What’s better than a day of parachute flying, eating seafood, and walking along the sandy shores of Thailand?

A night of dancing, drinking, and mingling with transvestites!

Ah. Even before coming to Thailand, I’ve known that besides its ornate temples, its exotic beaches, its elephants, its rubies, Thailand is famous for its gorgeous transvestites.

Rumored to be the world’s most beautiful, Thai’s girls can be seen at airports, supermarkets, and if you look carefully, besides you on the streets. I was a little shocked at the airport when at first I saw three pretty girls in fashionable outfits coming towards me, and suddenly I heard a raspy masculine voice coming from one of them.

Here, the girls are not detectable. Their transformation is so complete and perfect that sometimes they look more womanly than natural women. In fact, no one looks down upon them, no discrimination, no weird eye, just the people’s acceptance and their nickname as the “second women.”

When the tour guide told us we were going to go to a transvestite night club, I was surprised by the boldness, but also it totally piqued my curiosity.

We took a boat out to the middle of the water where suddenly, what I thought was an extension of the shore, I realized the colorfully lighted house was in fact a big ship buoying freely in the ocean.

As I stepped off our little boat and walked through the doors held by gloved and bow-tied tuxedo men, a cold rush of dry air-conditioning and loud pumping disco music simultaneously greeted me.

It was like a regular night club, complete with drinking contests, dancing crowds, poles, lights, and pounding fast music, but the only difference was the transvestite showgirls walking around in flashy gowns and bikinis, taking pictures and grabbing people to dance with them.

All of them were gorgeous, tall, curvaceous, and too perfect to be real women. I guess that’s how you could tell between real women and ‘second women;’ the latter were closer to perfection.

At first, I was a little shy to be staring at them, but then the tour guide told us they want the attention and are proud of their bodies. I took pictures with this really beautiful girl and later she grabbed me to go dancing.

It was so ridiculous to think about, a roomful of professional transvestite showgirls, tour groups, locals, and bouncer-like big men all in one room. But there, in Thailand, it felt so normal, so absolutely the best way to spend a night in the city.