January 1, 2022

In the morning, we headed to a nearby cafe that was mostly populated by older expats, and had an OK breakfast—I had bread, fried eggs, sausage, juice, and tea. Roman got a Benedict that was not actually a Benedict—they used a sweet salad dressing in place of hollandaise. Noooooo!!!

After breakfast, we headed to the beach. I was disappointed at first—it was pretty, but the waves were crashing almost to the end of the beach, so there was no dry sand to sit on. And because the waves were pretty high, I wasn’t really interested in swimming.

We walked until we found a set of stairs to sit on and I had some more thoughts about having expectations.

Eventually, I stripped down to my suit and waded into the water, and then things actually got pretty fun.

The water was warm and a little wild, and I went exploring down the beach.

I found us a nicer spot to sit and we packed up our bags and moved to a shady spot

And watched the locals pass us by.

Back at the condo, I took a short swim in the large pool.

For lunch, we walked down a side street away from the beach, and sat down at an open air restaurant, where Roman got krapow moo and I got a surprisingly good Thai beef salad with khao neo.

After lunch, I went to get a mani pedi while Roman got a massage, and then back home I meditated on the balcony while Roman snuck a cool picture.

In the early evening, we had a little walk by the pool, and Roman briefly transformed into a mannequin.

Then we headed to Cicada market, a night market that sells food, as well as arts and craft by local artists. Before heading into the market, we checked out the food market next door and picked up some fresh coconut drinks.

Cicada market felt a little fancy, but wasn't terribly expensive—we looked at paintings, bought some cute handmade coasters, and got some oyster omelets.