Chapter 3 – Eaten Alive

Dracula’s spawn live here. Little blood sucking creatures sent from the depths of hell to torture us ‘till insanity. They’re not just after a drop or two here and there. These tiny Thai mosquitoes are evil, and they’re out to suck us dry.

I knew they were going to be bad. Having grown up in South Africa, I’ve been the victim of the little beasts’ bites before. So I came prepared, with bags loaded with Peaceful Sleep, Rub Away, Patches, trendy Bangles that make you look like you’re an avid supporter of a charity, even a nifty little clicker device that’s supposedly meant to ‘shock’ the itch out of the bite. You name it. I packed it.

Well, all I can say now is what a waste of backpack weight. Why? I’ll tell you why...

It was our very first evening in Thailand. We decided to enjoy it sitting on our veranda with a much anticipated, ice-cold Tiger beer. Before doing so, I made sure we did the necessary repellent application - on the ankles, behind the knees, the back of the neck and the arms. Light, but thorough, just like the bottle said.

No sooner had I sat down than the first bite appeared. Small, red, and perfectly round slap bang in the middle of my calf. I put it down to the little bugger’s stealth. He must have got me before I applied the ‘Natural Rub Away with added Citronella Extract’. Or so I thought, until another one appeared, and then another, and another, all within seconds of each other.

Obviously my weapon of choice wasn’t strong enough to ward off this little troop of nasties. So I put one of our super stylish repellent bangles to the test. But its ‘pleasant smelling, insect repelling vapours’ proved more of an attraction to the little suckers. I should have seen it from the start. The thing looked too good to be effective. So I grabbed a patch. But it was useless. They were everywhere. Their bites were everywhere. And by then it was clear I was under attack.

Half an hour later and I was in a state of frenzy. My body was one big itch. My two hands torn between scratching, lathering, shocking and squashing. But still they came, like little kamikaze pilots, their sights locked on any piece of skin that didn’t already resemble a piece of bubble wrap. And there I sat, a lone soldier fighting a war that had been declared on me.

Something had to be done.

So I started lathering myself in every form of repellent we had. Until every piece exposed flesh was covered, and then recovered with one or another rub on stick, cream or spray. I kept at it until it stunk so bad I didn’t want to be near myself. The only place I didn’t apply the stuff to, for fear of actually blinding myself, was my eyelids.

Where did the little sucker bite me? You guessed it, my eye lid.

It sucked the blood from the only piece of flesh that protects my precious eyes from the hostilities of the outside world, and I didn’t even see the damn thing coming. It was the itch that first drew my attention to it. A little irritating itch. And then it began to swell. And it kept on swelling until it became the size of gross. The size you don’t want to look at but you just can’t help yourself.

And just when I thought it couldn’t get any worse, they struck again, their target this time, my ear. Not the soft dangly lobe, no, inside the hard little pointy-outy bit right before the hole.

That’s when I knew I had no choice but to surrender and retreat to the air-coned, mosquito-free indoors.

I had lost the battle. But I am here for a year, so the war will continue, and victory will be mine.

You just wait and see.

The Second Chapter - The Ins and Outs

We're here. Safe and sound. The entire journey took us a full 24 hours and the last stretch was every bit a struggle, but we made it, and so did our bags thankfully as those 26.3 kilos are all we possess between us.

We're staying in a small resort called Cousins. We've got a nice size room with air-con, a king-sized bed, a fridge, cupboards too big to hold the contents of our backpacks, and an en suite bathroom.

The resort itself is lovely. Lush foliage line the little paths that divide the bungalows, of which there are 30. There's a pool, although we're a mere 100 metres from the beach, and a little rustic bar and dining area.

The staff are brilliant. Monte, who I guess can be called the manager, has quickly become our friend and 'go-to guy' for all things local. And Mieu, the resident ladyboy (who seems to have taken quite a liking to Marc) provides us with much daily entertainment. I swear he tries so hard to be a woman I almost think he deserves my boobs more than me.

The resort is brand new. In fact, most of the places here are, as the entire area was swallowed by the 2004 Tsunami. The swimming pool and three palm trees were what remained of the original Cousins. It's incredible to think that right where I'm sitting writing this post now, passed a wave 8 meters taller than the top of my head less than five years ago.

I can't say we did much when we first arrived. A well-timed tropical downpour confined us to our room for two days, where we got some much needed sleep. I think we've now officially made up for every hour we missed due to work, large nights out in London, and the general day to day stress that comes with trying to survive in the western world.

