Koh Chang

The bus ride to Koh Chang started off the morning of the Kings big anniversary party, a blessing in many ways, the roads were very quite as the crowds of yellow were already well ensconced around the royal palace and those who weren't were crowded around the telly's in their homes. Ekami too was quiet and we picked up our connection with little trouble. The ferry ride mind you was very funny, I think my favourite companion was the gay boy, his ensemble was pretty (in pink) much every cliche you can think of but the footwear was nothing short of inspired!
How can you top brand new shiny white gumboots with pink lace wrapped around the top and tied daintily in a bow on each side, it set off the pink baseball cap and adhered to the ancient rule of matching, hat shoes and handbag.

With hardly a foreigner in sight the Thai tourists made up the bulk of fellow travels and prices everywhere fell dramatically to match, I wandered about the plethora of dive schools and finally decided on one of the only bunches that were open... what a bunch of cowboys, I should have known by the late departure time (10 am for a dive trip). Sure enough the boat ran aground and we all dove back to shore.

We ended up staying in a bungalow on white sands beach which is beautiful although I imagine quite crowded in tourist season, the waves were quite wild and fun to play in, the ocean was warm, encouraging all day swimming and the afternoons were great for cocktails on the beach as the sunset, in fact one evening we even saw the perfect sunset, you know the kind where the sun actually sinks into the water and you can here it going tssssssh. but there was enough cloud cover off the horizon to do the whole colour symphony thing, God must have had a special angel on sunset duty that night. Of course there was the usual glut of sunset photographers wrapped in futile attempts to capture what is essentially an experience, sunsets are one of the great impossibles of photography though I perpetually have to fight the primal urge to try.

The bars and restaurants along the sunset beach all sell a variety of seafood which is fantastic though some are inexplicably half the price of others! After we wandered down to one of the bars supposedly showing "the world cup" but instead of the soccer we were treated to highlights from the Kings day, this has become a theme, and although it appeared inexplixable at first I have gradually come to understand that this is because of the amount of illegal gambling that has become associated with the event. The rights to televise it were sold to Thai national t.v. instead of either of the cable channels (a source of great controversy in itself) and now the channels that have it are not showing it because they all simultaneously are showing old footage of the King! The powers that be know that no-one would dare criticise the King so a point is being made. (though there is a joke circulating about how in the good ol' days in Russia (under communism) there were two t.v. channels on the second was a soldier telling you to turn back to the first, but here in democratic Thailand we have 7 channels that all show the same thing, now that is choice.

Koh Chang being "Elephant Island" has a number of large beasties (and elephants as well). Baby elephants are very cute though the one that I went over to pat decided that was the perfect moment to take a dump! Washing elephants with a nail brush is an experience some tourists actually pay money for? Hmmm, I guess it saves the animal trainer a job.

The trip back to Bkk started with similar elements of farce that I am coming to expect in Thailand, the ferry couldn't dock because the tide was too far out (again), after an hour a ditch digger arrived and hauled the thing to shore, I climbed aboard wondering how the hell they were going to get the thing back out to sea (and if there was now a hole in the hull, (at least it was open air and the water was warm so drowning was not a realistic fear). Sure enough they again used the ditch digger and we eventually got back to the main land, the bus journey passed without incident and soon I was on the local bus home, it's funny how some men seem not to have realised that certain after-shave has more aroma indicators in common with toilet cleaner than with exotic flowers and spices, and why is this always the case with the guy whose armpit is hovering too close to my nose.

Now safely back at the salt mine otherwise known as Chokchai Rangsit, I came into town today to see a movie and noted that Thailand, for being dubbed the "land of smiles" seemed to have just as many po-faced commuters on the sky train at 9am as the London underground, Interesting, maybe I will do a comparison smile count on public transport in different parts of the world at 8:30 or 9am and find out who really is the "land of the smiles" and who is the "land of pissed off commuters".
Anyway better get to my movie.
Love N.J.