Chiang Mai Beauty Queen
Mel often ordered a curry and rice plate for 50 cents at lunch. After that, he enjoyed a refreshing fruit shake from a small stand near his guesthouse. It was operated by two local women. Every day they set out a huge bowl of fresh fruit with cantaloupe, coconut, bananas, oranges, watermelon and tropical fruits never seen in the U.S. He would point to what he wanted. One of the women would peel it and put it in the blender. Mel usually had a blend of three fruits, one of which would be coconut or bananas to make it creamy.
The fruit shakes weren't the only reason Mel liked that place. One of the owners was so sweet, pretty and friendly he could hardly stay away. She spoke no English and Mel spoke no Thai, but one day she pulled out a Thai-English dictionary and they managed to talk a little. Her partner spoke a few words of English and, eventually, he was able to ask the pretty one to dinner.
To his surprise she had a car, a luxury by Thai standards. She lived in a modern condominium with her sister who ran a furniture store and owned the new Toyota. His new girlfriend took him to the finest seafood restaurants he had ever been in his life. Romantic open-air tables sat next to brooks and waterfalls. Lush tropical plants and colored lights overhead provided even more ambience. Tank after tank of live seafood, little of which Mel could identify except catfish, took the place of menus.
After dinner she would take him to her home where her sisters served him native fruits. The oldest sister, the furniture store manager, spoke English.
It turned out his date was a former local beauty queen. They showed Mel photos of her at eighteen years old in her bathing suit with the Miss Chiang Mai banner across her chest. Even though she still looked eighteen, she was thirty and much more slender than in the pictures. "Imagine," he thought, "an ugly bastard like me dating the most beautiful woman in the city famous for the most beautiful girls in the world."
Even though Mel was very attracted to her, their difficulty in communicating made him impatient. Mel felt she would make a wonderful wife, but he wouldn't wait for her to learn to speak English. He often grew impatient with Thai women, finding it difficult to really talk with them.
I'm sure there are plenty of men who would have more patience with ex-Miss Chiang Mai. His loss might be your gain.
A Reply to Feminist Critics
When the topic of mail order brides comes up some feminists lose all logic. They distort the truth, considering international marriage a form of trafficking in women. It's as if men who find wives overseas are buying them from a catalogue like a new power saw. An article published in the feminist journal Breakthrough by Judith Mirkinson titled "Red Light, Green Light: The Global Trafficking of Women" accuses men who marry women from overseas of buying wives and keeping them as virtual slaves. She makes these claims without any supporting evidence.
That these men buy their wives is ludicrous. What they purchase is information: the names, addresses and photos of overseas women who want to meet men outside of their country. This is no different from what dating and match-making services have been doing for centuries. Women provide information to introduction services of their own free choice. It doesn't matter whether they live in Hanoi or Hoboken. There is no deception.
Feminism is better served by aiming at the real problem: Millions of women forced against their will into prostitution. Filipinas are promised jobs as waitresses in Japan and Russian women positions as receptionists in Israel and then forced into prostitution. There are millions of children in India who are enslaved in factories. The sex slave industry in Thailand is infamous.
Equating intercultural marriage with sex slavery is an incredible irony here. The liberation of women should include those escaping poverty and abuse from macho Filipinos or alcoholic Russian men. Prosperity and a stable family in the United States or Europe is not slavery.
Claims are made that many women who come to the U.S. are subject to abuse. There are isolated instances, like a Seattle man who shot his mail order bride in a courtroom. There are thousands of successful intercountry marriages. Certainly not all are going to work. Domestic violence, sadly enough, happens too often between couples around the world.
Immigration law requires women applying for entry visas into the U.S. to obtain police clearances from just about every place they have ever lived. These women are no criminal threat. It should be the other way around. The man is the one who should get a police clearance. If he has any kind of violent past then his fiance should be notified and denied a visa for her protection.
A Closer World Community
If a man is attracted to women of a certain racial and cultural background, what's wrong with finding them overseas? International marriages help bring the world community together. A marriage between two individuals of different cultures is an exciting thing. It is an opportunity to learn and experience new ways of life.
