If you've travelled around mainland South East Asia then you've heard it before...
Same, same...but different.
Don't know who started it but I don't think it'll go away anytime soon. We've heard it in Cambodia and throughout Vietnam (with a little variation from Minh when he asked if I'd get on a bike with another driver - Same same banana, different colour!) and also now in Thailand. Actually heard it even more in Thailand which I thought was odd because down south, the thais are darker and curlier and quite often with dreadlocks.
Yep, I am same same asian people - everything the same!
Have really enjoyed being the same same...but different.
Thailand part 1
Escape from the Sanctuary...
After travelling around Cambodia, Vietnam and the Philippines, I had to admit that at Bangkok airport, I wasn't looking forward to Thailand. I figured it would be over modernised and choc-a-block with tourists.
After the crazy boat ride to Had Tien and our home for the next week: The Sanctuary, we figured this would be a great place to chill out. Great beach, lots of hammocks and yummy food. What we didn't expect was that we'd actually landed ourselves on hippy detox land. Posh hippies were everywhere - either chanting for 5 hours (what the hell do you chant about for 5 whole hours?!), eating lots of tofu, wearing fisherman pants, getting massages from a guy with big curly hair called Simba or getting their colons cleansed. Carly got into the true spirit of things and joined the cult that was the colon cleansing, husk eating and pill popping crew all bowing down to the gurus called Moon and Joseph. I did venture in a couple of times to chat and always felt a little bit like an intruder but they were a really lovely bunch of people - much lovelier than I would have been if I'd had to eat husks and stick a tube up my arse everyday! Trendy chillout type music was played everywhere and, on our last night, we had the pleasure of listening to techno from 11pm to 7.26am (yes, I just happened to still be awake having not been able to get the stupid techno out of my head). All I wanted to listen to was Justin Timberlake, Madge and Michael. Fuck the trendy chill out music. Last morning and we were glad to be getting out of there - onto a boat to Had Rin where we'd get another boat to Surat Thani. Had Rin's the home of the full moon party (which we didn't make...when I first got to Thailand, I really wasn't up for it but by the time it was on, I sat on a sun lounger watching the moon and all the boats take all the party goers over...Carly was detoxing and Els was still getting over food poisoning - bad tofu or bad vodka, we're not sure, but Moon sorted her out with a coconut shake and some other interesting ingredients). Had Rin isn't the most chill out place to be, full of party backpackers and a beach still not cleaned up from the party. So me and Els got back on a boat, paid our 100 baht and went back to the Sanctuary. And, oh my god, how glad we were to be back. We found a hammock, bumped into a friend I'd met in Vietnam and relaxed to trendy chill out music while eating a tofu burger.
Finding Joy in Krabi
Our second week would be spent in Krabi - on the eastside of southern Thailand. Still in recovery from the tsunami but doing really well. We stayed in a place called Railay Beach, chilled out at the pool in the mornings, went to the beach in the afternoons, ate sweetcorn and watched the sunset, drank some sam song and partied after some thai boxing and a great fire show (really fit thais wearing only little yellow sarongs, it's not a bad life). We met some great people called Tom, Tick and Toby (nearly, Tom, Dick and Harry), and also Megan, Keith, Sam and the lovely Joy (aka Monk), some other people who we can't remember their names but we called them Fingernail, Bob and The Body. It was a rock climbing and dreadlock culture, great party nights and lots of sam song. We went on a speed boat trip around the Phi Phi islands (LOVE speed boats), visited 'The Beach' beach, snorkelled with the most amazing fish (really cute and brightly coloured, I loved it. Els, we started to call her Hovis after lots of yellow and black stripey fish started chewing at her bum thinking she was bread for dinner - Hovis, no longer, two wks in the sunshine and she is now officially wholemeal, brown bread - the fish don't like that) and I even had a go at some rock climbing. Between you and me, I'm not such a great rock climber but thanks to The Body, I made it up there. I now just have the achey arms to prove it.
A bottle of tequila and some lime and I'm done!
We ended our two weeks on a boat trip back to town. I sat at the front and got thoroughly drenched - the boat driver made me put a life jacket on. The other tourists on the boat thought something was wrong...why just me with a life jacket, is it coz I is thai? Nope, apparently just to save me getting more wet...bit too late for that!
Dripping with sea water, I wondered who'd forgotten the tequila and lime. Goddamn, I was tasty (if you like things salty)
Who wasn't looking forward to Thailand???? I LOVED IT ;o)
The Countdown...
4 weeks left of our big trip and we're headed for Laos. Sawasdee ka Thailand...see you up north.
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