Geckodelphia

May 7th, 2002 at 12:00am

Writing for the beauty salon, this time on Ko Samui, while having a pedicure (again). Actually hadn’t had one for several weeks so I’ve been way overdue! I’ve been on Samui for 3 days now, hanging out with Jonathan and Qadir (friends from Philly). We are all staying at the Tamarind Retreat on Lamai Beach and the place is out of this world! It’s a Thai-style house built into these huge boulders on the hill, overlooking the hillside and Lamai Beach below. The whole house is open-air (including the bathroom). It’s beautiful! So peaceful too. We have an incredible garden all around the place. As guests here we were given a free treatment at the Tamarind Spa so yesterday Joni and I went over to indulge. First we had some time in the Thai herbal steam room, then a 1.5-hour massage, and then a 30-minute facial. We were so relaxed after that!

On Sunday we drove around the island in the Jeep they rented just to get a feel of the place and check things out. We stopped at Mae Nam, a small village on the north side of the island, and were buying some coconut jewelery in one of the shops when the guy who worked there told us of a place having bands play on the beach that afternoon. It sounded good so we decided to go and it was a great time – the first guy played nice blues on acoustic guitar and it was right on the beach just as we were told. It seemed to be a real local crowd of ex-pats and Thais living on the island. So great to see live music! We met some nice travellers there and tonight we may have everyone over at our place for a little early evening party. There are only 8 villas at the retreat here and we’ve invited our neighbors (who happen to be American as well) so hopefully we won’t get in trouble for making too much noise.

Anyway it’s just great to be staying in a really nice place and having friends from home catching up on stuff in Philly and news from home. Qadir has even renamed our house from Sala Dhawan to Geckodelphia. Side note…as I write this I am listening to a Thai woman nearby singing to her boyfriend’The answer my friend is blowing in the wind…’ It’s just one of those travel moments – I just can’t explain how beautiful it sounds…

Sala Dhawan, our house at the Tamarind Retreat

Joni, take a picture of the papaya I just cut up…oops

…lets try that again!

Entry Filed under: Koh Samui,South,Thailand