Day 17 - Ko Samet
There's an unusual sound outside the window as I slowly open my eyes. Similar to the sound of the jungle but it isn't the cicadas. Outside I am greeted by my first rain storm. It buckets down, noisily slapping leaves and gushing from decrepid guttering. Thunder booms through the foliage. Once it has stopped I decide this is the day I hire a scooter and explore the island. At least when I lose control on a bend and die and become a cliché news story I can blame the wet roads. I'm given a racy yellow model and affect total confidence in its use. I'm a little apprehensive though, that cultural caution again. Another tourist has hired a scooter just before me and puts it on its side metres from the hire shop. Do not be that guy. But actually there isn't much to it. There's only 1 road, little traffic and with all the hills, turns and speedbumps you can rarely get above 30 km/h. Probably just as well given my inexperience and the fact that I don't think there's a single helmet on the island. I go down and up the island and stop for a lunch of papaya salad with fermented fish and salted crab. Sucking out the yellow innards of the crabs for all I'm worth I can't help but feel that someone else got the best bits. Walking along the beach afterwards I'm accosted to do a survey by a pair of young Americans on some kind of school trip. "Just one more question!" goes on for about 5 minutes but I was in no hurry. They ask about facilities, pollution- air and seaborne but the question about the standard of service for which I'm preparing a fullsome diatribe never comes up.
I return to the southern tip of the island for sunset but the clouds that brought the rain earlier have settled in for the evening. The light had gone which was a cue for the insects to come out. They ping off my body and face as I ride back, big stinging 'thwops'. There is no-one at the scooter shop to hand it back to so go for dinner nearby at a place called Banana Bar. Any establishment with 'banana' in the name is, in my experience, rough around the edges if not the middle too. But it turns out to be a pleasantly homespun restaurant. The maternal proprietor takes my order and insists I spray insect repellent on myself. Bit late for that but I indulge her concern. My pasty legs are ripe for attack I suppose and I realise I've abandoned my 'trousers for dinner' rule, island life I suppose. The scooter lady still isn't back after dinner and I reason that maybe she meant I should return it at eight o'clock rather than by eight o'clock. There's a tiki-themed bar further down the street that wasn't nearly as tacky as that sounds so I go in for a kill-some-time drink. In fact it's done out so well, rattan furniture and lampshades covering bulbs that throw out a dim but intimate light, that I can picture it doing good business in London. For the few weeks a year they could throw open the front windows to the night air anyway. The house music playlist is perfectly judged, creating an atmosphere without intruding on my profound inner thoughts. Two women sit in a booth flanked by plants that resemble mother-in-law's tongue. They look young, though how young I can't tell in the moody light. They are attractive and I think about the impossibility of talking to them without an unthreatening pretext. Nothing will ever pass between us and I feel quite certain they aren't casting the occasional sideways glance in my direction but I allow myself the fantasy anyway. They finish their drinks and get up to leave. At the door a backward glance?...no, they are looking forward.
The morning comes and back at the scooter shop I don't get to the bottom of 'by' or 'at' but I do learn that the scooter lady had toilet many times yesterday. Back on foot the day passes without note but I feel like I'm adjusting to the slower pace of life here. Returning to the tiki place in the evening I sit looking at out at the indolent dogs on the street. A young Asian woman comes into the bar by herself. That is unusual enough in itself but it gets stranger. I'd say she looks Chinese but cannot be sure.
That's not her.
She gets a drink and sits a few stools down from me. After a little while she comes over and asks me to take a picture of her with her phone. Chinese tourists, in my experience anyway, don't tend to interact with other groups, other nationalities. And if it sounds like I have something against Chinese tourists it's because I do. They are the worst tourists I've encountered on my travels. Certainly it's a generalisation and I don't like to make those but I've seen enough of them behaving badly and showing little respect for the sights and cultures they visit and the other tourists they are around that I feel there is some validity to it. My pictures meet with some approval and she returns to her seat. A little time passes and I can see her waving at me from the corner of my eye. She raises her glass in a cheers. I fumble for my beer and knock it over, cool. There's various games scattered around and she brings over Jenga. I feign ignorance of the rules to give myself a moment to work how to deal with the weirdness of the situation. We're only a few doors down from the vice bar and I still have 'do you want to play pool?' on my mind. A Chinese woman is unlikely to come to Thailand to solicit for sex work so maybe she isn't Chinese but I also don't think she's Thai. We chat in halting English as we play and she mentions Laos. Ah, maybe that's it. A much shorter commute. But then she starts showing me pictures of family and friends and my suspicions ease. She must just be travelling alone, however unconventionally, and wants a bit of company. "You want to walk on the beach?" Ah! That's where will discuss the cost for the night I reckon. But what's the worst that can happen? If we go to the beach and she cuts to the chase then I thank her for the Jenga and politely decline the offer. After a promenade up and down we sit and she spells her name in the sand 'Rui' and I spell mine. She tells me about her hometown of Chengdu in Sichuan province in....China and we're back in the friend zone. She tells me of her love for hotpot, a Chengdu speciality and shows me many pictures of hot, steamy broth. We look at the stars and it's all rather romantic in a ridiculous kind of way. We have a couple of beers before calling it a night and arrange to meet for breakfast the following morning.
