Advertisement
Published: March 13th 2008
Edit Blog Post
Poipet to Siem Reap
Cars packed with people and motorbikes Alright, border crossing into Cambodia from Aranya Prathet... Quite an experience. I thought we were passed the times of being followed and spied on (apparently a common practise in East Germany when I was still a little tucker...) but as I had to unwillingly experience, it is still happening daily at the border! Seriously. After falling for some dude on the side of the road that helped us get the visa (for 'just' 1200 Bath... bloody rip off mate!) we were being followed by his young friend all the way to the other side, onto the bus and to the taxi/bus office, where we were basically pushed into getting a t axi from the border to Siem Reap. Apparently there was only 1 bus a day at 2pm (other guys told me it left at 3pm and takes 6 hours... who knows) and 'lucky' us, we found another couple that needed to get outta that joint so we shared the taxi and 'only' had to pay 350Bath each (thanks Paul).
Advise, make sure you have US dollars on you (get the money in Bangkok though cuz all the foreign exchange banks we tried had no US dollars! Stupid sorta cuz why
would they be foreign exchange then if they don't have foreign currencies???) cuz it's cheaper that way. We figured we paid 200Bath commission each cuz others that paid with Bath only paid 1000Bath.
Anyway. Cambodians have a way of getting your attention so don't fall for it. They ask where you're from and if you say Australia they'll throw a nice "G'Day mate. How ya goin?" at you. In my case it was "Guten Morgen"... not impressive at all I have to say cuz wherever we went we got a "G'Day mate" thrown our way! Not kidding. We made the test once and said we were from some weird country like "Turkmenistan"... he boy was a bit confused and shuffled along with his postcards... Funny funny!
The taxi ride was interesting. Shared with a couple (Aussie/British) and had a good time chatting while we were shaken up and experienced some sort of roller coaster ride. It was possibly the worst road I had ever been on so far. Most of it wasn't even an actual road but more of a wide dirt alley in between 2 fields with sheds on either side. But we were sitting in 'luxury' with
windows and air con! The windows were more important than anything as I had to realize that Cambodia is possibly the driest country we have been to yet. So much dust and dirt! Crazy. But the ride was ok even though my stomach wasn't feeling that great towards the end of it. BUt we made it and... guess what... the driver had called another friend and we all cramped onto a tuk-tuk (designed for 2 people but we hopped on with 4 plus 4 backpacks... the boys had to sorta hold on tight) and we were taken to a 'selected hotel'. They all have friends everywhere, ask where you're going next and voila... " I have friend there". Very predictable. If you want to avoid being hassled all the time, tell the tuk-tuk driver you've been there before, thell the hotel you have already booked another hotel, 'thank you but no thank you'.
The hotel was ok and the tuk-tuk driver "Mr Ya" talked us into booking him for the next day to go to Angkor Wat.
The Temples are great, a must see! Unbelievable if you think about how they must have built those giants! Incredible and bjust
breath-taking (literally if you climb the 'steps' of that Hindu temple... my fear of heights challenged me a bit there and after being stuck about halfway up the thing, I somehow made it back down safely. But they were crazy steps and my legs were a bit sore the next day!).
It's a massive area and with USD20 a very expensive trip if you pay another USD 15 for a tuk-tuk for the day. Problem also is that you depend on where your driver takes you and at his pace.
So here's an idea for those who want to be more independent. Hire a bike. We've seen many people on pushies and the road is flat. You can start at Angkor Wat if you like and just see what you want to see and not, like us, have to see everything else first (Angkor Thom and all the other little Buddhist and Hindu Temples etc).
By the end of the day I was tired and hot, had little energy left to explore all of Angkor Wat as much as I would have liked to. I think that's a way they tuk-tuk drivers play just so you booked another day with
them cuz you haven't seen everything. But that's just my opinion. I personally enjoyed it all and was very impressed with all the details caved into the stones etc but I'm glad we didn't buy the 3 day pass. It is a lot of money if you're traveling on a budget! One thing I was disappointed about was that the top part ot Angkor Wat was actually closed off and we couldn't go in, so there was not really much to explore there and I would have loved to see the insides.
The best thing that started our short stay in Cambodia was probably our l unch at 'Khmer Kitchen' in a little side street. Very very yummy food at reasonable prices. And dinner at a food stall was 'cheap cheap for you' though not spectacular but good for the wallet and good for hungry tummy.
Okay, bus to Phnom Penh... bought a ticket for USD 5, almost missed the bloody thing (or so we thought) cuz we missed the shuttle to the bus station. Had to get a tuk-tuk there. The dude said USD 4 to get there... rip off. I walked off and all of a
sudden USD 2 was ok... and we made it on time... and had to wait on the bus for another 30 mins or so before we actually took off.
One thing that bugged me was that I had to go to the loo and was charged 1000 riel to use it. As I walked out another local lady used it without having to pay. I had the shits the entire bus trip cuz that was like such an obvious rip off! And having to pay to use a disgusting hole in the ground just because you're a Westerner can apparently we all have money to throw around like there's no tomorrow... well it really annoyed me. That's racism, isn't it? One of my photos will also show the toilets at Angkor Wat where 'non-locals' are charged 4 times as much as locals to use to toilets...
Anyway, the bus trip was long, especially if you don't start out on a good note...
When we arrived in Phnom Penh we wouldn't even get off the bus without being squashed by tuk-tuk drivers throwing their leaflets at us and almost dragging us to their tuk-tuks. Well we managed to agree on a
fair price and off we went through night time city traffic for what seemed to be ages. We had booked at TAT Guesthouse and it turned out to be ok. The room was not the best but the TV worked and the food upstairs was prepared with lots of love at good prices. The place is run by a nice family and even though we were constantly asked by the 'dad' and other tuk-tuk drivers out the front where we were going and if we want a driver, it was a good spot to be in.
We decided to do a history day and went to the Tuol Sleng Museum. During the Khmer Rouge regime this former high school was transformed into a prison and horrible things went on in there. It was very devastating to read about those captured and tortured there. If I remember it right, of the 2000+ prisoners held there only 7 actually survived. It was a cruel place and will leave you speechless. The movie shown (10am and 3pm) was ok too, very sad because it told the story of a couple that didn't survive the regime. After that we decided that there was no
need to see the killing fields as well. I'm not sure if I would like to stand on those grounds knwoing that not long ago hundreds of thousands were killed there (basically with bare hands because bullets were too precious).
Our Vietnam visa was organised within a day and the next morning we got on the bus to Ho Chi Minh City. So check back for news from Vietnam...
Advertisement
Tot: 0.087s; Tpl: 0.013s; cc: 11; qc: 52; dbt: 0.0579s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb