Reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated. Well, slightly exaggerated. Actually there is no exaggeration. This is the English department, so I may be dead from a student stampede before long.

It's been a while, since my return from the south. After I got back I went out and got a bike! A cheap, $60 used Japanese thing. It was nice enough for me. It had a belt instead of a chain, which was new, but overall worked out. I enjoyed it for 1 day. Notice how this paragraph is in the past tense?

So, I was riding home one day, crossing the street at an intersection. A taxi decided to do a U-turn pretty quickly and crashed into me. So, that was fun. Honestly I'm fine, it just sort of knocked the bike enough to make me quickly jump off it. Anyway, now the wheel was all bent out of place. So the taxi driver took it to the side of the road to get it back into shape. After spending about 30 minutes pounding away, he declared it was done. Except, the wheel was all crooked. I said it is definitely not done, so he basically said "Ok, fuck it then?" and drove off. Why you gotta make things all complicated, man? So I got a photo of his plates and I'm waiting for the ever-so-fast Thai police to get things taken care of. Stiiiill waiting. I'm not hopeful. I'm glad it was a cheap bike. When I replace this thing I'm going to stick to only my side of the street, on the sidewalk. Combined with my 4th rabies shot (2 more to go!), Thailand is trying its damnedest to kill me.

I got back from my vacation on Saturday, which gave me all of Sunday to get settled and hit Monday running. Except I got a text that we wouldn't be meeting until Wednesday. Alright, then! Tuesday I got a text saying it'll be Thursday. Then Wednesday yet another text saying Friday. I actually got a bit of a cold during that time, so it worked out nicely. But as such, I only had 1 day of work before another weekend. Silly, my job is. And to be honest my job is pretty cushy. I have so many classes learning the same material, I can pretty much reuse my lesson plans 4, 5 times the same week. It may get a bit boring for me, but I don't think I've ever had a chance to practice one lesson so many times. After this year I'd imagine they'll be quite refined, so that'll be nice. On the downside (upside?) my classes are big. Really big. Like, 50-60 students, "I use a microphone to teach" big. This will take some getting used to.

Regardless, with a whopping two days of teaching in Thailand under my belt, I am ready to make judgments about Thai students. First of all, they are not shy at all, especially the girls. This is a big change from China/Taiwan. It's also very easy to get everyone to talk...although, I find that they abandon English pretty quickly, so that's kind of missing the point. I told them hearing Thai makes me sad, and when I am sad I give lots of homework. We did an activity where each class got to come up with rules, and I was surprised by how straight laced Thai students were. I've done this activity before, and almost always the first rule they come up with is "No homework", "No tests", or something along those lines. Only 1 or 2 of my classes did that. The rest said very reasonable things like "No cheating" or "Please participate". What the hell, guys? Do you know how to be kids? Actually compared to China/Taiwan they do. They have a good amount of free time, comparatively, and have a variety of interests. The rest of Asia is really hard on their students, so it's nice to see that they get some time to enjoy being kids now and then. Anyway I took a picture of the board when the rules were finished. One of them shouted "Selfie!" so I was happy to oblige.

Speaking of Thai observations, I've had a note on my phone of weird things I've noticed about Thailand, so here they are:

• Ketchup is really sweet here, even moreso than the US. It tastes like candy.
• Fast food is a bit expensive. In fact, they give you your food on real dishes when you eat in.
• Thailand has apparently figured out how to do steak properly - I'm looking at you, Asia. It doesn't cost a months salary for a crappy cut of meat, and isn't cooked on a plate of noodles. God, wtf Taiwan.
• Escalators run a little fast here. It throws you off at first.
• Stairs are slightly smaller than what the rest of the world uses. It's awkward to make so many tiny steps.
• People drive on the left side of the road. I know that's not revolutionary, but it takes getting used to even as a pedestrian.
• Women's fashion here is more "sexy" rather than "cute" like the rest of Asia.
• There are men's clothing stores. Maybe even as many as women's. I know that sounds obvious, but it's apparently not, Taiwan.

This blog in general was pretty "Wtf, Taiwan". But it's funny, I really miss Taipei. It still feels like home to me. Bangkok is 100x more exciting than Taipei is, but I just don't feel like I fit in here as much as I do there. Maybe it's the language thing. At the very least, I know a taxi driver in Taiwan wouldn't say "Eh, I'm bored of your bike that I broke so I'm leaving." And that's the big difference - Taiwan is very nice, orderly, and kind. It's just not as exciting.

So this tour. Wow. We first drove into town to catch the bus. But it was early and left already! The awesome owner, Mr Tawee called the bus company and raced to catch up to it.

