El Nido

Last post before I depart!  I thought a travel sex story would be fitting.

I’m not someone who loves Valentine’s Day, nor am I one who scorns it.  For me, it just comes and goes like the tides.  There is one Valentine’s Day, however, that is forever etched into my memory, and thinking about that particular day will always make me smile.

Two years ago, I was travelling in the Philippines; I was sitting at a bar my first night on Cebu, and I started talking to the gentleman next to me.  Our conversation flowed so easily that it felt like we’d known each other for years; we skipped the small talk and jumped right into deep conversation about our travels, life philosophies, families.  We laughed and talked for hours, then agreed to meet the next night.  I arrived that night with a huge group and dragged him from the bar to our table… then proceeded to ignore all the people I came with to talk to him.  I felt so drawn to him – to his laugh, his easygoing nature, his penetrating questions and openness (maaayyyybe to his extraordinary body as well).

We met again the following night – same place, same time – and as we were chatting on a porch underneath a full moon, a photographer asked if he could take pictures of us “while we were flirting and the sparks were flying.” Yes, of course, we said, laughing.  As he walked away, I put my hand on Neil’s leg and said, “Just so you know, I am flirting with you.”  He smiled nervously and we continued to talk until I absolutely had to go.  He walked me out; we were both planning on heading to another island around the same time, so I asked him to come north to meet me when he got there.  Sadly, he said, he was heading south, but he’d keep in touch and maybe we could meet up for a day before I left.  I grabbed his hand, leaned into his ear and tipsy-whispered, “No – you need to come up north so I can fuck you.”  He kissed me lightly on the lips and said he’d try to make it.  We said our goodbyes; I didn’t sleep a wink that night thinking about how his strong hands would feel running down the length of my body.

Fast forward a week and a half.  I have just arrived in El Nido; I’m walking back to my hotel, and who should cross my path but the one person I’ve been wanting to see this whole time?  We hug, we laugh, we beam at each other.  He tells me that he was warned not to go south because there was political turbulence, so instead he came north, hoping to run into me.  Looks like the stars aligned!  That night, we had dinner on the beach, the surf literally touching our toes.  We ate freshly-caught fish and drank fifty cent beers by candlelight and talked like children do when they have a secret language.  The wait staff finally had to tell us that we had to leave – they were closing.  We looked behind us to see that they had taken all the other tables and chairs off the beach and we hadn’t even noticed.  I looked him in his clear, blue eyes and asked if he were going to take me home with him some night that week; he asked what I thought about tonight?  I kissed him in response, and we walked uphill to his hotel, me in bare feet.  We got a bit lost along the way – the good kind of lost.

We spent the next three days going on adventures (sightseeing, kayaking, snorkeling, making out in secret caves), eating amazing food, and fucking like bunnies.  My last day in El Nido happened to be Valentine’s Day.  That morning, I got a massage, bought a dress (a rarity for me), tweezed and shaved my travel body, and told him to come to mine before dinner.  As an avid fan of Dan Savage, I knew it was best to fuck first – so when he arrived, I was only wearing a sarong, which quickly got flung aside.  Even with the air conditioning on, we were soon covered in a slippery layer of sweat, which we’d earned.  We relished every inch of each other’s bodies and slid all over each other in the heat of the tropics until we were starving and exhausted.

Time does seem to sprint by when you’re enjoying yourself, so I remember the night in flashes: We’re sitting at an Italian restaurant overlooking the ocean, devouring pizza and sipping on cocktails.  We’re dancing at a club, our bodies jumping and bouncing to pop music along with a packed crowd, rum and cokes in hand.  We’re outside, dancing in the ocean to cool off, spinning and dipping.  We’re sitting on an old, overturned, wooden kayak, making out like teenagers.  He’s facing me toward the ocean and putting his arm around me and asking if I’d ever come back to El Nido – and if he were there, I’d be back in a heartbeat.  We’re walking back to his hotel at 3:00 am to fall into a deep sleep in each other’s arms – but not before taking silly pictures with each other on the balcony. We’re waking up at 6:00 am to the sound of church bells, and I have to go.

