Another day in Phuket

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Today I set the goal of taking some excess stuff, such as my boots, juggling balls, a skirt, hat, mosquito net and the like out of my bag and posting back to New Zealand as I have no room in my bag seeing as I packed for every eventuality.

After my walk to Kata Beach at back that took just over an hour, I showered and breakfasted at the resort ensuring I had a balanced meal and enough to get me through to about 2pm then grabbed the box I had packed up the night before, put it into a black rubbish bag for ease of carrying and headed off to catch the local bus I thought. Actually, I was approached as you are, by the local taxi drivers and it seemed that to travel the short distance to kata Beach they wanted 300baht. I was willing to pay 200baht but no more. So we had a stand off and as I knew I could catch the local bus for as little as 35 baht but it might require a wait, (and that I am not good at)I was willing to look at other options.



While I was sitting on the set next to the men trying to coerce the tourist who happened to walk by to take their fare, a young Japanese couple, hand in hand, crossed the road to negotiate a fare to Patong about 15km away from here. The taxi driver would not accept anything less than 300baht and they wanted to only pay 200baht…..so I stepped in and suggested that I could go with them to Patong and we could therefore, pay 300baht as they would pay two and I the 100baht. They agreed and we tried to renegotiate but the taxi drivers would not have a bar of it saying that each of us would have to pay a separate fare and there we had the stalemate.

I sat back down on the wooden seat near the footpath in the shade and decided I would just wait it out as I was in no hurry but the taxi driver didn’t want me to sit there any longer and decided that right then he needed to hose down the tree I was sitting directly under for the shade. The upshot was that the Japanese couple and I retreated to the other side of the road, (but only after I had told the Thai guy how rude he was and it wasn’t as if he would have understood that but I said it anyway), where they dipped out totally. The Japanese couple took a van and after waiting only a few more minutes longer, I hailed down the local bus at 35baht. The trip to Kata was uneventful beyond checking with the others on the bus how to get off the bus. If I had looked up I would have seen the buzzer I needed to press.

Once off the bus at kata Beach the next task was to locate the Post Office. Yes. They are red and white there too. It was rather a long walk of up to 2 km to the Post Office, but I had lots of shops to look at as I walked. There were few tourists around and lots of Thai salespeople trying to sell their wares, so lots of people to say no to. I got my directions from a lovely lass in a shoe shop and discovered it was going to be quite a walk in the heat, but I had the time.

Finally, I found the Post Office and handed over the box I had already sorted. This still meant changing over the box to one of theirs and refilling it. I did not ask how much it was going to cost as I had assumed it would be a static fee and of course it was, but very expensive and therefore, it blew my budget out of the water. To send my box cost me $80.00NZ. I was gobsmacked and shocked as I had expected to cost around $20.00NZ but no more especially as it was to take 4 weeks to reach New Zealand. Feeling quite stunned, I walked back the way I had come in the hope of finding somewhere to have a nice cool drink. Not finding anywhere that suited me, and I still had water anyway, I noticed a Mini golf park that had dinosaurs as its theme. Thinking I should be spoiling myself a little bit at least and that it didn’t matter if I was going to do it on my own (after all I could cheat as much as I wanted if I wanted to) it would still be fun to enjoy the dinosaurs. The cost was equivalent to what one would pay in New Zealand so I did it.

After leaving here, I realised that in the morning I had walked this far when out getting my exercise, so decided that it was no big deal walking home again and so I did. It reminded me of how inequitable costs are for taxis and tuktuks. In Bangkok this fare would have cost be 35baht and here 300baht, but that is how it goes as it is all about supply and demand.

The rest of the day was spent sunning myself by the pool and reading yet another book. At least these are available down the road at one of the shops. All books are sealed so that you can only read the front and back cover and the second hand ones cost around 250baht ($11.00) and new 350baht ($15.00). I am now onto my 5^th book as there is plenty of time for reading. Hmm I had thought I could turn my tv on, but am yet to make that choice. I have no idea what is available but might be driven to have a look in a day or two.

