FMP morning
Trip Start
Jun 11, 2008
1
41
62
Trip End
Aug 07, 2008
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Ko Phangan,
Thailand
Sunday, July 20, 2008
Jess and Pooja showed up at The Last Resort around noonish. They had left their motorbike the night before at the place they rented it from, which was near my hostel, even though they had it rented out until early afternoon. Because they had to walk from their guest house to my hostel, it took over an hour to get to me.
Perhaps against better judgment, the three of us (only two in helmets) got on the motorbike and rode it down to the beach and restaurant area of Haad Rin. Pooja was driving and she had learned the day before how to drive. Everything went smoothly! That's not to say there wasn't nervous laughter.
We went to lunch with two of Pooja's friends: Aliyah (spelling? one of her childhood friends from Ohio) and Ben (Aliyah's boyfriend). They both recently graduated from a masters program at Columbia in journalism and have spent the past year living in India, so it was great to talk to them. I myself had pasta in an attempt to fortify myself for the night to come: though I love going to sleep early, I made it my goal to try to last until sunrise for the Full Moon Party.
After lunch I took a stop in to a travel agency and made contact with Abby with my mobile. I bought a boat ticket for the next day to Koh Tao, the island where Abby lives.
Then we all went to the beach! Everyone was there. I was with Pooja, Jess, Aliyah and Ben, and I saw most of the people that were staying with us at The Last Resort, including the 3 lovely girls Laura, Steph and Emily. I saw the American couple from Texas (who's moving to Chicago) that I had been with on the bus a few days before.
I also saw most of the people from the Wildlife Friends of Thailand--about 12 of them had all met up on Koh Phangan. Most of them are now traveling through Thailand, like me, but some got special permission to take a couple of days off during their volunteering commitment and take a holiday down here for the party. It was fun seeing so many of them and I got to hear updates about some of the animals, as well as who's a couple now, who's been asked to leave, and all that gossip...
Two of the girls I volunteered with, Joanna and Emma, were on the beach. These were the two that I took my day off with to Hua Hin beach back in the day. They both had really bad scrapes on their arms and legs from moto accidents! Eek. I saw an exorbitant number of people in Koh Phangan walking around with white bandages on various limbs of their bodies, and even one guy with his left arm (broken) in a homemade Thai cast. He had to carry his heavy traveling backpack only on his right shoulder bc of the broken left arm! Cross fingers for safe moto-ing...
