He stared as I grasped the soap. I moved slowly but carefully and washed as best I could. It was the first time I’d been watched whilst showering, or at least the first time I was aware of. We were on opposite sides of the window but it didn’t matter, he could see everything. The angle from where he was perched certainly wasn’t the most flattering for me. We both maintained eye contact as I washed. It was a game of chicken, whoever stopped staring first would lose. Although, ultimately, I was always bound to be the loser. I was the one in the shower and he was the one watching me.
Sure, he was naked too, but that didn’t matter to me. All his friends nearby hadn’t bothered to dress that day either. He was still maintaining eye contact when he decided to urinate straight on to the floor. It was as if he was trying to provoke a response out of me. That was the last straw, I turned off the water and retreated.
Having a monkey watch you while you bathe comes with the territory of staying in a hostel in the jungle. The hostel I stayed at in Railay beach was, in fact, the only hostel to stay at. I arrived on the eastern pier and walked along the coastline, which receded about a hundred metres at low tide. A long staircase from the water’s edge took me up into the jungle canopy. The large, former-family resort came complete with pool and mountain views. A night at the hostel cost less than two coffees in a Sydney cafe. Railay only had enough space for one hostel in a small stretch of land stuffed with fancy resorts and reggae music-playing marijuana shops.
Railay is the island that isn’t an island. Over the two nights I stayed there I had to keep reminding myself that, whilst I felt like I was away from the Thai mainland, I was really just on a small, sandy stretch of the coast. Railay is a piece of land surrounded by the ocean on one side and sheer mountains on the other. The looming mountains are a forbidden beauty. They are so steep that they are unnavigable to cars or to other vehicles. As such, Railay is only accessible by boat.
Whilst not physically an island, Railay still maintains itself as a figurative island. With its two long beaches and scenic landscapes, the only reason to be in Railay is for a holiday. There is pretty much one street, no cars, no buses and almost no scooters or motorbikes. The occasional bike with a trailer attached will push its way through the main street in the early morning to deliver food to local stores and cafes. Golf cars wiz around the tourist resorts, transporting holidaymakers from the beach to the pool and back, but that’s pretty much it.
A place that has almost no vehicles sounds like a place ideal for a walker for myself. But, then again, the publicly-accessible areas of Railay are almost entirely walked in less than an hour. Most locals who work there get a boat in from Krabi Town each day. Some foreign workers at the hostel were staying in Railay for a month or two. I felt claustrophobic after spending two days on the not-island, I wouldn’t survive a month.
