Here we are three weeks into the trip and I haven't written a damn word. Mostly I blame the heat. And the constant distractions. Who has time to write when you're spending your days eating and drinking coconut shakes and getting massages? Life is tough.
Let's backtrack a bit. About three weeks ago, twenty hours of flights and airports culminated in an arrival in Singapore, the city that's somewhat famous for being the reluctant stopover for Southeast Asia backpackers. It's not that Singapore is a bad place; it's actually very clean and modern and safe. The reason it's a less-than-ideal destination for backpackers is that it's just not that interesting. It's a city of transplants and mostly generic culture. It's sterile. For travelers, it's temporary. Fly in, stay the night, move on.
Nevertheless, we decided to stay the entire weekend and soak up some of the city's famous nightlife. For me, Singapore was a great transition to Asia; it's very much a modern city and it's easy for Westerners (English is the official language). We rode the metro a lot, ate some good food (including some great Indian food in Little India), and stayed out late in Clarke Quay both nights. I really can't think of much more to say; Singapore was fun but forgettable.
On Sunday we scrambled to barely make our flight to Thailand, where we had one night in Bangkok (yeah, for real). After wandering through Silom for a long time, we finally managed to find our guesthouse, owned by a very friendly American expat named Mac. We treated ourselves to some noodles and spicy tofu salad, which was legitimately amazing, something I never thought I'd say about salad. We considered heading out for a night on the town, but once we realized how tired we were, we opted for the massage recommendation from Mac. He walked us a few blocks to his favorite local spot, where we indulged in an hour-long session for the ridiculous price of $5 a piece. It was at this point that I realized how cheap Thailand was going to be and that I was going to be spending more time getting massages than eating. Game changer.
We weren't meeting Sabina's friend Sonnie until the weekend, so we decided to head to one of Thailand's many islands for the days in between. We settled on Koh Samet, an island close enough to Bangkok that it's a popular weekend destination for Thais. The bus ride from the city was about four hours and our timing was accidentally perfect: our ferry ride from the mainland to the island (about 45 minutes) was just before sunset and was very picturesque.
Since it was a weekday (early in the week) and there had actually been an oil spill in the area only a few days before, we decided to play hardball a bit and shop around at a few of the places. In Thailand, the price of almost everything can be haggled and we felt that we had some leverage in the situation. I was more than happy to turn Sabina loose and sit with the bags while she visited a few bungalows and talked pricing. Eventually we settled on a small operation after she was able to talk them down to less than half of the starting price. It was a simple bungalow, but it was clean, close to the beach, and close to town.
The next morning I woke up at 5:45 to go for a sunrise run on the beach. It was overcast, quiet, a bit moody, and actually very pleasant. At the start of the run, I was a little lethargic and my muscles were tight, but after ten minutes I started feeling pretty good. That is, until I ran past a pack of resting dogs, evidently spooking one, who freaked out, lunged at me, and sunk his teeth into my leg.
Let's stop here a moment. This is Day 7 of the entire trip, Day 5 in Asia, Day 3 in Thailand, and basically Day 1 on any kind of beach. Also, I didn't get the rabies vaccine before we left because the odds were so low that I would run into any problems. Here's a more accurate transcription of my thoughts on the matter:
IT'S MY FIRST DAY ON A THAI BEACH IN THE FIRST WEEK OF A MULTI-MONTH BACKPACKING TRIP AND A MOTHER FUCKING STRAY DOG JUST BIT ME. ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?!?!
I hobbled back to the bungalow and as I entered, Sabina asked "How did the run go?" My response was "Not good", at which point she noticed that my hands and lower right leg were covered in blood and I was feverishly cleaning the wounds with antibacterial wipes. After stopping most of the bleeding and crudely applying some bandages, we walked to the international clinic, which was about fifteen minutes away on the other side of town. The clinic wasn't open yet, so we called the emergency number, which went to the doctor's cell phone. I could tell I had just woken him and once I said I had been bitten by a dog, he started mobilizing immediately. Luckily he lives above the clinic, so he and one of his assistants came right down and ushered me in.
