Real connections between people in Koh Phangan
Remote beaches here often run on cash, so I go with notes in a small dry bag before I set out. I also bring a refillable bottle, which cuts the plastic I would otherwise leave behind. Rubbish is the part that matters most. I cannot assume there will be a bin where I sit, so I carry a small bag and take everything back out with me when I go. It weighs almost nothing on the way home.
The longtail boat to Bottle Beach was forty minutes late and the day was getting long. A man next to me opened a banana leaf parcel of rice and pushed half of it toward me. We ate with our fingers while the engine puttered and the beach slowly got bigger. I do not know where he was from. I know he put chili in everything. My eyes were running and I told the boat it was the sun. He nodded like he believed me, which I am still grateful for. The rice was better than anything I have eaten since.
You came down the Haad Rin hill on a Wednesday afternoon on a scooter with three chickens in a bag on your lap, all three looking extremely calm. You gave me a polite two finger wave, like a bus driver. I waved back with a mango. We both carried on with dignity. That is the whole story. I have since been told this is a normal Wednesday. I wave at every scooter now, in case it is you, and I always carry a mango, in case you wave back.
Every afternoon in Chaloklum I watched an old fisherman mending a net, until I finally asked what he was doing. He answered in Thai, then slowly in English, then with his hands. I came back the next day with a notebook. Three months of afternoons later I can say fifteen things about nets and he can say good morning in my language, badly. We both think we are winning. Yesterday he said a word I did not know and held up a knot. I said, yes. He said, good. I said, good morning. He said, very bad.
Did anyone find a black mesh bag with a dive mask inside, near Thong Sala pier? The strap is pale blue and there is a small turtle sticker on the case. I think I left it on a songthaew bench on Wednesday afternoon, ferry day. If it was picked up, it may be on the pier bench, or the songthaew driver may have set it aside. The mask took me ages to find, and it fits just right. I will check this board again on Sunday.
You laid your mat two spaces from mine at sunrise yoga in Srithanu, and halfway through the breathing part your phone rang. You turned it off so fast and apologised to the whole room with both hands. Everyone smiled. I was trying not to laugh into my towel, and failing, quietly, which sounds worse than it was. I have no idea how to find you. I would like to buy you a coconut. I would leave my phone at home.
My scooter would not start at midnight in Haad Rin. Two men walking back from the beach stopped, pushed it a hundred meters up the hill, cleaned the spark plug with a rag and a lighter, and got it running on the fourth kick. They refused my money, got on their own bikes and rode away. I never found out what was wrong with it. I never found out what the lighter was for either. I carry a lighter now. I do not smoke. It is a very strange thing to be devoted to.
The ferry left Thong Sala pier twenty minutes early and I stood on the boards with my bag, watching it go. A woman next to me, also left behind, said, okay, now we eat. We got fried rice from a cart and sat on the pier steps until the late boat, sharing one fork, because the cart had one. The rice was not that good. I remember every grain. She is probably in another country now. I hope she is eating. I hope the ferry is on time.
