Five Days of This - Samui

It’s another sunny morning and for some unknown reason, I’m awake before 9am on a holiday. For some reason, the evening’s carousing has failed to provide me with evidence in the form of a hangover. The hangover fairy is yet to bite me in the bum, and I am taking advantage of my morning chipperness and starting in on the sun worship. It also helps that there is poolside wifi so I can bond with the Twitterverse while drinking a Mai Tai.

It’s at lunchtime that we decide to venture away from the irritatingly gorgeous UK couple who have been shoving their loved-up bronzed bodies in our faces and move to the main road to scavenge some lunch. The restaurants on the street are all desperate for our custom, until we select one where I watch boxing on screen and Ora struggles to pour the largest, cheapest beer I have ever seen. Five bucks each and we’re done and dusted.

We keep moving down the street in search of some swimwear for me. For some reason I’ve failed to do my yearly bathers shop and instead have only some makeshift swimwear. I am of course the only woman on the beach not in a bikini - they vet out those with body or modesty concerns at customs, I swear.

Each ‘fitting room’ I’ve entered in shops have little potties with pee in them. Just so you know.

I ask the woman if i can try on the dresses. She graciously agrees and I ask her for a changing room. She again nods and I think I’m meant to head to the corner. She starts unfolding a sarong. I think, oh wow, she knew I wanted a sarong as well as a dress? Turns out the sarong she is now hanging with both hands is the fitting room she’s setup for me. Oh joy.

We continue past stores selling kids clothes, Cds, handbags, and my favourite, a man with a large hanging basketr of peanuts and eggs. thankfully, I’d just been complaining that there’s no way to get a decent egg around here - good thing that guy was around.

After sweating our guts out down the street, being well fed and watered, we decide on a taxi to take us back. Turns out no taxis are available, but guess what is - that’s right, a motorbike. We throw caution to the wind and jump on the back of some random thai dude who proceeds to put our possessions in the front basket and ferry us down the street, wind whipping our hair, and show us the lake view. I won’t lie, it was pretty goddamn awesome.

Back at the ranch, it’s time for a quick kip by the pool, where we read, sun ourselves, and imagine sunset which is now happening elsewhere on the island - certainly not on our side of things. We see our friends from earlier, two gorgeous bronzed girls from aussie and the UK who give us the lowdown on island activity. I catch up on a tweet or seventeen and Ora makes friends with two Yorkshire men next to us. We have our gin and tonics and pina coladas at happy hour, then head back to the room to get ready for a sweaty evening dodging lady boys, sweating, sipping buckets and endless happy hours. This is Thailand.