From Asia to Europe

Here I am, back in the cold of the late fall in Central Canada, ie. ‘home’ (now). I’ve been here now only two days, and so my eyes are still focused squarely on the past – as such, my attempts to chronicle that last few Thai moments are better written now than later.

Where did I leave off? ….Right, in the thick of the bit of ‘rest and relaxation’ that was Koh Samet. While we were spoiled with the sights and weather of Southern Thailand early in the trip, it was, in retrospect, a lovely ending to continuous bus hopping and guest house searching.

Shortly after the trip around the island, we installed ourselves in all the usual tourist places: by day, on the beach (avoiding the nasally calls of ‘massssssage’ aimed at each of us and ‘pedicuuuure’, especially at Chrissie) and by night, at the Naga Bar, followed by the Silver Sand bar. Which is to say: we drank by night with all the vigour of a uni student, and by day we nursed our hangovers as lazily as we could. The bars were full of mixed characters: singing Swedes, teary expats, Thai male gigalos, enterprising Iraelis, year long travelers taking a break – all evidently with one activity on their minds. (Note: Thai male gigalos).

Our departure left us with one and a half days in Bangkok to snatch up everything we’d had our eyes on during our few brief stays in the city: it was a frantic zigzag mission across Khao San Road, the weekend market and famed knock-off mall. In the process, travelers from the past two months of travel kept materializing: Swedes from Koh Samet, an expat from Pai, and 3 of our full-mooners from Coconut Beach on Koh Phangnan. It’s a wonder that anyone actually leaves the country – like the quicksand Chrissie stepped in near Pai, it sucks you in and keeps you there. After some time, you can’t even remember when the dreadlocks and tattoos appeared.

I left Chrissie to another day of pure consumerism and flew out to meet Matt and Del in Taipei while visiting the school and filing my taxes all the while (a pleasant surprise when the agent showed me what I can expect to receive back – another future holiday in store?) While Taipei felt strangely foreign, it was nice to return to the comfort of milk tea and dumplings. I met Matt’s new ‘man-friend’ – Matt is such a collector – but with good taste… I should have employed him with the task of finding me a boyfriend, preferably one who wants a ‘woman-friend’.

My layover in Vancouver saw a brunch with my former neighbour Scott, a sort of Robin Williams with a Melbournian accent. Conversation involved the usual bi-polar flipflop between joke, politics, health and well-being – he’s onto the next idea while I’m dragging along, laughing at the last. At one point our waitress graduated from perplexed to giggly when I peeled my luggage sticker off his face and Scott exclaimed, “I just got a brazilian on my forehead!”

One last memory to end this trip and overseas blog, on the beach near the Naga bar with bartender ‘Bong’ or ‘Bang’ or more likely ‘Dong’:

Barman: “You have beautiful hair.”
Chrissie: “Thank you.” (Uncomfortably.)
Barman: “You are so beautiful.”
Chrissie: “I bet you tell that to all the girls.”
Barman: “I don’t!”
Chrissie: “Fuck off! Yes you do.”
Barman: “Oooo, a strong one. I like you.”

Just, Laura.

Tags: General Travels, SE Asia Travels

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 19th, 2006 at 4:07 pm and is filed under General Travels, SE Asia Travels. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.