Sharon Meets The Ladyboys

by Sharon Stolzenberg

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Hopefully shows like this will help break down barriers and our society become more tolerant of people who are transgender.

Oh what a night! My partner Lee and I had a great night at Star City Showroom recently. We went along to see the Ladyboys of Bangkok. A spectacular party atmosphere in a cabaret format. It was a different experience from those I have had with Les Girls; Carlotta's other touring shows or that of Simone and Monique's Playgirls Revue of the past. There was no visible compare and there were no jokes being told - but there was a fair deal of comedy and a lot of sheer fun with lots of colour and movement. The show kept moving along with very brief introductions for the individual performances and little breathing space for anyone, including the audience.

There was no crudity nor bawdiness - just a bunch of beautiful girls doin' their thang and some cute handsome boys in support roles and providing great dancing. The girls were just lovely for the eye to behold, and the boys were very cute and spunky too. The "Mother" was a lovely person who performed some really amazing acts. I was moved to tears with her/his half man - half woman costume and presentation. There was just something that spoke to me about intersex, the Yin and Yang. What spoke to me so much was the idea of being split or tom and living a sort of double life, as was the case in my early transition. Memories, Luv!

The only problem I have with the promotion of the show was the wording on flyers and in the programme book. The word "transvestite" was used. I really thought, that by now at least the word "transgender" might have been used, let alone the more accurate, perhaps, use of the word "transsexual".

In the private lives of these women who perform in a show, that has as its crowd-puller the gender ambiguous title "Ladyboys" and the old cliché "the girls you are watching are all men", they undoubtedly have a very personal sense of self-identity which undisclosed to their audiences. After all, it is just another type of acting and performance. For example a "stripper" or "erotic dancer" does not have their complete identity contained within a portion of the professional work. Nor does an actor, in playing a role on television or motion picture production or in a theatrical work, live that character in real life.

Certainly, the term "Kathoey", has been used in Siamese and Thai culture for some hundreds of years, and, whilst the term Kathoey has been used in the publicity flyers and the program book, there has been some attempt at educating an Australian audience about past and modern regional Thai (formerly Siamese) culture. This is where I think the strength in breaking down barriers for transsexual/transgender people in our society can progress. If a multicultural society such as ours in Australia can learn more about how another culture deals in a relatively positive way with people who seem to not fit into the neat little sex/gender categories of male and female, then hopefully our society can become ever more accepting of transgender people.

After all as Humans we all hold aspects of female and male but our western culture seems to bust a gut in ripping them apart and regiment gender and sex behaviours and cultural mores that our society is missing out on so much freeing of the spirit.

There has been some major research by academics in the fields of anthropology. Two such researchers are 1. Peter A Jackson of Latrobe University in a paper titled The Persistence of Gender: From Ancient Indian Pandakas to Modern Thai Gay - Quings (subtitled paper of interest is titled Non-normative Sex/Gender Categories in the Therevada Buddhist Scriptures): and 2. Dr. Richard Totman, an eminent British Social Scientist, who I have heard has made a detailed study of the culture. To quote from the souvenir booklet from the "Ladyboys Cabaret show that Lee and I attended.

"The eminent British social scientist and author, Dr Richard Totman, has made a detailed study of the culture. For centuries in Siam, as Thailand used to be known, some people born boys have chosen to adopt the mannerisms and lifestyles of girls - often from an early age, He said. They are known as "Kathoey", and enjoy a recognised position within the community at large. Some would form themselves in troupes of traveling actors and perform bawdy dances and songs at country fairs. Attracting huge crowds the popular "Likay", as this was known, is the original form of the modern cabaret show. Kathoey have long been accepted by their countrymen as neither men or women, but as occupying a space somewhere between the two genders: as the "Phet Thisam" - a "third sex", said Dr Totman. His latest book to be published in Britain - "The Third Sex" - is the result of three years' research in Thailand following three individuals who started their lives as boys then decided to pursue their own sexual destiny. The acceptance of a "third sex" is widespread throughout South-East Asia and is quite consistent with Buddhist and Hindu teachings. But such a notion does not sit comfortably with Western orthodoxy and has no precise counterpart in the West. Even the term "transvestite" fails to carry the true meaning in translating "Kathoey". Western culture cannot grasp the total focused commitment of those pursuing the long, sometimes painful and frequently costly, journey to determine their own gender in the third sex."

