the third sex

My maid arrived on Saturday with her young nephew, her brother’s son, in  tow.  The lad, who is nine years old,  was going to  use my swimming pool.  He  got changed and went happily downstairs to splash around for a couple of hours while his auntie did the ironing.

After he had gone my maid said, “We  think he will become ladyboy.”  I must have looked utterly gobsmacked, because she laughed at my expression.  “Not be surprised!  Lot of ladyboy now!”

I asked her why they thought the boy might develop in that direction, and she told me that he was becoming effeminate, sometimes liked to walk like a girl, and preferred playing with girls and girls’ toys. He also enjoyed looking at photographs of glamorous women, rather than the usual sort of thing that boys of that age take an interest in.

He was regularly teased by his schoolmates for all this, said my maid, but it all seemed good-natured: he certainly wasn’t being bullied.

To be honest he had just seemed like a normal, nice kid to me. Very polite, natural smile. Why do you think he would become like that, I asked her. She replied, and she has said this to me before, that a lot of young Thai boys don’t want to become Thai men. The lot of the working class Thai male is a tough one. The boy’s father is a hopeless case, and certainly no role model for a youngster.

The lad, my maid continued, is bright. He is also sensitive. Because my maid’s son is also a ladyboy, there are a lot of ladyboys around the family. Already the boy can see that the perceived glamour of being a ladyboy can lead to a good lifestyle, she said.

Time and time again I have spoken to ladyboys about how they first decided to follow their chosen path, and I have heard stories that stack up like this one. So often, the decision has been made before puberty. And yes, some have told me that they decided as young as eight or nine years old.

In other words, the lad could be a classic case. It’s too early to tell yet. But as the family is already talking about it, there is the distinct possibility.

Personally, I hope the boy straightens himself out and gets a good education that would at least give him the chance of a decent career. The ladyboy lifestyle may appear glamorous, and it often is, but there can be a great deal of heartache involved, for the ladyboy herself and for her family.

One evening during the week I was taking some photographs of a ladyboy friend. We had just started. She was wearing shorts and I realised that underneath she was wearing two pairs of knickers. One pair was the usual small bikini briefs and the other a thicker, outer pair rather like cycling shorts. Ladyboys often do this. The heavy pair helps to hide unladylike bumps and bulges, and also adds to the fullness in appearance of the hips and bum. Anyway, I asked my girl if she would take off the heavy pair and then put her shorts back on.

Modestly, she retired into the bathroom to do this. I had to have a quiet laugh to myself. Not only was I about to take my lens to her bare bottom and then photograph her wanking off, I already knew her very closely indeed, as we had spent a few evenings together and I knew exactly how she looked and tasted. Yet she was diving into the bathroom to remove an outer pair of knickers.

Ladyboys can actually be extremely shy. They may not appear so if you are meeting one in a bar or on the street, but get them into a one-on-one situation, and they can almost faint away out of embarrassment.

I remember taking a video of a ladyboy once. There was one other person in the room with us, namely my assistant Ek, who is a femboy. The girl I was trying to video had a good big cock and I wanted to get some shots of it standing up. But she kept putting her hands in front of it, because Ek was looking. This is a video, I pointed out. I need your hands right out of the way. I may as well have been talking to myself. I had to send Ek out of the room.

Then again, if I have two ladyboys round to photograph during the course of an afternoon, I usually have to send one right out of the room and downstairs to the cafeteria, because the other one will be afraid of being seen. I explain that I shall shut the bedroom door while the pictures are being taken. But the bathroom has a door to the bedroom, and the girl being photographed will get paranoid that her friend will come out of the wrong door if she uses the loo. So, out she goes.

I think this shyness is often because ladyboys can be extremely bitchy. If you have ever heard them talking amongst themselves about another ladyboy, you will realise they can be far more catty than genetic girls. So they get shy about the size of their dick, because it will become a big joke amongst their friends, whether it be big or small. They get shy about skin blemishes, particularly on their bottoms. I was taking a set of pictures last week, and the girl put her hand across her bum when she took her pants down.

What’s up, I asked. “Have black,” she said. Gently, I removed her hand, expecting to find the black markings you sometimes find with dark-skinned people. It’s usually around the area where the bottom cheeks meet the tops of the thighs. But I looked, and told her that her bum looked fine. Very nice indeed. I took a few pictures and she studied them, frowning. “Yes, look nice,” she said at last, and gave a beaming smile. Then she relaxed. So I made someone happy that evening.

Schoolgirl O

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There was a rather pathetic story in the Pattaya Mail recently about a ladyboy arrested for stealing money so that she could pay for a boob job.

Personally, I can take or leave ladyboy boobs. Many is the time I have been photographing and the model has said to me apologetically, as she started to undress: “I no have breasts.” And I have always replied that I didn’t really care, and that a lot of people I know who love ladyboys also don’t care too much either.

Although of course the startling combination of breasts and penis is often what makes a really good ladyboy photograph, I just don’t find implants sexually exciting. To me, they are just….implants.

