Continued from taking the taxi boat from Tonsai Bay to Ao-Nang beach with Song-Che.
2-5-10 Song-Che and I took the taxi boat to Ao-Nang beach where he would find a hospital to check out his tail bone (rock climbing) and I would decide where to go next.
I walked all over Ao-Nang town in search of Wi-fi with no luck. I almost pulled the trigger on a bus back to Bangkok, but decided to spend a few extra bucks and enjoy my trip instead. I found a travel agent with tickets to Phi Phi island and got on my way. A bus picked me up at the agent and made a few more stops along the way. The girl sitting next to me spoke with a Southern accent, but turned out to be a school teacher from Sweden. Tessa was really nice and we had a great chat before lunch at the ferry station and getting on the boat.
The boat got to Phi Phi island around 3PM. The people I talked to weren't lying when they said this place was expensive. I was planning on renting a motorcycle when I arrived and exploring until I found a nice place to stay, but the island turned out to be about 1/10th the size of Koh Phangan and there are no motorcycles or cars here. Bummer. I checked my bags into a decent place and went out to the beach to relax.
In front of me were three people from Singapore- the one in the middle was a boy, wearing boys clothes, with the exception of a bra underneath? You see something new every day.
When the sun went down I went out and got some pizza at a local place then walked around with Tessa to explore the island. We came across a place with a boxing ring and I couldn't pass up the opportunity to try my hand at some Muay Thai boxing. I was paired against a guy named Eric from Australia.
After waiting around we finally had our turn in the ring.
The fight was pretty even. I'm a little more built than Eric, but he has more weight and his legs and arms are longer than mine.
Tessa got some good videos of the fight, I'll try to upload them later.
After Round 2. Muay Thai is really tiring. Eric got a good shot on my eye, but I got some great kicks in and gave him a bloody nose.
I won after 3 rounds and I would definitely do it again. It was really fun and great exercise. I'm trying to find some Kung Fu classes in China to stay in shape and learn Chinese at the same time.
The videos-
I walked around after the match to cool off and got some noodles. While I was walking I ran into some Chinese people from Shenzhen and had a nice chat with them before retiring.
2-6-10
This morning I woke up, had some noodles and hit the beach.
Some people there told me about some hills with great viewpoints on them, so I set off. On the way I ran into the Chinese people from last night. They came with me to go find the viewpoints.
It was quite a hike up, but the view was well worth it.
The people that told me about this viewpoint at the beach this morning told me you could keep walking straight through the jungle and end up at a tiny beach on the other side. They said is was a really tough hike though- right up my alley. The Chinese people wanted to try too, so we set off.
The path through the jungle wasn't nearly as bad as the beach people had said, even the elder parents of one of the Chinese guys with us made it through with no problem. We made it to the beach which had a much better atmosphere than the main beach of the island. It was cleaner, had very few people and lots of shade.
We sat down at a little snack hut to cool off. After napping in a hammock for a bit, the Mom of one of the Chinese guys had me translate for her. She wanted the lady working at the snack shop to make us a big dinner because 'she looks like a mom so it will taste better than the island food.' We agreed on a price to make everybody happy and she got to work while we relaxed in the shade and went swimming. The wife of one of the guys with us couldn't swim so he made her a little lifejacket out of a piece of styrofoam he found. It got some nice stares from everybody else on the beach.
Dinner was served- some great eggs, shrimp, squid tomatoes and rice. It was very tasty and the fact that we were relaxing in the cool shade on the beach made it even better.
The Mom and Dad. They told me they were retired and just buy and sell Chinese stocks and travel for a living. Not bad. I wish I was familiar enough with things over here to play the Chinese stock market.
It was getting dark and I didn't want to take a taxi boat back to the inhabited side of the island, so I ran back through the woods. On the way I ran into some Germans and chatted with them on our way back. I got back to the main part of the island and walked over to another side I hadn't explored. There was a beach here and I'm here sitting at a table with an Australian guy casually chatting and writing this journal.
I said goodbye to the Australians and walked further down the island. In this really ritzy side I ran into Stu from England, the guy I had shared the bungalo with on Ko Phangan island. Small world. We walked around the island and ended up at the Muay Thai place to watch a few fights. Stu is in the middle here with his buddy on the right.
2-7-10 Sunday
I woke up and found out it was Sunday- which means it's about time to head back to Bangkok and collect my passport from the Chinese embassy, laptop from the travel agent and the rest of my things from Bang's place. I got a bucket of noodles from 7/11 and ate on the beach.
Met up with Tessa at an internet cafe and played some Swedish card games for a bit while my phone charged. She taught me some cool phrases in Swedish that I hope to use later. I got my ferry/bus ticket to Bangkok, said my goodbyes and went to the dock.
I waited here on the dock for a bit, wrote some postcards and caught up on this journal when the boat came in.
I hopped on and I'm sitting next to some people from Beijing now. They're really nice and helping me with my Chinese. I'm not terribly excited for my next few days in stinky Bangkok, but hopefully I'll meet some cool people on my ride up. The total voyage will be about 20 hours.
