Another one. The Dilemma.

Now for the interesting turn of events. The floods are still very bad here in Thailand, and Bangkok has been hit really hard. All the government buildings had been shut down so there was lots of trouble getting our ED visa papers, which was a problem for Mick and I because our newly extended visa's were going to run out in a week. We are from Canada so if we leave the country and come back we only get 15 extra days instead of the usual 30. We thought we would have our new visa papers by then so it wouldn't be a problem and the next time we left the country we could get our 1year ED visa. So that was causing us quite a bit of stress, we didn't know when we would get our papers and the cost of having to do 2 more visa runs now was quite substantial. It was a set back but not the end of the world. 

Then we got a call from the agency director here and he said he had a job for Mick and I, but we would be 40 km's a part in a really rural part of Thailand and we wouldn't enjoy it. Since we came here to teach and live together we didn't take the job. There were some...uhm...communication errors? and we got another call the next day saying that we just turned down the one job that had been guaranteed us. Another setback. Slightly larger than the first.

 Mick and I thought okay, well we have to go home, it's hard for us to find jobs because of our age and lack of experience, and without help from an agency we didn't have much hope. But! Thank goodness for my dad. He is the smartest person I know, great with people, rational, and just the tiny bit intimidating when he needs to be. Combine those qualities and you get a very persuasive person. He got in touch with the agency, and explained the dilemma we were in. Magic. The next day we got a job offer at a school in Bangkok, the offer even included Tanita so the three of us would all be able to teach at the same school. Yay! Problem solved. 

Except for not. For Mick, the job offer didn't appeal to him any more and he decided that he was going to go home.  I won't lie to you guys, everything looks all amazing and beautiful over here, life on the beach, travelling around, fun all the time. I mean it is, obviously it has been amazing, but since we came here to teach, we have had to deal with a lot of other stuff as well and it hasn't been easy. We have had a lot of unforseen problems and it has been hard to deal with them by ourselves. I think all that took a toll on Mick and this was the final straw. I think a seed was planted in Mick's heart when we talked about going home and it grew and grew so when we got offered jobs it was too big to shake it. Since I am being all honest, I was pretty homesick at that point and the thought of going home to winter and skiing and family and friends seemed pretty darn lovely so I completely understand why Mick would want to go back. How could I be mad at him for that? I couldn't. I didn't want him to do something if he wasn't going to be completely 100 percent happy doing it. It all happened really fast. We got to Bangkok, he booked a flight, and the next day he flew out. Saying goodbye sucked. Mick is pretty awesome in case you hadn't realized and I was going to miss him so much. You know how when people talk about travelling they talk about finding themselves and growing as a person? I think Mick grew more than he realized in this month in Thailand. I realized though. I saw him turn from an amazing guy, into an even more amazing guy. It is hard to explain the change I saw in him but it makes me so proud to see the new confidence and maturity and swagger that boy has. If you don't hang out with him very often...you should probably start. 

So now here I am. In Thailand still. Hanging out with Tanita. Still have my hopes set on teaching. I'm a little nervous though. Tanita's boyfriend is coming in less than a week and soon I will be on my own. I mean I'll still be with them all the time, but I will be staying on my own and looking for my own apartment and that's scary. It has been really weird here without Mick and it has made me think about home a lot so I have been pretty homesick lately.

 But I'm lucky. I have the most amazing family and friends...I live for the skype calls with my dad; who is always always smiling and reassuring and excited. He encourages me to go out and do as much stuff as I possibly can and every time I talk to him I get all excited about being in Thailand again. And the emails from my mom; the constant updates about Y and R, hearing about the funny things going on in the hospital, and the constant reminder that she is proud of me and she loves me and the reassurance that The Nest isn't the same without me. And my brother bear's ridiculous sense of humour always makes me smile when I open a message from him. It's like he is in the room with me, him and Alan ganging up on the baby. But he is doing amazing things at school and I am disgustingly proud of him. And I also have a very cool boy named David that I miss who talks to me every day, and sometimes nights, who always makes me smile and laugh and has made being so far away from home a heck of a lot easier. Although, it's hard to think that I wont get to see him until May. He even gives up studying to talk to me. But don't worry. I make sure he gets good grades. And I miss Jordan. My beautiful, interesting, and perfect Jordan. You've got a special place in my heart and you know why. And Jenna. Smart and motivated and so much fun, what's not to love? And Brenna. The biggest heart in the whole entire world, and independant, and I'm so proud of you. And Amy. You are like my own personal sunshine, and even though I have to share you with Vancouver, you are doing so great. There are so many other people I miss. Krew 92. And Morgan. I miss you everyday. Always. And Devin. And Fraser. And Mick now. 

So yeah, I get homesick, how could I not when I have such amazing people back in Canada? But I am so excited about the upcoming months. I still fall more in love with Thailand every day and I have met so many great people here that make being on my own seem like a piece of cake. I will start blogging more regularly and keep you guys updated. As of right now the area where my school is is still very much under water so the school opening date is set for December 6th. I don't think it will be pushed back any further but time will only tell. In the meantime Tanita and I have been researching places to help out with flood relief and have found a place where we can go and pack and distribute supply kits so we are going to go check that out tomorrow. If there were spelling mistakes in here please, please forgive me, I am wayyy too lazy to go back and edit this. It took me long enough to write. I apologize. Talk to y'all Later. 

