"Back to the Garden" or "The Continuing Story of Bungalow Ben"

What's up? Really?!! No way! That's awesome! Well, enough about you, it's my turn.

I'm in Bangkok, Thailand, about to buy a ticket to Cambodia, with plans to hit up Vietnam and Laos as well, all in the next month. I'm almost broke, waiting for my W-2 info so I can do my taxes and get my refund, and hopefully not go into credit card debt. That being said, I'm feeling incredibly lucky now.

I just spent 2 weeks on fantasy island. My Swiss bungalow neighbor called it "Disney Land for Adults". Imagine an island in the ocean, and then a beach only reachable by motor boat, and clear blue-green water. Then imagine pretty much anything you'd want to do while you are there. Let me back up.

The last time I wrote, I was in Calcutta (Kolkata for you Bengalis), awaiting my flight to Bangkok to begin my adventures in Southeast Asia. Since then, I would say I haven't really had any adventures in Southeast Asia, save 4 nights in Bangkok. Since then I've been on Kho Phan-gnan (pronounced "pan yang") in the southern Gulf of Thailand.

When I arrived at the airport in Bangkok, I felt like I'd stepped back into the real world. The cleanliness, the food, the way people dressed. It felt so much cleaner. And in retrospect, I don't think these are all good things, but it did feel like I'd stepped back into a world I understood, even though I don't speak Thai at all.

I suffered from reverse culture shock on the taxi ride to Kho San Road (where all the backpackers stay), as the interior of the car was the nicest I'd experienced since leaving home (probably longer than that, actually), and the drive was simple and smooth, with people actually using straightforward lanes. We got stuck in traffic for 20 or 30 minutes, but so what. That's any city. It really struck me as very clean, and despite all the people wearing masks to avoid pollution, it was nothing compared to Delhi or Mumbai.

I basically spent 4 days living like an American tourist, enjoying roads that didn't smell like shit (mostly), exotic foods, cheap prices and an air-conditioned hotel room. One night I hopped on a ferry, got off at the end of the line, wandered around and rode back on the back of a motorcycle. There are motorcycle drivers who wear jerseys to signify that they are for hire, and they don't put up with nuisances like traffic jams, driving 70 mph in the other lane past lines of cars. I really liked it there, but when everything is cheaper than you're used to in America, it deceivingly adds up and eats up your wallet.

When I was done with Bangkok, I took an overnight train to Chumphon, then a ferry to Kho Phan-gnan, then a taxi to Haad Rin beach, then a motorboat to Haad Yuan beach. After several "full" answers from hotel owners, I found a bungalow at a place called Ocean Rock. For 300 baht (just under nine dollars) a night, I had an attached bathroom with a real toilet seat and a porch with...yes, a hammock.

I got to know my neighbors (a German and a Swiss) fairly well and after 4 nights I decided to pay for a few more when I found out they'd booked my room already. Grumbling and cursing fate, I walked down the beach getting a series of "full" answers when I met a Greek woman in a restaurant who said there was a place called Eden Garden at the end which had bungalows for 150 baht (just over 4 dollars a night). I found the place and loved it immediately. A bare bones hut, similar to the one I stayed in at the beach in India, except this one had wooden floors, a porch with a hammock, and a killer view of the ocean, hidden behind palm trees. I paid for 10 nights up front.

By the end of my time there, I couldn't walk anywhere or eat anywhere without running into someone I knew, whether they were 50 something Israelis, 20 something Canadians or 30 something Greeks. As long as you're friendly and open-minded, you can make friends incredibly fast. I'm not sure why I didn't do that at Gokarna in India. Probably because I was recovering mentally from other things and feeling less extroverted.

As goes the code of the open road, when you're fitting in and feel like you have a community, that means it's time to go. Especially when you're living in a fantasy land and you see guys working at the bar because they ran up their tab too high and they're basically trapped in paradise now (a strange concept).

So even though I haven't been integrated with the culture and exploring the real Thailand, I'm very content with my experiences so far. The point of this journey is to mix things up and have new experiences. I've never been to a tropical island before, let alone one that drew people from all over the world. And I've never had a hammock either (something I will remedy quickly whenever I settle down). Has this been a hero journey? There were a few exhilarating motor boat rides that involved getting airborne...nah, it was really just vacation. Well, I don't care. It's been awesome.

Also, I fell completely and head over heels in love. Her name is "Thai fisherman's pants". It was written in the stars. An Irish girl told me that even though I pulled off the look to some degree, it was doomed to be a fleeting love affair influenced by the romance of a tropical island. Well, we look forward to proving her wrong on our three week anniversary.

Peace,
Ben