Forgotten Notes

Over the course of our month long trip, there were a few events that were hilarious or noteworthy but not enough to write an entire blog about. We called these forgotten notes…

1. In the Chiang Mai hospital B spent at least an hour on the phone trying to get the paper work to come through. For some reason, the idea of faxing or calling a foreign country was nearly impossible. While speaking to the Canadian insurance rep in a state of pure frustration, B uttered my favorite line of the day, “I’m in a Thai hospital and they are holding me and my passport hostage!”

2. After getting two massages prior to this, we decided to splurge and spend 30$ on a 3 hour massage extravaganza. This included a one hour foot massage, a one hour traditional Thai massage and a one hour oil massage.

We were seated next to each other in a very dimly lit area, sat in comfy chairs with soft blankets and told to settle in for our first massage. During the foot massage, I noticed that my masseuse had some strange techniques. She had a very light touch and would sometimes slow to a complete stop. After a few minutes of this I started to wonder… so I barely opened one eye and peeked out at her to find that she was in fact, falling asleep. She was one hundred percent nodding off and then jerking back awake. I didn’t know what to do… Every time she fell asleep I’d slightly move my leg to jostle her awake again. I was annoyed but I knew that the Thai massage was next and there was no way she could fall asleep in such a physically demanding massage.

I was wrong. When massaging my hands at the end of the Thai massage, she most certainly nodded off several times. Then came the oil massage where, guess what? She fell asleep again.

Feeling pretty ripped off at the end of it, I took the manager to the side and quietly expressed my displeasure. I was incredibly nice about it, “maybe she’s sick?” but that isn’t how it works here in Thailand. The manager practically sprinted over to the lady to ball her out and I quietly put my money on the table and ran the hell out of there. Confrontation? No thanks! I hope you enjoyed your nap, ma’am.

3. During the same massage, B had an interesting experience as well. In Thailand, masseuses are less um, respectful of your privacy. A hot oil massage is always a shirtless event of course, but every Thai massage ends with a stretching sequence that involves raising your arms above your head and the masseuse grabbing your body and swinging it to and fro. My lady was kind enough to let me put my shirt on but B wasn’t so lucky. There she was, her and a strange Thai woman, just doing some naked stretching. When in Thailand…

4. Keep in mind, B had injured her foot just days before this happened… The level of cheapness we reached was astonishing. It was February 1^st and we headed for our last dinner in Chiang Mai to our favorite haunt only to find out that they had shut down. We saw them packing all their shit into the back of a pick up truck and closing up shop. So, disappointed, we head to another of our favorite stops only to find that it was closed for the night (It was 6pm, by the way.) Then off to our third favorite stop… looks like that place is closed for the night as well. The entire city was desolate and since we didn’t want to pay $4 at our hostel, we kept on trucking. Walking aimlessly for over an hour until we finally decided to cave and eat street food for the very first time. It was a glorious discovery… fresh spring rolls for mere cents? Fresh fruit? Fried rice and chicken for a dollar? If only it was cooked with a little more consideration for hygiene. It is a miracle though, neither of us got sick on our entire trip. I had some stomach pains one night but neither of us fell prey to food poisoning.

5. While staying in our bungalow on Koh Phangan, we were sitting in our hammocks relaxing when a man was suddenly standing by our stairs. He made eye contact with me and, unable to simply ignore him, I said hello… his eyes were burning holes in my face so honestly, I had no choice. He was a very strange Australian dude. He proceeded to tell us all about how his girlfriend and him were in a huge fight and how he needs to blow off some steam. Later that night we heard them screaming at each other two bungalows down and then him ripping off on his scooter.

If you’re familiar with Coach from Survivor, imagine this guy a lot like that. He is completely clueless but not realizing it himself. At one point I was sitting in my hammock when I notice him standing in front of a huge palm tree. His girlfriend is standing in the water watching him and he pats his hands onto the side of the tree to get a grip on it, shouting to her, “How many do you want?” I ran inside to get B, “Jesus, this guy is gonna try to climb this tree.” He was forever dubbed Coconut Bob after that. Sadly he never got that coconut.

Whenever we left the house we always had to so in a hurry because Coconut Bob had a habit of hopping onto his scooter and chasing us down. We stopped at the 7-11 once, knowing he had followed us when he said, “Hey!” We responded, “Oh, Hi” like we hadn’t noticed him 3 feet behind us. “I saw you leave. I’m stalking you.” And that was the end of our conversations with Coconut Bob. We expected to see him randomly pop out from trees for rest of our trip.

6. Speaking of the bungalow… It is insane what you get used to. I could drool with more water pressure than our shower in that hut. You couldn’t even hear the shower when you were sitting in the main room. When you were using it, you had to crouch down to take advantage of gravity which would get the pressure just high enough to remove soap off your body.

7. Here’s a rundown of the two scooter accidents B got into. Now, she’ll try to tell you otherwise but don’t let her fool you.