I’ve had interesting Valentine’s Days before and since, especially while traveling, but I can’t imagine any topping that night – a night that felt perfect.  A night that capped off a magical movie-like travel romance in an idyllic setting.  A night when the stars aligned.

 

Transitions

I’ve mentioned this briefly in a lot of posts over the last six months, but here it is again for good measure: I’m leaving South Korea.

After seven years of living in this beautiful country that has become my second home, I’m packing a few boxes to ship back to the US and selling / giving away everything else in my apartment.  I’ll be leaving the country with one backpack, four crossed fingers, and a thousand memories.

Seven years.  Typing these words leaves a lump in my throat.  I’ve developed some of the closest relationships in my life here, and although the world is getting smaller and my friends are only a Skype call away, it’s not quite the same as hopping on the subway or walking down the street to meet someone for a beer spontaneously.  In the past few months, I’ve felt like George Bailey at the end of It’s a Wonderful Life because when you part from the people you love, you tend to tell them how much you love them. There’s a Korean word, 정 (jeong), that describes how I feel about Korea – it’s indefinable even in Korean and has no matching English word – but encompasses feelings of love, attachment, affection, community, and giving.  Korea sometimes feels like a big family, and I appreciate that more than I can say.

I’m nervous about going home… I’m expecting the reverse culture shock of coming back to the US to be much more difficult than the original culture shock of moving to Korea, especially given the current political climate! That being said, I have a LOT to be excited about – seeing family and old friends, forging a new and more meaningful career path, probably moving to a new city.  I’ll be traveling for six months (in Africa, Spain, and the UK) before I arrive in the US and definitely looking forward to grand adventures!  My future is uncertain, though: Will I be able to find a job?  Where will I end up?  Will I have to have roommates again in order to be able to afford living in the US?

Also uncertain is the future of this blog.  I don’t use my phone to do anything blog-related for privacy reasons, and as I’ll be backpacking, I’m not taking a laptop or iPad with me.  I don’t know how often I’ll have access to internet cafés or if the ones I come across will be places I feel comfortable posting in.  I will try to post / check into Twitter when I can in the next six months, but it’s likely that posts will be few and far between.

So before I embark on this journey, I’d like to say: I feel so incredibly lucky to be a part of this blogging community.  Writing this blog has given me an outlet to uncage a creativity I didn’t even know I had, and I’m grateful for that every day.  The ways in which sex bloggers support and encourage each other inspires me and fills me with joy.

I’ll be coming through Barcelona, London, Edinburgh, and Bristol this summer; if you happen to live in one of those places or know a trustworthy person who does and will provide a sleeping space on their floor in exchange for some good storytelling, please shoot me a message on Twitter or an email (@teachershavesex / teachershavesex@gmail.com) and let me know!  As you can imagine, traveling for six months is going to be pretty expensive, and even hostel dorm rooms add up!

I’ll be posting one more Sinful Sunday and one more non-fiction story before I take off; for now I just want to say thank you so much for reading (and for posting the hundreds of gorgeous photos and pieces of writing many of you do that put ideas in my head!).  May your 2017 transitions be positive and peaceful ones, and I hope all of you will experience your own grand journeys this year, even if they happen in your own home.

xx

Jo

 

Can’t Always Get What You Want

On the last night of my trip this past February, I went out for dinner and drinks with a man I’d met in Laos and then accidentally run into in Thailand.  He was tall, handsome, easygoing, and very open; our conversation flowed effortlessly, and he made me laugh.  After a couple of beers, we started walking around the Chiang Rai night market and got caught in a rainstorm.  I said something inappropriate; he pretended to leave, and I touched his arm and said, “Stay here and kiss me instead.”  He smiled a very warm smile and said, “You know, I’m actually enjoying our conversation.  I’d like to just stay in the moment and keep talking if that’s alright with you.”  And OF COURSE it was.  We ended up drinking until 3:00 AM – past bar closing time – and laughing our asses off.  It was a fantastic night.  The kind of night where you share really personal shit with a total stranger because they’re a total stranger.