Oh yeah. If you are looking for some cool blogs to read other than mine...I would get tired of listening to me too.... you should check some of these out. 

http://www.mickleahy.com/

http://bubblewrapandnutella.blogspot.com

/http://mpridyblog.blogspot.com/

http://conradpridy.wordpress.com/

http://madisonirwin.com/

I find all of these blogs highly entertaining. Hopefully you do too!

Part Two! Yay!

Hello again! How are you? Gooood. Ready for part two? I would hope so. Cause there is going to be a part 3 too, so you should probably read part 2. So where were we? Phi Phi. Right. Yeah. So Phi Phi was awesome. But it was time to move on. So we did. To Krabi! If you have heard of Krabi you probably heard about how amazing the beaches are and everything. Well I did too. But we decided we wanted to do something a little different because we had been on the beach for two weeks already (I know, you can never get too much beach) So we decided to stay in the town of Krabi instead of one of the many surrounding beaches. It was a good choice. We had fun.

The first activity of the day was a fun little field trip to the doctor! Like I mentioned before, I stepped on a rock in the ocean and cut my foot open real good. You would think I would have learned my lesson about rocks in the ocean after Tanita's little episode in Phuket, but nope. This happened. I was against going to the doctor, but Mick was pretty adamant that I needed stitches. Good thing I have a future doctor as a best friend because as you can see, there was a LOT of sand in my cut.

I'd love to say I was super tough and handled the stitches the a champ. But I did not. It does not feel okay when someone sticks a 4 gauge needle into your open wound repeatedly. Not okay at all. There was lot's of screaming. And it doesn't help when Tanita is standing there cringing and telling me how disgusting and painful it looks, and Mick is eating chips....

Once the doctor sticks the needle into the cut and freezes it it's supposed to be a smooth ride right? It supposed to be numb and you don't feel him sticking that big sharp metal wire thing through your skin? That's what I've heard atleast. Cause that was not the case. He didn't feel the need to freeze the part he stuck the wire through so it hurt. Badly. But never fear, he thought he would try again and stick the needle in my cut a few more times. Didn't help. I was supposed to get 4 stitches, but I think because I screamed so much he only gave me 3....

Anyways! Now that I was all fixed up and stuff we could go exploring! But we didn't. Not the first day. I was having a hard time walking around so we just chilled pretty much. We did have some fun with sheet in a bag though. Mick's mom is a genius and found these puppies at a travel store. Seeing as our beds did not come equipped with safe looking sheets, they were a life saver. We were really excited and obviously needed to take stupid photos in them. These are just a few...there are many many more...

Tanita was really jealous, almost to the point of tears, so being the kind soul that I am, I let her in mine.

The next day I popped a ton of pain killers and we headed off to a beach for the day! We just couldn't stay away from the sand and water. It was a nice beach, nothing too fancy, but the atmosphere of Ao Nang was lovely so we were content. 

Out of commission. But it's okay cause who doesn't love sitting on a beach alone while their friends play in the water?  Don't feel too bad for me though. We lied to a nice Thai lady and said we would come check out her restaurant and she gave us free pineapple, so I was happy.

Mick finally indulged. I mean, he had had many different kinds of chocolate sundaes before this, but every time we walked by a Hagen Daas he drooled a little bit. This was a relief for Tanita and I because it was getting awkward having to clean up his drool all the time.

Krabi was cool because there was a night market every night. There were bands and so many shops and disgustingly cheap food. Our kind of place. We hit this place up every night for dinner.

Life was pretty good on Krabi. I could see myself happily living there. Then life got a little bit better. The next day we stumbled upon a temple. By stumble upon I mean it was located right next to the clinic I got my stitches at we were too dumb to see it when we were there. But since everything in Krabi was so chill we figured the monks wouldn't have a problem if we went in and checked it out. 

Alright. Fun is over. Time to go back to Bangkok and be all responsible. Not to worry though, there are still tons of cool things to do there and lots of fun was had. You guys ready for part 3? I promise to blog diligently from now on so I don't have to do this anymore. I don't blame you if you stop reading the updates. 

Remember me??

It's okay. Totally understandable if you don't. It has been awhile. You know when you miss 3 days of going to the gym and then it's sooo hard to get back into it then you end up not going for two weeks? Or you put your book down for a day or two and you never end up finishing it? Same time of thing has been happening with blogging. That would be totally okay if I was just mad chilling at home and not doing anything interesting to blog about...not sure why I would have a blog if that was the case though...anyways, I have done tons of cool stuff since the last time I blogged so it's a lot of effort to sit down and catch up. Rambling doesn't help. So I guess I'll show you some pictures. And explain them. That is typically how this blog works. ALRIGHT LETS GET TO IT OH YEAHHHHHHHHHHH.