She got cocky one night when we were returning to our bungalow. Coconut Bob always parked so close to the huts and B was determined to do the same. She made me dismount then pulled the gas and went full speed into the deepest sand, dropping the scooter onto its side. Just a few scrapes though!

The second time was in the parking lot of the mall in Phuket. We had plenty of bags and she offered to put one on the handle bar. When moving out of our parking spot, from my perspective, she floored it straight into the back of another scooter. As she tells it, the bag got stuck on the brake. However you put it, she still rammed that scooter with several people watching. No one even blinked an eye though and we backed up and busted out of there.

That being said, two little mishaps is nothing short of a miracle when driving in that environment. I’m very proud of B for handling herself in literally the most stressful driving conditions I can imagine.

But she totally crashed twice.

8. Finally, an update on B’s ankle. As you know, she had a mishap jumping off of an elephant and was diagnosed in Chiang Mai with a 2^nd degree ligament tear. Seeing as her foot remained swollen and sore for the entire trip, the first thing she did when we got back was go to the doctor for x-rays.

About an hour later she got a call, “You need to come in immediately.” After around 8 x-rays and various scans, it turns out that not only is her tibia and fibula cracked, her talus bone (above the heel bone) is shattered. The doctor called it the biggest misdiagnosis he has ever seen. The only option now is an ankle replacement surgery. This is major, folks. You’d think they would have rushed her in right away but she is currently being passed from surgeon to surgeon because they’re all throwing their hands up in the air when they see her scans. Seriously, nobody knows how to fix this.

On the plus side, she’s in very little pain and her biggest concern right now is not being in a cast for her brother’s wedding. My biggest concern is that she is healed in time for rafting season.

Overall, we absolutely loved our time in Thailand. I would love to go back now that I know what I liked and what I didn’t find so fun. Before we can do that though, we have another adventure to plan…

Thanks for reading!

Our Last Week

We underestimated how much travel can take out of a person. After four weeks of being in an Asian country, switching homes every few nights, going out for every meal, it can make a person miss the comforts of home. That being said, it’s not like we had a bad last week, it was quite the opposite. For the last four days before leaving, we got daily massages and didn’t eat a stitch of fried rice. We found the best Italian restaurant I’ve ever eaten at and made it our spot for dinner every night.

We did go on one tour, a boat ride to the Phi Phi Islands and Khai Nai Island. I will admit, I wasn’t excited about this tour because of how motion sick I get but it was surprisingly mellow and I was able to enjoy it. The smaller Phi Phi Island, Phi Phi Leh can be seen in the movie The Beach but apparently the making of the movie was hugely damaging. I guess paradise wasn’t perfect enough for the movie makers so they completely tore apart the island to reconstruct it, introducing plants that are not even native to the area as well as destroying many that were. In other words, Leo is such a jerk!

An interesting piece of history about Phi Phi Don, the larger of the two islands is that it was nearly completely destroyed by the 2005 Tsunami and it wasn’t until 2010 that the majority of it was finally finished being rebuilt. One of my regrets is that we didn’t stay on Phi Phi Don. After having about an hour to walk around the island it had a very relaxed vibe that reminded me a lot of Chiang Mai but in a compressed area. Despite all the tourist shops, it seemed like a place you could get a bungalow and relax.

Along the way to the islands we stopped at a lot of sight-seeing locations where everyone rushed up and plastered themselves against the windows of the boat. At this point, I was content to sit in the middle of the boat and let people fight to see rocks and take poorly angled photos with partial boat railings in them. I’m sure in week one I would have kicked my own ass and told myself to take a look but when you’re burnt out on week 5 it’s like, rocks? Monkeys? I’ve seen those. Plus, the guide stole B’s camera and took about 30 shots of monkeys in various positions so it’s pretty much like I saw them myself. I could even make a flip book for you.

On our last day we hit up the Big C for our snacks and of course, the best souvenir anyone could have, a legit Thai broom. You bet your buns I carried this thing on 3 plane rides and got countless stares. I'm sure they just regretted not buying one themselves.

Then we had to prep for the longest two days of our lives. Our first flight was a one hour flight at 11:30pm on Monday the 20^th from Phuket to Bangkok. We checked in at about 9:30pm and sat at our gate until boarding at 11:15pm only to be turned away because we were apparently at the wrong gate. Looking at our tickets, they actually said 10:30pm so we hit full sprint towards what we were told was the correct gate only to get to our seats on the plane to find people sitting in them. The flight attendant checked our tickets which definitely said some Russian people’s names on them instead of ours. B was in full panic but knowing that our next flight was in 8 hours, I wasn’t particularly concerned. Eventually they got it sorted and threw us in any available seat. The lesson here, don’t fly Air Asia!

Bangkok airport at midnight is bustling like a beehive, if all the bees were on strike and sleeping on the floor. We got some midnight rice followed by some save for later cake and went in search for somewhere comfy to have a snooze until 8am. Unfortunately, somewhere comfy does not exist in an airport. I think I managed one restless hour of sleep in a chair worse than the bus from hell and we ventured over to our gate at about 4 or 5am. We proceeded to eat our cake, because what else are we supposed to do at 4am?