All of this is to say, as Girl on the Net did in a fabulous recent post: Not all men want to have sex all the time.  I can’t count all the times a male friend or acquaintance has said to me, “Ugh, you’re SO lucky; women* can just sleep with anyone they want any time.”  But the thing is, guys, we can’t. Because not every man is up for sticking his dick in any person that comes along, and the narrative that they are is ridiculous at best and insidious at worst.

This narrative that men are sex-crazed, testosterone-fueled horn dogs who spend all their waking hours thinking about how to get laid is damaging for both men and women.  First, it contributes to the “boys will be boys” narrative that is used to justify sexual harassment, abuse, and rape.  The idea that society (including lots of television shows and movies that we all watch and love) propagates that men are obsessed with sex and that’s just the way it is encourages men to buy into it and all of us to look the other way when they do.  When they don’t, they’re often mocked by their peers as being weak or feminine, which is bollocks.  I can imagine another guy from my trip saying to the man who told me he just wanted to spend time talking to me as a person, “Are you kidding, man?  You didn’t hit that?”  That.   

Second, if men are perceived as hormone-driven perpetrators of sexual aggression and violence, how does that affect how other people interact with them out in the world?  There has been a huge outpouring of grief and anger recently over two Argentinian women who were murdered while traveling in Ecuador; the news of this was followed by hundreds of internet comments from women saying they “should have known better than to travel alone” (even though they weren’t alone…) and basically that women should, for some reason, expect to be harassed when they travel.  ‘Cause, you know, that’s just what men do. 

As a solo female traveler, this fills me with rage.  Rage that women are being killed not only when they travel, but domestically as well.  Rage that anyone has the audacity to say they somehow had it coming because they dared to be independent and explore the world around them.

It also makes me reflective, though – people are always telling me that it’s too dangerous to travel alone specifically because I’m a woman.  But if they’re regarding women as perpetual victims, it means that they’re also regarding men as perpetual predators.  When I travel alone, I actually feel pretty safe because for the most part, people are looking out for me because I’m a female solo traveler and they’re worried about my safety.  People see me as a potential victim; does that mean they see all men as a potential threat?       

I do not automatically get to fuck anyone I want because I’m a woman.  Just like I’m not automatically a victim because I’m a woman.  Just like men are not automatically aggressors – nor will they fuck anything that moves – because they’re men.  We live in a more complicated world than that.

When we say that straight women can just pick up any guy they want whenever they want, we’re saying so much more than that.  While I would have loved to take tall, handsome, charming man home and ridden him like the dirtiest cowgirl, I am more than okay with the fact that he wanted to spend time getting to know me instead of my body.  That was hot. 

I know this is Serious Stuff – promise to write a filthy one next week.

*Of course, when they say “women,” they mean cis hetero women, which is a whole other rant.

Don’t Call Me Baby (NSFR)

I put on the only clean shirt and real bra I had, along with a blue, elephant-clad skirt (everything is elephant-clad in Southeast Asia) I’d bought as a souvenir in Myanmar.  I’d brought foundation and one pair of earrings with me on the trip for just this occasion: pick-up night.  I had a super nice hotel room; no neighbor to either side of me, a king-sized bed, and a real shower. 

Buzzing with excitement and anticipation, I set out for the one bar in town all the tourists seemed to gravitate to, bellied up to the bar, and ordered a whiskey and Red Bull.  I expected it to be a long night of looking around and talking to a few people, so when the very handsome gentleman (whom I’d not noticed) next to me said, “That seems like a dangerous drink,” I was thrown into momentary confusion.  He had a salt and pepper beard, a beautiful accent, and strong-looking hands. I thanked the universe (I’m sure Bill Nye would find this hilarious and / or annoying) and tried my best not to be an awkward, blubbering American.  

