22-27/des full moon party & tragedy

After vered left, everything was as nice as before, but already lived. So I think I spent too much time on the island. But was worth for my friends, because all of them but zac, were staying there a couple of weeks more. So we had party together for a couple of more days together.
This island is known for its beauty, but as well for its party, the parties around the moon cicles. The most important one is the full moon party, that this year was one day after xmas, and they said we were 16000 people. Too much!
The also celebrate the half moon party, and the no moon party. At the begining, it wasn't like this. It started being something that only attracted a few people for the full moon time. Then, like with everything, started growing and being polluted by turism, and now you have 4 parties a months, and internet costing 4 times more that in bangkok.
If you try to forget all these things, and keep the idea of celebrating the cicles of the moon, it becames something quite nice. And if you imagine as well that you celebrate this party with thai people, then is paradise, but most of the thais are prostitutes and lady-boys, and the rest drunk westerners. It's all about being positive!
The afternoon of the 26th (full moon) was the bitrhday of an israeli friend of mine, tahi. We (me and zac) spent that day in the cocohuts beach (or vereds beach), playing volleyball, and winning!! And dancing and celebrating tahis birthday, whereas there was the earthquake, that affected the western part of thailand, about 200 or 300 km south west of ko phan gan, where we were.
For the moment, 40000 people died.
We could feel the vibrations of the earthquake, and I read that was possible also from somalia... shit. Here is not easy to start things, and the lucky ones will have to re-start their lives again. And so many families affected by that.
It's strange how destiny is changing all the time. If this was meant to happen, I was lucky. I could have gone there, because it's suposed to be very nice, and just because I met those guys, I went to ko phan gan. I wish all the luck to the survivors.

15-18/des Had rin & party

After swiming a little bit, enough to clean our faces, we decide to go south of the island, to had rin, probably the most turistic part of the area, but many things are happening here,so you always finish there. The alternative would be to rent a motorbike, and come here every night, risking our lives on the roads, and with some alcohol as well in our bodies... No way!! I thing is worth staying in had rin, and they think the same way.
Had rin is full of restaurants, bars, clubs, travel agencies, internet, shops... I know that is not what we think when we dream about thailand. But a part from these facilities, this is a cheaper place to be, because of the competition. Even if there is a kind of mafia, and they try to fix the prices. One example would be internet. 4 times more expensive than in bangkok. But the room cheaper, as the food... And it's also a nice place. It's placed at the very south of the island, and in had rin, it get very thin, and the, thinck again. So, in 300 meter, you have 2 beaches. One is the sunrise beach, obviously on the eastern part, where all the discos and bars are. The one on the western side is the sunset beach. And that makes it nice, because if you go out, you could see the sunrise, at 6am, or after playing volley ball, at 6pm, the sunset. Night here are quite crazy, because of the buckets. They sell a small bottle of whiskey, red bull and coke for 3 euro, and 2 or 3 people can share that. So everyone is quite drunk, even if this doesn't create big problems. Everyone is dancing till late at night, with different kinds of music, and of curse, on the beach. And I'm enjoying a lot, I love to dance here, and people says that I do it good!! Also some girls has come to talk to ne saying that!!! ;-)
We used to buy bottles and drink in the corridor of our guest house, right in the center of the town, 2,5 euro. Not bad. From there you can see the main road.
You can also see a lot of thai prostitues, but nos as in bangkok.
80 % of the people are from western countries, and from these westerners, 50 % are israelis. The rest english and swedish.
The first night was quite crazy for all of us, but for me, a little bit more. I was jumping through a fire circle many times, and fortunatelly nothing bad happened. Another nice thing of this beach, is that in every single bar or disco, you can see people with poi (with fire) or playing with a bar with fire as well... amazing!!!! (malabars)
So depending on the nights, days were more or less long, but always nice because of the people we were with. During the day, we were playing frisbee, volley ball, walking on our hands, or just lay down, with a book. Nice life. In a way, I felt as I was living a kind of hollidays from my real trip!!
All days are quite similar. Only the people is changing. I had dinner one night with 2 israeli girls from tel aviv. Here is so easy to meet people, because everyone wants the same.

