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Published: December 13th 2007
Patong Gong!!
Paradise??? Para-Blech.Greetings from Northern Thailand...Chiang Mai to be precise. A beautiful city full of life, color and culture...quite a contrast to Bangkok yesterday, Bangkok is just...full. Shannon is back safe and sound from her meditation retreat and is very happy. She has some stories to tell but I will leave that to her.
I emerged from my 12 days of seclusion (from Shannon) happy as well. Travelling alone is quite the rollercoaster to be honest, some days were great other days I just wanted to hide, especially in Patong, where every suit shop, massage parlour, gift store, beer bar is yelling at you to come and spend your money....Patong got very overwhelming very quickly....so I left. my escape? Blue Canyon Golf and Country Club in Northern Phuket. Tiger Woods won the Asian Open or something there a fews years ago. A magnificent course, I played 2 days in a row....and of course enjoyed the Mandatory Caddy. Yep, you can call her a caddy or you can call her a 22 year old Thai girl who's never hit a golf ball in her life, I really don't care - that was fun. She carried my clubs, replaced my divots, fixed my ball marks,
marked my ball, laughed at my jokes, told me where to hit and where the wind was coming from. She even smiled when I hammered the biggest slice of of my life over the forest and onto another fairway. Her Comment: "Very long many trees." Or when I duck hooked one into the middle of a lake : "100% Water hit again." Unbeknowst to me she kept my score and even circled all my pars. At the end of the round I checked the scorecard and realized she was totally accurate on my good holes and when I would hack it around the bush she would give me a 6 instead of an 8 or 9. She even cheated for me! Nice girl.
I spent a few more days in Phuket lazing around the beach. I met a Swiss dude named Jan, (who I'm pretty sure was straight) and we hung out for a a couple days, drinking well into the night....After Phuket I still had 4 days until meeting Shannon so I went to Ko Phi Phi Island. A beautiful place that was one of the hardest hit by the Tsunami. Phi Phi is still recovering from the
Ko Phi Phi
they call this the "Tourist Village" Tsumani but that doesn't mean that tourists aren't there, Phi Phi is jam packed with sun bathing tourists in the day and at night gets really crazy. There are a few bars that are amazing, right on the beach, with so many lights, torches, loud music, fire shows and absolutely liquored up foreigners...it was crazy. I ended up meeting 3 South African guys and their friend, Jane, the first night I was in Phi and we had an awesome time and went out 2 nights in a row. So far of all the foreigners I've met I've really liked the South Africans, I think their beer guzzling, rubgy playing culture is quite similar to the hockey players in Canada. Great guys who love beer (and whiskey, the drink of choice in Thailand? Sangsom and Coke).
You may be able to tell that my 12 days in Thailand was a little different than Shannons! I was aware, painfully sometimes, that while I was out partying, eating, drinking, golfing and swimming, that Shannon was in complete silence, meditating and thinking about her life. I started to think about mine once but then I stopped.
So then on Monday I headed
Phi Phi Beach
Water was so shallow here you couldn't swim, just had to sit and bathe....I went in once, but hey, it's better than shovelling snow! to Suratthani to wait for Shannon. We met and she was in great spirits and has been ever since. We have had quite the adventure the last few days. After Shannon and I met in Suratthani, we decided hit hit the next train out of town to Bangkok. So we did and stayed in one of the sleeper trains. The train left at 6 at night and got into Bangkok at 6 the next morning. So yesterday we spent the day in Bangkok, did some shopping and then caught the next sleeper train north to Chiang Mai! That was another 13 hour trip. So the past 2 nights has been spent sleeping on the train-pretty fun actually. We got into Chiang Mai this morning about 8 and have just had a quiet day so far, eating, resting and trying to decide what to do next.
Cheers, Greg.
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Maha
non-member comment
Wow...what a trip!!
Hilarious to say the least!! Glad to hear that you have found the time in your hectic schedule to squeeze in a quick golf game or two.....I laughed through your entire message as I can totally picture you out on that course duck hooking a huge drive into the jungle. Just had an idea....Golf Trip 2010 in Thailand!! Anyways, glad to hear you are both doing well and having a blast. I'm heading out to shovel my driveway for the 10th time this year. Merry Christmas, Maha