Some thoughts on Patong, sadness at a Wat, and John Denver

As you might guess from some of the photographs I posted, I found Patong Beach irritating and depressing. When we got back home it felt like returning to Thailand. I do not like to see people using each other, in economic desperation, or destroying themselves. I saw a lot of destructive behavior at Patong Beach. I also saw kindness, hard work, and kindness. The beaches on Phuket, as distinct from the party culture, are relaxing and a wonderful break from winter.


Sunday we also went to the grocery store that was below ground level. There is a plaque on the front that memorizes the Tsunami. Many people died in the store, they could not get out.

There was an excellent bookstore in Patong, with an in depth and intelligent selection of books. I bought a novel, Snow, and also Newsweek and Business Week. Newsweek had an excellent article on Asian poverty.

Sunday night we listened to the African band for awhile. People kept requesting rock and roll and pop. The band kept trying to get across that they were an African band, but I do not think that some of the people got it. It was sort of like requesting John Denver songs from Bob Marley. The band did play a few exciting songs, among the junky requests. If I had my way I would want the band to play the music they loved, then I could learn something. One sort of ironic request, for Patong, was "Oh Baby it is a Wild World, It is Hard to Get By on a Smile". Another song, that did sort of fit was Bob Marley's "Three Little Birds." I did like the band when they were playing African and Reggae music. The band is from Cameroon.

Monday morning Pong, Jit and I visited a Wat. Pong and Jit went to worship. Wat Lampetch (sp) is at the North end of Patong beach. Entering the Wat you can see that it was re-built. There was fresh concrete on the walls and no paintings or decoration. The crematory, though, looked like it was original. There were about 10 worshipers, women, most of them looked sad and like they were carrying a burden. I imagine going to the Wat on a weekday morning is usually because of the need to worship. There was a Monk, braiding a string, as he was receiving offerings of practical essentials. There were cats and chickens, it was a good break from the Patong experience. Pong said that many people were cremated here. There is another Wat nearby, up the hill a little, that also must have been the center of body identification.

Monday, before we took off, we went to Woody's to say goodbye, this time there was low key Reggae music playing. Others were using the Internet so we could not check out email. I still hope to meet Woody, but I will probably not return to Patong or Phuket this trip to Thailand.

Today, Tuesday I worked on my STOU project and sorted through some of my trip photographs. Tomorrow I will probably go to STOU because I need faster bandwidth to explore faculty web pages. It was actually cool today, it was nice. On Yahoo it said that the low temperature was 69 degrees.