Come On Man/RAILAY

The night ferry isn't as bad as they say, so long as you don't mind sleeping like Nosferatu for the entirety of the trip. It's actually pretty swell for me, on account of my intimacy problems. The real killer is the van ride across the mainland. Just like in Laos, an old, cramped, shitty van is made to play TARDIS and carry far more passengers than its exterior form would ever suggest. The padding in my seat is so worn I can feel the springs digging into my back along every bump along the road, and let me tell you, Thailand has no shortage of bumps in their roads. A brief rest stop is allowed, inside a tin made of cheap wood and corrugated aluminum, surrounded by flimsy benches. Getting up, I bash my head against the van's ceiling, only to find Jackass 2 is playing on a small, grainy TV inside. I feel like the franchise is following me, like a more butt-obsessed Sadako.

While Railay isn't technically an island, a range of mountains along the peninsula means visitors have to take a boat in and out. Once we come into port, I find myself in East Railay Beach, one of the two town centers. A single room at any of the hotels here costs too much for my lonely ass, so I hike inland into the jungle for cheaper options. A narrow dirt road takes me past a few clumps of bungalows, and I stop at one particularly ratty collection sitting in a sunlit field. At 350 baht, I still think I overpaid. See if you can figure out what's off about the bathroom:

It isn't the cold shower. Like a poetry-writing teenager, I've long since gotten used to them. No, it's the lack of a fucking sink that really threw me. Not to brag, but I've seen a lot of bathrooms in my time, and this is the first I've been in that was sans-sink. It's not the biggest deal, but...geez. It makes all bathroom operations just a little more frustrating, like eating soup without any lips. Oh, and they told me they wouldn't be able to give me any toilet paper until the evening, which was also just...not cool, guys.

With my backpack stashed away, I continue along the dirt road and into dense forest.  Here, the path gets more and more haphazard as it zig-zags up a series of hills. Next to the path is strung what must be the only cable line for this entire side of the island, which I'm a little reluctant to use as a walking support. After about a half hour of hiking, the road spits me out onto West Railay Beach.

All throughout the area jut gorgeous white limestone karsts, perfect for rock climbing. Unbeknownst to me, Railay is actually one of the world's biggest rock climbing destinations. I meet another backpacker on his way to town, who points out how many of the cliffs are already bolted and ready for climbing. All you need is a bag of gear and someone to belay.

Even getting into town requires some bouldering: Since the end of the beach is blocked by more cliffs, the only paths through involve either working your way through a narrow crevasse, or catching low tide and trying to wade around the shore. Fuck it, I love rock climbing. This'll just be foreplay:

After scrambling through the narrow passage, I eat lunch at a cafe that's supposed to have great tuna sandwiches. While I eat a big plate of internet exaggeration and disappointment, Simon and Niels walk by, completely out of the blue.

They've already made a day of climbing, and are quick to rave about the experience, as well as point me in the direction of where I can find some guides. Before leaving, they also let me know where they're staying in the area so we can meet up later.

Most climbing tours are scheduled for the early morning, so it turns out to be tough finding a guide to take me now that it's past noon. Still, I finally find a local Thai who promises for 800 baht to take me to as many spots as we can manage before sundown. He hands me a pair of climbing shoes, and before I can even get them on, chides "The shoes fit! Come on man!" and leads me to the first cliff. Like everyone else in the area, he's deeply tanned and tightly muscled, and makes me feel absolutely ashamed after seeing him effortlessly scale these rock faces to thread the rope for me, only to have my out-of-practice and out-of-shape ass clumsily try to match him. "Have a water! Come on man!" he helpfully suggests.

Before the light starts to fail, we get in 2 3/4 climbs before my paltry energy reserves finally run dry. Back at the shop, my guide makes fun of me when I ask for band-aids for my fingers that have blistered and burst. "Come on man! Fingers okay! You don't need! Come on man!"

The wussy man needs band-aids for his boo-boos.

No, I insist, I do need. Because I thought I was a hard man, but it turns out I'm just a pig-tailed Nancy Boy who's afraid of getting a widdle infection.

Outside the climb shop I sit at a table in an alley to bandage my hands. Next to me a Thai Rasta with shoulder-length dreads is playing guitar to a blind child. After I finish wrapping my fingers, the Rasta offers me the guitar, which I'm all too happy to refuse until the blind kid, sensing a new performer, smiles wide and chants me on. 

