I am realising how much I have missed the simple act of ear-wigging. It's odd being able to fully comprehend what others are talking about. Unfortunately, Lonely Beach where I am stopping is also backtwatters central on Koh Chang so many of the conversations are inadvertently hilarious - last night there was one group having a long debate about why Islam is bad. Admittedly the most vocal person in the group was Thai, but she was sure enough telling everyone why Muslims are evil (a bit of background for those unaware - the south of Thailand has a large Muslim population and there seems to be talks ongoing about potential semi-autonomy for the region). Then the rest of the group (rightly so) rounded on her and then dropped the whole "that's racist" bomb into the conversation. I had little desire to point out that it isn't racist. It's wrong, but not racist.
On Tuesday I started boozing at 11.30am with the thought that one beer before lunch is not bad when you're on holiday. It ended at 1.30am, with me dancing on a speaker in a bar, trying to play pool with a Finnish carpenter (I lost), trying to talk with a French couple who now smile and wave every time they see me, introducing Koh Chang to the 'One Step Beyond' dance (see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N-uyWAe0NhQ&feature=related) and its suitability in trance music and also dancing manically with some more French people and the lad from the bar of the resort I'm staying in. They all now wave and say hello. I think this is a good thing. I just wish I could remember half of it.
I think I left the last blog flippantly commenting I was going to the bog after being fed the local delicacy of 'laab' - raw strips of beef with Thai spices. I have never before experienced such vibrant hues of faeces in all my life - ranging from near black through to flourescent yellow/green. Add to this some fantastic explosive qualities, the consistency of water, the clockwork regularity of trips to the toilet (11pm, 1am, 3am, 5am) and you can safely assume I'm never going anywhere near laab again. Just say no kids. Only after the 5am trip did I resort to emergency measures and broke open the Imodium. I didn't shit again for 40 hours. It was a little longer than that before I felt I could pass wind confidently.
I have managed to get nightly games of football with the village lads, in which I attempt to match them for deftness of touch, agility and speed. Sixteen years of pizza, beer and limited exercise have put pay to any chance of being able to compete on a level. However, I have always considered myself skillful enough to be able to drop a ball on to someone's head from across a 7-a-side pitch. Some footballing purists may call it 'long ball', 'hoofball', or simply 'ugly'. The Thai lads seem to prefer close ball control, turns, flicks and tricks.
That was until I began providing a large number of assists from my own half. Since then there has been a significant increase in the use of the long ball in Thabom, at the loss of the intricate passing game previously adopted. I feel I should apologise to the current national team manager on the off-chance that this trend spreads beyond Thabom and ruins his vision of a passing, entertaining, creativeand visually attractive style of play. The national team manager is Bryan Robson, and anyone who has had the misfortune to witness his previous teams (my beloved Blades ebing one) will know that these concepts are completely alien to him. I will, therefore, not be apologising. And to prove that his good work is already performing wonders on Thailand, the national team got dumped out of the South East Asia Games this week, in the first round. They have previously won the competition 9 times and were the defending champions.
Right, that's about it for now. There'll be a larger update when I get back to Thabom. Paying for the internet makes me much less keen to write massive long updates...
Finally (and again)
(and I've completely ruined the original of this photo by clicking 'Save' instead of 'Save As'. I'm hoping there will be a few more sunsets before I leave Koh Chang)
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