4:17

You know, when I was growing up, and if you went camping or hiking way out in the boonies, on state forest land or a state/national park, it was pot growers you had to watch out for. Back in college, I remember me and some friends were on a three-day backpacking trip, and we came across a trip wire across a trail, two days out from the nearest trailhead. We were like wtf? ... Then we discovered the pot field smack in the middle of federal land. Wouldn't you know it, our three-day trip turned into a week long hike ... Unfortunately we only had about four-days worth of food between us and no Doritos or chips (crisps to my UK brethren). I remember being high as a fucking kite, in the middle of nowhere, when it dawned on me that 1) I was stoned as fuck and 2) the nearest pizza place, Mexican restaurant or burger joint was at least two-days' hike away. On a clear, quiet autumn evening, they say you can still here my screaming lamentation echoing among the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains: "NOOOOOOOOOooooooooooo ... FUUUUUUUuuuuuuuk!" Ah, youth. Now, in this day and age, it's always some rural meth lab that's blowing up or otherwise getting busted by the local cops ... or some unsuspecting person stumbling across the operation. In the small town where my parents retired to, on a lake, one day not long after they moved in, a real estate agent was showing a house down at the other end of their rural lane to a prospective buyer. The house had been on the market for six months and uninhabited; when they got to the kitchen, they discovered the meth works. Needless to say, the agent didn't get the sale. I never tried meth -- same same yabba, for those that don't know -- but used to dabble with speed, usually during final exams, I confess. That was more than enough for me. Buy you're right. Meth labs go hand in hand with mullets and Scorpions t-shirts. Speaking of which, I remember driving around in my big-ass Ford after school (outside of football and wrestling seasons), age 17, rocking out to the Love at First Sting album.

Nor certain neighborhoods in my Midwestern home city of the United States ... really any large city inside of either coast. You could find them on the coasts too, but then they would just be hipsters being Ironic.

Can I start that thread? In all seriousness, this is turning out as enjoyable as your previous thread about ladyboys in Viet Nam (which is about a lot more than ladyboys in Viet Nam. So this thread is great, at least. This attitude that many expats seemingly share regardless of the land has always mystified me, even more so than those seekers of true love who are blinded to everything and everyone else. You aren't the only one who hears the bitching and moaning, unfortunately. I suppose that old adage is true: many people just like to complain. Anyway, thanks again for a great read. I'm apparently plus one'ed out at the moment, so you have one in reserve.

Yeah, what's the big idea, making us sift through all the silly wankfests that are that other forum? I kid, I kid; as BB said, all is forgiven with this wonderful update. And may I say -- please take this as the compliment that it is intended to be: the picture (ID 28295) in post 49? Of Paeng? Damn ... just ... dayum. BTW, speaking of that other place, on behalf of all right-thinking folk, sorry to see that thread you posted about a certain jailbird turned into such an ass-hat convention over there. I'm of a mind to more or less agree with your thoughts on the subject, and even if I wasn't, I wouldn't go out of my way to be an a colossal asshole about it. But such is LBP; I couldn't be arsed to comment in the middle of that fuckwaddery. And speaking of said jailbird, I see she is indeed out of the hoosegow; is that a temporary thing, as I gather -- does she still have to pay the restitution or face the long, long jail sentence? If you don't want to risk another shitstorm, or just don't want this thread to go OT, I can PM you, if you prefer ... although I would think an ill-mannered shitstorm wouldn't happen on *this* forum. P.S. I'm all outta plus one's today, but I shan't forget once I'm reloaded ...

I've got a t-shirt on right now underneath my dress shirt -- just got home -- that I bought back in Thailand. It fits fine, but: it's an XL and it fits skin tight. I'm sure it would be XL for your average Thai dude though ... And I just went OT, but then I started the thread, so it's okay. ;) And I've seen plenty of Western Europeans go overboard with the goofy-looking, too-small warm-weather clothes bought here while on holiday, not just the Russians. Not that this Yankee is a fashion template or anything, mind you.