On the bus, I met my crew for the day: Our guide was A (just the letter), 2 Americans, 2 Polish, 2 Germans, and 2 Dutch. Quite the multi-national group. So we drive for about an hour and get to the dock. Then we pile into a boat to go across the lake. I use the word "lake" loosely because it take almost an hour. "Lake" like, "Lake Michigan". Along the way... wow. Sheer cliff faces going down into crystal clear water that looked like the surface of a mirror. I've never been in a place that looked more untouched by modern life. That continued when we arrived at our jumping off point. A village that's just floating on the edge of the lake. They prepped lunch, and we were invited to swim. I mean, I can't swim, but they also said 20-30 minutes. Seems kind of like a waste, so ah well. The Dutch guy and I chatted, and he told me about Holland and his opinion of the country. Interesting stuff, I learned a lot.

Lunch was fish that was caught 30 minutes ago. Scary looking thing with lots of spines and teeth. Tasty, though. Also some chicken, vegetables, and fruit with rice. Awesome meal. After a rest it was in the boat for 10 minutes, then a trek to the cave. At first I took off my shoes to cross the streams. I would soon realize how futile this was. When we got to the cave we put our cameras in our guides waterproof bag. Turns out that was much needed. We had to wade through this cave, and at times the water was up to our necks. I'm glad that I was taller than the water line or that would've been interesting. I made sure someone at least at my height went first to see if they suddenly disappeared. The cave was unreal though. So many curious rock formations and strange looking walls. Since we were in water most of the time, no photos - so you'll just need to come yourself. But it was an amazing adventure, and the highlight of my trip. After that we just went back to the village, had a snack, and made our way back home. To help alleviate boredom, we searched for songs that we all knew. Turns out amongst Americans and Dutch, the Fresh Prince of Bel Air theme song is universal.

That evening, the UK girls and I headed into town to see what was up. We went to a local market, and we shared some sweet potato donut things, and some nougat taco things. I also had some fried chicken and stopped to pick up snacks for my hike tomorrow. We stopped off at a bar, and who should show up but Beer! Our guide. I mean, beer also showed up. We all played Snakes and Ladders, which was new for Beer. He won, lucky bastard. I turned in early for my morning hike.

I slept like a baby, because The Green Mountain View Bungalow in Kaoh Sok is just amazing. (Hello Google!) After breakfast, Mr. Tawee took me to the park entrance. I set off on my 14km hike (7 there, 7 back). About 2km in I ran into Trevor. An American from Minnesota, Trevor is a simple guy. He lives in the middle of nowhere, has no electricity or plumbing, and bikes 14 miles in the Minnesota winter to work at his family's saw mill. We had a nice hike and chat together, but he didn't feel up to going all 7km. He turned back around 4.5, to return tomorrow. I went on, and man that trail was rough at times. At one point I broke a spider web, and looked down to see a yellow spider the size of my hand on my arm. I screamed like a girl... I mean, I screamed like manly man and thrashed around until I was sure it was off. Unfortunately, I don't have many pics from the trail because it's not that interesting. There's a lot of marked waterfalls, but being dry season they're quite unimpressive.

Anyway, that's it! Back to Surat Thani for the train to Bangkok. Originally they didn't have anything til 9, but I ran into Juan on the platform (What are the odds?) He had a 630 one, and I asked the staff if there was any way I could get on that one. They said it was full, but 10 minutes later they sent someone to find me and let me know of an opening. God, southern Thailand is so much nicer than the north. Anyway, back to Bangkok!

Phuket gets a bad rap. But I actually enjoy it. It's basically considered a sleazier Las Vegas, which, is true. But Phuket Town has a charming, old time feel. I didn't do much there. Walked around, found this really weird museum based around taking pictures with you in optical illusions. It was quirky, stupid, and I loved it. After that I went to go hike a mountain before going out to Patong beach. I saw some monkeys on the way and thought "Please no bites..."


"Wait, what day did I need to get the next vaccine... SHIT."

So, back down the hill, to the hospital. It was more expensive here than Surat Thani, but not extreme. I got the bus to Patong, and met Juan. He's from Spain, and we would meet again later on the train back to Bangkok, as luck would have it. Anyway, Patong. Patong is not family friendly, which I'm like "Why are there families here?" I just can't imagine saying "Cmon son, your mother and I are going to the gogo bars in Asia." But Patong is super exciting. So much energy, so many restaurants, bars, clubs, its overflowing with electricity... and the only time I saw a McDonalds next door to strip club. I bounced around to a few bars, and one of the bar girls challenged me to Jenga. I lost, and she said that means I owe her a drink. Fair enough. We played again and I won, so I said the next one was on her. Nope, not so much. Double standard, I say! Anyway I turned in early, as I had a 730 bus. I was staying in a capsule hotel, which, can we make these the norm over hostels? It's all the benefits of super condensed, shared living (social aspect, cheap price) with your own "room". Love it.

