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Mags Meanderings:
From Som Tam
To Mushy Peas
life is a cabaret
Ladyboys, or kathoey, are a feature of Thailand often
seen as curiosities by Western visitors, who flock to the
lavish vaudeville style Ladyboy shows of Pattaya and
Bangkok.
The reality is that kathoey have been an accepted part
of Thai society for centuries. Mainly thanks to a peculiar
mixture of Buddhist tolerance towards differences in
gender, combined with the very liberal Thai attitude to
sex (providing it remains in private) and the idea that
women should remain chaste until marriage, while men
will continue to be men.
As with many other things - not too different from
attitudes in the UK a few decades ago. Except that
our clergy frowned upon sexual deviance, while often
practising it themselves!
The word kathoey is derived from the Khmer for
‘different’, and was originally used to describe anyone
who had leanings other than heterosexual. A hazy
definition to make in Thailand, where our usual Western
perception of sexual relationships can make it difficult
at first to understand who is who and what is what.
It was once explained to me that to Thai people, sex is
as natural as shaking hands, and when you begin to see
how their culture reveres men as the makers of babies,
it all begins to make sense. Except that the element of
closeness in relationships also extends to friends of the
same sex. It is quite normal for example to see two male
or two female friends walking along the Soi hand in
hand. They are likely to be primarily heterosexual - but
in private the edges are blurred.
Historically kathoey held a geisha style role in Thai
society. They worked in bawdy burlesque shows, or
were ‘companions’ to men, providing that closeness
denied them by their potential chaste brides. Then in
1920’s Bangkok a more modern version of Ladyboy
cabaret began, which by World War 2 was providing
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