We check out the beach our hotel is next to, Nai Thon. Unfortunately, it is cloudy and starting to rain, so the beach kind of sucks. We decide to go "Phuket Town", and figure out what's going on over there. The cab drops us off at a mall, which has some rad metal sculptures out front:
This nerdtastic collection included Darth Vader, Spider-Man, Batman, one of the dudes from Stargate, and, weirdly enough, Ned Kelly way on the right over there. There was also a xenomorph:
And this fella who we couldn't figure out:
He had this thing in his hand:
It looked like some sort of card. Maybe he's supposed to be Gambit? If anyone out there has a clue, let me know. It bugged the shit out for me for about a whole 2 minutes.
It was about 10am and for some reason the mall wasn't open yet, so Jessie and I decided to walk around the streets and see what was what. Unfortunately, it was fucking monsooning outside and within about 5 minutes it was as if we had jumped fully-clothed into a swimming pool. Thais in cars would pass us, laughing, we were so soaked. I do not have any pictures as I was terrified of turning my camera on for fear of it shortcircuiting or something. Turns out that afternoon was a bad idea to bring a book in my pocket:
Carrying that wet book smell around all day is awesome. Awesomely smelly! Ha!
Eventually the mall did open, and we decided to get haircuts, which is why from now on I will be far better-looking in pictures. During the shampoo I got a scalp massage that nearly gave me an erection, and later we ate a bunch of roast duck for lunch. After roughly a million hours it stopped raining enough that we grabbed a taxi and hightailed it for Patong Beach, the nightlife center of Phuket.
Along the way, we saw Wat Chalong, a high-falootin' Buddhist temple that looked pretty neat on Wikipedia:
Here is Jessie with brand-spanking-new haircut. You can also see the tiny amount of rainwater that did not manage to pour completely on us.
The deal with these statues is you buy some gold leaf from the monks, and then you rub it on them (the statues, not the monks. Or maybe the monks too, what the fuck do I know). You can also make an offering of incense, pray, and get a number that will correspond to a piece of paper that tells your fortune. Here is mine:
Boy, that's quite a language you guys have here. I'm going to assume it was a good fortune, because so far I had not been murdered.
Yes, it was a good temple. Quite satisfactory. Next, our cab driver insisted on taking us to a cashew factory, which was the most incredible and life-changing thing I have ever experienced. Unfortunately, the story is actually too emotional and draining to retell, so we move on right ahead to:
DRUGS! I mean, Patong Beach! No wait!
Yes! Drugs!
Checking out the pharmacies was priority uno in Patong Beach, and I am happy to report that they worked just fine. As in, I bought this valium here for about three bucks. I believe the conversation actually went:
Me: Do you have vicodin?
Pharmacologist: What is vicodin? What is it for?
Me: Uh, fuck. I don't know, sleeping?
Pharmacologist: Oh! Valium?
Me: Hey, that'll do. Do you accept money?
We also checked out info on tours of Phi Phi Leh, and mostly walked around a lot, passing such intriguing locales as Christin Massage:
Definitely something we should have checked out more closely. Also, original copypaintings!
After dicking around for a bit, and me buying a ticket for a Muay Thai match the next day, we decided Patong was the place to be and booked a guest house for the following night. We also visited the massage parlor next door, which happened to have doctor fish:
The fish were about 3 times as big as any doctor fish I had ever seen before. I think these are the feet fish that eat the other feet fish. It also turns out having a fish eat the dead skin off your feet is ticklish as all hell. Jessie had a tough time of it:
She was in fact so unable to keep her feet still that the old lady running the place had to come over and physically hold Jessie's knees down. Which I enjoyed quite a bit. After the fish, we received some sweet foot massages, but then we had to get serious:
Drag show serious. This is at the Simon Cabaret after the show, which consisted of musical numbers to songs like "Barbie Girl" and some tracks from Dreamgirls. After the show we hit up a couple bars and then it was back to our last night in the Nai Thon hotel. But first:
Street vendor grilled corn! How have I lived without you?!
Up next: Snorkeling, Muay Thai, and more! An adolescent boxer gets knocked out so hard he foams at the mouth! Be there!
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