Day 131! Today’s day number one of volunteering! So far, I’m thoroughly enjoying. I really got lucky with the hostel I got the chance to volunteer in. I’m very much looking forward to the next month on the island.

Even after a late night, I woke up bright and early from the light shining into my bed from the window.

But I had a very nice way to start my first full day as a hostel volunteer, FaceTiming my parents!

We chatted for just under an hour and it was really nice getting to fully catch up on my trip with my cousins. Also I got to tell them all about my new role at the hostel.

After we wrapped up our chat, I headed across the street to the main part of the hostel. Since I have 50% off the food here, it makes everything pretty much the same price as the mainland Thailand. So I got a muesli bowl and enjoyed yogurt and fruit.

Now, usually I’d start my morning off with Thai food. But this is so affordable and good that I was happy for a slight change.

I finished my healthy breakfast and started my hostel repping gig a bit early interacting with the fellow travelers that were up.

But while I was chatting with a guy, Arunesh from India (currently living in Toronto), the other volunteer, Paul, came up and gave me a smoothie!

It was a very nice gesture and just another reason why I know this hostel is a great fit for me! It creates a great community and I’m excited to be a part of it for the next month.

I then spent a lot of the morning playing pool with other travelers and chatting with new people.

There have been so many people at the hostel to meet and meeting them is already something I would’ve done. It’s pretty cool that I’m getting to stay here for free and live on an island just to do that!

I started getting hungry, so I ordered another meal from the hostel. This time I went fully away from Thai and SE Asian food… and for a favorite meal of mine, a quesadilla.

After eating and a bit more pool and mingling, my friends from the night before were playing a card game and they invited me to join them. It was a game like Old Maid. But instead of getting rid of your cards, you have to get 4 of a kind.

The sun was slowly starting to set at this point. So we hopped on motorbikes and made our way to Freedom Bar. This bar is directly on its own private beach which was quite beautiful.

We stayed there for just under 2 hours, before I needed to get back for another shift at the hostel.

I quickly showered and then walked across to the main part of the hostel. There also was a stunning sunset when I got outside!

When I got to the hostel, I had a bit of time to eat dinner. So I got one more dish from the Hostel, a Pad See Ew.

After eating, people slowly started trickling into the lobby to hang out, eat, and drink.

Tonight, I was putting on a beer pong tournament!

Now… there was also a Cabaret happening tonight… so even though I was successful in getting 8 teams to sign up to play, all but one decided to leave early. This unfortunately is just something I’ll have to get used to as a volunteer!

Everyone left and Yi came up to me to let me know that since everyone left, he was okay if I set out early for the night.

I walked to Sairee Beach to meet up with a couple familiar faces, Joya and Miri!

It’s pretty wild we’ve been able to meet up in 4 different places in Thailand! We watched a fire show outside the bar I went to last night and then after that finished, we made our way down the beach for a late night swim in the nice and cool ocean.

After a lovely swim, two great things happened oh my walk home. The first was getting 10 Baht a piece of fried chicken.

The second was running into a friend, Taps, I hadn’t seen since Dalat, Vietnam! It was pretty crazy to run into each other after so many months.

I then walked back to my hostel and called it a night!

So far I’m really enjoying volunteering at a hostel. As I said before, I’m being compensated for what I’d be doing anyways! I’m sure there’ll will be plenty of crazy stories, but for now there will be shorter blog posts.

– Elie