Gina pointed out that there’s more interesting cultural stuff to do in Bangkok than party with ladyboys. I suspect she’s dead wrong about this, but because we have a pretty egalitarian relationship, I’m willing to give her ideas a try. Just not last night. Last night was all about the ladyboys. Or ladyboy, if I’m honest. Because when Coffee’s in the room, there’s really only one.

After doing a little apartment shopping in a neighborhood in Bangkok that we thought we might like for a home base, but which actually turned out a little bit too slow for us, we decided to hit up Chinatown for some dinner. The evening’s extravagances began with dinner at T&K Seafood, which is a pretty well-known seafood place, and it didn’t disappoint. Here’s a pro-tip for ordering at T&K Seafood: You know how when you order hot wings in the States and, inevitably, they’re not all that hot even though they triple checked that you’re sure you wanted ’em hot and you’re pretty disappointed in the wings, plus they pulled a bait and switch with the waitress at Hattrick’s and so you got a slightly less wildly attractive waitress than you were led to believe you’d get? That doesn’t happen at T&K Seafood, the first part about the heat. If you ask for spicy, spicy is what you will get. And when you’re in Thailand, you should definitely ask for spicy.

Of course, Gina orders the cashew salad, because she’s exactly the kind of person who does things like order the cashew salad at T&K Seafood. (She also once ordered the veggie burger at Bobby’s Burger Palace in DC, which face palm.) She made up for this slightly by ordering a spicy papaya seafood salad. But with all this salad ordering, it was pretty clear that I had to do the important work of living up to the expectations they have over here for a healthy American appetite. I ordered the spicy squid salad, the spicy pea shoot salad, and the massive grilled lobster. That seemed to satisfy the waitress’s expectations.

Here’s another pro-tip for ordering at T&K Seafood: If you order three dishes that are spicy, you’re also gonna want to order a cashew salad so you have something to put in your mouth to relieve the heat, which is relentless and long lasting. Seriously, the food is so hot, you will stick your tongue in your Chang beer in a desperate attempt to put out the fire. But this will not work. Here’s another thing to know about T&K Seafood: If you want virtually everyone who walks by while you’re eating—this will be hundreds, if not thousands, of people—to look at your grilled lobster, then at you, then back at your grilled lobster, with looks of admiration (from the men), unbridled lust (from the women), and a little of both (from the third sex), you should order the massive grilled lobster. At 2,000 baht, the lobster is in no way cheap by Southeast Asian standards, but the attention from the passersby alone is worth the expense.

After dinner, we decide to take in some culture, so we head off to Nana Plaza to check out the nightlife. Gina suggested we take the forty-minute walk to get there because she still has not assimilated in that regard, but she was defied. Instead we waited about thirty minutes for a car because the traffic around Chinatown is intense, so we pulled up to Nana Plaza about forty-five minutes later. Actually, we pulled up a few blocks away from Nana Plaza because the traffic there was pretty intense too, so we saved the driver a little time and hoofed it. This made Gina happy.

If you don’t know what Nana Plaza is, I suggest you stop reading this and start googling with SafeSearch disabled. If you know exactly what Nana Plaza is and you’re not a cultural and moral relativist, this is about the point where you’ll want to stop reading this and go back to looking at cat pictures on Facebook. If you are walking down Sukhumvit Road, which is the longest road in the world, toward Nana Plaza, you may start to wonder if you’re really in a world-famous red-light district, the largest in Bangkok. There are lots of shoe stores, street food vendors, and 7-11s. This is because you have not yet crossed that one street after which the red-light districtness of Nana Plaza will basically slap you in the face. It will do so, of course, in a way you will enjoy if you’re a cultural and moral relativist.

Nana plaza has lots of food and bars and go-go places. And there are working girls basically everywhere, which we enjoy because we’re Americans and appreciate a culture where there’s a strong work ethic. Here’s what I mean when I say they’re everywhere: There are prostitutes literally everywhere. They’re in the bars, on the sidewalks, walking the patios in their micro bikinis, playing pool. There are six of them dancing with that one person who’s maybe not a guy but we’re not sure next to the pool table. They’re everywhere. Gloriously so. But we’re not in it for those kinds of girls, which can be found all over the world. No, we came to Thailand for the spice. And if it’s spice you want, Thailand delivers.

The spiciest part of Nana Plaza is toward the end at a place called Obsessions. Obsessions is a little like Hooters in that you understand the point of the name. It’s also totally unlike BJs, which isn’t anything like Obsessions despite what you might expect. If you read above where I urged you to maybe go look at pictures of cats on Facebook if stuff makes you uncomfortable and thought that I might be talking to you specifically, but then decided to see where this was going anyway, well, it’s going there right now. That’s about all you’re gonna get out of me in terms of trigger warnings, which I think is fair.

