A Singapore Lady’s View

Reading your readers' submissions has been quite an eye opener. Although I'm not entirely surprised most of the stories found here are negative 'ever-afters', I'm beginning to see the allure of Thai people, their child-like attitude
in trying to reach their dreams while still grappling the economics of modern life. Before I go on, let me introduce myself. I'm a Singaporean female who has been to Thailand many times over (with Singapore being surrounded by Muslim countries,
Thailand has the nearest thong bikini friendly beaches – heck I could get arrested back home!) Thailand has always been exotic to me, back in the 1980s I was a wee lass when I attended one of the 'Tiffany Shows' with my family (yes,
mom did squirm even though it was a watered down cultural show) and I thought my grandma was absolutely lying through her false teeth when she said those beautiful ladies were actually men!

Fast forward to the year 2000, being a young woman with her Singaporean beau, we frequently took trips with a group to Thailand on a bike (nothing like being strapped on a bike for 9 hours having bugs in your visor and an aching bum). Hat
Yai, less famous than its sister cities like Bangkok or Pattaya, is known to be the playground for many Malaysian Chinese looking for a good time. One will be hard pressed to find any westerner in these parts, indeed the party life here is mostly
confined in 'bra-less' lounges (whatever that means) with the cursory establishments of massage parlours, brothels and indoor 'shows'. In one of our trips, we couldn't secure our usual accommodation due to the surge in
booked rooms over a holiday period. We had to make do with one of the short-term rooms in the infamous Pink Lady Hotel. Apart from the piped in porn channel, mirrored ceiling and the double size bathtub sans wash basin, I never forgot
what Lee*, one of the fellow bikers told me; 'Come and see how fortunate you Singapore girls are'. There I saw girls my age, sitting in what they call a 'fishbowl', padded boobs and make up, staring at men staring back at them.
Till then, I had believed that education is a great leveler of circumstance but why weren't these girls in school? It can't be that they are too poor to attend school because the Thai government had pledged to provide free education
for the first 12 years and highly subsidized higher education. I begun to think about all the opportunities I was blessed with, wondering how in such a cut-throat environment like Singapore, that there aren't many disillusioned young Singaporean
ladies falling into the flesh trade (most probably falling into mental institutions). I came away with more questions than answers.

Now fast forward to today. I've since became single and have been dating for a while and the heart of what brought me here to this site is the dichotomy of Thai women and their propensity (and prowess) to snare good single men. Reading
the generous missives by the gentlemen here has given me a clearer picture of an average Thai woman's characteristics. What has propelled me were a few unfortunate accounts, where, I've been looked over in favour of a Thai girl by men
who became completely besotted with them. One was an American whom I befriended, he reiterated a conversation he had with a bargirl to me, saying that she doesn't like her job and wish she could go back to school. My friend then told her
to take advantage of the Thai government grants and subsidies to further her studies. She replied that she's thinking of that while dropping hints that she likes him very much and wants him to be her boyfriend. This was where I wish I said,
dude, she only wants to talk about her problem, not to find a solution. Although this Yank and me did develop a mutual attraction, he dropped a bomb one-day by announcing he was utterly in love with a Thai girl whom he met during one of his military
operations. He could not live without her and was positively pissed off at the visa restrictions, but oh what is love without a bit of resistance?

While I was nursing my broken heart; I kept wondering if that little piece of visa obstacle, that bit of 'lost in translation' charm, that cheery innocent visage that hides an empty (if somewhat childish) vessel was what's
making a few good men pull on their cape for a Marvel moment. Comparatively, I can travel anywhere relatively visa-free, my dry wit is equivalent to a Brit, I'm still cheery after much self-reflection (read:self-loathing), I matched my face
to that little ditty face map from beautyanalysis.com (Thanks Ben Dover and bend-over in a bow I shall) and came out tops. PLUS I got a killer bod to match (thanks to all that mandatory inoculations and my nation's obsession with swimming).
— I began to question my so-called fortunate hand in fate for being born in an affluent society, where my socio-economic grounding is portable worldwide, and yet unable to make a man fall madly in love with me as they do with such fervency on
a Thai lady. Why would a sane man go through all that trouble for a Thai woman whose only going to leave him second-guessing her loyalty, humour and mental state? I was naturally crushed.

I was convinced this Yank was under some black magic (which is rather common in Asia, especially in Thailand, Vietnam, Indonesia and the Philippines) but it was out of my hands and for my own sanity I had rather not stay in touch. And I'm
not sure if I'm alone on this, but I've noticed this particular enthrallment men exhibit happens only with Thai ladies. I hardly ever hear of guys gushing over their Filipino, Viet, Indonesian love of their lives. There are a few other
instances where I knew of good decent men who clearly had dreams of building a happy home life dashed in mere months. Their Thai wives couldn't handle the realities of their new roles (no more strings of other boyfriends – time to get serious),
baffled at the complexities of housekeeping budgets and couldn't understand why their husbands had to work all the time.

On this note, I shall leave with an advice a certain senior officer had for that unfortunate Yank-under-spell, 'Only Japanese and Singaporean women are worth marrying, the rest will love you long time'.

Stickman's thoughts:

I remember when I was last in Singapore in 2002 and marvelled at the ladies down there. I remember suggesting to a few Thailand based Western friends how attractive the local Singaporean women were – and they thought I had lost my marbles!

But you're absolutely right, Thai women do seem to weave some sort of weird spell over guys.