In Bangkok, making yourself into what you want to be takes on a whole new meaning, writes Richard S. Ehrlich, Asia Sentinel.
Making an outie into an innie has long been a hallmark of Thailand’s thriving sex change industry, but doing the opposite – making a woman into a man – is difficult and it will cost about US$12,000 an inch, at least for the first inch, says Thailand’s most famous transgender surgeon.
The price per inch goes down but the pain goes up for acquiring a longer bit of wedding tackle. At that, having your gender reassigned is cheaper in Bangkok than anywhere else on earth, and it’s so common that it is advertised in the newspapers in bold print, attracting generations of journalists eager to tell the tale. Thousands of people flock here from all over the world, but particularly the United States, Australia, Europe, China, Japan, South Korea and the Middle East, mostly men seeking to match their softer side with a physique to match.
Using a penis to create a vagina is relatively easy compared to the surgical difficulty of constructing a penis with a clitoris, says Dr Preecha Tiewtranon, who bends people both ways. “I have done more than 3,500 of this kind of operation in 30 years,” Preecha said during a recent interview at his modern, three-story, white-walled Preecha Aesthetic Institute on upmarket Thonglor Road (http://www.pai.co.th). Preecha leads a staff of 15 plastic surgeons slicing, dicing and reconfiguring both male and female sexual organs.
The Thai government recently changed its law on transgender operations and now requires Thais to wait at least one year before undergoing a sex change. In response to the new law, Preecha says he sends his Thai patients to two psychiatrists to confirm that the individuals qualify. After a surgeon slices off the male organ (aaagh), and plumps the breasts with implants, the newly created woman can usually enjoy sexual relations and climax, he says.
