The land of the Thais - Bangkok and Koh Samui

It is not easy to be born in a tropical region and then to be uprooted and hurled into a desert for livelihood. To be born in a place like Assam where rain seemed passé and flood - an annual event, and then move to a dry-arid place like Doha! So holiday invariably meant running for greener pastures, literally! Anything that comes under that color palate looks worth it.

Me and my hub's last official holiday was in Oman, in between came Dubai, but that was more to entertain my parents. Oman has its fair share of greenery and its proximity to ‘Salalah’-  a hill station in an hour flight from Muscat, makes up for the otherwise barren existence of the Gulf-ians. But we did not want to head back to the same region all over again.

And it hardly took me and the hubby a thought to blurt out in unison – ‘Thailand’! I am a sucker for South East Asia! The love solidified into something more permanent after our visit to Hongkong and Macau two years back. Me being the travel show fanatic that I am, pat came the name, ‘Koh Samui’, though it took a while to convince the husband of an island that attracted tourists like never before. A close competitor was ‘Chiangmai’, for the sake of its breathtaking hills and tribal villages, but we decided a beach is a beach is a beach! So ‘Koh Samui’ it is, striking off the other obvious choices like ‘Phuket’, ‘Pataya’ etc. But heading to Thailand and not stopping at Bangkok was out of question. So a-little-longer- than-a-week holiday was divided between Bangkok and Samui island.

On 28^th August evening, two days before by 30^th birthday, we flew to Bangkok! It was a rather longish flight, via Mumbai, and we reached Bangkok on 29^th afternoon, after the breaks and waits, at around 2 pm local time. Again, the hedonist in me was slightly disappointed, the lanes, the roads, the buildings, did not impress me. Both me and the hubs kept on comparing the feeling with our homelands – Assam and Manipur, partly because of the tropical trees.

The following five days in Bangkok were like any other touristy city exploring affairs. A cultural show in the Thai Cultural Center called ‘Siam Niramit, was the highlight in my activity list. Being the self-claimed aesthete that I am, I had made sure we do it on the very first evening and it was worth every moment. Sadly enough, cameras were not allowed, I particularly wanted to capture a purple goddess in her Thai finery and a crystal yo-yo she kept playing with which caught my fancy. The rest as expected was a heady mix of dazzling temples, eclectic markets, gleaming palaces, ritzy shopping malls, and in between the notorious traffic. And the Thai food affair that we indulged in deserves  an independent post, such is the reverence and love, undying.

On the last day in Bangkok, Koh Samui flight tickets were booked and we checked out of the Baiyoke Sky Hotel in the wee hours of the morning of 2^nd September. The ride from our hotel to the Airport was a Thai treat spiced up in Indian spices. The cab driver was the rare breed of Thai man fluent-in-English-know-it-all types. He rattled out dialogues, names, one-liners form Bollywood and Indian politics ruled the tip of his tongue. What initiated it was a complete denial from him to believe my hubby to be an Indian – a perennial problem the hubs faces for his Mongolian looks– last was in Hongkong, where people would ask for directions in local language, without a thought.  So the hubs had his haggling line in place in broken English– ‘My friend, you like brother, so how much less?'

The Bangkok-Samui flight lasted for barely an hour. As the pilot announced the descent, I craned my neck for a look through the window, and what I saw was a promise of a wonderful holiday to be spent in the breathtaking tropics and clear blue water laced with white powdery sand under the warmth of a pristine clear blue sky. After the pulsating, busy, action-packed Bangkok, Samui island seemed just the perfect idea of a laid-back holiday that we had been craving for. The ride from the aircraft to the airport got our excitement levels soaring and the spectacular view surrounding the tiny airport got us excited. We had already booked rooms at the Q-Signature Resorts by the beach which seemed to cater to our need for a resort with a sea view and easy accessibility to the beach. But if only things in reality matched glossy brochure pictures! The reality was rather uninviting – forget beach view, the beach was an apology for one. We decided we would look for better options since we would not be checked in till 2 pm anyway - the standard check-in/out time the Thais followed. The good news however was that scooties were available on rent for a meager 200 bahts. So there, the hotel was kind enough to have let us leave our stuff till we figure out some place to book for the next few days. Sleepless, foodless, homeless us, hired a scootie and ransacked the whole of ‘Chewang’  beach – the Thai Baga beach equivalent  – the hotbed for party scene. Though we are not exactly the wild party animal types but we do not exactly qualify for the unsocial-searching-for-Nirvana quiet types either. After having explored quite a few of the beach side hotels and resorts and series of disagreements over the same, we finally and eventually got what we desired at the ‘Samui Lagoon Bay Resorts’ – picturesque cottages tucked in a mini jungle of sorts with a splendid sea view overseeing the pool. It looked something like this.

This became our home for the next four days in the beautiful island of Samui –‘Safe Haven’, although only a visit to the island would tell that  it is just so much more than just a ‘safe abode’. After catching on a much needed sleep and a gastronomic delight  by the pool, we headed out to explore the island. For those of you who had been to Goa or Pondicherry or any of the beach destinations where renting a two wheeler is the easiest thing to do, you would not be surprised. Our thoughts automatically wafted back to our holiday in Goa. And it was only a co-incidence that we had always wanted to go back to Goa without realizing that we will find Thai equivalent of Goa here!  

After a great meal in one of the road side bistros, we booked a day long diving tour for the next day with ‘the Easy Divers’, though it would take more than an ‘easy’ attached to its name to convince me to dive in this lifetime! I opted for snorkeling instead.Though the day long yacht journey to Koh Tao – ‘Turtle Island’, famous with divers, was a bit of a drag, but the hub’s excitement after the underwater experience was worth the day long journey. Besides, I saw some diving enthusiasts and some veterans from around the world, to whom diving was as easy as breathing. The divers savored the dive, the first timers were encouraged with a certificate, while I savored the exquisite pictures which had to be bought for quite an exorbitant price from the photographer who dived along just for the photographs!

The next two days in sum now looks like a nice early morning dream that you savor for a long time. A dream of late mornings, hearty breakfasts by a spectacular view of the beach, delicate breeze caressing your hair lulling you to fall asleep etc. And then scootie rides without a purpose, defying all traffic rules, directions, no need for a map, since the idea is to get lost and come out of it on its own, of tourists outnumbering locals, of street food by the beach, of carefree casual clothes, of remaining immersed in the calm beach during the day and playing with the wild waves by night, of sitting in the balcony and playing with your thoughts and sometimes playing with your camera too so that you can live those moments all over again, of tattoo laden bodies, of rock music flowing from the numerous roadside bistros and nightclubs. All in all, Thailand’s third largest island, Samui, to me, was a heady concoction of luxury of time, pleasure in nature's cradle, awakening of dormant senses, tickling of undiscovered taste buds, in short, a hedonistic treat to be re-lived again and again and again!