Anyway Patong actually has a lot of what Ko Phi Phi has in terms of water activities, albeit more crowded. Still, I like it there. Wouldn't mind spending more time in the future. But for now, it's onto Kaoh Sok!

And Kaoh Sok lives up to its reputation. Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful.









I arrived around 2pm. I was ambushed by extremely aggressive touts as soon as I got off the bus. I had a place in mind to stay, about half a kilometer away. After shooing the touts off, I made the mistake of telling one I don't have a place yet. I was ambushed again, and one said if I don't like it, he'll drive me back here. We shook on it, which was good enough for me. It was about 2km away, but honestly, was perfect. A bungalow out essentially in the jungle, with a decent restaurant and cheap beer. I took it, and asked him what I could still do with the 3ish hours of daylight left. He said I could book an elephant tour. I wanted to do that in Pai, but it was like 3000 baht an hour, or 1800 if I could find a friend. Expensive either way. He said it was 800. Wow. Sold. I was still paired with someone, a Thai girl named Bo. Turns out she lives in Bangkok, and studied abroad so had great English. We rode together, and wow. Elephants are cool. Ours was the ADHD elephant, because she kept stopping to like, play with this plant, or Oh look, a butterfly! I didn't mind, but the trainer had to continuously encourage her along. At one point he said I could ride on her head.

Yes please?

More like her neck, but still. It was actually difficult, as with each step the shoulder blades tried to push you off. He said I could hold onto the ears. But when I did she flapped her ears like "Dude. Stop touching my ear, yo." Anyway I managed to not fall. I didn't want the framed photo they took of us, even if the frame was made from elephant poo. (Yup). I did want a digital copy, and they had no way to give it to me. Ah well, a framed photo it is. Who has those anymore?!

Back home, I met my neighbors - 2 girls from the UK. They were going on a "night safari". I decided to join. Our tour guide was a jolly dude named Beer. Yup. Beer. They asked why, and he said "Because my parents like beer."

I love this stupid country.

Anyway, a lot of spiders and lizards on the night trek. Beer gave me a local smoke, which was just plain tobacco in a palm leaf. I had trouble keeping it lit, but meh. Was okay. Tried it anyway.

Back on the trail, it was getting dull so I picked up a rock and threw it. The sound caused everyone to stop, and Beer looked intently in the direction. I had a chuckle, and not 5 seconds later another crash and rustling came from the same direction. "Haha, that wasn't me!" I thought. Never found anything though.

Back at the bungalow I slept like a baby. The owner set me up on a tour tomorrow, and absolutely amazing life experience. But more on that next time.

Krabi's so so. As more and more people got off the bus, eventually it was just myself and one girl from Australia. She had just graduated high school and is travelling by herself for 6 months. I find that hilarious. I envision my cousin, around the same age doing that, and no way in hell her parents letting her. Anyway the bus stopped and the driver said "Alright, here's Krabi. But it definitely wasn't. It was on the side of the road still 5km away. So I refused to get off. He said okay okay, pulled the bus into a U-turn, stopped at some dimly lit parking lot, and said "Okay, Krabi." After much arguing it seemed we didn't have a choice, this is where it stops. So we decide to split the outrageous cab fare into town. Also, I wasn't going to leave some 17 year old girl alone in a dark parking lot in rural Thailand.

Bring late, there wasn't much to do. Found a guesthouse, then we went out to the local market. Except they were just closing. I wanted to catch the early ferry to Ko Phi Phi, and climb up to the Tiger Temple - so I hired the innkeeper's son for the morning.

The Tiger Temple is pretty impressive. It's ~1250 steps to the top, a tiny outpost on the top of this skinny mountain. The way up was covered with monkeys, so I thought "Damnit, getting bit again." But it was incident free despite an absolutely exhausting 45m climb. I tried to keep pace to make the ferry, but wow, I was spent by the top. Amazing view though. After going back down we stopped at another temple, then it was onto the port to go to Koh Phi Phi.

Koh Phi Phi is amazing. They say it's the most beautiful island in Thailand. It is definitely that. There's a lot of water sports to do, which I wasn't interested in. For one time in my life, I was just going to do nothing. I met up with Jeppe, a guy I ran into in Bangkok and Chiang Mai. He was kind enough to share his bungalow with me. The first day, we went to the beach and just hung out at a bar all day. We chatted with the owner and the kids that work there. The kids also are the performers in the daily fire show. Yup. Kids working at a bar instead of going to school, and playing with fire in the evening. That evening was the fire show, which was a bunch of people doing acrobatic things with balls of fire on chains, torches, ropes, etc. It was totally awesome, and lasted like 3 hours. They had a lot of audience participation, and each time you got a free shot. I jumped the fire rope, and on the way out it singed my ear. Nothing serious, but I also noticed it burned off a bit of my hair. Eh, I needed a trim anyway. The rest of the night was a giant beach party.













