Spare time in Patong

Having moved to the new apartment also meant that there was a change in restaurants and bars. I went with Elias to this Danish/Swedish owned restaurant close to our apartments, it had been a long time since I had been having some Danish food. Not knowing what to expect, I was happily surprised to meet the owners of the guesthouse, called A1 Guesthouse. It was run by the couple Claus and Goy, he was Danish and she was Thai, but had lived in Sweden most of her life.
They were really nice people, so were the people working in the restaurant, they were really outgoing and friendly. This became our daily watering hole, I guess the days we were not there, everyone worried that we were ok.
I got to talk to Claus after a few days and he was very proud of his place, which he didn't run like most other people in Patong, that's for sure. Maybe we were spending most of our time in the bar, but the place was actually more a restaurant with a small bar. At the same time, it was not a bar serving lady drinks.
I discovered that one evening when I offered the girls in the bar a drink, they all politely said no thanks. That was very surprising, but it was one of the decisions Claus had made when he setup this place. The girls should not encourage the guests to buy them drinks because they would make money of it as it happens in most other places. This suddenly saved me a lot of money, compared to the other bar I used to sit in as I would give a few drinks now and then to the girls being there.
His wife Goy, who was originally from Thailand, but had been in Sweden since a small kid, spoke Thai, Danish, Swedish, German, French, English and what other languages you can come up with. A very nice couple and now I understood why my Swedish neighbor Elias, had been spending so much time here in this Swedish/Danish/Thai restaurant/bar.
The chef in the kitchen pretty quickly discovered that I liked spicy food, so she would load up every dish I ordered, Danish or Thai, with chili. In the beginning it was just a few, on the side, but as time went by, they would be plenty and could probably kill most people from Scandinavia. At this point I can honestly say that Tabasco is like ketchup nowadays
We would often take the girls from the restaurant our for dinner, out to party, play pool where I would normally lose or to the beach, as they were nice and showed us a lot of stuff around town. There are so many places and things you wouldn't know about if someone would not tell you. Don's BBQ for example, BBQ buffet for almost no money. Thai BBQ, very good buffet style too... Could keep on going, but am getting to hungry thinking about it.
Things also get a lot cheaper when you are accompanied by local people and it is also easier to get the food tasting right when there are locals to certify that my taste buds need the spiciest the restaurant can make it.
Now and then though there was a little extra time for some drinks, just a few. When there was too many drinks, Elias would have a tattoo to celebrate it. He got a few, haha
Now enrolled in the dive master training, my idea was that there would be plenty of time every day to do some serious exercise on the side. I realized soon that the reason why most Thai people don't exercise is that it is just too damn hot here to do any outdoor sports.
Not an excuse, just a little bit too warm to make sense, leaning up against a heart attack if exercising vigorously here. For the same reason the indoor gyms exist, where air condition keep the temperature to a bearable level.
The problem was just that we didn't end up getting much free time, and what we got ended up being used for tests or reading books. Most of the time we were not home until 6pm, tired of swimming most of the day or spending most of the day in the cold pool. At least the beginning, will see in a few weeks