As I am traveling at the same time I am always keeping an eye out for some fun and weird little places to eat and explore what is going on. The standard half westernized place you can find at any corner, but finding something that really makes you speak about it years later is sometimes a little bit more difficult to find.
While I was on the island of Koh Lipe in Thailand while scrolling around for some munchies I saw on maps this little place ran but just one little lady which had fresh fish made into sashimi.
Normally I always look at the eyes of the fish to see if they are hazy or not. The more hazy, the older they are. This is the reflection of the light, but the fish was seriously still half moving here
Nothing more nothing less. Fresh fish made into perfection and that is it. Instantly I was intrigued what exactly was happening here.
So of course this needed a little walk on by to see what was going on over here.
Was there even action going on here?
While heading towards this little place it meant turning off of the main road in Koh Lipe. Now there aren't exactly a lot of roads in general in Koh Lipe so turning off of them was even more weird.
Walking into this dark alley made me wonder if this was even going on. Eventually I found the place called 'Barber Haircut by Mali'. which of course already sounds a bit shady.
But indeed this was a little barber shop, one table to eat and also it had a tent to sleep in standing there with the sign 'Hostel'. And most of all.... It was dark and deserted and nothing was going on over here.
As we already had debated about heading here for days it was kind of a bummer to see that it was closed and nothing was going on over here.
We decided to leave the place and als leave the dream about fresh fish. As it was low season here this was also not really weird that nothing was going on.
Until while walking back a scooter stopped in front in me with the brightest old little lady which said in a big fat Thai accent 'Are you looking for meeeeee, Maliiiiii'
'You want fresh fish, you need to order fish so I make for you later.'
'Come back tomorrow and I have fish for youuuuu'
But all of was said ratherly calm so I wasn't sure if she was happy that we were there or not. I said we would come back tomorrow but I had no idea if tomorrow something would be going on....
The day after
The day after I was really curious on what would happen today. We had said that we would be passing by but would there actually be something going on, or had these just been words to ditch us and head out again.
While walking again into the dark alley there was still nothing going on a Mali's place but I have to admit that we were there on the exact minute as we had said as my Dutch mentality means that I am a little bit too punctual on there.
We hung around for a couple of minutes before deciding that Mali had bummed us and we needed to search for a new destination.
As we were walking back disappointed the scooter stopped again and it was Mali with a gigantic fish in a big shopping bag.
'You ready for fresh fishhhhhhhhh'
And she put on this finding Nemo kind of hat and went at it.
'If you want beer you need to get at supermarket here'
She laughed so hard and we got some beers at the supermarket and still now I was wondering what was going on. Her place was dark when we reached and now there should be a fantastic meal coming out? I was still in the dark of what would happen exactly.
Wow wow wow
While having a beer and looking into the dark alley and still wondering what was going on Mali headed inside and I started to hear some shopping sounds and in less that 5 minutes later she came walking out with the fish again but now in beautiful bite sized sashimi kind of pieces perfectly prepared!
The snaps do not do justice on the masterpiece because of the dark on how beautiful this was was cut and how awesome the fish tasted but here is a little hint.
Also with some chimichurry kind of sauce and some soya sauce and a mango prepared this was literally the best fresh raw fish I had ever had and I was stunned by everything that was happening here.
Mali also just sat down to see on our reaction and she started chattering away on all kinds of things.
The vibe was good and the fish was even better. What kind of awesome surprise had we walked into?
Mali told me she was a bit of a hussler so she was always doing all kinds of little job and also did sashimi orders for some other restaurants and hotels. But all of this was on order since she needed to send out someone to catch a fish for that.
That was the reason why we needed to come back a day later and ofcourse this is only a one-woman-show for everything.
We had some more beers and jut really enjoyed this super fresh fish and chatted away with Mali and left with our hearts full and the belly full as well.
Traveling and taking the small alley is just so full of surprises sometimes, what a weird but fantastic setting this was!