I am enjoying a quiet time here at Lamai Beach, hence the lack of blog posts, a relaxing time but nothing of any note to report. Still big waves but I am managing to avoid them as I take a walk along the beach. It is a lovely beach, wide enough to be quiet as you walk along but all sorts of beach bars and little hotels lining up along the back.
But things livened up last night in the streets behind the beach where all the shops and restaurants are. I thought that the Thai yellow shirts had returned, but no, it was just something to do with Chinese New Year.
There was lots of drumming, a "dragon" dancing, a parade through the streets and lots of noise. I had noticed over the last few days that some of the shops had what looked like red paper decorations hanging down. Now I know these were not paper decorations at all but strings of particularly noisy firecrackers. As the dragon visited each shop/restaurant, the firecrackers were lit and made a tremendous noise, until finally the one at the top exploded with an even louder bang and threw out piles of red shredded paper. Then money is placed into the mouth of the dragon before he goes on his way to repeat the whole thing at the next place. You can imagine the noise as he moved along the street followed by the procession and the drums and the whole place became awash with red paper. Quite a celebration, but I hope now that that is the end of the very loud fireworks for a while.....
Lamai Beach is still the same mix of families, older couples, backpackers and fat men with Thai girls. The strip behind the beach is a nice place to wander around in the evening, always busy and a choice of places to eat, shop or drink. And all virtually open air, so nice not to be confined in aircon.
And I am still amused by the signwriter's typo's here. I like the "Do Do Laundry", especially handy for those with dogs. The "Glasshopper Cocktail" is perhaps in celebration of the Chinese New Year. The Thai massage which costs you "200 Baths" for one hour must be very clean. But my favourite so far is the place where you can let out all your frustrations in their "Chair For Rant"....
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