I know many of you maybe wondering why I was in the hospital and had to have surgery. Well the doctors were concerned that I was developing a "male cancer." I discovered that in the western mind that is the polite way of saying "your testes and lower regions are going to hurt like hell post-exploratory surgery, and your genitals will look like Chinese eggplants for several weeks." On top of that, from the surgery I had a minor infection, fever and needed antibiotics as well as many many painkillers. I am on some now. I just want to make it clear I do not have penis retraction syndrome, or Koro , brought on by the belief that foreign women are really witches who have stolen my penis and I did not see the beautiful Hu Li Jung or Fox Spirit who is known to steal the male penis: Penis panics in southeast Asia have become known under the term "Koro" (which means " head of the turtle " in Malay). Some anthropologists have referred to Koro as a culture...

....and when I do, it makes me wish I still lived in Asia where I could watch human bowling on TV. My last post, which can only be described as a "Machismo" moment, expresses how frustrated I am getting with CATO and it was a result of too much tension and watching CATO consistently awarding the wrong groups awards for the right kind of reasons. It is like my cousin asked, "Why not award Ron Paul, guys?" To relax the Asian way I want you to enjoy the collection of videos from this Japanese serial series and know that there is more to life than political bickering.... like human bowling.... please send me your comments or more funny videos. I have a feeling I am going to need as much humor as I can get this weekend....

For those of you who cannot keep up with our blog whose posts move faster than the Nasdaq ticker, I wrote an article about the potential benefits and drawbacks of poverty or favela tourism and while it seems a little brave new worldish, it can have its benefits for the very poorest people in the world. There is a controversy over the practice in Thailand, but from a strictly libertarian perspective, exposing the rich to the discomfort of poverty can be a cause for philanthropy as it should be . I appreciate the criticisms of the Europeans, but would like to ask them to ask their businessmen and governments, just as I ask American business people and the government-frequently- what have you done to help the poor in this country or Thailand, or Bolivia, or Latin America, or the former Soviet Union lately? Taste of poverty for the rich: Thai hotel stirs controversy over lavish feast By Jocelyn Gecker ASSOCIATED PRESS 7:47 a.m. April 5, 2008 BANGKOK, Thailand – A Bangkok luxury hotel trea...

h/t to Stuff Asian People Like for this: http://www.asian-central.com/stuffasianpeoplelike/2008/03/05/25-staring-at-people/

You remember Sally Kern , the politician who said that people who are lesbians, gays, or otherwise some type of homosexual were more dangerous to our country that terrorists? Well, I wonder what Ms. Kern would think of a cartoon where a woman turns into a man and whose family turns her back and forth from a man to a woman? WATCH HERE TO SEE THE CARTOON.

I was going to post something about gay and lesbian rights in Thailand, but, these posts pretty much say it all....from the actual movement toward freedom and rights for lesbian women to the vulgar, these posts really do say it all.... http://www.isiswomen.org/wia/wia398/soc00007.html http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3693/is_199903/ai_n8852028 http://www.mangosauce.com/farang_life/farang_lesbian_lust_thailand.php If you take the time to read through them, you will see I do not have anything to add.

Over the weekend I spent time with my cousins and extended family. I should give you some background, most of my cousins are women and I realized just how insane young women have become in trying to meet guys or conversely how much pressure men put on women to be different from they way they are. I want all you guys out there to take a deep breath and give women some room to rest and be themselves. A posting from Little Caper proves my point when she says: I won't eat anything that's artificially blue. Freaks me out. Those colors just don't exist on edible things in nature.I am a bit of beer snob and lately have become obsessed with something called Sunset Wheat. Although if it's all that's available you can force me to drink something nasty out of a can. But you'll owe me big time. I am OCD: I count the number of times I chew my food. I count my footsteps. If I step on a red square at the grocery store with my left foot I have to step on a right tile with my r...

If Gay Marriage should be a right, how about ladyboy marriage? Becky has a nice take on it that when gay marriage comes to Utah the rapture cannot be far behind. I guess it is just whose behind we are discussing that matters in a literalistic sense. http://girlinshortshorts.blogspot.com/ I think the case can be made that people should be allowed to do pretty much whatever the hell they want as long as they do not hurt others in doing so. It is only in cases of harm that government should intercede to protect the rights of both parties. In parts of Asia where everything seems to be illegal, people do everything anyway. I mean, who would ever really know that in the above picture of the Band they are all men? I bet half of you young men out there would love to marry one of these "girls" and only later ( but hopefully not too late ) figure out that they are not tastefully carrying a mango in their thong underwear. I am proud to say that I have male friends who look like this, a...

After living part of my adult life in Asia, specifically in South East Asia, at first I found it very difficult to understand the American reluctance to accept and tolerate people who were either Lesbian, Gay or Transsexual. I had seen many. Some were my friends. In Thailand there is nothing wrong with having a highly educated ladyboy as a friend to advise you on meeting a nice highly educated upper middle-class Chinese woman. So I never really thought anything of ideas like homophobia until I came home to the United States. It seems to me that Thai's are much more honest about things generally and about sexuality in particular without all of the stigma we associate with it. You can read about ladyboys here: http://www.thai-blogs.com/index.php?blog=8&cat=290 Any offense against a Thai ladyboy may wind up getting you beat to a pulp as many are experts in kickboxing and can be quite aggressive. If only the same were true in America. I am sure things would change overnight here f...