Hey Folks!

Here's day one of my update. Thought you'd enjoy reading it over! Expect an update from me every 24 hours or so. Sometimes less, sometimes more. But one update will cover each day.

As always, you can reach my site at www.aaronlawrence.com. Don't forget to preorder the videos! Just click on the link to the ordering information on the main page. : )

--Aaron

May 30th
Late Evening (Eastern Time)
Somewhere over the Atlantic

I once flew to Amsterdam in the first class section of a major airline. The seats were comfortable, the staff were pleasant, and the food was great. Those in the seats around me where quiet and respectful, and I managed to get several hours of sleep along the way. Ohhhh, those were the days. : )

I'm writing to you from seat 47K on an Air France flight. Seat 47, in case you are unfamiliar with the layout of a Boeing 747-400, is as far back from first class as Philadelphia is from New York. The entire cattle pen, I mean section, is filled with drunken French passengers. Not good looking ones, either. For being from a country that has such a reputation for beauty and sophistication, these people are not doing them justice. I mean you'd think there would be at least one good looking guy somewhere near me!

Actually, there is one. Next to me is my friend and fellow American, Vidkid Timo. He's staring into space thinking right now, as he didn't bring anything to do on the plane. "Don't need anything," he indicated to me earlier. As for me, I have already gone through four issues of Newsweek. I'm halfway through my magazine stash, and we're not even a quarter of the way through our journey yet.

Timo and I, as you probably well know, are headed to Russia to film amateur porn videos for the next 12 days. Assuming we don't wind up in a Russian jail cell somewhere, I expect to return with at least three new videos of sucking, fucking, and all-around pornographic fun. I have a plan, you see!

When setting up this trip, I knew that Timo and I would be hopelessly lost in Russia. If even a quarter of the reputation about Russia's corruption and crime are accurate, we'll probably be gunned down upon exiting the airport. You all haven't helped alleviate my anxiety, either. Do you have any idea how many warning letters about Russian corruption you folks sent me? I appreciate your concern, but a little reassurance is in order. I mean I'm headed to Moscow, not Mogadishu!

However prevalent local corruption is (I'll let you know while I'm here), language remains an even bigger issue. We can be surrounded by the hottest young men in the world, but if we can't ask to suck their dicks on camera, they won't do us any good. So I engaged the services of a young man by the name of Maxim, an escort and porn star living in Moscow. Director Cadinot fans among you may have seen Maxim in his flick, Safari City.

If all goes according to plan, we will be meeting Maxim just past customs in Russia tomorrow late afternoon (Moscow time). The three of us will then fly to St. Petersburg together. We'll probably want to spend the evening recovering from our trip.

Since there isn't a lot to report right now (except that the Frenchies have quieted down and are trying to sleep), I want to tell you about some of the places we will be visiting. Not the touristy places, either. I have a book all about them, and will figure that all out on the flight from Paris to Moscow. I mean the FUN places. The places I have extensively researched for this trip. The dens of sin and inequity that Timo and I will call home for the next two weeks. : )

When reading this, keep in mind two things. First, the Russian culture has a different view of the age of consent than we Americans do. In the USA a kid needs to be 16-18 before an adult can legally have sex with him. In Russia it's 14 for oral sex, 16 for anal. Second, there Russians have no drinking age. "Or if we do," one Russian put it to me, "it certainly is not enforced." As a result a 14 year old can walk into a bar and get served. This makes for a bar culture which is very youth oriented. Whether this is good or bad for my business remains to be seen, but I'll certainly let you know how everything turns out.


St. Petersburg
- 69 Club. A dance club with a rather interesting way of staying predominantly male. They charge more for women to get in. It's always $1-3 cover for men. Women pay $4 from Tuesday to Thursday and Sunday, $10 on Friday, and $15 on Saturday. I suppose it evens out with the American bars (and phone lines) that charge men while inviting in women for free. Either way, the 69 Club is supposed to be the trendiest dance club in St. Petersburg. And did I mention they have male strip shows? I intend to find out just how much those strippers charge to bare all on video.

- Jungle. This is the oldest club in St. Petersburg and is on the outskirts of town. I've heard it has bad food and cheap drinks, and attracts a teenage crowd. Many of these guys are under 18, and so wouldn't work for filming. But there may be some workable models in the crowd who would like to make a fast buck. If we drop in I'll certainly let you know.

- Sinners. This is supposed to be our best bet for recruiting guys in bars. It is a huge bar with four floors and a romantic view from the roof. There are go-go buys all night long, and nude dancers mix with the crowd inviting the guests to paint the dancers with body paint. Filming this is probably too much to hope for, but then again you never know. I have been told their English-language menu has prices to take the strippers out on escort. That will certainly be an interesting sight. We'll have to be careful here though, as one source claimed this place was Mafia-owned.

- Kat'Kin Sadik. This isn't a bar, but rather is a cruisy area in Pushkin Park. s many as 50 guys cruise around the monument to Catherine the Great. My sources tell me that in Russia, those with money go to the bars, and those without hang out in the park. If that is the case, perhaps we'll meet a few good looking young men who would like to earn a nice wad of American bills. I certainly hope so!


