Another Disaster In The Making Or Finding A Filipina Called Alice…
Back in Blighty, after saying goodbye to the suddenly not so ebullient Mem at Bangkok airport, I was in a pretty bad way. Not just love lost but the company I thought I was working for hadn't just gone bankrupt but had completely disappeared, leaving a pile of debt! Its owner in the throes of an expensive divorce had decided to cut his losses and disappear with whatever cash he could get his hands on. Most likely on the first plane to Bangkok – he had shown an unusual amount of interest in my trip to Phuket and photos of Mem in her bikini. The only good thing was that I owned my house without a mortgage so would always have somewhere to live… I had an old school friend who ran an estate agency and he was very happy to rent it out for me, around 1,500 quid a month for doing nothing. The alternative was working in some minimum pay job for next to nothing.
This left me with nowhere to stay but after reading most of the submissions to Stick's site I knew that the Philippines was a viable alternative. I could not take going to Thailand so soon after ending it with Mem. Too many memories. As it happened the only cheap one-way air-flight was London to Kuala Lumpur on Air Asia and thence on to Clark Field (and Angeles City). So a few weeks to sort my stuff out – the house was quickly rented, starting the next month – and off on a new adventure. Just to add to my angst, my mate who had been hanging out with Lek (the girl who had introduced me to Mem) in Phuket had married her and got her a visa for the UK, already having proudly installed her in his council flat! He was told not to talk to me again after the way I had treated Mem! WTF? Most likely, she didn't want me telling any tales I had picked up about her – actually never found anything bad about her except what her husband already knew about the Thai guy following her around Phuket.
Kuala Lumpur was pretty much like Bangkok, even down to the nasty touts in the tourist markets – they turned out to be Thais! I quite liked the place but was only there for two days. The hotel I stayed in had a surveillance camera in the ceiling of the room, which I assume was something to do with the Muslim owners ensuring that no sexual impropriety went down in the room. Actually, I assumed it was a fire alarm of some sort but after studying it for a while concluded that it was indeed a camera… needless to say I won't be staying there again. As to the young women, there was a mixture that lacked the density of beauty you see in Bangkok but was occasionally intoxicating, though I did not find any interesting bars – this was just girls wandering around the shopping centres. I wasn't going to make much effort when I was on the way to a go-go ghetto like Angeles City.
On the plane to Angeles I sat next to an absolutely stunning girl who I assumed was a Filipina. The problem was I couldn't work out if she was twelve or twenty, bar-girl or hi-so type coming back from holiday or even work, and therefore could not formulate any kind of opening sentence. She had me completely flummoxed so I just read my book instead. Having so misread Mem, it had somehow left me adrift and somewhat insecure – I later learnt that my disinclination to go out at night when back in Blighty was a sign of depression. Actually, I thought it just a waste of time as I wasn't going to find anyone to replace Mem in the UK bars, but what do I know?
Immigration and taxi to the hotel were straight-forward and from leaving the plane to throwing my bag down in the hotel room at Central Park took a mere twenty minutes. The bad news was that the hotel, at around 1000 baht a night, was poor quality but it had a reputation for good security and in a place like Angeles good security counted for a lot. It was a few minutes’ walk to the main strip, Fields, where most of the gogo bars are all lined up in splendid neon. Being a new face in town I was immediately subjected to begging pleas from the threadbare kids and desperate touts trying to sell useless junk but I ignored them all and made it to the end of Fields where there was a McDonalds for some much needed food.
There was a desperate air of poverty to the people loitering around the area and even the odd destitute looking Westerner. Someone else opined that they had the air of cut-throats and that just about summed them up. It was still daylight so I had a bit of a wander around after some of McD's finest chicken. I was surprised at the heaviness of the pollution, mostly from things called Jeepneys which were built like tanks and only stopped for passengers, anything else fair game. After the bars there were a few shops and then a big SM Mall across the way which I got to by dodging through the traffic, walking through a car-park and then up over a walkway – almost knocked over by desperate begging kids a couple of times. It seemed a rum way to get to a major shopping centre but at least the air-conditioning worked.
