Damned Do Gooders and Quite Possibly the Most Beautiful Beach on Earth

Where in the world is....

Ok, so we left Gili and went back to Kuta then Bangkok for the night to do some 'stuff management' where we're keeping our extra 'stuff'. We headed out at the crack the next morning for Phuket, a quick flight south. We decided on the plane to head for Patong, just because it seemed like there was some action there. Little did we know what variety of action. I mean everyone who's heard of Phuket knows there is a serious sex business going on there. But the blatant-ness of it was a bit beyond comfort level for Liz and I. I mean, I'm a fairly open minded person or so I like to think. But when the sun went down in the evenings the streets were filled with ladies of the night (or men dressed as women who are even more beautiful than the women). There was an overwhelming amount of both white men burnt to a crisp (aussies) and men tanned to leather (europeans) who were either sitting at bars groping the asses of these young ladies or sitting by the beach being pawed by young thai men. Again, I'm all for expressing your sexuality but when I know they are coming here to pay for it and these young folk (I like to think they're all of age but we know the truth) are taking part because they have no other way to make real money, it's not fun to watch. Plus just the visual of seeing a dirty old man rubbing the chest of a... 16? year old Thai boy is as they say - Just not right. Mind you, part of that was our fault by not looking around before we paid for a chair to sit in and then realized we were clearly in the 'gay' section of the beach. Liz is like "Um... do you see any women here?" Frankly, we were glad for it because then we don't have to worry about being hit on or anyone giving a crap what we look like in our bikinis.

The first night we were there, walking down the main strip and seeing all the ladies in the bars with skirts up to their cookies (word stolen from Kolosky) we kept being offered to see a 'free show'. Finally we stopped to inquire as to what exactly the free show entailed. Apparently, you can go into one of these places and watch women stick various objects into their nether regions. For free. For a minute. Then you pay to see more. Now I know this sort of thing goes on in a variety of seedy countries, but these shows were indiginous to the area... apparently they insert not only the usual things (ping pong balls, balloons, etc.) but also various local sea life including catfish and SWAMP EELS.

I'm not kidding. Liz and I were very tempted to go watch this take place and I know I'll get an earful for not, but we just couldn't see encouraging this sort of activity. I mean, how does one decide to put a swamp eel in their cooch? Liz asked me later that night, "Why would you put an egg in your vagina?". My response was, "Because it fits?". This then lead to a raucous scene of me twisting my legs into assorted positions and making "shwing!" noises as I showed her what I imagined the shooting of ping pong balls might look like. It was one of those nights.

I don't know, the whole thing just felt dirty. And I can deal with a little dirty but it was... dingy. One night we hung out with the guy next door to where we were staying who is opening a mexican place (he's originally from mexico) and his lame ass american friend who was helping (Why do most americans who travel have to do the "I've been here, I've been there"... he asked us not one question about our own travels - he just figured we'd want to hear all about his because they were SO interesting. He wasn't interesting. At all. He Patong. We asked what he loved so much. "It's hot. And Cheap." Okaaaayyyy.). They had a prostitute friend who was staying upstairs... she seemed very nice, she shared her beer with us. But she told us how she's from the north and has been going from shady beach area to shady beach area because she wants to make money. She said while her family doesn't approve or want her to be doing that sort of work, some families encourage it since the girls then send money back to the family. Again, let's not encourage this, huh folks?

SO, with that said, we've headed north to Koh Lak. Generally speaking Koh Lak is a jumping off point to visit the Similan Islands. But we were pleased to get here and find prostitutes, not-a-one. On the way into town we passed a sign for the Tsunami Volunteer Center. So yesterday we stopped by and chatted with the two women running the place, young girls from Singapore and here. Long story short, we're going to stick around Koh Lak and do some volunteer work for them. We're not sure what exactly... we told them what our collective experience was and they felt it might be a waste of our 'talents' to send us off to teach english. But we'll see. We're heading to Phang Nga later in the week to meet up with Liz's brother who will be down with friends for the weekend. Then we're coming back here to do the volunteer work for 2 weeks. We went to a little get together they had at a bar last night and met some other volunteers, all of whom seem to be a really good group, so it should be fun. It's amazing to think about the devastation this area experienced as a result of the tsunami.... this province was the hardest hit in Thailand. Thousands of people died, mostly foreign but over a thousand Thais as well. This organization has helped rebuild homes, rebuild boats (a source of income for many), teach english to the children since many of the people who died spoke english (people working in tourism usually are near the water and they're the ones who speak english). So they need to retrain a new generation of children so they are able to continue on with the tourism which is so important to their community. They also run programs for senior citizens, assistance with small businesses and a whole bunch of other things. The 3 year anniversary of the tsunami is the day after Xmas, so we're going to come back here and help them set up for that then be here through that time.

Koh Lak itself is a small town, beautiful beach. It does have a certain solemn air to it and when you think of how many people lost their lives here it makes sense. But the people here seem happier and more genuine than other places we've visited in Thailand so we're content to stick around for a while. Yesterday we went to the National Park and hiked to a really nice little beach and just lounged around, made sand castles and lollygagged in the water. We actually went RUNNING on the beach in Patong and here the other night. We're trying to get our asses in shape (literally and figuratively) for our return home.

Today we did a day trip out to the Similan Islands. Ho. Ly. Crapola. I've never ever in my life seen beaches like these. Liz has been to many a beach and said nothing has come close to the clearness of the water. I have photos of us floating in it by the beach and you'd think we were in a pool. The sand is the consistancy of pie dough (says the chef). It's just unreal, I cannot possibly do it justice through words. The fish were beautiful, similar to the Gili Islands. At one point we were getting ready to reboard the boat and I just put my mask to my eyes for a second while I was waiting and was like, "Um, there's a turtle right here!". It was just swimming right in front of me. So I got to follow him around for a minute or so, he was close enough to touch. They're really cool creatures. Amazing place. Liz plans to go back there once her friend Jay comes out to meet us next week to do some diving since it's on the top 10 list for such things. It's expensive here compared to other places so she says. But I guess you get what you pay for. We haven't had great experiences with customer service with those kinds of trips... like on the boat today the guys did next to nothing for us when it comes to that sort of thing. He mentioned a few of the fish we might see but didn't snorkel with us (he was the 'snorkel guide'), didn't remind us to put on sunscreen, didn't ask if anyone had any questions... that seems to be the way things go here for the most part.

I have lots of comments to make regarding people we've met and places we've been including the painful influence the western world has had upon this lovely country (and many others) but I hesitate to bore you further. Liz and I are having a good time, we spent a good amount of our days in Phuket laughing our asses off about what was going on around us, if only to keep us from hating it. Oh, we've rescheduled our return flight home, so I'll be back January 14th early morning in PDX. We have plans for the next few weeks till about the 7th then we'll see what happens for that next week. I'll keep it all a mystery for now. The place we're staying right now is really nice, the people that run it are a family and tell us we should treat the place like it's our home, including using their computer at the front desk for internet, so that's what I'm doing :)

Hope everyone is having a nice wintery winter season and has a lovely time prepping for the holidays.

Abbizzle (named by our Gili friend Raphael who is a big fan of Snoop - particularly entertaining when he would call us with his lisp from the bar as we walked by on the road, "Abbizzle! Lizzizzle!"