Well, what else can I do? Come on man. I give a very mediocre performance of Smashing Pumpkins' "Today" for the kid while the Rasta practices twirling a firestick. I have to give credit to the blind boy though, as he kept me in the alley long enough to have Tyler and Sander coincidentally walk by and notice me. Together, we grab some dinner at a Thai restaurant where the waiter insists on cleaning and then trying on our sunglasses. As it turns out, he prefers Tyler's £150 designer shades to my 5 dollar fake Ray Bans. Some people have an eye, I guess (Which was not a joke at the blind kid's expense, and shame on you if you thought it was! Alternatively, shame on me if no one thought it was and I just made an awkward dick out of myself [You know, awkward like nestling a set of brackets inside multiple sentences in a set of parentheses inside another sentence {Or your butt! Shut up!}.].)

Around dusk Tyler and Sander lead me into the jungle to visit a Reggae-themed bar they found the night previous, that they tell me has some of the best coffee they've ever had. Also, weed. It is named, imaginatively, Reggae Bar.

The boys don't lie. I order, and watch as the be-dreaded bartender/barista painstakingly hand-grinds the beans for what seems like an eternity before disappearing behind his beat-up espresso machine and returning with a god-damn excellent iced mocha. As we sit back and enjoy our coffees, we're chatted up by a Swiss guy sitting with his girlfriend on some pillows a few yards away.

"So ver are you all from?" he asks.

Each of us answers in turn. Sander, Tyler, then me. "America."

"That damn country!" Whoo boy.

"Well hey, we got bin Laden!" I reply. Now, I'm never quick to defend the States, because, well, everything, but geez man. We got bin Laden!

"Big deal, only take 10 years to find guy on dialysis in couple of mountains!"

There is nothing that will make a person more patriotic than some dick stranger in a foreign land ragging on his homeland. Unfortunately, all I have time to come back at him with is "Hey, you know, it was more than a couple mountains..." before his girlfriend gives him a look that says "Stop being mean to him, you know he only has an American education." As if to apologize for his rudeness, he asks Sander "Would you like?" and offers a joint he's just bought, but is turned down. Then Tyler, "Would you like?", again turned down, "No thanks man". And then he looks at me, retracts the proffered joint, and falls silent. What a global fucking citizen.

The bar has an acoustic guitar lying down, which starts to get passed around after Tyler rolls a couple blunts from his own stash. Once I've picked it up, and started plucking the intro to Metallica's "One" (because a girl from Montreal requested "Wish You Were Here", and I figured I should show the poor girl what real music sounds like), Swiss Miss Fucking Asshole starts loud-whispering to his girlfriend about how easy it is to play guitar. I mean, it's totally true, it's the music community's dirty little secret how stupidly easy it is to play guitar and impress people, but CHRIST MAN GET THE FUCK OFF MY STAR-SPANGLED NUTS.

But maybe I've been going about this all wrong. Better to take the high road, and show him some of that American compassion and diplomacy we aren't known for in the slightest. Catch him off guard.

"You want to play something for us?" I ask, holding out the guitar for him. Global citizen, here.

"Oh, I don't play guitar." He doesn't even play guitar! I swear to fuck I wish I gave more of a shit about Switzerland just so I could have levied some truly prejudiced and paint-peelingly offensive epithets his way. Even now, I just shot all my knowledge on that hot cocoa zinger a paragraph ago. Are they the ones with funny hats, or shoes? What's their pants situation? Ultimately, it didn't matter, because by now the entire bar was tired of his bullshit and just ignored him, and he left shortly after without saying anything. U-S-A! U-S-A!

We smoke a little more, and I try to field some music requests, but apparently all people from Europe want to hear is Oasis, and then after that maybe change the vibe with some Oasis, and then finally close out strong with Oasis. If you're from Europe and you take exception to that, well, talk to everyone else from your continent. Only you might have to speak kind of loudly, because they're all listening to goddamn "Wonderwall" for the hundred billionth time on repeat through a busted Walkman from back when that band might have mistakenly been considered good. Yeah, I'm a music snob, and I will fight you!

I'm sorry, just thinking about that Swiss guy got me all worked up. "Oh, I don't play guitar" what a dick.

After about the third time someone asks for an Oasis song and I say "Sure" and play The Misfits, I leave with Tyler and Sander for their bungalow, where we smoke more weed and play the card game Shithead for another few hours. In almost total darkness, I walk through the jungle back to my bungalow, where I sleep fitfully, because that's kind of my thing now.

That Swiss guy was kind of a bummer, so here are some cats being lazy at a Railay restaurant.

From Railay East, we catch the morning boat to Ko Phi Phi, where we can meet back up with the girls and keep our little party going. Rather than a longtail, this is the fast boat, so for the majority of the ride we sit feet over the railings, just riding the waves, the toothpaste foam of the water bathing our soles after each bounce and brief spell of hangtime. Range after range of limestone cliffs race by behind the warm spray of ocean water. Fuck. I liked Railay.