There were plenty of ATM machines but they refused to work with my Nationwide card. Found an internet shop on the second floor and used Skype to phone Nationwide who informed me there was a lot of fraud in the PI and I should have told them I was going there. Fair enough but the cheeky blighters wanted to know what I was doing in Angeles City! Research for a novel I told them which confused their computer as it did not tie in with my proper job… after a bit of interrogation they reluctantly allowed me to use the card to take my own money out of the bank! Very nice of them. The PI has very expensive overseas calls so if it hadn't been for Skype I would have dropped some serious dosh sorting that out. They also told me that it was just as well that I had phoned as it would have tripped their security if I tried to log-in to my internet account from the PI and I would have had my password reset, no way they would send the details to the PI, either! So I might have ended up with no access to my bank account!
The sales girls in the SM Mall were ultra keen to sell me something but not particularly attractive after the charms of Mem… I couldn't read them, had no idea if they were just trying to sell me the usual junk or interested in something more . I hid out in the Starbucks but even there I wasn't entirely safe, the girl behind the counter went into a long spiel, expecting me to remember her name and demanding to know my own. Was this some kind of Americanisation of the PI, where the staff were trained to be ultra friendly or were these women hot for foreigners? I sat down outside the Starbucks, enjoying their cheapest brewed coffee although I made the mistake of ordering the largest size which came in a cup that could pass for a soup bowl! No sooner had the first drop of caffeine sizzled into my veins than the security guard sidled over and asked if I was looking for a woman! I wouldn't trust such a guy as far as I could throw him so lied, told him he was too late.
In half an hour I'd had more female interest than I got in the UK in a year, and I hadn't even tried the bars yet! Although all these women would've easily ended up with fit young men if they lived in the UK they really weren't what I was looking for… yes, stupid boy that I am, I was looking for a nicer version of Mem! Which probably meant a much younger version of Mem… The supermarket was full of school kids who nudged each other when they caught sight of me, they made an awful racket – an unruly mob of middleclass kids who gave every impression of being really spoilt, loaded up with junk food and high spirits. It took nearly half an hour to pay for the couple of mangoes I'd bought for later consumption – and very good they were, too. Some very attractive girls on the tills who gave me glorious smiles.
After another shower – the dreadful humidity meant I was taking a shower every time I returned to the hotel – it was time to go see the famous Field's gogos. The beggars and touts went into overdrive when they saw me but I managed to ignore them… an ice-cold San Miguel in a huge gogo bar my reward. The bar was so big you really needed binoculars to see the babes on the far distant stage… one of the mamasans was all over me, giving my groin a tug demanding to know what my cock was doing. She wanted to know what kind of girl I wanted and what I wanted to do to her – I could have a cherry girl for a 1000 US or a three-holer for loose change or even her if I was into older women. To be fair to the old bat (she was probably a touch younger than me) there was only one other customer in the joint so they were obviously desperate for money.
I left as soon as I finished the SM, not really my kinda joint but have to start somewhere. The religious types probably expect me to feel some guilt at these antics but all I felt was the shiver of excitement at the possibilities of the night. A few more bars passed the time but the only attractive girls turned out to be cherry gals… one was really hot but didn't really want much to do with me – I am hardly some 20-year-old's dream guy. I wandered off down the road, out of the main strip and towards the SM Mall, hoping to find some more interesting women – Field's bars they seemed to be either too-nice-to-believe cherry girls who could pass for jailbait or rather hardcore.
Once on Perimeter Road the bars vary from large joints to much smaller neon dives – some of them are quite well disguised with just a touch of neon and big door hiding a large gogo bar with loads of young ladies. It took me another 4 beers and bars before I found Alice – there were plenty of other women on offer but compared to Mem they weren't physically up to the mark – says Beer-Bellied me who can only pull an older, fatter woman back in the UK but then that is the whole point of paying the airfare and taking disturbing levels of heat and pollution; you have to pay for your sins!