13/des finally the south!

On my way to the agency, a nurse, 35 years old, payed for my bus ticket and started talking to me. (I just write these things all the time because I'm so impressed about thai behaviour towards foreigners)
So, I was at the agency, and thing went in the best possible way. I talked directly with the boss, and we've decided that they will start 'moving' me from january. He told me that as I don't have any oriental 'touch' in my face, There's no way to do tv comercials, but I could do fashion shows and catalogues, even if there's less money. For me this was great, because my friend were leaving to ko phan gan today, to spend the xmas there, and for the full moon party. So I menaged to buy a ticket for this island one hour before leaving, that became 2,5 hours, because the time here is a relative thing. But anyway, I was happy. They were going on an other bus, ana will come tomorrow. Before that, I have re-rent my room to a guy israeli guy, so I got the money back. I met 2 swedish and a german guy, that lost his wallet somewhere in the bus. 11 hours on the bus, till surathany, 3 hours on the boat to ko samui (ko means island), and 1,5 to ko phan gan.
I met my friends on the harbour, and decided to go north, looking for a quiet beach. Finally the sea again!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I was really looking forward this moment. The water is quite clear herem and there are small islands, quite high, and very green. We rented a bungalow, I shared with zac, the guy from boston. Chris and eileen were sharing another one. We renterd a couple of motorbikes, and started discovering the island. Roads here are bad, but very bad. Really vertical slopes, and old motorbikes.... Once at our beach, we bought a bottle of whiskey, and drink a little bit, right next to the sea, and talking for hours. Once a little bit drank, we started playing capoeira at the beach, where a german girl joined us. That was funny.

12/des Attapone

Today, I'm going to start the day alone, and I like this idea. I decided to go out of bangkok to see a floating market. Not the most important one, but who knows.
The market was quite small, ridiculously small, but with small boats, with vegetables, kitchens... mostly for food, and I think that also for turists. 10 minutes far from the market, there was a little town, made by floating houses, and that was interesting. It seemed a pour area, and it was really dirty, averall under the pieces of wood used as bridges. It was very smelly as well, full of dogs and cats, no people. It was separed from the market by a train way (via de tren), were everyone was walking in.
After that, I go back to bangkok, to lay down on a park that I once was, a few days ago. After 10 minutes, a man (50 years old) came to me, and asked me the meaning of a word that I can't remember anymore. We spent the whole afternoon and evening together. He told me that there was a chinese festival in chinatown, and we went there. Thai people seem very interested in what people think about them, but as well about what people tihnk about basic life things. After paying my dinner, he gave me his telephone number, for anything I could need it.
Once in the guesthouse, I met a couple from scotland, chris and eileen, john, from new zealand, and zac from boston. We went out for a while, they seem nice people.
I great how impossible is to prepare a day in this country, because it is always much more interesting that the few things you have organize.

11/des JJ, the biggest market of the world

I woke up late this morning, and even if it doesn't sound nice, I hope to not find ana downstair. But she was there. She had been waiting for me for hours! We went to the weekend market jatujak, the biggest market in the world with more than 10000 shops, of any kind. We spent 5 hours there, and at the begining, she was looking for some trouser... and I only wanted to walk thruogh all the alleys, so I told her to meet at the guest house to have dinner together. She said she was ready, and so we walked together to whole day. At the end it was a nice day, and she is a good girl. I judged her too fast. Even of that, she has something that makes me feel tired.

