Southeast Asia

Oh darling, of course the parents downloaded the app. You really thought the generation that survived ration coupons, housing reforms, exam wars, property bubbles, and the one-child policy was going to sit quietly while their precious only son announces he’s “focusing on himself”? Please. These aunties did not endure thirty years of sacrifice for their family tree to end in a one-bedroom rental with a houseplant named Kevin. Let’s be honest: this isn’t about romance. It’s about security, face, continuity, and the deeply rooted belief that adulthood equals marriage. For...

Ah, sisters. We have this extraordinary, almost Olympic-level ability to divide ourselves and fight the wrong battles while the house is literally on fire. Look around the world. Women’s bodily autonomy is being rolled back. LGBTQ people are criminalised from Kampala to Kuala Lumpur. Authoritarian governments are policing classrooms, bedrooms, and wombs. Economic inequality is widening. Domestic violence shelters are underfunded. Online misogyny is algorithmically turbocharged. And yet here we are — sharpening our claws for each other. I’m not saying these questions about sex, gender, identity, and lesbian space...

Let me tell you something about family WhatsApp groups, darlings. They are not innocent. They are not “just for updates.” They are mini-parliaments, surveillance hubs, emotional labor factories, and occasionally — digital crime scenes. I belong to several. Of course I do. Big Asian family, remember? Aunties, uncles, cousins, nieces, the whole orchestra. Every morning: flowers, blessings, good-morning GIFs that sparkle like they were designed in 2003. And who sends them? The women. Always the women. Because apparently even in cyberspace, it’s our job to keep the peace, keep the...

I have walked through Patpong more times than I can count — in heels, in flats, in righteous feminist anger, and occasionally just in anthropological curiosity. And let me tell you something: if you think a “Patpong girl” is a fantasy character invented for lonely men on holiday, you have understood absolutely nothing. She is a migrant worker. She is a remittance machine. She is an informal economist with better negotiation skills than half the men in Bangkok’s financial district. When people say “bar girl,” I always want to ask:...

I have a soft spot for women who own the night. Over the years — from Manila’s humid backstreets to Bangkok’s neon arteries and Jakarta’s stubbornly defiant dance floors — I’ve met many of them. Some became sources. Some became drinking buddies after closing time. A few became lifetime friends. And let me tell you something: these women are among the toughest people I know. You don’t survive decades in clubs and discos by being delicate. You survive because you can read a room in three seconds flat. Because you...