Stickman Readers' Submissions November 11th, 2011

The Holy Grail of Asian Girls

What is this propensity to get married? How come Thailand seems to draw so few married men to its shores? The plethora of single over 50's men that litter the streets of Bangkok, hailing from all parts of Europe, the US, the UK, Aus, NZ the list
goes on…

I sometimes wonder if I won't, without knowing it, turn around and see a 55 year old man, still living an individual life in BKK. But I must admit, for me personally, I hope that I don't really want that.

He Clinic Bangkok

I feel that I am looking for the perfect girl. I'm 32, dated enough to feel I have a fairly good idea of what I want. It's just that it doesn't exist. Because what I want is a combination, a mix of cultures to make my girl.

Let me explain. I've lived in Japan in Fukuoka, the south island for 2 years. They say the south island has the most beautiful girls in Japan, and having travelled, I truly believe this. Big wide eyes, tall, clean, long legs, feminine,
milky white skin. In the US, if we're playing a numbers game, 1 or 2 out of 10 girls are to my standards of beautiful. In Japan it's 7 or 8 out of 10.

Some Japanese girls play the cute + dumb card, which can be highly annoying after you get over the strange sexual arousal this can have for a very short time before you get to know her. The personality of J-girls is interesting because it's
so varied. You have the ones whose only interest is to become a housewife, have babies and stay home. Some who are ditsy and dumb because their culture has leaned them towards the male dominated extravagantly female submissive society, and then
you have the high achievers. Women who retain their femininity and I guess, according to their western counterpart's, a submissiveness, yet carve out a highly successful career for themselves.

CBD bangkok

It was in this group that I fell in love with my first J-girl. She was my English student and a morning news announcer to her city of 15 million, like on the TODAY show. She had a PhD in social media, was intelligent and funny, and had such
a wealth of knowledge about world events, and local events. For 2 hours every day, part of her job was to simply read all the news she could so she was up to date with everything. She had a passion for, strange as it may seem, increasing the rates
of organ donation and transplants in Japan and had set up a website to push for further funding for this.

So to talk with her on any issue was of exhilarating freshness. To learn not just ideas, but new news, history and another's opinion explained with clearness and logic was fun. To be socially mature, yet still so kind / compassionate
/ submissive – mix them – to this day I still think of her. I had to leave and she was sad, and I tried stay in contact but as with a girl like that, she is swept away in the busyness of life.

Characteristics such as kindness, diligence, honesty and humility all are held in high regard in Japan. As such this makes for a pleasant time when meeting people anywhere you go. And for an almost completely atheist (despite people calling
themselves Shinto or Buddhist) society you could be mistaken for thinking they weren't all following some singular unity based religion because everyone's so polite. However, this translates into never really hearing what people's
true opinions are unless you're very close friends. And being work colleagues will not be anywhere close to that mark. Being considerate in Japan goes to extraordinary lengths; to the point that after 9pm we turned the TV off and talked in
hushed tones for fear that the house next door which was not connected structurally in any way might be disturbed by our noise.

I must say before I went to Japan I didn't think Japanese girls would be attractive, simply from pictures and movies I've seen, but I was quite taken aback and surprised and found them nothing like the movies, but very beautiful.
However it must be said that although under arms and legs and bodies are silky smooth, downstairs will remain a jungle. It's the culture there, for whatever reasons.

wonderland clinic

My next journey took me to China. I entered with exuberance. Excited about the prospect of meeting and conversing with a powerful communist nation's people. I wanted to know how they felt about foreign policies, the US, their country's
history. And I was told before I left never to mention the three T's – Tibet, Tiananmen Square or Taiwan, whilst teaching in class. I worked in a university for one year in a place called Suzhou and also Shanghai. I could never have had more
wrong expectations. Chinese people are incredibly rude. Not just to foreigners but to everyone. People gasp in horror as they hear of the boy who, after hitting a 23-year old poor country waitress in his car and breaking her ankle decided it would
be too much hassle and costly to deal with her. So he stabbed her to death. Or the other case of the 3-year old toddler that was hit and left to die, with people walking by the body and not helping. People in China don't help one another,
even if you're dying, except for your own family and close friends.

