All of the
material in this interview is original.
It is all
copyright Stickman (c) 2004.
This interview
appeared in the Stickman Weekly column of 16 May, 2004. Captain Courageous
is the webmaster of a very popular ladyboy website.
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Tell me a little
bit about your website. How long it's been running, what made you
start it up etc.
I am a journalist
and have been for most of my working life. I have worked as a foreign
correspondent, as a travel writer, as a broadcaster, and also as a photojournalist.
Ever since I first handled a camera, when I was about 12 years old, I had
wanted to take photos of naked girls. I didn't know anything about
ladyboys at that time! It was only the coming of digital photography
that got me into nude photography. I have liked ladyboys for donkey's
years, ever since my first visit to this part of the world, when I went
to Singapore way back in 1980. I was taken to Bugis Street, a very famous
night market. It was my first night on my first trip. I was
jetlagged, drunk and totally disoriented, and that was probably the best
light in which to see Bugis Street. The market and all the little
restaurant tables were packed with people. Then around midnight all of
these transvestites came out of the shadows and moved amongst the tables.
I had the kind of feeling you get when you are an adolescent and you start
noticing girls for the first time: I was breathless at the sight of them.
I didn't know what they were, didn't know what was underneath the clothes.
As an experiment I took one back to a short-time hotel and that changed
my life!
I kept quiet about it all at the time.
You'd have
to, wouldn't you?!
I made one
comment about it in my local pub back in London and the hostile reaction
I got convinced me to keep my mouth shut in future because no-one was ever
going to understand. The funny thing is that the people who like
ladyboys are usually regular people, like me. I get emails asking
if liking ladyboys means you are gay. No, it doesn't. I have
no attraction to masculinity at all. I love women and I love ladyboys.
They really are like the third sex. When you go with a ladyboy it
is not like being with a guy. You're with a girl who has a dick,
and the rule book goes out the window.
When the internet
came along in the mid '90s I immediately set off surfing for pictures of
ladyboys. There was very little around back then in 96 and 97, a
long time ago, right.
Yep, it is
in this modern world. Did you get any idea then to do the site?
I found one
site that had Thai ladyboys but the pictures were so bad. The photographers
were just
going into a short time hotel room with a ladyboy, a 35 mm camera and a
flash, and
firing away. The pictures made the ladyboys look cheap and ugly.
The pictures were just very, very bad!
I hadn't photographed
a nude person ever since first holding a camera but I thought, I can do
better than that, so I went out and bought myself what was then the new
Sony Cybershot, delivering 3 million pixels with a beautiful big Carl Zeiss
lens. Over the course of a couple of weeks I rounded up a few ladyboy
friends and photographed them in
my apartment,
and in a short time hotel. I made sure to use plenty of natural light
to get really good skin tones. When I had five sets I emailed the
owner of this particular site and asked if he would be interested in buying
them. He was on the phone half an hour later and was very interested!
He bought them and said that whatever else you can do I will take them!
It worked like that for two years or more. I would shoot them and
he would buy them, sight unseen in the end. It developed into a good
working relationship. And it changed the appearance of the site.
How did you
come up with the name Captain Outrageous?
In my schooldays
my nickname was Captain. I was going to call myself The Captain,
which sounded pretty cool. But when I was going through my first
pictures I kept catching myself saying, "that's outrageous!" That's
how the idea of Captain Outrageous came about. Much later, when I
Googled my name, I found that is also Ted Turner's nickname. So,
if you're getting any odd emails these days, Ted, sorry about that!
It was funny
doing my first photo shoots. I was in a relationship at that time
with a ladyboy named Jeab. She was my very first shoot. I had
seen her undressed many times but when I saw her in front of the camera,
pulling her pants down and acting a real tease, it was so erotic, so totally
absorbing and so different through the lens.
When did the
site as it is now begin?
At the beginning
of 2003. I had started taking photographs at the beginning of 2000,
and I ended up working for two other sites. I enjoyed it immensely
and I had a great respect for the site owners. But I saw that they
were making a lot of money and I was making almost nothing once I had paid
my model fees. And it was taking up a lot of my time: I was still
a working journalist. I felt I would either have to stop doing this,
or start my own site, because if you are working for someone else you're
never going to make much. The demand for ladyboy pictures is growing
at a fantastic rate, and I felt that having my own site was viable.
So I left to go out on my own.
