Fantasy or Reality?

Many times it’s been said that western men come to Asia / Thailand to act out their fantasies, specifically where ladies are concerned. If you don’t believe me just ask any western lady and she’ll give you an ear full on how only
western men who couldn’t find a date to save their lives in Podunk Alabama and who have an outdated sense of gender roles are truly living a fantasy by taking a foreign wife. In other words if they’re not in their home country wining
and dining a generally typical overweight and controlling feminist who doesn’t believe in traditional male / female roles then you are most certainly living a fantasy. Perhaps, but let’s focus on where the traditional gender roles
originated, look at some examples and comparisons and then move on to some sort of guidelines to determine if you’re living a fantasy or are in fact living in reality. During the course of this submission I’m going to illustrate
some points with images taken during a recent trip to Pattaya with my pocket camera, the Fuji F30. Again, these are straight out of the camera save for resizing. No flash was used and most were taken while moving which isn’t a sound technique.

Pattaya. When you hear Pattaya mentioned it’s almost always in regards to Walking Street and the many bars, gogos, and the like where Thailand’s working ladies of the night are available in mass quantities. Where better to define
fantasies? Some of us also know there’s some very good diving available from dive boats who sail out of Pattaya and diving is what I spent most of my daylight hours doing when I recently stopped there for a weekend after a rather stressful
trip to southern Thailand. I stayed at the Hard Rock Café Hotel simply because I had a ton of professional equipment I didn’t want disappearing from my room and I was willing to spend the money to have this security. Besides, they
had parking.

Just how was it that “traditional” gender roles came about and why is it that these roles were pretty much universal around the world well before we could tune into CNN and have a feminist lecture us on how we should behave? I’m going
to say right now in the beginning that men and women ARE NOT EQUAL. No, I’m not saying they shouldn’t have equal rights and responsibilities across the board because I strongly believe they should. However, men and women are very
different and these differences don’t allow equality when it comes to many things such as physical ability / strength, personalities, and even intelligence. Yes, you heard me right. Recent studies prove once again that intelligence is directly
linked to brain size and men typically have a brain about 7-10% larger than a female brain. Sure, it’s very common to find men who aren’t as physically or mentally capable as certain women but we’re talking generalities here.
Men became the protectors and doers of hard labor and other physical tasks from the very beginning of time because “generally” men were more capable and in the beginning these traits are what kept civilizations alive. Men also had
personalities that emphasized problem solving as well as the inclination to be aggressive in the pursuit of solving these problems. That’s it, very simple right? No need to discuss the thousands of years of differences in how civilizations
and societies had female leaders or men who cooked or any of that noise as they’re what we might call statistical anomalies. Suffice it to say that with perhaps the exception of France that despite modern advances that de-emphasize the
need for these physical and mental traits that men still pretty much rule the world. While currently there’s really no good reason females can’t be great CEOs or heads of state, there must be strong generational and societal reasons
there are so few.

We can also examine the basic family structure and the need for procreation to maintain civilizations at current or growing levels. Do you realize that Japan and now even Thailand are decreasing in population <This is wrong. Thailand's population is most definitely increasing – Stick> because they’re not meeting the necessary output of 2.3 children per family necessary to maintain population levels? Several excellent academic studies concerning Japan’s state of affairs point to western
style feminism (taken too far) as the reason Japanese females are increasingly unwilling to accept traditional family roles. They want to work, control their own lives, have equal rights, respect, all the things their western counterparts also
expect. There is one big difference however. Western societies took a long time to get there and this gave time for both genders to adjust. Japan has tried to get there very fast in comparison. Basically you have Japanese women who want to be
treated a certain way and Japanese men who would rather stay single and pay for sex than marry them. This results in a dramatic decrease in procreation and a like drop in overall population numbers. Excess and radicalism could be argued to be
the main reasons for much of the worlds ills. When something is taken too far things start to come apart at the seams. The family unit is under such an assault. Many European nations have the same issues going on concerning declining population
numbers and actually must DEPEND on immigration to fill out their work force. These trends are changing the political, religious, and ethnic makeup of entire countries. Most not for the better.