I'll never forget the lady who, way out in the countryside where there were no foreigners, was heavily pregnant and thus she kneeled, not resting on her ankles, her body straight up. Just her knees touching a cushion in front of a supermarket
on a terribly freezing winter's day. Her sign painted so eloquently in Chinese calligraphy, saying her husband had had a car accident, was in hospital and she needed money to help for food and the hospital. I watched her. She stayed there
for 8 hours, head bowed. Chinese people gathered round, pointed, read the sign, stared at her but almost no one helped. They found no shame in standing 2 feet away and being intrigued by her but giving no money. I don't usually give money
to beggars, but it broke my heart and I gave a good amount.

In China if you don't know someone you don't help them. The stories above came as no surprise to me at all after living in China for one year. I perhaps related this to having such a difficult history during the Cultural Revolution
that families reverted and insulated the outside world. Death was far too cheap and common to care for others and so you can only protect the ones around you and this has translated to today. But then I think of Japan with an equally momentous
struggle to regain a quality of life after WWII and their ideas of humanity are far better than China's.

Hygiene is another major issue in China. Think of a beautiful girl walking down the street, for a fleeting moment your eyes glance at her, until she hawks up a glob and spits it out onto the pavement. This is also done inside restaurants
as well, on carpet. Underarms remain unshaved. Bodies go unwashed for 3 or 4 days. Farting, picking noses, and squeezing pimples are not taboo. They will be done where ever and whenever they feel the need. I'm not talking poor uneducated
people either; I'm talking about sons and daughters of factory and business owners.

I travelled to China after watching many a Chinese movie that had reached the shores of the US thinking that Chinese girls would be beautiful. Alas, I was sadly mistaken. Mathematically I would say 3 out of 10 are. If not a little less. But
the ones that are beautiful are amazing. I'm 6 foot 3. So I find tall girls attractive. I've found on average Chinese girls are the tallest of all Asians. They have the whitest skin in some parts of the country and their features can
be flawless. Their faces never belie their true ages. However, China is still extremely conservative, something I was unaware of. Most girls will not be interested in a foreign man and the ones that are, are often frequent travellers abroad. Even
the poor country girls look for Chinese companionship. On average they will show no interest in a white Caucasian. They will comment on your handsome features but never be interested in anything more. I'm excluding prostitutes in all this,
of course.

I could never marry or even date a Chinese girl ever. Her selfishness, and also her dominant personality are not to my tastes. As well as watching her pick her teeth, nose and spit at will; no matter how pretty can be a turnoff. Leaving used
tampons out in the open in the bathrooms was another major disgusting habit.

However they surprisingly are very up to date with world events and policies and I loved chatting with them. Their government can do no wrong in their eyes. Tibet is rightfully theirs as is Taiwan and the people who are causing all the trouble
are rogue terrorists. However, this is not surprising the as the government has tight controls of media. The only people that can rise above this are ones who travel or search out truth for themselves. But in general Chinese people have logical
ideas and can back their arguments up about their country's foreign policies. They willingly talk about politics and many know a plethora of US, UK and Australian politicians. They all knew and kept informed about the uprisings in the Arab
countries and had their own thoughts on the NATO intervention versus China's non interference stance. Although some of their historical facts seem to have been mislaid by misinformation, they were intelligent and logical and an interesting
people to talk to.

All my friends there were male. I chatted with many females in class, but I had no desire to find a girlfriend and as such enjoyed conversations with a group of guys when out drinking.

My final destination has been one year living in Bangkok.

Comparatively I would say 3 or 4 out of 10 girls here are pretty. There's a wide range of girls in Thailand. Short and tall, flat faced or European features, light skinned, dark skinned, short stocky legs or slender bronzed legs that
are seemingly endless.

Thailand girls are by far the most fun. And I extend that to the whole of the Thai race. If you're friendly you can have a joke with just about anyone. A kind word and laugh will get you through most situations. Even to the policeman
who was making jokes with me as he was fining me 200 baht for not wearing my helmet. I don't care; he did it with a smile. It's why people can fall in love with the girlfriend experience so easily.

I know Asian people look younger than their age and Thai people do, but compared to Chinese and Japanese they still look older. Thai skin still looks weathered comparatively. It's no surprise however due to the year round heat and sun
beating down despite their best efforts to stay in the shade. You never see the porcelain flawless milky white doll like features here that some of the Chinese or J-girls have. The J-girls sometimes had the smallest chin, a small dainty nose,
big eyes, a face you could cup in both hands and kiss with affection because of its cuteness.

