What do you get when you cross Las Vegas with Chinatown? That's what this place has been like for the last several days. Originally it was supposed to be a quick stop on our way to another island or jungle adventure, but finding a tailor to do a wedding dress and having a back that suddenly decided to stop working caused us to stay longer than we planned. While it's not exactly a bad city to visit, the "charm" wears off quickly when you realize that every single place is like all the others. They all have the same stuff and "for you a good price". I appreciate how hard it must be to make a living here, but after the third day we've learned how to say "no thanks, don't want" and "too expensive" in Thai.
Apparently everyone is surprised by us being Americans. It seems that we're a bit of an anomoly because Americans aren't really expected to be here at this time. Everyone seems to think that we're Australian at first or possibly Canadian. We're working hard to not play up to the ugly American stereotype, however, it's easy to see how these things get started. There have been several times when someone on the street extends a hand for a handshake and I have to forcefully ignore them. The first couple of times someone put out their hand I took it and then was being lead to a suit shop. Now that I have a suit I shake my head no and have to seem like the asshole because I don't want to interact with some guy wearing a shimmering purple dress shirt who calls me "boss". Sometimes they just give up, but there have been sometimes where as I'm walking away I can tell they say something derogatory, which hopefully makes them feel better because if I can't understand the insult then it really doesn't count to me. Because of this I'm looking forward to getting out of this hyperactive sales area.
We did at least go to a couple beaches while we were here. While it was fun to see the islands that you know from movies, it felt like I was a part of what's destrorying them as well. The beach from the movie The Beach had hundreds of people standing around on it. The shore looked like a parking lot for boats. It's a little sad watching people, including myself, trample down the thing that was once beautiful so that we can get a picture of it and say we were there. It makes me appreciate times when we go somewhere and there is no one else around.
We leave for the jungle today. Hopefully we can do some sort of camping/hiking trip to drastically change up what we've been experiencing so far. While we do have to come back to Phuket for the wedding dress, we will only be here for another day and then we move on to hopefully nicer places that don't feel like there totally devoid of anything real.
