Siem Reap and Back

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After a long couple of weeks of hard work, we all decided to take a deserved break in Siem Reap, finally getting out of Phnom Penh! We took a 7 hour minibus northward, along the river, all the way to what was to be a lovely weekend.



With nothing bad to say about the journey, apart from the fact that the seat in front of Emma was infested with ants appearing from every nook and cranny - the poor French guy sitting there didn't have a clue, but in fairness, it was probably better that he didn't - we can quickly move on to our superb Siem Reap stories.



We arrived mid afternoon on Friday and immediately took a dunk in an ice-cold pool. So unbelievably refreshing you cannot imagine. I cannot emphasise enough how necessary it is to book a hostel with a swimming pool every single time you have a long journey.



So, Friday evening we took a brisk walk around Pub Street - the tourist centre of Siam Reap - to find some food to eat before heading to book our place on "Siam Reap's number 1 bar crawl". The dinner was exquisite. A duck curry with jasmine steamed rice. Mouth-wateringly delicious. I kid you not, during dinner I quickly saw off 2 pints of 'Cambodia Beer' (legend) and I was already gone. Either I'm a serious lightweight or I was seriously dehydrated, but let's be honest, it was clearly both of those things. We walked for about 500m to X-bar to buy our $10 bar crawl entry tickets which promised 4 free drinks...



We quickly galloped back to our hostel which was only about 10 minutes away, gathered up some loose change that we were inevitably going to spend and had a quick shower and a change and we were off. We looked like the biggest bunch of dweebs. All heading out in our Siem Reap bar crawl vests, of which mine was too small for me. One size fits all they said... Over this holiday, if the Cambodians have taught me one thing, it's that in their country, I'm larger than morbidly obese.



After another small hike back to X-bar we realised we were late and ran on to the next bar. We met up with everybody and picked up our first free drink, a butters shot of whiskey or a beer, of which I obviously had the beer whilst the girls and Shyam nailed the disgusting shot. Legends.



After a few games of flip-cup and watching a game of beer pong - we didn't even get involved... - we quickly reconsidered the $10 as a fair price tag. I mean, it was the best bar crawl in Siem Reap but it was the world's worst bar crawl - work that one out. We headed on to the next place after about an hour and a half and saw-off our second rank shot. Some tiny cocktail of crap that was probably leftover from a previous night. It was less like a bar crawl and more like a "let's stay at this bar for 2 hours and then move on". We decided we couldn't even be bothered anymore, took the $10 hit and went back to Siem Reap hostel.



I don't want to do Siem Reap too much injustice as it is a fabulous city as we discovered the next morning. We had a nice lie in and went to the markets. A bit more spending was inevitable and we grabbed a small bite. Emma and Verity then decided a tanning day was required, so paid a few dollars to go to a swimming pool of a much nicer hotel next to us. Shyam and I took a nice dunk in our cool (temperature reference) outside-but-under-cover pool and had a good boys relaxation session, before I cracked on with a bit more revision, whilst Shyam continued powering through books on his Kindle.



I must tell you a bit more about Saturday though. It was the dreaded day of the worst diarrhoea of my life. About ten times worse than the previous time I mentioned. If you get queezy easily I suggest moving on... Throughout the day, I was on and off of the toilet, losing about half a litre of fluid each time. My poos worsened throughout the day and transformed from wet brown poos in the morning to literally green water by the end of the day. When we came back from dinner that evening I told Facebook (check out my face-morphed diarrhoea picture on there) that I had pooed 7 times. This was at 8pm I think. Before bed I had reached a marvellous 10. Just to put things into perspective, I even had to apply some Sudocrem to the area (ewww) just because I'd been using toilet paper that was pretty much newspaper the whole day! Sorry for the image created, I thought it was too funny not to share. Just before bed I phoned Mum and Dad who were partying in Edinburgh, pretty much crying down the phone just to tell them my issues, only for Mum to tell me what I already knew - "eat solid foods and keep to rice and bread. Stay hydrated too". Thanks Mum! But your voice did make me feel better already! (Awwww what a schmoozer) At this point in the night I had really reconsidered not going to Angkor Wat the next morning. Emski prescribed me some Immodium instants in addition to some Diarrolyte and I slept like an ikle baby...



Until 4am, when we were already up to get a tuk-tuk to Angkor Wat to watch the sunrise. This was also a lovely day. With myself all congested from the immodium - terrific by the way - we spent a brisk 6 hours walking round temple after temple. I reckon the four of us had lost interest after the first temple (well I did anyway), but all of us pretended we were enjoying it the whole time. After the 6 hours was up, bearing in mind it was only about 11:30 am, we grabbed the tuk-tuk driver and said "home".



Emma and I had decided that it was time for a nice romantic getaway for the rest of the day and evening, so we booked (Emma found) an unbelievable four star hotel, just down the road from the hostel, for a mere $14 each - unheard of anywhere else! We were greeted with icy flannels to wipe our face - heavenly; even beating the warm towels given to you after a Chinese at Tai Pan - and we were shown to our room, which we were upgraded to a King-Size, poolside, huge room. There is no other word than heavenly. It was literally heavenly after what we had been through already. Heavenly, heavenly, heavenly. We grabbed lunch (still the same day!) by the pool and had a nice afternoon dip in the first clear-water pool we had experienced.



We had an afternoon kip to recharge our batteries and headed back out to Siem Reap, only for the hotel to tell us they have free tuk-tuks into town. Bloody hell. What a find Ems!!



We had a nice romantic, sweaty meal at a Latino Steakhouse, where Ems had a Hawaiian Pizza and I got 3 mini mixed burgers. Amazing meal. By the end of the meal, at only 9pm, we were already falling asleep and so grabbed the nearest tuk-tuk back to the hotel. We got in, climbed into bed and immediately fell asleep... Only to wake up at exactly the same time, at 4am covered in sweat, struggling to breathe, because we had forgotten to put the blinking air conditioning on! Haha



We laughed it off and fell back to sleep. We are currently on the hottest bus ever back to Phnom Penh, covered in sweat, with mini swimming pools on everyone's seat, but at least there are a few other tourists this time! It is a sauna on here. We should be back in another couple of hours so I can upload this hilarious blog.



All is good and pooping is healthier. Apart from, I forgot (!), I pooped in another hole halfway through the coach journey! Weirdly starting to enjoy it.. LOL.



Love you all,



Blog again soon,



Love Tobes and Ems of course xxxxx

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