As they started cleaning the two holes in my leg, they gave me a tetanus booster (slightly different than the one I received before leaving the States) and started me on the post-exposure rabies vaccine, which is a series of five shots spread out over one month. The doctor also explained that if I received immune globulin (basically a shot of antibodies), the odds of getting rabies would be "practically zero". The only catch with this shot is that it's expensive. In Thailand, a poorer country, the shot is $1,500; in a rich Western country, the shot could be anywhere between $2,000 and $7,000. Thank you Thailand for being poor!
Obviously I had secured a travelers' insurance policy before leaving and I had even opted for the zero-deductible option because I had a feeling that something was bound to happen eventually. Knowing that I would be reimbursed for all expenses, I didn't hesitate to order the immune globulin. It took a few hours for it to be shipped to the island by boat, at which point I went back to the clinic and they administered it. They also started me on ten days of antibiotics.
Here's the synopsis of the situation: I am very confident that I will not contract rabies because the medical staff was able to take action very quickly and because the stray dog that bit me had a collar, implying that it wasn't as wild as it could have been and probably doesn't have rabies. I have received four out of the five shots of the rabies vaccine and will be immune in about two weeks when I receive the final shot. I have been going to a clinic every day (with one exception, see below) to have the wounds cleaned and the dressing changed. The injury has never really hurt that much except when I accidentally hit it or when it's being cleaned.
It sucks that I have to go to a clinic every day and I can't go in the water at all (for fear of infection), but I see two silver linings to this cloud. One is that I've gotten to see a part of Thai culture that I wouldn't have normally seen. Before leaving the States, I had read that Thai hospitals and clinics are very good and very well respected and now I can see why: I have been receiving excellent medical care everywhere I've gone at a fraction of the price back home. Everyone has been very professional and helpful and most of them speak English too. It's been a very positive and eye-opening experience, especially given all the talk of health insurance back in the States.
The second silver lining is that I'm now (or will very soon be) immune to rabies, which opens the door for previously unavailable volunteer opportunities for working with animals. Even though I'm a bit gun-shy now around stray dogs, I still love dogs in general and will be looking into some volunteer work next month at a Bali animal shelter. At least one of the dog shelters in Ubud requires the rabies vaccine, so I see this incident as something of a blessing in disguise.
Once all my treatment is done, I'll be submitting a claim (and a lot of itemized bills) to my insurance company. I expect that everything will be completely covered, so I won't be any worse for the wear, except for a couple small scars on my leg and a good travel story. And all the antibiotics has forced me to go into a detox, which is something I was hoping would happen anyway.
Aside from having my flesh ripped open by dog teeth, Koh Samet was actually very pleasant. We spent our days eating, sleeping, laying on the powdery white sand, and walking along the beach. In the evenings, we would sit on bean bag chairs a few feet from the water, smoke hookah under the stars, enjoy the perfect weather and the sea breeze, listen to music, and watch the local children put on fire poi shows.
Once the weekend came around, we caught a bus back to Bangkok and checked into a nice hotel in Riverside (Tongtara Hotel). The hotel was running a deal to attract tourists and we ended up paying only $30 a night. We spent the weekend exploring Riverside and Silom and hanging out with Sonnie and her husband Randy in the evenings. I would leave during the day to walk the city and go to a clinic while Sabina would visit temples. It was really nice to walk around Bangkok and get a feel for the culture, though I was often frustrated by the size of the city. I got lost several times because I thought I had overshot my mark, when in fact I hadn't walked nearly far enough.
Both Friday and Saturday night we ended up on Khaosan Road, a Westerner-catering shitshow reminiscent of Bourbon Street. The road extends for several blocks and is filled with bars selling cheap beer and buckets of mixed drinks, hookahs, the same American party music played loudly and repeatedly, street vendors with piles of bugs (for eating), racks of cheap clothing, ladyboys, and hawkers trying to convince you to go see ping pong shows. The party goes well into the night and makes for some pretty fantastic people watching. The novelty wears off really quickly though; after one night, you're pretty annoyed with the entire scene.
