Thailand Update

I made it safely over to Thailand – landed in Koh Samui airport at 8:35am local time, exactly as predicted! I find it amazing that I can travel halfway across the world and arrive exactly at the predicted time, but could try to get a bus or train in the UK to somewhere a few miles away and end up being hideously late. 

Flight was okay, despite being 11 hours long. I managed to start and finish one of the books I bought (Slam by Nick Hornby) and also watched <i>Be Kind, Rewind</i>, <i>21</i> and, happily for me as it’s one of my favourite shows, an episode of Scrubs. The food was pretty good too – certainly a lot of it! I had a nice Thai meal for ‘dinner’, a sandwich around tea-time, and then a nice breakfast a couple of hours before landing. Additionally, I got <i>another</i> breakfast on the second plane to Koh Samui. Nice! 

First irritation of the holiday came about when my luggage didn’t arrive at Koh Samui airport at the same time as me. However, I managed to get a taxi to where Adam and his friend Danny (and now me, obviously) are staying, and after a laborious difficult phone call later (“”I’m staying at the Tawee Guest House”” “”Where?”” “”TAWEE. T..”” “”C?”” “”No, T”” “”P?”” etc!) they managed to get my luggage to me. Second, and I’m hoping final, irration came on opening up said luggage and finding that the bottle of water I bought had split open, completely soaking my towel and a good proportion of my other clothes. Wonderful. 

The Guest House we’re in is pretty okay, actually. No hot water, but a decent room with a TV, en suite and aircon. For 400Baht (about 7GBP) a night, no complaints from me! We headed to the beach for much of yesterday, which is gorgeous – lovely sandy beach with very calm, deep blue, warm sea. Can’t upload pictures at the mo, but will do so soon. It was pretty peaceful despite the many people there and the persistant beach sellers offering everything from sheets, beads and ice-cream to tattoos, hash and cocaine. Unsurprisingly, we made no transactions.

Eveningwise, we had a really tasty seafood meal, followed by an evening of drinking in a few of the many bars and clubs. We caught a live band in one, who were actually very good, doing covers of recognisable songs such as ‘Kiss Me’ and ‘Don’t Look Back in Anger’. We also managed to squeeze in some pool, in which Adam and Danny both beat me as usual, and headed back to the hotel around 4am, navigating our way through a wave of prostitutes, which is somewhat of a culture shock.

Today, much of the same so far, but later on in the hols we’re planning to do some diving, head off to the national parks, and do some island hopping, as well as check out a supposedly legendary ‘Half-moon party’ on the 9th. More updates inevitably to follow! Please feel free to leave a comment below to say hi, and update me on how you’re doing.