There is no sex in this post.

I have run into a Doctor that I know. 7,000 miles from home and I bump into a friend that I hang with in LA Thai restaurants along with the rest of the LA CH crew. Small world. It was great to see him because you never know when you might need medical advice. Read in between the lines.

I meet up with him during breakfast to exchange PI cell phone numbers. He is with an exquisite long raven haired thing, thin and beautiful. I'm feeling kind of scruffy and I mention that a visit to barber is called for. We both recall an AC barber story that Epi has shared about the BEST BARBER EVER. My friend seemed to recall that the barber was on Santos Street. I remember a single chair barbershop on Santos but with Blow Row fast morphing into Hi Roller Row, it's gone.

Earlier, I had been to a barbershop in Clark SM mall. Perfectly serviceable. Only one thing wrong. It's in Clark SM mall. Clark SM mall fills me with dread. It is a harbinger of the demise of AC as we know it. It's just a mall but that is exactly it. It is a mall. A sign of the changes going on in AC. Money is flowing in. Our dumpy and dusty little collection of shacks, bars and go-gos with the puppy love gushing LBFM's is changing into an evil collection of $150 per night hotels and glitzy money sucking go-gos with exquisitely beautiful dancers that IF you can even barfine them at 5x what it used to cost, will want you to get your nut off a FAST as possible, with their providing as little service as possible and then split instead of trying to drain your prostrate of every drop of fluid and trying to stay with you for as long as you will let them all the while professing their true and everlasting love for you.

It's not all the way there yet but AC is past the point of no return on the path that so many of our destinations have traveled for which we say "You should of been there when…". Bangkok, Cuba, Costa Rica, Rio de Janeiro and Cartagena are shadows of the way they were in earlier times. I'm being nostalgic, things change and evolve. You can't stop progress and even in the new order of things, you can find things that are better for us even if we miss the old ways. AND YOU CANNOT BEGRUDGE PEOPLE TRYING TO IMPROVE THEIR LIVES.

Anyway...

I recalled a barbershop across from Norma's Foreign Exchange. It is clean if basic and shopworn. I step inside intending to only get a shave. The barber is an older dude with a no nonsense demeanor. It quickly becomes apparent that I am in the presence of barber GREATNESS. Absolutely no BS. Not a single wasted activity or movement. No fru fru. His tools were not new or fancy but held and used in the way of a master artisan. The towels were frayed but their purpose undiminished. The scissors were constantly snipping but with directed purpose. The razor was deftly and effectively drawn against my exposed throat. The most difficult spots to shave were handled with such skill that there was no doubt that he shaved them perfectly.

After we got started, I simply just shut up and left myself to his professional judgment. Hair cut, hot oil shampoo, shave and a facial. The man was MASTERFUL and a wonder to behold. The results were like no shave I have ever had.

This was not spa pampering. This was a shave and a haircut. No estrogen here. Ernest Hemingway would make a journey to get a shave and a haircut here and then write a story about it.

He has been a barber for over 40 years and was a barber in Clark while the USAF was still there. Odd as it seems, this was one of the highlights of this trip so far.

"It's not all the way there yet but AC is past the point of no return on the path that so many of our destinations have traveled for which we say "You should of been there when…". Bangkok, Cuba, Costa Rica, Rio de Janeiro and Cartagena are shadows of the way they were in earlier times. I'm being nostalgic, things change and evolve. You can't stop progress and even in the new order of things, you can find things that are better for us even if we miss the old ways. AND YOU CANNOT BEGRUDGE PEOPLE TRYING TO IMPROVE THEIR LIVES"

And the one common denominator behind all this? The internet and internet sites promoting our hobby. Nothing else is different. It's not like men have suddenly decided to make mongering a hobby of theirs. The only other change is the strong economies developing in Asia that have created a larger Asian mongering crowd.

We all participated in Club Hombre and other sites in order to exchange ideas and inform others but several years later, it has come back to bite us in the ass and now all the lurkers have become active participants and all of those guys brag to other former clueless men and the chain is beyond control now. It was inevitable.

Places like AC, Thailand, etc are still an absolute blast but how long that continues is not looking bright.

I agree with Blazers that the internet does play a big part in the change. But I think a bigger impact has come from the lonely loveless guyz who have naively sponsor and have delusions of forming sincere relationships with these girls. So many guys are coming to SEA and "falling in love" with these girls and sponsoring them. Guys are giving these girls a new job; they are paid not to fuck other guys! Of course, with a job that pays so well for not working, shit it would be insane not to Moonlight and sign an exclusive services contract with other guys as well! And with all this free time and money you might as well find a local guy to share it with. Hell why not start a family too.

An observation I have noted and heard others repeat is that "I see really hot girls in the street, but not working in the bars>" There have been PLM's since there was the world's oldest profession. Up to two years ago, In AC if you wanted to find a sponsor you would get a job in the bar and wait for your Prince Remittance to walk through the door.

Now the girls never even has to step into a bar to work, she just goes to the internet cafe and gets a yahoo messenger account. Soon she is flirting and charming desparately lonely guys from the far corners of the western world. Hey she speaks English. Even if it's a low level it's amazing how guys love to talk about themsleves, and the girl fools the guy by smiling, laughing, and typing "oo." Finally a young women is acting engaged and buying his game. Now she flirts and flashes him a boob. Guys are wiring big money and proposing marriage in exchange for this. The is now not only getting paid not fuck other guys, she getting paid and not fucking any foreign guy!

IMHO, as much as we want to blame the demise on guys who tip a couple thousand pesos for a ST, and just cough up for 250 pesos SML LD, a pay trike drivers 100 pesos for a two minute ride, and pay $300 a night for a hotel it's much more the sponsorship that is killing things. If it was just an influx of high rollers who just want to monger, then prices might go up a little but the bars would be flooded with hotties and girls would be providing great service. However, that is not the case. The vast majority of Bar girls are no longer really motivated by a barfine + tip one night stand (hell might as well call it one hour stand these days.) Girls are motivated by finding another boyfriend, they are no longer in the milk selling business, they are selling cow timeshares.

The business model has changed, girls make more money buy chatting over the internet telling guys what they want to hear and occasionally showing them a boob. Guys are puking money for this stuff. Then the come to AC and

I used to really laugh at "the sky is falling" posts about the demise of AC, but there are definitely valid points made here. The AC landscape has definitely changed, but I think the Korean influence is a lot more significant than the internet monger horde'.

I still think you've either got to be a little creepy or ultra-picky to not have a good time in AC. There are still thousands of girls in the bars and you're still free-riding on the goodwill of those ATM "boyfriends" as every bargirl knows you'll never put her on the payroll if she doesn't rock your world first. This is still an excellent recipe for GFE, but, YEAH, some girls do get quickly snapped up by guys that buy the illusion.

Smitty
As always good to hang with ya for a while. That young thing you saw me with was Elena my Rhapsody girl who has since gone psycho on me again. This girl does not handle her alcohol. Sweet as can be when sober but a nasty jealous drunk.

It was interesting to actually witness some of the drama I had read about before arriving. I hope on your return you either avoid BNE or have the cajones to say goodbye. As many have ppinted out-- nothing good can come from continuing to lead her on. Unless you really intend to commit to her which IMHO would be a huge mistake.

See you soon.

JUST like i reported....I don't advise people to go to AC....it's like a dog with no teeth and it's nuts cut off now...actually quite boring....had more fun in manila...but avoid burgos street trap.

Great writing, Smitopher. Sounds like you enjoyed that haircut and shave more than sex!