Irreverent, informed and downright eclectic books and reportage from Southeast Asia and beyond
Roving Asia expert Ron Gluckman recently reviewed my book Sacred Skin for the Wall Street Journal. His review was shortened for the Journal publication but has now turned up in its full length glory on Ron Gluckman’s website.
The review also covers another soon to be published book on the same subject, by Bangkok journalists Joe [...]
Another golden oldie, that old chestnut, the Phuket Vegetarian Festival, which I covered in 2005 for Fortean Times and several other publications.
Never mind the flash resorts, sleazy bars, high rise condos and MacHolidays on offer on Thailand’s largest and most overdeveloped tourist island. Phuket also has culture. Every year, men and women have their faces [...]
The definitive Bangkok novel has not been written yet.
But The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi, a dark and fast-moving Sci-Fi novel set following the reign of Rama XII, gets pretty close.
Local hacks should take note - this 500 page tome is light years ahead of the rather tepid Bangkok Noir genre. The dystopian [...]
Visionary World Publisher Hans Kemp has created a short film on Khong Khuen, the trance state entered by Sak Yant (Thai Spirit Tattoos) devotees at the anual Wai Khru festival at Wat Bang Phra, a Buddhist temple west of Bangkok, last month.
Watch and marvel and travel to the very heart of Thai culture, far from [...]
Great news from the Land of Smiles!
PC Air (probably no pun intended), a new Thai airline launching this month, is recruiting transgender and transsexual flight attendants.
Thailand has long been a country with a vocal minority of gender benders, and while there is discrimination against the third sex, it is not as nearly bad as in [...]
I attended a Thai festival at Bexleyheath in South East London last weekend.
Much to my surprise, one of the performers on the festival stage was the fantastic Georgia from Bangkok´s equally fantastic Ad Here Blues Bar. Georgia did some Blues and Jazz standards for a crowd of several hundred Thai and local punters…a great day [...]