Like a Prostitute

Throughout our whole first full day back in Bangkok, locals spoke to me as if I was Thai. At the Chinese Consulate, they spoke to me as if I understood Chinese. English coming out of my mouth shocks people and I can hear laughter – workers laughing at their co-worker’s mistake of assuming I was Thai and speaking to me as one – as I walk away. 

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It’s hard to be in Southeast Asia with Scott and not feel like a prostitute. We walk around and I perpetually feel others sizing us up, that I’m his Thai/Lao/Cambodia prostitute, a local girl who preys on white foreign men using them for money or a potential ticket out. If I didn’t open my mouth and talk to reveal a western world accent, why wouldn’t what they were thinking be true? These type of pairings are all over Southeast Asia – white men with their Southeast Asian girlfriend or wife. These men are sometimes older, chubbier than average, lonely looking. I’m terrible. I cast judgment but complain about others’ judgment on me.