Encountering Cambodia and Vietnam - Siem Reap, Tuesday 2016 February 16

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After 25 hours elapsed time travelling, I arrived at the Garden Boutique Angkor Hotel, a lovely small hotel on a side street. The garden was in the quad, surrounding an enticing, fairly large swimming pool. The side street is off another side street.

I just finished (4:20 pm) a walk up to the night market, which my guide recommended as a place to have dinner after dark, which comes about 7:00; however, my brain is too discombobulated to contemplate such a negotiation. In my cowardly way, I will eat at the hotel.

Except for the major road into town (and perhaps others), streets here are devoid of sidewalks and full of constant streams of motorcycles, bicycles, and tuk tuks. Just enough vans and SUVs passed by to deter me from trying to cross the main street leading to the night market. I stayed on the sunny side, not particularly wise in the 30°C heat. The sides of the streets are effectively broken cement deteriorating into dust, similar to the roadway itself. The key was to walk slowly and steadily to enable the drivers to avoid me. Relatively few other people were walking.

I took the opportunity to fruitlessly enquire about a plug convertor. Inadvertently, I seem to have not packed my two converters, although I distinctly remember choosing them - probably tidied them away into the drawer again. The hazard of relying on technology! Thus I am pushed back into hand-written notes, after committing to use my new Surface computer. I hope Noy, my guide, can help tomorrow.

This morning, Noy met me at the airport, with a comfortable Toyota Camry. To my surprise, no one else was joining this tour extension, so I will have a private four-day tour of Angkor Wa. Good and bad – usually other participants ask interesting questions.

My exit from the visa scramble at the airport was very late because I was confused by the signage. The visa ($US30) is obtained on arrival. The first line I joined was for passport control. “Over there!”, I was told. All I could see was a mass of people. I joined the apparent line, wondering why so many people were hastily completing forms handed out on the airplane. When I reached him, the official said, “You need the form!” “Another form?”, I mewed plaintively. He turned away dismissively, “Another form!” Wandering through line-up barriers, I spied a woman filling out a form different from those I had. She kindly pointed exactly to the visa application forms in the middle of the melee. I hastily filled out the form while standing in the now long line-up; the form asked all the same questions as the visitor card and the customs form. Admittedly, the staff were working as fast as humanly possible, barking peremptory instructions to those who faltered. The long line was for paying and surrendering one's passport. To one side of the line-up barriers was a large huddle of all the travellers waiting for their passports to be returned. One official’s job was to hold up the passports in turn, allowing us to recognize our own, as his ability to pronounce so many foreign names was fading.

Except for being long, my flights were uneventful. Cathay Pacific across the ocean could be considered comfortable, a minor miracle in these days of cramped legroom. Having left Calgary at 11:15 pm, my body had been ready for sleep, so I napped on the way to Vancouver and out of Vancouver. However, the airline practice of keeping the lights out for about nine hours on trans-Pacific flights irritated me after about six hours of naps and twitchy muscles. I edited photos on my new Surface, happy to discover some efficiencies on this platform. Then I watched the movie, Room; I became so engrossed I could hardly realize that I was actually in the sky over an ocean. Oddly, I was seated (middle seat of the middle section) in the midst of a University of Calgary Travel Study program to Bali, featuring food writer John Gilchrist, seated next to me. He told me Cambodian food was bland. Later I chatted with Lois, who led my trip to India. The tour was flying so far for only two weeks’ stay! Not worth the effort – a month is much better.

In my room, I concluded my afternoon with a set of stretches to loosen my tortured muscles – very relaxing – and counterproductive to my efforts to stay awake! Swimming worked better.

Dinner: delicious turmeric-based chicken curry with green beans, Angkor beer. Cost $US10.

View Siem Reap on the map.

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Photos

Central Boutique Angkor Hotel
An oasis after long flights and confusing border bureaucracy!

Siem Reap street
Buzzing cure for jet lag

French Colonial architecture
...of what?

Traditional Cambodian architecture
...of what?

Construction crew
Not quite how we do it, but it works

Cool swim at the end of a hot day
Central Angkor Boutique Hotel

Comments

[Isabel Gibson]

Cowards all
I guess cowardice is relative. I'd consider your solo travel to Cambodia pretty brave, and give you a pass on eating in the hotel. Do the immigration folks at the airport want some help with their wayfinding, do you think? And were all the Cambodians built like those guys on the roof?

[Vivian Brennen]

Cambodia & Vietnam
Enjoyed the interesting blog. My daughter who lives in Toronto, just ran a marathon in Bagan Myanmar and they are on their way to Vietnam. Yesterday morning they took a balloon ride at sunset over the Bagan temples. Anxious to hear how they enjoyed that - have you done that yet? Keep blogging, Vivian