Now it is Saturday and I must say that a better way to start the day would have been with Saturday morning cartoons. Ryan started out the day mind-numbingly watching numerous episodes of Bones and I caught up on writing overdue emails.
The biggest news perhaps is the missed phone call that I received yesterday followed by a text message from Ryan to announce that the missed call I’d gotten from Chris was to let me know that he’d decided to drink the same Kool-Aid as Ryan and I.
Chris works for BAE (British Aeronautics). He builds tanks. Obama has cut his program and others affecting BAE and BAE Santa Clara is reducing its workforce drastically. Those of you who know Chris will understand how easy it was for him to transfer to another position within BAE, which he did, not without growing pains. BAE had announced impending layoffs and employees had been given an opportunity to volunteer for layoffs. After much thought and a few conversations with us, Chris finally made the decision to join us here in Thailand. All the cool kids are doing it, why aren’t you? We are expecting his arrival mid-September.
I’ve been asked to tell you all a little bit about our daily lives. And here I thought the detailed scuba course renditions were so descriptive of what we were doing. But I will run you through a typical day or two. And I’ll include pictures.
Alarm clock rings at 6:30 and I push snooze. It rings again at 6:40 and I push snooze again. It rings again at 6:50 and I begrudgingly get out of bed with a few grumbles. I throw on a bathing suit, a pair of shorts and a tank top and wash my face and brush my teeth and run out the door to be at the shop by 7:15ish. It’s a 5 minute walk to the shop, give or take a minute or two depending on exactly how sluggish I’m feeling.
Leaving the bungalows
Walking past the wastewater collection
Walking down the road...
The Shop
Our divers meet us by 7:30 and we walk to the pier to catch the boat.
The Boat at the Pier
Setting up the Gear
Ryan briefing students
We get everyone on the boat and give them a boat briefing which includes where the coffee and water are, the bathroom rules and procedures and no dripping in the dry cabin. Depending on the course we’re running we’ll set up the gear as appropriate and head down to the dive sites and do the appropriate dive briefing for the site and course that we are doing.
Phi Phi Dive Sites
Generally, we’ll do the first dive on either Bida Nok or Bida Nai. We’re in the water before 9:00 and back on the boat by 10:00.
On Bida Nai and Bida Nok we see Mr. Shark
The boat will then go back up to Phi Phi Leh for the surface interval. We’ll moor in one of the bays. That’s our “lunch” break. Since it’s no later than 10:30, it’s probably more apt to call it a late breakfast, even if we are eating Chicken Chili Basil. Our surface interval generally lasts about an hour and a half, during which time we’ll eat, jump off the top of the boat and lay about in the sun.
Alexia with Claire and Richard - the lovely English students who dove with us for almost a month and took many many PADI courses
Craziness
A Happy Man
Our second dive is off of Phi Phi Leh.
On Phi Phi Leh, we see Mr. Turtle
We’re back at the Pier around 1 to 1:30. We unload the boat and unload the divers and head back to the shop to debrief and sign logbooks.
If we’re not diving in the morning, then the alarm never rings and the early morning is spent lazily watching TV until the shop opens at 10:00. Lately I’ve discovered that I can “steal” wifi from the bungalows behind us. A friend of us lives in those bungalows and gave me the password (though as it turns out – cracking the passwords is really really easy). So I’ve been spending less time mindlessly watching TV and more time mindlessly surfing the net.
Our afternoons can be spent either teaching theory, teaching in confined water or working shop hours trying to book classes or fun dives. I’ve taken up playing backgammon again if Holly’s working the same shift. It’s a great way to pass the time. My mac also has backgammon, so I'm also playing the computer, but the computer is too easy to beat.
Evenings are spent eating, visiting with friends, watching TV and sleeping. We’re in our room surprisingly little except to sleep. While the afternoon shift ends at 6:00 p.m. we’re very rarely back home before 8:00, which leaves little idle time.
Lately, I’ve been wanting to eat at Papaya a lot because they have the kittens and I love playing with them. They’re about the cutest things ever and have great little playful personalities. Papaya also has the best curries to be had on this island. The owners are also delightful. The brother of the owner of Papaya is our boat captain. The whole family is so happy and genuinely nice.
The Cutest Thing EVER
More cuteness
Oh look, more cute...
And while all this cuteness is going on, mama naps in the fridge next to the Singha
The Thai people in general seem genuinely happy and nice. I try to smile a lot at people I cross on my way to work or wherever. It always surprises me that the Thais always smile back. Not always so with the farang. Farang is the Thai for “outsider” hence all whiteys are “farang.” It apparently is also the name of a delicious fruit we’ve just discovered that tastes somewhere between a pear and an apple and is best enjoyed when freezing cold.
