Koh Samui Thailand Continued
SCUBA Diving
Saturday, March 8, 2008
It was another lazy day in paradise today. We did find
out from the dive shop that the weather was on the mend and so booked SCUBA
diving for next Tuesday; we are excited about this. Julia, as you would know
from this web site, earned her SCUBA PADI dive certification in Egypt back
in December. The diving there was OK but quite cold here, on the other hand,
the water temperature and air temperature are very pleasant so I believe she
will have a better experience.
The Thai Girl
Julia in the pool.
We finally made the long walk on our beach taking us as
far north as we could go. During the walk we discovered many other resorts.
So this evening we ate dinner at one of the more posh places and met an
interesting Canadian family consisting of a very tanned and relaxed father,
a very happy looking mother, and one of their three daughters. Julia started
our conversations by making the classic mistake of saying, "it is so nice to
hear an American accent
while we eat such a delicious dinner; it reminds us of home". Well they had
a great time explaining to us they were not Americans.
But it was good to
have a conversation with someone that spoke English as their first language
even if they were Canadian.
Sunday, March 9, 2008
The male Hin Tan rock formation.
We walked to the far southern end of the beach today.
At the very end of our walk we discovered the Hin Ta & Hin Yai rocks. These
rock formations seem, when viewed from certain angles, to look like male and
female genitalia. They cause enough interest to support a whole tourist
street and of course a bar.
We have come across some really bizarre spelling of
English signs in Egypt, Japan, and now Thailand. Here is a shot of Julia
considering the relexing massage.
Today Julia and I made a resolution to lose 10 pounds. I
guess the motivation has been wandering around without many clothes on. Your
stark nakedness can be a compelling motivator about matters of body weight. Anyway,
I will keep you posted on how successful we are in this endeavor.
Julia considering franch fries for lunch.
I hate to sound insensitive but it is extremely
interesting listening to English as-a-second language speakers communicating
to each other in their form of English. Sometimes
it is funny and other times extremely painful but the good news is that they
are trying to speak English. This is good news for me as it is the only
language I know, and just barely at that.
Monday, March 10, 2008
We finally figured out what the whole fireworks thing is.
Last night we had dinner on the beach and ate exquisite fresh steamed
snapper and blue lipped mussels. While drifting away on a wine, wave, and
surf high a man came walking up the beach selling fireworks. So if you paid
the fellow he would launch a rather large and menacing looking skyrocket for
you so you could go "oow, arr" and everyone trying to sleep would be
disturbed; we resisted the temptation.
We dropped into the Lamai market on our walk here is a
shot of me in the market. It is amazing to us how people do not get ill here
more often from food poisoning as everything in the market had a good
coating of flies on it.
We went for a long walk on the streets around Lamai Beach area today. The
weather has gotten hotter, the wind has died down, and the rain only falls
in short bursts now, this all adds up to feeling hotter.
After the market we found a little shop that offered Thai
cooking lessons. We went in and met the owner. He is a leathery skinned man
with very good English skills. He explained the whole process and we could
not resist, as we both really like Thai food, so we signed up for a lesson.
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
Up at 6:00am today so we could make our 7:00am transport
for SCUBA diving. Finally the weather had cleared up enough to allow us to
do it. It was a short car trip to the port and then an hour and a half cruse
on a very fast dive boat to Koh Tao which is a little island north of Koh
Samui.
Boat Ride Video
Once there we dropped of the beginner divers and headed
out to a dive spot call the Pinnacles. The Pinnacles were another 15 minutes
from Koh Tao out in the open water.
SCUBA Video
Here is a shot from Koh Tao.
This was Julia's second dive as a fully qualified SCUBA
diver and she was still not feeling at easy with the whole thing. As it
turned out we had a great dive instructor, a French Canadian named Bruno,
who real helped us both.
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
We had an excellent time today at our Thai cooking class.
Sont Sukhavachana was our instructor and a good instructor too. His
good English skills really made it easy for us to follow his instructions
and take his advice.
Sont, his wife, and Julia.
First he took us to the Lamai market, yes the same one
with all the flies, where he gave us his advice on how to select meat, fish,
and vegetables. He also explained what many of the vegetables were, as most
were mysterious to us.
Julia and me presenting our freshly completed Phad Thai.
Sont taught us the techniques and processes, many of his
own invention, for each of the dishes on our curriculum. We
first made Yum Moo Yang a very delicious Thai salad, and then we made Phad
Thai, an excellent rice noodle plate, then Thom Khaa Gai, a scrumptious
coconut soup, finally Gaeng Kiew Waahn Gai, an exquisite green curry.
The great thing about this was not just learning how to
make Thai dishes, or being introduced to some amazing cooking techniques,
but we got to eat each course too. I highly recommend this if you are ever
in Koh Samui. Click here to see Sont's
web site.