We talked for a bit and took our drinks over to squishy mats overlooking a river, where we continued with travel stories, laughter, and one more drink each.  When he suggested another, I suggested we go back to mine instead.  “You’re a strange fish,” he said, smiling.  “Yes,” I said.  “I know.”  On our way out, he suddenly wrapped his arms around my body from behind me and kissed my neck hungrily; I was a bit taken aback, but far more turned on.  He stopped me just outside the bar to kiss me again while onlookers hooted and hollered at us in the street.

I don’t remember the walk home; I remember him pushing me down on the bed as soon as the door was shut behind us, pulling my skirt and panties down, and immediately burying his face in my cunt.  I smiled a great big smile and gave him gentle direction, which he happily took.  He said I tasted great, and his tongue and fingers felt great.  He did have strong hands – he used them to build things, and I could feel their dexterity.

I pulled him on top of me to kiss him, his mouth tasting salty and sweet, his weight perfectly pressing me into my giant mattress.  I rolled him over and we sat up; I took his shirt off and softly bit his shoulder.  His lovely, olive, smooth, toned shoulder.  This is when he looked at me and said, “I’m not going to fuck you tonight.”  “Okay,” I replied.  “Why?”  “I’ve had a few drinks, and…” I unbuttoned his pants and pulled his (indeed flaccid) dick out from his boxer briefs and said, “… and you like having your cock in someone’s mouth even when it’s soft, right?”  Of course, he replied, and I playfully licked it for a while before taking it into my mouth.  Over the course of a few minutes – wonder of wonders – he became hard, and I continued to go down on him, delighting in feeling his cock grow inside my mouth, his veins now standing out, him now standing up next to the bed. 

I have chronic jaw pain, so blow jobs aren’t my favorite thing; that being said, I’d happily be a pillow princess for hours, so I try to be fair.  I tried to work him with my hands, but he told me to take them away.  Fair – some guys just aren’t into the use of hands as part of blow jobs.  If it weren’t a one-night stand, I would tell him about my jaw pain… but I didn’t.  I was having fun, and the pain wasn’t too bad, so instead, I said, “You might like this,” and laid on the bed on my back.  I hung my head off the side of the bed and leaned it backward so he could slide his cock all the way to the back of my throat; he loved it, and I loved how excited he was.  Until:

“Yeah, baby – you like my cock in your mouth, don’t you?  Oh baby, that feels so good.  I love fucking your mouth, baby.”

That stopped me cold.  I’m not sure if y’all are aware of this, but I am a grown-ass woman.  I am not a child and I’m certainly not an infant.  I get that there are people who use this word as a term of endearment – I do too, with people I’ve been dating for months – but when someone I don’t know calls me baby, it instantly feels skeezy and cat call-y.    

I kneeled on the bed, my cunt still slippery but my mental boner gone, and whispered into his ear that I wanted to feel him inside of me, thinking I could salvage the moment.  He grabbed a condom from the bedside table and rolled it on, but shortly after we started boning, he lost his, too.  He said it was the condom; I said that was a bummer, but no condom means no penetrative sex for me.  I realize that at this point we could have done a million things; we could have continued playing, kissing, touching each other (touching ourselves).  Instead, we opted to sleep and give it another go in the morning.

We did, and it was great.  We woke up at 6:00 am and fucked like champs, not saying anything but making the bed (and each other) squeak and groan.  We lay in bed for a short time after, chatting quietly, before he kissed me goodbye and stole away into the morning.

A few times the night before, he’d teased me for using “sex educator” language (barrier, STI, etc.), which I think may have been as much a turn-off for him as baby was for me.  We were hardly a perfect match, but we still had lots of fun; our communication also wasn’t perfect, and that’s okay.

For me, one-night stands open the doors to sexual partners I’d never date, and that’s why I love them.  They are exciting and fun and always interesting, and this grown-ass woman hasn’t regretted a single one.  Even when they call me baby.  

Brand-Spanking-New Toy

Not the sexiest picture, perhaps, but the things I’ll do with it are sure sexy!

