So we took the boat from Ao Nang to a small island called Koh Phi Phi and, to be honest, I have mixed feelings about the place. The reason being what happened here 11 months ago.
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Our Lonely Planet guide is redundant as most places it mentions don't exist anymore...the palm trees on the beach are nothing but stumps...there is basically only one street which has been hastily reconstructed by the locals and travelling volunteers...everywhere, reminders of what nature can do, how lucky we are that we didn't travel last year.
We have spent a lot of time trying to imagine what it must have been like. The beach we've been going to is in a bay surrounded by trees and forests which have recovered/survived it in the first place, but behind the beach is wasteland covered in rubble and shells of buildings. Where the guide says there's a bar, there's a memorial garden.
Aside from this it's the most beautiful place we've been so far - the beach and bay look like the Peter Andre-Mysterious Girl video! The sea is shallow for so far - you can stand so far into the sea to the point where people on the beach are just dots. There's a couple of good bars which are busy every night (simply because there's no others).
So I don't really know what to make of it all. Despite it being a very nice island, there's an eerie feel to it, and we can't help but feel slightly guilty for being here enjoying ourselves whilst people so, so much poorer than us spend their days struggling to rebuild their homes and livelihoods.
So, due to a combination of this and the fact that we're getting withdrawal symptoms from nightclubs, we've arranged to leave today. We're taking a boat in about an hours time to Patong in Phuket. Apparently it's kind of like Bangkok by the beach. We hope. If it is, it's exactly what we're looking for - the nightlife of Bangkok but with oxygen!
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