10/des 1 day with a cambodian monk

I woke up with any special plan in my head. Nights can be noisy around Khao san road, but nothing really terrible. It only makes me wake up a little bit later. I started walking towards sanam luang, an area close to my place, with another market, universities, and a buddhist university. But before doing anything, a big natural orange juice!! The market, is full of buddha statues, images, and religious things, and very busy as well. I got into a wat right next to the market, and after 30 seconds, I heard: what's your name? This time was a buddhist monk. A 23 years old guy from cambodia, that became monk after being novice for a long time, and temple boy before. He just moved to bangkok 1 year ago to study buddhist psicology. And this random (I think that means something that non decided, aleatory...) decision, changed totally my day, and make it quite especial. He could speak english enough to comunicate about certain kind of things, but not enough for many other. So sometimes, english become a kind of limit.
We spoke, in the wat, about cambodia, and catalunya, about our ages, and what we have done, and what we would like to reach in the future. He seemed to apreciate my positives comments about him, or buddhism (even if I still don't know nothing about) a lot, almost feeling bad. And we went on for one hour, under the biggest tree of the wat. Another monk was with us, but he was keeping a 2 meters distance. After that he told me that he wanted me to take me to his own wat, were he's living, and present me his 'master', the oldest monk of the wat. And that place was 1 hour far from bangkok. He wanted to pay all the transport for me, bus, and motorbikes. Monks don't need to pay public buses, and they have the first seat reserved. On our way there, we spoke a little bit about his religion, and the absence of mine. Before getting into the bus, of course, he prepared all his clothes, in the thai way. Monks here are wearing orange or dark brown clothes, and you can know were are they from depending in their way to fix it. He showed me both ways, cambodian and thai. I think that they are extremelly elegant, and respectful. Once in his wat, we sat down on a big room, with 5 main big chairs, and made me seaat in the middle. He sat on my left side, and after 5 minutes, the old monk sat on my right side. He could not speak any english at all, but trough kosal, we menaged to talk about were I was coming from, and about the wat. They offered me water with ice, and regarding the situation, and how special it was for me, I accepted, even if it's known that is always better to avoid ice in asia. Fortunately nothing happened. I would say that big cities have no big problems with the water, but you never know were it is coming from. Once in his room, a very basic space, shared with another monk, with no windows, and as a bed a flat hard surface with a carpet on it. Book, pictures, water, and music. And that surprised me because one of the group was something like new kids of the block. Another thing that surprised me, was that while talking, a mobile phone sounded, and he took a it away from the orange clothes!! That was funny. It was a friend of him from cambodia, and he wanted to talk to me. And so we did, for 5 minutes. He made me promise that I'll visit him when I'll go to cambodia.
He showed me all his pictures about friends, family... and I understood that he has no mum, and probably no dad, but he had godfathers, and godmothers, and even godbrothers. I guess that thiese was the people that took care of him. He told me that his future plans pass from learning english properly, and travel to myanmar and india, to learn more about buddhism, and if possible, became a teacher. More or less like my plans, even if my plans are less clear for the moment.
The way back to bangkok was a little bit longer. There was no space to seat together on the bus, so I stood. And there was a lot of traffic. He told me that monks has special seats because they are suposed to try to meditate everywhere, and get away from the noises. We had dinner together, I wanted to invite him, as I was grateful and happy about the day we spent together. He was also happy and excited, but told me that they can only eat twice a day, once in the early morning, and then at lunch time. I was also told to seat first in the terrace, and that he would come one minute later. It's a way to show respect to buddhism. It's not well seen that a western is walking with a monk, and still worst if a western seats in the same table. But in that way was allright. The owner of the terrace, offered him a pepsi cola. He also told me that the proper way to say hello to a monk is puting the hands together in front of the brest, and looking down.
He told me to remember him, and to write to him. That we had to stay in touch, because he liked me a lot. That surprised me a lot, but I'm going to stay in contact because he seems a very interesting person. Coming from 2 very different places, cultures, societies, we have very similar ways of seeing things.
After that, I went back to the guest house, and met a girl from switzerland, from zurich. Ana. He had been traveling quite a lot, and seemed pretty informed about everything. But there was something in her that I didn't like that much. She was complaining quite a lot. I couldn't avoid thinking in ljiljana, also because her family is from the old iugoslavia, on this case from serbia.
I spent the rest of the evening reading, writing, and crossing smiles with people, with nice feelings. I was a very complete day, and totally unexpected. That was what I was expecting!!!

9/des bus, skytrain & boat

Only an interlude in this open journal. It's quite strange to write about the past, things that now seem to be far away from my present, but that only were one week ago, but so many things are happening, all of them special in its own way. Today it's the 19th of december, and I'm going to write about things that happened the 9th.