Thai girls are a very mixed bunch. I work in government; I've met the so called good girls, who really are just exactly that. Good to a T. Have a boyfriend, are always home on time, never sleep at their boyfriend's house, not interested
in drinking, don't go to clubs and there is no convincing them otherwise. But there's also the other type, who aren't bar girls but still like to drink. Started in university with friends and are cautiously happy to mix their time
chatting with a foreigner, maybe it's the unknown or the so called attractiveness of a taller whiter male. They may have never been to the foreign bars but are willing to go simply with a bit of persuasion. These girls can also be a bit more
liberal in terms of sex. And if you're honest from the start and don't promise long term commitments or dating they can be quite happy to sleep with you without drama. The 'that is life' attitude.

However, I am dating a Thai girl now, and despite her being incredibly talented in communication – she in the sales part of our office – far more than I could ever hope to reach, if you delve a little further you just find emptiness.

People meet her and love her. Her jokes, her enthusiasm, her confidence, her tenacity to chat to anyone and make them laugh are second to none. But after all that died down and life kept trudging along I found myself sitting on the beautiful
shores of the river, in an outside restaurant and happy to let her spend time with her Iphone on Facebook. Normally this would irritate me with anyone else but a Thai person. But I always carry a book and am more than happy to throw myself into
learning or enjoying it by myself. For I know that invariably when we start eating the conversation will be only about her job, her boss, her colleagues, their families, which someone is sleeping with someone else and the mundaness of classroom
gossip.

I tell her she's boring. I've tried talking about world issues, refugees, hunger, war, education, freedom, ethics, morals and politics. I've read a lot about Thai politics even to try to have some kind of intelligent discussion
with her but she's not interested. I've asked her questions on how she would like to see Thailand change, or questions about ethics, morals versus western view points etc. But all the questions sail away in the quiet slow balmy breeze
of the Bangkok night sky.

Sure I can talk about the financial crisis in Europe, the Greek debt problem, the US latest policy moves of removing troops from Afghanistan before the election, the risks of the Iranian nuclear program and Israel's talk of strikes but
even when telling her all the information and then asking her opinion, she is still unable to formulate one. She's never been asked, and she's never been interested.

This extends to almost all Thai people I've met. Surely as you get higher up in the Thai levels of government this must change. Surely the people on huge salaries, high up in the top echelons of society have views and opinions, sound
judgement, logical reasoning and dreams for their country's future but I've yet to meet these people sadly.

Finally I must comment that it's interesting the different features the different countries find attractive in a western male. I am tall, fair skinned, blond hair, blue eyes. Thai girls love blonde hair, a straight strong western nose
and fair skin. The tallness somewhat. Chinese girls loved height. It was the one mitigating attraction for them. Additionally they loved a skinny man. I'm quite muscular, but they didn't like this. They like skinny a lot. They weren't
too fussed whether you had white or tanned skin. J-girls, just loved the foreigner. They didn't really care too much. As long as you looked foreign they liked you.

Also to note. Many J-girls get a foreign boyfriend to learn English. If the boyfriend insists on speaking in Japanese to get better he often finds himself unceremoniously dumped. A foreign boyfriend is seen as somewhat of an accessory. J-girls
want to learn English and they don't mind having sex and a cool accessory for the time being. Sure some get married and only from my own knowledge these are the marriages that have lasted the longest of any Asian-Western country courtship.

Many Thai girls on the other hand often only learn English so they can get a foreign boyfriend. If you already speak Thai then it's all the better. Thai girls for me personally, on finding out I speak Thai, much prefer to converse in
their own language than English. English seems to be somewhat of a chore, and if they don't have to deal with it all the better. I like this as I like to learn and like to know what's being said in my presence.

In finality, if I could have the happiness, exuberance and enthusiasm of a Thai girl, mixed with the kindness, loyalty and honesty of a J-girl, plus the confidence to speak their opinion logically and intelligently of a Chinese girl I think
I'd find my perfect match. Oh, and the western girl? – the bigger breasts 🙂 I wonder if she's out there…

Stickman's thoughts:

As I have said an nauseum, the differences are so great that despite what so many claim, and despite protests to the contrary, most Western guys just aren't suited to dating an Asian girl in Asia.

nana plaza