Back on the lovely Japan Airlines, we had a 6 hour flight to Tokyo which was filled with more not-so-delicious foods followed by highly delicious ice cream. I actually read the other day that the owner of Japan Airlines not only gives up the majority of his income in order to increase the income of his employees, but he also takes the bus to work every day. This makes me like JAL even more. And their aprons are so damn cute.

A short 45 minute layover in Tokyo and my eyes were feeling like sandpaper. The air is so dry, seriously bring eye drops if you are taking a flight as long as this. Then our last leg of the flight, Tokyo to Vancouver, was a whopping 9 hours of sleepless flight. I did manage to watch In Time, 50/50 and Ides of March though. I’d skip In Time but you should watch the others.

And so, we finally made it home to the beautiful Vancouver airport where I was giddier than a hoarder on garbage day. My first trip to the bathroom and I could count at least 6 things in there I was thankful for: toilet paper, warm water, hand towels, hand soap, auto-flush, an actual TOILET!

So in short, as much as we adore Thailand, we are damn glad to be home.

Ping Pong Show

Let’s start this off with a warning, this post isn’t for the kiddies or the prudes. Most people go to Ping Pong Shows in Thailand and refuse to write about it – it’s something that people are only comfortable telling their friends in person so the information can’t get into the wrong hands. Well, I’m not like that, so here goes.

For those of you blissfully unaware of what a Ping Pong Show is, it is a display of vaginal talents performed on stage by lovely Asian women who must spend hours honing their craft. To be specific, they do weird shit with their nether regions.

B and I had heard of the Ping Pong Shows long before going to Thailand and always intended to see one but didn’t know where to look. After meeting a few people on our trip, they told us which seedy streets to walk on and sure enough, we were bombarded by people holding signs advertising the various spectacles within. After being convinced by a lady that “Free Entry” was only for the next hour, we followed her into a building, past rows and rows of bars and poles and finally into a huge white door with the words, “The Secret” hanging above. It was dark and it was empty.

That’s right, B and I and a dark room with a black lit stage. We were seated directly in front of the stage for optimal viewing, I assume, and immediately the show began. The deal at the shows is that entry is free but you have to buy a drink. That seems like a steal but the drinks are 900 to 1200 baht. To translate, a Coke is 30 bucks. Thankfully we were pre-warned about this so it wasn’t entirely shocking, you just have to ask yourself, “Is seeing a string of razor blades come out of a vagina worth a cool 30 dollars?” The answer is yes.

What a show. Firstly, since we were the only people watching the show it meant that we were, by default, volunteers. Within moments of sitting down, a man came out and handed us each two balloons. We were directed onto the stage where a semi-haggard looking Thai woman laid down and inserted some sort of blow dart device into her hoo-ha and proceeded to shoot darts at us until she popped all of the balloons. It was terrifying, disgusting, and fun.

The tricks were broken up with dance numbers by some much better looking Thai girls as well as lap dance type performances. Not knowing that, they asked again for volunteers (a few more spectators had trickled in by this point) and since B is such a go-getter, I insisted she be one of them. Little did we know, B had to lie down on a mat to get a massage by 3 women, naked, using only their breasts. Needless to say, I was near-hyperventilating with laughter by the end of it.

In addition to the razor blades and the darts, some of the other marvels we saw were: A woman pulling sewing needles out of her great dark fortress, a woman “swallowing” water from a coke bottle into what I can only assume was her uterus, only to empty out a dark liquid thought to be coke into another bottle, the usual ping pong in and out show, a woman honking a horn, a woman smoking two cigarettes (I bet her OBGYN is not pleased about that,) and a woman pulling a seemingly endless string of flowers from her garden.

Since fair is fair, B volunteered me for the “sexy lapdance” which was similar to her violation but I was sitting instead of lying down. The girls were all very nice and repeatedly apologized for subjecting us to this. I guess they forgot we paid out the ass to be here.

Our final time on stage was both of us and two obnoxious Australians… This involved one of the women to lie on a mat with two of us on either side. We then had to eat apple slices off of her various body parts. Seems simple, right? Unfortunately they kept moving causing us to mouth-chase them all over the mat. A ridiculous sight I’m sure but at least we got a healthy snack out of it.

Although some of the things were a little grim, the shock wears off when they open with the whole razor blade act – I mean, what could be worse than that?

So if you’re in Thailand and want to see women commit acts of violence against their unmentionables just ask me where to go.

S.

White Water Rafting III

We did it again! In the province just above Phuket there is a river that hosts rafting trips. Sadly, it is dry season right now so the river is quite low. We didn’t realize though, that it is so low that hundreds of boats have to line up at the edge of the dam and they then open it up for about 45 minutes while we all play bumper boats down the length of it.