I'm having lunch in a kind of mensa, a kind of old and spontaneous mensa, that is next to a skyscraper, in the downtown. And of course, is full of life, like everything here. But this time, the people is really well dressed, business men and women. All this space, filled with tables, is surrounded by these thay moveble kitchens, full of colors, and smells, and like everywhere here, really clean. This one is covered as well, but quite better than the one in the street. During the wet season for the rain, and now for the sun. We have 30 degrees, and it's a little bit wet. But I know it can be worse. And I'm the only western, of course. This starts being normal, and of course, I love it!! But I' m sad because anyone has come and talk to me. Not here, but it has happened on my way here. 2 girls, tahy nurses, started speaking to me, and have payed my bus ticket. I was on my way to the immigration office, to try to extend my visa. But it was only possible for 10 more days. So I'll have to travel to the border, with malaisia, myanmar, laos or maybe cambodja, depending where I'll be.
It's 6 pm, and I'm lying down on the grass, in a beautifull park. After waking up from a small siesta, it seemed to me to wake up in a small paradise. Can sound exagerated, but! Everything greem, quiet, by the river, soft music, and people reading, talking, children playing... I could go on with milions of small presents. Thai girls look so young!!!! I guess that their 'becoming older' come later than in europe, but more of a sudden. Maybe not. But they are so beautiful, and look so sweet, and they dress quite provocative, with short dresses, small t-shirts... but everything under control!
It gets dark at 6pm.
After the being at the immigration office, I've taken the skytrain, I kind of out of the ground subway, that is passing 20 meter above the ground, in in front of many flats. But it's not taht noisy, but expensive. And the people that use it, don't talk to me that much. Maybe I should start talking to people, not only wait for them to come. But, in a way, it's the same I'm doing with girls, always wait for them to come. It's the shyness, I kow, and it's something I would like to beat soon!!! It's quite easy here, anyway, to meet people, I'm not the same jordi as the jordi in barcelona, and I definetly prefer this one.
After the skytrain, I took a boat, that is navigating in the river. And chepa. I decidwd to go till the last stop, and enjoy the trip. I met an old german lady. I see 'water houses', wats, and as long as you get far from bangkok, everything is getting older and creppier. On my way back, I left the boat in the middle of the way, in order to walk a little bit, and I went to visit a wat. I was there talking to a monk, an old one, that was living in sweden and france for a while. Hes english was good. He opened the wat for me, and these kind of things made the visits more special to me.
I called the agency, and they told me that the boss wanted to meet me next monday. So, I had to stay a few more days in bangkok. And, since I'm not very secure about wanting to work now, wasn't a very nice new. 3 days in bangkok are enough. Because I think that thailand has to be something extremelly different. But, I'll wait, you never know what can happen in the meantime.
At 6pm, parks are full of people waiting for the aerobic class. It's funny to see how people from different ages, is joining the same free en outside class. The teacher is teaching from a podium, and first of all puts the himn of thailand. Everyone, sing the song, and of course, stop doing anything. After that, dancemusic, but loud dancemusic!!! There were only a couple of western girls, one of them quite pretty.
Diner. After that, I decided to walk a little bit, And I sae, for the first time, prostitues. A lot of prostitues, thai. All of them with old westerners, but as well with people from my age. And can't avoid to remember my days in canoa quebrada, brasil, where I saw this disgusting thing for the first time. How can you feel iof you pay to make love? Well, I'll not go deeper into that.
But I only hope that the thai girls that come and talk to me, are not prostitues. They are all kind, and smilly, and everything...

