I haven’t yet got the pictures developed, but in the meantime here is a description of the second half of my family’s vacation in Thailand. I left off at the end of our time on Ko Phangan–a small island in the gulf of Thailand.

To go to Mass, we had to journey south by boat to Ko Samui, a much larger (but still small) island very close by Ko Phangan. The interior seems to be mostly undeveloped tropical wilderness, while there is habitation around the coast of the island.

We took a ferry to Ko Samui, my mom and I gladly paying the extra 40 baht (one U.S. dollar) to stay in the air-conditioned cabin of the ferry, as it was jungle-hot outside. When we reached Ko Samui, we located the first Catholic parish, St. Anna’s, and I was thrilled to get to go inside the church, locate the tabernacle, and kneel before Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament. I felt so happy to be close to him again in this foreign place. The janitor cleaning the church looked over at me and smiled.

My sister’s friend Martin talked with a local person there and found out the Mass time, and then we went back to my mom and sister and made our way to the resort we decided to stay at. My mom and I were ready to be in an air-conditioned room with western-style toilets and toilet paper you can flush.

The resort was very nice, and the staff was friendly and hospitable. We feasted on wonderful food, morning, afternoon, and evening. We went shopping almost everyday at the main strip where they had lots of little stores and peddlers selling souvenirs from sarongs to knives. We even saw an ENORMOUS statue of the Predator made out of various metal pieces. It was very scary and weird, and it must have weighed a metric ton because the thing was life-size (7 feet tall probably).

We wiled away the days like this, which was fine by me. I read a lot and grew in greater respect for my patron saint, Therese of Lisieux. That girl is HOLY! I realized more deeply how far I am away from truly loving as God loves. One of the things she said that struck home with me was “Love is fed by sacrifice”.

On the third day at the resort, I got a stomach bug and had bad diarrhea and fever. I was in a world of hurt. I am, however, forever indebted to McDonald’s because my diarrhea hit me while we were shopping along the main street, and I needed to get to the bathroom IMMEDIATELY. I remembered the McDonald’s a half block away and sprinted there, knowing they would have a bathroom I could use. Sure enough, they did, and I was temporarily relieved of major badness. So say what you want about their food and all of that–they were a bastion of help for me on that day!

Thanks be to God, the fever abated and the next day I began to recover. We flew back to Bangkok the morning after that one, and we met up with one of my mom’s old friends from her work, a very kind Thai woman. After that, my sister and I had a good time in the evening watching some seriously cheesy teeny-bopper movies on the movie channel at the hotel. It was really neat because it brought back old times we used to have together growing up as brother and sister. It felt really good to share in such a simple joy with her again, and I am thankful to God for the time.

Then Friday morning came, and my mom and I got on a plane and flew back to the States. The planes were interminable, but eventually we made it back home, sano y salvo. I was happy to return to the good ol’ U.S. of A.