This is my office

Mark and I are now PADI certified Open Water Divers. We finished two dives yesterday (Thursday) and two today. Its simply amazing, the best thing I've done in a long time. Today we went to 18 meters, saw a big stingray and varieties of smaller fish. No sharks, we hear people see them from time to time but its very rare. Our instructor, Henrik is Danish and a big, round guy around 45 or so with bright blue eyes. He smokes cigarettes in between dives, after dives, on the way to dives- but somehow seems to make a living on something that requires excellent lung capacity. He lives on this island, Ko Tao, one of the only places in the world where weather and conditions allow year-round diving. Most of his students are German and Danish, he says he gets few Americans because "Americans just don't travel that much." He opened up his arms on top of the boat as we rode back to land yesterday and gestured to the water surrounding us and said "This is my office."
I spent 5 days here, several days longer than I expected so I'll get to see less of Thailand but its OK, the diving made it all worthwhile. Tomorrow morning I will catch a boat to Ko Samui, another nearby island with more mainland access. I plan to walk around a little bit, see some sites if someone will allow me to stow my backpack at their store or office. Around the evening, I plan to catch a bus/train/something else to Krabi, or as a second choice, Phuket. I want to see a bit of the west side of Thailand, on the Andaman sea where the tsnami hit and where apparently this is not diving season. I might have made my last dive for a while, so that's sad but I'll try to remember what I learned. Mark is going to stay on here and take another couple of days' diving courses, perhaps get certified a couple of levels above what we have now. I'd love to, but its just as well that I am short on time because each course is around $200 US and that is more than I've spent on all other things combined since I arrived! To add perspective, our overnight bus/boat combo (which were fairly plush!) that took us the 9 hours from Bangkok to Ko Tao was about $20 US. Its hard to burn through your cash here unless you want to dive and dive and dive.
We have met some folks here, no one that we've spent as much time with as each other, but there are Ollie the Brit and an American named Sky who are roommates. I find them a little dull, MF says they are "characters". The other divers are more interesting, we enjoy Mr. Banana Hammock and his wife. Mr. BH wears that thing at meals in case you think we are mocking a man who strolls on the beach in all his glory only. There's the abrupt Danish woman instructor who seems kind of mean, the 80s porn star-looking (blonde feathered near-mullet) instructor who sounds like AH-nold and was in the tsunami last year, sexy Christian who doesn't speak much English and has messy half-dreads, the generic blonde male Dane/Swede/something with an ear infection who's name is probably Sven or Hoyt. He's sitting out today, talking to Mr. BH.
Anyway, Ko Tao has been good to me, very very beautiful both above the water and below it.
I have 6 more days to enjoy Thailand and to make it to KL. I have my confirmation, Joey, so no worries and no trip north to Bangkok necessary. I'm on my way again, will try to write here if I can!