Of Fish and Phuket

I have some more Bangkok photos, some of which are really pretty, but first want to share the fact that my husband got a fishie pedicure. While looking for the foot massage joint with the most comfy looking chairs one evening, we passed a tank of fish that promise to eat the dead skin from your feet. Naturally, I turned to my darling husband and dared him to try it.

His verdict is that it tickled and felt weird at first but then didn't bother him. His feet felt really soft afterward. From my perspective, it just looked really weird. Then again, I'm the weirdo who doesn't like fish touching me when I snorkel. And speaking of snorkeling, isn't that a really cool close-up photo M got? The fish are eating the watermelon that I threw in the water so that they'd swarm around M. The Aussies we were with did it for their friend as well but she kind of freaked out by the abrupt crowd. I can't blame her for that.

Ko Phi Phi

The Phi Phi islands are famous for being the film site of Leonardo DiCaprio's movie 'The Beach'. If I hadn't already known that, I certainly would have from ALL of the advertising around Phuket islands. Of course, we love boats and couldn't pass up the opportunity to take a nice long boat ride to some gorgeous islands.

We signed up with a big group but snagged seats in the front of the boat with some funny Aussie tourists. The group of us kept things pretty entertained and the next time we get to Oz, we'll have to try out all their recommendations for Melbourne. But...the islands. They weren't particularly deserted. We expected that, given that we were with a fair-sized group ourselves but it was hard to take a picture of the beach or even the water without getting lots of people and boats in the shot. Oh well.

We took in the beautiful scenery on Phi Phi and did some people watching at the same time. Swimming around the boats, we also managed to get away from the crowds and float in the cove for a bit.
The boat kept going to a few other islands after Phi Phi - stopping for snorkling, monkey-feeding, and a mediocre buffet lunch. Lest I sound like too much of a complainer (becuase really, it was gorgeous), we finally stopped on a quieter beach with local vendors selling drinks and yummy snacks like grilled corn.

I thought I'd catch up on my reading but the sound of the waves and the gentle breeze lulled me into a calm meditation. Can we go back now?

Phuket City

From Bangkok, we headed to the beach on Phuket. We were originally supposed to be in Koh Samui but the devastating floods there forced us to change our plans (no thanks to Carlson-Wagonlit, their outrageous service fees and horrific customer service). With almost a week on the island, we intended to explore lots of the island but ended up getting SCUBA certified (him) and reading lots of books (me). It was just what we needed.

We did, however, explore the old town of Phuket City. The architecture is strongly influenced by the Chinese and Portuguese, creating an intriguing mixture that made me think I was on the streets of Lisbon...until I ran a Chinese temple or gigantic gold dragon.

Despite the many closed shops (it was still Songkran), we had some delicious food (hello, perfectly cooked greens! I haven't seen you in months!), a great exploratory walk, and eventually a heavenly Thai massage at the Raintree Spa.

Bangkok for Songkran

Oh, hi. It's been awhile but yes, here I am. Maybe back but without any great ambitions for text. Things have been very busy here in Kabul. Lots of work and lots of forced time indoors, too bad since we've had beautiful weather lately. We're coming close to the end of our tour but still have one last R&R to look forward to next month.

I've got lots of photos from our trip to Phuket and Bangkok - it was fantastic. Not much time for any photo correction so you'll get the basics but at least they'll be online. We arrived in Bangkok right before the Thai New Year, aka Songkran, aka the Water Festival. It's basically just how it sounds - lots of water and lots of celebrating! Two friends from Kabul met us in BKK the first night and we had a great dinner to celebrate my birthday. One of our friends was PCS'ing back to the US but we managed to convince her to stay just one last day to celebrate the New Year. She was glad for it and so were we.

We headed to Khao San road (the infamous backpacker district) where we joined the thousands of Thais and foreigners in a huge street party. There was music, drinks, delicious food, and torrential water beatings. We had purchased water guns along the way and while we put up a good fight, the buckets of ice water won every time. Aside from the water, there was a clay paste that (mostly Thais) were rubbing on people's faces. Since we'd watched 'No Reservations: Thailand' prior to our trip, we knew to expect this and thus my knee-jerk reaction to smack any stranger who touches my face and neck was suppressed.

One low point to the day was the pickpocketing of our new digital waterproof camera. These photos belong to a friend since, duh, all our photos were gone. Luckily, we had so much fun that even the thief didn't spoil our day. Also lucky? That we found a good deal the next day on a replacement waterproof camera (we knew we'd snorkel in Phuket and want to take pictures) for about $100.


P.S. This marks our third New Year party this year (Western, Afghan, and Thai).