The So-Called 'Fast Boat'

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So this morning I got up at 5:30 am, checked out of the hotelm, and got a breakfast of barbecued meat (duck?) and egg with rice. I then got on the 'fast boat' to Siem Reap. It was about 60 feet long, with about 60 people on it. Jam packed, and people had some ridiculous luggage. One guy had a basket full of half grown chickens, and a lady had two baby chickens with their feet tied together that she just set down on the floor of the boat. Oh, if it wasn't already inferred, this boat wasn't just tourists, but rather 1/3 tourists, and 2/3 locals. Much cooler that way. Tourists pay $15, and I think locals pay like $6. There's a very clear two tier pricing system in this country.

About three hours into the boat ride we ran aground going around a turn, and the engine died. Haha - typical. I was told a 7 hour boat ride, but who knew when I'd get to Siem Reap? Flies were EVERYWHERE, they loved my feet. I had no time to grab lunch to bring on the boat with me, so I bought a bunch of bananas in teh morning market. Well, those bananas were destroyed before I even got on the boat. They all split open. Bananas - what was I thinking? Now the flies were flocking to them.

After about 10 minutes the engine was back and running. However, even with the motor running, it took another 5 minutes to push us off of the bank that the driver had somehow managed to accidentally wedge the boat onto. Finally, back to cruising down the river. However, it's very clear that this boat is too big for the river. We ran aground a total of 6 times, and the turns were wayyy too tight for the boat. They would have to use a stick to push and paddle the boat around the corner while idling the engine. The boat didn't capsize though, although it felt like it may with the number of people piled in, and the luggage up on teh roof. It also caused a large wake that splashed up on the exposed banks of the river, probably causing significant erosion. Not so much I could do now that I was on the boat though!

Nobody seemed to care about the wake or the erosion, nor do Cambodians seem to care about littering. Going from Poipet in the 'share taxi' I watched a man throw trash out the window. This morning I watched children throw the plastic around their water bottles into the river. It's also okay to have a cell phone and play low quality Khmer music from it. Nobody seems to care - such a different culture.

On the boat, I sat in a portable plastic chair in center. I originally had a seat at the edge of the boat, but I gave it up to an old lady. It was hard to take photos of the boats and bungalows being in the center of the boat though!!! I asked the driver if I could go onto the roof, but I got a response of "unstable".

It's funny, because designer clothes are popular here. Lacoste and Ralph Lauren polos are big, and Louis Vuitton purses. The lady to my left on the boat had a new Gucci handbag. Many people dress like an affluent society, but I assume that all of the apparel is counterfeit.

Luckily we stopped at a store on stilts in the water to buy drinks and lunch. I bought rice with barbecued (duck?) and eggs, again. It was served to me in a styrofoam container and then a plastic plag. The Cambodians and Thais seem to LOVE plastic bags. Every time I go into a store or up to a street vendor to buy a bottle of water, the try to give me a plastic bag with my bottle. Who needs a plastic bag for a water bottle? Especially when there is a handle on it to begin with. I wonder how recently all of these disposable items have become popular.

After buying lunch I got back on the boat and my seat was taken. A big-boned girl with bleach blonde hair, nose ring, tattoo, sunburn, cargo pants, tevas, and smoking a cigarette. Must be German. I verified my assumption an hour later when she opened a German magazine. Well, my seat in the center of the boat taken, I looked around for another seat, but there was no room! I finally squeezed in between an old lady and a 20 something year-old guy who wasn't into talking. I felt like a sardine, and didn't have enough room to relax my shoulders. 10 minutes later, the guy to my left vomits off of the side of the boat. Good job - at least it wasn't in my lap! I am glad I don't get seasick easily.

Across from me was a 2 year-old girl. Her mother was still breast feeding her. Don't people usually stop around like 6 months? I don't really know these things, but this girl seemed way to old to be breast fed. Interesting.

There was a small tour group on the boat with us, so I asked the vomiting man if he was on the tour. He (Ryan) is actually from California, traveling alone, 23, and graduated Berkley last year. Cool guy. I learned he left the U.S. because he quit his job in Boston and was sued by a non-compete, (I don't fully understand), and decided he would rather go on a vacation than spend thousands of dollars on lawyer fees to be able to work in Boston sooner than 6 months from now. He had already seen Malaysia and Thailand, and didn't seem to know what he was going to do in Cambodia.

He told me that he was planning on spending more time in Malaysia, but was in one of the major cities and went out drinking one night. After 4 am, he doesn't remember anything until 4 pm. Something must have been slipped into his drink. When he came back to reality, he realized his money ($800), passport, and debit card were all gone, and there was a condom by his bed. He has no clue if he was raped or not. He canceled his debit card, and $6000 had already been spent. Whoa! He then went to a mall where the card had been used, and saw the CCTV image of who was using the card - a Chinese man. So, he has no clue if he slept with a man or not. Wow. Really, really fucking scary.

As we neared lake Tonle Sap, we passed entire communities floating on the water. The houses are built on a pile of bamboo, which allows them to float (and thus sink and rise because the river and lake fluctuate enormously). Very, very cool. Lots of people swimming, and drinking the water. The water color is a muddy brownish green - so it's not some crystal clear river. Clearly a lot of silt....and bacteria surely. When you live on a floating house, where do you go to the bathroom? The river seems to be the only option. Ryan said he went to the bathroom at the lunch stop, and the toilet was a hole in the house (this one was on stilts) down to the river. How do you drink and swim in the water you defecate in? This is another world. (Professor Fox, correct me on this if I am wrong, because it seems hard to believe they swim in the same water they defecate in).

Finally, after a little over 9 hours (the ride was supposed to be 7), we made it to Siem Reap, well, at least a little port a few miles outside of Siem Reap. We took a tuk-tuk into town, and asked the driver to take us to a guesthouse. The first one he took us to was $15 a night, with a swimming pool - too expensive. The next one he took us to has $1 rooms! They were all booked with those, but had $6 rooms without air conditioning. Perfect. We were shown the rooms, and they are HUGE. You can live like a king spending $15 a day on food and lodging. It's the transportation that gets expensive (only relative though, very very relative). The guesthouse is full of backpackers, and even has a rooftop bar selling $.50 draft beer!

We explored the town a bit, and it is really a nice town. Very touristy, but that's expected. Most importantly there is very little trash - at least less than Battambang. Some of the restaurants in the town are quite trendy, and I swear they look like they would fit in any major city in the U.S., only the meals are $3 to $4 - and that's expensive. A roadside stand will feed you for $1 to $2. Wonderful. We found a nice Khmer restaurant, and I introduced Ryan to amok fish curry, but it wasn't as good as the one I made. After dinner, we explored the market and bought lots of fresh fruit. We tried local bananas, mangosteen, lyche, and mango. Cambodia is supposed to have some of the best mango in the world! It was quite good.

We're both exhausted from the hot boat trip. It's hard work pretending to be a sardine! We just set up a tuk-tuk to pick us up at 5:00 am, and tomorrow we go explore Angkor Wat,a dn watch the sunrise. I'm very excited, as I have seen this place in so many books, but ugh, up so early tomorrow!

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Comments

[merritt's sister]

sardines!
I love the comments about the lack of environmentalism. I always wondered where people go to the bathroom in those situations too. what did people do if they had to pee while on the boat? Yes, some people even breast feed up to age four. I think they especially do it a long time in countries where there is little neutrition and breast milk is supposed to be full of critical vitamins and antibodies. That is so unbelievably scary about what happened to your friend. Has he gone for an AIDS test after maybe being raped? How do so many westerners end up there in Cambodia wandering around? Are there many tour groups?