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Hi There,
Well, here goes another update of what ive been up to for the past 2 weeks. Its been a roller coaster fide as per usual - no rest for the wicked and all that jazz. Well, after hooking up with my little sis, we caught the over night train down to Champoun, jumped off at 4am and hung around til about 8am where we caught a boat across to the Island of KOH TAO. It was like paradise stepping onto the beachy shores after all the chaos in Bangkok. The light breeze was a welcome relief too.
We arrived to our new home for the next 5 days - the nearest thing to home anyway - to start our Open Water Padi in scuba diving. It was so amazing. There was a lot to read and alot to learn so it wasnt a holiday, but it was so much fun to say the least. We did our 18metre dive on the final day and passed! Yippe, so both Marie and I are qualifed to dive now.
We then did abit of Island hopping and went to Koh Phangan and Koh Samui, both were gorgeous as you can imagine. Mainly sunbathing and chilling out and of course sampling the local cuisine. Pad thai has become a stable in my diet, ive been eating it everyday for lunch and im still not bored of it!
Then we caught a boat and bus all the way to Phang-nga where the Jame Bond Island is. That was fun. The bus picked up all the locals on the way which was amusing. It was cramed full, until you thought they couldnt fit anymore in but they kept on coming! We arrived at 2pm and went straight out to see the Islands - they were so beautiful - we did a few classic James Bond poses on the beach and then got caught in a thunderstorm so had to take shelter in a local thai fishing village. Sadly they had a baby monkey there who was passed to me to have my photo taken with it. It was so tiny that it even had a nappy on it. We refused to take photos as we didnt want to encourage that kind of tourism. After the rain and lightening had passed we went back to what we thought was a quiet town, only to realise that the vegetarian festival was going on. It lasts 10 days, and we were the only foreigners there (or farangs as we known to the locals). We were the tourist attraction to them as they passed us many different types of vegetarian foods to try and sample - some were nice and others we had to pretend to like so not to offend them.The best of it was the tradition of going into a temple and becoming possesed by something (im still not quite sure what exactly!) and running out with there heads shaking and there voices screaming. It was quite disturbing but fascinating. It seemed to go on for ages.
After all that excitement, we decided to head south for the Island of Phukett. We went to the main tourist town to see a bit of true toursit culture and stayed at Patong beach in this amzing resort. A treat for Maries last few nights. It had so many pools but we didnt get a chance to go in any of them as we were so busy sight seeing. We went to Phi Phi Ley which is where 'the beach' is filmed and then on to Phi Phi Don which was totally destroyed by the Tsunmai. There are signs everywhere in this part of thailand warning of evacuation routes in case of a future tsunmai, its quite eery.
We managed to fit in some muay thai boxing, which was quite fun to watch although 13/14 year old boys in the boxing ring was abit weird to watch. We even had a couple of know outs - one in the womens match and another in the main fight. We also did a thai cooking course making my favourite, Pad thai with prawns and also, Tom yam soup and Panang Curry. It was delish.
Yesterday we visited the Gibbon reheb centre, did some elephant trekking, rode a buffalo cart and saw a waterfall all by mid day! Not bad going we thought! Then sadly Marie and i said our goodbyes and went our seperate ways. I went off north to Kuraburi and she headed on a jet plane to Bangkok back to London.
So here i am, i a little town north of Phukett, its very small and stayed in a hut last night with ghekos for company! Off to start a volunteer project helping villagers rebuild there community after the tsunami. I'll be teaching the kids english and playing games, helping to make soap which is there way of making money and collecting stuff of the beach where they used to life. The whole village has moved in land by 2km in fear of another Tsunami happening again. I also get to help feed the gibbons and help look after them which will be fun too. The name of the village is Ban Talae Nok so im looking forward to getting to know the 200 strong communtiy.
Well thats it folks, another update whilst enjoying a cup of yorkshire tea - the first cup of english tea in 6 weeks! Ive enjoyed every last sip!
Well better go, thanks for listening and will write again soon.
Lots of love, adele x
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