Full Moon (or, how I met my missus) part 1.

OK, so picture this, you’re holding your beautiful bouncing baby girl and a 15-year old lad pushes past, all rowdy, spotty and loud (like all 15yr old lads tend to be), & that lad turns out to be the future husband of your beautiful bouncing baby girl. 

Or maybe this ... 

Your 19 year old daughter finishes school and whizzes over to Sydney on her gap year before starting Uni in Germany a year later. She’s all excited cos she’s managed to score a job as a nanny for a lovely family in Centennial Park. & then one day she calls you to say she’s met an Aussie bloke. Oh & by the way he’s 34.

& then in a heartbeat she’s married him, moved to Sydney and had a baby. And by the way, she’s your only daughter (only child even!) and you live in Germany and don’t speak any English.

That's me and Picky. This is our story. It’s true. Every last word of it.

For Pearl. How I met your mama.

I met Picky on the beach outside Ark Bar in Chaweng, the main tourist strip on Koh Samui off the coast of Thailand. 

Actually, I met her in the sea. She was floating on a lilo, so was I. We kinda bumped into each other. Lilo to lilo. We got chatting. I told her that I was a scuba-diving instructor from Sydney who was studying to be a psychologist. She was well impressed. She told me that she was a 19-year old German student who was working as a nanny in Sydney on her gap year after school. I was well impressed. 

Mainly I was well impressed that a 19-year old nanny on her gap year was bothering to talk to a 34 year old scuba-diving instructor who was studying to be a psychologist.   

That evening me and Picky had a Heineken or two in a bar. 

& then I lost her. 

I blame the full moon. 

Well, to be perfectly honest (just between you, me and the entire inter-web) I blame the Full Moon Party on Koh Phangan. 

I was in Thailand with a bunch of mates for the world famous (infamous?) Full Moon Party. I wasn’t there to meet my future wife. I was there to party. Hard. It was February 2004. The Full Moon Party was on 6th February. It was massive. There were probably 20,000 people there. We all went over on the ferry from Koh Samui. Me and my mates. And Picky. I lost Picky somewhere on the beach before the party even got going. I eventually got back to my hotel room on Koh Samui a million days later. 

I didn't know where Picky was staying and I didn't see her on the beach. I'd lost her under the full moon. Just like that.

And then, a few days later, by pure chance, I spotted Picky again in a bar with her friends. She told me she was leaving with her mates. She was going off to see the elephants in the north of Thailand. She was beautiful. Stunning. More beautiful than I remembered. Before the Full Moon Party I was only focused on the Full Moon Party. I cursed my luck. I’d met the most stunning girl I’d ever met in my life, had a quick drink with her, lost her at a Full Moon Party ... and now she was buggering off with her friends. 

I asked her not to go. I asked her to stay with me on Koh Samui. She told me that she didn’t know me from a bar of soap. And she reminded me that I’d lost her at a Full Moon Party. I kicked myself (again).

She left the bar. She had to pack. There was an elephant somewhere in the north of Thailand with her name on it.

The next night I was propping up the bar in a place called Mint with a Heineken in my hand. I was miserable as sin. I was so miserable that my mates had given up on me. They were across the road in the Kangaroo Bar, going nuts to Men at Work's 'Down Under'. Eileen was probably already on an ephalump somewhere in the north of Thailand. 

My mate Az came into Mint. He was a solid fella, Az. He walked towards me at the bar. I thought he was going to tell me to cheer up and drag me off to Kangaroo Bar to listen to another rendition of Down Under. He took a step to his left. 

Picky was behind him. 

She’d skipped the trip up north. She told me that she wasn’t much into ephalumps.

I ordered her a Heineken. 

& I swore right there and then that I wouldn't lose her again. 

I didn't. 

... more to follow in part 2.

Pip pip


A very special shout out to Roland Slee for his awesome shot of the full moon. The other snap is Ark Bar. The exact place that I met Pearl's mama