This story starts a few months earlier in Chiang Rai, Northern Thailand, right on the Golden Triangle, an area enclosing Burma,Thailand and Laos. It's the name given to a largely lawless area of all three countries and the centre of the drug trade, people trafficking and curiously enough garlic smuggling.

I'd been to Burma briefly, to get my visa renewed, and was passing the time at a bar, minding my own business when I was greeted by a Englishman, curious about my writing. His name was Peter. Peter was about 62, with a Santa Claus beard and a merry twinkle to match. He was one of lifes likeable rogues, and we soon fell in thick as thieves and got steadily drunk together. He was visiting the town with his Thai wife, Linda, but actually lived in Pattaya, South East Thailand. The three of us had a famous conversation, the sort that you just know was both profound and wise, but for some obscure reason the detail of which permanently eludes you.

Back in Pattaya, several months later, I'm sifting through bits and pieces of scribbles and notes and nonsense, deteremined to carry out a sort of ruthless spring-clean in an effort to reduce my load. I was about to consign a few dozen pages to the bin, when I noticed a scrawl followed by a number. It was Peters phone number in Pattaya. And I suddenly remembered him saying, if you come to Pattaya, give me a call and I'll show you around.

And so I did. He had trouble remembering me, but true to his word, we met up a few nights later to catch up and see the sights. By this time, of course, I thought I'd just about seen it all, and told him that at the bar in my hotel.

'Oh yeah?' He winked mischeviously. 'And what have you seen then you bloody Welshman?' This was Peter sober.

I confidently told him that I'd seen Walking street, had run the gauntlet of the girls on beach road (Meester, handsome man, I go with you!) the go-go bars and was thoroughly familiar with the goings ons and procedures of Sois (a Soi is a side-street)Â 7, 8, and 9 thank you very much! I sat back, confident of his approval of my solo investigative work. Peter pushed his chair back, roaring with laughter so much so he nearly fell over. Irascible and irritating, Peter was just as I remembered him.

'You bloody wanker,' he said wiping his eyes, 'Every time you've left this hotel you've turned left, right?'

I nodded, working out what he meant, but I was somewhat perplexed though.

'It never occured to you to turn right and work your way down the Sois rather than up 'em?'

'Um, er, well no.' I grinned sheepishly.

'Well at least that's sorted out where we're going tonight! Finish your bloody beer, and I'll show you the low numbers, and trust me they don't get much lower than this! Tosser!' he chuckled nodding his head.

We left the hotel and this time, turned right. Peter was right, oh dear to many lefts and rights going on, but I had never thought of going in any other direction other than towards the centre of the action so to speak, the culmination of which were the go-go bars, nightclubs and restaurants of Walking street. I was about to find out how wrong I was. A ten minute stroll found us at the foot of Soi 6.

'You've never heard of Soi 6?' Peter checked once again?

'Um, no, not really. I mean I knew there was one....'

'Oh shut up you Welsh Tosspot, I've told Paul, a mate of mine, who knows Soi 6 better than I do to meet him at this bar here, and we'll work our way up having some beers as we go.' He chuckled again to himself.

Soi 6 seemed much like any other Soi, but there were no open bars as in the other Sois. The bars on Sois 7 upwards were more like beach bars, everyone could see what was going on, there were no seedy velvet curtains such as here, no women imploring you to step inside for hidden delights. Peter and I walked into the first bar. It was virtually empty. There was just one Ferang, ourselves and about three bored looking women. Peter ordered a beer, while I peered into the seedy gloom. Immediately, two good looking women wearing next to nothing at all appeared and attached themselves each of us.

'Er, no, look I...' I began,

'For fucks sake Welshy, this is the way it works here. Buy her a drink, she'll try and get you to take her upstairs, just say no, unless you want to of course, she'll keep trying to persuade you, but as long as you let her stay with you, then you won't get pestered by the other girls'

'Okay, okay, what you want drink?' I asked the pretty young thing

'Vodka orange.'

'Pete, do the honours?'

He nodded, his arms around a woman in white lace lingerie. We made our way to some seats, to wait for Paul, my 'girl' in black lace lingerie, squeexing my buttocks as we went. As I passed the Ferang, a woman groping his groin, he stumbled into me,

'Whoops!' I smiled, steadying him.

'Shorry mate.' he slurred, turning his attention back to pushing his tongue down his 'girls' throat.

'No problem mate.' I said as my limpet and I steered around him.

The whole place was seedy, as I imagined a strip club in Soho to be, it reeked of a need to be decorated, of light, of people other than the drunken Ferang, Peter and myself. While Peter's 'girl' tried to interest him with one hand massaging his groin, her tongue in his ear her other hand trying to push her breast towards his mouth, Peter simply continued unabashed and explained the situation, while I tried to concentrate with my girl sitting on my lap, facing me, pushing her ampled chest into my face, and grinding her groin into mine.

Managing to drink my beer underneath her right armpit, and then ducking under her left armpit I managed to listen to what Peter was telling me, while her breasts sought domination of my head.