I’ve already written about the food, but I’ll say a little more. I’m always surprised by the quality of the food. I’ve actually not had a bad meal since we’ve been here – there are things I’ve enjoyed more than others, but always the quality is impeccable. You know how you can go to a restaurant you’ve never tried in America and it can be dodgy. Not so here. So while I continue to refuse to eat cow, that’s now turning into principal, more than anything else.
I’m also categorically refusing to eat most fish because I’m adamantly against the fishing practices here. I’m also seeing way too much fish at market and wondering what they do with it if they don’t sell it. And I'm seeing way too much fish at market that I see alive in the ocean in the morning. It's not a whoa, poor fish thing, I'm not pushing it that far, but they're prettier when they're alive in the ocean. I’m hoping that somehow it ends up in the restaurants. Also, I’m fairly certain that if they quit taking the squid out of my ocean, I’d actually see one every once in a while.
The fishing rules here are dodgy. There’s a lot of fishing boats. They break the rules and are protected by laws that say that they’re allowed to catch whatever is enough to sustain their family. They fish on our reefs, which they’re not supposed to do. I don’t like it. The places we dive are part of a “marine park.” Note that it’s a park, not a reserve. What does that mean? Absolutely nothing. It just makes it sounds like it’s protected, but its protection is very limited and only really adhered to by the dive community who enforces a strict no touching, no harassing of the wildlife.
La Mamita has become another favorite. It’s Italian, as the name suggests. I had fettucini with cream sauce and salmon the other night. I can’t begin to describe how incredible it was. Of course, just like the cheese sauce gnocchi, it has a week’s worth of fat calories. I’m not bothered though. I’m losing weight. Not sure why or how, but not complaining. I’m up to 50% spicy on the chili level in my panang and have even been able to swallow 100% without choking. That might be the secret to weight loss – sweat off ten pounds every time you eat a meal.
And then there's Pad Thai lady (Song)...
With the walls all covered in notes of praise
But I digress. Though the paternal units who might be concerned that we’re not eating enough, may your fears be laid to rest!
Every once in a while we’ve been asked to work the night shift from 6:00 to 10:00. Generally Ryan works that – not sure how it’s worked out that way, but it has.
If we’re diving the next day, there’s a chance that we have to go pack gear at 9:15. That part really irks me, but I understand why the shop we were working for does it that way. At other shops, you pack your gear when you know what you’ve booked and what you’re taking out the next day. At the shop we’ve been working at, they pool the instructors and pull from that pool. So there’s a chance that at 6:30 you think you’re taking fun divers the next day, then at 9:00 two discover scuba diving sign up, which requires an instructor and suddenly you’re switched from taking fun divers to taking a class. I have no basis for comparison, but I do like the pool system, provided of course, that everyone pulls his or her weight. As I understand it, that is often not the case.
Lights out around 10:00. Ryan’s pretty good about being lights out and sleeping by 10:30. I’m a bit less routine than he is and tend to do lights out and sleep time whenever I’m tired. That’s why I tend to be a lot more grumpy in the morning. Now that we’ve gotten into a routine, Ryan’s also back on a similar schedule to home where he falls asleep earlier and wakes up stupid early without the alarm.
The thing about writing all this about our day to day is that our day to day is changing now. Our month at Princess is over and we’re no longer employed. The island at this very minute is rather slow. That of course, could change next week. It's the full moon again so everyone's off to Koh Phang Nga to party like it's 1999. The island is again quiet for a few days and we’re once again freelancers.
As I started saying this morning, today was lazy. Ryan did think that we should leave the room at one point, so we walked around the island, picked up our pay at Princess, went to water hill to pick up a pack of bottled water, then came back to the room. We haven’t said much to each other all afternoon – I’ve been buried in my little projects and I’m not sure what Ryan’s been up to. As with our last pay day, we’re going to go for a special dinner of halibut at a fancy pants restaurant.
Now we’ve decided that tomorrow we’re going to Phuket. I want to see Harry Potter and go shopping. Ryan wants to shop for electronics. And we’ll stay overnight and go to immigration on Monday morning to see if they’ll stamp our passports for another month. It might be too early for that, but it’s worth a try since we’ll be there anyway.
wow, sounds awesome! much better life than most of us have back here! i wanna eat thai food everyday! oh, btw, it looks like our friends are most likely getting married at the end of march on koh chang.. so we'll be in thailand!
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