How much do
you pay the models for a photographic session?
I would prefer
to keep that under my hat, because this is a competitive business.
But I pay them a standard fee that I know is a very fair one, and I pay
for their taxis, and I pay a finder's fee if a friend has referred them
to me. Fixing the fee in your own mind allows you to know just how
much the site will cost each month. I would never try and bargain
a fee down... I have a good deal of respect for the models I photograph,
and I want them to enjoy the shoot. I try to get them laughing and
hope that they have a good time, partly because it is fun for both of us,
and partly of course because it all comes through in the photographs.
My approach works, because I have a continuous procession of models coming
to me. And they come from everywhere: the schools, universities,
cabaret shows, beauty salons, mainstream business, and of course the bars.
What's the
market like for these types of websites, both here in Bangkok and around
the world?
There are now
a lot of websites based on ladyboys or shemales.
What's the
difference between ladyboys and shemales?
In the US they
are called shemales and in Thailand ladyboys. The polite Thai term,
incidentally, is "sow praphet song", which means "second type of woman".
There are
probably about
half a dozen sites specialising in Thai or Asian ladyboys. I have
no idea how many there are in America but it is a lot. But many of
those sites are not producing original content. Like a lot of things
on the internet, there aren't that many original content providers.
A lot of the American websites feature photographs that are used under
license, bought, recycled, or just plain stolen. Having a good, original
site is where you have a competitive edge. I take all of my own pictures.
As to the market, Asian ladyboys are a niche within a niche. As with
the girlie sites, many people have a real preference for Asians, while
others are into Westerners.
Are these sessions
conducted in a dingy short time room in the PB Hotel or do you take them
to a flash studio and get it all done under proper lighting?
The single
most difficult aspect of all this is finding a good location to shoot.
I prefer natural light, because under the right conditions it will give
the most beautiful skin tones. But then you have to think of things
like timing the shoot for the right time of day, the angle that the sun
is coming into the room, the amount of diffused light as opposed to direct
light, the colour of the walls and the floor and the furniture. Like
yesterday afternoon. I had a shoot all lined up, and then the rain
clouds blow up and everything turns into total crap. I use a couple
of apartments and a couple of hotel rooms on a regular basis, but you can
become predictable if you use the same settings. In Bangkok, finding
a hotel room is difficult because they all have tinted glass, and that
will drain away the flesh tones. Now that the site is established
I'm in the process of getting a studio. And I've got some big studio
lights now: no choice, really. It will give me much more flexibility.
Do you know
many of the other players in the industry?
A few of them.
Three or four of the site owners. There are the two guys I used to
work for but
they were very unhappy with me when I left them: a great pity, I lost a
couple of good friends there.
What sort of
equipment do you use?
The Canon EOS
10D with an L series 24-70mm lens. I use a macro for the dirty close
ups. The Sony was very slow to use but the Canon really allows me
to move around. One thing which I try and get on every session, but
which is very difficult, is the spurt shots. For each set I follow
a formula where the model strips off, or does a tease show, and then whacks
off for the camera. I try and catch them spurting up in the air.
Some of them can't because they have been on hormones and there is just
a trickle, but with the best performers you can get a really great shot.
If you're fast enough! The Canon is very good at capturing this.
And I like dressing them up. The really young looking ones can look
great in school uniform, and in fact many of my student models actually
do cut classes and turn up wearing their own uniform. Then they peel
off, shoot a load for the camera, get dressed, and go back to school.
They cum and they go! Others can look great in sheer pantyhose, especially
if they have a big dick. Transparent nighties, yes, again, much depends
on the model. And I've recently started a series of ladyboy lesbian
sets, where I have two ladyboys going at it with each other. That's
not always easy: ladyboys are not into other ladyboys, they are into guys.
So you have to mix and match your two models, otherwise you get a set of
pictures of two limp ladyboys rolling around giggling.
Do you have
sex with your models?
Yes!
There is always some sex play during a shoot: you can't help it.
But I never let it reach a situation where I toss the camera over my shoulder
and leap on the model. I'd never get any sets finished if I did that.
When I really like someone I invite her back later. I meet some great
ladyboys that way!
Some photographers
make a point of sticking their own dick into the pictures. I never
do that. Some people like to see that kind of shot. I don't.
The last thing I want in my fantasy is someone else's hairy beer belly.
Who are your
membership? They and even you are a bunch of right perverts, yeah?
