Yesterday, straight couples did their damnedest to make Valentine’s’s Day a romantic success. Two gay men in Pattaya put all of their efforts to shame. And set a new world record while they were at it. Nontawat Jaroengsornsinpose and his partner Thanakorn Sittiamthong locked lips for 50 hours and 25 minutes, breaking the previous world record by over 4 hours.

The two took part in Pattaya’s annual World’s Longest Continuous Kiss Contest held at “Ripley’s Believe It Or Not” in the Royal Garden Plaza on Pattaya Beach Road. The only gay male couple to enter the event, their winning kiss also netted them a 30,000 baht diamond wedding ring and a 6,000 baht hotel voucher. In Pattaya, a bar boy forced to kiss that long would walk away with less than a 3,000 baht tip.

The contest, which started on the 13th, required couples to maintain a kiss and remain within 1 meter of each other at all times, even when mother nature called. When a contestant had to go a referee accompanying the couple to the restroom would keep his eye on them to make sure the kiss was not broken.

The last gay couple to hold the record were Matty Daley and Bobby Canciello from New Jersey who kissed for 39 hours straight. Their record was trounced last year at Pattaya’s event by a straight Thai couple who mooched for 46 hours. Nontawat and Thanakorn’s efforts this year earned them a spot in the Guinness Book of World Records.

Sounds to me like one of the local gay gogo bars need to field a team for next year’s competition. The bragging rights for having two of the world’s leading kissers on staff should be priceless.