Engaged in Phuket

I really have fallen behind on blogging. I meant to write about the huge Giants Superbowl, my trip home to New York in February and the whole LSAT experience. But alas, now that all seems to be old and boring news in the face of our recent few weeks.

Despite our constant complaining about the need to escape the horrid Amsterdam weather for some sun and fun in February, by mid January we still had not planned anything. At this point, we realized that there were no sure places to beach in Europe at this time of year, Africa was too unstable to go for our intended safari adventure, and St. Martin was retardedly expensive to fly to from here, despite it being a Dutch colony and there being direct flights. This we learned all in one fateful Sunday, where Matt spent no less than 12 hours behind the computer searching for trips. We finally decided to search for destinations in Thailand, and after some long and grueling hours (on Matt's part) we had booked our trip to Phuket on the south coast of Thailand (of tsunami fame), flying Malaysia Airlines via Kuala Lumpur and staying at the Indigo Pearl hotel and resort from 8 Feb until 17 Feb. And what a trip it was.

The flight to Malaysia was just under 12 hours. Thankfully we had little TV's and we spent a good portion of the flight watching synchronized episodes of House. The food was also pretty tasty and different (I had spicy chicken with rice and mango for breakfast). The problem was the screaming child in the seat in front of us, and his aloof parents that when the little portable crib was removed during landing, the mom wanted to put the sleeping baby on the floor like it was a piece of hand luggage. Also it was either the bathrooms up ahead of our seats or this collicky baby, but something stank all flight!

When we landed in Kuala Lumpur we were bombarded with the humidity - ahh, how nice it was. I immediately scanned the airport for a Starbucks, and while I was glancing around I spotted the thing, smiling at me from the floor above. We had some pick-me-ups and my sure-fire disease-preventing and stomach-healing cure for long-haul flights - Alka Seltzer. Works like a charm. After a short layover we boarded for our one hour flight to Phuket.

Our resort was only a five minute cab ride from Phuket airport, which I loved. Nothing is worse than touching down from a long flight and having a long road trip ahead. Going home that way may be even worse. Our room wasn't ready when we arrived (around 11am local time) so we sat in the beautiful open air lobby and drank iced teas and chatted. About an hour later we were escorted to our room, and we quickly packed away our things and threw on our swimsuits and went to the pool. The resort had 3 pools (one of which was adults only so no more screaming kids), 3 restaurants and 3 bars. You could also order drinks and food at any one of the pools. We took it easy our first day, relaxed and ordered drinks and salads by the pool. We have a standard beach vacation mode - wake up early, sometimes exercise, eat, go to the beach, come back to the room around 4 or 5, shower and nap and then go out for dinner. And that was pretty much the standard for this trip too, though we did change it up and do different things some days.

On our second day in Phuket, we took the tuk tuk to the beach and spent the entire day there, leaving at 4:30 to go back to shower and nap. Our plan was to go back to catch the sunset, which is famous in these parts. Unfortunately, we slept through it. We had made dinner reservations at the Thai restaurant in the hotel for 8 and before eating we headed to one of the bars in the hotel that overlooks the grounds, the Rebar. It's a very beautifully designed open space and they had a really good band playing. We climbed the steps and sat at the top before going in, and this is where Matt proposed - overlooking palm trees, in the moonlight, with good music playing in the background. Of course I cried, and said yes before he had even formally asked. I had no idea what he had been planning all along, and it was very sweet and romantic. We celebrated our engagement with Kir Royales.

The next day we took a speedboat tour around the Phi Phi islands. The water here was beautiful and clear, and the islands were surrounded by huge bat caves. We stopped at three islands and one larger boat for lunch. The highlight of this boat trip had to be the Russian couple on board. The guy was hideous and a definite mafia type - he took his $2,000 camera in the water without a care. His girlfriend was very beautiful, and very dumb, and the two kept fighting in Russian the whole type and he was constantly posing her for pictures. The other funny couple was an old hippie couple that we think were Greek - they were just annoying and always in the way. The other American on board was acting typically American by chatting everybody up in a very loud and friendly voice. That night we ventured out to the beach for dinner. After eating, we stopped by a little bar on the beach that had a pool table. After a beer each and one rather sorry game of pool, and noticing some shady business going down with the male English patrons and the Thai ladies behind the bar, we got the heck out of there.

On Wednesday we spent the day at one of the pools. The pools were so well serviced, the workers would come by with cold wet towelletes and fruit every so often, exactly when you were wishing you had one of those things. We saw a couple there that had been on the Phi Phi trip - the guy was Canadian/American and the girl was French. Matt and he planned a tennis match in the evening, and while he was out I went out to the beach to get a manicure. I had this new beautiful thing on my finger and chipped nail polish - that just couldn't be! That night we met up with the couple again for drinks at the Rebar then dinner on the beach.

The next day was my 28th birthday, and Matt surprised me with a day at the spa. While I was getting scrubbed and wrapped and massaged with various coconut-inspired products, Matt took the opportunity to get a cheap massage on the beach. That night we did up with a steak dinner at the hotel, and they gave me a cake for my birthday :-)

On Friday we planned to take the morning cooking classes. First order of business was going to the outdoor market that was a 10 minute drive from the hotel. The smell of this place really hit you hard - lots of fish in the hot and humid weather! We picked up the things we needed to make our menu - fried shrimp cakes, thai noodles with prawn, papaya salad, green curry chicken, and fried bananas. Unfortunately our kitchen was not air conditioned so it was very hot, but still a lot of fun. Our teacher, Peak, was really nice and a great cook and we ended up with some amazing food which we polished off for lunch. After eating, we went back to the room to cool off and nap and start our wedding planning.

On Saturday night we attended a thai kickboxing (muay thai) match. We had ringside seats, which made us quite obvious - the only others in ringside were clearly tourists. There were 10 fights in total, 5 rounds each. We were very surprised by how young the fighters were - some could have been as young as 8. It was kind of disturbing to see a young kid get punched in the head so many times as to knock him out. But the fights were intense and lively, and the crowd was getting more and more into it the more they started betting on the fights. We opted against that, but there were even some tourists getting on the gambling action. The coolest part of the fights was the fight music they played during it. It made it seem almost like a ritual dance and was pretty hypnotizing.

To enjoy our last day in Phuket, we took advantage of the beach and then headed back to have lunch at the pool. Since the airport was only a 10 minute drive away and we already had our tickets, we got a 5pm checkout and got to spend all day in the sun before having to return to the Amsterdam rain. A 13 hour flight later, and we were back. What a great trip!