Ko Phi Phi
‘Ko’ means island in Thai. Phi Phi is reckoned to be one of the most beautiful places in the world, although it’s actually made up of six islands. It is also the setting for a number of movies, most notably The Beach, y’know, the Leonardo DiCaprio film where a bunch of travellers live in utopic isolation (it doens’t last..) We arrive in early evening, grab some food, watch the opening of the Olympics and get our bearings on the island. It’s a tiny, tiny place. You can walk from the beach on one side to the other in less than 10 minutes, winding your way through meandering streets, sopping up the tourist culture on the way from the ubiquitous stalls selling identical summery wares – vests, cut-off jeans, print dresses, boardies and flip flops. It’s here, on Ko Phi Phi, that Roy and I indulge in chicken sandwiches and lemon crepes. It’s horribly western, but why not? I dont spend every day in England just eating roast beef and jellied eels. In fact, I can’t remember the last time I ate either.
Flavien and I can’t wait to get in the water, and if you’ve seen the Andaman coast, you’d understand why. Not just clear, the water is full of tropical fishes, and is warmer than a bubble bath. We swam out as far as we could, climbed on rocks, spotted bigger and bigger fish and threw each other around. Or rather, he threw me around. Later that evening, we headed to the beach for a bit of quality drinking time – an overnight bus journey does that to you. The buckets of Sangsom are so ridiculously cheap and available that you can’t help but be encouraged to drink. As I found in Bangkok, I can drink whiskey til 1999 comes back round without getting trashed (although three glasses of wine sees me gurgling on the floor), but the same could not be said for most others. One American girl who I recognised from our guesthouse particularly opened my eyes that evening. We had met in passing earlier on. She seemed sweet, quiet. She was overweight, with bleached frizzy hair, friendly enough. By 10pm, she was drunk. A weedy Thai guy began to take notice of her. “A-ha!” His face lit up. “Prey!” She drank more, he became more attractive. Or at least, that’s what I assume happened. What followed next surely wouldn’t have happened if she hadn’t carried on drinking. As the packed beach continued to party around one small stage area, the American girl and her Thai letch had their shorts round their knees and were grinding away against the stage. Everyone was pointing and laughing. All was lost for this girl. Fast forward two hours. Flavien’s eyes have glazed over with drunkenness; he’s roaring French expletives and crashing his weight from one foot to the other with ferocity. The American girl is drooling; her weight distributed entirely onto the tiny mass of the Thai guy and his spindly moustache. They stop every few moment to canoodle and slurp. Her friend insisted we walked them back to Harmony House, yet then she got distracted by a passing Australian guy (I can empathise..) and seemed to completely forget about her companion. I demanded the girl’s camera and took a photo of the sorry situation as I was sure their own memories would fail them in the morning. Alcohol, I summised that night, is not your friend.
What does it say about me that I need to set my alarm to wake up at 2pm? In less than a week, my sleep patterns had disintegrated to a shaky, crumbled mess. I threw a towel and spare bikini in a bag and headed to a close by restaurant where I would be meeting a group of people I’d be spending the night with. Yes, I was going to camp out on Maya Bay – the beach where that DiCaprio film mentioned above was actually filmed. Like a 14-year old, I had to stand on the back spokes of a bicycle (not easy in flip flops) whilst our boat’s captain cycled me through the markets of Phi Phi to the port. Around 15 of us were going on the trip. Flavien was supposed to be coming with me, but the previous night’s drinking had left him incapable – not from hangover, but from general embarrassment. Once onboard the long boat, we became acquainted. An American business graduate called Mike was pretty amiable, as were a group of Irish friends travelling together. The group of Canadians were odd and unsociable, but I expected no less. Our captain, Em, took the boat into a cove. We strapped on snorkel masks, jumped over the side of the boat and swam amongst brightly coloured fish and corals.
We took kayaks further between the rocks before arriving at the bay. As the day trippers filtered away, only the 15 of us were left as the sun set, deserted on the tiny bay. Food, drink, smokes. This is all an evening needs to be. It doesn’t matter where you are or what you’re doing. A few simple things in decent company keeps me smiling for hours. Or even giggling inanely. I put that down to Irish Brian. We lounged in the sand, swat mozzies and listened (and squealed?) as crabs clattered over the beach, spindly legs hitting spindly legs at high speed. By around 2am, most of us were at the water’s edge, looking up at the stars, eyes gently closing.
Our last night on Phi Phi was memorable for numerous reasons. Some of which I won’t go into. I’d been spending some time with one of the fire masters who told me his name was Lucky. He was amusing and apparently used to western girls falling at his feet, and disappointed when I wasn’t as impressed with his fire twirling antics. His hair was like a kid’s from Sesame Street. Anyway, we were sitting on the beach one afternoon when a guy with ‘ENGLAND’ tattooed on his back sat in front of us. This guy, Luke, turned out to live only 10 minutes from me back home, in Eltham. We got chatting with a 37-year old Spanish/Canadian couple who’d been travelling for two years as part of their honeymoon. The four of us drank buckets, took photos as the sun set and then went to dinner with Roy, his Dutch friend Mark and some guys Mark was traveling with, including an Argentinian composer, Leandro. Coincidentally, we ran into Mike the American and his Irish comrades in the restaurant. Such is the way of the well travelled path. However many of us were there ended up on the beach, drinking, watching the fire shows and really just carrying on what had already been going on for several nights. Leandro and I comandeered a longboat for ten minutes, lost everyone else, walked to the other side of the island and did “a loop”. Several times. It was one of those lovely evenings where everyone seems to just have a good time. Everywhere I turned, there was someone I wanted to speak to in depth. By the time everyone else was too drunk to stand and tripping over their own feet to get to their respective beds, Leandro and I decided to go swimming in the sea. It was 4am. The stars were out. The water was warm. We had a pretty good time with that.
- RED
