phuket!

random stuff rack related:
on the clearance rack at wellcome (grocery store): strawberry flavored correctional fluid (i wonder why its on sale?).
i saw a man wheeling a raw rack of meat on his bike, uncovered, in the rain. good morning hong kong!

jon and i went to phuket (thailand) for a week on the beach with both sets of parents. i was a little nervous going into the event. luckily, my dad set the mood of graciousness early. as a frequent traveller, he gets access to all the first class lounges. he returned with a canvas bag full of hardboiled eggs and ice cream cups. it was quite magical watching him produce item after item from his mary poppins sack (and people wonder why i never blush anymore).

we stayed at the evason six senses suite. VERY nice. most ppl who go don't leave the resort at all. they have everything from spas to libraries to game rooms (including foosball and ps2) to gyms to pools and pools and pools (and waterslide). they even have a private island, replete with snorkelling (coral!), parasailing, sea kayaking, and windsurfing. our parents spent a lot of time lounging on that island (almost as much time as they spent at the breakfast buffet: 3hrs every day, ppl, who the heck eats breakfast for 3 hours a day?! oh right, the ppl who spawned me).

jon and i spent the first four days getting our padi scuba licenses. i totally kicked his butt on the written tests (even tho i slept thru all the videos and he's taken the course before). booyah! ahem. the water was pretty choppy for our sea dives--i've never seen so much puke in my life (from the passengers, not the fish). luckily, underwater visibility was still good. our first dive was a reef dive. who knew fish came in so many colors? how is it advantageous to be neon pink with bright yellow checks? i almost put my hand right thru a scorpion fish (which is crazy poisonous)...it was the only thing we saw (or didn't see, in my case) that blended perfectly into the sandy bottom (bastard was tan colored). our instructor, born, showed us all sorts of sea slugs and baby moray eels, etc. no idea how she found them...she'd tease them out of their holes with her little bell. they were never larger than my little pinky. my favorite fish were big and white with reddish bellies. they had bright yellow, forked tongues that they'd jab into the sand over and over, like snakes (why doesn't satan have a forked tongue?). oh, and of course, the fluke, who is the duke of soul. jk. what is a fluke anyways?

our next couple of dives were all wall dives, which means you dive near these rock islands that rise vertically out of the water. underwater, tons of creatures are anchored to the nooks and crannies in the rock. you get all of the anemones and corals and shrimp and slugs that you'd get in shallower reefs, but you also get the schooling fish and rays and sharks of the deeper waters (altho we didn't see any sharks). floating in a school of fish is amazing, especially when they all zig at the same time (how do they know?). on the second day, the current was pretty strong, and i sat on a sea anemone. i was trying to kneel on the bottom while jon did a skills test, but the water kept pushing me backwards, and before i knew it something was tickling my leg. the pain comes on slowly, like eating spicy food. you can't feel the burn until its way too late. and then...i was in the shower trying to pee on myself. i have no dignity in these types of situations (b/c i'm normally so composed). then born tells me that vinegar works equally well. oh good. btw, there is woefully little info about anemone stings on the internet. they hurt for a couple of days, then they play like they're getting better (swelling goes down), then they come back for a double whammy--of itchiness! they started feeling like poison ivy! i had to scald them under hot water to keep from scratching. stupid anemones. still, i can't wait till my next dive. floating underwater for hours at a time is a very relaxing way to be. diving also increased my bathing tolerance. no longer am i limited by wrinkly digits (convenient cuz our room had a very large tub, something i've definitely been missing in hk).

the rest of our time was spent atop elephants and in cabarets (mom insisted on going--she knows thailands' trannies are second to none).

Dad took about 50 pictures of this one, and about 1 of everyone else. maybe he wanted to make a flipbook of her dance.

costumes and sets were pretttttty darn elaborate.

soft porn notwithstanding, dad is getting better with his large zoom lens.

infinity pool

my parents, kayaking off. don't be fooled, before long, my mom had stretched out with her book and her parasol, while my dad was charged with ferrying her around the island.

airplane!

elephant

crow