It definitely wasn’t the best rafting trip but we didn’t have a terrible time. It seemed like most people were there solely to splash water at each other. B and I are now serious rafters (serious face) so we weren’t in the mood for such antics. The amount of capsized boats was astonishing. The river was mild but no one knew what they were doing and with so many boats in such a concentrated area, it was a recipe for disaster. At one point we saw just a helmet bobbing down the river.

Before our rafting trip, we stopped off at a monkey cave that had countless monkeys all throwing shit and eating bananas bought by tourists. They were all obese too, and there were remnants of ‘nanner just lying all over the ground. This is clearly the all you can eat buffet of the jungle. Since hearing a horror story about monkeys I was very careful to NEVER MAKE EYE CONTACT. Except once. With a baby. Because I could totally beat him in a fight.

The cave itself was awesome and even had a bat cave alcove. I had a momentary batman feeling and was about to walk in but then I saw the actual bats and we booked it back to the van. Unpredictable little buggers.

We met the first non-asshole Australian people of the entire trip. A group of 3 that ended up being our rafting partners for the day. The car ride home was filled with song, us all trying to find one that we each knew the lyrics too. Barbie Girl by Aqua had the most accuracy. It also got us thinking about which songs we knew the entire length of. B’s is Bohemian Rhapsody and mine is Gangsta’s Paradise. I tried to learn all the lyrics to Jump by Kriss Kross once but that is a surprisingly long song so I settled for learning Gangsta’s Paradise by Coolio. It’s amazing what pressure does to your memory though, we both stalled and petered out a verse in.

I guess I’m just not destined to be a performer, who knew.

S.

Happy Birthday To Me

Yup, I’m another year older and I got to celebrate it in a tropical paradise. Or a mall. Yup, totally a mall.

We planned to do white water rafting for my birthday but after learning it would be a total of 4 hours in the car, and with my tendency to get car sick like a 6 year old, I decided to be lame and go see a movie instead. Rafting will be tomorrow but today was a day of relaxation, pampering, and lady boys.

We woke up to hear about a bombing happening in Bangkok. When I looked further into it, the news said an Iranian man (those guys need to lighten up a bit) had a bomb go off in his own house as part of what may have been an accident. He ran out of the house bleeding and tried to hail a cab to the hospital. When the cabbie wouldn’t take him, he promptly threw a grenade at him. When the police came, he threw a grenade at them as well, which bounced off of a tree and blew his own legs off. World’s dumbest criminal? Coincidentally, we saw a Thai man with no legs crawling on the floor at the mall today, begging for change. Coincidence?

So we got our asses out of bed after B sang me an impressive rendition of Birthday Sex and we did what I always wanted to do on my birthday – drive around Phuket looking for a gas station in sweltering heat. Next stop was the mall where we found a grocery store. Not a hoity toity grocery store where a box of granola bars is $7 but a real extra foods type grocery store called The Big C. I know this sounds strange, but the level of excitement was through the roof. When you eat at restaurants with a budget of $10 a day, a grocery store is a very welcome change. They also don’t have very many here. Most people seem to shop at local stands or 7-11. I’ve literally seen 3 grocery stores in an entire month of being here.

Next stop was pedicures – I picked neon pink, obviously. The level of hygiene left much to be desired and at one point she shaved the bottom of my foot off with a razor blade. This is illegal in Canada but common practice here I suppose. I had very tender heels for the remainder of the day. B’s pedicure was extremely painful, or at least it seemed so as she spent the entire time with her hands clenched in fists with a worried look on her face.

Next was lunch and blizzards, obviously. Then movie time. The movie choices here were pretty terrible. All mindless action flicks, Safe House, Man on a Ledge, Contraband – we went with Man on a Ledge, it cost a whopping $2.50. Thai movie theaters are interesting. Firstly, there are different levels of seats: deluxe, superior and a couch. Once you pick your seat type, you get to pre-choose where your seat is from a monitor, similar to going to a concert. After watching countless commercials, I was confused when the people in front of us stood up, “Are they leaving?” Then everyone else stood up and the screen turned to the Thai national anthem with pictures of their king flashing. One thing about Thailand, they really love their king. People have calendars with his face on it. Who in Canada has a 12 month calendar of Stephen Harper? Thought not.

Man on a Ledge was as can be expected but it was nice to be in an air-conditioned facility for a few hours. Next stop was GROCERY SHOPPING! One of the highlights of my day, believe it or not. Breakfast has been really rough for us here. We can never find anything to eat and we end up paying out the ass for gross food. Since we are in the same hostel for a week, we decided to spring for a toaster! Yup, we bought a toaster. It even toasts little suns onto the bread. We also bought a two loaf pack of bread (less than a dollar) as well as jam, a 6 Liter jug of water and a cake, of course. All of this had to be held, by me, on the back of our scooter for a drive through chaos-town at night.

