the third sex

I was sitting in my favourite bar beer, as the Thais call them, which is the French Kiss on Patpong 2. This is a briliant bar. An island bar, with the sidewalk on one side and the sliproad on the other, it is one of the best places for watching the streetlife and for eyeing up the freelance ladyboys who congregate around here late at night.

That is not the only reason I like it. The owner is French, and he runs the bar as if it was a miniature bistro. There is a small but good menu of French food, cooked up in the tiny kitchen, and there is French wine. You can sit and have an appetiser, and a main course, and finish off with a plate of cheese, all washed down with a bottle of vino. At a Patpong bar beer! It is almost unbelievable.

Oh, and the staff are great. They all know me, of course, but even if I don’t go there for a couple of months, which sometimes happens, they welcome me back like a long-lost friend when I do turn up again.

Anyway, this is not the main reason I mention the French Kiss. As I was saying, I was sitting there with a totally straight friend, who does not know about my liking for ladyboys. We were having a quiet drink. Then along comes a ladyboy who I have known intimately for a long time, and who is one of the most exciting girls I know. Even thinking of her makes me… Anyway, she sees me chatting to my pal. Then very cheekily she steps into the bar, says hello to me, and gives me a great big fat kiss on the lips. Then, with a vixen smile, she retires.

Now, what do I say to my friend?

As I wiped the lipstick off my face, I pondered a couple of possibilities. One, I could blame it all onto my doppelganger. Two, I could say she was a friend of the family. Three, I could topple off my stool in a dead faint, Basil Fawlty style.

I decided to be nonchalant. “A lot worse can happen to you than being kissed by a boy who thinks he’s a girl,” I said to my friend. “Oh,” he replied. “That was a boy, then? I thought it was a girl.”