Travel Guide...
 

The UK clearly has one of the worst censorship problems in the civilised world but that's not to say one won't encounter censorship elsewhere.

To try and assist the international traveler. I will try and catalogue any occurrences of censorship that one may stumble across.

This page is no longer updated and is marked for deletion

Local Customs & Behaviour

These are some of the guidelines being given to tourists visiting a popular part of India's north-western Rajasthan state to ensure they can respect local culture.

The guidelines come after a number of unfortunate cultural faux pas, including an Israeli couple kissing at their Hindu wedding ceremony and a Finnish woman walking naked down the streets of Pushkar.

Officials say the list of these dos and don'ts has been prepared by the local administration in Ajmer district to "educate foreign tourists about local culture and sensibilities".

Prithvi Raj Sankhla, Ajmer city's sub-divisional magistrate, told the BBC: We have asked hotels and restaurants across the city to hand out the 20-page booklet to tourists as soon as they check in.

The guidelines say:

• Men should never touch women in public, even to help a woman out of a car, unless the lady is very elderly or infirm
• In Indian culture... men socialise with men, and women with women
• Married couples in India do not hug, hold hands or kiss in public. Even embracing at airports and train stations is considered out of the question
• Generally it is improper for women to speak with strangers on the street and especially to strike up a casual conversation
• Drinking alcohol or smoking in public, no matter how innocent, are interpreted as a sign of moral laxity and are not acceptable.

Hotel and guest house owners have been asked to blow up the relevant points of the guidelines and paste them prominently in their reception area to ensure that all tourists take note of the information, Sankhla said.

The local administration is also going to be tough on those found to be instigating misguided religious beliefs in the holy town of Pushkar, he threatened. But he insisted these were only guidelines and should not be seen as a code of conduct for tourists.

The guide follows a number of incidents deemed "indecent behaviour" by the local people. The Israeli couple were fined $22 and apologised for kissing and hugging at their wedding. The Finnish woman had taken a dip in a sacred lake and told a court she walked naked to appease a deity.

Night Life Guide

In March 1999 Denmark passed a law legalising the sale of sexual services . The new law voted in 81-27 by Danish parliament will go into effect on July 1. Sex purchased from anyone under the age of 18 will result in a maximum sentence of two years in prison, the law states.

Prostitution is already widely tolerated in Denmark, and since the mid-1970s police rarely arrest women for selling sex. Along with this new law, Danes stepped up measures to prevent prostitution by minors, help women get out of the sex trade, and stop those who bring women in from Eastern Europe and Asia and then force them into prostitution.

November 2005

Show Girls at 5 Rue Des Halles is worth a visit. When I was there earlier this year the quality of the girls was good. Each girl's performance lasted 20 mins, with most of that time spent wandering among the audience, who were permitted to touch. The occasional double acts lasted approx 30 mins and were particularly good. There are 2 shifts per day (usually 4 girls per shift) with the changeover between 5 - 6 pm. Entry is 50 euro for the whole day (midday to midnight) and private dances are available from 80 euro.  The venue itself is tiny (approx capacity 20) and no refreshments are available.

Chochotte is worth visiting. The Chochotte website is at: http://chochotte.theatre.online.fr

Just try any Bar Americain (advertised in the listings mags) and you'll find plenty to keep your hands full...

Beware there are some very nasty rip offs around. I saw one stunning blonde girl ( I've since seen her in a bit role of a Marc Dorcel video) outside a rue St Denis Club so I followed her in. I was told I had to wait but meanwhile the fee was €250 euros for half an hour alone with her. When she was free another pretty girl came in and they offered me a threesome for an extra €250 in a private room. I won't go into detail but watching them play with themselves ( not even each other) with panties pulled aside from a distance of 10 feet was all that was on offer, and I had already signed off a credit card so no refund!

Even escorts are difficult in Paris since the closure of several agencies and arrest and imprisonment of agency bosses.

Your best bet is to try a top London Agency with girls in Paris on their books and search an internet site such as Captain69 or Punternet for a quality booking and recent reviews.

Sad to say Paris is Europe's rip off centre for a bit of fun. Prague and Budapest are now the hot spots and no doubt soon the new East European EU member state capitals as pretty girls want to earn what seems a fortune to them for being nice to randy men.

Tokyo's Shibuya district is home to 'happening bars' which offer chaotic, erotic action at bargain prices. One out-of-the-way club is located in the corner of a nondescript building off Miyamasuzaka and the place looks, well, sleazy right down to its official ladyboy greeter.

