After the Jungle party and the full moon party on consecutive nights, we were both pretty knackered and took yesterday to just lay around in hammocks by the beach. We also booked our ferry to come to Koh Samui for today. Before dinner I confirmed the ferry reservation and found out we had gotten the last tickets. Everyone is trying to leave Koh Phangan and all of the ferries are booked solid. Some other people we met at our hotel were stuck in Koh Phangan for several extra days.
This morning we got a ride to the ferry port from our hotel managers “papa” and his little girl in their pickup truck. At the ferry port, there were people everywhere. It seemed that all of the ferries were supposed to leave at 12:30 but the pier could only fit two small boats at the same time meaning that none of the ferries actually left on time. Our ferry from Surat Thani to Koh Phanang was a large car ferry, with space for vehicles on the bottom and then seats for passengers on the next two levels up.
Our ferry today was much smaller, it had a bottom section where passengers could sit inside with gasoline fumes swirling about, passengers could pay extra to sit inside a VIP area with A/C and a slightly milder smell of gasoline or they could sit outside along the railing of the boat. Most people opted to sit outside on the deck in the full sun. Being such a pasty whitey, who is also a cheapskate and not a fan of the smell of gasoline I spent the hour long ferry ride in a corridor between the VIP section and the outside area.
When we arrived in Koh Samui, as soon as you exit the boat there are touts everywhere trying to get you to take their taxi or A/C minivan. "How much to get to my accommodation" I asked, to which I was given answers of between 800 and 400 BHT. "That is very far away" many of them would say and then produce a map and show me where the port was and where my hotel was. Eventually we were able to power through everyone and get onto a songthaew (a pickup truck with seats and a cover in the bed) where we were able to get a ride for 100 BHT.
At night we went into Lamai beach town, where there are a lot of lady bars. These are bars where often a woman is dancing on a pole in the middle of the bar and one can find companionship from Thai women. We opted for a regular bar and sat to listen to a band play and have a drink. At a table near us there was a very muscled looking western man having a drink by himself. Shortly he was joined by a scantly clad Thai woman. After about 20 minutes the man went away by himself and then returned shortly with some keys in his hand and then departed with the woman. Apparently all of the bars in Lamai are good places to find companionship.
On the way back to our hotel we walked through the bright lights of the night market where you hear lots of silly things from the merchants trying to get you to look at and then buy some of their stuff. There was one stall that was selling electronics and I had the following conversation with the man working there.
Salesman: Hello my friend, out tonight for some buying?
Me: No, just going for a walk
Salesman: Why not buying?
Me: I don’t have any money for buying
Salesman: How are you in Thailand if you have no money?
Me: I spent it all on companionship from your mother, that’s why! (What I actually said was, “I can afford to travel because I don’t buy overpriced junk” and then walked off)
Check out a slide show of all of the pictures from today here:
No comments:
Post a Comment