temples and theives

My time in Koh Tao seems like a dream, everything went by so quickly. I started my diving course 20 minutes after I got off of the ferry and spent my evenings reading books and going to supper with my dive group. The first day of diving was spectacular. I've always been afraid of the deep dark ocean, and it was exhiarating facing my fears under water (things like taking out the regulator under 18 meters of salty water). I was able to swim next to sharks, beautiful schools of multi-colored fish, trigger fish, angel fish, and fantastic forests of coral. I had a lot of trouble with my ears and equalizing and after the first day I had a reverse block (too much pressure inside my head that I couldn't get rid of) and I was afraid I'd burst my eardrums, by the end of the week they were ok though. I've really enjoyed my time on the islands and I'm sad to leave the beaches behind, but time is of the essence so the day after my dive course finished I caught a night ferry to Chumphon. There's absolutely nothing to do in Chumphon other than leave. I spent the day walking around town aimlessly and catching up on my emails. I napped at the train station in the evening and caught an 11pm night train to the big city of Bangkok. I rode 3rd class to save money and it was so very uncomfoprtable. Imagine sitting for 10 hours on a wooden church pew jolting along the tracks with zero personal space and a bathroom right infront of the seats, not the best way to travel, but it's cheaper than a hot meal, so the price was right for me.
I managed to find a hostel in Bangkok that's only 25baht/night (86 cents) and it's very nice and well-managed. I decided to spend my first day walking around the temples and koh san road (tourist district. I hopped an intercity ferry up to the temple/grand palace area and made my way to wat pho, the reclining budda. Just outside of the temple gates a guy started folloowing me a little too closely so I sped up, and then he sped up. He asked me for money and I said "no" which is apparently not the response he was looking for. I was so close to the gates and he came up behind me and grabbed me. I let out a scream from the soles of my feet, so loud and desprate I didn't even recognize my own voice. The guy ran away down the street without getting anything off of me and some people came out of the temple gates to make sure I was alright. I said yes and after a little while of being checked over by officials I went into the temple. I spent about 15 minutes walkingaround with a blank look in my eyes, not really seeing anything I got to the reclining budda and just started to cry from shock. I've never felt so small before, so vulnerable. All of the "what if" phrases started going through my mind, what if he had a weapon, what if there was no one at the temple gate to help me. After a few minutes of collecting myself and having other tourists think I was a really devout buddist I snapped a few pictures and got out of there. I wanted to be around people so I went to koh san road which is crawling with tourists. Paranoia was getting the best of me and I found myself following people around just so that I was never in a place by myself. Koh san has everything a person could imagine wanting, you can even buy spounges off of street vendours! I spent the next few days walking to koh san from my hostel through a bustling Chinatown. Mazes of shops in all varieties makes navigating chinatown impossible and I was lost before I knew it. After finding my way there and back I met some great travellers, Ant and Kieran, and we dressed up to go to the skybar and look out over the city without having to actually buy anything (it was rediculously expensive) I almost wasn't let in because my shoes weren't "fashinable" enough (leather sandals), but in the end we took the long elivator up to the 64th floor and looked out over a city that seemed to be on fire with lights. We stayed for a few minutes until a waiter asked if our order was on the way and then we slipped out of there back to our part of the city, where meals cost less than 3 dollars and there are cockroaches walking across the tables (I had one crawl up my leg during dinner). The rest of the night was spent hiding in the TV room and watching movies (it was 35 degrees outside, and the humidity was unbearable). Next stop for me is Kanchantaburi, home of the famous river kwai.

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