What I Learned From A Stranger in Thailand
People make places worthwhile. That’s what I’ve found across a great deal of travels — especially in a hostel in Phuket.
Travels are painted and layered by the individuals you encounter. The people make the place. This much I have learned for certain. In my travels, I have met some truly wonderful people.
But, naturally, I have also met some people that I did not find so truly wonderful, some people that would be more aptly described as characters or foils. Not mean or malicious people but strange, idiosyncratic individuals who are a bit too candid at times.
And yet, I’m sure others in different countries and cultures thought the same about me, too at one time or another: a wide-eyed American exploring a faraway land that, to them, to the on-site local, may have been the only place they’ve ever been.
One time, in Phuket, Thailand, I met a man in a hostel. He called himself Stan. We did not so much "meet," but, rather forcefully, he sat down next to me in the lobby and started talking as if we had been friends for years already. It was not much of a conversation at first, for he was not talking to me, but at me.
Stan said he had been on the road for over a decade. He looked easily over 50 years old, the only one in the hostel over the age of 26. That gave him an air of arrogance that I’m still not sure whether he earned or fabricated. Stan was balding, thin and gangly, with a nose that looked permanently sunburnt and a graying five o’ clock shadow and haggardness that hinted at recent bouts with alcoholism.
I asked him where he was from.
“All over, kid," he said. "All over.”
(To note, I’m 6’2" and at the time had my own scruffy facial hair. It had been years since someone called me kid. Whether he did this affectionately or in condescension I do not know).
This began a series of stories about how many women he’s been with, how many wives he had divorced, how many overseas investments he had fortifying his many bank accounts.
Stan proceeded to tell me, and anyone else who would listen, about his travels. About how jungle safaris are not as great as they sound. About how the best Shanghainese food he ever had was in Sydney, Australia. About how, if he wanted, he could've "made it in Hollywood."
The way he spoke told me that he really thought highly of his own existence. More than once he referred to himself affectionately in the third-person: “When you’ve been on the road as long as this here Stan, you’ll know wisdom, kid.”
He was not exactly friendly, though he acted as if he was the most popular guy around once-upon-a-time. His manner was gruff and forward, and it was clear that he did not give a toss what anyone else thought of him. Perplexingly, I felt comfortable around him because I knew that he didn’t care whether I did or not.
Other than his age and arrogance, what I remember more than Stan’s stories was the way he smelled. Maybe it was simply the fact that he smelled. His presence made me wince and crinkle my nose. But I never said anything, nor did any other hostel visitors, because that’s just not what you do. You don’t arrive in a new place in a country foreign to you, and try to make friends by telling someone they are in need of several showers.
For four days, Stan and I shared a room with two other college-aged guys from London. By the end of the three days, we three youths all smelled like Stan because we'd shared a room with him.
After this distressing realization, I took on a temporary but not unreasonable fear of balding, long-armed and thin 50-year-old men with sunburnt noses. I’m not sorry for writing this, and I’m not changing Stan’s name to protect his identity. Instead, I wish to pose a warning to other travelers not to share a room with Stan, lest you want to find out what it’s like when soap itself does not work.
Travel isn't about where you are
Though unoriginal of me to say, it really is the people you meet that make the places you go. Sure, Phuket is a beautiful place, a sight to behold and one that I hope to see again soon. But there’s only so much I can write about white-sand beaches and scenic boat rides.
But Stan? I could write a book about his pungent scent alone, and then a sequel entirely about the holes in his socks.
The thing about traveling is that the place you go is not always what's worth traveling for. The destination isn’t usually the best part. Only sometimes it is, on those occasions you get (un)lucky enough to not meet anyone mildly interesting.
People make the place worthwhile. That’s what I've concluded across a great deal of travels.
I don't know what it is the case, but it is. Maybe I should have asked old Stan this question. I’m sure he would have answered with gusto, and with some vague reference to something or someone he had conquered in his colorful life.
Reflect and prepare for a changing horizon
When the pandemic befell the world, everything changed. Travelers all over were told to bunker down and cancel their flights. “Tame the wanderlust until this virus goes away,” we were told.
Nobody appreciates being told they cannot do something. For me, hearing this from someone only motivates me.
The reality is, the world told travelers not to travel for a long time. At the time for me, that meant two years of travel coming to a full stop because the universe intervened.
But a time of rest can be the launchpad for a next step. A period of reflection, musing, and gratitude.
In the pandemic months, I’ve had the opportunity to reflect on my travels, as well as learn to appreciate home — sunny California — to a degree I never have. For this I am thankful.
I had the opportunity to write about my time overseas. To remember the places I traveled. To remember the people I met. To remember Stan.
Now, travels are once again part of life. But before this was true, then, we could only live day by day in anticipation of that freedom, taking the tide as it came.
This waiting, at any stage in life, prepares you. If you let it, it can ready you for the journey to come.
And a journey most certainly is coming, because one always is. The horizon always moves. The best we can do is reflect on what was and prepare for what could be.
I've learned we live life in chapters, each scene part of a winding story. That is the lesson that I arrived at during times without physical movement.
Who knows what the next journey holds.
Oh wait. That’s right — Stan knows.
This story was first published October 10, 2020.