From what I could gather, the girls of the "Ladyboys" were certainly not just cross-dressers, nor "transvestites" in the sense of how the English language definition defines a transvestite. Nor could I see that they were trying to represent a "third sex" in the presentation both on and off the stage. Lee and I managed to travel with some of the girls and boys on a light rail tram from Star City into Central. Also from what I can only work out from my own experience of early transition, for me the age of 17, when I commenced female hormone complementary therapy and began "transition", these girls would have probably "transitioned" about the, same age and even earlier.

I am certainly not advocating a "third sex" category for all transsexual or intersex or transgender people. However, free choice for those who may feel comfortable with such. category for themselves can be a good thing, providing that personal free choice doesn't infringe the rights and freedoms of others.

Which brings me to a poignant consideration. It would be really lovely if in contemporary Australian society and the rest of the West, if we lived in a society that was so much more accepting of our sex/gender variant people. For transsexuals, intersexed, and those on the varying hues on the transgender spectrum, life for us might just be less painful and complicated. If our "society", that comprising of our parents, school systems, workplaces and other social arenas and the various religious institutions were freer in their attitudes to sex and gender in our culture, then we would, I'm sure, have a much better world. I'm not advocating a free-for-­all approach and certainly child sex abuse, rape, and sheer exploitation of people or animals are such that they violate common human decency. It might even be the sort of world that might be closer to the sort of world God originally created. However, now in the meantime there are the everyday folk who live the lives of transsexed, intersex and transgender experience and those who are our family and friends. It is such people as these that can be the pioneers for change for a better world. There are of course those family and lost friends who could not come to terms with transsexed, intersex, transgender as well as homosexuality and unfortunately the hurt to innocent people continues. (Even in Thailand there are still regions that do not accept people categorised as Kathoey).

As for my own lived experience, my parents were very supportive. Yes we had our misunderstandings and had to learn a lot and continue to grow with many a laugh and many a good cry. I realise they have been a real blessing in my life. I realise that I too have been a blessing to my parents and siblings. I am their daughter and sister and in all that entails I have learnt some of life's lessons on how to treat other people. My Catholic heritage, the grass roots working class catholic ethos I grew up with taught me a lot, too.

Despite what negative speak Pope John Paul II and his fellow conservative cronies in the Vatican (God bless them) might happen to say about transsexuality and transgenderism, a lot of my peer Catholics and non-Catholics were not so hung up about sex, gender or sexuality. Some were though, and I was picked on and bullied at school. The bottom line was, and is, to be a decent person and do right and treat others as one would wish to be treated in return. A "good walk in someone else's shoes" can really do wonders for the soul. Even when one cannot fully understand something, one can at least try to empathise.

Anyhow, I guess what I enjoyed so much about the "Ladyboys of Bangkok" show was we had a real party atmosphere and the good vibes and positive energy all around. Some ladies in the audience sighed out loud when they saw the beautiful figures the girls have and the gentlemen too enjoyed the show.

Hopefully shows like this will help break down barriers and our society become more tolerant of people who are transgender. A society in which families don't throw children and teenagers out of home or sexually and emotionally abuses them simply because of their child's transsexed or transgender or homosexual aspects. Parents mightn't be so uptight if their little "boy" turns out to be really a girl and later a woman, or their little "girl" turns out to be really a boy and later a man.

There have, of course, been many other performers who have been pioneers for bringing out into the open transsexual and transgender realities. Perhaps "ambassadors" for transsexual and transgender people. Certainly in terms of being "out there". At times too they have provided opportunities to allow us trans-people to sometimes laugh at ourselves and for non trans-people to have a bit of a laugh with us, not at us. Thanks to Carlotta and the girls in her shows over many years. Thanks also to Simone and Monique for their Playgirls Revue. Thanks too for the many other "drag" performers who have graced many a stage floor and have entertained and enlightened.

I also just simply thank all of us trans-people who dare to be who we are, to have the courage to live our lives being true to ourselves, whether we are visible or not. The fact that we have had the guts to be ourselves and to do our best in life with what we have is just wonderful. Keep on partying every day because the whole world needs to party. We just might be the ones to show them how.

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