I think the 'Incest' thing in the book was an example of the classic 'I've had a hard life sob story' used by so many bar girls.

I watched a very good Thai movie about drug use and prostitution among Thai youth with a bar girl who explained everything that I didn't understand to me. She said that every sex worker that she knew first had sex with their mothers second husband - not their birth father- and that it is very common.

I would guess that she was telling what she believed to be the truth.

I watched a very good Thai movie about drug use and prostitution among Thai youth with a bar girl who explained everything that I didn't understand to me. She said that every sex worker that she knew first had sex with their mothers second husband - not their birth father- and that it is very common.

I would guess that she was telling what she believed to be the truth.

That is really sad. I wonder if that means this happens to most Thai girls, or if it means that the Thai girls it happens to are effected by it psychologically and more likely to become prostitutes ?

I know the same thing happens in the USA.

I'll go to my next question on the book. Starting on page 249, the Thai detective Phiraphan gives his long closing talk. I think the detective is supposed to be the voice of reason, seeing things from the Thai perspective. He says:

"Now most sex tourists wouldn't think of describing themselves as such. They see themselves as men of the world, visitors to an exotic country where young, beautiful girls treat them as gods. But in my view ninety-nine per cent of the men who wisit Thailand without a female companion are sex tourists".

So is it really that high? Is it really 99% ? Somehow I think that must be an exageration, but I haven't been there is almost 30 years. When I visited there 30 years ago I was a round the world backpacker who had been in India for six months and just wanted to see the next exotic place. I didn't even know Thailand was famous for prostitution, although I found out about it when I got there.

Maybe a large percent of the single men over 40 who come there are sex tourists, but could it possibley be as high as even 90%, no less 99% ? Is sex tourism the thing that drives the whole Thai tourist industry?

So is it really that high? Is it really 99% ? Somehow I think that must be an exageration, but I haven't been there is almost 30 years. When I visited there 30 years ago I was a round the world backpacker who had been in India for six months and just wanted to see the next exotic place. I didn't even know Thailand was famous for prostitution, although I found out about it when I got there.

Maybe a large percent of the single men over 40 who come there are sex tourists, but could it possibley be as high as even 90%, no less 99% ? Is sex tourism the thing that drives the whole Thai tourist industry?

99% is certainly an exaggeration, but you'd be safe to guess at least half and probably more. You can either work it out from the TAT tourist statistics, or just get a rough number of working girls in farang bars and how much trade they do and work backwards. Still there are the backpackers, temple-gazers, golfers, surfers, sailors, retired gents alone on group tours, etc.

If you loosen the definition to mean foreign men who will have sexual contact at least once with a Thai woman in any compensated (define as you wish) relationship, then 80-90% is probably right. Which probably maps pretty well to the percentage of Thai men who have contact with a Thai woman not their wife somewhere on the mia noi <-> brothel spectrum.

Does it drive the whole Thai tourist industry? Certainly not. But take away sex-tourism and you'd see fairly substantial losses in some sectors and locations.

"Now most sex tourists wouldn't think of describing themselves as such. They see themselves as men of the world, visitors to an exotic country where young, beautiful girls treat them as gods. But in my view ninety-nine per cent of the men who wisit Thailand without a female companion are sex tourists".

Most of the men who claim not to be coming to Thailand for prostitution are the fools that we constantly hear about being ripped off in amazing ways by their darling "tilacs".

They convince themselves that because they are not handing money over after every session, they are better, more honorable, studdlier, higher on the social scale than those who do, but they are taking advantage of the same poverty and low status of women that "sex-tourists" do and usually with the same women - although the girls that they take up with don't tell them that they are usually on the game and on vacation.

I've met many girls who told me that the sure way to get a sucker to fall in love with them is to give him some for "free", but they always get it back a thousand times over.

Sex-tourists might be a bunch of sleaze-bags (ie, normal men), but at least they are honest with themselves and have some sense of reality.

For example when Pete and Joy go to her village and the house she grew up in, about page 65-70, it says all the young men are sprawled around watching TV, don't work, and expect the women to support them. Is this true? It sounds kind of hard to believe in a farming community.

It partially depends on the time of year. In Isaan there is only one rice harvest a year (for most people), unlike the 2 or even 3 in some other places. After the harvest in, say, September, and until the rain comes and new planting is done in, say, May, the land is dry and barren and the farmers have very little to do. Some might be more entrepreneurial, and engage in other activities, perhaps caring for cows, breeding fish, or making and selling temple gongs. But, as another poster said, often any outdoor work begins at daylight and is finished when it gets too hot, perhaps 9am or 10am. So if you visit an Isaan village during 'normal' daytime hours during the hot season, you are likely to find a distinct lack of industry.

Once the rain has come and the rice is planted, it is cooler; there is also weeding and fertilising to be done. People can be busy in the fields for much longer.

They might also go out pre-dawn to gather mushrooms, or at night to catch the frogs which become so abundant in the rice paddies.