How men are the most stupid

I’d gladly drink from the River Lethe so I would not know this side of men.

I have a friend who I had decided awhile ago that we were going to be just friends. I know people thought we might be an item, but my friend is not what I am looking for. He doesn’t like to read. Can you imagine? He might as well have told me that he doesn’t like to breathe. He makes me laugh though. And I don’t mind having friends who are different from me. It makes life livelier.

But I’ve caught him checking out other women. And I mean c-h-e-c-k-i-n-g them out. I think that when men are with female friends they should abstain from acting like wolves with their tongues hanging out in front of a dinner plate. Or dish if you prefer the old slang word. My ex-boyfriend did this and we fought about it and I was the psycho one. Sure.

I’ve had time to think about why this bothers me. Okay, I know men look. I know. I know they scratch their crotches too and guess what, I don’t want to see that either. And on a separate and related note, I’m tired of seeing Thai men urinating on the street, behind bushes and walls.

You know there are certain qualities of men that I do find endearing like when they show off in front of a woman by playing Frisbee with abandon or ride their motorbike into the curb in an effort to show off. (Hello Nick!) Or when they hold your books or act like they are protecting us (sans “stopping short” ala Seinfeld). I adore and love men, yet when they act base they break my heart.

It’s a class thing. There is no class in revealing your inner most animalistic desire in public. There is no care in how the other woman, no matter how chummy you are, is feeling. This is not about how women can be too sensitive or confidence level or self-esteem, it’s about appreciation and respect for the woman you are with.

Since my own break up (my brother he tells me I’m at stage 4; you know, stage 1: denial, stage 2: anger, stage 3: smoke a spliff and stage 4: get metaphysical), I have had a chance to pay closer attention to the other singletons. Or maybe I’m tuning in a different way now that I’ve had to rejoin the herd.

Many couples, it seems, break up in the Land of Smiles. It could be the ebb and flow of the expat community or it could be that we are in the Bermuda Triangle of relationships. Whatever the case, there is no better place than here to watch men.

It’s like a zoo day field trip. I made the mistake of walking through the Night Bizarre area on my way home, and as a result, I walked by bars and bars of women waiting for farangs to arrive, calling out, and slow walk behind a happy old man with his hand on his new Thai girlfriend’s back.

Any halfway decent fella who arrives here will enjoy “rock star status” among the Thai women who are all too eager for a social lift, while others will feel destitute and lonely, looking sad in the malls and market places. Yet the most shocking for most outsiders is seeing an old white man with a younger Thai woman. Sometimes the age difference is uncomfortable. I remember hearing a French guy at a guesthouse ranting, “These are men who would not get (he used a French word) laid in their own country, so they come here. And some of them are with beautiful women, while they are fat and old and disgusting.”

I’ve come to dislike the Australians in this context and I know this is a horrible stereotype to make, but they are an uncouth and a dirty looking lot. In groups they remind me of excited monkeys who have been let out of their cages. The Europeans seem to do very well though. This is because most of them make an effort with their appearance and do not act like monkeys. Of course, this makes them susceptible to ka-toys or lady boys. But what the hey, that’s what the American men are here for.

The Thai men aren’t any better. My own mother has even told me to stay away from them. It amazes me how acceptable it is for Thai men to play the field; they are commonly referred to as “playboys”. I know it’s the women who tolerate it and the soap operas that perpetuate this behavior. Men act this way because we let them. I guess we’re afraid they will leave us. I say go. I don’t have a head for games. There are plenty of fish in the sea and I plan on reeling in the one with the ocean in his heart.

So maybe Thailand is nothing, but a large waiting room. And those who find love either look supremely delighted or bored. Anything in between must rarely catch my eye or exist.

But I’m not bitter – it’s just the taste of the apple that grows here. Eve is going to sit under another tree. And drink deeply.