Next up was the Hardrock Café for dinner. We saw it the other night and there was quite the performance of Thai people dressed like 80’s rock stars singing Evanescence and Black Eyed Peas songs so there was no way we could pass that up. I paid an obscene amount of money for my meal. It was $20 Canadian but when you are used to paying $2 for a meal, that really stings. Our water was THREE DOLLARS for a small size bottle. We got 6 Liters for 1 dollar just an hour prior. Truly painful. I am getting cheaper and cheaper every day. You know it’s bad when you waver between two menu options because one is 75 cents cheaper than the other even though you don’t want it.

The asian band was followed by a bunch of bikini clad girls hanging out in a foam pit. Then the bikini contest which involved the girls dancing for what seemed like 20 minutes. Just sweating under the lights and extremely exhausted. The chipper host, “Come on, sexy girls, we are going to burn our fats tonight!” I thought it would end after the dance with the usual applause-o-meter but it kept going when the girls had to do a hula hoop contest. Not a single one dropped. They hula hooped for so long that the host actually called an end to it and made them all jump rope. Still, no one faltered and we had to resort to the applause.

We were about to leave when but the cabaret show started. This involved 3 lady boys in various outfits very poorly lipsynching to Beyonce, Tina Turner and CCR. A trainwreck impossible to look away from.

Then off to bed to wake up bright and early for rafting.

Anyone who knows me, knows that this is quite happily, exactly how I’d spend my birthday.

S.

Phuket and Valentine's Day

Happy Valentine’s Day from Phuket! We arrived here at 11pm last night and boy was it ever one of those long days of travel.

We woke up at 8am to do our least favorite activity: pack. I loathe packing and moving, so much so that we’ve decided this will be the last time we do it before we head home. Since Phuket is our last destination, and the island is about a one hour journey from top to bottom, we figure we can stay put at one hostel and just scooter when we need to.

Check out time is 10am so we had a quick breakfast and then it was off to the ferry. The ferry was at 12:30, or so they said, but we had to go one by one due to our not so practical mode of travel. B scootered me to the ferry with my bag (a 15 minute ride) then she headed back to the hostel for her bag, dropped it off with me at the port, returned the scooter, walked to the port and met me. The things we get done before noon are astonishing.

So we sat in the blistering heat from 11:30 to… Oh the ferry is an hour late, as always. A surprisingly smooth 3 hour ferry ride to the mainland and we arrived in Don Sak. Let me tell you about transport in Thailand, it is a fucking mad house. There is very little organization, a lot of yelling, and hundreds of people in panic mode. So we ran our asses off to the bus, not wanting to miss it or sit on the floor and made it in time. This is a one hour bus, the double decker sort, that we take to another town, Surat Thani. I didn’t think a bus could be shittier than that first bus we took but imagine that one then transport it back 20 years.

When we arrived in Surat Thani, it was complete chaos. They were shouting at us, “OFF THE BUS! NOW! FAST! HURRY! YOU WILL MISS YOUR BUS!” I felt like we arrived at Auschwitz and they realized I don’t have any skills. I ran to get our bags and B ran to the ticket office. They put the stickers on our shirts (all major transit is organized by stickers on your clothes) and we were off to find our bus.

After countless Thai people pointed in the direction of this giant double decker bus, we started moving that way, only to be stopped by a few more who pointed at a pick up truck in front of said bus. Entirely confused, we asked again and again… we threw our bags into the truck thinking that perhaps it is just transporting the luggage but when the Thai man clearly told us that we were to get in as well, that was that. A uncovered shortbox pick up transporting Me, B, three Italian men plus all of our baggage. It was a very tight fit and for all we knew, that was where we would be for the next five hours.

With the wind in our hair, we were just starting to get comfortable after ten minutes or so but suddenly we pulled over to a tour agency where we were told we would be for the next half an hour until our mini-bus arrived. They then extorted us for an additional 300 baht (about $10) to take us directly to our hostel instead of just dropping us off in butt fuck nowhere. Lovely, lovely.

When the mini-bus arrived, there were 14 passengers and 13 seats plus at least one bag of luggage per person. When we all didn’t fit, they told us all to get out and they pulled all of our luggage to the curb as well. Since I am a rational person, my first assumption was that they were going to get a different bus but naturally, I was wrong. After a 5 minute reorganization they managed to Jenga us all in there a bit more efficiently and we were off. Incredibly squished, but on our way.

When we got to Phuket in the middle of the night, our driver had no idea where our hostel was. He said he was going to drop us off at a mall and we could get a taxi from there. Hell no. I didn’t get extorted for nothing, sir! We made him drive around aimlessly and stop for us to try and find maps, to try and get net connection, to ask countless taxi drivers. Eventually we found it though and it is a beaut!

What a great way to finish off the trip. Our hostel is the most like a hotel we’ve been in so far. The bed is huge, there is a wardrobe for clothes, a vanity, a real shower, water that actually gets hot, multiple towels, a mini-fridge and wait for it… My absolute favorite, HAND SOAP! This is the first place to have hand soap since our very first hostel in Bangkok. It may not sound like much but when you had to flush the last toilet you peed in by pouring a ladle full of water into it, you really appreciate the little things.

