It started out sensibly enough, with
the need to explore off-foot, we found a taxi outside our resort who
would turn out to be our own personal chauffeur for the whole day, I
can't remember his name so I'll call him Lloyd McKenzie, he was
extremely friendly and helpful.
Lloyd McKenzie drove us on the northern
stretch of road passing villages, road-side shops, homes, jungle
forest, avoiding various street furniture such as scooters, people
and dogs to our first destination a Chinese Buddhist temple.
It was a very modern concrete heavy
temple, that looks like it had just been freshly repainted set within
the hills with a great view, and ignoring the fact that it didn't
look overly aesthetic, it had a very quiet and serene atmosphere.
Looking around the statues of the gods and admiring the Taoism used
within the architecture, we left the temple.
Lloyd McKenzie took us to a village
that we'd passed on the way there called Fisherman's Village, as the
name suggests a village, with a lovely long bay beached area, with
hills descending down into the horizon into the crystal clear water
and a few fishing boats moored up on the beach front, this place was
majorly unexpected and a chorus and repetition of 'wow' could be
heard as we all grabbed our cameras to savour the scenary.
We went to a beach-front bar and
relaxed lying down in its lounge area, while sipping on drinks we
have probably the only ever conversation that's been had at that bar
to the effects of 'surely it can't be that hard to open a bar here,
on the beach, listening to awesome music, with cold beers. It would
be awesome!' - it was about that point the power went out, it didn't
deter us of our dream though.
Lloyd McKenzie drove us back to Smile
Beach and some of us relaxed lying on the grass outside our rooms
reading or sleeping and generally saving energy for the night ahead,
the half moon party.
Time was getting long in the tooth and
we an idea was planted that tonight's event required vests and
fluorescent face paints, so the group stupidly sent off the two
people to pick our vests for us, as a 'fun surprise'.
They returned with the look of naughty
children, this wasn't going to be good, and instead of unveiling the
vests there and then we decided to wait until later... Lots of tense
moments passed as we got ready for the night and we all convened
again for the big presentation ceremony.
They started off strong with bright 80s
head and wristbands, but then it was instantly learnt that you don't
sent off two buffoon douchebags to do the work of sane thinking
people; they, of course, got themselves respectable vests with black
and white obscure photography on it, another two had Rolling Stones
lips and a fish or something and another two, were what could only be
described as, shite. One said 'No Money, No Honey', another 'Sex
Instructor, First lesson free'.
After mourning the death of giving a
good idea to idiots, we sucked it up, got a few pop-band photos and
went to the beach for nice relaxing meal to build up on stodge, I got
the meal, but not the relaxing.
Due to the set up of the restaurant's
tables on the beach, they seat everyone to look out on upon the
water, but as there wasn't enough room on this particular table,
someone would have to sit on the opposite side of the table with
their back to the water facing everyone. That person was me.
I can cope looking at my friends for a
duration of a meal, I don't find that too stressful, I do find being
singled out by our waiter on the other hand, very unnerving.
His over-affectionate verbal nature of
wanting to carry me to my room when I get drunk and his hands
touching me with belly rubs and hugs, saw the smile from my face
being wiped off as it was replaced blank friendly endurance to end
this situation as soon as possible without violence.
In order for that to happen, he made a
deal with me, he would give me a free large bottle of Chang beer if I
downed it straight away or I would have to buy him two. I was
hesitant at first, because I am rubbish at downing drinks, it's not
something I can do, but peer-pressure saw me accept.
After a few minutes of blissful silence
as he went off and got the beer, he quickly returned with the bottle
and opened it up. I took in a deep breath as a stalling tactic while
I prayed the ground would swallow him whole, I take the bottle and I
slowly chug away and after what felt like hours of drinking this damn
beer, I was done and I could finally relax.
Not so, as our waiter was
over-enthusiast that I drank a whole beer, he felt it appropriate to
be more over-affectionate than he was before. I was not in a good
place at that moment.
The waiter eventually fucked off and
the alcohol surged through my veins and I cheered up a little, as we
met Lloyd McKenzie who drove us to the south of the island for the
Halfmoon Party.
...
Arriving at 9, the place was empty.
Hm, that's a little crap, though for an
all night event you don't want to get there too early, still gave us
a good opportunity to look around; it was dark, but from what I can
remember, the venue was set in a big open space within the jungle
with a stage at one end, a dancing platform in the middle of the
dance floor with a giant pole holding up a large canopy, opposite end
of the stage was a large wooden structure that housed one of the many
bars that looked over the main dance floor, in and around the main
space were waterfalls, sitting areas, food stalls, paint shops, etc.
etc. Also the whole place was lit by UV lights.
While it was empty we put on the
fluorescent paint on our faces, representing our beings and self-awesomeness in our fuzzy drunken state and to be honest I can't remember seeing anyone enough to register their decals, I was like a douchey Hulk Hogan though, if that gives you any direction of mind imagery of what was going on.
Time passed and we
left at 430am, what happened in between?
- One friend
drank too much, too quickly and ended up having a good ol' sleep in a
flower bed by around 11.
- So, two
friends looked after him and nursed him as best as they could,
leaving him for dead every-so-often enjoy dancing and the like.
- Another
friend went into a manhunt mode, but hunting for girls with bear
hugs, he randomly disappeared, only to be found later when we got
back asleep in his bed.
- I was on the
stage, hand pushing the air for pretty much the entirety of the
event, occasionally being stopped by people giving me much love for
my body paint.
- Our last
remaining friend disappeared until 1030 the next morning, not knowing
much of what happened in the last 12 hours.
At the end, a very
welcomed Lloyd McKenzie was waiting outside with big grin and walked
us to his taxi where we had a tranquil drive, like being in rally car
during a race, back to the resort.
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