Thailand and The End

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All good things must come to an end, as the saying goes. And our time overseas was definitely good, absolutely, and yes it has ended but apart from the initial shock of arriving back in Melbourne, there doesn't seem to be any reason why the good must now end and the bad must begin. We had such a fantastic time and instead of rueing the fact that we are back it seems more sensible to reflect on how fantastic the trip was. An incredible time of nearly 7 months were neither of us worked a day and did only what we felt we wanted to do. No alarms, or jobs, or responsibilities or deadlines, just freedom.

Our time in Thailand was really great, we both had very little money, even for Thailand standards we had really nothing. We spent the days reading and relaxing and the nights drinking Singha Beers on the beach in front of our hotel or, if we had enough vodka-redbull buckets under our belts, at the notorious Green Mango nightclub. One night Kristian was quite the bleary eyed tourist walking home from said Mango when suddenly he wasn't looking ahead anymore, suddenly he was on his back looking at the stars. An unidentified assailant had swiftly up ended him with some kind of thai kick boxing manouvre. Problem was the poor kid couldn't understand why that had happened. Perhaps moments before he had looked at the assailant and mouthed off. Perhaps? Perhaps it was something he had said a few days ago. Perhaps. Perhaps it was for no reason at all. Perhaps. The things is you see, that these buckets of vodka and red bull give you, apart from sugar and alcohol, quite a few memory holes. So the inciting event of the assualt it seems shall remain a mystery.

We hired bikes while we were there and went for a ride around our side of the island. We also had some tailor made suits made which look fairly schmick. In the end we decided out of pure necessity to cut our trip a little shorter due to lack of funds. However we both agree that if we had returned on the original 27th May return-date, we would not have felt it was time. Even though it was sad to recognise that it was over, we both knew that it was now time.

A few people have asked what the highlight of the trip was, which is quite a difficult thing to answer as there was so many. We stayed on the beach in California, gambled in Vegas, stood where JFK was assassinated, saw an NBA game, drove across Texas, Arkansas, and Memphis, had beers at BB kings blues club, ice skated in Canada, drunk beers that got colder while in a spa in Waterloo, stood atop the Empire state, saw a broadway musical, strolled around central park, stood where John Lennon was killed, went to Blenheim Palace (birthplace of Winston Churchill), had bangers and mash in Oxford, stood inside the Sistine chapel, St Peters basilica, The Colosseum, saw Mozart recitals in Vienna and Prague, drunk copious amounts of Czech beer, played skirmish beneath a Prague castle, stood next to the Berlin Wall, went to crazy German nightclubs, saw the Socceroos play Lichenstein, Saw nearly every World Cup match, went to the Yukon, to Paris, to Spain, had a German address, meet countless fantastic people. Just to name a few things. So its kinda hard to decide. Infact the whole thing was a highlight. A damn good time.

And what now? Where to from here. Well Kristian returned from a 7 month holiday to find his boss...on holiday, so he has a week or two more before he heads back to work. Myself, I went from a job interview yesterday at the Victorian College of Optometry in Carlton, and I start in just over a week as a sessional Optometrist. Also while I was away my parents a) Decided they wanted to move b) Bought a house c) Sold this one, so I will be moving with my brother to the city somewhere. He says just south, I say just north so maybe centre.

So thank-you everyone that has followed our little adventure on this blog, I can assure you that we had a fantastic time. Thanks to both of our parents for handling all our stuff back here, while we lived a more carefree existence. Thanks to all who left messages, it was great to hear from back home and from else where. I guess this goes without saying but if you ever get the chance to travel and not work or travel and work definitely do it! But don't forget socks and the 2 airports in the same city thing 😉


Cheers


John

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Comments

[LindaLee]

So Sad
Well guys, I know your families are very glad that you're home now, but I will miss reading your entries from all your travels. It's been so entertaining and interesting to stay abreast of what you were doing and where you were going, and the writing has been excellent...a nice mix of human interest, history and culture...great photos, too. Too bad I didn't have the chance to invite you to our seaside hamlet in Oregon when you were on the west coast. We could have taken the boat out for dungeness crab and gathered mussels on the beach. I don't suppose you'll be this way again, but if so, look us up: www.bandon.com All the best to you now that you're back in the real world again. The transition will no doubt be difficult but I know you'll manage. :-) LindaLee