The sun blazes down and my plan to meet her without looking like a sweaty mess is in tatters. The beach does not look the same in the light as it did in the dark and the spot where we'd arranged to meet was not where I'd left it. Everything looked familiar but different, the chairs, the tables, the bars. So up and down the beach I'd gone searching, fruitlessly and embarrassingly forlorn. We hadn't exchanged numbers or any contact details. After about 30 minutes I gave up and trudged back to town resigned to my sliding doors moment. As the phrase goes that I taught her the previous night 'c'est la vie'. Well an evening of conversation and company made me feel a touch more human anyway and I could weave an elaborate day-dream of what might have happened. There she was though, right in front of me. Wearing heavy-rimmed glasses and sipping on a juicebox, barely recognisable. We, somewhat tetchily, debate where the meeting point was before she throws up her arms in an 'oh well!' gesture and gives me a hug. Over a coffee she tells me that she's never been further than the beach next to her hotel at the top of the island. I mention that I'm a consummate scooter-ist and that I can take her to see the sights. Chivalrously I let her choose our ride and we end up on a powder-pink stallion called 'scoopy'. I do have some hesitation and am not overly-enamoured with the thought of killing 2 people rather than 1 but it doesn't feel like the moment for faint hearts. If she is willing to risk her life then so am I. We go to a particularly nice beach I'd found the day before. She's afraid of the water but Chengdu is 1300km from the sea so perhaps that's understandable. If only she'd joined the Chengdu Sea Cadets. But she's also compelled to go in. Back and forth she goes between the primal fear and the rational knowledge that people do it for fun and plan whole holidays around it. It's a stretch to imagine the sea draws us into it because a gagillion years ago we had flippers and what-not but yesterday I watched a dog paddle back and forth beyond the breakers for over 30 minutes for, from what I could tell, the sheer joy of it. "I don't have a bikini" she says, " I don't have any swimming shorts" I say. "We could...." I say, "buy some" she says. So we do and I take her hand and we wade out until we're waist deep and that's far enough. The sun burns a hot orange as it dips towards the horizon. Golden hour bathes the rocks we're sat on in a yellow light.
That's her.
It's all rather romantic and unexpected and a wholesome endorsement of the blissful freedom of travel. To saying 'yes' when you want to say 'no'. And the next day she is gone, off to meet a friend in Pattaya. She leaves me in a kind of revery. Feeling something old and something new, grateful for something borrowed and a better shade of blue.
There's an unusual sound outside the window as I slowly open my eyes. Similar to the sound of the jungle but it isn't the cicadas. Outside I am greeted by my first rain storm. It buckets down, noisily slapping leaves and gushing from decrepid guttering. Thunder booms through the foliage. Once it has stopped I decide this is the day I hire a scooter and explore the island. At least when I lose control on a bend and die and become a cliché news story I can blame the wet roads. I'm given a racy yellow model and affect total confidence in its use. I'm a little apprehensive though, that cultural caution again. Another tourist has hired a scooter just before me and puts it on its side metres from the hire shop. Do not be that guy. But actually there isn't much to it. There's only 1 road, little traffic and with all the hills, turns and speedbumps you can rarely get above 30 km/h. Probably just as well given my inexperience and the fact that I don't think there's a single helmet on the island. I go down and up the island and stop for a lunch of papaya salad with fermented fish and salted crab. Sucking out the yellow innards of the crabs for all I'm worth I can't help but feel that someone else got the best bits. Walking along the beach afterwards I'm accosted to do a survey by a pair of young Americans on some kind of school trip. "Just one more question!" goes on for about 5 minutes but I was in no hurry. They ask about facilities, pollution- air and seaborne but the question about the standard of service for which I'm preparing a fullsome diatribe never comes up.
I return to the southern tip of the island for sunset but the clouds that brought the rain earlier have settled in for the evening. The light had gone which was a cue for the insects to come out. They ping off my body and face as I ride back, big stinging 'thwops'. There is no-one at the scooter shop to hand it back to so go for dinner nearby at a place called Banana Bar. Any establishment with 'banana' in the name is, in my experience, rough around the edges if not the middle too. But it turns out to be a pleasantly homespun restaurant. The maternal proprietor takes my order and insists I spray insect repellent on myself. Bit late for that but I indulge her concern. My pasty legs are ripe for attack I suppose and I realise I've abandoned my 'trousers for dinner' rule, island life I suppose. The scooter lady still isn't back after dinner and I reason that maybe she meant I should return it at eight o'clock rather than by eight o'clock. There's a tiki-themed bar further down the street that wasn't nearly as tacky as that sounds so I go in for a kill-some-time drink. In fact it's done out so well, rattan furniture and lampshades covering bulbs that throw out a dim but intimate light, that I can picture it doing good business in London. For the few weeks a year they could throw open the front windows to the night air anyway. The house music playlist is perfectly judged, creating an atmosphere without intruding on my profound inner thoughts. Two women sit in a booth flanked by plants that resemble mother-in-law's tongue. They look young, though how young I can't tell in the moody light. They are attractive and I think about the impossibility of talking to them without an unthreatening pretext. Nothing will ever pass between us and I feel quite certain they aren't casting the occasional sideways glance in my direction but I allow myself the fantasy anyway. They finish their drinks and get up to leave. At the door a backward glance?...no, they are looking forward.
