Southeast Asia is without question home to the highest concentration of ladyboys on the planet. The majority of the ladyboys in the region live in Thailand. The next biggest group is in the Philippines. There are also some ladyboys in Cambodia and Indonesia. Myanmar has a handful of ladyboys and Laos does too, but they are few and far between. Then there is Vietnam. Hanoi is the capital but Ho Chi Minh is the biggest city. So where the ladyboys in Ho Chi Minh City?
While there are some ladyboys in Vietnam they are a rare breed. I have only met a few ladyboys on the street in Vietnam and that’s after traveling all over the country. There are no ladyboy bars or massage parlors, but they sometimes show up in those places.
Chica Bar at 60 Pasteur in District 1 currently has two ladyboys working. You have to look closely though because they look like regular girls! One has brown skin and the other is white. There is another good looking light skinned ladyboy who works a few doors down at The Pub too.
Vietnamese culture isn’t as open to ladyboys as Thai society, but then again not many places are. Still, there are lots of ladyboys and cross dressers on Vietnamese television every night of the week. Apparently, they just don’t make it out into places where foreigners might cross their paths in any real numbers.
One of the easiest place to find ladyboys in Vietnam looking for money is the “T4M” section of Vietnam Craigslist. Most of them are not Vietnamese though. Out of an entire page of posts you might find one or maybe two Vietnamese ladyboys at the most. The rest are Thai and Filipinas for the most part, though I once found a Asian Australian there who wanted to give free blowjobs to white guys!
There are always a few ladyboys on Tinder too, but there’s no way to find them other than swiping through all of the male and female profiles until a transgender pops up on the screen. Needless to say, this is very time consuming.
Ladyboys are pretty rare in Vietnam, but they are also pretty hot. The few I have seen were really good looking. They had porcelain skin and gorgeous faces. A few had surgically modified bodies to match, but even the natural ladyboys were really attractive. They could almost all pass for “real women”.
That beauty can sometimes be used to lure people into problems. There are ladyboys who roam around tourist heavy streets of Ho Chi Minh City like Hai Ba Trung and Pham Ngu Lao on their scooters at night looking for guys. They only ask for 400,000 Dong ($20 USD) which is much less than most genetic girls. They do the deed in short time hotels or even back in their customer’s guest friendly hotels and most of the time it all seems to go off without a problem. Some guys claim to have been pickpocketed by ladyboys on motorbikes in the middle of town.
Other than that, the only place guys can really find Vietnamese ladyboys is on ladyboy dating sites. There are some Viet ladyboys on Ladyboy Kisses and TS Dates but they are not exactly filled to the brim. There are also some Thai ladyboys living in Vietnam who have profiles on Thai Friendly.
Probably as time goes on more and more ladyboys will emerge in Vietnam and they will undoubtedly turn to the internet to find guys for love or money. That’s the way of the world isn’t it?
They definitely are not anywhere near as prevalent here as in other cities in Asia. Need to hop on dating apps and start swiping and then you will locate them.
It depends. There are probably more ladyboys in HCMC than say Shanghai, Macau or Osaka. Of course HCMC doesn’t compare to Bangkok, Pattaya or even Phnom Penh in terms of numbers of ladyboys, but they are around if you look. I haven’t seen all that many on dating apps though. You find more in the streets and bars, and usually be accident.
Many bars have ladyboys on Bui Vien and some are mostly ladyboys , but they often look like men with HIV (which is very high in bui vien) in a wig and want 50-100 dollars for bad service and are all bottoms. Also some work in expat bars such as xuxu bar and other local bars on pasteur street. Again the often want you to buy drinks and pay 1-2 million VND only for you to here them complain and say do not touch , i got to go now , best to go to thailand and enjoy it, vietnam is a scam
Thanks for the comment. I haven’t spent much time on Bui Vien.
Anyone know if the ladyboys still work at The Pub and Chica or have they moved since Covid?
The one at The Pub is still there but unfortunately not as cute as she used to be!