Koh Samet, adventure two

All I knew about Koh Samet before we embarked on this overnight adventure is that Koh Samet is an island because the word "koh" in Thai means "island." With a backpack full of the essentials, we hopped into a taxi, then into a minibus, then onto a boat ferry, and then after about 6 hours reached our destination: a beautiful beach resort island with warm blue water and sugary powdered sand. There were 12 of us this time, the California kids and a few international students, and we ended up finding a slightly overprices bungalow with enough sleeping space for all of us, complete with 3 king beds and 4 twin beds. We spent the first afternoon and evening on the beach, eating lunch at a restaurant on the sand, taking naps, and taking dips in the ocean. Once it got dark the island transformed into a completely different place: the restaurants turned into clubs, the lights were lit, and we stumbled across a lantern-lighting ceremony that may have been for a birthday celebration, but the language barrier was hard to penetrate. We took a walk away from the beach for dinner because the farther you are from the ocean, the cheaper things become. At the restaurant we met a very nice Thai man, our waiter, named Audi. He spoke with us in English and helped us with our Thai, and invited us to go clubbing with him later that evening.
To continue on the trend of things working out just perfectly by chance, we ended up at the club he recommended after spending about an hour at a smaller more relaxed bar. Once we met Audi at Naga (the club he recommended to us), we danced, got our faces painted in neon, and had a really really really good time. After we all had our fair share of moving around on the dance floor, we ended the night in a communal skinny dip.
Day two was slightly more frustrating because the 12 of us split into different groups, and even though I had a good time with Alexis, we both felt like we were being viewed more and more as as opportunity to get ripped off, probably because we were young and white and on a beach resort island. The locals, besides Audi, didn't really want to hang out with us and it seemed as though everywhere we went, things were overpriced or we were given attitude. It definitely detracted from the overall experience, however I would say it was a successful vacation overall.