As New Year's Eve dawned, I could be forgiven for being a little confused. The hotel had asked me to come and celebrate the start of 2025, a hotel in Bophut had been wishing us all a Happy Xmas 2015 for the last week and in Thailand we were approaching the year 2558.
But being certain we were still in 2014 I started the evening with a glass of pink bubbles (pee why?) and some Kettle Chips by the pool with the two Swedish girls next door before entering the fray that the hotel promised as an evening of fun, food and games..... It's so good of the hotel to put this on free of charge as an "opportunity to improve our relationship and connection". The party promised free food, soft drinks, a staff funny show and the cocktail showman - as Mr Bennett may have said - who has been my friend these many parties..... Additionally we would be invited to participate in games. Hoping to avoid the latter, Irene, Agnita and I chose a table as far away from the small stage as possible... Normally there is a very good live band headed by Angel, the very popular front of house manager, but for some reason not this year. It was a shame, she was really missed by us all, there are a lot of returning guests here and it was a pity she was not part of the party.
And as returning guests, we three had a bottle of wine delivered to the table from Surajit and his family (the owners) which was really nice of them and of course much appreciated. The good food eaten, the festivities began with drinking games on the stage, a raffle for many prizes, and no, I didn't manage to win the rice cooker I had so coveted, and the housekeeping staff doing their "funny show" of Hawaiian dancing. The poor girls had to work really hard appearing four times, the only time I didn't like the performance was when the new General Manager joined them on stage and proceeded to inappropriately, I thought, "bump and grind". But the girls "did good", one or two helped I feel by the odd cocktail...
And speaking of cocktails we were treated to two performances of the juggling cocktail man, he's getting a lot better and I think only dropped a couple of molotov's... They did seem to be brushing up a lot of glass though throughout the evening. But everyone enjoyed the show with lots of loud, good natured cheers at his near misses. My main Health and Safety concern was him taking a large slug of beer every so often during the difficult bits. There was also a great German couple, she looked so like Sharon Osbourne and at one point led a conga around the restaurant, out onto the beach and back in again. She was in bed most of the next day...
But eventually we were called to the beach to welcome in the New Year, whichever one it was! The hotel provided lots of lanterns to light. I was smugly PC in refusing one (I know, not a position I take very often...) they are really dangerous to to sea life here. They have made an effort and use a wooden frame but most still have a fine wire cross frame to hold them together. I'm sure the hotel used non wire ones...
The weather this year was ok with no rain so it was lovely to be on the beach at midnight watching the massive displays of fireworks all around the huge bay here and across on Koh Phangnan.
But the weather didn't quite play ball when it came to the lanterns. The wind was just a bit too high and as each one was released it seemed to blow directly sideways, a live firebomb landing on any human who got in the way... The odd one that got any lift soon got trapped in the palm trees at onetime setting the trunk on fire! But on a positive note it did mean fewer to damage the Dolphins! Tina and John, my Brit blog readers joined us in time for New Year so that was good, but sadly the lack of a live band meant we had to miss out on John's excellent stagecraft...
All in all it was a great evening and good on the Florist Resort for putting it on.
All has been quiet on the Western front since then with Thailand taking a long holiday with a lot of the world and going back today, 5 January. I have spent my time as usual wandering, lolling and reading. I did finally pop into Chaweng yesterday for the famed Sunday lunch at Tropical Murphy's - a must do at least once when I'm here. I also wanted to see what the new Central Festival shopping development looked like. I have always like the chaos that is Chaweng, the road behind the beach. It's a mish mash of stalls, shops, bars and restaurants. Motorbikes are parked all over the pavements so you end up walking in the road, dodging the taxis and songthaews, the sound of the taxis touting for trade drowned out by the bargaining going on in the shops. I was hoping they hadn't taken any of this madness away and was pleased to see that they hadn't. They've done a good job with the entrance. It's big but not too obvious and the mix of new shops and restaurants inside is good, including a new Central department store, a first for Samui. Carole will also be very happy at the huge new Jim Thompson shop there and it's only a few steps away from Tropical Murphy's. Excellent town planning.
On my travels I saw this push chair (look carefully, it is there behind the photographer's headphone cable...) being used to carry veg and lemongrass that had just been picked and it made me realise that you never see a Thai child in a push chair. Not sure if this is to do with the very uneven pavements or the fact that they also seem to be unofficial but handy motorbike lanes. The children are either carried in a blanket if they are really tiny, tucked between the adults on a motorbike or toddling along under their own steam. Contrast that to the two American expats opposite me who had a huge contraption worthy of a Sherpa going up Everest with this tiny baby lost within it once it was hauled on to the father's back. It did make me think that a we sometimes over engineer our lives - I just wish they'd over engineer the bits I want like the wiffy....
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