The morning comes and back at the scooter shop I don't get to the bottom of 'by' or 'at' but I do learn that the scooter lady had toilet many times yesterday. Back on foot the day passes without note but I feel like I'm adjusting to the slower pace of life here. Returning to the tiki place in the evening I sit looking at out at the indolent dogs on the street. A young Asian woman comes into the bar by herself. That is unusual enough in itself but it gets stranger. I'd say she looks Chinese but cannot be sure.
She gets a drink and sits a few stools down from me. After a little while she comes over and asks me to take a picture of her with her phone. Chinese tourists, in my experience anyway, don't tend to interact with other groups, other nationalities. And if it sounds like I have something against Chinese tourists it's because I do. They are the worst tourists I've encountered on my travels. Certainly it's a generalisation and I don't like to make those but I've seen enough of them behaving badly and showing little respect for the sights and cultures they visit and the other tourists they are around that I feel there is some validity to it. My pictures meet with some approval and she returns to her seat. A little time passes and I can see her waving at me from the corner of my eye. She raises her glass in a cheers. I fumble for my beer and knock it over, cool. There's various games scattered around and she brings over Jenga. I feign ignorance of the rules to give myself a moment to work how to deal with the weirdness of the situation. We're only a few doors down from the vice bar and I still have 'do you want to play pool?' on my mind. A Chinese woman is unlikely to come to Thailand to solicit for sex work so maybe she isn't Chinese but I also don't think she's Thai. We chat in halting English as we play and she mentions Laos. Ah, maybe that's it. A much shorter commute. But then she starts showing me pictures of family and friends and my suspicions ease. She must just be travelling alone, however unconventionally, and wants a bit of company. "You want to walk on the beach?" Ah! That's where will discuss the cost for the night I reckon. But what's the worst that can happen? If we go to the beach and she cuts to the chase then I thank her for the Jenga and politely decline the offer. After a promenade up and down we sit and she spells her name in the sand 'Rui' and I spell mine. She tells me about her hometown of Chengdu in Sichuan province in....China and we're back in the friend zone. She tells me of her love for hotpot, a Chengdu speciality and shows me many pictures of hot, steamy broth. We look at the stars and it's all rather romantic in a ridiculous kind of way. We have a couple of beers before calling it a night and arrange to meet for breakfast the following morning.
The sun blazes down and my plan to meet her without looking like a sweaty mess is in tatters. The beach does not look the same in the light as it did in the dark and the spot where we'd arranged to meet was not where I'd left it. Everything looked familiar but different, the chairs, the tables, the bars. So up and down the beach I'd gone searching, fruitlessly and embarrassingly forlorn. We hadn't exchanged numbers or any contact details. After about 30 minutes I gave up and trudged back to town resigned to my sliding doors moment. As the phrase goes that I taught her the previous night 'c'est la vie'. Well an evening of conversation and company made me feel a touch more human anyway and I could weave an elaborate day-dream of what might have happened. There she was though, right in front of me. Wearing heavy-rimmed glasses and sipping on a juicebox, barely recognisable. We, somewhat tetchily, debate where the meeting point was before she throws up her arms in an 'oh well!' gesture and gives me a hug. Over a coffee she tells me that she's never been further than the beach next to her hotel at the top of the island. I mention that I'm a consummate scooter-ist and that I can take her to see the sights. Chivalrously I let her choose our ride and we end up on a powder-pink stallion called 'scoopy'. I do have some hesitation and am not overly-enamoured with the thought of killing 2 people rather than 1 but it doesn't feel like the moment for faint hearts. If she is willing to risk her life then so am I. We go to a particularly nice beach I'd found the day before. She's afraid of the water but Chengdu is 1300km from the sea so perhaps that's understandable. If only she'd joined the Chengdu Sea Cadets. But she's also compelled to go in. Back and forth she goes between the primal fear and the rational knowledge that people do it for fun and plan whole holidays around it. It's a stretch to imagine the sea draws us into it because a gagillion years ago we had flippers and what-not but yesterday I watched a dog paddle back and forth beyond the breakers for over 30 minutes for, from what I could tell, the sheer joy of it. "I don't have a bikini" she says, " I don't have any swimming shorts" I say. "We could...." I say, "buy some" she says. So we do and I take her hand and we wade out until we're waist deep and that's far enough. The sun burns a hot orange as it dips towards the horizon. Golden hour bathes the rocks we're sat on in a yellow light.
It's all rather romantic and unexpected and a wholesome endorsement of the blissful freedom of travel. To saying 'yes' when you want to say 'no'. And the next day she is gone, off to meet a friend in Pattaya. She leaves me in a kind of revery. Feeling something old and something new, grateful for something borrowed and a better shade of blue.
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