So we woke up this morning feeling good about life and exploring Phuket. We rented a scooter, found the beach (which is extremely packed but we are going to find another one soon!) and the mall. It seems like after a long day of travel, we need western comforts. We had pizza and ice cream for our Valentine’s meal today and it was fantastic.

Driving here was an insane adventure. It is reminiscent of driving in downtown Vancouver right after a hockey game lets out. The amount of people is insane and the roads are filled with scooters. I’m glad B is a great driver because if it was me behind the wheel, well we’d be staying home.

S.

Ang Thong National Marine Park

Last night I was reading through some old e-mails from some friends who had been to Thailand and noticed a suggestion to do a tour of Ang Thong National Marine Park which is a 100 sq km area housing just over 40 islands of rock formations, all uninhabited except for one. We only had one full day left on this island though so we ran to our reception area and booked one for today by the skin of our teeth. B wanted to do snorkeling and I wanted to do kayaking, this one just so happened to have both.

So, 8am bright and early we got packed up, fired up the scooter to blast to 7-11 for yogurt and waited for our guide. It’s always interesting when the taxis pick you up because it’s usually a truck full of other foreigners and rarely does anyone talk to each other. I’m always car sick, so that’s my excuse. You’re about to spend all day with these people though, you’d think you’d say hello.

Oh, before I go on, I need to mention that as we were leaving, my hammock got caught on B’s arm and tore it about 6 inches.

Anyhow, we met up with the other taxis, had some fruit for breakfast and then we were off. It was a speed boat through the ocean where slowly these rock islands started appearing. Honestly, I took two gravol so I was fighting sleep at this point but I do remember a rock formation resembling a skull closely and another resembling a monkey.

Our first stop was to go snorkelling for about an hour. I happen to get quite panicked when snorkelling – my body is highly confused when presented with breathing under water and it would rather not. But since B always holds my hand and guides me through the water like a 6 year old, it is do-able. We saw a ton of fish, though mostly just schools of the same type. B saw a jelly fish as well, which was when I decided my time frolicking in the deep sea was over and I booked it back to the boat.

Another short ride and we arrived on an island that has a lagoon which was featured in the movie The Beach with Leonardo Dicaprio. It was a brutal climb up incredibly steep steps but worth it by far. It’s a damn shame we couldn’t swim in it but it was getting destroyed by the chemicals in our sunscreen so they had to close off swimming permanently. Oh well, at least we got to look at it!

Next stop was lunch and then kayaking. B and I have developed quite a taste for massaman curry which is a red curry with potato and chicken usually, which we get over rice. It is SO good. They served this at lunch as well as some fried veggies and noodles.

I’ve never been kayaking but since my hard on for rafting started, I figure anything with a paddle will suffice. Man, it was rough. We were given zero instruction other than, “Go to that island, half way around and back.” No guide, just us and the open sea! It was QUITE windy today, by the way.

When B gets nervous or awkward, she laughs uncontrollably. So when I was getting pissed off, not knowing how to control our water craft and she is in the back in a giggle fit, I believe i said something like, “I realize you are laughing but I am currently scared for my life.” And it’s true, I was pretty sure we were going to tip. On the way back we had to constantly row and row hard because the waves were so strong and directing us into the nearest rock island. We made it though, just in time to watch everyone else fail miserably trying to get back.

There was a guy on the tour with us who was maybe 30 years old and had clearly taken a diving course recently. He showed up wearing water shoes, shorts to his knees, a skin tight diving shirt that was long sleeve, some sporty streamline shades and a bucket hat. His shins, hands, and face were the only skin exposed. Maybe he has that same disease that Powder has.

The way back on the boat was the roughest I’ve ever experience. We were getting pummelled by the waves and I had to sit in the back holding my towel over my face as the water assaulted us. We got back to the hostel with so much salt on us that we could literally brush it off of our skin.

Then off to the food market where we saw this, clearly the best part of my night:

When we got home from the market, we had our traditional evening hammock rest while looking out at the night sky. Mine ended abruptly with a ripping sound and my ass flat on the floor. Just another day in paradise.

S.

Koh Phangan, Take Two.

As you know, I’ve been feeling pretty down about this island. I had a rough few days but yesterday we decided to rent scooters to explore a bit more. We had been wavering on the idea of scooters because safety is a big concern for us. One in every ten people here seem to be covered in bandages from scooter accidents, the roads can be rough and filled with people, and no one wears helmets.

Naturally, since we are Safety Sallys, we insisted on finding a bike with good brakes and solid helmets. We found a nice one, after walking around for about an hour in the sweltering heat and without any training other than, “This is how you turn it on,” we were off onto the open road. There aren’t many road rules here but we just keep to the very side and pray for the best.