That is a fucking brilliant song; well-played BB. Even long before I discovered transgendered women and would have told you I was straight as an arrow, I dug that song. Incidentally -- I'm assuming it's OK to go OT in this thread? -- Tori Amos' cover on her Strange Little Girls album is a cool version as well. [media=]http://youtu.be/4PsHlSZ_3jo[/media]

Gotta throw my two cents in with Ken on this one; he makes an excellent point; even simple grammar and conventions we take for granted can be opposite or dramatically different. Someone who doesn't have the past progressive tense in their native language, for example, probably isn't going to completely understand it when you say "I was riding my motorbike when it began to rain, the pavement got slick and I crashed." They may understand the verb to ride, and understand motorbike and the pronoun "I," maybe even the past simple of "to be" -- but the nuance of a continuing action in the past that was interrupted by something else -- that's going to be lost on them/confuse them, even if they know the verb "to crash." That's because to express the same idea in their language would use totally different verb tenses or the present tense with qualifiers to indicate these actions happened in the past. Articles are another one -- there is no equivalent of "a, an or the" in most Asian languages; they simply don't exist. So unless they've had formal training/instruction, even someone who otherwise speaks English well either won't use them at all or often use them incorrectly, which naturally sounds goofy to us. Sorry to get all nerdy and long-winded, but I find linguistics endlessly fascinating. Seriously, I could go on and on. If I had it to do over again, it would have been my major in college (and may be my masters degree in the future). Anyway, it's been my experience that if someone has some prior experience dealing with English-speaking foreigners (this includes most bar girls that have been in the trade for a bit), if you grade your language -- i.e. use simply terms like J.D. and others suggested above, and speak slowly, but with a normal cadence, you can generally make yourself understood. But if someone only has a smattering of English words and/or isn't used to dealing with or has little experience talking with English speaking foreigners, as Ken ably stated, you have to resort to structures they are more apt to understand, which sounds like pigeon English to us native speakers, but is instinctively grammatical to them. Hence: "Yesterday ride motorbike in rain. I crash."

Submitted, without comment : Russians 'Worst Dressed Tourists' - Poll And, while looking for the original source of this, I came across this news, also from Skyscanner, from much earlier in the year (sorry if I'm posting something that's already been posted/discussed): Poll suggests Russians are the 'new rude' Americans were ranked six -- this is a European poll, mind you -- behind the British, Germans and Chinese, as well as the aforementioned Russians and French.

Just wanted to say thanks to you gents that have lived abroad a long time; your thoughts and views are interesting -- at least to me. When I last went home to the States a year or so ago, after a year and half stint between Viet Nam and Thailand, I had no particular plans to come back to stay any time soon. Being back in the States, in spite of the reverse culture shock one feels upon arriving back home, it was a relief to be back. Walking down the street and being just another guy that no one gives a second thought to, instead of being treated like a Rock Star and/or performing clown -- that's nice. But within four months, I got that itch, and two months after that I was on a plane with a one-way ticket. I'm going home for a month in mid November (having been over here 13 months this time); it will be interesting to see if I feel a month is enough time at home, or if I wish the time were longer. ... For me it's been a big difference this time around, living in a relatively -- stress the word "relatively' -- cosmopolitan city like Sai Gon, as opposed to the small rural towns I lived in, both in Thailand and Viet Nam the first time around. But then that's probably a whole 'nother topic.

Heh, I think that happens everywhere you have people mixing with different nationalities; I'd wager that is hardly unique to the Thais. I have had that happen to me in Japan, China and France, among other places. And not just playing romance, but in a professional setting, too. Hell I've done it myself; once I had a French girlfriend, and whenever she wanted to talk about something uncomfortable, suddenly my ability to speak French went to shit As for accents, I agree with Kahuna. But it's a two-way street. Here in Viet Nam, for example, I find it very difficult to distinguish a north accent from a southern accent, unless they say certain words that are pronounced differently in the north. My Vietnamese friends think that's crazy, because to them the difference is glaring. And most of my British and Aussie friends -- much less any Southeast Asian peeps -- can't distinguish a southern American accent from that of the Northeast, Midwest, West Coast, etc., which, to me, naturally sounds obvious.

So if I can't have a big member, is being a big member the next best thing?

Eh, everyone needs a hobby ...

Sorry, but I've had this James Brown song in my head since I saw the topic of this thread. Thus I've come to, in turn, infect you all .. [media=] [/media]

Sorry for continuing the OT, but actually the spell check does work for me too, only it considers the British spellings as incorrect. So I'm not sure it's the forum software, per se. I'm using Opera, but have it set to mask itself as Internet Explorer (it seems to get along with the site better that way) To wit:

I read somewhere that this was being shown all over the globe, except in the back home in the U.S. market. Now I can't imagine why that would be.

Well, I think it was just like some of the previous posters' have pointed out: an otherwise intelligent guy, who happens to be lonely -- not to mention naive -- and looking for love, convinced that all he has to do is find his soul mate and everything will work out for the best. And he just kind of lost his head. I haven't kept in touch with him, so I don't know how it all turned out. I never met the girl involved either, so I really can't say whether it was "true lub" or he got seriously gamed. I just remember thinking at the time: "here's a guy that's already came to Thailand to live and work because he ostensibly loves it, and is now returning home -- a place he professes to genuinely dislike -- so he can make more money to support a bargirl -- supposedly getting her out of the bar -- back in Thailand, where he wants to be. That's nuckin' futs, that is." But there was no suggesting to him that this might not be a good idea; he made it plain and clear that he didn't want to hear it. There is all sorts of fucked up logic involved in that, that I can't fathom, but I hope it all worked out for the best. Who knows? Maybe they were soul mates and love conquered all. In spite of being a butterfly man and the proverbial loner, I'm also a hopeless romantic who likes happy endings.

