Sorry, it's been ages since I've been on this thing. I'm sure you've been waiting with baited breath!
By way of an excuse, I was really fucking tired - and then I was busy being drunk!
Basically, I did quite a bit of travelling in a very short space of time. Some of which you know about, some of which I'll tell you about now . . .
A quick recap prehaps . . . 2nd November, 5 hours to Vientiane; 4th November, 27 hours to Siem Reap; 9th November, 6 or 7 hours to Phnom Penh; 11th November, 16 hours to Bangkok; 13th November, 15 hours to Surat Thani; 14th November, 5 hours to Koh Samui and then finally, the next day, 2 hours getting to Koh Phangan . . .
I was supposed to spend longer on Samui but the weather was crap and it was hitting Samui before it hit Phangan so I headed out there for some sun, knowing there'd at least be less rain than on Samui. Twas a great idea as it turned out.
Though, the night I spent on Samui I did meet some nice people, including Vicki the accountant from London, who joined me for a discounted dinner in the hostel restaurant, which was awesome coz I hadn't actually talked to anyone in about three days, not since I'd gotten off the bus in Bangkok. I mean, I talked to hostel staff and people I was buying things from, but no "regular" people. Then after that we and some other people in the hostel watched Red - which is just such an amazingly brilliant film! John Malkovich is the man!
Then it was off to Koh Phangan, and Munchies, where I spent the next week - but that's for a different blog (coming later on today). I'll just relate one part of the story here, and it's not that nice a part for me.
After all that travelling, I hit a wall. A solid, heavy and hard wall made out of sleeplessness and too much caffine and sugar, adrenaline fuelled days of just trying to keep awake enough to get from the bus to the hostel . . . I hit that wall and I bounced off it and landed in the dust. For about a day and a half I had a headache, I was exhausted, I had no appetite and I couldn't even think straight! Not pleasant . . .
So ladies and gentlemen, don't hold it against me that I wasn't here, chatting away to you, because I really would have like to . . . I was just in pieces, on the floor, so wrecked I could barely even read. Honestly, I thought I might die. Funnily enough, and this might be a good thing, during all of it, unlike when I was sick in Hong Kong, I didn't want to rush home, didn't want to just get the fuck out and come back to all of you, I just wanted to get better so I could go back to having fun. That's some way I've come in the last few months (not that I don't want to come home and see you all, I just like that I've still got two months left before then and that there's plenty more interesting things to see and people to meet along the road).
And speaking of the the Road, you might think that I hate the Road after all of that travelling, but I don't - though it was nice to spend a week in one place after so much moving. But the Road is not a thing to be hated, or cursed. You have to be careful of course, to be weary of it certainly, because it is untrustworthy and it will go where it will, not where you want, but if you respect it, it will take you along its course and leave you safe. A poem to leave you to muse upon, perhaps -
The Road goes ever on and on
Down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow, if I can,
Pursuing it with eager feet,
Until it joins some larger way
Where many paths and errands meet.
And wither then? I cannot say.
by Bilbo Baggins of the Shire.
One day I walked out of a door, 145A Carrigwood, a white door in Dublin, and stepped upon that road, an followed a familiar course, that led from way to way, until all the roads were different, and upon that road I have met many people, some who I hope too see on the road again, and some who I hope will follow the road to my white door some day, or to other doors where we may stop together and take our ease in each other's company, but my Road, the road I follow and that I am thankful to be on, this Road leads from place to place, and eventually the way will lead me Home again - just not yet.
*End of sentimental crap*
Much love,
Shane.
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