We put less than 2 dollars worth of gas in our hog and with a full tank of gas and a couple of full bellies we rode until the pavement turned to dirt. Then, concerned for our well being, we turned around and did it all again. In doing so, we found an amazing little night food market with the most delicious banana pancakes! A banana pancake is a very popular dessert here that isn’t anything like it sounds. It is a very thinly spread piece of dough that is put on a griddle and then filled with your desired fruit. The dough is then folded over the fruit, fried again, and then covered in your desired topping (nutella and chocolate seem to be common ones.) It is then cut into squares and eaten in seconds.

We also found the most beautiful beach I’ve ever seen in my life. It is on the north part of this island in a place called Choluklum. We promised ourselves we’d come back in the morning before we checked out but it turns out that the hostel we booked on Koh Tao was full and they had to cancel our reservation. With a stroke of luck, we googled the bungalows on that perfect beach and not only are they in our price range, they had one free the very next night. HAAAALLELUJAH!

We woke up this morning with smiles on our faces. MOVING DAY! We finally got to say good riddance to the shit hole that was Red Cube and hello to where screen savers must be made. This place is GORGEOUS.

Not wanting to spend an arm and a leg on taxi services, we decided to transport our luggage to our new bungalow ourselves... on our scooter. No, we’re not total idiots, we didn’t try to take both backpacks at once. First B got on, she’s the driver. Then I strapped one backpack on and took the bitch position on the back of our 150CC beast. So maybe we have to lean forward to stream line our bodies against the wind resistance when going up hills but hey, we made it. Renting a scooter was the best decision we’ve made since coming to this island. I can say that with confidence because I’m writing this from the hammock on the deck of our bungalow overlooking heaven.

S.

Full Moon Party

I thought the full moon party was happening this week but it turns out it was just a Jersey Shore convention... Oh well. Yup, it was a beach packed with 20,000 good looking people and 10,000 ugly ones, all covered in neon body paint and drinking buckets of alcohol.

For those of you who don’t know, the Full Moon Party is a party on Haad Rin beach on the island of Koh Phangan. It hosts about 30,000 people on the full moon every month. To put that into perspective, only 12,000 people actually live on this island. If you’re young and in Thailand, there is no way you are going to miss this party.

We stayed about 20 minutes away from Haad Rin in an attempt to avoid all the noise but we all know how much fun I had there! We taxi’d to the party at about 10pm that night and walked into complete chaos.

I’m not much of a partier nor a drinker so this is quite out of my element. In all honesty, if it wasn’t for B, I wouldn’t have even gone to this but I am glad I did. It was the first time I actually had fun on this island! Within about 6 minutes of arriving, we encountered this guy:

Body paint and neon are the sole requirement for dress here – shoes definitely not needed as shown by this flip flop graveyard.

There was food galore and endless supplies of alcohol. Most of the alcohol is served in buckets which include a mickey of alcohol, a can of your desired soda and usually a Red Bull. The Red Bull here though has ephedrine in it, which we were told by a Canadian fire fighter we met later in the evening, which makes you feel like your heart is going to explode. B learned this after consuming her bucket of red bull, vodka and coke but luckily didn’t have any adverse effects other than a case of beer goggles.

The beach was littered with people so thick it was like a full pickle jar when you want that one on the bottom. The beach was lined with bars, each one hosting a different DJ and type of music. You just walked down the beach and stopped for an impromptu dance party whenever you felt the urge.

My four favourite parts of the night are as follows:

First up, the Fire Slide. It is impossible to take good photos in this light so I apologize for the shit quality. This was a giant spider net rope ladder that led up to a platform that housed a big ass slide with water pouring down it. Now, in North America they might have something like this but there would be some sort of safety barricade and there most certainly wouldn’t be pillars of fire on either side. Every time someone would come down, since the slide was wet and so was the pad that you land on at the bottom, the people would FLY off the end and into a crowd of people walking by unknowingly. We stood for some time and watched people get taken out at the knees over and over.

Second up, the Fire Jump Rope. You don’t have to be a trained professional to use this insane jump rope about 20 feet long and lined with flames, you just have to be drunk enough. We watched time and time again as drunken MEN jumped in only to be immediately hit by the rope and then catch on fire themselves (I guess we women aren’t dumb enough to do this.) And to make matters worse, the Thai people running it did nothing to make it safer. In fact, if you happened to perform a miracle and jump the rope successfully, they would just start swinging it faster and faster until only Flash Gordon could triumph.

Third up, when we got back to our hostel at about 4am, we had a 2 minute walk to our door. In that time, a stray dog came up to B. She bent down to say hello to it, “SAAAA WAAAAA DEEE KAAAA PUPPY!” That must be the secret call because it was mere seconds before suddenly there were 5 dogs around her fighting each other for turf. We booked it back to our hostel while I repeated, “Stay calm, they can sense your fear.”

And fourth up... This guy.

S.

