Happy New Year 2008

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Here we are in Thailand, across the other side of the world from most of you, and we have probably spent the first day of 2008 much the same as most of you: lazing around eating junk food, nursing a hangover whilst watching comedy movies and The Simpsons! Yes, the world is the same all over in many ways!

We are on the island of Ko Phangan, staying at Hat Rin beach, home of the famous full moon parties. This year, the full moon happened to fall on Christmas Eve, meaning that would be the party to end all parties. Not wanting to be so much in the thick of things, we decided to wait for the serious party-goers to head out and instead wait for the more mellow New Year's Eve party. Ooops - It was crazy!

The evening started off quite mellow with everyone congregating on John and Nicole's balcony for drinks. We then all gheaded to Om Ganesh Indian restaurant for some great food. Miraculously, all ten of us made it all the way back through town together to the beach without being separated. However, once there it was bedlam. The beach was filled with people, all dancing on the sand. We shopped for a "bucket" and then joined them, watching the fire twirlers. At midnight, the whole beach thundered with the sound of 30,000 people all counting from 10 to 1 and then cries of "Happy New Year!" and a firework display.

From there, we headed up to a balcony overlooking the beach where we could watch the craziness from a "safe distance". One guy who was busy dancing on the corrugated iron roof suddenly fell through! Luckily, people pulled him out and he was unharmed. At about 5:30am we decided to take a break and eat a sandwich before returning to the beach to wait for sunrise. Plans changed, however, when it suddenly started to lash with rain. People started pouring off the beach and into any place with cover, including our sandwich place. By the time the rain eased off, it was 6am so we decided to call it a night, but what a night! Great fun!

Happy New year 2008!

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Photos

At one of the beach bars with John, Nicole, and Jason
You may think Nicole and John look familiar. We originally met them in Egypt and they are already on our website from then.

The beach AFTER the party!
I guess we won't be sunbathing for quite a while.