Ban Phe

This weekend we decided to go to the beach with our new friends that we made at English Camp. We decided to leave Saturday morning so we still had time to kill here on Friday afternoon and evening. The evening started with the typical trip to the Friday market. The Friday market is the biggest Friday of the week. It is literally a huge flee market but with a big amount of food street vendors more than anything. Obviously, typical Asia you can find all sorts of electronics, cheap clothing, earrings, fake sunglasses, purses, watches, etc. etc. etc. They say that you finally have adapted to Thailand when you realize everything you own is fake… This market has become my favorite because it has the lady with the bbq pork with cilantro, onions, rice dust, etc. It is absolutely delicious and I will definitely be making it when I get back to the states. That, and sticky rice.

After the market we came back home and had a dance party in the kitchen. It was a pretty fun afternoon. I have found myself a lot more content in solitude than I have ever been, not to say that I don’t lack that human contact but sorting out my thoughts and being ok with who I am and the decisions I am making has helped me deal with my own demons. That and the fact that on any given day I have 2 or 3 people from home whom make an effort to communicate with me. That has seriously helped me immensely. Regardless of how much I get used to this lifestyle, nights where I can hang with other people are always fun… It is a nice break from the routine.

The next morning I woke up and made French toast and homemade syrup. They were pretty delicious. We got ready and started walking to the bus station but on the way there got stopped by another teacher. She told us to wait and then forced three students to drive us there in their motorcycles. It was pretty comical. It was an internal struggle to decide should I hold on to him, or should I just try to keep myself… wow, what the American teaching system has done to me.

We took a bus to Klaeng where we met Barry. He put Dani and Jess on a Songtao and I drove down the coast with him on his street bike. It was an hour and a half of sheer pleasure. Looking at the beautiful ocean surrounded by lush landscape, not commercialized, smelling the salty water, all while feeling the wind on my face. A year from today I would have never thought that I would be driving on a motorcycle in the countryside of Thailand to go the beach. What a beauty.

When we went there we met with Bryan. One of his friends owns a hostel so we went and hung out there. We then met a guy named Miguel from Barcelona who took us to his Mexican restaurant. We sat around drank beer, drank a typical Thai drink called liquid crack, and hearing stories from all the men and their ex thai wives. It was pretty comical.

We then decided to ride down to a further beach. It was Barry, Jess, and I on the moto… Which is not weird here in Thailand at all; after two or three days you get used to seeing families of 4 on one moto… T.I.T. (This is Thailand, a very common fraise used by the farrang). First we got pulled over cause Barry was not wearing a helmet, he paid them something like 7 dollars and we got to go. Then Barry slowed down and turned very awkwardly and we crashed the moto. I could not stop laughing. Nobody got hurt, thank God.

We finally made it to the beach. Barry and Jessica went and played in the water and I laid and tanned. (I am on a mission to get dark, Thai people LOVE touching white people so EVERYWHERE I go I have random people petting me.)

After a fun time at the beach we got ready and went to the bars. It was a lot of fun. We then ended up at a Thai strip club. There was nobody else there so we thought it would be fun to just get up on the stage and dance. OH the four of us sure made fools of ourselves but had a blast.

The next day was a beach day. We bummed around and got to play some soccer on the beach. We also got to watch a group of guys play soccer on their dirt bikes on the beach. It looked like a blast. I was soooo jealous. We then finally headed back, we took a different way and stopped in Rayong (the big city, but not really) on the way home. Went to an actual store! HOOOOORRRAAYYYYY! And bought a couple things we needed.