Bad Moon on the Rise

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  Ko Samet, Thailand
Saturday, February 18, 2006

M: To escape Bangkok's loud, hot, polluted insanity, Jessie and I decided to spend a couple of days on the beach. There are about a zillion beach options in Thailand, but we decided that we would go to an island we had heard about and seen pictures of in a magazine. It seemed quiet and beautiful and great! (J: and pretty close to Bangkok for a short excursion) So, we packed ourselves up, hopped on a bus and headed south.

Three hours later, we got off the bus, walked across the street (past an elephant on a leash - yeah, it was kind of weird) and headed down to the pier. We took this rickety, tiny boat over to the island, hopped in the back of a "taxi" (which is really a pickup with benches along the back) and were deposited at some beach front bungalows.

Of course, it is hard to complain about waking up in the morning and skipping down the steps to the beach where there is fresh mango and pineapple and the water is warm and glorious

A Ko Samet Sunset

. We were a little spoiled by the absolute beauty of Fiji, the quiet, lack of tourism on the island there and the incredibly nice people we stayed there with. On Ko Samet, there were TONS of European tourists. (J: Missy forgot to mention that our first night there another middle-aged man, from Germany, chatted us up for HOURS, asking us advice on dating and stuff, which was just totally strange.) It was inexpensive and fun, but we didn't meet people we really loved and there wasn't a whole lot to do.

J: The first night we were there was a full moon. We were sitting at a table on the beach having just finished dinner when I realized the bright pink light coming out of the darkness was actually the moon. It was incredible. It went from bright pink to red to orange to yellow to white, slowly making its way higher and higher in the sky (sorry we were unable to capture it in a photo, although we did try).

M: We walked around the island, swam, sat out on the beach, etc. We actually spent a good deal of time floating around in the water. We just wanted to stay there in the warm ocean water as much as we could. Actually, the whole day was on the beach - breakfast was on the beach, walks on the beach, dinner on the beach. We spent ALL of our time on the beach - possible to stay there all day. Very relaxing, but we were both getting anxious to move on to the north of Thailand.

Plus, our walks lead us through the unpaved, incredibly horrendous streets, through the piles of garbage both behind the resorts and between the rocks on the beach, past the real life of people living on the island. Sometimes there is a hard truth to traveling

A Perfect Storm

. We are so privileged to be able to go out and see the world, to pick up and leave, to stay in our cushy hotel (even if it is less cushy than the place we live at home). We try to tip frequently as we watch the people who work 14 hour days for nothing go home to houses where there is no clean water. And this is Thailand, which is more developed than many of the developing countries we've seen. We find ourselves in this weird dichotomy of thought - being tourists and doing "stuff" and seeing the world, while trying not to exploit our privileged place in it.

Blah, blah. Sorry to go on like that. The real adventure of the island came the last day when we loaded back onto a small, rickety boat to cross back over to the mainland. And it was pouring. Rain was coming in the slats of the wooden boat and the lack of windows didn't protect anyone from getting absolutely soaked. The most reassuring thing was when the "captain" handed out life jackets. But we made it back to shore without real incident, met a man from CT (he stopped us to ask us where in New England we're from - that has never happened to us before!) and hopped back on the bus, still slightly wet to have a transitional evening in Bangkok. And we gleckel on...

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Ao Tubtim

Beach Swinging

Dinner on the Beach

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