(Editors note: This is three weeks late. We are no longer in Spain. Sorry). So we were off to Ao Nang, across the bay in the height of wet season, at the whim and mercy of the winds! And it was fine. In life, as in every human endeavor, the worst thing that can happen is that you die and that only makes the tax-man cry. I digress. Before we left, we had begun looking at how we could afford housing in London and come to the eternal human realization that we could not. This led us to an unusual, but enjoyable, detour to our plans. We became house-sitters.

Who Would Hire You?

The Internet, dude, obvs. What matters at this point is that we had just booked a housesitting gig for a family just outside Chelmsford (who were lovely and will return in a later update). We were waiting for the ferry and stepped outside for a smoke. That’s right. We had taken up a little smoking because the cigarettes were $3 a pack, and every now and then it’s kinda nice. Freud postulated the Todestreib as an aspect of libido seeking to lead us back to death. It’s very Germanic, very Schopenhauer, kinda sexy, and it’s the excuse I’m using.

So anyway, this guy comes up to us for a light and starts talking to us. That happens sometimes, but he was English so it was unusual. Then it came out: he was there with a friend, and they were ALSO FROM CHELMSFORD! So we had to meet up with them. But first, we made it to Ao Nang:

Ao Nang:

We had our best days in Thailand in Ao Nang. It’s touristy, but its gorgeous. A huge boardwalk sweeps from the beach up through town, and we had killer Indian food there. We had a little kitchenette in our hotel room, so we looked about for a grocery store. All I could near us was a small local market, so we headed out. It was very much a local market. It was someone’s garage where they sold onions and some other random items and English was in short supply. But who needs language, really? We can get by. We grabbed onions (obviously) and lentils, and an obscure Indian spice mix (obviously!), along with some mushrooms. We had it made.

Christa had to work that evening, so I started on the lentils. And it was perfect. I don’t know if it will make it to the vestigial recipe part of the blog, but red lentils stewed down with onions mushrooms and obscure Indian spice mix is pretty good. We lived on it for three days. We had reverted to a glorious and semi-primitive style of life alluded to in the second section of Strauss’ tone poem of Also Sprach Zarathustra. The next day we went out for an island tour.

We also saw a monitor lizard:

Return of The Chelmsford Crew:

After our trip we met up with Brandon and Jay, our new friends from Chelmsford. We met at a place called the Cotton Club, and like everywhere in Thailand the beer was $3 and the pool was free. It was their last night in town and things went on for a little while longer than it needed to…but you only live once no matter how long or short it is. We had a great time with them, and we did meet up with them in the UK, and I ended up celebrating my birthday with them. Photos to come when we get there. The next day we went to Railay Beach.

Life and Death on Railay Beach:

I was hungover. I had come down with the beginnings of a cold, and Christa was having some troubles and I’m losing my train of thought (There is an entire artillery barrage going off outside my window at the moment for Virgin Mary Day in Barcelona currently. It sounds like the bombing of the Bastille and it is glorious. Having been in Spain for two weeks now, I can tell you that God is most definitely not a protestant… -Ed.) . Anyway. We decided to do a little hike to a viewpoint. If you have been to Thailand, you know where this may be going.

I only have one photo, so I must explain the hike. First of all, we were walking on a narrow pathway between some resort and a vertical cliff towering above us. We were surrounded on both sides by overweight tourists and monitor lizards. One of the resort employees was poking them with a stick. The lizards, not the people. Suddenly on our left loomed a sheer cliff with a rope dangling down it. As a side note, Railay Beach is a rock climbing center, so this was not terribly surprising, although its placement near poisonous lizards was somewhat surprising. ‘Wouldn’t that be hilarious,’ I said, ‘if that’s the trail!’

‘No,’ said The Wife.

We wandered down a little further. Suddenly we were on the beach. No trail in sight.

‘Darling…’ I ventured.

‘Yes?’ (It is impossible to denote, at this time of human development, and with our limited grammatical science, the amount of terror a woman can instill into a question mark).

‘I think that was the trail.’

I need to explain that Thailand is very unlike the West. It is not a weak country with ‘lawyers’ and ‘value of life’. It is Hyperborean. Life is cheap. Beer is cheaper. I saw something shift in Christa as we walked back. I could see the Amor Fati settling into her bones. We were hungover, and ready for death. After having plundered life of all its treasures, the hungover individual is more prepared for heroic acts than anyone who got a good nights sleep.

We doubled back. There. It. Was. A sheer cliff. Ropes marking the stages. Water ran down in streams beside the rope making a muddy hell undoubtedly similar to Hamburger Hill. And at the end….a viewpoint I guess.

Let me tell what we were wearing.

Nic: Flip-flops. Short shorts. I don’t remember what happened to my shirt.

Christa: Flip-flops. Short shorts. Tank top.

This is not rock-climbing gear, but the call of life (so similar to the call of death at times…) must be answered. And so we clumb. That’s an obscure past-tense from Middle English! That’s exactly what I was thinking hauling through the mud and through running water and monitor lizards while slipping along a muddy rope upward ever upward ever upward. I was thinking of how I could finally use clumb. It was a trek. The participation trophy was a swift 70-100 foot fall onto stone. So we chose to not fall.

The viewpoint was mediocre.

Afterward we went to the beach. There was a cave there full of wooden penises, which I had a photo to share, but it’s on my phone which is in London. Update about that later.

And then we went home. The last day we took a Thai cooking class, which is important for later – because there is a tale of fried rice. The next day, we headed down to the island of Ko Lanta, which we heard was a sweet paradise definitely without concrete statues of Kirby….more on that to come.

Next up: the Great Misdirection, the Suffering of Man, and a good 5k on the beach.