I bought this for $0.75 in Kalaw, Myanmar, in an open market; it was hanging above a selection of fruits and vegetables.  I have no idea what its intended use is (any thoughts?), but I already got a good whacking with it from a one-night stand (it’s stingy, but pretty low-key).  He delighted in having me hit the soles of his feet with it, which was exciting to me – I LOVE having the soles of my feet hit with any impact toy, and it was nice to meet another person who enjoys the same kink.

I’m also keen to have someone use it as leverage for a hard fuck – to wrap it around my body and pull me against them as hard as they can.  To keep at it until they’re panting and exhausted and sweaty and we collapse in a fuck heap.  I’ll probably have bamboo splinters, but I’ll be so full of orgasmic dopamine that I won’t care!  

Seriously – what is this actually supposed to be used for?

Thanks, Myanmar!  Other travel photos to follow…

P.S.  I ATE RATTAN, and it was delicious!  I’ll be thinking about it every time I come across a cane… or a cane comes across me.

See who else is playing this Sunday…

Happy Endings

Back from vacation!  Woo!  Back from white sand beaches and blue-green water and beautiful – stroke – delicious fish!  Wait a minute… blerg.

So I was lying in bed in a dorm room in the Philippines a few weeks ago, trying to sleep, when my roommate came in very respectfully and quietly.  A few moments after he lay down, we heard two drunk guys coming down the street, talking loudly; they were stopped by someone with a feminine voice asking them if they wanted a massage.  At three-thirty in the morning.  “Six hundred pesos for one hour,” the masseuse said.  “Ah, yes,” said the guys.  “Maybe.”  The masseuse continued: “Maybe you’d like a special massage?  If you want a happy ending, of course, it costs more.” 

At this point my dorm mate and I both bolted upright and stared at each other, mouths agape, not believing out ears.  If we could hear this conversation, then no doubt everyone in our hostel and everyone in the guesthouse these guys were staying in across the street could also hear the entire conversation.  My dorm mate looked out the window: “They’re ladyboys!” he exclaimed.  He recognized them because they’d been hitting on him all night at the bar. 

“Okay, okay… wait,” said the drunk guys.  A couple of minutes of silence passed before they came back and gave money to the masseuse.  “Two people,” they instructed.  Then: “Room four.”  And just in case the masseuse or the entire neighborhood didn’t hear them, they repeated: “ROOM FOUR.”  As a friend of mine later put it, nothing was lost in translation.  I wanted nothing more than to knock on their door the next morning to ask how the massage went, but my better judgment regarding manners told me that might have been a bit tacky (but SO MUCH FUN). 

Mountains and beaches are beautiful and all, but moments like this are the reason I travel. 

Let us go into your hotel…

A couple of weeks ago, I was walking down a very narrow dark alley toward my guesthouse in a small city in Southeast Asia when I was silently approached from behind and tapped on the back.  I spun around to see a young man nervously clutching a paper in his hand.  He looked at the paper and read from it: “Can I come into your hotel and interview you?  Let us go inside it will be more comfortable there.”  I walked out into the main alley where there were streetlights and people and asked him to repeat himself, not 100% sure I’d heard him correctly.  He followed me and read the same sentences again, motioning inside and starting to move toward my hotel.  “Hold on,” I said, holding up my hand in a universal stop position (it’s probably not actually universal, but I think he got my drift).  A friend of his then magically appeared out of the shadows; they exchanged a few words, and the friend mysteriously melted back into the dark alley from whence he’d emerged. 

I looked at the young man, concern furrowing my eyebrows.  “You want to interview me?” I asked him. “Yes,” he said.  “Are you a student?” I asked.  “Yes,” he said.  “How many questions are there?” I queried.  “Yes,” he stated. 

Oof. 

I then asked him to hand me the paper, and allllll the questions included were about sexuality.  Now, if you know me (and some of you do), you know that I’ll talk about sex pretty much anytime with anyone.  But this was weird.  The questions included:

Have you had a boyfriend or husband?
Do you have a husband or boyfriend now?
Have you ever kissed a man?
How many men have you dated?

It got more risqué from there, until the last two:

Have you ever had sex with a man you didn’t know?
Would you mind if I touch you?