I believe when we last left our Heroines/Hero, they had returned from Myanmar with fresh 15 day tourist visa's, tan's, and their hearts set on a new location. Phi phi islands was the next stop on their adventure, and to date, the most beautiful. Let's see what kind of shinanigans they got in to.


A quick boat ride over to the island. And by quick I mean 3 hours in the blazing sun with no shade resulting in a super cute shorts and tank top tan.

When we were awake the view wasn't too shabby...

But as we all know, if I am on a vehicle, and it is moving, I will fall asleep. This time I took Tanita down with me. Not as comfortable as it looks.

 Mick, being the good friend that he is, made sure we were awake to see the cool islands...he might have been a tiny bit less hungover than the two of us.

We arrived! This doesn't do justice to how blue the water was when we rolled up, but wait for it, I'll get there..

Phi Phi was super cool because it was so laid back. Such a nice change from Bangkok, nobody asked me if I wanted a Tuk-Tuk or a suit...I didn't know what to do with myself. Here there are no cars, no shoes, shops open at 10, and grabbing a bucket with breakfast is totally normal. So basically it was heaven.

 Everywhere in Phi Phi is ten steps away from the beach so we could pop over there at any time...and seeing as there isn't much else to do on a tiny island, my homeboys and I was hittin dat up errryday. (Tanita and Mick)

The whole bay is a sand bar and you can pretty much walk out to that point without actually having to swim. I think it was shortly after this photo was taken that I had my first ever suicidal thought. I seriously considered just walking and walking and drowning myself because there was no way my life was ever going to get better than in that moment. I didn't do it obviously. That would have been inconvenient for Tanita and Mick because then they would have an empty bed in their room.

HOW IS THIS POSSIBLE??? SO BEAUTIFUL!!!

Oh hey there. Wanna be best friends?

Oh. I wish I had seen this side of you before I suggested that. Oh well. Guess I'm stuck with you now.

The most popular form of transportation here. I think I got asked if I wanted a taxi boat only 3 times, I said "no thank you" and they were like "okay that's chill" then left me alone for the rest of the time. Take a lesson Bangkok.

When we weren't on the beach we were kicking it at our cool hotel room, we have our own area of the hotel with a TWO benches and some tiles. We are a big deal. The best part of the hotel though was it came with built in pets. We had two pet kitties that hung out with us. One was camera shy though.

 

 JEALOUS OF ALL OUR BENCHES?!?! Thought so.

The cool thing to do in Phi Phi is go snorkeling, so obviously being the cool kids we are....we went snorkeling.

We got to tour some really awesome islands before the boat driver steered into this beautiful cliff-cove-shallow water-area. He stopped the boat and was just like "okay jump" Everyone was looking around at each other really confused, but then Mick and I were like "well okay then" and jumped in. And it was awesome. There is so much salt in the water that you can just float and stare up at the huge cliffs covered in tropical foliage. Like I said, awesome.

The rocks in the clear blue water look really pretty and stuff right? Yeah well they aren't so pretty when you step on one and have to get stitches. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

After swimming, we went to another area and got to snorkel for 45 minutes. I think I mentioned to you guys that my dad says I always speak in extremes? I can't remember if I did, but basically my dad says that in my world everything is the best. When I am doing something, I always explain it as "the best ever" Like I will go see a movie, and come home and say it was the best movie ever, then go see another one a week later and say the same thing. But seriously, I mean it this time, snorkeling in Thailand was the best thing ever. We didn't take any pictures because we were too busy marvelling, but just trust me. Best. Thing. Ever. I will leave you with this lovely image though...

Moving on. After Snorkeling we stopped at Maya Bay. If any of you are die hard Leonardo DiCaprio fans you will remember a movie he was in called The Beach? It was filmed on this beach. It was beautiful and everything, but I was really disappointed that Leo wasn't waiting on the beach to feed me fresh pineapple when I arrived. Still lot's of cool stuff to see.

Not done yet, the last stop of the day was monkey beach, but on the way we got to see the most unreal sunset ever...I know I know...extremes. Atleast Alan can say I told you so.

MONKEY BEACH. When we rolled up to the beach everything was all quiet, then all of a sudden the trees started shaking and a whole stream of monkeys came pouring out of the jungle. They knew we had food, and they would stop at nothing to get it. We lost a few good men there on monkey beach. Just kidding. But they did attack some people for their papaya.

 Okay okay. Enough. I am hungry. And my brain hurts from blogging. Although it was fun to look at these pictures and remember the week we spent in Phi Phi. The rest of the time was just a blur of sunny days on the beach, fire shows at night on the beach, and cheap buckets. But I think Phi Phi is a must see for anyone going to Thailand. I have decided to be considerate and break this update into two parts for your convenience. Mostly for my convenience actually. But a little bit for you guys. Krabi is coming next, and the plot thickens. Stay tuned friends. I'm off to grab some pad thai and get away from this crazy rooster that keeps staring at me and it's army of baby roosters.