BEST OF ASIAN EROTICA 2
Edited by Richard Lord
INTRODUCTION
Eroticism is on the march; or maybe it’s more apt to say, it’s on the slink.
Whatever the proper term, perhaps nowhere is that advance more evident than in Asia, which has by far the largest population of any continent. Asia practices eroticism in fascinating ways and, recently, Asian writers and writers based in Asia have been chronicling some of this eroticism.
In the second half of 2006, Monsoon Books (Singapore) published Best of Singapore Erotica, the first anthology of erotic fiction (along with a handful of erotic poems) ever released in Singapore. That volume proved to be a surprising success: not only did it dominate Monsoon’s own bestseller list for many months, but just four months after the collection first hit the bookstores, we were going into our second edition.
Strongly encouraged by the success of this venture, Monsoon decided a few years later to come out with a second collection of erotic short fiction.
This time, however, the company decided to cast its nets wider and brought out Best of Southeast Asian Erotica, in which four other countries were included. (The new territory included Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand and the Philippines.) Although it only appeared in late 2010, this book, too, seems to be a success, both critically and commercially. Now we are taking our erotic sampling out into a new frontier: the world of ebooks.
The stories included in these first two e-collections represent a mix-and-match of the best works from the two earlier print volumes. We have dropped the flash fictions and poems from our Best of Singapore Erotica collection and then merged them in these first two volumes of ebooks with pieces from the Best of Southeast Asian collection.
As the first collection was composed entirely of Singapore stories, there is still a heavy presence of Singapore fiction in both of these first volumes.
Subsequent volumes feature first-rate erotic fiction (and some non-fiction) from throughout Asia.
But what we offer here is exemplary of the principles we employed throughout in selecting stories for the first two print collections: good stories, well-written, though with a definite erotic flavour. This is not pornography; it is a sub-genre of full-bodied literature which looks at and celebrates the sensual and the sexual in the human experience. These stories were not chosen simply because they titillate (though many of them do that as well), but because they delight, inform and sometimes even enlighten and ennoble.
We enjoyed putting both collections together (as you might well imagine). We think you will enjoy reading these stories and seeing why Asia is fast becoming the world centre of eroticism in all its richness and variety.
GOOD MORNING, BANGKOK
Andrew Penney, Thailand
Savika. As Thai as the fragrant jasmine rice used each year in the Royal Ploughing Ceremony to ensure a good harvest. But—quite unmistakably—also a daughter of Mother India; the pink and bronze tones in her complexion telegraphed her Thai-Indian ancestry in a way which stiffened the cocks of a certain kind of Thai male with thoughts of Hindu gods making love in a sea of churning milk.
The General who was admiring her contours as she slept was one of those men. Although Savika’s Indian features were softened by her Thai blood, the heft of her full breasts belonged to an apsara, one of those curvaceous Hindu sprites decorating temples all over Southeast Asia.
In the quiet street far below the sleek new studio apartment which the General used as a garconniere, street hawkers were setting up their noodle carts in the pre-dawn, and steady streams of Japanese cars were already threading themselves through the Bangkok roads in a routine which was designed to beat the dreaded rush hour jams of Krung Thep, the City of Angels.
It was so early in the morning that nearly every car in that thick flow of traffic had a sleeping child strapped into the back seat, an authentic Bangkok angel dreaming in his or her school uniform. The natives of Bangkok love to boast that their children eat, sleep, study, and are even born in cars; the city’s traffic department has a squad of officers trained to nip through traffic jams on motorbikes and deliver babies in the gridlock.
Savika was sleeping so deeply that the General was able to use his cellphone to speak to his official driver without waking her. This was hardly surprising; the General was physically powerful, sexually experienced and was known to be a bold and demanding lover.
One of the national emblems of Thailand is the garuda, a fearsome and very virile male eagle which soared into Buddhist mythology via the Hindu culture that is at the root of so many things Thai. This includes the writing system, religious rituals, court etiquette, dance, music and art—even virtually every surname in the Kingdom. The Hindu God Krishna himself was said to have ridden into cosmic battles under a banner depicting this creature.
The General had swooped over—and against—Savika’s supple young body like a garuda, taking his pleasure from the rich curves which felt so different from the smooth milky flesh of his main wife and his main concubine, who were both Sino-Thais of good birth, like himself.
He had spread her arms on the bed like wings and used his strength to press her wrists into the mattress as she moved her hips under him in that fierce Indian rhythm which they both enjoyed. The heavy breasts swelling above that narrow Indian waist had been crushed against his smooth chest during their lovemaking, and her heels had squeezed the firm muscles of his lower back when she wrapped her legs around his waist to pull him more deeply into her body.
The idea of making love with a dusky Indo-Thai woman represented erotic possibilities which were something like a drug for some Thai men. Savika herself took some very sharp pleasures from satisfying the General’s tastes for Indian women, who were believed to be loose and uninhibited.
The erotic appeal of such women never failed to grip these Thai males, whether they were ethnic Thais, or a luuk jeen like the General, whose family had emigrated from China three centuries ago and risen to the very highest levels of Thai society—as courtiers, senior army officers, and titled merchants.
Indo-Thais had lived and prospered quietly in the Kingdom for centuries.
It was a small community; fewer than 70,000 souls versus something like seven million Sino-Thais.
Like the Chinese, they had become utterly Thai, producing a caste of Thai-speaking businessmen and advisers. The chief Hindu priest of Thailand, who presided over royal rites, was Indian, and at least one Indo-Thai had served as a Privy Councillor.
Shortly before six in the morning, the General decided to wake his mistress for some brisk exercise before he headed for the office.
He bent his head between the thighs of the sleeping woman, and blew softly on the sensitive folds which were exposed because she was so relaxed that her thighs were slightly parted. When Savika’s hips moved, her patron gripped her knees to part them even further and began to pull her out of her slumber by raking the lips of her yoni with his strong white teeth.
The General was fond of sleepy sex; he had a taste for watching women sleep and for taking them before they were awake enough to know whether they were ready to be penetrated by him. He loved feeling sleepy women tighten about his lingam in surprise as they began to realize what was happening to them.
None of his women were complaining. He knew that Savika, who happened to have the same name as a popular Indo-Thai TV actress, was particularly fond of being woken up for sex.