On Sunday, we ventured out to the Chatuchak weekend market, one of the largest markets in the world. We walked around for hours, looking at food, art, clothing, toys, and knickknacks, and probably saw only one-tenth of the entire market. It's massive. Again, the people-watching was fun. The weekend market is a really great way to spend a Saturday or Sunday afternoon and be productive with some shopping at the same time.
After the weekend in Bangkok, we decided to head south to the island cluster of Koh Samui, Koh Phangan, and Koh Tao. Each island has its own reputation and all three are major tourist destinations. Spas, world-class diving, restaurants, bars, beautiful beaches, and the infamous Full Moon Party all beckon travelers from all over the world. Initially we thought of going to Koh Samui, but after getting an idea of how developed (read: expensive) it is, we opted for Koh Phangan instead. We hopped on a flight from Bangkok to Surat Thani, took a random bus to a random hotel, ate $1 pad thai at the night market while dogs and rats ran the streets, took an hour-long bus ride to Don Sak, hopped on a multi-hour ferry to Koh Samui, then took a 30-minute ferry to Koh Phangan. I fell asleep on the deck of the ferry to Koh Samui and treated myself to a pretty righteous sunburn.
We found ourselves some nice mom-and-pop bungalows (Blue Lotus) that were $14 a night. Yup, you read that correctly. A bungalow on a peaceful part of the island only feet from the water is $7 per night per person. Add to that $3 dinners and $7 massages and you're starting to see why Thailand is pretty great. What's funny is that we haven't run into any other Americans on this trip, just Europeans and Australians and the occasional Canadian or Kiwi. I've had this same conversation with locals and other travelers and none of us can explain the absence of Americans. They just don't come to Thailand for some reason.
The next week at Blue Lotus was very peaceful, filled with eating and walking along the beach and exploring the island a bit. It was at this point that something in me finally gave out and I succumbed to some tummy issues. Sabina pointed out that taking antibiotics for ten days probably killed off the good bacteria I needed to cope with everything, leaving me vulnerable to foreign stomach bugs. After vomiting some pad thai one morning (which did not taste nearly as good the second time around), I spent the better part of two days floundering in bed with stomach pains and nausea, feeling completely lethargic and dead to the world, and making some less-than-ideal trips to the bathroom. Luckily I had procured some Thailand-specific antibiotics before we left, so once I started popping those, I started to feel better very quickly. However, I didn't make it to the clinic during those two days and without my daily cleaning, my wounds became infected. Uuuggghhh. When I finally did make it into the clinic, the doctor prescribed me four days of two new antibiotics, which I just finished up yesterday. Let's hope this cycle doesn't repeat itself.
After some discussion, Sabina and I decided we should split for the rest of the month (i.e. the rest of Thailand). While I was sick and praying for death, she went out and enjoyed the nightlife and was now sort of over it, so she wanted to move on to another island. On the other hand, I felt like I needed to settle down with a single clinic and a single doctor so I could more effectively close out my medical issues before moving on to the next country. Also, I decided that I wanted to be in Koh Phangan for the Full Moon Party, knowing full well that it'll be a sloppy, drunken mess filled with annoying 20-somethings. I figure that I'm here only once in my life, so I pretty much have to attend. Even if it is an annoying spectacle, I'd like to come to that conclusion myself. Besides, how often do you get to party until sunrise on a Thai beach with thousands of people?
I think that pretty much brings us current. Sabina is enjoying the island paradise of Koh Phi-Phi and I've recently moved into a bungalow at the famous Sanctuary, a holistic/wellness/yoga resort in the jungle accessible only by boat. I don't think I'll have the time or energy for any yoga or cleanses or fasting, but I will happily take advantage of their location and their restaurant menu, which is probably one of the best in the entire country. Full Moon is tonight and this feels a bit like the calm before the storm. After Full Moon I'm planning on bouncing to another part of the island since my current commute is annoying, considering I have to trek to the clinic once a day. More to come on that later.