But on the third day the sun rose, and so did we.

Our first few days pretty much revolved around meal times, as we had little else to do but laze on the beach until our stomachs told us it was time to move.

The food here is amazing. Thai like we've never tasted it before. Every dish is fragrant and delicate and carries a kick that still allows each ingredient's flavour to live. A big bowl of Tom kha kai (a coconut and lemon grass chicken and noodle soup) will set you back about 80 Bhat (£ 0.80) in a restaurant, and 30 Bhat if you go local.

As we're on a backpacker's budget, we've allowed ourselves one restaurant meal a day, which is usually dinner. At our own peril, this has forced us to really explore the real local cuisine which has, at times, proved rather interesting due to a pretty extreme language barrier and the use of ingredients very foreign to us foreigners, or faranges as they call us here.

The only way to really deal with this tiny little glitch, is to eat what you get without thinking about it too much. It all tastes good, it's when your mind starts to wander that it becomes a problem.

It does make for a more interesting day though. It means flagging down mobile 'food bars,' motorbikes ingeniously fitted with a mini kitchen if you like, driven by local Thai people. Depending on who stops, you're able to get anything from ice-cooled fresh fruit on sticks, to filled Thai pancakes and the staple Phad Thai.

It means adventures to the local market, which is always an experience. We bought fresh prawns, calamari and monk fish from there on Wednesday, and Monte was good enough to cook it for us. Despite the fact that it tasted amazing, it was probably the closest thing we're going to get to a 'home-cooked' meal in a while, so we were incredibly grateful.

It means frequenting the street-side BBQs that do a mean grilled chicken on a stick (they put a lot of things on sticks here) and Green Papaya Salad.

It means being brave and bold and open minded. Until we get the dreaded 'Bang Niang Belly' or suffer from severe bum burn. Then we'll probably have to rethink.

But believe it or not we haven't just been eating and sleeping since we arrived, although by this blog it might seem so. We've met up with both Ken from Volunteer Teacher Thailand and Steven from Fun 4 Kids, and are hopefully starting to get involved with some of the projects they have running from Monday. More on that when we have more.

I've also done my Open Water Diving course and was fortunate enough to do my first 2 dives in the Similan Islands, one of the top 5 dives sites in the world. It was incredible. I'm hooked. And my father, I'm sure, will be delighted to know that I have finally, after all these years, found my version of his love for birding, although a tad more dangerous and only slightly more expensive.

Maria, my dive instructor, has introduced us to the expat community and their local watering holes, so our faces are starting to become familiar, and we're slowly seeping into the woodwork. There's a few Swiss, some German, a couple of Aussies, some Americans, a few poms and a token Saffa, who's house we're going to for a Braai this week.

Other than that, we're acclimatising. Our lobster red bodies (yes, we got burnt, badly) have cooled to a crisp golden brown. Our sweat pores that have lain dormant for the past 4 years are functioning once more. We're hot. We're happy. We're back in summer. And we're loving it!

Until next time.

K & M.

PS We've posted some photos on http://www.flickr.com/photos/43679192@N07/sets/72157622625214124/ for your viewing pleasure.

The First Chapter

Tomorrow we begin the journey that many have called brave, a few irresponsible and the rest crazy.

It’s true; we’ve had to be brave. We’re leaving our friends, our families, our lives. And they’re right. It is slightly irresponsible. The money we’re using to fund this trip could have been a pretty healthy deposit on a house. And yes, it is a bit crazy. We’ve quit our jobs and given up our only source of income in the mists of one of the harshest economic climates we’ve ever encountered.

But we considered all these things. We thought about them long and hard. And we decided to do it anyway.

So tomorrow we board a plane to Singapore, where another will take us to Phuket. There we’ll find a bus that'll drop us off in a little place on the south west coast of Thailand called Khao Lak.

Here we’ll spend a month or so ridding ourselves of the baggage of the western world, and volunteering in some independent charity organisations still battling the destruction of the 2004 Tsunami.

When we get sick of the monotony of the tidal change, we’ll head north to Chiang Mai, then to Laos, onto Vietnam, Cambodia, Malaysia, The Philippines, New Zealand, Australia and finally home, to South Africa.

We hope that a few of you will come visit us somewhere along the way. If not, we’d love you to follow our epic journey on this blog.

Stay tuned.

M&K