Mortal Coil

Family

2008 me Mam passed away aged 57.
2019 me Fatha passed away aged 69.

Gets yi thinking like.


I left Blighty in 2006 with two parents and I'll return in 2019 with none.

Feels like I'm skippering HMS Rudderless through the Sea-of-Middle-Aged-Nihilism. Destination? The Port of Despondency. Certainly forces one to dwell on the impermanence of this thing we call life. Our slide down the fabled mortal coil. Perhaps their spirits inhabit another realm? Perhaps not. I'm more inclined to think that once the lights are off .... that's it. Game over. The universe is a cold, uncaring bitch. We return to our constituent atoms, thus decreasing the energy density of the universe and contributing towards its entropic demise. Ashes to ashes. Dust to dust.

After a few days of mourning I started remembering the fun times growing up. I'd ride the bike aimlessly for hours thinking about the old fella.

He was over the moon when I showed him flight tickets to the UK after 13 years away. Our last words: "You better not die before I get there you old sod."
"Course I won't bonny lad - just get yasel yem." he laughed.

Home? Not sure where that is anymore.

Weather

During May the weather has been as changeable as my mood. One moment crossing a rickety bridge in brilliant sunshine and the next sheltering from tropical storms. Sanuk Mak.

This old dear was hanging onto her parasol for dear life as an old fella explained how they rear fresh water shrimp in the local fields. I love staring at the motorised aerators for some reason. Aerator? Nice word.

Hat Yai

A view from a friend's condo. Always find it strange in people's homes when they have normal stuff like fridges and TVs etc. It serves to remind me how minimalist I am. How content I am with next to nowt. People are generally shocked to hear I haven't used a fridge in a decade. I go on to explain how it's a real treat to drink iced water - whereas to them it's simply water - they're desensitised to the simple pleasure of savouring the coolness. However, this philosophy mostly falls on deaf ears. People demand comfort. Having a TV playing in the background is totally fucking alien to me now. Freaks me out a bit. People still have those?

I sometimes go to the other side of town for a few laps of this lake. Better than monging in front of a TV any day of the week.

In all truthfulness I can't think of a single reason anyone would visit this town. It's not even friendly. I've found there to be a big difference between anywhere south of Chumpon and the rest of the country. No wonder the Trang lads call it the Dorty Sooth. I miss the North. Loads.

One thing Hat Yai does well is Dentists. They gave me six of those new-fangled composite-UV-light fillings in an hour. No pain. Top work. I was a bit worried in the waiting room. When I was a kid fillings meant injections, drills and dark metal teeth. Those days are long gone ..... we live in amazing times.

Work sent me to Bangers for some David Brent Office training. I was in fine form introducing myself to 30 teachers after sleeping opposite this soapy. Did the office lass who booked the room know? Was this a test? Did I fail?

Bike trip

The Easter/Songkran break involved some wonderful evenings chilling in PakNamLangSuan. I love that name. There's a 400B A/C room on this beach. Incredible. I was the only guest. However, the A/C had no remote and the room had no windows. Someone had glued the A/C lever to Arctic and I found myself shivering after an hour. I knocked it off at the wall and it was still cold in the morning given there's no gaps in a sealed concrete box. Class.

Not far from the beach is this temple. I absolutely love this village. I didn't see a single Thai/Farang tourist. Perfect. To think this is just across the sea from the madness that is McSamui!!

A few days were spent in Prachuap discussing stock portfolios with Matt who'd escaped Bangers. Wish I'd known all this in 2011 before losing $200k with Barry Payne. I was too focused on booze-n-birds in Phuket at the time to GAF about investing. Dumbass. Cost me big that did.

People

Rode up to Trang to hear about Stef's trip to England. Like me he hadn't been back in donkeys. He brought some jing jing cheese back. Heavenly.

Don's a magician from Sunderland. Lovely lad but he doesn't quite have enough cards up his sleeve to get the Mackems out of the third division. There's something weird going on with my left hand in that photo - it's morphed into a crab claw??

Welsh Nick's a canny lad. He's off to Hanoi soon.

It was good to see Simon again. He was in the Hat for a night and ponied up for posh eats. He brought back memories of Phuket 2010/2011 where we drank in the same gang. Some crazy shenanigans there man. Last time I saw him was Nana Plaza 2012.  Great crack.

Slightly easier on the eye is NongMai. She works in my local scran hole. Lots of flirting going on. She's one of those lasses that doesn't realise she's hot. Uni lasses are the best man.

The next time I write I'll have been to England and back. Looking forward to seeing a niece I've never seen and flying on an A380 Airbus.

Been walking through the streets of my home village on google-street-view. Couldn't do that in 2006. Everything feels so connected now. I'm not sure I like it.