The problem(s) with Paradise

Treasures of Koh Lanta

Josh's Coconut

View from above

Hello from Koh Lanta, an island in the Andaman Sea off the west coast of southern Thailand. We are staying in a traditional wood and bamboo hut overlooking the water. There are monkeys in the banana trees above us and the sound of the surf puts us to sleep at night. It's raining again today, but it's beautiful here. We collected shells and took a dip in the pool this morning before the storm, then Josh did his schoolwork, we played a family game of UNO (I won!), Todd and I sent in our absentee ballots and I did some yoga. I know I've referred before to the ups and downs of our travels. Even in the rain, today was an "up," but unfortunately the past week or so has been disproportionately heavy on the "downs."

Josh got sick in Koh Chang. It was awful and it tore my heart out.  Although he only vomited for 2 days and nights, it took him much of another week to get his energy and appetite back. I think he had food poisoning, although we've done everything we could to minimize our risk.  As Josh was recovering, Todd was dealing with a longer-lasting issue that we *think* was an intestinal parasite. Thankfully, he was able to get some medication in a Koh Chang pharmacy that helped. We left Koh Chang on October 31 and had an almost all-day voyage back to Bangkok. Everyone was feeling pretty good. We had an Airbnb for the night, plane tickets to Krabi the next afternoon and a few days booked on Koh Lanta.

That night after we went to sleep, though, Todd got sick and it was bad. He couldn't keep anything down and he was pale, dizzy and shaking.  I was scared. It was midnight and we were staying in a pretty residential area of Bangkok.  We don't know anyone, and even the Airbnb host was remote. It's not like she was next door. I didn't even know how to call for an emergency if I had needed to. Is it 9-1-1 in Thailand also? Would an operator speak English? Would they be able to find us where we were staying?  Thankfully, Todd did eventually get to sleep so we didn't have to answer those questions, but we did get moving first thing in the morning to seek medical attention. Todd located a good "travel clinic," where they diagnose and treat common travel-related issues. They think it was a separate/new issue from the parasite, probably food poisoning, and they sent us home with a new antibiotic for Todd.

We stayed another night in Bangkok just to make sure things were better (they were), and rescheduled what we could of our onward travels for a day later. We arrived in Koh Lanta yesterday.

I feel compelled to write about the state of sanitation in Southeast Asia. As beautiful as these countries and their people are, there is a real problem with the lack of regulation and standards surrounding sanitation. Garbage is everywhere. Cans, bottles, wrappers and worse.  On the sidewalks, street corners, and even washing up on these gorgeous beaches. Unfortunately, trash cans are hard to find. Many people don't think anything of just tossing their garbage wherever they please. It's a far cry from the extensive composting, trash separation, and recycling we saw in Germany.

Hand washing (with actual soap, warm water and a clean towel) is virtually non-existent and I can confirm that hand sanitizer is not available commercially. I cannot count the number of times that we have gone to bathrooms where there is either no soap dispenser or it is empty. NONE of the bathrooms have anything but cold water and only a handful have anything with which to dry your hands. If they do have something, it's usually a damp towel laying on the counter, or a roll of toilet paper (yes, that works about as well on wet hands as you'd imagine).

One of the pieces of advice we'd read before coming here was to avoid "street food," which is everywhere. It's cheap, it smells amazing and there are so many choices!!  The truth is, though, that it doesn't matter where you go. It doesn't matter how well-decorated, air-conditioned, expensive, delicious or whatever a restaurant is, when there is no system for inspecting, grading, regulating and ensuring a standard of cleanliness in food service, there are no guarantees. Even the restaurants in 4 star hotels have no one to answer to.  Restaurant staff use the same bathroom that we do, yep, the one with no soap and hot water. So, you can eat toast and those panda pops from the 7-11 at every meal, or you roll the dice.

We have heard that the water in these countries is not extensively filtered or treated, thus it is not safe to drink. While bottled water is readily available and everyone here drinks exclusively bottled water (even locals don't drink the water from the tap), many restaurants, hotels, guest houses lack full sanitizing dish-washer capabilities. So.....the plates, cups, silverware, even if they are cleaned, are rinsed with water from the tap. Vegetables and fruits, when rinsed, guess what, water from the tap.  Fresh fruit smoothies, which are everywhere here (and are delicious, mind you), are made from fruit and ice. We always hope the ice is made from filtered water, but who knows?

The place we are staying now has a huge tank of filtered water that they make available for guests and they are proactive about letting us know that their ice, smoothies, frozen cocktails are safe. The pool water is filtered and gently chlorinated. We wish more places were as transparent and cautious. Especially now...

Another thing that is lacking regulation here is motor vehicle safety. Motorbikes and mopeds are everywhere and they are super cheap to rent ($3 per day in many places)!  Some of the islands don't even have roads big enough for cars, so a motorbike is necessary if you want to get around. It seems like everyone rides them. Locals, tourists, singles, couples, kids, even moms with babies.  Motorbike taxi drivers can fit passengers and one of those HUGE suitcases (conveniently stacked right in front the of the drivers face)!  We even saw a man ride by in Cambodia on a moped with three huge pigs strapped on the back (granted I don't think they were alive anymore)...

While we've been here, we've witnessed two accidents right in front of us (one in Laos where a young girl on a moped was struck by a car when she failed to stop at an intersection and the other in Koh Chang where we heard the crash happen, but didn't see the details). The girl who got hit in Laos was OK, she was visibly shaken, but walked away from the accident, but we're not sure if the victims of the other accident even survived.  The sound of the impact was bad and several ambulances came (and soon left) with lights and sirens a-blazin'.  In addition to those 2 firsthand accounts, we have overheard tourists comparing stories of their crashes on motobikes, and have seen many people with scrapes and road rash all over their bodies. Thailand has one of the highest motor vehicle fatality rates in the world, and I'd be willing to bet many of those are from motorbikes. We have been conducting an informal poll on helmet use and we estimate that less than 10% of riders wear them. Supposedly it's law that can be enforced by a $200 fine, but we have yet to see any police. I cringe every time I see one go by, especially the ones with children and babies packed in.

Our next two weeks are fluid, but we leave Thailand on the 19th. I'll probably post again before we go, stay tuned!