Wednesday, December 8.
I can't seem to learn this lesson enough. I won't profess to know just what the lesson is, but I have a feeling it's something like this:
Why cling to possessions? They don't mean a thing in the end. And besides, someone probably really needs those Chacos you lost in the ocean today, and someone else will deeply appreciate the prized stickers on that favorite Nalgene. You've got to let go. There's just no point in doing otherwise.
It's extremely tempting to be ridiculously frustrated with myself, or with anything else that could be blamed, especially when I reached for the shoes immediately after our three person kayak that should really only take two, flipped, and when Lacey's Chacos, but for some reason mine didn't, and when Austin's equally full Nalgene floated, but mine was nowhere to be found -- by me, anyway. I'm doing my best to remain calm about it, but I have to admit: I'm not about to throw my fiddle in the water, whether or not it's in a water-tight PVC pipe. I do understand though, I think.
All that aside, we really have had a wonderful second day here. We got up at seven and, a little later, had an oatmeal breakfast and makeshift tea with plenty of room for improvement over the Whisperlite stove that Heather kindly lent us. Then we hopped on a "tri-yak" at fifty baht an hour and had a simply glorious ride out there before we flipped over and a fairly crazy adventure ensued. After a long time of searching for my missed items, Austin lost track of one of the paddles, so while I satin the boat to keep from losing it too and tried to clear my mind, Lacey and Austin dove frantically for the paddle while trying to hold onto the other two. Without a paddle, I drifted farther and farther away, and so eventually decided to beach it and wait on shore. Once I made it, I turned to see my two companions swimming goofily to shore with the three paddles. After that, Lacey and Austin paddled back while I walked along the shore, partly to look for my shoes and partly to lessen the tippiness of the kayak. Pretty soon, the beach dropped off so I had to finish the long walk on the road, but soon enough I got a ride on the back of a motorbike, and the paddlers got back soon after I did.
After a delicious lunch of veggie omelettes, we spent the rest of the day relaxing. As the sun started to change the colors of the sky, Lacey and I set out for fruit while Austin foraged for a coconut, and we came back with three mangoes, a pineapple, and thirteen bananas for a total of 165 baht (about US $5.50)--a lot by Thai standards, but not so much for an island where probably only the bananas were local.
Friday, December 10.
On Wednesday, we had dal bhat Austin style for dinner and a perfectly ripe mango for dessert -- actually, it was probably the best mango I've ever had. On Thursday after tea, we had oatmeal for breakfast and then Lacey made our packed lunch of potato salad and fruit salad (mmm). Then we set out for the place with the best deal on two motorbikes, renting two scooters at 550 baht total for 24 hours (that's about eighteen US dollars). That's right -- it was motorbike day. It turned out the place was run by a guy from Northern British Columbia who's lived in Thailand for years and knows more about the island than most residents we've talked to. It was much harder than I expected, though mostly because the road I started on was a small dirt/gravel path with lots of bumps and deep sand, but before too long, we were zipping around the island with the wind in our hair and toothy grins on our faces. We failed to find the little-known waterfall we'd been pointed to and instead took a swim on the perfect beach -- beautifully rockless sand, a amazingly clear water, a beautiful view, and nice little swing. Then we made our way to a bigger waterfall, ate our lunch, went for a fresh water swim, and played for a while on a big rope swing before drying off in the sun and hiking back to our bikes. Then we drove all the way up to the fishing village at the Northwest tip of the island to look around and stopped by one of the other falls, where we just climbed to the top and hung out for a few minutes. Then we headed home, but not before getting quite lost and riding up a long, narrow driveway to the library, only to find out that it was closed.
Back at Dusita, it was my turn to cook dinner, and it turned out really well. We had long beans, eggplant, and onion on rice noodles with a great lime soy sauce, and our last and still more divine mango on the side. For dessert, we cooked up one of the sweetest, tastiest things I've ever eaten. All we did was heat up coconut milk with fairly unrefined brown sugar, add in the rest of the over-ripe bananas in small pieces, and then boil it until the milk got thick and the 'nanas got mushy. It was SO GOOD. (Yes, we'll be having this at home.)
After that, we walked out onto the beach in the dark with our candles left over from HM the King's birthday, sat down on a fallen palm tree, and broke open two coconuts to sip their milk under the stars. It's a laborious process, requiring one to cut open and dig out the deep and very fibrous outer husk and then drill a hole through the shell to stick a straw in, it is so worth it. What more could one ask for?
I woke up this morning and peeked over my hammock with an overwhelming appreciation for what lay before me. The early morning light breaking through the coconut fronds, water lapping rhythmically at the shore just meter away, and not a soul in site.
With more detailed directions to the hidden waterfall from our Canadian friend, we headed out after scrambled eggs with veggies. We didn't have time to make it to the falls in the end, and so took a treasure-collecting walk on the Ao Phrao beach instead, but returned to the bikes fully satisfied with our time on wheels and our self-guided tour around the island from the left side of its skinny roads. The rest of the day was spent relaxing -- what do yo know... We had a pasta salad and tang for lunch and then talked as much we could with three of the resort staff -- all from Cambodia. After much deliberation, we succeeded in inviting them to have tea with us at 4 O'clock, as we'd missed it this morning and didn't have enough food left to have them for dinner. It was great fun, and the youngest one, fifteen years old and the daughter and niece of the other two, came back later while Austin was making dinner and sat down to look at her English-Cambodian phrase book with Lacey and me. We then brought dinner -- the rest of the macaroni with eggplant, long beans, onions, and soy protein in a stroganoff-esque sauce -- onto the pier to watch the sun set, and then cracked into some more coconuts as the moon rose. Tonight it's early to bed, and tomorrow we borrow the resort's masks and flippers to go snorkeling off the shore for our last day in this tropical paradise.
Saturday, December 11.
The wind is howling across the ocean and through the trees. Walking on the grass alongside the beach, I couldn't be happier. I'm sitting in my hammock facing the water, enjoying the wind in my hair and its cooling effect on the temperature.
No comments:
Post a Comment