Entering Obsessions for the first time, you would be forgiven for thinking it’s a strip club. It definitely has that strip club vibe, except it doesn’t take ten minutes for your eyes to adjust to the lighting. There’s stadium-style seating around a stage with poles in the center, there’s a more or less wide-open changing room behind our left shoulders, and there’s a cocktail girl or ladyboy (who knows) who’s fun but not really sexy, which I think is purposeful: that’s not her job. And there are girls on the stage, like ten at a time, which if you know anything about American strip clubs, you know this is already way more girls than is typical for a Sunday night. You will also likely know that some of the girls in American clubs offer extras or takeout—because despite what Chris Rock said about sex in the Champagne room, there definitely is. Sometimes.

Except Obsessions is not a strip club. You can tell because instead of there being ten girls on a good night, there are more like 60 or so. And instead of them coming out from the hidden-from-sight changing room in a rotation of two or three at a time, all 60 or so of them are either on the stage or over by the bar or out on the patio or sitting in the plush leather-ish stadium seating with the guests. Nobody swings around the poles, American-stripper style. Nobody twerks, except for that one really sexy chick in the black leather-ish minidress. And all of the girls are available for takeout. It’s their bread and butter.

Just a note about strippers. Many of you will maybe want to come across as more enlightened or sensitive or politically correct and refer to strippers as dancers. You might also want to refer to hookers or prostitutes as escorts. If you’re one of them, I urge you to go to a strip club and get a hooker for takeout, then have a conversation with her afterward about her dance training and what her favorite restaurant is to escort men to. Or you can just talk to my friend Molly who put it like this, “Dancer? Have you seen what we do? That’s not dancing: It’s stripping.” I gave up arguing with women since I started taking Prozac, and I was never inclined to argue with the professionals to begin with, and Molly was a pro, so I’m inclined to just believe women on this. Believe women.

Also unlike an American strip club, there’s no need to tip every girl every three minutes when they make their rounds after the song is over. The concept of tipping the girls at Obsessions was pretty baffling to the cocktail waitress. And none of the 60 or so girls in the place were at all dejected or resentful or stopped winking and smiling and giving the International Sign Language sign for “Would you like a BJ?” if you didn’t want them to sit with you or leave for a little takeout action at the local hotel. They were congenial and fun and persistent with the BJ offers in a totally unpushy way. If you’ve ever been to an American strip club and just wanted to relax for a few minutes and enjoy your beer or (in the case of a full-nude joint) your orange juice that tastes like SunnyD mixed with saliva while you watch the show, you’ll appreciate the totally casual approach at Obsessions.

The other thing you’ll appreciate is that whereas there may be one or two really hot girls at a typical American strip club—and if there are two, one of them’s the bartender, and she doesn’t strip or give extras or offer takeout, ever—all of the 60 or so girls at Obsessions are absolutely stunningly beautiful. All of them. All. And that’s how we met Coffee.

We were sitting on the plush, leather-ish seats enjoying our drinks, just taking it all in. Gina was drinking Chang beer and I was enjoying double pours of Black Label neat—Keep walking, Bangkok—which the cocktail waitress had no trouble understanding that I wanted a good two-finger pour. And we were discussing how incredible it was that 100% of the girls in Obsessions were absolutely stunningly beautiful. All of them. All. And just to make the point really clear, I gestured at a stunningly beautiful girl who was making eyes at us from over by the bar, which she took to mean, Come on over and sit with us, and so she came over and sat with us.

At first, Coffee sat to my right and Gina sat to my left. I was a little uncomfortable with this arrangement so I asked Coffee to sit between us, which she was happy to do, and so she scooted over me, dragging her really extremely sexy ass across my lap as she did so. Gina was fine with the sexy ass scooting situation, but was a little bit timid at first about sitting so close to Coffee, and it took her a while to come to grips with the fact that it was not only totally appropriate to get handsy with Coffee, but that it was expected. Coffee, of course, was a total pro. She was understanding and gentle and took it slow with Gina in terms of hand holding, neck nibbling, and other forms of heavy petting. She took it less slow with me because I am not timid. At all.

Here’s how it works at Obsessions: You take a seat and order drinks. If you have a girl or two or three or four (or however many you want, really, which you can do because you don’t have to tip them) sit down with you, the cocktail waitress will ask if you’d like to buy a drink for the girl and for herself. This is totally optional, but we opt in because we like to party and that’s just how we roll. Your drinks will be totally legit. The girl’s drinks will be way more Coke than whiskey because she’s working and needs the caffeine to balance the alcohol if she’s gonna make it to the end of the night. Coffee’s night ends when someone takes her out of Obsessions to the local hotel for a little after-dinner spice. If you’re gonna enjoy a little takeout Coffee, and I think you should, it will cost you 1,000 baht for the club, 3,000 baht for Coffee, and whatever you’ve racked up on your bar tab. You will also have to pay for an hour in the room at the classy hotel nearby. 3000 baht is about 90 dollars American, by the way. There’s no requirement to take Coffee out, however. You can just chill and enjoy drinks and some pretty heavy petting, but eventually Coffee’s going to have to get up and leave you because she doesn’t work for nothing. Gina and I decided to skip the takeout this time, but we definitely didn’t want Coffee to leave because she’s such good company, so we paid her the 3,000 baht plus the house fee for her time. It’s worth noting here that Gina thought that maybe Coffee would prefer to get paid her usual rate and not have a threesome with us in the local classy hotel and just go home for a good night’s sleep. Gina was dead wrong on this one. Coffee made it abundantly clear that she would much rather have a little pre-good-night’s-sleep threesome action with us, hands down.

