I’ll still be posting about the new year’s eve bombings as news surfaces, but in the meantime I wanted to point out a great little New York Times travel story from Megan Cossey. It’s about Bangkok’s burgeoning lesbian scene, and it contains this excellent lede:
On the night of Sept. 19, military leaders in Thailand suspended the constitution, seized control of Bangkok and imposed martial law. Someone forgot to tell the lesbians.
Several nights after the nonviolent coup, a crush of cheering women crowded around the stage at Shela, a lesbian nightclub near the city’s major downtown park, Lumpini, where a popular singer, Palmy, was performing. Fans crammed the balcony, imported whiskey was flowing at every table and a lone tom, local slang for a butch lesbian, was dancing by herself behind the pool table.
Coup or not, it was just another night out for Bangkok’s puying rak puying, or women who love women.
Five years ago, this scene would have been unthinkable. Lesbians either met each other at non-gay establishments or through word-of-mouth parties and restaurants. But thanks to the rapidly expanding Thai Internet, and a growing number of younger, more self-possessed lesbians, two nightclubs and several weekly parties catering exclusively to lesbians have opened in Bangkok in the past two years.
(Emphasis mine.)
Note: I live about 500 meters away from Shela.