The next, hungover morning, I was more determined to do nothing. Jeppe and I had found a buffet the previous day, and ate our fill with what is honestly, the best deal on the island. After I wanted to go to a beach with no people. I found a pretty isolated looking one on Google Earth, and was going to try and go there. Jeppe declined, as his toe got scorched and hurt to walk. Turns out this beach was about an hour hike through village, forest, and jungle. But I made it, and nope - 0 people, except for... A bar. Yup, one guy running this bar in the middle of nowhere. His beer was expensive, but I talked him down by renting one of his chairs also. I just hung out on the beach, watching the waves in silence. Well, except for the waves and birds. And I built a sand house for a hermit crab I found. We became BFFs.

That evening was bar hopping and watching the football game - a great end to a great island. I don't like to visit places twice, but Koh Phi Phi is an exception. An amazing, beautiful place that everyone should try and make it to.

"God damnit Surat Thani!" I said to myself, as I waited in the hospital emergency room.

But lets back up a bit. My contract begins on March 1st, but classes don't until the 15th. What that means is complete insanity, as I get paid for knocking off to Southern Thailand. I'm due back on the 12th to do some planning and meetings, but until then... hello vacation. (Again)

I had planned on going down to Hat Yai, a largish city near the border to Malaysia, then popping on down to the border itself. I'm starting to reconsider, as apparently things are a little tense down there. They sometimes suspend train service (as in today), and even when they don't there are a lot of security checks and soldiers. But this could be outdated info, we'll see how it plays out.

Anyway, I took the overnight train and shared a cabin with Pravit. A nice fellow, he's a bank manager with a son who is studying English. He also pays a ton of money for his tutor, and wanted to hire me instead. In return, I can stay at his house for free. That'd be interesting... a live-in tutoring job. Anyway we exchanged info and kept in touch. He got off about an hour or two before me, while I was fast asleep. But he called later that day to see if I made it okay. (Aww). Being Thailand, the train was 2 hours late.

Seriously, Thailand. I can understand buses running late - you can't control other people on the road. But for god sakes, you're the railroad company. Everyone on the route is you. Get it together.

There's not much to do in Surat Thani. I saw a park on an island I wanted to visit (it's nice), then the City Pillar. Essentially that, it's this pretty temple clad in white. Also nice. The only other sight was the Monkey University. Yes, that's a thing.

See apparently, picking coconuts sucks. So they actually train monkeys to do it. They of course, ship them off to Monkey University to get their Bachelors of Coconology. (Or Coconomy?) The course is 6 months, and when you visit the nice lady puts on a show about how it's done. They're trained to first twist them, then bite the stem if that doesn't work. Afterwards I got to play with the smaller ones, which is AWESOME. Monkeys are cool. They just wanted to climb on me, and I fed them the coconut they harvested earlier. Which also, is the best coconut I've ever tasted.

My high monkey opinion (which would make a good band name) was shattered shortly after. On my way back, I stopped to eat lunch at a local place. They made a dynamite curry. Anyway at one point the owner comes out with his monkey. I guess monkeys are normal here? So we were chatting, and the monkey just decides to climb on me. Alright. The owner didn't seem to react. I kept eating while he sat on my shoulder and chilled. After a minute, he decided to leave. And as you do, jumped into my lap, screeched, bit me on the chest, and left.

The fuck? So I open my shirt, no blood, but it hurt quite a bit. The owner apologized and ran to put some antiseptic on it. Which honestly is the least you could do. So I left, and at first didn't think much of it. But I called the monkey guy at the school (yeah, I have a monkey guy), looked on the internet, and the overwhelming consensus was "Get it checked out".

God damnit Surat Thani. So I went to the hospital, where there are people with serious injuries. I felt like an idiot walking in and saying "So, a, uhhh... monkey bit me." But they had a doctor check it out, consult with his staff, and said "It's almost fine for sure, but we're going to give you a rabies vaccine to be safe."

Immediately I thought back to childhood, when rabies vaccines were 6 giant needles in the stomach. Apparently that's old skool. It's still a lot of needles, but small ones in the shoulder. Then my next thought is, this is going to cost a fortune. Turns out even though I need to go back for 4 follow up treatments, they're only about $13 each. Annoying, but god, can you imagine that in the US? I'll take Thailand's medical system, thank you.

Despite one asshole monkey, the others at the school were great. I took about 100 photos, and now's a good time to sort them. I'm on the road to Krabi, a beach town about 3 hours away. If there are any monkeys, I'm leaving.

You. Fuck you.