One Sandal

I'm now off the East Coast of Thailand on Koh Pha-ngan, at a beach known as Hat Rin. Every 28 days this place has a huge party on the evening of the full moon. Evidently 10,000 plus farangs flooding the beach once a month wasn't enough of a big deal, so now they have half moon parties as well, where only a few thousand white tourists drink and dance the night away on the sands of Hat Rin until the wee hours of the morning. Actually, yesterday was a nice combination because it was Saint Padraig's Day as well as the Half Moon Party, and of course Hat Rin has an Irish bar, which was full of well, mostly Irish people, many of whom had been drinking since about noon. The bizarre thing is that while it was an Irish bar, it followed the Thai custom of leaving your shoes at the door. Which became a problem when the drunken Micks dropped their pints in a million pieces on the floor. Anyway, when I left the Irish bar to head to the Half Moon Party I couldn't find my Tevas. I later learned that sandal theft is quite common here. After spending the rest of the night (morning, really) wandering around barefoot, I bought a pair of flip flops this morning (OK, actually it was this afternoon) only to discover my Tevas sitting outside the Irish pub a short time later. Had a nice chat at Mr. Chicken with a Swedish bloke until quite early, who seemed amazed that an American could be at all informed about the world. It's actually a bit strange how few Americans I've met thus far.

For whatever reasons, all the bar/restaurants here play movies all day. I just watched 1/2 of "Diary of a Mad Black Woman"while eating Pad Thai for breakfast. It had some funny moments, but the movie cannot quite decide whether it wants to be a comedy of a really, really cheesy Hallmark movie.

Thaland, for whatever reason, loves Bon Jovi. And I still hear ''Assereje" almost every night.

I've got a pretty good bit from Phuket from my last night there, but I'm going to save it for when I'm able to upload the photos.