Babylon

Almond blossoms in Spain

The Babylon in Bangkok is said to be the best gay sauna in the world.

He wasn't in a position to judge.

"I haven't been to a gay sauna in 20 years," he commented to a man lingering outside the steam room.

"Same," the man replied. "That's why I'm on the outskirts."

They grinned in a flash of recognition.

"Looks like you're about to get lucky," the man continued, nodding in the direction of an Asian man standing nearby.

"I wouldn't be so sure about that," he responded.

But there was at least a brief and optimistic communication between him and the man from Laos. The suggestion that they might consummate the introduction was met with a "I look around first".

It was a kind of gay sexuality he had never been drawn to; the ceaseless touching of numerous men; before the finale with some virtually random pick.

He liked to think the people he was sleeping with were good people, or interesting, or had the pathos of doomed destinies.

He was still sad from the departure of Nick that morning and wanted to distract himself one way or another. Prior to the Babylon he had had lunch with a mutli-award winning writer for teenagers, a social worker until getting sober and embarking on an enterprise to fulfill his dream of becoming a writer. Boyfriends with boyfriends with girlfriends had been the theme of his last book. Designed to sell by the bucket load to teenage girls, who were the principal purchasers of such books.

"You're starting to feel things," the American writer had commented. "You've got the typical response of the abused child, 'I never wanted to feel anything'."

"No, I didn't," he responded, gazing out the restaurant window of the Malaysia Hotel.

"From what you tell me it's no wonder," the writer said.

He shrugged and continued to stare at the car park fronting the hotel.

The Malaysia had been marooned in a nondescript part of what had then been the sprawling shantytown of Bangkok when he had first stayed there 40 years ago.

Back then it had been a citadel for backpackers, one of the most famous stops on the Coca Cola trail. The corridors were filled with stoned westerners from all over the world, diving in and out of each other's rooms, retelling tales from Afghanistan, India, what was then called Ceylon, wherever it was they had been. 

The bellboy who carried your bags to your room would take the opportunity to become your provider: "You want hash, heroin, Thai sticks, lady?"

As in so many similar hotels, the bellboy invariably warned of the dangers of the city outside, of how they would be ripped off for sure and it was much safer, quicker and cheaper to buy through him. They were usually right.

While The Malaysia was now surrounded by increasingly upscale condominiums filled with westerners eking out comfortable retirements on their western derived pensions, the hotel itself had barely changed in appearance in that 40 years. If there had ever been a renovation, which he doubted, it was a very long  time ago. 

But while The Malaysia had changed little in appearance in half a century, it had changed greatly in the clientele it attracted. Not only were the present generation of backpackers far less debauched than they had been, it was now seen as something of a gay hotel. The grey hairs hanging around the lobby and lounging in the armchairs made it look like an old age home for elderly queens.

It had been several long decades since he had stood outside the front of this same hotel and an Arab man had pulled up in his black BMW. He had reluctantly stooped down to the window to negotiate. He didn't like Arabs. They always expected value for money. A value he was extremely disinclined to provide. The negotiation complete, he had climbed into the comfortable smells of the brand new car and the less comfortable smell of the waves of cologne coming off the randy Arab.

It was all a long time ago, as he brought his attention back to the author of Boyfriends with Girlfriends.

Lunch complete, he wandered off to The Babylon. It might have been a citadel of gay Bangkok, but he had never been there. Within a second or so of having paid his 230 baht he ran into someone he knew. The upper crust Englishman grinned cheerfully, showed him around and advised him to relax and enjoy himself, there were some true uglies wandering around and there was no need to be shy. 

He might have passed his physical prime some decades before, but indeed there were some beached whales blocking the corridors.

And by the sound of it some of them were having fun. He wasn't. He sat in the heat of the sauna and sweated out the toxins before finally calling it a day; running, just as he thought he would in a moment of precognition, into a young man outside who was much more his cup of tea. When the working "boy" let slip that he only slept every other day and wouldn't mind sleeping at his place; all was revealed. There was a reason why the young man didn't have enough money to get inside the sauna and was happy to go with him for a discount rate of 500 baht. Just the sort of errant soul he would have once been happy to party with for days, weeks or months. No longer. 

Instead he slushed through the bucketing rain and flooding streets of Bangkok during the wet season; kundioh, kundioh, alone, alone, and grinned or grimaced ruthfully to himself. It was time to join the dots.