Phuket and Koh Phi Phi

Last Thursday night I headed to the airport to fly to Phuket, an Island on the Eastern side of Southern Thailand. I left with two of my American friends as well as two Finnish girls. We planned to find a place to stay when we got there and then go explore Phuket and the beach in Patong that night because it had been about three weeks in Thailand and we were getting antsy to finally be in the islands.

The next day was my birthday so we caught a tuk tuk to Kata, a beach further toward the southern tip of Phuket. After finding another hotel we headed to Hat Nai, a beach that was supposed to be relatively quiet and spent the day exploring the sand bars and rocks along the coast, floating in the ocean, napping on the beach, and eating at the tables under the trees. That night we got dinner at an outdoor place on the hill overlooking the ocean and watched the sunset, which is supposed to be one of the most beautiful sunsets in the world. There were cats everywhere sitting with us and kind of begging for food. After waiting an hour or so for another tuk tuk to pick us up we made it home and crashed early that night, all five of us girls crammed into one bed with a fan blowing over us.

The next day began the highlight of the trip. We booked to be picked up and taken to a boat which was about an hour long ride to the Island of Koh Phi Phi. The ride over was incredible, after being in the middle of the ocean for half an hour or so, huge rising cliffs started appearing in the distance. These islands were like enormous walls of rock covered in green, sometimes forming little coves and caves that appeared as we passed them. After dropping off our things we were then taken back out for snorkeling at another beach a little ways down the coast.

That evening I rented Kayaks with a couple friends on the opposite side of the beach that we were on, and kayaked out around the corner of the island , then spent the rest of the night wandering the pathways of Phi Phi, which is mostly hotels, restaurants and bars, and street vendors. In the morning we headed back to the beach and I decided to take a kayak out by myself to see more of the island. Later that night we met up with more of the people from my program who had arrived on Phi Phi a few days earlier and went out to dinner, then spent the night at the beachside bars around the island.

In the morning we took a traditional longtail boat to snorkel and visit beaches on some of the smaller neighboring islands. Maya bay specifically, is a beach I wanted to see because it is where The Beach, one of my favorite movies, was filmed. It was pretty fulfilling to visit it and explore the island a little bit and take some photos. Then we headed back to catch our boat back to Phuket. I slept the majority of the ride on the back of the boat, and woke up to find myself back in Phuket, a little sad to leave paradise but happy to be heading back to my temporary home. We had a long dinner at a beautiful place in the town, sat at a coffee shop for a while, and then headed to the airport for our 11pm flight back to Bangkok. It was another three hours before we got back because our cab driver got lost multiple times and couldnt find the school, but I finally arrived back at my apartment.

I’m currently studying Chinese philosophy back at Rangsit, and so I spent a lot of my time on this trip thinking of it in a similar way to the Tao. Much of the last four days falls into a category that, like Tao, is explained as being beyond language. In Tao they say, how do you tell someone what an apple tastes like without them trying it themselves. An experience or any lesson really, is just that – they must be personally experienced to be understood. I’ve always had (or at times even felt stuck with) some innate need to find the right words and images to sufficiently capture what I experience as I see it, but I’m finding that some things may be beyond these mediums. No words can explain what it is to do things that make you feel you are fully awake and present. It is something that is only really understood when you find yourself there. I am grateful to be finding myself there more often than not these days.