I'm very proud
to accept the title! This is the great thing about being a pervert.
You can do the most disgusting thing in the course of the afternoon, and
then in the evening you can be having dinner with the most respectable
people, and be sitting there thinking to yourself, "if only they knew what
I had been doing a couple of hours ago they would think what a thoroughly
disgusting git I am."
What about
your members? Typical stereotype?
No, no typical
types. Those who I have met are perfectly respectable people of all
ages. About 50% of them are American, probably 20% from the
UK, the same in Japan, a lot in Germany, the rest worldwide. Many
of them contact me and say, "I've just discovered ladyboys through the
internet, where can I meet them?" As I said earlier, the net is spreading
the message. Some ladyboys give many non ladyboy interested people
the hard come on.
It can make
you think that they are desperate.
Very often
they are. Many of them make a precarious living that way. At
a certain time of the night along Sukhumvit you will be hassled.
A lot of men pretend that they are being taken in by a female. But
they know what is going on. Since I have been communicating with
others, and since I have become so well known in the ladyboy community,
I have learnt a lot about human nature and what people really want.
No matter what they might pretend. The old barriers are breaking
down and if you are with someone who looks and sounds and behaves like
a beautiful woman, what's the difference really? Once you take away
the masculine and feminine aspects of sex, if you reduce it to the pure
act of sex, a level sensual playing field, then straight sex and gay sex
are equally as enjoyable. I think a lot of people are coming to realise
that. I love women and I have been married three times. Before
my Bugis Street experience - and I was married at that time - I had never
had a same-sex relationship and had never really fantasized about doing
so. After Bugis Street it didn't change my attitude towards girls:
I just felt that my sexual world had become a richer and more exciting
place.
Do you shoot
them in other countries or just in Thailand?
I haven't done
so but that is only because I am here. I'd like to do some shooting
in the Philippines and Indonesia and also look at Laos and Cambodia but
I haven't done so yet because of practicalities. I am still a functioning
journalist and I therefore have to ride two horses at the same time.
But there will come a time, yes, and it's not that far away.
What about
farang ladyboys?
I have never
been with one. I just don't have the knowledge. I'd like to
give it a try in terms of photography and many of them are extremely beautiful.
The best ones seem to be in America, in California.
What are the
legal ramifications of it all?
Pornography
is illegal in Thailand but I'm photographing consenting adults for an agreed
fee and the
pictures are being published in America, where my server is located.
Pornography is legal there, within certain limits and as long as
the subjects are of legal age. People can only view my site if they
become members, by paying. So I don't see how this affects Thailand's
legal system. But I wouldn't like to put it to test in a Thai court
of law.
<Laugh>
One site owner is a very good friend of mine. We often get together
to swap notes. He told me of a recent trip he made upcountry.
He booked a suite in the biggest hotel in town, set up his camera and his
lights, phoned his ladyboy contacts to arrange several days of intensive
shooting, rubbed his hands in glee, and went down to the lobby for a drink,
only to find that the hotel was hosting a police convention. Fear
and loathing in Udon Thani! I wet my trousers when he told me that
one.
The site's
profitable?
Yes, I'm happy
to say that the teething problems were over quite quickly and the site
is growing every month. But it's hard work. Running costs are
high for a site like this and you can never take your eye off the ball.
On the up side, you see the response to what you are doing immediately.
I watch the daily live stats and see what works and what doesn't.
Part of it is getting the name of the site out there. There is a
tremendous growing interest from people in ladyboys. A decade ago
most people had never heard of nor seen one. To promote, I put pictures
on TGP sites <independent free access sites that post pictures with
links back to the source pay sites>. When the site was first started
a year and a half ago, there were only two TGP sites specialising in ladyboys.
Now there are at least a dozen.
Not just some
readers, but also me and some of my closest friends think that ladyboys
are mentally unstable men who have butchered themselves in the worst possible
way.
Are you talking
about ladyboys, or about post-ops? Those who have had their dicks
cut off, well that is something else entirely different.
What is different
there? How many have had the chop?
There is an
increasing number who go the full monty. They pump themselves full
of hormones to a point where the dick ceases to become functional and becomes
like a little spout. They develop a disgust for themselves that they
are still male and they realise that they, as a ladyboy, have only have
a very limited shelf life. The operation is very affordable,
it is only about 100,000 - 120,000 baht. They go for the snip and
then they can try and enter the mainstream as women. Sometimes it
works and sometimes it doesn't. I have no interest in post-ops myself.
