordinary and sensible lives right here.

[Phil Conners]

Btw, what part of Sweden you from?

Oslo

Btw, what part of Sweden you from?

Oslo

Nice place, I lived there myself between the ages of 3-6.

What a load of bull. Oslo is the capital of Norway, not Sweden, which anyone from any of the two countries would surely know.

Well, if you back-track a little bit you will find that Sweden and Norway was actually in a union for close to a hundred years. The union was dissolved in 1905. Norway was at that point "reporting" into the Swedish King.

Check out: http://www.stavanger-web.com/17may/

To this day Sweden and Norway enjoys a big brother/little brother type sibling rivalry which is course is only masking the true love between the two nations.

I was fortunate myself to be born a Norwegian, but my family relocated to Sweden when I was 6.

Replying Oslo to my question is as factual as is answering the same question: What part of Greece are you from? with "Melbourne". Spot on.

/// DFW

Yes and before that Norway was part of Denmark.

Union or not, Oslo has never been a Swedish city.

[dfwbkk]

Yes and before that Norway was part of Denmark.

Union or not, Oslo has never been a Swedish city.

True (and before that it was in yet another union with Sweden).

However, back to topic: Anyone else out there actually subscribing to Trink's web-service?

Has his style changed at all?

Seeing how "cramped" he claimed to be under the censorship at Bkk Post, surely he has a few new gimmicks?

/// DFW

[tutsiwarrior]

I have only been in Thailand for about a year and a half or so but I did like to look at the nite owl column every week in order to clock how many weeks I had been here ("50 weeks and still no job...sheesh")> most of it was crap but the column was a pleasant diversion from other pseudo journalists that had not much to say. I admired the courage that he displayed when he informed that Lolitas blow job bar in Soi Cowboy had relocated to the premises of Alley Cats off Sukhumvit.

Right on bernard...

[dr_Pat_Pong]

I have only been in Thailand for about a year and a half or so but I did like to look at the nite owl column every week in order to clock how many weeks I had been here ("50 weeks and still no job...sheesh")> most of it was crap but the column was a pleasant diversion from other pseudo journalists that had not much to say. I admired the courage that he displayed when he informed that Lolitas blow job bar in Soi Cowboy had relocated to the premises of Alley Cats off Sukhumvit.

Right on bernard...

Were you a customer there Tutsi ?

[mbkudu]

Yes and before that Norway was part of Denmark.

Union or not, Oslo has never been a Swedish city.

True (and before that it was in yet another union with Sweden).

However, back to topic: Anyone else out there actually subscribing to Trink's web-service?

Has his style changed at all?

Seeing how "cramped" he claimed to be under the censorship at Bkk Post, surely he has a few new gimmicks?

/// DFW

I did plunk down the twelve bucks and honestly I don't think it was worth it. I actually liked his column when he was in the Post. I read it from 1991-1999, the years I lived in Thailand. Like I said in another thread on this forum, I think with age he has gotten out of the loop of the nightlife scene. There is more of his 'tude'

and less informative stuff about Thailand. His latest page, Friday June, 4, 2004, is a pitiful self loathing Bernard Trink going on about all the mistakes he's made in his life and other regrets. He said he regrets not writing a book on his experiences living in the Kingdom and that it would be too difficult for him to go through all his articles as research material for a book. Gee, what better does he really have to do? I thought that's what retired old farts did; write about their past greatness and hope that people believe it and maybe appreciate it.

[chanchao]

> He said he regrets not writing a book on his experiences living

> the Kingdom and that it would be too difficult for him to go through

> l his articles as research material for a book.

Well.. if anything sums it up then it must be this. Even Bernie himself can't be arsed to read back his own drivel...

Cheers,

Chanchao

[john b good]

Well I for one miss him a bit..........

Take a look at it this way and I suggest that even if only 10% of what he wrote was the gospel it is still a greater percentage than in the majority of other articles in the Post "as most of these articles are attempting to have readers believe that the said article is based on the truth and we all know just how much truth the realm can conjure up. very little in most cases

The weekly page was an icon and if it was past it's use by date that is the reason it should have ceased to be published. Not because it was embarressing the social order crusaders in the realm.

If you can't tell it like it really is (because of editorial policy) there is not much point in telling it at all.

Trink had a contribution to expat life in Thailand.

I know from talking to many expats, who whilst they would rubbish his page yet they were all reading it from top to bottom.

That has got to say something.

[Goat Roper]

I read his page for more than ten years and never had any notion at all to criticize his work, I simply separated the wheat from the chafe as I read, I don't ever recall knowing anyone that did absolutely perfect work that everybody would agree with being perfect so why would he be any different, and frankly I looked forward to reading his column.

[camerata]

He continues writing on his own website, www.idontgiveahoot.net

In today's column he states that he was naive for listening to his reader's assurances that they would follow him to the web when he was handed his walking papers and that "few did".

If he believed that, it was just his big ego leading him astray. His column has been rubbish for years.

Trink's "golden years" were back in the 70s and early 80s at the Bangkok World. In those days, he not only gave recommendations about particular massage girls giving particular "special services," he had photos of them too. Plus lurid descriptions of the live shows in Patpong. None of it was appropriate for a mainstream publication, but it sold newspapers.

After the column moved to the Post, it became a lot tamer (no photos of dancers) I think because he came into conflict with the feminists who run the Outlook section, and whose mission is social reform. During this period he started up his crap about HIV not being the cause of AIDS, but generally the column still had plenty of news about the nightlife scene.

If anything, it was the Internet that killed the column in the later years. Once he started getting those readers' emails feeding his ego and reinforcing his negative views, half the column was letters and very little was real news. At the same time Stickman had got his site going and was delivering what readers really wanted.

I think if Trink wants to SELL his column while Stickman's is free, he needs to offer the real nitty-gritty like he did in the 70s, instead of moaning all the time. But I expect he's a bit old now for hitting the nightspots.

From what journo friends tell me, Trink didn't speak a word of Thai and he was a total technophobe. He wouldn't touch a computer. All his columns were typed on a manual typewriter and input to the editorial computer by other staff. Same thing with his hotmail account - others operated it. He also had centerfolds pinned up all around the area where he worked, which I imagine drove the feminists up the wall.

[maerim]

He said he regrets not writing a book on his experiences

I don't.

[stroll]

Where can one find some of the old 70's stuff?

[ka12345]

Yes and before that Norway was part of Denmark.

Union or not, Oslo has never been a Swedish city.

True (and before that it was in yet another union with Sweden).

However, back to topic: Anyone else out there actually subscribing to Trink's web-service?

Has his style changed at all?

Seeing how "cramped" he claimed to be under the censorship at Bkk Post, surely he has a few new gimmicks?

/// DFW

Oslo is a Swedish town. We just let the norwegians borrow it along with the oil. We'll take it all back when the place get sorted out.

BT's style has not changed much, just a bit more rambling that the BKK post editors would have removed. He didn't use to write much about his own porn surfing in BKK post but he recently spent a good part of the column describing what kind of different porn websites he has come across.

I would say the content is not worth $12 but you can do it for charity. Don't let the old man starve...