Entrada

A few weekends ago (I know, I know, I’ve been incredibly lazy with updates lately – I’m sorry!) Carlyn and I visited our friends Alice and Kara in Trang, the province directly below Krabi.  We got to experience a far less touristy town than our own which was a nice change of pace for the weekend. 

40km drive to Pakmeng.  Our butts were sooorrreee.

For the two and a half hour journey, we took an evening bus from Krabi right as we got home from school.  This of course did not go off without a hitch.  We arrived at the bus station from Aoluk (where school is) and asked a bus lady for a ticket to Trang.  “Last bus leave,” she said.  That was it.  That was all she said.  “Isn’t there another bus at 5:30?” we asked (We knew there was).  “Last bus leave,” she repeated showing zero interest in helping us any further.  Happy woman.  Luckily a cab driver named Polo who is obsessed with Stacy noticed us trying to pull teeth from the unhelpful lady and asked where we needed to go.  Polo is constantly telling us that he’ll take us places for free, but we’re never sure if “free” is only for Stacy (who he LOVES) or if “free” means “free of cost but sexual favors included” so we have yet to take him up on the offer.  We explained that we were headed to Trang and knew there had to be another bus.  He said there was and instructed us to walk back out to the main road and catch a bus there.  Thanks, Polo!

Clearly enjoying the ride.

Sidenote:  I should mention that whenever we said we were going to Trang, we were met with completely blank stares from Thai people.  No matter how many different ways we tried to pronounce it (one wouldn’t think such a simple word would be so difficult), they never understood us until we pointed to a map.

As we reached the main road, a bus was pulling into the road that leads to the bus station and we flagged it down to inquire whether it was going to Trang.  It slowed and I walked up to speak with the bus steward (I made up this term, but there is usually a person who sits with the driver who helps with luggage and takes ticket money so I figure “bus steward” sufficiently describes who this guy was).  To accurately picture what happened next, it is necessary to place yourself on the road with me, preferably from Carlyn’s point of view about ten yards behind me.  The side of the bus was about six inches from the edge of the road (remember they drive on the left) so as I walked to the front of the bus, I had very little room (and I was carrying a large backpack).  I was walking on that kind of rounded edge where the asphalt curves under before it gives way to dirt and plants.  The combination of my comically terrible balance, the twenty pound backpack strapped to me and the fact that I was walking on a curved surface was, as you can imagine, the perfect storm of slapstick-meets-potential-disaster.  Trying to jog to the bus steward, I started wobbling on the curvy road edge, and my feet started doing that thing the Roadrunner does – a whole lot of spinning going nowhere.  I desperately tried to find traction on the road, but with a backpack that weighted more than me hauling me down, I was headed into a slow-motion cartoon fall.  For a second as I teetered on the edge, I was sure I would pitch myself into the brush to the left (and who knows what horrors would await me down there) but at the last second I managed to avoid that and my knees smacked hard down on the street.  The bus steward, who had seen all of this unfold was still standing next to the open bus door making no effort at all to help me off the ground and in fact appeared to not even care that I was down there.  With the weight on my back and so little room to maneuver, getting up was a task, so I extended my arm to the bus steward.  He looked at it like I was handing him a gopher carcass.  Okay, I thought, so he’s not gonna help me up.  I did my best to heave myself off the ground on my own power.  “Trang?” I asked him.  He flapped his hand the way Thais do to indicate “no” and got back on the bus.  If I thought he would tell the driver to wait til I was out of the way before he took off again, I was mistaken.  The bus lurched away literally inches from me.  I stood frozen still.  I was terrified that the side of the bus would knock my backpack, propelling me into that scary brush area next to the street, but luckily it just narrowly missed me.

Tough life, eh?

I turned around to see Carlyn with her jaw at her knees.  Having witnessed the entire ordeal from behind, she too had been certain the bus would knock me off the road, and seeing the way I fell, she thought for certain I had landed on my face.  Lucky for my future career as a SI model (oh, you haven’t heard about this?!), my face was fine.  My knees were another story.  The left one was already starting to swell, and both were bleeding, caked in dirt and gravel, and somewhat numb.  Though once she realized I was fine, Carlyn could no longer hold in the laughter and once I had time to process how ridiculous I must have looked, I too was doubled over in giggles. 

We did finally make it to Trang and spent the evening with Alice and Kara at a local restaurant listening to live music.  We were the only white people in the place and as such, some Thai guy at the next table bought us dessert and roses.  That’s just how it goes here for farangs as fetching as us.

Sunbathing on the boat

One of the things we were most excited to see in Trang was Moricot Cave which Alice and Kara had talked about when they visited us some months back so the next morning, we rented motorbikes and drove the 40km to the beach at Pakmeng where we hoped to get a longtail boat to Koh Muk, the island that is home to Moricot Cave.  Since Pakmeng isn’t at all a tourist destination, there were no advertised tours nor were there boatmen harassing us for trips to Koh Muk.  Instead, Alice negotiated with some random guy with a boat to take us to the island.