I’ll admit it freely, while a political and financial conservative, I’m very much a social traditionalist. Why? Perhaps because I remember the “good old days” when I was a kid and mothers were mostly there when
you got home from school, dads worked, and there was a definite order to things. Order begets security and peace. Now I look around and there is so much social chaos in western societies that I just don’t feel comfortable living in them.
Unfortunately the influence and demands of the west are starting to manifest in countries like Japan and Thailand in unfortunate ways, at least from my perspective. I believe (not for religious reasons) that a marriage is between a man and a woman,
that “a parent (don’t care which one)” should always be home with the children when the children aren’t in school or normal social activities and ‘daycare’ is not a social activity. If you must have two
incomes then stagger working hours, if the woman has greater earning power than the man can care for the home, all that is necessary is that a parent raise the children. Commonly however it’s the woman who cares for the family and home
and the man who works and personally this is what I prefer despite spending over five years as a stay at home dad. So while I prefer certain things, the family comes first even if that means I must do something I’d rather not. Necessity.

Men who ‘prefer’ (as I do) women who are happy taking care of the home and children are increasingly becoming disenchanted with western women. And of course there are the physical attributes to consider. Obesity is at an all
time high and men being visually stimulated when it comes to sex are more and more finding western women undesirable. Women bless them aren’t so shallow..:) These factors, gender roles and physical desirability, are leading more and more
men to other countries to find suitable marriage partners. It also leads them to other countries for sex. This is the part of the submission where we move from examining traditional gender roles and move into the “is it a fantasy”
discussion.

This is a good example of the genesis of my logic concerning this subject: As a teenager I watched war movies, police shows, and action movies and often fantasized about parachuting into enemy territory and saving the world, shooting it out
with the bad guys and bringing them to justice, working behind enemy lines to gather intelligence, swimming under water to gain access to a foreign port, piloting helicopters, shooting weapons, fighting, and many more such things. At 12-16 years
old these were clearly fantasies. However, I found myself spending 20 years in the military (and four years as a police officer) as an intelligence officer in Naval Special Forces. I can tell you for sure, during those 20 years things were very
real! My fantasy became my reality. Was it everyone’s reality? Of course not. But it was mine, and it was the reality of those who served with me and there were many of us.

While out and about in Pattaya I saw many examples of western men who went there for their fantasies. Men in the beer bars with younger women, men of all ages walking down the sois hand in hand with young and attractive women, and of course
many businesses filled with women looking to be someone’s fantasy.

There were even women picking up money from Western Union offices who were fulfilling one guy's fantasy long distance while other guys stood close by waiting for her to fill his fantasy as well.

I think we can safely say that all the men above ‘could’ be viewed as living out their fantasies. But they ‘could’ also be actually living their reality. I’ll use myself again as an example. I love Asia and in fact am
more “at home” in Asia than my home country. I’ve lived in Asia around 20 years. Asia is my reality, and everything that comes with Asia such as a younger wife (11-12 years younger), availability of a mai noi if I wanted one, and my wife believes a woman’s place is by her man's side helping him build his career so he can take care of the family. If I chose to participate in the sex industry as a customer then relatively inexpensive sexual
experiences with much younger great looking women would also be part of my reality. If I find myself single when I’m 70 years old and decide to take a 22 year old woman into my home for however long, then that also is my reality. I’m
living here and all the perks of this society are my reality.

When did it become my reality? I’d have to say almost immediately. After my second year in Asia I knew I’d be living here forever as soon as I possibly could. When I had to spend the last five years back in the states for personal
reasons I knew in my mind that my real “reality” was waiting for me in Asia. My home country felt like a fantasy, albeit not a nice one. Ok, at this point we’ve discovered that for the reasons I’ve outlined I was able
to change two of my “fantasies” into “realities”, and I think most would agree that’s what I did.