Koh Phangan and Red Cube Hostel

We arrived on Koh Phangan a few days ago and walked into hell on earth. Ok, maybe that is an exaggeration but I truly hate it on this island. I wasn’t pleased with Koh Samui because it was so unbelievably touristy but this place has been disappointment at every turn.

Koh Samui is the largest and most developed island of the Gulf of Thailand islands and it seems like there are more Europeans than Thai people there. The island’s sole business appears to be tourism. Every store you pass sells sunglasses, sarongs, shorts and beach hats. Every restaurant boasts American food on their menu. Every second vehicle is a taxi that honks at you, thinking you may have forgotten you need a ride.

That all being said, we had a beautiful hostel with a gorgeous private beached area, a pool, a restaurant, free beach towels to use, and a very cute puppy named Mini.

Now, welcome to the home of the full moon party (that will be another blog entry entirely) and the Red Cube hostel. Firstly, no one knows of the Red Cube. Whenever we go anywhere, the taxi drivers always know the names of the hostels. Not this time, as this place is clearly unpopular.

We were greeted by a woman who took our money, gave us the key to our room, showed us the place and explained the general rules of the hostel. Our room was disappointing to say the least, especially after seeing the very new and inviting lobby they have downstairs. This room reminds me a Czech prison. Our beds are foot to foot and there isn’t a mirror or place to really put anything down but that is all something we can live with.

Then I sat down on my bed. It’s broken. The entire mattress collapsed in on itself and you can feel the outline of every spring. Knowing how hard it is for me to sleep in even the most comfortable bed, B kindly offered to switch with me. She’s such a doll. Now, onto the blankets. There is no flat sheet on the bed, just a fitted one. The blanket is too small to cover the single bed, let alone our bodies in a laying position. I am quite short and B is taller than I am – they do not cover from shoulder to feet.

Ok, so we won’t sleep with the air conditioning on, no biggie. Next, time for a shower before bed, that’ll be nice. The shower head is not in a separate area from the toilet or sink – this is quite common in Thailand that there be no curtain but generally it is to the side so that not everything in the bathroom gets wet. Not at the Red Cube! The shower head points DIRECTLY onto the toilet seat. If you’d like to be standing under the shower, you have to be straddling the toilet. There is no way to avoid getting every single square inch of that bathroom soaked. So, when B had her shower, she made sure to toss the roll of toilet paper out the door to keep it dry.

A few minutes later I hear her yell, “The door in here is just SOAKED” which causes me to look up at the door, where I notice streams of water pouring out from under it and the toilet paper, which is outside the door, soaking wet. I couldn’t help but laugh at this point because, seriously? Did I mention that the entire cube of bathroom is raised a foot off the floor for no apparent reason?

B got out of that shower steaming angry. We haven’t complained much in Thailand because it is usually met with laughter. Dinner takes an hour and you’re unhappy? Say something and you get laughed at. Hurt? Laughter. They take very few things seriously but this just built and built until...

B storms downstairs and let’s it out on the lady who checked us in. She did it in a pretty tame way for her, but it turns out that the woman doesn’t even work here. The owner just asked her to stay here since he was in a motorcycle accident earlier in the day... she gave us two towels to use as additional blankets. Toasty warm!

It’s been two nights and two days and we have yet to talk to anyone with any authority here. The only person who admits to working here is an unpleasant man who continually tells us to wait for someone else who works here to get in. It is beyond frustrating.

Other complaints about the Red Cube, this island, and the last few days:

1. The room, more specifically the bathroom, smells like assholes.

2. I got ice cream down the road today and it tasted like chemical.

3. I got a curry and rice dish at a restaurant today that had a dead fly in it. At least it was cooked, right?

4. Haad Rin beach is covered in garbage. Ban Tai beach is covered in rocks... and garbage.

5. There is never anyone at this hostel – staying or working here.

6. The prices here are insanely over inflated. Every day is like being in a sports arena but they charge you to use the bathroom.

7. Their specially made custom logo curtain is too small for the window.

8. The reading lamps and power outlets are conveniently located at 6 feet high.

And here is where people tell me to stop being such a negative nancy and to look on the bright side so here are the positives about this island:

1. At least this room doesn’t smell like dead bodies.

2. Hey, I didn’t consume those ice cream calories! That’s a plus, right...

3. Dead fly = protein? I bet it is a delicacy, they must have been confused when I complained.

4. Is that garbage on the beach or just free stuff? New flip flops? Need a lip gloss or a blush? How about a comb?

5. No one at this hostel not only means a lack of general atmosphere and new faces, it also means quiet hallways!

6. Sports are... fun?

7. That bright sun at 5 am? Early bird catches the worm!

8. Six feet? I can work on my high jumps!

See, silver lining.

Oh, I almost forgot. When I was sitting in the lobby on my computer this morning, someone was just checking in. He came back down from the room a few minutes later holding dirty sheets and asked for clean ones, since new sheets were not put on his bed before he checked in. He was told, “No, no more sheets, all finished” and had to go back to his room to presumably sleep on a bare mattress.

Really.

S.