Happening bars in Roppongi and other parts of Tokyo, explains Shukan Taishu offer customers a chance to engage in, or observe, anything-goes activities, performed spontaneously in the most exhibitionist style imaginable. Catering to the jaded affluent and the morbidly curious, they generally charge a minimum of 10,000 yen (£50) for membership by couples, and perhaps twice that figure for unaccompanied males. Females are generally admitted for a nominal fee, and in some places even free of charge. A typical admission charge is 4,000 yen (£20)

An example club had a maximum capacity of about 15 people. So as to leave little doubt as to its purpose as a venue for the sexually open-minded and the hopelessly horny, its brown-hued walls were festooned with suggestive motifs, such as phallic symbols and erotic "shunga" woodblock prints from the Edo period.

Four women, who appeared to be in their 20s, and seven somewhat older men were already seated and sipping at their drinks. The reporter's eyes gradually adjusted to the interior gloom and they soon noticed that an older man with white hair was in the process of using a hemp rope to tie up a nude young woman, using an elaborate combination of loops and knots. Once she was rendered immobile, he began teasing her nipples, and she writhed and squealed with a combination of humiliation, pain and pleasure.

Seeing this, a woman who appeared to be an office worker said, Ah, I feel like eating! She knelt before her date, lowered the zipper on his trousers, and buried her face in his crotch, making loud sucking sounds. After bringing her date to orgasm, 'Yukorin' moved on to the customer at the next stool and, after washing out her mouth with a shot of tequila, repeated the process.

The reporter was upbeat after his experience. After all, he asks, where else can you enjoy such chaotic, erotic action in a city like Tokyo at these bargain prices?

The locations for some of the city's Designated Red light Areas is a little surprising, in as much as they exist in the heart of the city's commercial and historic districts. Orchard Towers is one of the DRA's. Angel's Disco (formerly Club 392) in Orchard Towers is a sister-club to the Angel's Disco in Bangkok's famous Sukhumvit area.

Orchard Towers is also home to several escort services. The ironic thing about the Orchard Towers set up is that Singapore has managed to squeeze escort services and bar front brothels onto it's most fashionable shopping street, and managed to build them into a plaza with dry cleaning services, foot doctors, jewelers, golf stores, pharmacies, flower shops, etc. Open a door on  he wrong floor and you're in a different world from the touristy, commercialized bustle that most people think of when you say "Orchard Road."

Some of Singapore's DRA's are pretty seamy. Deskers Road, in the words of one sources, is "the classic low-end red light district." But it is within easy walking distance of the City Hall MRT station. The "Deskers Report" goes on the describe the area. The DRA is in...the back alley between Desker Road and Rowell Road. Here you will find a teeming mass of humanity milling along the alley, looking in at all the doorways. Inside the doorways you will see 1 to 6 women sitting around looking bored and contemptuous in a bare room with cane chairs. Posters on the wall advise the use of condoms...

Deskers Road and the nearby Flanders Square DRA's can be reached by foot from the Little India section of Singapore. The most popular DRA is in the Geylang area of Singapore - which is not a normal tourist hangout. Geylang is the land of cheap accommodation and immigrant housing in Singapore.

The emphasis is massively on prostitution rather than a show. The go-go bars tend to feature several girls on stage in various states of undress. However they seem to stay on stage for ages and clearly get very bored.

The upstairs bars on the Patpong offer a show for the price of a beer. These mainly feature girls extracting all sorts of goodies from their 'pussies'...ping-pong balls, firecrackers, sparklers, dildos etc. For the price of another drink, hostesses will happily provide a bit of pretty intimate lap dancing with both sides having a good grope. (or even full sex!)

Detailed information about bars, GoGo bars and massage available on Thai-Anxiety

However, I have also noticed the following news story which will certainly effect Akron: (America Land of the Free...Bullshit springs to mid)

Even before it could be enforced, a federal district court has put a hold on a new Ohio rule designed to clamp down against nude dance clubs.

The hold, in effect until at least Dec. 21, will give senior U.S. District Court Judge Ann Aldrich time to study whether the new rule is constitutional or whether she should strike it down, as she did a previous law on nude and topless dancing. 

The earlier rule required all dancers to at least wear pasties and G-strings. Judge Aldrich said the rule was too broad and too vague and thus a denial of First Amendment rights of free expression.

The Ohio Liquor Control Commission went back to the drawing board and came up with Rule 52, which prohibited certain simulated sexual acts. Judge Aldrich said the new rule was a step in the right direction but might also have problems.

County commissioners voted 5-1 in late July 2002 to adopt the ordinance, which also bans G-string tipping. County officials said that part of the ordinance is being reconsidered and won't be enforced for the time being.

Also starting Sunday, dancers under age 21 won't be allowed to work in clubs that serve alcohol.