You would be forgiven for thinking that this was all my idea and that Gina was totally appalled at such bad behavior and was uncomfortable and not having a good time at all, etc., but you would be dead wrong about this. Gina and I have a totally equitable relationship, and she’s a lot more adventurous than you probably know. And although she isn’t as totally unfettered as me in terms of sexual mores and stuff like that, when we’re having a particularly adventurous evening like last night, there’s lots of checking in between us to make sure everyone’s having fun and comfortable and so on. For example, when Coffee and I decided it was time to take her really beautiful and luscious breasts out of her bra for a little fondling and mutual nipple squeezing, Gina passed on Coffee’s suggestion that she get in close for a little nipple sucking and licking action. This was totally fine, and in deference to my wife who still loves me, I passed on it too, even though I’m male and was totally into it. Totally. Likewise, when Coffee decided it was about time to take matters into her own hand, I let Gina know what was going on below and that, of course, she could shut off the tap at any point. If you’re one of those people who believes that Gina would find it impossible to say no to me in the face of all my male power and privilege, you’re an idiot.

You might be wondering who goes to a place like Obsessions. Well, if you’re a careful reader, you’ll have noticed that people like Gina and me go to places like Obsessions. There were definitely other couples in there too, plus a pretty surprising, if I’m honest, group made up of a woman in her 30s and her parents, who were much older. Obviously. But overwhelmingly the clientele of Obsessions is straight males. Hands down. They may be single or in groups. They could be American, European, or Australian, or they could be from another Asian country or from Thailand. It’s helpful, in terms of the girls-on-stage action at Obsessions, to either be a group of Korean men or to be sitting next to a group of Korean men. Cuz when the Korean guys roll in, all of the girls turn away from whichever direction they were facing to face the Koreans. Coffee helpfully explained that Koreans are rich and particularly generous. I think Gina proved that we’re pretty gosh-darn generous ourselves by giving Coffee all of the baht that she had left, which was supposed to last us all week, after I’d already paid her. Cuz that’s how we roll: making it rain, bitches!

Just a few notes to sort of sum up the Obsessions experience: The changing room isn’t completely wide-open, but it’s close. And you can definitely catch a decent amount of topless action going on in there if you look over your left shoulder every once in a while, especially if you use the mirror strategically. The bathroom is also worth checking out. There’s a lady’s room, which I noticed some of the men who maybe aren’t ready to lose their illusions just yet tend to use. Because if you harbor any illusions that the absolutely stunningly beautiful girls in Obsessions don’t pee standing up, you will be relieved of those illusions when you go to the bathroom. I discovered this when I excused myself to go to the bathroom after Gina had politely requested that Coffee shut off the tap on the down-below action going on down below. I also discovered that in the like ten seconds that Coffee engaged in some pretty vigorous over-the-shorts heavy petting, I had experienced a little perfectly normal under such circumstances pre-orgasmic self lubrication, which was pretty clear from the state of my shorts and would have been embarrassing if I wasn’t so well adjusted. But I am well adjusted. Plus, I think my shirt covered the offending spot well enough, but I won’t know for sure until Gina reads this.

In previous posts, I’ve suggested that maybe some of the more conservative types are suspicious of trannies and ladyboys because they might have been misled by them in the past. There is no such misleading at Obsessions. It’s extremely clear what you’re getting into, and it’s refreshingly open and above board. That International Sign Language sign for “Would you like a BJ?” means exactly what you think it means*. I’ve also wondered how long it might take your typical cis-gendered, red-blooded, straight American male to start thinking, “close enough,” in a place like Obsessions. Turns out it takes no time at all.

I’m obsessed.

*Since writing this piece, I learned from a prostitute in Soi Cowboy that there are subtle differences between the International Sign Language sign for “Would you like a BJ?” and the Bangkok Sign Language sign for “Will you buy me a drink?”** Subtle. Soi Cowboy is another red-light district in Bangkok that’s down the road a ways from Nana Plaza. The prostitute I learned this from is named Anna—because prostitutes are people too and so they have names like everyone else. Anna thought my mistake was hysterical. Hysterical. So much so that she told all the other working girls at her bar and so we all had a good laugh.

**It’s worth noting, however, that when the working girls in the red light districts ask if you’d buy them a drink using the International Sign Language sign for “Will you buy me a drink?”, this does not mean that BJs are off the table. You just have to ask differently.