8/des tuk-tuk day

Just looking for a park to eat my breakfast, orange juice and a kind of pancake, took a couple of hours, and 3 or 4 km. But it's always nice to walk in bangkok, even if sometimes is hot enough to avoid the sun all the time. So walking in the north of the center (turistic center, and for the moment my center), a couple of thai girls, same age as me, or maybe not, it's really hard for me to say the age of people here. Both boys and girls look very young. Maybe 5 ot 10 years younger. One of the girls was very beautiful. Wow!!! Anyway, life goes on, even in these moments. They always wanna talk to you, and it start being difficult for me to believe that they want something else. But we'll see.
So they told me that that wednesday, was the buddhist day, and that you could visit all the wats for free. (I had never paid for any wat, but...) and that there was an special price for tuk tuk. Tuk tuk, are tricicles where 2 or 3 people can seat, with an engine. They run quiet fast if traffic wants, and I heard that when they turn can be dangerous. I didn't think that much about that, just in case. So, for 40 baths, less than one euro, I was 4 hours around bangkok. visiting wats. Good, eh!! The driver looked 17 years old, but he was 27. He asked me if was possible to visit 2 shops, a tailor and a gems shop, because they were giving tuk tuk drivers 10 liters of gas for turist. First wat was wat somana, right next to a school. were an army of 15 girls (10 years old) dressing all of them green, attacked me, for giving me their hands, and even for kissing me. They had to jump. Thais are quite short, maybe 1'60m. And this orgy in front of buddha. The second was wat suthat. Amazing thiss one. The monks are working there, and they take care of the wat as well. You enter into a squared open space, surrounded by 60 buddhas in each of the 4 sides. In the center, and very big, the was. There was noone inside, and that made it more special. I have pictures, but I still don't know how to share them. Buddhists burn something (incens) and offer flowers. Then they seat on there knees and pray.
It's funny because many people, old and young says hello to me all the time, always withj a great smile in their faces. And that's why I feel very safe in here. You don't see strange faces, even if you go alone, or during the night.
As I like all this, I start thinking that I would prefer not to work here, and go to the south, to the beaches. But on the other hand, I would like to see how work is here. I'll call tomorrow. 3 or 4 days in bangkok is enough, maybe too much. But 'the unexpected' is here as well, that's why it wouldn't be a proble to stay here for a while.
I have dinner with philippe again, and is something I like, as he seems a peacefull person, that knows what he is talking about. Friendly, correct. A good travel mate.

(is all of you see big english mistakes, please, tell me!!!! I will really appreciate it.)

7/des downtown and chinatown

It's my first real day in the city, waking up at 10h, not bad. I decide to go to visit the agency, placed in downtown bangkok. Bangkok it's huge, and it takes a while to reach any point. But they are extremelly cheap from 4 to 10 (with air-co.). About 10 or 20 cents. Is not always easy to say where you wanna go, because people do not speak much english, and the thai pronunciation it's really hard. So the best way, when possible, is to make someone write the place you wanna reach inn thai. Streets are quiet chaotic, and they drive cars like in england. It's noisy and polluted.
Once in the agency, that was in the 19th floor, I talk to ms. kob after waiting a little bit. I showed her my pictures and stuff, and she told me to call back on thursday, because she was suposed to talk to the boss, or someone, to see if I fit in the thai market. Of course not as a thai. She didn't look very interested anyway.
After that, first a park and then to chinatown. I was with I thai english teacher for a while, showing me the wat traimit. Wat means temple in thai. A 3 m golden buddha. Once in chnatown, extremelly crowded, full of small stand of food or anything on the 'walking way', more noise, and more poollution. But a lot of life, quiet organized if you look where is taken place. I met a couple of french girls while having lunch, noodle soup with some vegetables. I have never been good at eating with the sticks, but I'll have to improve. Even the soup is eaten with sticks, of course the solid part. An old lady, from france, stopped me a little bit allarmed because she loved my eyes. The sidewalk is losing energy at 5 o'clock, more or less, but not the the car's part. It's funny to see how they take advantage of the sidewalk. From kitchens, entire kitchen ready to prepare anything, to fruit sellers, drinks... but as well mechanics, and electricists using the sidewalk as an extension of the their space. And there are no problems at all, everything is working. But slow.
I was at a small monastery, and there were novices (guys that are going to be monks) singing, or maybe praying. That was a very peacefull space, without tourists, as it was not in the main road.
I was stonished, because I saw less than 20 people walking around chinatown. That was good!
After walking for more than 5 hours, I sat down on a park. From my place I could see groups of people practising tai-chi (I think), I bigger group joining a lesson of aerobics, a couple that was going to merry with a photographer, and people running. I was a little bit far from everythinf, and suddenly a women came and seat right next to me. After 30 minutes she asked me for my name, and we were trying to comunicate for 1 more hour. I was using some of the lonely planet sentences, but it wasn't easy since she could only ask a couple of sentences. But was interesting anyway. She looked very shy. She had many wounds (ferides) in her hands. She was 34 years old. I still don't know if she was looking for something. She was a little bit strange.
There were small altars in almost every single shop.
On my way to the guest house, I found a man. Well, he found me. They always ask you where are you from, or what's your name. This man, asked me where was I looking for. I said nothing special. He presented himself as doctor in political science. And we talked for about 20minutes, maybe more, about thailand, spain, and barcelona. People need to hear first spain to connect it to barcelona. After that he ased me to tell only good things to my friends, in order to make the turism grow faster. He told me that they have 8 million turist a year, but I don't know if that's in bangkok or thailand. I slept a little bit, eat some food, and went to walk again. The guest house has a nice terrace, quite relaxed as is 5 minutes far from the famous khao san road. It's nice to read there, and write my diary. I started reading the book that caroline gave me as a present. merci beaucoup caroline, et merci aussi pour le mail. ;-)
And tomorrow more!!!

