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Doctor Fish
Bond, James Bond. The big bloke from Birmingham on our long-tailed boat was fulfilling an almost-lifelong ambition to be on the island off Phang Nga in the Gulf of Thailand where the 1974 movie, The Man with the Golden Gun was filmed. His surname is Bond, but better, his father’s name James Bond and he couldn’t resist visiting the family’s namesake territory. Officially re-named James Bond Island, it is one of a series of rocky outcrops in the gulf which rise dramatically from the sea and make this area eerily stunning. Spooky enough that the producers saw fit to have the island home to a Bond villain, this time Francisco Scaramanga; they always pick places where deep in the earth, under a huge, dramatic natural feature there is sufficient bad-power to blow up the world. Bond and the beautiful heroine (this time, Britt Ekland as Mary Goodnight) usually end up trapped, facing death, then escape, killing the villains and, in the process, blowing up the island, all the while making the world safe again. An intoxicating formula, we had to go there, not only because the area is now a regular tourist haunt, but also because we had seen these limestone projections from the sea on our earlier flight to Samui and were intrigued.
Earlier in the day, a group of Russian tourists became quite concerned when the guide on our Sim’s twilight tour said we were going to a cave temple controlled by the Mafia. The Russians failed to grasp the rest of his explanation, that the mob in control was of rabid monkeys who plague tourist for food and bite the occasional one that annoys them. His warning to be careful of the monkeys was taken as a more sinister caution than intended by this group who, we think, wanted to get off the bus there and then and walk home rather than be exposed to this particular mob. The guide, a very comical Thai, reassured them patiently that this was just his sense of humour but they still looked unconvinced.
We stopped later at what was described as a sea gypsy village, Koh Pannyi, although the guide quite rightly thought this misnamed since these people stayed put living in this village built entirely on stilts above the water. It is a traditional fishing town, a Muslim one, the occupants of which now make their living also through tourism. And they start young judging by the kids that sold Kaelene postcards she didn’t want and the ladyboy who posed with Marty, this time with a monkey on each shoulder, each (the monkeys that is) trying to supplement their earnings by pick-pocketing.
If the twilight tour was the formal sightseeing, the motorbike was its informal counter. Our backsides were battered black and blue exploring the northern part of Phuket, the western beaches right up to the remote Mai Khao in the north, to an exquisite Chinese furniture and picture gallery in the middle of nowhere, the little towns along the coast and the big new tourist developments, past rubber trees and an anteater and up hills that our little bike could barely make to the top. There is no insurance for motorbikes in Thailand and, despite that, we western tourists ignore formal advice and good sense and hire them by the thousand. And by the dozens it seems there are tourists hobbling around on crutches with bandaged arms and legs, which all goes to show the consequence of ignoring wise counsel. Perhaps our only disappointment was being waved on at a roadblock where the revenue-gathering traffic police were checking the licenses and helmets of tourists. After being fined 300 Baht on our last visit, we wanted to be able to smugly produce all of the correct credentials this time, but it was not to be.
Our motorbike-bruised and weary bodies didn’t go without treatment, we’ve discussed the sublime nature of Thai oil massage before and we indulged again, almost every day (our recommendation for intending travelers is The Mango Tree at the southern end of Rat u Thit Road), but the novelty this time was doctor fish, a treatment where little fish called Garra Rufa nibble on your lower limbs clearing them of dead and diseased skin (as if we had any). Rather than bite, these little things hoover away the affected areas leaving tingly fresh, smooth skin. Our legs and feet were obviously in poor condition as our tank full had a field day, whereas they took barely an interest in the disappointed couple dipping into the next tank. It is quite an unusual experience feeling these creatures working their way up your legs, banging into the soles of feet and having a good old crack at the stubborn bits of dead flesh.
Along with those treatments there are the manicures, pedicures and face cleansing (yes, they mine all that pimple juice from clogged facial pores), and it is all so unbelievably good and inexpensive that we looked at our departure tickets and pondered a visa run and returning, never to leave again. And we have made a few reckless promises; after a farewell barbeque at the Kiwi bar (after which Tiggy closed early so the staff could come to Rock City and hang out with us), we have promised to find husbands for five of the girls and then to buy the neighbouring bar to keep them all employed, and we’ve also accepted the invitation of Mr Kit, the taxi driver at the Andatel Hotel, to return in January and visit his family somewhere in remote rural Thailand.
The final anecdote should be about our friend, Bathhurst John. He doesn’t talk about it, but he was in Patong when the Boxing Day tsunami hit in 2004. He credits his being alive today to a night’s drinking at the Andatel after which, instead of going home to bed (at another hotel by the beach), he wandered down to the shoreline and saw the dramatic emptying out of the sea from the bay prior to the big waves rolling in. Realising something was terribly amiss as the first wave started to appear in the distance, he turned and headed for higher ground and made it. His hotel room was smashed to smithereens and had he been in bed, he would undoubtedly been among the casualties. There were 260 killed, 1100 injured and 700 reported missing on Phuket.