the third sex

A ladyboy friend was telling me recently how she travels down to Singapore and hustles for business there. Many Thai LBs and GGs do this, Most go overland, because although the cost of an air ticket is not high (the flight takes about two hours) they are trying to make money rather than spend it. So they usually take the bus, travelling down to the Thai border town of Haad Yai, where they then board another bus that will take them through the Malaysian peninsula and over the border to Singapore.

As these are all ASEAN countries entry is easy enough, but the Singapore authorities are fully aware of what the girls are up to and will often issue a visa for only a few days, especially if there are several other Singapore chops in the passport.

Once on the island she heads for Orchard Towers, a shopping mall on Orchard Road, the heart of tourist country. This is one of Singapore’s great pick-up joints, and although the island does have recognised red-light areas, where prostitution is legal, the odd thing about Orchard Towers is that unlike the others it is right in the heart of tourist country and it does not appear to be “official”. However, so well known is the place for pickups that all the taxi drivers know it as the Four Floors of Whores, and the police don’t appear to show any interest in the goings-on there.

I’ve been knocking around Singapore for a good many years, and I can remember both the old Tropicana, a bar-come-disco that was opposite the Hyatt Regency Hotel, and of course Bugis Street; if you wanted a girl you went to the Tropicana, and if you wanted a ladyboy you went to Bugis Street.

Orchard Towers seems to combine the attractions of both these long-gone venues. If you are looking for it on foot, it is at the top end of Orchard Road, right next door to the Thai Embassy. It is a two-block commercial development, with a four-floor shopping mall that is crammed with the usual kind of places such as tailor shops, electronic goods retailers and so on. What you scarcely realise if you visit daytime is that amongst all these outfits is a vast number of pubs, bars and discos. They don’t open until 5pm, which is when the Four Floors of Whores dramatically changes aspect.

Enter any of the entertainment venues and you will find GGs hanging around looking for business, and at a large number of them you will also find ladyboys. And it is not just the Thais, either, for you will also find Malaysian, Indonesian, Filipino and even Singaporean ladyboys. More nationalities too, I suspect, if you really start looking: a friend told me he found a Mongolian GG on his last visit, so now I won’t rest until I’ve found a Mongolian ladyboy.

For the girls, of both kinds, the attraction is the money they can make, especially when the fleet is in town, but even during an average period because of the huge number of tourists and business visitors who gravitate to Orchard Road: many of them unaware, until they stumble into the mall for a few drinks, of just what is available there.

My ladyboy friend told me that business can be really good. The going rate for a short-time usually starts at 150 Singapore dollars (US$92 or 3,600 Thai baht) and easily goes up to double that, depending on how attractive and how smart she is. If she gets an all-nighter of course it is even better. Compare this to the 1,000-2,000 baht she can expect for a short-time if she is bought out from a Bangkok bar, and where she is surrounded by intense competition, and you can see that the milkrun down to Orchard Road is well worthwhile.

My ladyboy friend called me back a couple of nights ago, sounding very happy. She was back in Bangkok. “Many, many customers!” she bubbled with excitement. Then she told me she was in hospital in Bangkok, and had just had the operation. She had been saving a long time for this, but the money she made in Singapore had doubled her savings, and having made provisional arrangements with the doctor before she went away she had been able to check in as soon as she got back.

“Now I really lady” she told me over the phone, sounding so content that although I preferred her the way she was, I felt delighted for her. I only hope that she doesn’t feel let down after, when she realises that guys prefer their ladyboys to be fully equipped.

But then, when you look at it, a ladyboy has only a limited shelf life. This girl is already 26. She is attractive, but not sensationally so – her real attraction is her lovely bubbly personality and her fondness for jokes. So, unless she attempts to move into the female mainstream now, what is she going to be doing by the time she is 30?

This is the conundrum facing ladyboys. We see only the gorgeous, alluring third-sex creature. They see a whole lifetime fraught with potential difficulties and rejection.

Anyway, just in case you thought Singapore was boring, it isn’t.