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Published: July 21st 2006
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Sunday 9th July Paul - Had a nice day in bed as I was ill. I bet you all really wanted to know that. We were thinking of catching the bus to Bangkok tomorrow but we decided against that now as I didn't really want to be needing to go 'poo' in the middle of a 12 hour bus journey. Hold that sexy thought...
Laura - I'd just like to add a little message to Mark here. I hold you fully responsible for Paul's illness as when I spoke to you on the phone the other day the first thing you asked was "have you got the shits yet?". CLEARLY you tempted fate.
Paul - Felt better by the end of the day and we went to get something to eat. The children here really are not representative of the rest of Cambodia at all and it's quite sad. It's sad also that most people just fly into Siem Reap airport, see the temples and then fly out again. It's making these kids more and more abusive of western tourists who don't give them money. ANYWAY it was World Cup final day so we stocked up on some
snacks and Laura got some beer (I wasn't allowed any due to dodgy stomach) and settled in to watch the 1 am kickoff. Good game, the world cup has been quite disappointing hasn't it? Or is it just me watching it in Asia? Nice headbutt by Zidane although if he was going to do that he might as well as just smacked him instead. Would have been funnier.
Monday 10th July Paul - Got up feeling much better and decided to go to the Land Mine Museum as it was run by a local guy for free! He uses his spare time to help teach people to clear land mines and I think (don't quote me) he has cleared over 100,000 land mines himself! There are also 10 land mine victims living with him and one of them showed us round. Learnt a lot today about the problems facing Cambodia, especially on the Thai border as it was one of the more heavily mined regions. Hundreds of people are still dying every year in Cambodia alone because of land mines!
Laura - The land mine museum was a bit of an eye opener. The guy
who showed us round had lost a leg because he'd stepped on a landmine playing with his sister and brother in a forest near his home when he was nine. His sister and brother were killed by the flying shrapnel. It was such a sad story. By the way America still produces landmines, along with many other countries. We were quite surprised by some of the countries who haven't signed the petition to ban landmine production. Makes you realise what sort of world we're living in...
After the land mine museum we got back to the hotel, had some dinner then watched some terrible films on cable TV.
We really enjoyed Cambodia and were quite sad to leave. Not so sad to leave Siem Reap, due to all the stooopid tourists who walk around the temples in their boob tubes and hotpants, listening to James Blunt on their Ipods. Also quite glad to be leaving the beggars in Siem Reap as some of them got quite nasty with us.
Siem Reap was not a true reflection of the rest of Cambodia though, which we thoroughly enjoyed. The children in the rest of the country were beautiful and
friendly and some of the smaller towns we visited were lovely. The food is also very excellent, I find it hard to believe that it is not internationally available like many other Asian foods. The local people were very accomodating and very grateful that we chose to visit their country. All in all a great country, as has every country we've been to so far. Will we find a place we dislike? We shall see...
Paul - As we are slowly writing this blog in Bangkok I think we can safely say we have found somewhere we dislike... Khao San Road in Bangkok = Magaluf in Europe... more on that later
Tuesday 11th July Paul - So today we got the bus to Poipet on the border between Cambodia and Thailand.
Laura - I think I should just mention what a joke the bus was. It was by far the crappiest heap of metal I've ever sat on in my life. It was even welded together in the middle. Safety first! We sat on this bus for half an hour before driving around to get petrol. Then we drove back to the hotel
Bus number 1
Yes that is a line of welding running down the centre of the bus... where we'd met the bus. At this point the driver realised that the bus couldn't reverse. After 20 minutes of poking around under the bus we all piled off and into another bus, which was only marginally better. Cue another 15 people arriving by mini bus who were promptly squeezed in with us, much to our amusement. Bags in isles, people hanging off chairs, no air con (as promised)... A fun filled journey. Add to that the fact that the road was so bad it felt as though we were sitting on top of a pneumatic drill. During an earthquake. Are you jealous yet?
Paul - Hilarious journey there as we were sat behind some thick girls dressed in mini skirts who had clearly flown in from Thailand and were getting the bus back. They were complaining about the road (which to be fair wasn't great) but this one girl asked Laura if she could open the window more to which Laura declined. Now this was fair as they both had an equal share of an open window and if the girl opened it more then Laura would have no window at all. So what did this girl do?
Cambodian petrol station
Diesel in old fanta bottles is the norm! She opened the window anyway! Legend!
Overheard them talking in the cafe at how AWFUL Cambodia was and how they were thankful they were back in Thailand. Ignorant idiots. Anyway we got over that swiftly as we had reached the border and there was another legend to entertain us! A German man... a German man with open wounds on his legs! Open wounds with flies buzzing round them! Sexy to say the very least! And he was drunk to top it all off! After putting on a show for a while and refusing medical attention we were unfortunately ushered across the border before we could see the outcome of his antics. We climbed aboard the poshest bus I have ever been on (the seats even had foot rests) and we were in Thailand. And it reminded us of... ENGLAND... errrrr... great?
We drove on the left hand side of the road past lots of electricity pylons... just like in England. Wasn't exciting in the slightest...
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Vodoo Hodooo
Finally my evil vodoo doll is working - ha ha ha ha ha [read in a slightly crazed, evil type laugh way]. Paul and Laura 'dodgy digestion' vodoo dolls are available from all good toy shops and some rubbish ones too