Backpackers have never had a reputation as being especially finicky about their appearance or cleanliness. But things may have reached a new low in downtown Bangkok yesterday when a Thai prostitute named Chanhira Thanarat refused a sexual encounter with American backpacker Brad Thompson because he was “too dirty.”
“He never shower,” Thanarat said of the 19-year-old Thompson. “He think he can love me with bad smell. He never wash Bob Marley shirt. I find different man!”
Thompson doesn’t deny that it had been “weeks, maybe months” since he had last washed his favorite t-shirt, a green short-sleeve displaying the face of legendary reggae musician Bob Marley. “Still,” Thompson said, “I don’t think it smells that bad.” Thompson proceeded to reach into his backpack and pull out a shirt whose smell can only be compared to an unholy mixture of body odor, feet, and death.
Asked when he last took a shower, Thompson paused for several seconds before asking, “You mean, with soap?”