My wish came true. Waiting for the bus from Krabi to Bangkok, I met four girls from Argentina. It was really strange speaking Spanish with them, most of it came out in Chinese at first. We got in a van and set off.
The van drove an hour, dropped us off at a truck which drove us 1/2 hour and finally got on a real bus.
2-8-10 Monday
I didn't sleep very well on this bus, but I felt much much better than on the bus from Chiangmai to Bangkok. We arrived at 6:20 AM I said Adios to the girls and set off for the Chinese consulate. On my walk to the subway station I walked through China town again and had a bite to eat.
Some guy there tried to sell me one of these strange Thai coffins. It's a little early for that.
I made it to the subway station in one shot this time (90 minutes) with no misdirection. They gave me a Visa valid for 6 months but I can only enter China once. This ruins my plan to go visit my foreign exchange friends from UCI in Korea and Japan.
I got back to Khao San road, picked up my laptop and got a cheap room. Walking around Khao San I ran into Stefano Patana, an Italian guy I had made good friends with in Zhuhai. Small world getting smaller... He was headed South in a couple hours so we didn't have any time to hang out. Less than an hour after that, I was walking around looking for a bite to eat and I ran into Song-Che from Tonsai bay buying fruit. I met him on the other side of the country, strange. Turns out he had cracked his tail bone and came back to Bangkok to catch a flight back to his home in Korea. We had a bite and got in a bus to go to the center of BKK so see some malls.
This place was really cool, lots of artwork and big giant mall after mall.
Each mall was a huge 6-8 story structure and were literally one after another on each side of the street. We had fun looking at $400 jeans and the like and chatting with the employees.
We walked down a side street to find some more food. There's are small rivers throughout Bangkok and you can take speedboats to get around the city for a few cents.
On this street was a big building- the Anti-Money Laundering Office. Apparently it's a big problem.
We had some BBQ chicken and walked back to the center where Bang was going to meet up with us.
Bang met us here with the stuff I had left at his place and we walked around a bit more.
We went to the top of this mall called Central World where they had a big ritzy grocery store complete with coconut shaped coconut juice boxes for people that need help spending their money.
In the back of the grocery store was a big food court, so we had some great food and headed back down.
In the front of this mall was a big concert with some famous Thai girl and a band from Korea.
There was also a set up for Chinese New Years, in Thailand. The music was really cool at this display.
We got in Bang's car and he drove us back to Khao San road, but we got lost in China town. We said our goodbyes at Khao San road and Bang went home. I hope to return his kindness when he comes to the US.
Song-Che and I walked around Khao san road meeting random people- a big group of Chinese from Guilin and some Germans. We had a few more snacks and retired. My knee was really really hurting me all day and getting worse. I had jammed it into a sharp edge on the bus yesterday and though it was a small wound it became increasingly immobilizing throughout the day.
2-9-10 Tuesday
Today I woke up and my knee was much worse- swollen and red around the area with intense pain when I bent my leg. I found a pharmacy and bought some Antibiotic cream hoping it would do the trick. I returned to the hotel, spread it on thick and slept for a few hours. It seems a little better already and the redness has gone down slightly. I'll use the cream religiously today and hope for the best. If it's not much better by tomorrow AM I'll see a doc. The last thing I need during my upcoming flights and move to Beijing is an aching limp.
I slept some more, then got some food, walked around a bit and ended up at a guesthouse with a movie screen to watch "The Beach" with a rootbeer. The movie starts out on Khao San road then moves to one of the islands I was on, so I was really interested. I got about 1/4 through it when Steven Verlinden from Chiangmai called me. I met up with him, helped him get a room in my guesthouse and then we walked around Khao San road. We had a blast messing with all the Thai people trying to get our money. Steven bought some wooden frogs for his nieces then we walked around trying to sell them back to vendors and tourists. I was getting tired and my knee needed some rest so I went back to the guesthouse, chatted with some Germans on the balcony and went to bed.
2-10-10 Wednesday
I woke up this morning and my leg felt about 1000 times better. Did some reading, ate some noodles and met up with Steven. We went out for a walk and found this gang of cops on segways.
We rented some bikes from a little kiosk by the park and rode off.
It was really fun riding around to various monuments and ringing our bells at all the laughing Thai people.
We had some delicious batter fried bananas for lunch, I'm going to try to make some when I get access to a kitchen. I have about $12 left of Thai currency to spend before my flight tomorrow, so I think I'll buy a few shirts or some property or a compact car here before flying out.
Steven and I came back to the guesthouse and he was on his last $.30 or so, so we got some poor man 7/11 noodles and watched a movie before going to bed early.
2-11-10 Thursday
Woke up around 3:45 to catch an airport shuttle with Steven. We had the same flight to Macau, he was flying there to take a ferry to Hong Kong and meet up with some friends.
We got off in Macau and explored a bit, had lunch then parted ways again. I said goodbye to Macau for the last time and crossed back in to Zhuhai China where I met up with Samuel Woo (all my things were at his apartment).
That's a wrap for Thailand. I can finally get to Beijing in the next post!
Stay posted, another blog to come hopefully this week.
I miss you all.
Love,
Robert
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