"Even if I got rid of all my problems, I'd just go out and get new ones..."

Lady Boys of Bangkok
12:25 p.m. on 2005-07-24

I went to see the Lady Boys of Bangkok yesterday night.

"You will see onstage seventeen performers," boomed the introducer's baritone. "And all of them are men!"

For the first half of the act I felt a little uncomfortable. There was a slight whiff of exploitation about the whole thing, of a circus-carnival lure. I was happy for the cross-gender factor to be the hook which pulled me into the show, but I was there to be entertained - and I wasn't being.

Do you remember high school talent shows? If you were girls, you would memorize a Britney or Steps routine and perform it on stage with your mates, whilst miming. If you were a boy you'd replace the dancing with air guitar and Britney with Oasis. It was bad then, but even worse when seeing professionals do it.

Hence the nagging sensation when watching the Lady Boys. I wanted the show to be successful because the group were good entertainers, not because of anything else.

Fortunately in the second half they seemed to loosen up a bit. There was increased crowd involvement, the audience had by that point had a little more to drink, and the dancing on stage was more impressive (albeit still with that whiff of high school talent show about it). But it was fun, it was a laugh. Dancing and cheering to YMCA, watching the two comedy leads embarass various male members of the audience... it was a good show, and I'd recommend going to anybody who hasn't seen it.

Linda raised a fair point in regards to any ethical queries. She said that given there were four hundred people in the audience - a packed house - and there was another showing a few hours later, and that each audience member had spent �18 to get in - she suspected it was the Lady Boys who were mocking us...

That still didn't answer the more important question, however: how the HELL do I get a figure like that?!

Listening to: Billy Bragg "Jane Allen"

Quote: "Then crap indeed..."

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