Oohs the days have begun to drift together with them looking much of a muchness. I did watch the tree climber though and wondered how long his lifespan might be as well as walk on the beach and womble into town to see if I could play pool.

His job is to prune the coconut palms around the resort removing the new coconuts and much of the fronds to leave plenty of room for new growth. To this this he initially starts with a ladder propped up against the tree and sometimes even ties a rope around the ladder and tree to stabilise the ladder. Then and I am not sure why, he puts one end of a road in his pocket and scrambles up the tree beyond the ladder using the coconut to gain traction. His strength in his arms in legs must be phenomenal. Check out the picture. While he is doing the trimming sitting inside the fronds at the top there are five or six mean doing very little at the bottom of the tree. I gather their role is to stop us the customers, from walking past just in case we are hit by a piece of falling debris or coconut from the use of his machete. This machete is stuffed into the back of his shorts prior to climbing. Health and Safety in New Zealand and for that matters, most other countries would have a fit if they saw the lack of safety here. I am still puzzled as to way he took the rope up? Maybe to tie it is a tree frond so the men below could tug on it, but certainly not in any way to protect his safety. It would only ensure that if for some reason he was attached to it, if he were to fall, then they could use the end of the rope to find him by following its length.

The beach here is lovely and very long with beautiful light coloured sand, but as a rip is present on the water, few people venture out far and most paddle and frolic near the waters’ edge. In the evening as the sun begins to go it is a serene place to just be at this time of the year before the tourists arrive in their abundance.

II wandered down town after having eaten kebabs in the resort restaurant, and had a long walk on the beach, eventually coming to a bar with a pool table that had two women playing, so I stopped to watch. It is funny how you measure yourself against the other players and I had decided that I was definitely better than the both of them. No measure of my success it seems. I eventually got the opportunity to play with who I thought was the better player, the local Thai woman. Her name was Ghan. We had five games and I won one, but only ‘cause she sank the black by mistake. Each time I was close, but not close enough. They also play slightly different rules to us with extra turns if you totally miss your ball or drop the opponents ball in the pocket. To be able to play though you have to buy drinks, so by the time I had finished playing I felt quite tipsy.

The next day after tea of sweet and sour chicken I went off through the night market and was at yet another pool table. This time I played another local girl, bought a drink and lost four games to her. While I was there though another Thai lady started speaking to me in English and it seemed she was keen to learn better English and I better Thai. So we sat together for other an hour and had a great laugh at each other. Her name was Jai, 46 years old, two adult children and a husband who died 16 years ago. Her goal is to find a foreign husband to look after her as she works in a bar from 2pm till 3am serving drinks, and encouraging people to buy. Anyway I think that is what she does. I tried to figure out if she was available in other ways, but the language barrier didn’t let us get that far.

Today I will go back and talk with her again and see if I remembered anything I learned from the night before.

Sadly, my days at the moment are spent hanging out at the pool, reading, playing with my genealogy on the internet (wifi) in the foyer and walking to get some exercise so I can sleep at night.

Hey had my first real conversation today with a lady at the pool. She told me she was from Australia but it was evident form her accent that she was not born there. Her and her husband are from Serbia and are now settled in a place not far from Adelaide. We talked of the propaganda and what it is like for the local people in Serbia and surrounding districts as well as a bit about her family but she was hard to understand with her nuances. Still it was a conversation. Her name was Lily and they had been to Phuket before so were excited about doing even more exploring on this visit.

I also managed to have a couple of games of pool downtown again and this time only bought a coke. I am yet to win a game. God loves a trier. Oh and a lovely oil massage to make my sunburn feel better, with a discounted price of 350bhat (15.00).

Tomorrow I go on another adventure thought to Phi Phi Island. Watch this space. Yes! And hopefully will get to really talk to some people.

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