Man Meter

There’s nothing better, nothing, than tropical paradise. I’ve stated to everyone who knows me, and those that don’t, that my dream is to buy an island and move there. When they ask if they can come visit, the answer is yes, if you can find the island.

So you can imagine how psyched I was to visit the darling islands of Phuket. Most recently popularized by Leonardo DiCaprio and the film The Beach, these islands pepper the coast of Phuket. And they are beautiful. So I jumped at the chance to book an all-day boat tour that included snorkeling and visits to The Beach beach, Viking Cave, Monkey Island, I mean this sounded awesome.

And awesome it was. We hopped on the boat around 9AM, prepped and ready to enjoy the next seven hours on the sunny beaches of Thailand. The only thing that got in our way was the sun, which didn’t really want to make an appearance that day…or the days before and after. Basically, my streak is intact, the places I visit come under a steady flow of overcast and clouds. Sunny San Diego? Not when I visit. Scorching hot Singapore? Yes, but no sun. And Phuket, where the water is crystal clear and the sun beams rays of brilliance upon you? Nope. But whatever, partly cloudy was good enough for me.

From sing

First stop, The Beach beach. That was nice. Except for the 50 other boats and hundreds of people teeming on the island. Fair enough, this is the spot that has probably boosted Phuket tourism 500%, so I’ll live with it. But it was a 45 minute boat ride, which made it slightly disappointing to not be really able to enjoy it wholly.

Ah yes, and the first real downer of the day. As soon as I step off the boat and flip on my camera, the battery meter begins blinking. I’m sitting in one of the most majestic places I’ve seen, and I can’t capture it because I didn’t charge my frigging camera battery. Bummer. Man Meter rests steadily at 7. Plus 1 for cruising through that speed boat ride like nothing, minus 1 for having a camera without a charged battery.

We spend 40 minutes walking around the island, and then we’re off. Off to snorkeling! Whoo hoo, the tour guide drives the boat around 5 minutes. We basically circle the tip of the island and wind up on the other side of the coast, where the magnificent coral is only 10 meters below the water. “OK, put on your fins and jump in!”

Now, here’s where things start to get dicey. I can swim, mostly. I mean, I made it all the way to Beginners Level when I was a kid, that’s right I graduated Pollywogs and Tadpoles, I know my way around the Turtle float. But really, I haven’t swam in a long time. Nor have I swam in the ocean any time recently, like in last 10 or 20 or whole life, so jumping out of a boat in the middle of the ocean is a bit daunting. I could feel the Man Meter dipping, hovering around 6.

But hey, I’m always one to jump at the chance to do new stuff. The flippers went on, the snorkel went on, and into the deep blue ocean I went. And into the my stomach did I swallow much water. Holy crap, the current was pretty rocky. Strangely enough, high tide was in the middle of day, and we were snorkeling in it. Man Meter drops to 5 as I begin to wonder if I would drown two feet away from the boat.

I kicked a little, threw my arms around in circles, just like I was taught to tread water. Ah, but nice currents make it hard to stay calm and afloat. A couple more mouthfuls of water and panic began to sweep over me for real. I couldn’t really stay afloat, oh and did I mention, I never snorkeled before. Sooooo, I’m sitting there, or more accurately, slowly drowning there, and the options available to me are: die a most embarrassing death or scramble as fast as I can back to the boat. I chose scrambling, and the Man Meter dipped to 4.

As I clung to the step ladder, other folks were jumping into the water. Yes, I felt like an assclown, trying to scoot out of the way of everyone. Once everyone passed, I hopped back onboard, a little shocked, a little dazed, but happy to breathe. Our tour guide, Don, was great. He said, “Mr. Lee, what’s wrong, have you snorkeled before?” We proceeded to have a one minute conversation followed by a quick snorkeling lesson on the spot. He was great about it, but I was a bit freaked out.
As he encouraged me to get back in, I politely asked to wait, to let me regain my composure, and to try again in a little bit. Man Meter struck to 3.

Ah, I believe I mentioned the current. That current was rocking, nice and easy. Up and down, up and down, and being on a stationary boat for any length of time in those conditions means one fun thing: seasick! Yes sir, I was beginning to feel nauseous. And that’s when it struck me, consciously, my Man Meter might be lower than 2. After all, I had just failed miserably at snorkeling, believed that I might have drowned two feet away from our speed boat, needed snorkeling lessons on the spot, and now I was getting seasick from standing on a boat…that I paid to take me to go snorkeling and touring the islands of Phuket. Sad.

Granted I said, well, maybe it’s at 2, the Man Meter that is. But as I got more nauseas by the second, I realized I wasn’t at a 2, I wasn’t even at a 1, I was in negative territory my friends. That’s how unmanly I was, negative!

From sing

After another 10 minutes, everyone came back onboard and we were off to Monkey Beach, where there are…monkeys…on the beach. Unfortunately, this was also high tide, meaning the beach was about 2 meters under water. Meaning we had to check out the monkeys as they sat in the trees. Which also meant I didn’t get to stand on solid ground. Which meant that I was doing all I could to not hurl in front of the assembled strangers. Man Meter, still at negative 2.

Next, we had lunch. Which, thank god, was on a non-submerged island. There, I rested and thanked all that is right in the world that I could lay down for a couple minutes. I finally began to feel better after about 45 minutes and the threat of booting in the boat was substantially reduced. Man Meter, negative 1!

We cruised over to another snorkeling spot, which also happened to be in the middle of the ocean. Seriously, what the hell happened to my idealized version of walking into the water from the beach and learning to snorkel in like 3 foot deep water? Where the hell did that go?? But the current was much calmer by now and Don really wanted me to try again. So the snorkel went on, the breathing exercises started up, and he was confident that I could do it! Yes, I can! He told me to leave the flippers off and just hop in next to the boat. Get my breathing down, get horizontal, and get going! Whoo hooo.

And off into the water I went. And into the water my head went. And look at the beautiful fishies. And look at the funny coral. Man Meter plus 2, I’m in the water!
And breathe. And breathe. Sounds like Darth Vader. Can’t hear much else. Lots of breathing. The boat is drifting away. Breathing. Can’t breathe normally. What about my nose, can’t breathe. Boat, where’s the boat. Darth Vader. OK, swim. SWIM. To the boat. Get out, get out! Yup, I snorkeled. Yup I’m out of the boat. Man Meter, 1.

Don wanted me to put on flippers and go out again. I declined and said I would try when we got to the beach snorkeling. He said OK. Man Meter said I’m at 0.

We spent 20 minutes there, no seasickness this time, the current was pretty calm. Then we went over to Bamboo Island. Apparently there’s bamboo there, we just didn’t see it. There was also a roped off area where people could swim, kayak, snorkel. But no one seemed intent on doing much more snorkeling. And I was indifferent to trying one more time.

Thus, in the end, we got to see Leo’s beach, but it was overcrowded. I almost drowned and had a panic attack in my first foray into sea snorkeling. I got seasick. We didn’t get to hang out on Monkey Beach. And there was no bamboo on Bamboo frigging Island. But, it was tropical, the lack of sun made it much more bearable, and I did get in the water eventually. Even it was only for 2 minutes. Nonetheless, the Man Meter petered out at 0, pretty sad day for my masculinity. Which was fine, since I already had my nuts crushed in the Thai massage (read below).