There are varying degrees of quality when it comes to breast implants. Ladyboys who are able to afford a Rolls-Royce job will end up with soft, rounded breasts that look and feel very much like the real thing. But these aren’t cheap, and I don’t see many of them.

Most will go for the medium-range job, which costs around 40,000 to 45,000 baht. The result here will often be pretty good, but it’s a bit hit and miss. I have known cases in which one of the sacs has leaked, which of course is very dangerous. I once had a ladyboy friend turn up with only one breast, explaining that there had been a leak and the doctor had removed the faulty sac for repair. The effect was so bizarre that I was rendered temporarily impotent.

With many of the medium-price jobs, the surgeon fails to align the nipples, so that they point in different directions. Sometimes you can feel the place where the sac rests against the breastbone, which always makes me feel queasy. And constant massage of the breasts is needed for a few weeks after the operation so that the implants settle in and soften up, friends often being seconded to help out, which is nowhere near as erotic as it sounds.

The cheaper range, costing about 20,000 to 25,000 baht can be distinctly iffy. Sometimes the breasts are as hard and round as watermelons, pointing at the ceiling like missiles when their owner lies down. Heaven knows what is inside the sacs, but industrial silicon cannot be discounted. I feel sorry for girls who have this type of boob job done, as the result is neither convincing nor sexy.

Natural breasts that are the result of taking female hormones over a period of time can be very attractive. Schoolgirl O had the most perfect example I have ever seen: perfectly shaped natural breasts that had not a hint of silicon. I have seen other pretty good examples, and I have even known several ladyboys who could lactate. One girl I remember could squeeze her breast and literally squirt a thin jet of milk.

But of course, the taking of hormones to form breasts has its corollary in the downstairs department. Inwardly I groan when a ladyboy removes her bra to proudly display neat hormonal breasts, because I know that when the panties come down there is not going to be anything correspondingly impressive there.

One thing that all ladyboys have in common is the urge to display their busts in public. Time after time after time, I have seen ladyboys walking down the street in broad daylight with their breasts hanging out of their blouses or T-shirts, and without a hint of embarrassment. That is what marks out a ladyboy who might otherwise pass as a genetic girl. But they never learn.

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I had a very interesting email following on from the previous entry, the reader wondering if there is any environmental factor that can be triggering genetic changes amongst young Thai males, changes that in particular affect the genitals. Over the past couple of generations, he says, during which there has been an incredible surge in the number of Thai ladyboys, there has been an enormous increase in the use of chemicals for food production.

There is also the fact, he adds, that the American government used chemicals to clear jungle during the Vietnam War. These chemicals were dropped from aircraft and could have floated for hundreds of miles in the air. The compounds could have been ingested by the Thai population, which went on to produce children who developed a genetic defect.

The reader adds that he is only speculating, but this is the kind of thought-provoking email that I enjoy reading.

My immediate reaction is that I travel regularly to Vietnam, but I know almost nothing about Vietnamese penises. I am not gay and so I do not follow the gay scene there. My interest is in ladyboys and the amount of ladyboy action in Vietnam is almost negligible. This is not to say it doesn’t exist. But Vietnamese society is more conservative than that of Thailand, and of course you have a communist government that is not dreadfully amused by what they would no doubt describe as depravity and decadence.

So, I’m not in a position to comment on the sexual proclivities and problems of young Vietnamese males.

There is no doubt that what appears to be a large number of teenage Thai boys are being served very poorly in the downstairs department. Time after time after time – and don’t forget I see an awesome number of ladyboy penises – I see a pair of panties come down to reveal a little bud of a dick, or one that clearly was never going to do what it was supposed to do ie propagate the human race.

Female hormones are sometimes to blame, and eventually of course taking hormones will remove the maleness from a penis. But this takes time, and a good strong cock will fight hard and long against the feminine tissues that start to swirl around the bloodstream of a normal teenage boy.

I really don’t have an answer. Very little real research has been carried out on the Thai ladyboy phenomenon. I think I will stick with my original premise that the majority of ladyboys are ladyboys for an economic reason, followed by teenage rebellion against society, followed by malfunctioning of the naughty bits, followed lastly by genuine transsexualism.

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There is an interesting story currently on the BBC website, reporting that Australian researchers have identified a significant link between a gene involved in testosterone action and male-to-female transsexualism.

DNA analysis from 112 male-to-female transsexual volunteers showed they were more likely to have a longer version of the androgen receptor gene.

The genetic difference may cause weaker testosterone signals, the researchers say.

One of the team, Professor Vincent Harley, is quoted as saying that transsexualism is still widely viewed as simply a lifestyle choice, and consequently carries a social stigma, but that the research findings support a biological basis of how gender identity develops.

One study has shown that certain brain structures in male-to-female transsexual people are more “female like”.

It is encouraging to see serious research being carried out on this subject, about which little is known. However, as I have said here before, as far as Thailand is concerned I am convinced that relatively few ladyboys are genuine cases of transsexualism. If they were, there would be something genetically askew for a disproportionately large number of people from one nation. (more…)