It was quite nice 20 years ago I lived there at that time and absolutely loved the place. But we left over a decade ago and there were at least 10 very good solid reasons why we left. In terms of the vampiric management of tourists, one of the reasons I left Samui, was the attitude of alot of the locals. Even back before the Apocalypse many of them were very jaded, and they seemed to be indifferent, and service suffered as a result of that. Less so with the Burmese workers, as they tend to be quite kind and helpful. Also, there is little to no local pride, as most who are from Samui and Phuket left long ago, after selling their land. That hurts. It was hard living in a place where most of the locals just did not seem to care about the island. Sometimes, the place felt like a 2 year old dishrag in a diner kitchen. Most of the people there for the past 20 years are transplants, who do not care about keeping up the island. The ex-pats always seemed more concerned about maintaining the cleanliness, than the locals. Phuket and Samui are finished for those of us who have seen them back in their glory days. I moved to Samui over 20 years ago. Back then it was paradise. Over the years it got highly developed, and traffic increased dramatically, and we eventually left. Alot has changed since Covid. Been back recently, and have a few friends still living there. I could literally go on for an hour, but I will try to summarize. The overdevelopment was rampant and completely unregulated, the hillside that I lived across from had construction that never stopped, the concrete trucks would tear up the roads and they were not repaired properly, the congestion became unbearable, the prices skyrocketed, people held me hostage constantly because the island was 20 km from the mainland and therefore they deserved a huge premium on their products and services, everything became more expensive, huge numbers of Russians moved in, and I got sick of being trapped on an island where the ferry or Bangkok Air was my only alternative. During covid 90% of the business on Samui collapsed, and all the mom and pop stores remain out of business to this day, with the exception of just a few. They were replaced mostly by higher end places that are quite pricey. No thanks. Believe me I could keep going. Leaving Samui was a great decision.