Full photo albums: Koh Samet, Chatuchak Weekend Market
Singapore
Let's backtrack a bit. About three weeks ago, twenty hours of flights and airports culminated in an arrival in Singapore, the city that's somewhat famous for being the reluctant stopover for Southeast Asia backpackers. It's not that Singapore is a bad place; it's actually very clean and modern and safe. The reason it's a less-than-ideal destination for backpackers is that it's just not that interesting. It's a city of transplants and mostly generic culture. It's sterile. For travelers, it's temporary. Fly in, stay the night, move on.
Nevertheless, we decided to stay the entire weekend and soak up some of the city's famous nightlife. For me, Singapore was a great transition to Asia; it's very much a modern city and it's easy for Westerners (English is the official language). We rode the metro a lot, ate some good food (including some great Indian food in Little India), and stayed out late in Clarke Quay both nights. I really can't think of much more to say; Singapore was fun but forgettable.
Bangkok
On Sunday we scrambled to barely make our flight to Thailand, where we had one night in Bangkok (yeah, for real). After wandering through Silom for a long time, we finally managed to find our guesthouse, owned by a very friendly American expat named Mac. We treated ourselves to some noodles and spicy tofu salad, which was legitimately amazing, something I never thought I'd say about salad. We considered heading out for a night on the town, but once we realized how tired we were, we opted for the massage recommendation from Mac. He walked us a few blocks to his favorite local spot, where we indulged in an hour-long session for the ridiculous price of $5 a piece. It was at this point that I realized how cheap Thailand was going to be and that I was going to be spending more time getting massages than eating. Game changer.
Koh Samet
We weren't meeting Sabina's friend Sonnie until the weekend, so we decided to head to one of Thailand's many islands for the days in between. We settled on Koh Samet, an island close enough to Bangkok that it's a popular weekend destination for Thais. The bus ride from the city was about four hours and our timing was accidentally perfect: our ferry ride from the mainland to the island (about 45 minutes) was just before sunset and was very picturesque.
Since it was a weekday (early in the week) and there had actually been an oil spill in the area only a few days before, we decided to play hardball a bit and shop around at a few of the places. In Thailand, the price of almost everything can be haggled and we felt that we had some leverage in the situation. I was more than happy to turn Sabina loose and sit with the bags while she visited a few bungalows and talked pricing. Eventually we settled on a small operation after she was able to talk them down to less than half of the starting price. It was a simple bungalow, but it was clean, close to the beach, and close to town.
The next morning I woke up at 5:45 to go for a sunrise run on the beach. It was overcast, quiet, a bit moody, and actually very pleasant. At the start of the run, I was a little lethargic and my muscles were tight, but after ten minutes I started feeling pretty good. That is, until I ran past a pack of resting dogs, evidently spooking one, who freaked out, lunged at me, and sunk his teeth into my leg.
Let's stop here a moment. This is Day 7 of the entire trip, Day 5 in Asia, Day 3 in Thailand, and basically Day 1 on any kind of beach. Also, I didn't get the rabies vaccine before we left because the odds were so low that I would run into any problems. Here's a more accurate transcription of my thoughts on the matter:
IT'S MY FIRST DAY ON A THAI BEACH IN THE FIRST WEEK OF A MULTI-MONTH BACKPACKING TRIP AND A MOTHER FUCKING STRAY DOG JUST BIT ME. ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?!?!
I hobbled back to the bungalow and as I entered, Sabina asked "How did the run go?" My response was "Not good", at which point she noticed that my hands and lower right leg were covered in blood and I was feverishly cleaning the wounds with antibacterial wipes. After stopping most of the bleeding and crudely applying some bandages, we walked to the international clinic, which was about fifteen minutes away on the other side of town. The clinic wasn't open yet, so we called the emergency number, which went to the doctor's cell phone. I could tell I had just woken him and once I said I had been bitten by a dog, he started mobilizing immediately. Luckily he lives above the clinic, so he and one of his assistants came right down and ushered me in.