The world's getting smaller. In time, more men - and women - will seek husbands and wives throughout the world. American women will seek European husbands, Latin men will seek African wives and so on. Our races and cultures are more intermixed than ever, to the consternation of many. Ethnic hatred still flares around the world. As more people from different ethnic backgrounds learn to love, respect and appreciate each other we will all live in a safer world.
Advertising in Overseas Newspapers
There are over 70,000 Filipinas working as domestic helpers in Hong Kong. Sunday is their day off. Run an ad in Hong Kong's top English language newspaper, the South China Morning Post. It has a special relationships section called "The Meeting Point" which runs on Saturday and Sunday. If you are looking for a Filipina, state so in your ad. Most international introduction services mentioned in this book will run and help you write an ad. You can do it yourself for as little as US$60. It costs US$100 through services like Pacific Century. You can also place Hong Kong ads on-line at their web site.
Email: classified@scmp.com
Another convenient place for personal ads overseas is the Recycler, an advertising tabloid published in the United States and many places overseas. You can run an ad in 300 overseas cities for US$350. An ad for one city costs US$30, with additional cities at US$5 each for 180 characters or approximately three lines. The Recycler's only Asian publication is in Japan, but they have many throughout Russia, Europe and Latin America.
Directories with Overseas Newspapers
Four directories that are available in the periodicals or reference sections of most libraries are Newspaper Press Directory, Willings Press Guide, Ulrich's International Periodical Directory and Editor and Publisher Yearbook. Check them for English-language newspapers in countries that interest you.
You Can't Go Wrong
A big advantage for Americans is the international fascination with our culture. People worldwide are eager to learn about life in America. The media of many countries probably has more news and information about America than any country except their own. Don't let the fear of making a cultural oversight prevent you from writing and placing an ad. Even if you blunder, the simple fact that you are a foreigner will arouse considerable interest. A certain degree of confusion may just prompt women to respond if their curiosity is aroused. It's hard to go wrong.
Angeles City, Philippines
Angeles City is the place to go for the hardcore bar-hopper seeking female companionship. An air-conditioned tourist bus leaves from the Swagman hotel in Ermita three times a day. It's a two to five hour drive, depending on Manila traffic. You can also avoid staying in Manila entirely. Have your hotel in Angeles City arrange a car to pick you up at the airport for US$50. If it's your first trip to a third world country, it might be worth the extra US$15 to see someone holding up a sign with your name on it as you leave customs in Manila. If you don't mind haggling, you can negotiate a taxi ride at the airport for about US$30-35.
There are many bars in Angeles City, mostly on Fields Avenue between Margaritaville and MacArthur Highway. The size and number of bars may be a far cry from the hundred or so that thrived during its heyday, when Clark Field was up and running. There are still plenty of places to see.
Make a hotel reservation before you leave. Some hotels are booked in advance, especially if the U.S. Navy is in town. Up to 5,000 horny sailors occasionally have R&R there. To avoid commuting via side-car motorcycle taxis (called "trikes") between your hotel and the bar district, try the Orchid Inn, Park Chicago or Tropicana. Further out, the German-owned Clarkview is a nice place as is the Swagman, which serves Australian food.
There are so many bars filled with friendly girls in Angeles City it's hard to recommend just a few. The best bar is the one you meet the right girl in, and the girls in the bars are always changing. I always have a good time in Voodoo, Y and the Club. Tahitian Queen and Champagne have the best-looking girls. I spend lots of time in La Bamba. Like Connections, it opens at 2 p.m., three or four hours earlier than most bars.
Margueritaville never closes. This bar and restaurant has good, cheap food and drinks where you can meet local freelancers and shoot pool. They serve decent Thai food.
One Angeles City phenomenon is Cherry Girls or virgins. Every bar has a couple and some have many. How does a virgin work as a prostitute? Some do not. Some work in the bar only and make money from lady's drinks. Others will go bar-hopping with you, but won't sleep with you. Some sleep with you but keep their clothes on. Still others will do pretty much anything as long as she remains, technically, a virgin.
Visas and Marriage
The fun ends here and the agonizing wait to reunite with the woman you love begins. It takes six to nine months to get a U.S. visa. You are not in the mood to wait months to enjoy the affections of your lover. It can be frustrating and a hassle, but it is necessary. Of all the experiences in this guide, processing the documents and forms to get that visa is the only one that is no fun.
