Talkin' Thai.

Oh me. I'm in Thailand, and it's everything everyone's ever told me it would be. There are vendors waiting around every corner to plan the next leg of your journey, Australians draped on every corner about to come of age, the Thai people are some of the friendliest and most hospitable people I've ever met, and the beaches are paradise... almost.

I spent a few days in Bangkok, recharging, decharging, and recharging again, for my dive into the south of Southeast Asia. I saw the national palace, the emerald Buddha, the floating market, I got massaged, loitered on Koh San Road, hired and fired Tuc Tuc drivers, and even suffered a night in a 2 dollar hostel with aforementioned coming of age Australians (COAA). Bangkok has been checked off my list.





Since I only have about a week in Thailand, I thought, as does every Westerner, that I could find paradise untouched, in all its divine serenity. One night bus with many COAAs, a 3-6am layover in a barracks for backpackers and a bumby boat ride to the middle of the Gulf of Thailand later, I landed on Koh Tao Island. Paradise? Not really, but the island offers plenty of distractions. When I arrived, I discovered that this island and the few surrounding comprise the scuba-diving-for-beginners capital of the world, or at least for COAAs.

So I decided to enjoy my paradise-lost with a healthy bout of productivity. As of tomorrow, day 4 of the Scuba School International's Beginning Open Water Dive Course for Certification, I will be a scuba diver. It's been four somewhat strenuous days of theory, classroom time, studying, examinations, pool drills, and finally (tomorrow) open water test dives.

When it's over, I'm taking my certificate and dashing for the border. My next stop is Malaysia. My search for paradise continues.





What I'm really sad about is saying goodbye to Pili and Santiago, my two new friends from Spain. I've been travelling with them ever since that fateful day at the Thai-Cambodian border. It's been great with them. Coincidentally, we have had until now similar itineraries and keep meeting up even after loosely agreeing on a time and location. I've learned a lot from them, and I think they've learned a thing or two from me.

Santiago is going home early for family reasons, their friendship is now on the rocks, and Pili was and still is in undergoing a severe work/money/location-related quarter-life crisis. Getting to know them and being with them as their poorly timed dramas have unfolded, has quite honestly, been arduous, but looking back on it, I'm glad I could have been a part of it.

It's strange the way people connect while backpacking, and detach. You're so much more likely to spill your guts, tell white lies, and desperately hold on to people you've never met before, while traveling through a strange land with only 10 kilos to your name. I thought this might have been just because I am traveling alone, but I'm starting to notice that even those in groups are ecstatic to meet an unfamiliar face. Sometimes I think it's all fleeting and shallow and why listen or help someone when you'll never see them again? But then again, I stop and think, I'm gone for several months, these are the only people with whom I'll share these memories. I don't know if I'll ever see them again. But this is just how it is. And I'm trying to enjoy it.

I know when someone says "omg, are you on Facebook? We've gotta stay friends!", it's probably not going to last, but when someone's cried on your shoulder, shared their oxygen tank with you, and shared a two person motorcycle three-ways... that's bonding! Santiago and Pili, this one's for you!