Around the World: Beachside Thoughts

January 13, 1992

While I'm soaking up the sun, sand and surf, I'm trying to get a sense of where of I am.

Just on the horizon is the island of Ko Pha Ngan, an idyllic tropical paradise known for it's monthly Full Moon parties and openly tolerated drug culture.  According to Shirley, who spent a few weeks on the island, it's not uncommon to meet a handful of Westerners who have sold their passports to fund their drug habits and long term stay.  She also mentioned that tourist-on-tourist crime is fairly common.  Ko Pha Ngan is also popular among divers for the islands plentiful coral reefs and exotic fish. It's wise to know where to find what you want to do, and easy to accidentally stumble upon trouble.

Photo by Our World Travels

Despite very strict laws, Thailand appears to tolerate casual drug use within its borders without much concern, however, the authorities are explicitly clear that death is the penalty for attempting to smuggle any illegal drug out of Thailand.

Bangkok, it is said, smells like sex.  To me, it smells like a combination of incense and car exhaust.  The pollution in the city is so thick, when children draw pictures, they colour the sky yellow.  Behind all that particulate matter, however, is a thriving sex industry, where almost one third of the country's estimated 2.8 million sex workers are children.  Although prostitution in Thailand is illegal, it is conveniently disguised under the term "service worker", where a specific interest can be chosen from a sort of showcase in the country's massage parlors, karaoke bars and bath houses to provide the establishment's advertised service, but behind closed doors, actually do a whole lot more.

Even as a tourist, on a tourist-industry fueled island, the sense that women are not equal in Thai society is transparent.  Although women have the right the vote, they don't seem to have much of a voice.  Pausing for thought, I realize that Harvey's beach-side beer consumption has convinced him to embrace his inner chauvinist. 

The beauty of the scenery suddenly seems to have lost its appeal.

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"The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. The opposite of art is not ugliness, it's indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, it's indifference."
~Elie Wiesel

Around the World: Ko Samui

January 11, 1992

The ferry to Ko Samui seemed to take forever, after the uncomfortably long and loud bus trip.  Once the ferry docked, another bus, this one without windows and wooden planks for seating, was waiting to bring passengers to their island destinations.  After suitcases and backpacks were piled in a carefully tied heap on the roof, we headed to the Sandy Resort at Bo Phut Beach.  Anna insists on offering her bag of king fruit chips that she brought with her to snack on, which I am trying very graciously to decline.  The smell that erupts out of a freshly opened bag of king chips is best described as morbid.  Someone with a sick sense of humour has found a way to preserve the aroma of death and disguise it as a healthy snack.

On a more pleasant thought, there's a vitamin drink here called Red Bull.  It tastes like the Flintstones chewable vitamins I had as a kid, only in liquid form.  It's quite the pick-me-up.

Sandy Beach bungalow

Finally, we arrive and settle into the hotel room.  While we feast on lunch in the hotel restaurant, I've sent the contents of my backpack to the capable, soapy, hot water treatment of the hotel laundry service for 150 baht ($6).  All I have to wear until it returns is my swim suit.  As I'm heading toward the beach, I am reminded of the Hideaway Hotel in Fiji, with it's bungalow style accommodations.  I half expect to find a concrete wall and a building housing a dorm with 60 beds inside, although I wouldn't trade that for the little bit of luxury I'm being treated to now.

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There is nothing like an odor to stir memories.
~ William McFee

Around the World: Bangkok and Beyond

January 10, 1992

Started the morning with guided tour of the floating market.  It was such an interesting experience to have a store floating on the water.  Little canoe-like boats, mostly containing fruit, paddled up to the tour boat.  I didn't buy anything because all the fruit was already either peeled or cut and anything that has come into contact with the local water is a recipe for illness.  That, and the fact that the waterway is also an open sewer was all the reason I needed to be cautious.

Bangkok Floating Market
Photo by bangkok.com

I did manage to do a little shopping on the streets around the hotel, and getting used to the currency.  Up until now, prices have been fairly close to what I would pay in Canadian dollars, a couple cents less or more, but nothing that required any substantial amount of math.  Thai currency is 25 baht to 1 Canadian dollar.  It's strange seeing a piece of clothing for 200 baht, then haggling the vendor down to 100 baht, and realizing the item only costs $4.

Tonight, we are headed south and then to an island in the Gulf of Thailand called Ko Samui.  The plan was to take the train, but tickets for first and second class are sold out.  There are third class seats available, but tourists are apparently not permitted to travel in third class.  Tracey talked her parents into investigating other options at a travel store we had seen on Khao San Road.  Harvey went in to speak with the sales agent and came out of the store with bus tickets.

Khao San Road
Photo by traverati

Khao San Road is where backpackers go to find cheap accommodations, inexpensive restaurants, and travel arrangements.  It's touristy and crowded, with the same noise and chaos that is uniquely Bangkok.   

We were told to wait at the store front for the bus that was due to arrive at 5p.m.  As the hour approaches and we are all expecting to see a bus arriving, one of the store employees comes out and explains that we should now follow him to the bus departure point.  He guides us on a long walk, through alleys and streets, which really irritated Harvey and Anna, who had to carry and drag their suitcases behind them.

This bus ride ends early tomorrow morning in Surat Thani, a town on the south west coast of the Gulf of Thailand, where we will catch the ferry to Ko Samui.  In the meantime, I have a really loud movie in Thai to drown out all of the other sounds on the bus, as I attempt to find a comfortable position to sleep in the coach seat, snuggled in under the complimentary blanket.

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"Not when truth is dirty, but when it is shallow, does the enlightened man dislike to wade into its waters."
~ Friedrich Nietzsche