Heh, I was thinking more in terms of the Vietnamese people that it attracts, although I do know a few business types my age or younger that live down that way. Anyway, I didn't mean to imply that everyone who lived there was a yuppie. As for foreign breaky, I totally agree. I splurge about once a week or so; the rest of the time I stick with the local stuff or just eat in.

Nice to meet you. Okay, when I lived in Thailand, I didn't live in Bangers or Patts, granted, but Back-of-beyond Buri (aka Suphanburi). But I was only a two-hour bus ride/hour-and-a-half van ride (20 baht vs. 70 baht, if I remember the prices correctly) from Bangkok. Even so, I only went down about once a month to every six weeks or so, whenever the urge got strong (i.e., whenever I caught myself spending an hour or more looking at ladyboy porn ). Granted those weekends -- worked around a Thai holiday when one occurred -- tended to be big blowouts. The occasional weekend I headed down to Hua Hin for a relatively quiet weekend being an exception. My point is, that was enough for me. The rest of the time, I was content -- well, more or less -- to live in a quiet Thai town, where a big weekend out was a couple of Changs, flirting with the shy femboy waitress at one of the local Thai clubs and enjoying the house band or watching footy. Ironically I spent much less time thinking about Thailand and thai food and bar girls and ladyboys than when I lived back home in the United States. Now that I have plans to return to the kingdom next year, it will be interesting to see once I get settled in BKK if I can also settle down to a relatively quiet lifestyle with the occasional blowout every few weeks. We shall see, and I may be wrong, but I think so. When I know it's not far away, I'm not one of those people that feels like he's missing something if he doesn't go out looking for it all the time. It's not a constant temptation; rather, I know that Temptations (heh) will be there whenever I get around to it. Having said that, though, I think you are right, generally speaking. A lot of guys come to Thailand and go absolutely apeshit. Anyone who has lived there has seen it; when I lived in BFEburi, I knew a guy who would head down to Bangkok or Patts *every* weekend, while the rest of the time he spent complaining about how he was paying to work in Thailand. Last I heard he had gone back to the UK so he could ... wait for it ... more easily support his Thai girlfriend (plucked from a bar in Patts, naturally).

Hi Ken, you live in or near District 7, I assume? Please correct me if I'm wrong ... but just to help DT and others, that part of town is particularly expensive, too. It's the upscale yuppie part of Sai Gon, with new developments, restaurants, malls, etc. When I was looking for apartments last year, a Vietnamese friend of mine wanted me to look in District 7, and the prices surprised me -- I found a one-bedroom on the edge of District 1, a stone's throw from District's 3 and 5 (a pretty prime spot in terms of being relatively close to everything) -- and it was bigger and cheaper than anything we could find near her in District 7. Of course my building is old and not nearly as high falutin' -- and much more urban. I don't think I could sleep without the background noise of motorbike horns, now. I'm sure there are more traditional places to live that are cheaper down there, but my friend is young, and she felt I should be in some flash building. Anyway, I agree though: the VN economy has gone bonkers. Even in just the last two years -- I first came here in the beginning of 2010 -- to now, it's amazing how things have grown and changed. A great thread -- as was the earlier one -- I'm looking forward to the rest. You've got a unique perspective, being one of the few foreigners having been on the ground here in the 1990s.

+1 for making me laugh out loud, for real.

Wow, DT, that's too bad about your friend. If he won't listen to you, does he have any family or siblings that might be able to knock some sense into his head? Seems pretty clear from what you said that it has to be a scam ...

I'm sure the girls there blew out his candles ... more than once. And consequently his wishes came true.

It's showing up for me in Opera, and I have it masked as IE ...

This is actually good news. Now I can barfine someone else in Famous without getting the ole stinkeye.

I don't have a particular favorite; Connery, Moore and Craig all have brought interesting interpretations of the character to the screen. Interesting trivia re: Vee's favorite, Pussy Galore, played by Honor Blackman: at 39 she was the oldest woman to ever play a Bond Girl, and one of only two that were actually older than the actor portraying Bond (Connery was 36 at the time). As for Bond girls, again, can't chose just one, but if someone held a gun to my head, I'd have to go with Michelle Yeoh (I know, but I *don't* have the Asian flu, honest!).