As they started cleaning the two holes in my leg, they gave me a tetanus booster (slightly different than the one I received before leaving the States) and started me on the post-exposure rabies vaccine, which is a series of five shots spread out over one month. The doctor also explained that if I received immune globulin (basically a shot of antibodies), the odds of getting rabies would be "practically zero". The only catch with this shot is that it's expensive. In Thailand, a poorer country, the shot is $1,500; in a rich Western country, the shot could be anywhere between $2,000 and $7,000. Thank you Thailand for being poor!
Obviously I had secured a travelers' insurance policy before leaving and I had even opted for the zero-deductible option because I had a feeling that something was bound to happen eventually. Knowing that I would be reimbursed for all expenses, I didn't hesitate to order the immune globulin. It took a few hours for it to be shipped to the island by boat, at which point I went back to the clinic and they administered it. They also started me on ten days of antibiotics.
Here's the synopsis of the situation: I am very confident that I will not contract rabies because the medical staff was able to take action very quickly and because the stray dog that bit me had a collar, implying that it wasn't as wild as it could have been and probably doesn't have rabies. I have received four out of the five shots of the rabies vaccine and will be immune in about two weeks when I receive the final shot. I have been going to a clinic every day (with one exception, see below) to have the wounds cleaned and the dressing changed. The injury has never really hurt that much except when I accidentally hit it or when it's being cleaned.
It sucks that I have to go to a clinic every day and I can't go in the water at all (for fear of infection), but I see two silver linings to this cloud. One is that I've gotten to see a part of Thai culture that I wouldn't have normally seen. Before leaving the States, I had read that Thai hospitals and clinics are very good and very well respected and now I can see why: I have been receiving excellent medical care everywhere I've gone at a fraction of the price back home. Everyone has been very professional and helpful and most of them speak English too. It's been a very positive and eye-opening experience, especially given all the talk of health insurance back in the States.
The second silver lining is that I'm now (or will very soon be) immune to rabies, which opens the door for previously unavailable volunteer opportunities for working with animals. Even though I'm a bit gun-shy now around stray dogs, I still love dogs in general and will be looking into some volunteer work next month at a Bali animal shelter. At least one of the dog shelters in Ubud requires the rabies vaccine, so I see this incident as something of a blessing in disguise.
Once all my treatment is done, I'll be submitting a claim (and a lot of itemized bills) to my insurance company. I expect that everything will be completely covered, so I won't be any worse for the wear, except for a couple small scars on my leg and a good travel story. And all the antibiotics has forced me to go into a detox, which is something I was hoping would happen anyway.
Aside from having my flesh ripped open by dog teeth, Koh Samet was actually very pleasant. We spent our days eating, sleeping, laying on the powdery white sand, and walking along the beach. In the evenings, we would sit on bean bag chairs a few feet from the water, smoke hookah under the stars, enjoy the perfect weather and the sea breeze, listen to music, and watch the local children put on fire poi shows.
Bangkok
Once the weekend came around, we caught a bus back to Bangkok and checked into a nice hotel in Riverside (Tongtara Hotel). The hotel was running a deal to attract tourists and we ended up paying only $30 a night. We spent the weekend exploring Riverside and Silom and hanging out with Sonnie and her husband Randy in the evenings. I would leave during the day to walk the city and go to a clinic while Sabina would visit temples. It was really nice to walk around Bangkok and get a feel for the culture, though I was often frustrated by the size of the city. I got lost several times because I thought I had overshot my mark, when in fact I hadn't walked nearly far enough.
Both Friday and Saturday night we ended up on Khaosan Road, a Westerner-catering shitshow reminiscent of Bourbon Street. The road extends for several blocks and is filled with bars selling cheap beer and buckets of mixed drinks, hookahs, the same American party music played loudly and repeatedly, street vendors with piles of bugs (for eating), racks of cheap clothing, ladyboys, and hawkers trying to convince you to go see ping pong shows. The party goes well into the night and makes for some pretty fantastic people watching. The novelty wears off really quickly though; after one night, you're pretty annoyed with the entire scene.