just a detail

I still don't really know how do I have to write here.
Knowing that other people is going to read it as well, I could try to avoid writing about boring or unimportant things, and only talk about the funny and 'open to everybody' themes. Or like a diary, where I will write everything, without having any care about what I say because is my own diary, so maybe someone won't like it. I think I will try this second way, and if something very personal happens, will see then!!! That means that I'll copy everything I write in my real diary, the paper one, the one I write every afternoon, after walking around the city.

in motion!!

it can only take 34 hours to pass from one life to another!! Ok, it-s maybe an exageration, but something has finally started today, and I feel very good seating on a bar, writing about that, in bangkok.
I fortunatelly got a place by the window at the plane, and this made me dream, or put me on the right way to dream. Pass over the alpes is olways a nice experience, and arriving to a freezing helsinki, full of snw, as well. We passed from 15 to 3 degrees in 3 hours, and from 3 to 30 in 9 more hours. After waiting 8 hours in the airport of helsinki, which wasn,t bad at all. Time to be alone, to think, and most of all to remember all the people I,ve seen during these very last days.
Something was starting. But still more when I woke up flying over pakistan, and seeing and amazing landscape, a kind of strange desertic place, without sand, with dunes. And towns looked like ruins, like something left in the middle of nowhere. You could see the most narrow paths connecting this microsystems, suddenly separed by a river. A little bit further, I think, the himalaya mountains. And the Tibet. Or that was what I,ve thinked after more than 24 hours sleeping and aweaking. Anf after sleeping a little bit more, the ganges, the mythic river, when this is reaching the sea. Amazing!!!! Then myanmar. I,ve heard so many things about this country. Maybe I,ll be able to give my opinion. And finally bangkok.
If you walk 10 meters you can reach the city center for 100 baths (2euro). If you walk 200 meters, 20 baths. Let,s see if this is going to be `the everyday`s bread`!!
2 hours of a mix between the highest hightech buildings,( ericsson...) and those houses that are by the canals, not very clean, I must say!
I arrived to the city center with a guy from israel (spending the last 6 moths in india, and the next 6 in australia). Then we split, and I met a guy from switzerland (9 months travelling, starting with the idea of following the silk road, and finishing in myanmar, with his car). We are now drinking tea with 2 guys from kalmar, sweden.
The center of bangkok, is quite terrible for the moment. Only europeans, and neons, and people offering things. Food is cheap 200 meters far from the center, like noodles with meat, vegetables, and egg that costed me 0.6 euro. Not bad, eh! And it was very tasty!
(suposo que en ribas no li ha passat de llarg lo del noi suis!! pero encara hi som a temps!)
And well, I,ll try to get use to write as m,uch as I can. But today I, m tired.
Hugs to everyone!