Can't even look too closely. I have tried having sex with them but
I just can't do it. I feel like I am fucking someone's operation.
The very thought of a doctor and a scalpel slicing along a penis and opening
a hole in the groin. It makes me go cold. I just can't do it.
I don't even like to look closely. If you look too closely, it looks
like a bit of plumbing. There are a few sets on the site of post-ops
but rather than looking like a vagina it looks like a cistern.
What happens
to ladyboys when they pass their prime?
They tend to
go back upcountry, if they haven't opted for the op. Many have saved
money and will open up a business like a florist, a dress shop or a hairdresser.
They have a good commercial grounding living the way they have, and shifting
for themselves. Many ladyboys are actually young college kids who
have a decent education, and ambitions. A lot go into the media business
and there are many in the tourism business. I know many who work
in the offices of major companies. A lot of ladyboys really do look
and sound like women because they have been taking hormones since their
mid teens and they can pass as female in an everyday working situation.
Have you ever
been completely fooled?
Yes, but not
in an unpleasant way!
Even now, I
don't know why there are so many ladyboys in Thailand. I know of
many kids who are making the decision at puberty. I know ladyboys
in their teens now, who told me they decided when they were eight or nine
years old. And they start taking female hormones when they are thirteen,
fourteen, fifteen. So even I, having known the Thai ladyboy scene
for more than twenty years, find myself meeting ladyboys who would pass
completely, in any society, as a beautiful girl. A female build,
a female walk, a female voice, hormonal breasts.
A few years
ago, I had a steamy affair with a ladyboy named Kwan. She was small,
had a ponytail, wore a little tennis skirt with white socks and sneakers,
and had a knock-knee'd Lolita style stance that turned me on something
cruel. We would burn up the sheets. But we drifted apart, as
happens, and I didn't see her for a year. Then early one evening
I was walking up Silom Road, near Patpong, when a couple of young Thai
guys got off a bus. They were obviously gay. One of them, a weedy
looking little guy, came up to me and greeted me. At first I was
blank, but then I realised. It was Kwan. She had reverted to
being a male, and was working in a gay bar in Soi Twilight. He invited
me to go along, but I never did. The sexual heat had totally gone.
Do you think
the large number of ladyboys in Thailand could be due to acceptance?
It is partially
acceptance. Thais seem to think it happens because of something they
have done in a previous life. They are paying back the bad karma
in a previous existence and everyone accepts it. Some of them come
from broken homes. They see their father being unemployable, drunk,
useless and violent, and they take their mother's side. They do not
want to grow up as a Thai guy. A lot of Thais live very close together,
and the impressionable youngster sees his mother, sisters and aunts forever
making themselves look beautiful, with their long hair, makeup, perfume,
and sexy clothes, and he realises this beats being your average Sombat
in a pair of ripped jeans and rubber flip flops! The average Thai
guy walking down the street is invisible, but everyone looks at a beautiful
girl. The opportunities for a young Thai male from a poor to average
background are dismal. But if you are a beautiful girl, you can always
live well. It goes a bit beyond our comprehension that to do this
you have to change your sex, but Thais don't appear to have this rigid
attitude towards sex barriers. They haven't had the benefit of a
good Christian upbringing to teach them all about sex and guilt.
If you took a cross-section of the workers in the gay bars, I bet the average
percentage of genuine gays there is not much above the national average.
I also think that the possibility of doing the compulsory military service
is a factor. The only way a Thai guy can avoid being registered for
the draft is to demonstrate extreme effeminacy. I have on a few occasions
forked up for a ladyboy I cared for to have a breast operation, to keep
her out of the draft. The army isn't big on troops with tits.
Anything else
you'd like to add?
A lot of people
now come to Thailand specifically to meet ladyboys. It's a growth
sector of tourism, and I'm doing my part! But I don't think I'll
be getting a gong for it. Members ask me where they can meet ladyboys,
and whether they can me meet me to talk. Often it's the first time
they have spoken openly about it, and they are so nervous and they don't
know what to do. They quickly find out just how gorgeous ladyboys
can be. And how addictive. Sex with a ladyboy is a high-voltage
experience. I would say that they all go away having had their lives
changed. It is a life altering experience.
StickmanBangkok.com
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