#TeapotWine

Oh! I am living the dream! This morning I wasn’t woken up by someone snoozing their alarm or turning the light on and talking loudly at 5am or zipping and unzipping their bags continuously for ten minutes! No! I woke up in my king sized bed surrounded by tiny black men feeling refreshed and ready to start the day! I leapt out of bed theatrically like they do in the movies, raced to the curtains and yanked them open. Grey clouds swelled in the sky, the drizzle plopping sadly into the too narrow pool while a couple lay on the sun-loungers in their costumes attempting to get a rain tan.

Once breakfast was scoffed, the rain had subsided so we headed into the town to see what’s what. Ocea wanted to buy all the baby clothes for Hayley and Wesley’s new baby (due at Christmas) despite not knowing the sex. “Aww but it’s so cute!”
I reasoned with her that this is 2018 and gender specific clothing is out! If it’s a boy you can still put him in the dress and if someone makes a comment shout,
“I am no bird; and no net ensnares me: I am a free human being with an independent will and so shall my

grandchild be!” That’s just a quote I stole from the internet but in my mind I also said empowering things.

Tired from shopping, we headed to the pool and banked ourselves some sun loungers that were not moist from the rain.
Ahhhh...I lay back breathing in the warm air. Ocea and I chatted about life and went for a swim while Simon napped. Loud splashing noises were coming from the pool, there, clutching a lifesaver hoop, was a Chinese woman learning to swim. She kicked aggressively, legs flailing, as her friend filmed her and the other one helped her. I didn’t have the heart to tell her that the pool was about 1 meter deep so the hoop was probably redundant.

We decided to go check out the beach while Ocea pointed at almost all of the umbrella’d food stands.
“That looks like fried ice cream!” She said at each one.
“Nope! That’s just more seafood!”
“Nope, pancakes!”
“Nope! Some sort of chicken?”
“There!” I shouted pointing at the ice cream rolls sign. We hurried over, to the frozen plate and watched as they expertly chopped, scraped and rolled the cream around until it formed soft Oreo tunnels. “Thailand is the best!” I thought as a small bit of melted cream dribbled down my chin.

All the relaxing made us thirsty so we went to find another poxy fruit juice.
“Hey buddy, so...any chance we could get a lil cocktail up in here?” If I had been smoother, I would

have slipped a note into his hand. He looked frightened.
‘No...cannot give cocktail. Can give beer?”
“How about a little wine?” If this didn’t work I would need to use the puppy dog eyes.
I saw his mind reeling, probably picturing himself in some grotty Thai jail swapping bras for cigarettes and singing Madonna...again, might be thinking of Bridget Jones...
“Okay. I can give you wine but in a cup, not a glass.”
We smirked at each other like the Simpson’s Mr Burns.
“Excellent!”
Not long after the waiter re-appeared carrying two white ceramic tea pots.
“Your TEA!” Wink wink.
“Oh! Lovely tea! Cherry flavour! My favourite!” I was slightly gutted there were no police around because we would have got Oscars for that performance.
Simon rolled his eyes at us as we giggled and snapped selfies with our “tea”.

“My mother always says you should have two cups of tea!”
“How about two pots? A-hahaha.”
The unexpected wining had made us sleepy so we headed off for a well needed nap. I finished my book by the pool, sniffling at the sad chapters of the incredibly predictable story-line.

For dinner, Ocea had found somewhere special, a restaurant on the rocks. We spotted the restaurant across the beach, it looked like a magical house in a fairy-tale; the beach was lit up by spot lights highlighting the crashing waves, palm trees were just visible under the star lit sky. Behind our table, trickled a waterfall and then we saw it. A two page cocktail menu. Teapot wine step aside!

Carried on a silver tray our cocktails gleamed like beacons of hope. Mine, served in a coconut with decorative pineapple and flowers, Ocea & Simon's, in tall, slender glasses also dotted with colourful flowers. Apparently the king doesn’t mind if you’re paying high end prices for alcohol on his birthday.

Then the food. Oh my!! The food! The meat was cooked to perfection, the spice just right, all three of our meals as flavourful as the next (although, mine was definitely the best! Ocea even agreed!) we shared the tempura vegetables and slurped up the Penang curry sauce with delight! I shoved food into my face until a food baby emerged under my dress, my skin pulling uncomfortably! “Make more room!” I shouted to my swollen stomach.

The wine arrived with a series of medieval looking tools. “Don’t hurt the wine!” I thought. They faffed about and fiddled with the tools decanting the forbidden fruit into a large carafe. Unlawful wine is so much nicer than lawful wine! We gulped it down and my stomach yelled at me to stop! I knew I would have to live off sprouts and cabbage after this but I didn’t care! It was heaven!

After dinner we waddled off to find a tuk tuk and headed back to our hotel with the intention of playing cards. We poured more wine and I will never understand how I did this but I managed to eat the free snickers bar left in my mini bar fridge. It was the straw that broke the camels back or in my case the whale’s. I wasn’t sure that my arms would stretch far enough away from my stomach to play cards. I was falling into a food coma, my palms were sweaty, my knees week arms were heavy there was curry sauce on my sweater already... I was relieved to see Ocea and Simon suffering the same fate!

I was out cold until morning...