This leaves the bigger question of is it possible to ‘change’ your fantasy to a reality and then back again to a fantasy and have had it actually be a reality? Did you follow that? For instance, let’s say you live and
work in Spain and twice a year you come to Pattaya for two weeks each time and pay for sex with much younger beautiful women. Did your fantasy just become your reality and upon your return change back into a fantasy again? Technically yes. You
were certainly in Pattaya with those three young sexy women wrapped around you when you woke up in the morning, that I’m sure was really real. But is it “healthy” to think of it as a reality? Probably not. If you did then
it would affect in a negative way your other reality, your main reality, back in Spain. It you thought and behaved in Spain as if life in Pattaya was your reality then you’d probably develop many issues and problems in your life. Look,
there’s nothing wrong with having fantasies, even paid ones. Just keep things in perspective

What about if you come here to work for 3-4 years? Say you’re single and “go native” for the entire 3-4 years and enjoy all sorts of young sweet things catering to your every whim, and living like a king with maids and
all the trappings your western sized pay check allows? I’d say that IF you can successfully adapt back to your home country upon your return and actually live happily ever after with a western sized female who has a western sized attitude
with western sized ideas about how YOU have to live then perhaps your 3-4 years in Thailand was indeed your reality. However, for obvious reasons it might be mentally healthier if you just looked at those 3-4 years as a nice fantasy and left it
at that. This is a hard thing to do BTW, going back to your home country after being in ANY country where the values were so much different and enjoying them. Say you spent five years in the Middle East working on an oil rig and had to do without
alcohol, pork, your church, and casual sexual encounters. It would probably be a lot easier to enjoy your home western country after this 5 years than if you had spent the same amount of time in Pattaya..

The last scenario. You live and work in your home western country and spend every vacation in Asia enjoying the good life AND have concrete plans to retire in Asia say in 5-20 years. I know many guys who are doing this and I think it must
be very hard for them. You see them on many of the popular Thailand topic forums talking about their last vacation in Bangkok / Pattaya and also how they checked out home prices “in the country” and they go on and on about their
plans and exchange information with other people who have like dreams. Sometimes / often they’ll even marry a girl they met while on vacation and take her home to their western country just so they can extend their fantasy that much further
to help pass the time until they can retire in Asia. This is a very tough category. Often the desire to prematurely make Asia your reality causes you to marry, support a girlfriend in Asia, maybe even invest financially. Also often these things
fall apart and cause great pain and distress (not to mention losing out financially as well). When I see people doing this I want to tell them about all the stories on StickmanBangkok.com or even personal experiences where things fell apart and
caused the individual pain and more.. If you are such a person I’d think very seriously about experiencing more than just Thailand on your vacations. Perhaps visit some other continents and save the dreams of changing your reality for a
time when you’re closer to retirement and able to realize those dreams. So many people get caught up in these fantasies while thinking it’s their reality, very dangerous territory in my opinion. The sergeant from Hill Street Blues
comes to mind as he releases the patrol officers from roll call and says “be careful out there.” But you know that no matter what you say…

Sometimes it’s necessary to look at the life you’re living and classify it one way or the other if only to help determine the direction you’re heading and compare it to the direction you want to go. Sometimes you can’t
have everything you want, at least immediately. And sometimes you’re just one of those rather rare individuals who really can easily change realities between the extremes and be happy in any reality. And sometimes when you go to Pattaya
to spend the weekend diving you meet a beautiful young professional female athlete from the Ukraine who has the body of a hardcore dancer and just wants to spend the evenings with a male companion whose reality doesn’t include the ladies
for hire.. and sometimes she will come back to your studio and take off her clothes for the camera and….

Until next time…

Stickman's thoughts:

Thought provoking.