To get to Moricot Cave, you anchor your boat next to the island, hop off, and swim through the cave into the center of the island.  When we reached the island, the boatman pulled out a fishing rod and his assistant handed us life jackets.  We jumped into the water and waited for the assistant to follow us.  He did not.  Alice and Kara had made the short trek before with a guide so they figured maybe they could figure it out themselves this time so we swam towards the entrance to the cave.  A giant line of Thai people were coming out of the cave and we started in after they exited.  It took about ten feet for us to realize that this method was not going to work.  A few feet in and everything went pitch black.  We couldn’t see our hand in front of our face let alone a path into the center of the island.  Fearing that we would get lost and trapped in some dead end of the cave only to end up in a Donner Party situation, we turned back to once again plead with the boatman’s assistant to guide us in.

Beach restaurant in Pakmeng

Again, he said he would not accompany us.  He did not have a flashlight.  It was at this point that we realized that we hadn’t rented a tour boat – we had paid two random fishermen to drive us to a dark cave.  Aces.

Luckily we saw a farang couple heading toward the cave entrance with a guide and a flashlight.  They kindly allowed us to tag along.  What followed was nothing short of incredible.

Winding through the total darkness, we held on to each other so as not to get lost and followed the faint glow of the guide’s flashlight.  Then with no warning, the water below us lit up to a Day-Glo turquoise.  The sun was streaming in through the opening we could not yet see creating the fluorescent glow in the water.  We kept swimming towards the light and suddenly burst into an opening.  The pool of water around us was brilliant turquoise while rising up on all sides were angular limestone cliffs and jungle flora.  The tiniest jellyfish I’ve ever seen were littering the water and their stinging felt more like a funny nuisance than any kind of real pain.  We heard people shouting and for a few moments had no idea where the noises were coming from until four rock climbers hopped off concealed rocks across the jungle beach.  How they got there was a one mystery and where they vanished to after making their brief appearance was another.

We couldn’t take our cameras with us into the cave since none of us had underwater cameras or Drybags, so I figured stealing from Google was my next best option.

Saturday night, Alice and Kara had a small party at their house where we got to meet some of their Thai friends from school.  We taught them how to play flip cup and beer pong.  The exchange that best encapsulates what sets American/Canadian college experiences apart from all others:

On Alice and Kara's sweet deck

American Guy:  You toss the ping pong ball and if it lands in the cup, she has to drink the beer in that cup.

[pause]

Thai Guy:  Why would you do that?

[pause][blank stares]

American Guy:  Because.  That's what you do.

Thai Guy:  But why?

[blank stare]

American Guy:  Dude, just do it.

We saw a random elephant walking down the street on our way to a bar.  No big deal :)

It should also be noted that Alice and Kara's house is haunted.  Like legit haunted.  Apparently two people have hung themselves in the stairwell.  We've all examined the stairwell and are unsure where one would hang oneself should the need arise and it doesn't appear feasible, but desperate times and whatnot.  So after the girls moved in to this house (quite the nice place by the way and a steal since the whole town knows its haunted and no one will rent it), the Thai teachers at their school were asking them how it was going.  Kara offhandedly responded that she'd been having strange nightmares.  That's when the Thai teachers told them about the suicides and the hauntings.  They said the ghost was eating Kara's soul and made her go to the temple early one morning to give an offering to a monk so he could bless her.  They had multiple ceremonies at the house attempting to cleanse the evil spirits but none seemed to work.  One night Kara went downstairs to get a glass of water and when she returned, her pillow case had inexplicably been removed from her pillow.  Freaked out, she went into Alice's room who had been feeling weirdly frightened and was at that moment wishing for some company.  The whole thing is a little strange but the amount of people (and monks!) that have gotten involved has been astounding.  And they can't move out because the school's director found them the house and 1) Everyone is afraid of the director, 2) The director is Christian and I guess can't be persuaded to believe in Buddhist ghosts, and 3) The director is crazy. 

At a Thai bar that had no tequila, no vodka, no coke.
Basically there was beer and whiskey.
DO NOT drink Thai whiskey.

So Carlyn and I are sleeping in Kara's bed.  Carlyn was on her computer and I had just entered that state of sleep where you're not quite sleeping, but you're aware that you're also not really awake when there's this crash.  Just dead silence and then bam!  Carlyn lunges at me at the same moment I sprang awake.  We both sit there for a moment totally unsure of what to do, thinking there's some sort of spirit in the room ready to eat our souls.  When my heart was no longer in danger of flat-lining, I got up to turn on the light.  Nothing in the room was disturbed, but Kara's flatiron was on the floor.  We figured the flatiron must have fallen, but it's not like it had been teetering on the edge of the dresser or there had been a strong breeze to blow it off.  

Must have been the ghosts.  

Alice, Carlyn, me and Kara at the bus station