The law had been challenged in separate suits filed by dancers, managers and owners of nude dance clubs in Memphis, Nashville and Chattanooga. It forbids "the showing of the bare human male or female genitals or pubic area with less than a fully opaque covering" and "the showing of the female breast with less than a fully opaque covering of the areola."

The preamble to the law says it is not intended to suppress legitimate speech or expression but to fight the "adverse effects" or adult businesses, such as crime, blight and decreased property values. (Shameful or what)

Initially, the law was upheld by U.S. District Judge Robert Echols of Nashville, who cited the decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in the 1991 case of Barnes v. Glen Theatre, Inc. In that dispute, the court divided 5-4 in favor of an Indiana law that required G-strings and pasties. The court majority said this was no more than an incidental restriction on free expression rights. (The fact that I fart in the direction of such obnoxious disregard for human rights should of course be taken as an incidental minor criticism of a corruption of democracy)

Anyway, the court said, the Tennessee law still allows for considerable capacity and opportunity to express the erotic message. The decision may be appealed to the full Circuit Court of Appeals and then, if necessary, to the U.S. Supreme Court. A lawyer for the plaintiffs said that, so far, no decision on an appeal has been reached.

(Land of the Free?...Bollocks)

Note that the northern county covering Orlando used to allow full nudity but this has recently been changed. Now the best bet in the area seems to be a drive over to Tampa

The Steakhouse, a topless dance club applied for the permit in 1997 and was rejected. The Raleigh Board of Adjustment ruled that the business didn't have enough parking spaces. In addition, it failed to show that its business would not harm properties around it or unduly affect traffic.

The topless dance club lost the first round in federal court and took the case to a three-judge panel of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. It didn't fare any better there. The appeals panel used the ever-popular "secondary effects" argument to uphold the city ordinance. That argument goes that the city is not really infringing on anyone's First Amendment rights because city fathers don't like topless dancing but because such businesses are known to foster crime, property value deterioration and other bad things.

The appeals court rejected both claims. It said the 90-day period specified in Raleigh was reasonable to rule on permit requests. It also said that, because the Raleigh law does not actually regulate the content of speech, it can place the burden of proof on a business.

An attorney for The Steakhouse said he thought the opinion was inconsistent with higher court rulings but that no decision has been made yet on whether to appeal.

Shopping

Video: The vast majority of video tapes are SECAM which will play in black & white on a PAL video/TV. The majority of videos are dubbed (version francais v.f.) but arty and foreign ones are generally subtitled (version originale v.o.). Several shops, eg Virgin & FNAC, stock PAL imports from Benelux, Australia & the UK. French shops are particularly aware of high profile bans in the UK and will have PAL imports for any such video.

Laserdiscs: Generally a good selection of home grown disc as well as imports. One still needs to check vo/vf for the French versions. Try Virgin & FNAC. Laserdiscs are currently selling at bargain prices as the market is being wound down.

DVD: Again try Virgin & FNAC. Region 1 imports stocked at approximately £13-£26. French/European releases at £18-£22. These generally have the original soundtrack available but beware that a few early releases had mpeg sound as opposed to Dolby Digital. Also some discs have French subtitles automatically selected with the English soundtrack. France now seems to have a  few more DVD titles than the UK

Sex: Plentiful sex shops but a little research is required to find those with reasonable prices. There are several bargain basement type outlets dotted around Paris. Pretty near all French sex videos are dubbed into French and use the SECAM system

Hi to all the Melonfarmers

I'm on a break in Germany at the mo and it is really frustrating to see so many Hardcore DVDs in Videoshops freely available and at amazing low prices.

They're practically giving them away - the bargain buckets are piled high with consensual adult porn which you'd find difficult to get in the UK. The video stores are just off the main street - so easily accessible - you don't have to go down some pee stinking alleyway like London's so called "Sex area" Soho. The adult erotik area in the shop is well away from children either through a curtain at the very back or through a barrier operated by staff - so simple.

Videorama hardcore is 4.90 Euros!!!! (and remember they must be making their margin, paying tax etc.) Every taste is catered for - one shop I found is particularly good - it's prices don't increase if your taste is for the more unusual - it charges similar prices for similar genre i.e it's either hard or soft. Plenty of couples browsing. This is the way the UK should be going.

I was discussing the proposed ban in the UK with a lady (as opposed to the scruffy, chain smoking, threatening louts you find in Soho) at the counter in one shop and she just laughed - she added that adults are able to make up their own minds what they want to watch in Germany.