Moscow
- Chance. This is the oldest gay club in all of Russia. It has a giant "fish tank" above the club where go-go boys dive in at 2AM and go for a swim. It used to be that they took off their g-strings while they swam, but I understand a Gullani-type mayor in Moscow has put an end to that practice. Rest assured, I will investigate this travesty to the best of my ability. My journalistic ethics tell me that it is my civic duty to find just how hung they really are.

- Central Station. Another late-night bar that has strip shows beginning at 2am. Don't these people sleep at night? They're as bad as New Yorkers. Anyway, I'm told it is an upscale alternative to Chance. It won't be the best place to recruit models, but won't be bad either.

- Three Monkeys. This gay bar makes its money by offering free entrance. As a result, it is filled with hustlers and daddies buying them drinks. I have been told that Russian soldiers hustle outside, as their base pay allows only for a minimal existence. Always a supporter of gays in the military (or straights I understand some of them are), I will do what I can to make sure they earn some money while I am there.

- Barracks. This is right next door to Three Monkeys. It is a combination bar/sex club with video rooms, booths, gloryholes, and more. Upstairs is the Chameleon, a dance club for local youngsters. Many of these guys are available for hire. As one sex tourist put it, "I asked the bartender who was available. He just gestured at the dance floor and said 'all of them'". Sure enough, the tourist picked one out and wound up playing with him in the club downstairs. The most he ever spent there for a guy was $50. Definitely cheaper than my rates!

(Incidentially, Timo and I are staying half a block from the Three Monkeys, Barracks, and Chameleon. Convenient, eh?)

- Nemo Sauna. This men-only sauna is a bathhouse, not a club. It allows public nudity after 9pm at night. It is inexpensive ($4), but not the cleanest place around. Not the best place to recruit models, but it might be worth a shot.

- Kitai-Gorod. This is the best cruising place in Moscow. It attracts several hundred guys on warm evenings. Many of these guys are looking for free sex, but others are hustling for extra money. It is not far from the Kremlin I am told, and soldiers-hustlers often ply their trade here as well. I'm told this is a must-see for Timo and I.

All in all, a good assortment of places to see. Moscow will definitely be the easier of the two cities in which to film. Besides having more places to recruit models, we also have more leads on interested guys there. Maxim also knows the owner of a local escort agency, so that will make recruiting there a snap. I expect that our problem in Moscow will be a lack of time to film, not a lack of models. That will be a welcome change from Amsterdam, where we spent much of our days trying to recruit models.

We're headed to St. Petersburg first, and will get our first taste of Russian culture there. I look forward to getting to know the Russian people, gay community, and culture. I especially look forward to getting to know Maxim. He's so hot! And the guys he has recruited look great, too.

More when I reach Moscow!

--Aaron


It's around 6pm local time and I'm in the air between Moscow and St. Petersburg. The plane I am in is fairly old, with furnishings that were probably quite modern in the 1970's. That describes much of the Moscow airport, actually. I haven't seen anything else in the country yet, so I can't say if that trend will continue.

Arriving in Russia, Timo and I were lucky enough to get through passport control in ten minutes. I have never seen a line move so slowly in my life. There were only five people ahead of us, and it still took that long. Shortly after we got in line several plans landed and the line swelled to another 75 people behind us. Needless to say we were very glad of our timing, and made it through no problem.

Customs were a little more complicated. Timo had nothing to declare, so he zoomed right through the green line. I had to tell the Russian officials that I had a huge pile of cash with me. I could have gone through the green line, but I didn't want to risk some random search which might result in thousands of dollars being seized. That could happen either coming into the country, or when I try to take what money I have leftover back out. Fortunately the red line proved to be a good choice in this case. The woman let me through without so much as the slightest hint of an unexpected "tax." My lucky day perhaps? Dunno. But my pile of dollars made it through unscathed.

Maxim met us on the other side. He's cute! And friendly! He led us to the proper shuttle bus (an ancient van, really) that for the price of 15 roubles (fifty cents) each, took us from one terminal to another several miles away. Actually the terminals are quite close, but the entrances require a long drive outside of airport property. There didn't seem to be any sort of official transportation.

We had several hours to kill, so we sat for a while at the Moscow airport talking and getting to know each other. I don't know Maxim well yet, but I'm guessing he has a wild streak in him. Probably just as well - I know that both Vidkid Timo and I do as well. In the words of someone famous whose name I can't recall, "I think this is going to be the start of a beautiful relationship."

`More tomorrow! We're going to go to our hotel in St. Pete and go to bed. It may only be dinnertime here, but we're exhausted. I'll get some pictures posted tomorrow, as there isn't much to show you today.

--Aaron

PS, A lot of you were concerned that we'd get into trouble for filming in Russia. I wouldn't worry - their laws consider filming porn to be a misdemeanor. Actually they consider filming any type of porn to be a minor offense, so even if we were filming 8 year-olds we wouldn't be in much trouble until we returned to the States. That isn't our purpose though, and we will be keeping strict records regarding people's ages. If customs (Russian or American) gives us any trouble, we'll able to prove they are 18. So don't worry about me getting in trouble while I'm there. But be prepared to call Amnesty International and to write your Congressmen just in case. : )

PPS, Two hours later. I am at the hotel now. One of the airlines (don't know which) lost my luggage by sending it to Helsinki. Seriously! Luckily I have my carryons, which include my camera and money. All that is lost is my clothes, condoms, lube, and toiletries. Replacable stuff if need be. Off to bed now, will film tomorrow.