The mandatory week stay in a SHA+ Plus (State Health Administration) accommodation passed quickly enough. I played the tourist on Sunday, taking a longish walk through the touristy stretch of Old Phuket Town after my lunch and heading over to the weekend night market. I had a thorough look at the night market, but ultimately decided not to eat anything there–both because the prices seemed a little high and there were too many farang around. I left before it got crowded at stopped at an empty restaurant for the contractual Pad Thai. I got it to go, which was a huge mistake, because the heavens opened up on me halfway back to the hotel right when I was on a stretch of the road with no shelter. I got completely drenched before I found an awning to hide under. If I only I had chosen to just eat in the restaurant, I would have missed the rain.
I suppose I got over the jet lag quickly as I continued to wake up around 2am in the morning, something I was doing in the week before my departure. After a restless weekend, I officially began my new job still working remotely from the desk in my hotel room. However, other than a few meetings the first two days, I didn’t have a lot of work on my docket.
I wandered out into town every noon and evening to hit up different cheap restaurants. The two most common types of food are (soup) noodles and Cantonese-style barbecue (pork or chicken on rice). Those meals typically cost about 50-70 Baht. I did splurge once at a restaurant where I ordered two freshly cooked dishes–morning glory and some kind of clam since it turned out to be a seafood restaurant and it was listed on the front page of recommendations. That turned out to be a bit pricier (240 Baht).
On January 5th, I had an appointment for my second PCR test swab. Due to high demand, I couldn’t make a booking at any location near Phuket Town, and settled for Kata — one of the beach towns. Phuket has a rudimentary public transportation system of blue buses (more like pickup trucks or giant tuktuks) that run between the central market in Phuket Town and the main beach areas. The bus was just sitting at the market, so I climbed on and waited with the one other passenger until the driver was ready to start his round. It was super easy to find the swab center and they processed me quickly. I do find it funny that my best chance of catching Covid is going to the swab center. I took a quick look at the beach before heading back in to “the office.”
Unfortunately, the trip back was not as easy as I wasn’t 100% sure on where to wait for the bus, and I ended up following Google’s instructions to go up to the highway (a 20 minute walk). I waited along there for a while until I decided my best bet was to go back to the beach road, where I stumbled across an actual marked bus stop. These tropical countries have a very loose system where you can ask to be dropped off anywhere and can get picked up anywhere, but if you don’t know the route, you might end up waiting a very long time.
The excursion to Kata was enlightening because I got reminded of what the touristy beach parts of Phuket are like, with everyone (mostly taxi drivers and masseuses) trying to sell you their services. By contrast, life in Phuket Town was quiet and nobody bothered me (other than the occasional person who said hello just to say hello).
One of my doctoral classmates is not only from Phuket, but also happened to be spending the New Years visiting family (he normally lives in Bangkok). I had been in touch, and after a few days of messaging back and forth and changing plans last minute, we managed to meet up a fancy massage parlor on the far side of Phuket Town. I hadn’t seen him in four years but he looked exactly the same. He wanted me to show photos from my last visit, which I had on my phone, but it turns out they were all photos of food. We didn’t have much time to catch up as I went for a foot massage and he and his mom got some other kind of massage in a different room. They treated.
On Friday (Jan 7), I checked out of my hotel and booked a taxi through Grab to head to the villa where I will be staying for some time. It’s owned and operated by some friends of some friends and these friends are just kind of renting one (or two) villa(s) on a semi-permanent basis just to have the space available. Also, for storage I think, since there are some suitcases in one of the bedrooms and a lot of random stuff scattered throughout. The villa has three bedrooms with attached bathrooms, a living room (with sofa and TV), dining room, kitchen, and a brand new washing machine. The U-shaped building surrounds a private pool with deck chairs and a garden and a privacy wall separates the villa from the other units in the community. There is a communal pool suitable for swimming laps and a basic fitness room next to the office (not even a two minute walk from my front door). It’s basically paradise. I really got the VIP treatment, with a basket of snacks and a stocked fridge to welcome me (including a bottle of champagne which I’m saving for a special occasion). On the other hand, it’s a bit isolated (up in the hills away from possible tsunamis), so I don’t have the luxury of being able to pop out and find restaurants or look at shops. I can walk to a Family Mart, but other than that I need wheels. The rural parts of Thailand (or which this counts) don’t have much space on the sides of the roads to accommodate foot traffic, and culturally, I’m considered a little crazy for being willing to walk for the 5 minutes.
After a long weekend of ordering takeout through Grab and settling in for real this time, it was finally time to meet up in person with my friend/boss, who is living in a condo that is even fancier than the villa and has a gorgeous view of Kata bay. That morning (Tuesday Jan 11), I got around to arranging a motorbike rental and prepaid a month (4500 THB) on top of the deposit (2000 THB). The condo is on the other side of the “mountain” from the villa and it was a harrowing journey following my friend to see his place. On the way back–a mere three hours after completely the rental transaction–I found myself unable to steer right and slowly ran the bike off the road. That implies I gently came to a stop on the shoulder when in reality I was so fixated on trying to get the bike to go to the right, it didn’t occur to me to hit the brakes. The bike is now off somewhere getting repaired (both brake controls were broken) and I am sporting some gnarly looking “Thai tattoos” on my arms and legs. I’m really not sure which aspect of the situation bothers me the most. The pending cost of the repairs I am on the hook for, the pain of my skin lesions, the embarrassment of crashing so soon after getting the bike, or the fact that I can’t go swimming or work out for at least a week.