Soi 6 was simply the place you came for a quick fuck. It was about $5 a throw, there were rooms upstairs, no bar fines to pay, the drinks were cheap and there were no attendant rip-offs. Some men would come here, start at the bottom of the street and try and work their way up, much as you would a pub crawl. But there must have been some twenty or so joints on a longish soi, twenty beers is possible, but twenty....well, you know what I'm getting at. If any bloke managed a fifth of a half of what I'm capable of in a week then they're better men than I.

Paul had arrived, Peter introduced us and he went to get a round in, dragging two girls like manacles around his ankles. Meanwhile, drunken Ferang staggered past towards the toilet, the only toilet, led by a girl. The toilet doors were those sort of cowboy ranch style, lots of space between the floor and the lower part, and the top and the upper half. We were sitting diagonally opposite. Well at least I was. Peter and Paul, yes I know how that sounds, were still talking to one another, and in between dodging my girls nipple from her now exposed breast heat seeking my mouth, trying to hear what P&P were saying I was nontheless drawn to see the obvious, the girl kneeling on the toilet floor, his kegs around his ankles while she administered what he no doubt thought was extremely good unction. It certainly was extreme, and no doubt there was some sort of unction, judging by the sounds and grunts of the drunken Ferang.

We left shortly afterwards, but not until my girl in desperation had tried poking one of her nipples in my right ear. It took me a full five minutes to get my hearing back, she must have compacted some earwax or something which I eventually managed to root out with my little finger nail. Don't you just hate people that dig in their ears with their little fingernails so that you can hear them squeak right across a crowded bar even with a live grunge band thrashing away? Especially when they check the contents afterwards and either flick it or eat it. I flick.

Glad to be away from the earthly baptism of Soi 6, it was with mixed feelings that I let P&P steer me past disappointed girls enticing you into their version of earthly delights to specific bars that were allegedly of a superior nature. They were in the sense that they were variably more crowded (two or three other men in them), slightly better decorated or with prettier girls, but the basic message was the same. Fuck me. Fuck me now five dollar. Despite Peters inistence that he hardly knew the Soi, he appeared to be on first name terms with many of the girls, which I thought odd. When I asked him about this, he confessed that he came here about once a month 'for a bit of fun'. He assured met that his wife 'understood' and as long as she didn't know about it she didn't mind. So he told her he was going to play golf, even though he doesn't even have any golf clubs. It was obvious that he certainly putted something down holes in Soi 6 however.

In the next bar, Paul disappeared upstairs with a 'friend' so Peter and I waited chatting. My new 'girl' was voluptuous, firm and her studded tongue writhed in my mouth every time I opened my it to talk or drink, and of course the inevitable happened. Men cannot help their erections*. It's a fact of life. Sooner or later the little bastard let's you down (or up!) juts when you least want it. The worst sort are spontaneous erections, sometimes appearing even though you're thinking about something like Belgian lace weaving through the centuries. Which is worrying come to think of it. I recall as an adolescent, every day about two stops before my home boinggg, up it would come like the Eiffel tower for no reason whatsoever. And it wouldn't go away again for about three or four miles. So of course I couldn't get off and let everyone see my painfull, priapic bulge. Every day I was late for tea, couldn't explain myself why to my mother (my sister at the same school got home 30 minutes every day before me) but at least I became fit jogging three miles with a heavy satchel.

Back in the bar, the pocket python had risen from its slumber to the delight of my 'girl', her hand checking the 'oven' every now and again. Now she had something to work with she became mores insistent, licking my entire face, grinding herself into me, trying to drag me upstairs, Peter killing himself laughing at my discomfort. At this point Paul returned and Peter, coming to the rescue, paid the bill and we left. This time I didn't mind who knew I was priapic as we hit the street.

I had never seen anything like it. Women blowing men on couches in the bar. Men 'massaging' women with their hands inside their pantie, their breasts exposed. The only thing that I didn't see was actual full on sex, but by the time I told Peter I'd had enough and could we go somewhere less, well, obvious, it wouldn't have suprised me. It was as though the whole soi was one big anything goes brothel. There were even transexual and gay bars, presumably operating along the same principles.

We strolled towards Soi's two and three, passing the transexual Miss World photo-shoot at Tiffanys, a transexual cabaret joint. We stopped for a look, and Christ were they gorgeous.

We ended the night getting blasted on Soi 3, at a relaxed bar, surrounded by women even more impossibly beautiful than those of Sois 7, 8 and 9. They were apparently the cream of Pattaya's bargirls, and therefore more expensive. But after Soi 6, they were delectable angels, the height of feminine grace and decorum, modest and utterly desirable. A man could die happy here, just watching them move, smile, flirt and play.

As I found out a long time ago on this sojourn, sometimes all a man wants is the presence and company of a beautiful woman. Nothing more. For that is more than enough to satisfy his soul.

yechydda,

*Â Related story see: Men and their penises