[WHISTLER LOGS]
January 2011
The land of smiles, spicy food and beautiful scenery!!
The day after Christmas, we were finally ready to leave. I wrote we, because I had picked up some crew. I had met Gunter and Maria a few weeks ago, on the dock of the Royal Langkawi Yacht Club. They were looking for a ride to Thailand. So when it was time to leave, I gave them a call and they jumped on board. My third crew was Kemina, from Australia, who had never been on a sailboat but was very keen for a little adventure.
I thought that with all the trouble I had experienced with my engine, leaving would be easy. I was wrong. As soon as we casted off the lines and started pulling back from the dock, I knew something was wrong. The reverse lever had felt hard when I had pulled it back and now that I was trying to put it into forward motion it felt even harder. What’s more, the boat did not seem to stop its reverse motion. Something was definitely wrong and I suspected that the engine was stuck in reverse. Not a good thing since there was a Barnacles covered cement break wall behind us and it was getting closer by the second. The good thing though, was that I had crew on board and 2 of them were very experienced. I told Gunter to put some fenders in between the boat and the wall while I shut down the engine and dropped the anchor. Doing so slowed our reverse motion and Gunter, with the help of Maria, did a good job of cushioning the impact. Some friends on the dock who had come to say goodbye, had watched with interest our kissing session with the break wall. One of them, Jim, jumped in his dinghy and came to gave us a tow back to the dock... Once tied up, Maria washed the part of the hull that had come in contact with wall while Gunter and I pulled the reverse/neutral/forward cable. The rigid sheathing covering the cable had corroded and had collapsed when I had tried to pull the lever. We repaired it temporarily but I still preferred a new cable if one was available. So, I took my bicycle out of the forward berth and pedaled to town to try to find a replacement. Luckily I found one and in no time, Gunter and I had it replaced and functioning. By 2 that afternoon, we were ready to try again our leaving maneuver. This time we managed to do it without hitting anything!
Late that afternoon, we met up with Enchantress, a beautiful Ketch, owned by my friends Bruce and Tony, from Australia. We had met, a few weeks ago, in Johor Bahru and had hit it off immediately. We anchored next to them, on the north side of Langkawi, in a gorgeous natural setting. For the next 5 days, we cruised together and went from one beautiful Thai island to the next, until on New Year Eve, we reached the island of Phuket and were able to officially check into the country. Once all formalities done, we quickly headed for some Spicy Thai food. We had stopped at several inhabited islands on the way to Phuket and my taste buds were slowly getting accustomed to the spiciest food I had ever tasted. From Hot Red Curry dishes to Papaya Salads, a cold glass of beer or water was always required to quench the fire coming out of our mouths. Thai food is beautiful, simple and very healthy. Obese Thai people are rare and I noticed my waist line getting smaller after only a few weeks of Thai Food.
Kemina had to go back to Australia the next day after our arrival. Gunter and Maria stayed with me for a couple more days before they headed north, to visit other regions of Thailand. After they left, I went and anchored on the south side of Phuket and spent a few lazy weeks in the beautiful bay of Nai Harn. Tony and Bruce did the same!! Eating, drinking, swimming, kayaking, and trying to learn a few bits of this very difficult language consumed most of these few weeks.
Thai language is an extremely hard language. There are 44 consonants and 47 vowels for a total of 91 letters. The vowels can be placed on top of the consonants, under the consonants, before the consonants and even after the consonants. On top of that, there are five tones: low tone, falling tone, flat tone, high tone and rising tone. If you get the tone wrong, the word has a totally different meaning. For instance, Suay in a flat tone means unlucky but in a rising tone means beautiful. Thai culture and language places a very strong emphasis on respect. Respect of the King, of Buddha, of the monks, of the parents, of older brothers and sisters. For example, there are 11 different words for the pronoun “you” depending on whom you are addressing. More on Thai culture and language, next month. Stay tuned and Happy New Year!!