At A Glance
Author	.caitlin.
Contact	.caitlin.@bme.anon
IAM	.caitlin.
When	Six months ago
Artist	King
Studio	Koh Phangan Tattoos
Location	Thailand

I woke up with my head pounding and fluro paint through my hair. One of my shoes was on the pillow next to me, the other on the bedside table. I reached for my (warm) water and took a looong swallow. I was on Koh Phangan island, Thailand, and the night before had been the Full Moon Party. I had vague memories of drinking 'buckets' (vodka, redbull and coke mixed in a bucket and served with ice), and even vaguer memories of how I had gotten back to our motel. The two guys I was travelling with, Tim and Scott, were both passed out and snoring loudly, competing with the ceiling fan and the mosquitos to make the most noise. Tim had green paint on his nipples, and Scott had no shirt. Clearly, it had been an awesome night!

We were due to get a ferry off the island at 2pm. That left 4 hours to shake off our hangovers, since there had been a typhoon the day before and reports were that the ferry was horribly rough and that we would die if we went without eating something first. I had other priorities: I had an appointment to get my foot tattooed with bamboo for that morning, since I knew it wouldn't be sensible to have it done before the Full Moon. As I gulped down a coke and headed to King's, I wondered if I had made the right decision: after all, I was more hungover and hot and tired and covered in fluro paint than ever before.

Time for a little background info. I had had the soul of my foot tattooed twice before, done with machine both times. It actually wasn't a painful experience either time, but I wasn't happy with the results:

It was clearly uneven, with the most fading the deepest under my arch, which was impossible to keep moist during healing because it's the part you walk on. I'd thought a few times about getting it redone, but never really gotten around to it, until I saw the sign outside King's advertising bamboo tattooing. I knew very little about the process, but since machine tattoos had failed me already, I decided to give the bamboo a shot. King was really nice, and covered in tattoos, and there were a lot of photos of his work on the wall, so I was reassured about his skill. I made an appointment, and then danced around and told everyone I saw that I would be getting my foot tattooed. Most people rolled their eyes, but of the backpacking-type tourists who frequent Koh Phangan, a really high percentage had tattoos so no one looked too aghast.

Fast foward to me being hungover and walking into the studio. The boys were with me, smoking and occasionally dry-heaving a little. King asked me to wash my feet, but the black from my shoes was NOT budging, so I sheepishly climbed up on the chair.

King prepared his tools by wrapping nylon round and round the bamboo, tightly tying a small blade with about a 2mm chisel-type end to the length of bamboo.

He then used a lighter to melt the nylon and secure the blade to the bamboo.

It's probably significant for me to mention here that while King washed his hands, he was not wearing gloves at this point. He did get the blade from a sealed, sterile individual container, but the bamboo was taken from a jar with several other thin lengths. King did eventually put one glove on, but when the finger split he did not replace it. I had my blood tested three months and six months later and I was all clear. The reason I did not interject and ask for the type of hygeine preparation was because I was experiencing something culturally different, but not necessarily negative. I realise that to many people this might seem dangerous and stupid, but other people will respect my decision to keep things as culturally standard as possible.

When the blade first hit my skin I flinched, and my foot twitched. Tim was summoned from the front to holy my foot steady, and soon King settled into a soothing pattern, tapping the blade up and down on my foot. It was almost relaxing, apart from the fact that it was the most agonising thing I have ever experienced. The blade went in and out and over and over, and every time I tensed and held my breath and fought all my reflexed to pull my foot away. The first time he went around was excruciating, and I honestly thought I was going to pass out, or call the whole thing off.

I held my breath and closed my eyes and gritted my teeth and sweated and nearly cried. Tim had to hold my foot in an iron grip so that I wouldn't move. He begged for a break (I think he was going to throw up), so once King had finished the first time round the star, we all took a breather. I was happy that it looked super black and that there was no blood, and I even managed to smile for the camera!

However, the smile was wiped off my face when he started again. Holy jesus it hurt, so bad this time that my legs cramped up from tensing the muscles in order to not flinch. Scott was on foot-holding duty, and he complained that his fingers were going to fall off.

When King FINALLY set down the bamboo I snapped a pic of it which unfortunately is out of focus, but I think it gives a good picture of the proportions:

King slapped a thick layer of vaseline over the tattoo, which was super black,

and told me to keep it moist at all costs- not the easiest thing to do on a tropical island! After the obligitory customer-and-artist photo,

I staggered off with Tim and Scott.

We found a bar that was playing Friends reruns, and bought lots of cokes and gradually recovered before our ferry (which was as bad as promised, though I was doing ok until a guy threw up on my pack). I bought vaseline when we were back on the mainland, and carried it with me everywhere. Over the next few days I raised a lot of eyebrows when I rubbed vaseline on my foot whenever the opportunity arose. I also had to explain to the massage people that I didn't want my foot massaged, thank you very much, which took a lot of sign language and apologetic shrugging!

Five days later I was back in New Zealand, unemployed, so hobbling around was a lot easier. I tried to walk on the edge of my foot, but that really hurt my hips and wasn't always practical. Ten days after the tattoo was done, I was walking on it normally, but it was still completely scabbed and nowhere near healed. In fact, it was closer to six weeks before the surrounding skin finished peeling. This happened with the previous two tattoos, too, so it was definitely the skin on the bottom of my foot rather than the method that was affecting the healing time. Five months later, it looks like this:

compared to the before shot:

So overall, the bamboo experience was certainly memorable! It really was horribly painful, and that wasn't the case with the machine tattoos. However, the bamboo tattoo was far darker and better defined than the machine ones. I would recommend bamboo tattooing for anyone who wants to experience something different, and King proved to be an excellent tattooist. One word of warning, however: don't make your appointment for the morning after the Full Moon Party!

*Disclaimer: I had been in South East Asia for a month, and my black leather sandals were all I wore. They caused my feet to look horribly horribly dirty all the time, but for the record, my feet are actually very clean. Ahem.