Vietnam (part 2 ) and Cambodia

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Well GOOD news everybody! Somehow I miraculously got my lost rucksack back!! Not sure where it went to but somehow it turned up somewhere in Vietnam and a Canadian saw the flag on my backpack, looked at my flight details, contacted my parents (who were connected to the flight) they sent me an email with a phone number ... and now I have it back!
Unfortunatley though, I had already splashed out $200 for a new passport which couldn't be cancelled!

I ended up spending 9 days at Ho Chi Minh waiting for a new passport to be made, my backpack to be returned, and getting an exit visa ...all of this sounds simple enough but I was at the Canadian embassy and Immigration office everyday bugging them to do it faster. (Originally it was to take 15 days for me to get a paper that said I could leave the country!!! I had a flight in 13 days in a different country...but it all got sorted) Also the only way to get around in this city is motorcyle taxi's which are an adrenoline rush to say the least, especially with the way traffic works over here!

At this point I had been left by Tom who had a tighter schedule so this was the first chance that I had to do some solo traveling. Very glad that I had a chance to try it because it ended up being really fun! It's amazing how many backpackers that you meet when your on your own. Everyday I would do a tour and meet up with them after for drinks, or even just be sitting for a meal reading a book and people ask you to join them...its really cool that way!

Some of the tours that I fit in between going to embassy was Chi Cuh tunnels tour, a tour of underground tunnels which the vietcong used to fight the French and Americans. Very interesting if your into history but I would go on about it. Also did a nice boat tour of the Mekong Delta (major river in SE Asia) through some jungly river, ate some really good local food. A lot of my time also went cruising through some history war museums with really cool tanks, war planes, bombs, biast propaganda, and general american hatred places.

Finally, once everything was sorted, I got myself a bust across the boarder to Cambodia! As soon as you get into Cambodia you can see that it is a really poor country. But once we got to our hostel in Phoem Penn I found out that they are the nicest people I have met so far. Very friendly, always curious to know where your from and talk. I would love to have a lot of time to do Cambodia BUT because of the whole bag situation I was forced to do a quick tour. So first day in Phoem Penn...I got up early and went to the shooting range. One thing you may not know about Cambodia is there are absolutley no rules...I met two dutch guys the night before and ended up at the shooting range with them...for a mere $200 you can shoot a ROCKET LAUNCHER! Thats not all...if you were REALLY in the mood you can buy animals from the local market to shoot at including COWS, DUCKS, SHEEP etc. So I watched some ducks meet their unfortunate end in a very cool way. I couldn't afford this so I opted to shoot an AK 47 and a pistol. You can also shoot anti aircraft gun, throw a grenade, basically anythingg goes.

Next stop was the killing fields, if you don't remember I'll give you a quick history update. Cambodia came under rule of the Khmer Rouge a communist party, they wanted to rid Cambodia of all western influence so they took over, started kililng anyone who they believed was impure. Very brutal, lots of tortue, stravation, about 1/4 of the popultion was killed, and nobody stepped in because of what had just happened with the USA in Vietnam. The killing fields was one of the places where they ...guess what...killed people and lots of them, and put them into mass graves. Very sad and creepy place really.

Last thing I went to was probably the most moving one, it was a genocide muesum. It was a highschool, which the khmer rouge turned into a tortue prison. Was very disturbing how they tortured them, confined them in cells, and eventually killed them. The worst part was how it had room upon room of profile pictures of people who had been brought here and tortured.

I did the shooting range, killing fields and genocide museum all in one morning, then quickly caught a bus to the other side of the country Siem Reap. I arrived late and got up early to head over to Angkor Wat - 7th wonder of the world! I'm not usually one for temples but Angkor Wat just blew me away! It was MASSIVE! And on every side of this massive temple there were sculpted pictures on the stone walls! Won't bore you with it too much but it was AMAZING! Also went to Bayon temple, and Ta Phron. Ta Phrom I thought was the coolest temple because it was just covered in forest with trees actually growing on the temple with roots growing alongside the walls to get to the ground...you really have to see it but it was awesome!

So that was it for South East Asia, from Siem Reap Cambodia I caught a flight to Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia and next day another flight this time 12 and a half hour flight to London Heathrow!

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