Heavenly Coral Spawning
For the first time in thirty years, the full moon shone on New Year’s Eve. I bet Koh Samui went crazy. We didn’t go there, because there was plenty of excitement to be had right here on Koh Tao, the Turtle Island, where John is at long last getting his diving record set straight (but that is another story).
The soft white sand lay semi-fluorescent in the moonlight. A lantern rose into the sky, as smooth and serene as a passing whaleshark. It was soon followed by another. All along the beach, people were releasing lanterns. It looked like heavenly coral spawning.
We had left the loud music behind. Rap and house and—so help us—cheesy Eighties disco. Will we never live down that decade? But out here it was relatively quiet. We sat and sipped our drinks and didn’t notice when the last of the farang left the bar because we weren’t sitting on the terrace. A few tables had been set up on the beach and now the bar owner’s family were adding more. They all sat down to dinner, the children wide-eyed with wonder as fireworks exploded against the backdrop of the twinkling lanterns.
“We should get out,” I said just as a little boy stared at us, holding his glass of coke in both hands. John grinned and lifted his mango shake and soon we were engaged in a game of cheers, putting the drinks on our heads before sipping. The boy needed a re-fill of coke and his older relatives cheered and wished us a happy new year.
It was just after ten o’clock. Apparently no-one had the patience to wait until midnight as another set of fireworks exploded. When midnight was finally announced (two minutes early), I thought that things couldn’t get any more frantic, but they did. Thai and farang gathered together to light the largest lantern yet—it needed a dozen people to hold it. It floated into the sky: one last gamete, carrying with it the promises of a new decade.
Denni