The best-dressed ladyboys in Chaiyaphum

I was looking through some old photos from my semester in Chaiyaphum, and I came across one that just had to go up on the blog. And I realized that I have never properly addressed the subject of ladyboys. The well-dressed individuals in this photo are ladyboys. They may be dressed better than most of [...]

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A 12-year-old boy named Fuck

The little boy I’m doing homework with is Fah. He’s learning the Thai alphabet by writing the letters 50 or so times each in his notebook, so I decided to do a couple to help out. His brother’s name is Fuck. His full name is something in Thai that I couldn’t begin to pronounce or [...]

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Make that 100 days

In my last post, I mentioned that music has been banned throughout Thailand since the death of the King’s sister on Jan. 1. I mentioned this because I truly could not imagine something like this happening in the States or in any other Western nation. If our president was assassinated, you could play any song [...]

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Three days in Laos

Cities, as a general rule, are formed for a reason. A city may form near an important body of water, at the junction of major roads or rail lines, on the outskirts of a larger city that got too crowded or too expensive. Vang Vieng, Laos, is a different kind of city. As far as [...]

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The feather-duster trade in Khon Kaen

I’m fascinated by the different ways people make money in this country. Almost every day, I seem to notice another bizarre business that someone can apparently make a living in. There is a guy in Chaiyaphum that sells cowboy hats out of the back of his pickup truck (I have not yet seen a single [...]

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