The first time I saw Alice I thought Mem had caught up with me. Same hair, eyes, mouth, nose, face shape – could have been her sister, younger sister (just to put the boot in!). Same big movie star smile but better teeth. Completely different body, less curves and almost flat-chested gave a hint that she might not be legal… but she reckoned 22 which was mind-bendingly okay with me. I would not even think about trying to chat up a 22 year-old in the UK, they would probably call the police or their father. Just to add, Mem actually looked more like a Filipina than a Thai so it wasn't that surprising I found someone who looked like her.
Alice's skin was ultra taut and smooth, a hint of muscle under the silk – she came from Leyte and admitted to spending most of her youth cutting sugar cane – had heated, rough hands from all the real work. She seemed immensely happy when I had gestured her down from the stage and paid for a Coke for her (100 baht, beer was about 60 baht – I will quote prices in baht as this a Thai-centric site). The ratio of customers to girls was approximately one to thirty! Mem had been a kinda of dream girl for me (until I discovered she was ex-brothel and probably had a Thai husband), and, call me an old fool, it was the same with Alice, I was completely smitten with her on first sight, and not just because she looked so delicious, her whole being seemed to vibrate with happiness as I stroked her body and whispered enchantments into her ear.
The mamasan wanted to know if I was going to pay the barfine? A silly question but ever the gentleman I did ask Alice if that was what she wanted, giving her the option to refuse. I think that kind of consideration gets you into their good books rather than just getting the mamasan to coerce a girl into doing something she may not want to do. These mamasans seem to have a lot more power and control over the girls than in Thailand and I can't help but think that the atmosphere would be better if they were kept in the background rather than thrusting themselves at customers in an aggressive manner. I must say that all the waitresses I came across were much more polite than their Thai counterparts and much more efficient at making sure I had a nice cold beer pronto – many can be barfined, quite a few of them more attractive than most of the dancers in some bars. If one of them had looked like Mem…
So Alice and I made our way back to Fields and the hotel. I was pleased to see she was wearing jeans and a loose tee-shirt rather than the body hugging top and micro-shorts many of the women sported. There is no escaping from the fact that in Angeles City every older guy with a young woman is keeping company with a bargirl but a lot of these girls want to better themselves by escaping the neon, so I like to avoid girls who actually seem to revel in looking like a hooker. Mem loved to be a walking advert for sex but was easily persuaded into less provocative clothing by numerous shopping trips – some bar-girls would rather cut their wrists than wear decent clothing!
Back on Fields, the night had changed, the street full of police ushering bar-girls into the back of a big van, a few foreigners amongst them! One big guy looked close to tears and there were even a couple of Japanese-looking guys being herded into the police van. I hurried away with a tight grip on Alice, not wanting to come to the attention of the police, thankful I hadn't been in one of the raided bars (I had been in there a couple of hours earlier). If you thought some of the Thai police were running to fat, the Filipino cops looked exactly what they were – obese, corrupt, pigs-at-the-trough hated as much by the Filipinos as they were feared by foreigners. The level of stupidity and greed involved in arresting mere customers for a shakedown (confirmed later by reports on the web) beggars belief – a very quick way to destroy the scene, no more bar owners with bags of swag for the cops if the customers go elsewhere. Rumour is that there is one particular Manila-based cop who really hates foreigners who is doing the dirty.
A narrow escape that turned me right off Angeles City. As to Alice that is a whole other story that is still on-going and I dare not say too much yet… but if you want a hint I am writing this from the UK not the PI! After my experiences with Mem, I find myself getting paranoid about many things that I would normally have ignored, so it is not clear to me what is actually going down with Alice. I will also add that whereas Mem had a very loose pussy Alice was so tight I could actually believe her claim of my being the third guy who'd had the pleasure. As to the PI, it is very third world, more African than Asian in its level of corruption, but it is an ongoing exploration with the (mostly) delightful Alice as my guide. At least I got Mem out of my system but now I have to decide what to do about Alice. More later, if I am able.
Stickman's thoughts:
Nice build up, but a rather abrupt ending….!
