Crazy Cambodia

Well at last I've arrived in Asia, after all that time of easy backpacking in Australia and New Zealand. I flew into Bangkok about a few weeks ago, arriving late at night at the new airport so we decided to avoid having to head into an unknown city in the middle of the night and slept at the airport instead which wasn't all that bad. It was odd to be in a completely different place though but to be in such a sterile place as all airports are. It wasn't until the next morning when we left for the hotel that the full extent of Bangkok hit. Well to some degree anyway, Sophie had booked us a couple of nights at the Bangkok Marriot as my birthday present. So we headed there for a much needed shower and change and then headed straight into the city. The first day we decided to just go shopping for all the bargains we needed which was a bit of an experience. Market stalls are everywhere in Bangkok, selling everything from rip off tshirts, fake DVDs, clothes, bags and lots of unidentifiable foods and fruits. We slept very well that night, exhausted by little sleep the previous days and a long hot day in Bangkok (where we were caught in our first monsoonal downpore).

The second day we did the tourist things and visited the temples and musuems around Bangkok, all of which are incredibly impressive and decadent, all in the sweltering heat of the day. We travelled the city on the river boats that race up and down the dirty brown river that flows through the city, which barely pause at the jetties for people to almost literally jump on and off. That evening we headed to the Kao San road, famous for being the centre of the backpacker scene in BKK to eat and check out what was happening as we were staying further down the river. The area is very frenetic all through the day and late into the evening, with all the usual hawkers' stalls and market stall as well as people selling things to you as you eat, running off as the police arrive.

We decided we'd had enough of BKK for now (we'll be returning in a couple of months anyway) so made a move towards the Cambodian border. There are two choices if you're going overland, the main route which is possible in a day but involves a difficult border crossing, followed by an endless bumpy journey to Phnom Penh or the route we decided to take, supposedly easier. This involved travelling forst to Trat, a town about 100kms from the border. From there we had to get up at 5am to get the minibus out, a time of day when we were amazingly suprised to see so much activity. We got to the border just in time to make the boat to here, Sihanoukville, getting ripped off slightly by the locals who helped us to make it, but you've got to expect these things. The transformation into Cambodia was instant. Left behind were the shacks and rubbish lining the roads all the way through Thailand to amazing greenery and fields all around. The boat journey here was uneventful (apart from very nearly falling overboard at full speed when I went to lean on the non-existant hand rail outside the boat) but passed a beautiful coastline. We arrived in the port to be greeted by dozens of people wanting our business which was unexpected. Sophie and I got on the back of a couple of motos (which struggled to get up some of the hills with two people and a big bag on each) and headed down here to Seredipity beach which is pretty nice. The narrow beach stretches on for miles, backed by dozens of bars. It's slightly exhausting being on the beach, where mostly children, some of whom speak incredible English, hassle you to buy their bracelets and food every five minutes but its all good natured and quite fun. Then last night came a big suprise, bumping into Emily (again!) who I'd thought I'd not see again until we were both back home. I had had no idea where she was, apart from that she was somewhere in Asia so it was incredible that she happened to be in the same town and the same guesthouse. Now I'm positive she's following me!

On our last day there we went to a local island which was pretty nice on a little boat whose engine kept breaking down all the way there. On the way we went snorkelling which wasn't up to much as there was a lot of dynamite fishing in the past. The island was pretty nice to relax on though.

From Sihanoukville we went to Phnom Penh on a local bus passing rice paddies as far as the eye could see. At rest stops we were beseiged by lots of locals trying to sell things as usual but this time it included deep fried trantulas! About half way through the journey the bus slowed as we passed a small van sitting upright down the bank in a paddy, as the bus crawled forward we saw that it was a failry serious accident as we passed a lorry on its sie, spilling its load of sand all over the road. Lastly we passed a car, where only the rear lights were visible as it had obviously fallen vertically down the bank into the shallow paddy field. Next to it, for all the world to see, were the bodies of a young girl and a young boy, obviously pulled from the car. It was incredibly shocking, particularly seeing the dozens of locals crowding around and even our own fellow passengers leaing over to see, but not all that suprising in a country where overtaking a slower car is seen as a right, regardless of other traffic.

We spent only one night in Phnom Penh where we witnessed the heaviest rain I have ever seen, particularly worrying seeing as our guesthouse was on stilts over the lake. From there we went straight up to Siem Reap to meet up with Emily again and explore the Angkor temples. We visited the temples over three days, two days on the back of a tuk tuk and once on bikes which despite the heat was really fun. All the temples are different, from huge grand ones to smaller ones with amazing stonework and the one featured in Tomb Raider where the forest is literally overgrowing the temple.

From Siem Reap we took a boat to Battambang on the other side of the Tonle Sap lake which swells massively in the wet season. The whole journey took about 6 hours, during which we sat on top of the boat which swayed wildly from side to side despite the very calm conditions but probably more to do with the overcrowding which is very normal here. We had it better than another boat though that left just before us that was so overcrowded that when it went into our wake the bows literally went briefly under the water, terrifying for the people on board I'm sure. The boat journey was at times pretty interesting, passing through whole floating villages where children would come out to wave. Because the lake is normally much smaller, there are green trees and floating vegetation everywhere. At times we had to pass through channels through tree tops only as wide as the narrow boat, the branches brushing the sides of the boat. Vegetation would sometimes blow across our path so they would just speed up and crash through it.

Once in Battambang we found a hotel and booked a couple of motos to take us out to the countryside. We climbed a couple of hills to see some wats and all see the Killing Caves used by the Khmer Rouge to kill people by pushing them in, their bones piled up in boxes. All very sad. On the way home we took a ride on the Bamboo Trains, which are just bamboo platforms on wheels with a small engine built by the locals for moving up and down an active train line. When another bamboo train or even a real train comes the other way they have to lift the whole thing off to let them pass. All great fun as it got pretty fast and on tracks that make British rails seem smooth. Once back at the hotel we had a little incident, the sink in the bathroom simply fell off the wall and smashed all over the floor, water spraying all over the place! Instead of being sypathetic the owners got really angry, said we had broken it on purpose (not quite as rock and roll as throwing a TV out of the window I know) and must pay for it or we'd go to the police. So we went to the police. Going to the Cambodian police is a wierd experience, we went to about five different offices discussing it with lots of different people, most of it in Khmer. In the end the police who were obviously just on their way home agreed (unsurprisingly seeing as I couldn't join in the conversation) with the hotel man and we had to pay. Hardly fair as it wasn't our fault but there you go. So we moved to another (nicer) hotel and went for dinner in the roof top restaurant. On our way out we were invited over to some Dutch and Cambodian guys who were just tucking into a snack of barbequed frogs and bat so it'd have been rude not to try it. Tastes just like chicken!

We're now just chilling out today, and probably doing a Khmer cooking course tomorrow before heading back to Phnom Penh.

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