Editor's Note: Over the next little while I am going to share some stories told to me by a girl I met in 2017 at a bar in Koh Pha-ngan, an island in the Gulf of Thailand just north of Koh Samui. Koh Pha-ngan is famous for its Full Moon Party with attracts upwards of 20,000 party-goers, sometimes more, every month. I met her in a bar on the outskirts of Thongsala, persuaded her to leave the bar and travel Thailand with me from Surat Thani to Hua Hin and on to Chiang Mai. In that time, I got her to share some of her stories. These are her stories, and my understanding of them. I remain in touch with her to this day.
A Potentially Dangerous Situation
About six weeks into my time as a bar girl, I met a middle-aged Indian man. He had come into the bar in the late afternoon and sat down. He took his time looking over the girls and finally he signalled for me to join him. He was well-dressed and polite, and for his age, good-looking. We chatted for a couple of hours and got to know each other before he asked me to go back to his hotel for "short time" sex. We agreed on a price of 2,000 Baht and off we went.
It was just a short walk to his bungalow by the beach. He held my hand as we walked along. I thought to myself that this would be good. I'd pocket an easy 2,000 and be back at the bar by 9 pm at the latest.
When I entered the room, I found three other Indian guys waiting; one older and two younger. I was shocked. I had heard about this happening before, and it seldom ended well for the girl. India might be a wonderful place in many ways, but culturally it is very repressed when it comes to sex. That's why so many Indian men come to Thailand. They can do things in Thailand that they simply cannot do with girls in their home country, and Thai women -- but especially bar girls - are rumoured to be accommodating in bed. The truth is also that Indian men -- not all of them, but many of them -- come to Thailand on a tight budget, and they also tend to hunt in packs.
That seemed to be what was happening here. All four of them wanted to have sex with me, and what was worse, they wanted to have sex with me, all four of them, for 2,000 Baht. I was in trouble and I knew it. They were all bigger than me and stronger. What was I to do?
I told the man I had come with that I had only agreed to have sex with him. They all pleaded with me. I stood my ground. They pleaded some more. I refused to budge. They could easily have overpowered me. I was just a small Thai woman, about 160 cm and just 47 kg. I was tiny compared with them. I was also dressed in the traditional bar girl garb: loose-fitting T-shirt and low-cut short shorts. We wear that to entice the customers, but in this case, I felt very vulnerable. If they wanted to, they could have me naked in no time.