Hungary is a great place to purchase both mainstream and porn on DVD as there is virtually zero censorship. You can purchase hardcore porn at the Virgin Megastore in Duna Plaza,Budapest,on both DVD and VHS. But I believe most of the stuff on VHS is dubbed into Hungarian

Porn in Ireland is illegal unless it is pre 1992. Naturally, this law is flouted left and right, with more recent videos on offer. The tendency of the police is not to interfere unless there are particularly illegal products on offer, underage, etc. The government are pushing for tighter laws still, which, due to loopholes leave only porn on DVD legal, as such. I'm sorry I don't have more details on these laws, even Irish lawyers are typically uneducated on such matters. It is also far too expensive, with some shops charging as much as 45-50 pounds per video, and 50 being the starting price for a DVD. Recently, a shop called Utopia was raided for showing video covers in the front window of it's shop, and fined under the obscenity act. All videos here are pirated. You cannot buy an authentic porn film. This I learned from some friends who own and run a sex shop

If you didn't know, 'In Dublin' was temporarily banned because of very blatant ads for prostitutes in the back pages. The next issue was released as usual, without the ads. The ads, just like those on telephone boothes here, crept and then flooded back.

A shop in Dublin was "shamed" in the Irish Sun for selling "bootleg video nasties", including Natural born killers, TCM (now un-banned), cannibal movies, and so on. Natural born killers and hellraiser bloodline (both banned in Ireland) were shown on TV3, Ireland's newest channel. There was uproar of course, but typical of Ireland, it was not pursued. sort of reminds me of channel 83 in videodrome.

Sex: Every small record & video shop seems to stock a few adult hardcore titles for some excellent bargain basement prices. All such titles are mixed in with mainstream videos, no embarrassment here. Hardcore DVDs are also widely sold at very reasonable prices, ie approximately £20. The best choice of videos and DVD's in a high street shop was easily Fame at Dam Square. Give Virgin a miss as they stock very little outside of Playboy videos. They do have a selection of US hardcore DVDs though. There are a lot of sex shops which have a much wider selection including a lot more European produce. They however carry a hefty markup in terms of price.

Banned & cut videos: First of all Dutch releases are always in original language with subtitles so English speaking films can be bought with confidence. They are also free to import versions from all over the world. The market in Amsterdam clearly caters for the poor old Brits as some shops seem to have shelves consisting purely of those videos that are heavily cut or banned in the UK. A good example is Boudisque, near the central station on the corner of Nieuwendijk and Harings Pakkers Steeg. Bare Behind Bars, Nekromantik, New York Ripper, Deadbeat at Dawn, Exorcist, Clockwork Orange are just a few that feature. Again the best overall range is to be found at Fame Music where there is a fine selection of horror and martial arts videos. In addition they have a good selection of DVDs neatly arranged by region codes 0,1,2. Virgin near Dam Square currently has a comprehensive range of banned titles at 2 tapes for fl 59.95 (£18.50). They have the Vipco strong uncut versions of Cannibal holocaust, Zombie Flesh Eaters, City of the Living Dead, Boogey Man, etc.

Another shop that is a must-visit is Cult Video. It can be found on Amstel by following the pedestrianised shopping streets starting with Nieuwendijk all the way up until just past Rembrandt Plein. It is basically video rental but is has a small basement of sell-thru treasures for the repressed Brits. Another good shop for horror stuff (they have loads of posters/stills/etc. as well as videos) is Silver Screen, on Haarlemmer Dijk. If you continue along Nieuwen Dijk over Singel and onto Haarlemmer Straat, then across Heren Gracht, Keizers Gracht and Prinsen Gracht you'll come onto Haarlemmer Dijk, where you'll find Silver Screen on the 2nd last block on the right hand side.

Also well worth a visit is the Pantip Plaza. 5 storeys of hardware and 'remarkably cheap' software. As one ventures deeper into the recesses, one finds more and more offers of hardcore video CDs. Again only catalogues are available and the stock is kept somewhere safely off-site.

I located several shops selling a good selection of anime and a couple selling Hong Kong action titles. The vast majority of shops restrict themselves to Hollywood titles on Video CD.

• ALABAMA - Prohibited in zip codes beginning with: 366.
• FLORIDA - Prohibited in zip codes beginning with: 323 and 325.
• KENTUCKY - Prohibited
• MINNESOTA - Prohibited in zip codes beginning with 557 and 558.
• MONTANA - Prohibited in zip codes beginning with: 591.
• NEBRASKA - Prohibited in zip codes beginning with: 681 and 685.
• NEW YORK -Prohibited in zip codes beginning with:103.
• NORTH CAROLINA - Prohibited in zip codes beginning with 282.
• OHIO - Prohibited in zip codes beginning with: 452.
• OKLAHOMA - Prohibited
• TENNESSEE - Prohibited
• UTAH - Prohibited
• VIRGINIA - Prohibited in zip codes beginning with 223.