Border Crossing in Paoy Pet

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The only thing that exceeds the utter disappointment of seeing Paoy pet as your first impression of the journey to cross from Thailand into Cambodia is the slimy and corrupt border officials, who will take any chance they can get, to empty your pockets of your newly acquired Cambodian Dong.
I arrived in Cambodia in April 2007 with a reasonably informed view of the state of the border town, and armed with a manual dictating the problems travellers can have getting into the Country. If I could locate the writer, I would like them to know that without the list of their troubles… I may still be sitting in the Cambodian Embassy waiting for a visa.
After hearing that the border officials will often charge tourists an additional US$25 in order to get their visas faster, myself and my brother decided to refuse to turn over the money and pay the regular fee for a visa. The bus load of people we arrived with obviously wanted no hassles and we sat and watched everyone get their visas within 10 minutes of application.
Despite repeated badgering from officials urging us to just give them the money so we could leave, we stuck with our principles and waited around an hour, before finally being begrudgingly handed our passports. For any future travellers, despite the annoying knowledge that these officials pocket this money immediately, I would suggest you pay up and get out of the place. Principles are overrated.
After receiving our passports, we began looking for a taxi to take us across to Siem Reap.
Your best bet is to speak to anyone you can on the bus ride to the border, and organise to share a cab, which will end up costing you from $45-$75 for a car full, although the reasonable price when we were there was $50.
We met up with two Singaporeans who wanted to get to Siem Reap, and we began walking along the road from the border.
Warning: If you want to avoid the seeing the extent of Cambodia’s poverty problem, get a ride immediately. As we walked, I was absolutely shocked by the state of ruin the town was in. We were tailed by our mafia border official (who apparently held a grudge) to make sure we would not catch any unregistered taxis. At one point, believing they were out of site, we managed to find one, only to be overrun with angry Cambodians on scooters, yelling and screaming, and only to be quietened by being given a hefty commission, AGAIN, to go straight in his pocket. We eventually found a legal taxi, who demanded the $50 up front. A word of advice is to only pay half, and half on completion of the trip, as they have been known to take you half way and then simply throw you out when they have the cash. Be very careful who you trust.
Don’t plan on sleeping or trying to relax on the long ride, as at numerous points in the journey, I expected the poor corolla to snap in half.
Your taxi driver, if you have half our luck, will insist on driving at 100 km/hr over dirt roads riddled with pot holes, other vehicles and, as per Asian tradition, hundreds of scooters.
After this trying experience, some encouraging words: Siem Reap will make you forget Poipet immediately, and imprint itself on your mind as one of the quaintest, most interesting and above all, most friendly towns you will visit in Asia. Plan a couple of days here, as you are sure to love the variety and culture of Siem Reap.

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