All the guidebooks on Thailand take lots of time to describe the wildness known as the Koh Phangan Full Moon Party. And then spend another page trying to warn the reader away from it, too. Always interested in a party, I consulted Angie & Shan, my two beautiful and experienced Thailand party veterans.
"Skip it," was the instant consensus, "It's too overrun with tourists, and way overdone."
"But I kind of wanted to experience it, anyway..." I tried not to sound too disappointed.
"We're planning to go to the Black Moon Party, anyway - it's way better & cooler and more for those in the know!"
So that's how I ended up on a ferry to Koh Phangan early one afternoon - still feeling the effects of a couple too many Singhas, Changs, Tigers and buckets of God knows what the night before. I was still a little fuzzy on how I got back over the mountain and remembered stumbling around the hill trying in vain to find my hut. Shan helpfully reminded me how one of our group, Lex, had drunkenly dislodged a boulder that rolled down the hill and narrowly missed us in the pitch dark. Yeah, that sounded familiar.
Once off the ferry we gathered the group for a quick local meal and then rode the back of a pickup to Mac Bay Resort, the site of the shindig and also where Shan had procured us beach bungalows. I had the furthest one from the center of the party and it was still right behind a bar - if they needed that much room, I knew this was going to be big. When I found the reservations were for two nights I was knowingly assured they would be necessary and, oh, how right that was...
The music cranked up around 10PM, rousing me from a power nap and the fun soon began. The night soon was a blur of bodies moving and sweating up and down the beach to the house/rave/trance/whatever music spun by a team of DJ's working in shifts. I felt an instant bond with every person there - it seemed we were all in it together trying to make the party bigger, brasher, and wilder. Buckets flew by as I drifted in and out of the crowds, making new instafriends and re-connecting with our group, it seemd the night went on and on. Then, sometime between Angie seeking revenge on some rude guy and my 20th bottle of water, I realized the sun was up and the music ground to a halt at 9AM. A ragged cheer rose from the large crowd still dancing in the rising sun to the bitter end, then people drifted off, picking their way around the wreckage left on the beach.
All night long we had been checking on the guy we had nicknamed "Drunk Guy Passed Out On My Porch" at my bungalow, and when I was heading off to bed I realized he had rolled onto the beach into the mid-morning sun, and we got him moved back onto the porch and into my hammock.
I awoke with a start around 2PM and staggered outside, hungry and parched. I foggily wiped my eyes and realized my flip-flops were gone! The cool ones with the bottle opener in the sole! I wandered over to the open air restaurant in disbelief and Angie laughed, "Welcome to Thailand - everyone loses their shoes here!" Hoping to avoid a shoeless day and night before getting back to Koh Tao, I noticed the Thai men cleaning up the party debris from the beach had thoughtfully left a good-sized pile of abandoned shoes on the beach as they bagged all the other trash. It was like they knew, and I suppose they must have seen it all before. I poked around the pile, hoping to find mine - even though I knew I had left them right outside my door, and finally realized I had but one option. I settled on a newish looking pair that fit OK and gave them a quick wash in the Gulf of Thailand before taking them on a test drive. Problem solved. On the way to dinner that night at beautiful Had Riin, we passed a T-shirt shop and with a laugh, I noticed in the display front and center was one with the saying - "Who stole my sandals?" So I guess I've had a truly "Thailand" experience...
Then it was off to the After-Party, (you didn't think the party would only last a night, did you?) and eventually, I was very glad Shan booked the bungalows for two nights.
Almost a week later when I downloaded the pictures off my camera, my suspicions were proven as in the picture of Drunk Guy Passed Out On My Porch clearly show my flip-flops under the table right next to him. Now if I could just figure a way to track him down... Anyone recognize him?
