I have a confession to make: I love Patong. I know I'm not supposed to. A foreign woman is supposed to loathe it, revile it, avoid it. Certainly not love it.

Patong is crass and dirty and loud. It's a cultural and spiritual black hole. It's a degenerate hell fed by an insatiable desire for cheap booze and sex. It's not cool or trendy in any way whatsoever.

In other words, it's a hell of a lot of fun.

I love Patong in the way that I love B-movies and romance novels — it's light on plot but heavy in entertainment value. Besides, I come from a place where wrestling steers to the ground is a form of recreation, so who am I to judge?

When I was a girl growing up on a farm in Canada, I liked to turn over big rocks in the field behind my house to look at the ant colonies underneath, fascinated by their busy little world. For me, Patong is like that — one giant rock bottom in which to observe a species going about its frantic life.

The Western woman's role in the rhythms and rituals of Patong nightlife is not clearly defined, so reactions to her presence are unpredictable. This makes it all the more alluring to me, because the only real role for the farang woman in Patong, in my opinion, is to stir the pot. For one who delights in making people feel slightly uncomfortable, Patong is catnip.

Here's a synopsis of a typical night. It starts off in an Irish pub, where my friend and I discover the second-best conversation killer in Patong, after "I'm a feminist." We tell some young Irish lads we've met that we are journalists, in Patong on assignment, and that we will be writing about this night.

They look bewildered and immediately clam up, perhaps worried that the next thing they utter would be used against them in print. We convince them that I write for an erotic magazine back in my native Alberta called Hay Boy, and they're all smiles again.

We move on to Soi Katoey to wander aimlessly in a sea of transgendered gaudiness until an Englishman calls us over. He says he's relieved to talk to us; it's been so long since he's had a "real" conversation with a woman, and so on. I get this all the time in Patong, these guys moaning about how desperate they are to talk to someone. Usually, if you do stop to talk, five minutes in they have nothing to say. This bloke looks friendly though, so we sit down and he orders beers for us, quickly noting that he's none too rich and, gosh, he's terribly sorry he can't pay for them. His travelling buddy, meanwhile, looks over, grunts, and goes back to groping the girl he's sitting with.

Conversation soon shifts to politics. We launch into a debate on Bush-Blair relations about the same time that I notice an incredibly perfect, er, body part being flashed at me from the stage nearby. I mean really, really perfect. I suddenly realize that asking someone whether they're pro-Bush has a very different meaning in this part of town. I also now see just how easy it is to hide a weapon.

We leave Mr Cheapie behind and stroll down Bangla Road, where eyes from a sea of pudgy faces staring out from the beer bars seem to ask, "Are you with us or against us?" before quickly looking away. One guy, however, generic sort of European, fumbles for my arm and asks me to stay with him for a drink. I say no and keep walking.

We pause at a bar up the street and I see that he's hot on the trail, probably hoping I haven't noticed that he's drenched in sweat and his face is peeling. He leans up, his nose nearly bumping into my face, and slurs, "I'm persistent."

"Well, hoo-ee," I screech. "Isn't that remarkable. I'm Catholic myself! Never met a Persistent before! But it's all good, you know — it's the same god and all." The grin slides off his face and he leaves. Mission accomplished.

Looking around the bar, I'm reminded that my friends and I often joke that all the well-dressed, attractive men are turned back to their home countries upon arrival at the Phuket International Airport, while the young, sexy ones are re-directed to the beaches of Phi Phi
or Railay.

If the tourism authorities are truly serious about attracting more women visitors, then their next push should surely be to develop Phuket as a "hot man hub". At the very least, they should place an immediate and total ban on ill-fitting Hawaiian shirts.

While Patong is the kind of place where you can easily shed your inhibitions, abandon all your morals and get away with it, I can't say I've ever completely lost control there. At least not that I can remember. I might have teetered on the edge a few times. Vague memories include having my hair stroked by the mia noi, or mistress, of a go-go bar owner, downing a big shot I've been given only to be told, "In the '60s we called that electric Kool-Aid," or sitting in a dark bar with "family" types, that kind of thing.

I prefer to watch others lose control. Case in point, at an Irish pub recently:
A very drunk farang couple are holding each other very close; she's sitting on a barstool and he's standing beside her. I watch in awe as she wraps her legs around him and he hikes up her skirt. The couple's movements heat up, just as the band launches into a rousing version of
Mustang Sally.

I can't believe what I'm seeing, and I try to get everyone at my table to look over. Strangely, no one seems interested, and, now feeling like a voyeur, I continue watching as the woman tosses her head back as her mate leans into her. I hold my breath as it looks like Sally's going to finish her ride soon. But then the bar manager cuts in and quickly slows that mustang down.