What. The. Fuck.  The questions weren’t actually written in grammatically-correct English; I wish I’d taken a photo of the paper, but it seemed awkward to say, “You can definitely NOT come into my hotel, but hey, mind if I take a picture of your questions real quick?”  Some of the questions had non-English words randomly thrown in — probably where the translating app / software couldn’t find a direct translation.

I told the young man that these questions were too personal for me, and I wouldn’t do the interview.  I looked apologetic, but I was really thinking, “HOLY SHIT.  Does anyone really do this?  And how do they feel as the questions get progressively more sexy?  Eek!”

Has anyone else experienced anything like this?  My guess is that it was his buddy who put him up to it as a way to score with foreign women, but who knows?  Thoughts?

Travel Sex (NSFR – Not Safe for Relatives)

As in: Hey there, sister!  You might not want to read this one.

So I’m at this IRA pub in Derry, talking to the only other Americans I’d met traveling through Northern Ireland (they happened to be from my state, so we were getting on quite well) and a group of gents that had heard our funny accents and came over to talk to us.  I distinctly remember this one fellow who was telling me that he could no longer see out of his right eye because he’d gotten hit in the face with a rubber bullet.  “You’re pulling my leg,” I said, not believing him at first.  And then a split second later, I realized: he’s totally not kidding.  I’m in Northern Ireland.  

The whole time we’re having this conversation, I notice a big bald guy looking over at me (looking me over?) from a table a few feet away.  I give him a smile and keep talking to the group of guys I’m with.  After a couple of pints, they decide to call it a night and head out the door, leaving me still a bit chatty and not quite ready to leave, but with no one to talk to.  I go and sit in an empty chair next to the wall, and the bald bloke pulls up the chair across from me.  We exchange our names, say a few introductory words, and then: “So – how about we get out of here, then?”  “No,” I said, grinning — “I don’t think I’m looking for that tonight.”  We continue talking, and I realize that maybe I am up for it.  I’m really not into bald guys (Captain Jean-Luc Picard being the exception), but he was handsome and I was traveling.  “Okay,” I said.  “Okay, what?” he asked.  “Let’s get out of here.  I have a room in a bed and breakfast down the road.”  No more needed to be said; we grabbed our coats and walked briskly out the door into the January night. 

We did have a lovely conversation on the way; he told me about the history of the area, and I asked a lot of questions.  The cold air felt good in my lungs and I had drunk just enough to feel warm and giddy.  Once we got into my room, the conversation was done.  Usually, one night stand sex isn’t great; sometimes, it’s downright awful.  But this was hot.  This guy was built like a fucking bodybuilding giant, which again is usually not the type of guy I’m attracted to, but he was perfect that night.  He picked me up like I weighed nothing and fucked me against the wall, banging me into it so hard that we knocked paintings of ships off of it and so loud that there is no way we didn’t wake up every single guest.  He tugged my hair like reins and compressed my entire body against him.  He flung me all over the room like a rag doll, and I wanted more.  We rested for a little bit, soaking the sheets in our sweat, before going at it again. 

And then: “Okay, you can go now.”
“What?” he asked with furrowed brows.
“I said you can go.  Go home and get some sleep.”
“You’re not going to let me stay here?”
“No,” I laughed.  “I’d also like to get some sleep.”
“Are you serious?”
“Yeah, I’m serious.  I had a really good time, but you need to go.”

He put his clothes on, looking confused, and joked about me being cold.  He gave me his card (there once was a time before Facebook), like I was going to contact him. 

And honestly, it felt good to have that kind of power.  I walked into the B&B’s dining room the next morning, tranquil as a monk, smelling of sex and faintly smiling, and sat down in a beautiful hand-carved wooden rocking chair at a table with a doily on it next to a wall covered with sky blue and cream colored wallpaper, and I tore into the Ulster fry in front of me like a champ.    

In any case, the point of the story is that travel sex is great, you guys.  Go do it (be safe!).  And it’s okay not to be Facebook friends after you do.