04 May 2002 Samui

Hi all ,
Once again here i an update... for you and me both. The space bar here is
hard to negotiate so you may see a few words stucktogether here and
there.... not to worry. Here we go anyway....

Well it's not the snoring of Kelly or the Cock farm ( steady ladies i mean
of the bird type) that wakes you up in the morning... Its the intense
heat.... Takes a good bit of getting used to but it still wont let you get
away with a decent kip...but who cares anyway. I slide straight out of the
wet bed and into the slightly cooler wet shower...then i dry myself off with
the wet towl and take my wet self onto the dry dry beach... instant
happeness....plus laughter when you read the signs along the beach on how
some owners try to excuse the state of their bars and doorms with things
like "No worry about for decoration"... ahhh shud up a da face ....

This week we decided that we would just take time to ourselves to get ready
for all the traveling thats in store... a mini holiday so to speak of.( i
can see us using that excuse on every Island we get too but as long as i
keep fooling myself i dont mind).. Tomorrow 5th May we will leave ko Samui
for the slightly less populated and hopefully less touristy Island of Ko
Phan-ang ( thats just above Ko Samui Dee Dee...mark it on the map!!)
We've had a fairly eventful week anyway ...the first night we got here it
was all wet a muddy so it was hard to be impressed...Plus we had a few larry
lizzards come in and out of the room which meant kelly was awake ...which
meant i was too...mmmm !!

It all got better the next day when we moved into better accomodation
(without any pets) for the same price.. nice move. Lazed about on the beach
and did the usual thing...for the next two days.
There isn't an awful lot to do on an Island...but we managed ... There was
Thai boxing on in the islands "stadium" so i was straight on for that... off
we went....The stadium was more like a room... not to worry... We looked at
the bill for the night and there was about 8 fights scheduled...super
stuff... Right...lets start the gambling then Diggers... I took the first
name then he took the second and we keep swapping around who we had for the
night...it was the best way to pick the fighters as there was no form cards
to help us...out they came.... The music played and two little helpers
walked forward into the ring...did a lap of honour and then everyone stood
for the national anthem..bit like the Irish one where you get to cheer at
the end...I felt right at home as i didn't know the words to this one
either...
THe anthem was over and no sign of the boxers...im sure they would be along
soon...the little helpers started to do prayers and then strecthes...then
de-robe... No !! I couldn't believe it...the little helper were the main
attraction...they were only 14.. Instant smell of a tourist scam...they
spent the whole of the first round with there gloves stook to their eyebrows
following each other round the ring.... m'yself and diggers were just
laughing at each other... Round two... happy days...the slightly bigger of
the little guys was getting kicked around by my man... hurray for the
littler little fella... i won....Every other fight was just as
entertaining...and it wasn't long before we sussed out that round one was
get the beers in round...which was nice of them i thought....Really enjoyed
the night i have to say.

The next day it was off on a sight seeing tour of the Island...not much to
see really... THe big buddah was just that...big and we drove to another
beach which amzingly enough also sand and water... enough of this lets go to
a waterfall....we did... When we got there it was not like i had pictured it
and was more like the dodder...it was only missing a burnt out car because
it had the locals hanging around drinking... one kid wouldn't shut up crying
....we all wanted to "give him something to cry about"...we left to go to
another waterfall that was aparently 4 times bigger than the last. After a
nice walk up through a mountainous forest we reached the waterfall...or more
like.. we reached "the fall"... Couldn't really see the water, I suppose it
is the summer.
That night we drove to another town had a bite to eat and dragged the ladies
into a go go bar... I think they were impressed with the hospitality !!

So that was enough of the jeep for this Island all we had to do was get some
petrol in it the next morning and leave the keys back by 10....easy !!
Myself and Diggers got up early and went for the fuel.. "Left or right Mark
???"...."... "ahhh lets go right Gav... ok".. and off we went in search of
one of the "many" petrol stations... or so we thought.. As the bank wasn't
open yet we would just have to use marks(diggers) money to get a half a
tank.... 10 towns later and not a sign of a station....it was now about an
hour since we left and just approaching 10... oh shit....nerves were
starting to kick in...thoughts of getting charged an extra day circled the
mind... hurray a petrol station...all was well. We asked for half a tank ,
the dunce put in a full tank... we didn't have enough cash to pay for it.
Not to worry ill just pay with the Credit card...
"No..Mon-ney...Mon-ney...Mon-ney"... Look i only have a credit card.... i
didn't really see the point in telling him weonly asked for a half a tank as
he could barely say money... The only option was to leave my passport there
and go to an atm machine get money..come back pay them and head back home.
Simple plan...but again hard to explain to the little mon-ney man... Of
course there wasn't an ATM Machine for another 10 towns, the only machine
had a man using it who was trying to pay his monthly bills with account
numbers of about 20 digits long...what a dissaster. How hard can it be to
just get petrol and come back...answer...very easy if you turn left instead
of right... Later discovered if that choice was made then we wouldn't have
been gone nearly 2hrs and had the girls thinking we had crashed... Of course
the two of us were just laughing at each other the whole way home...what
else could we do..It was all soon forgotten about later..

I would love to tell you that i got a nice sleep that night but we had a
squatter in our bungalow..well outside our bungalow...biggest lizzard i have
ever seen...easily 2 foot in length...I asked him 'nicely' to move he did
but his memory still lived on with Kelly.... I didn't even try and tell her
not to worry about him...no need to waste my time or hers... THe only thing
for it was a few drinks to settle the nerves so off we went to the beach
with a simple plan...get Kelly drunk so she can sleep!! THe plan was soon
forgotten after we met a few lads from Templeogue...and spent the night
drinking with them...I was the one who ended leg-less... the lads from
templeogue ended up with sore ears from me talking (or dribbling about
football)...(A big Sorry Alan Murphy and Brian...hope the ears recover
soon!)
Spent the next day dying in bed...i was about as useless as an arse without
a hole...and that was it...

right im off...

Cheers,

Gav.