On Sunday, we ventured out to the Chatuchak weekend market, one of the largest markets in the world. We walked around for hours, looking at food, art, clothing, toys, and knickknacks, and probably saw only one-tenth of the entire market. It's massive. Again, the people-watching was fun. The weekend market is a really great way to spend a Saturday or Sunday afternoon and be productive with some shopping at the same time.
Koh Phangan
After the weekend in Bangkok, we decided to head south to the island cluster of Koh Samui, Koh Phangan, and Koh Tao. Each island has its own reputation and all three are major tourist destinations. Spas, world-class diving, restaurants, bars, beautiful beaches, and the infamous Full Moon Party all beckon travelers from all over the world. Initially we thought of going to Koh Samui, but after getting an idea of how developed (read: expensive) it is, we opted for Koh Phangan instead. We hopped on a flight from Bangkok to Surat Thani, took a random bus to a random hotel, ate $1 pad thai at the night market while dogs and rats ran the streets, took an hour-long bus ride to Don Sak, hopped on a multi-hour ferry to Koh Samui, then took a 30-minute ferry to Koh Phangan. I fell asleep on the deck of the ferry to Koh Samui and treated myself to a pretty righteous sunburn.
We found ourselves some nice mom-and-pop bungalows (Blue Lotus) that were $14 a night. Yup, you read that correctly. A bungalow on a peaceful part of the island only feet from the water is $7 per night per person. Add to that $3 dinners and $7 massages and you're starting to see why Thailand is pretty great. What's funny is that we haven't run into any other Americans on this trip, just Europeans and Australians and the occasional Canadian or Kiwi. I've had this same conversation with locals and other travelers and none of us can explain the absence of Americans. They just don't come to Thailand for some reason.
The next week at Blue Lotus was very peaceful, filled with eating and walking along the beach and exploring the island a bit. It was at this point that something in me finally gave out and I succumbed to some tummy issues. Sabina pointed out that taking antibiotics for ten days probably killed off the good bacteria I needed to cope with everything, leaving me vulnerable to foreign stomach bugs. After vomiting some pad thai one morning (which did not taste nearly as good the second time around), I spent the better part of two days floundering in bed with stomach pains and nausea, feeling completely lethargic and dead to the world, and making some less-than-ideal trips to the bathroom. Luckily I had procured some Thailand-specific antibiotics before we left, so once I started popping those, I started to feel better very quickly. However, I didn't make it to the clinic during those two days and without my daily cleaning, my wounds became infected. Uuuggghhh. When I finally did make it into the clinic, the doctor prescribed me four days of two new antibiotics, which I just finished up yesterday. Let's hope this cycle doesn't repeat itself.
After some discussion, Sabina and I decided we should split for the rest of the month (i.e. the rest of Thailand). While I was sick and praying for death, she went out and enjoyed the nightlife and was now sort of over it, so she wanted to move on to another island. On the other hand, I felt like I needed to settle down with a single clinic and a single doctor so I could more effectively close out my medical issues before moving on to the next country. Also, I decided that I wanted to be in Koh Phangan for the Full Moon Party, knowing full well that it'll be a sloppy, drunken mess filled with annoying 20-somethings. I figure that I'm here only once in my life, so I pretty much have to attend. Even if it is an annoying spectacle, I'd like to come to that conclusion myself. Besides, how often do you get to party until sunrise on a Thai beach with thousands of people?
I think that pretty much brings us current. Sabina is enjoying the island paradise of Koh Phi-Phi and I've recently moved into a bungalow at the famous Sanctuary, a holistic/wellness/yoga resort in the jungle accessible only by boat. I don't think I'll have the time or energy for any yoga or cleanses or fasting, but I will happily take advantage of their location and their restaurant menu, which is probably one of the best in the entire country. Full Moon is tonight and this feels a bit like the calm before the storm. After Full Moon I'm planning on bouncing to another part of the island since my current commute is annoying, considering I have to trek to the clinic once a day. More to come on that later.
Full photo albums: Koh Samet, Chatuchak Weekend Market