You can forget about getting a tourist visa for her, unless she is from a prosperous country like Sweden or Japan. Chances are she is from somewhere like the Philippines or Russia, making a tourist visa out of the question. Most men get a fiance visa, in which case you must marry her within three months of her arrival in the U.S. If you get married in her country you must get a marriage visa.
There are two steps to getting her visa. First, petition the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) in the U.S. The purpose of the petition and approval process is to make sure you have a legitimate relationship. It minimizes the risk that she is coming to the U.S. just so she can get permanent residency. You must have met her in person within two years of filing. Her children, if any, are eligible to come with her as long as they are under twenty-one and single.
When a petition is approved, as almost all are, it is forwarded to the appropriate overseas embassy or consulate. Your wife or fiance will receive a list of requirements, the second step in the visa process. These include a physical examination, police clearance and identification documents, such as a birth certificate. She must then apply for a visa to come to the U.S. She will be interviewed at the U.S. embassy or consulate once she has fulfilled the requirements, has all her documents and completed the application.
People sometimes pay thousands of dollars to have a U.S. citizen illegally petition an overseas relative to join them in the U.S. To minimize this sort of thing, you must prove that you have a legitimate relationship. Take special care where the form asks to explain how you met your friend. The instructions don't mention this, but you should go into detail how you met and how much you are in love.
You may have established much of your relationship through letters and phone calls. You need to prove this. Provide copies of letters, greeting cards and your phone bills. You also need photos of the two of you together to prove you have met personally. Any other evidence, such as greeting cards, should also be provided.
Make your written explanation truthful, sincere and detailed. Describe how and where you met. If it was through an introduction service or correspondence club, describe the details. The service may have included personality evaluations and reference checks. Provide copies of these if you want, but they are not necessary.
Ideally, your fiance is single, never married, without children and you met her in person. If all these conditions are met, you should have a smooth ride. If not, things can get complicated. Consider professional assistance. Get an immigration attorney or pay an international introduction service to handle it for a hefty fee. Surprisingly, these introduction services often know more about immigration laws pertaining to marriage than lawyers. Lawyers usually deal with more complex and different types of immigration matters. Complete and assemble the immigration forms yourself and you can have an immigration lawyer review them for around US$100. I recommend you at least have this done. Mistakes in preparing the forms or documents can delay the processing and your reunion with your lover for weeks or months.
It describes the technicalities involved in the visa process. Applicants with a communicable disease, dangerous physical or mental disorder, drug addiction, or admit to having committed so-called serious crimes such as prostitution, can be refused a visa.
She will also need a valid passport. Birth certificates can be surprisingly hard to come by in the provinces of third-world countries. She also needs a police certificate from all places lived since age sixteen and a medical examination.
The Affidavit of Support causes some men to worry because of the accompanying financial documents you must provide. You don't need worry about this. All the INS wants to know is that you have enough income to support a wife. Provide evidence of a source of income such as a pay stub and a bank statement. You don't need thousands of dollars in a bank account or the stock market, just enough income for the two of you to live on.
A Comfortable Honeymoon
Once the immigration hassles are over, and you have brought her home, you are ready to enjoy each other. Let her take time to get accustomed to her new culture and country. Her new-found affluence and the experience of seeing a new country for the first time may be a little disconcerting at first. She will be excited about her new land and husband. A little homesickness may creep in, since this may be the first time she has even been away from her family. This is where you come in and experience the joy of guiding her through this period of adjustment.
There are different ways of going about it. You could keep her so preoccupied with your special favors that she has no time to think about her new situation. When she isn't preoccupied with you she may be resting, recovering from the preoccupations. You might want to show her around town. Educate her on her new surroundings, help her make new friends. Find out if there is a Filipino community in your hometown. Above all show her patience and understanding.
Your first few weeks together are an important time for both of you. You're still getting to know each other. You may have spent only a week or two together before, and that will have been several months ago. She will make an extra effort to please you and, I hope, you will return the favor. How you handle this period of adjustment will affect your entire marriage. Be nice to her. Go out of your way to make her feel comfortable and secure.
