Advertisement
Published: February 14th 2009
Day 33/34 - Sihanoukville (don't ask us how to pronounce it as we still aren't quite sure, we call it SV)
WE FORGOT OUR PASSPORTS IN PHNOM PENH!!! S was more panicked then G, since S wasn't sure if a guesthouse in SV would let us stay there w/o a passport. S did have a photocopy of her passport so she just hoped they would accept that. Luckily when we got to the place we wanted to stay at - Monkey Republic - it was no issue. However, we would have to circle back to Phnom Penh eventually for our passports but at least we had a roof over our head for the next for nights. Monkey Republic (MR) only had one double room (bungalow) left, but for $8.00 it didn't matter that it was the closest bungalow to the bar. Or the fact that it had no A/C, no hot water and no flushable toilet (to flush you pour buckets of water into the bowl and wait for gravity to do its work).
MR is a popular backpacker/ holiday place to stay and was full of young westerners and Aussies. This was the most Caucasian people we had
seen in one place since we've been in Asia. We immediately knew that this wasn't a city we would be in love with. Across the street from MR was a movie theater that was playing "Slumdog Millionaire"at 8PM for $3.00 so we decided to check it out. The theater was small, consisting of couches and scoop chairs, so we were lucky we got in considering we were not the first people waiting in line. The movie was really good and even though it took place in India, some of things were relevant to life in Cambodia (begging street children, poverty stricken communities and exploitation). On our way back, a lovely English girl - Andrea - we had met at the rest stop was hanging out at the bar in MR, so we decided to join her for the rest of the night and headed to the beach.
The beach was lined with restaurants that had tables and comfy chairs set up in the sand with all sorts of bar-b-que and drink specials. We settled on one place, relaxed and enjoyed a beer. Andrea saw a group of English guys she had met in Laos and they invited us to
meet them at a nearby place on the beach. We finished our drinks and walked over to the bar/restaurant/club. It was full of really obnoxious drunk British chav girls and boys (no offense - but you English people reading know the type of people we are talking about). We stayed for a drink but decided to leave - if we wanted to get wasted with a bunch of 20 year olds we would have saved our money and just gone to Panama City, FL. I mean , if we were with a bunch of friends on a two week holiday, it might have been fun, but it just wasn't what we are here for. It was the worst of Ibiza, Thailand and Cancun all rolled into one.
The next morning we woke up to one of gloomiest days we've seen in Asia so far. We cursed ourselves for not checking the weather report before coming to the beach. Before we were going to shell out the $20 to snorkel the next day, we decided to checkout the forecast for the next few days. It wasn't good. Rain, Rain , Rain. So we decided to save our money and booked
a ticket back to Phnom Penh to retrieve our passports. We stayed in doors for most of the afternoon as it rained on and off, but we did manage to upload a bunch of TV shows and movies onto our ipod for really cheap so that was the highlight of our day. Eventually the rain let up and we met up with Andrea and headed to the beach for the cloudy sunset. We walked the beach for a while and the minute we sat down, we were bombarded with women trying to give us manicures and little girls selling us bracelets. G caved in first and got a manicure, then Andrea, but S remained a firm "no'". Well for about 2 minutes then finally after so much harassing she just gave in. It was the crappiest mani ever but for $2, whatev. This one girl tried her best to get G to buy a bracelet, but G won the battle and the little girl left empty-handed. Steph's girl hit the jackpot as she made a over-priced bracelet for S's niece.
Later that night we got some beers at the bar at MR and chatted with one of the owners
for a bit. The owners were all stereo-typical expats that think they are better then everyone else. So we finished our beers and went to have some seafood (barracuda) on the beach. It was a low key night and we said our goodbyes to Andrea and headed to bed as we were leaving bright and early for Phnom Penh the next day.
xxx
S & G
Advertisement
Tot: 0.064s; Tpl: 0.027s; cc: 8; qc: 23; dbt: 0.0273s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
che
non-member comment
"...if we wanted to get wasted with a bunch of 20 year olds we would have saved our money and just gone to Panama City, FL. I mean , if we were with a bunch of friends on a two week holiday, it might have been fun, but it just wasn't what we are here for. It was the worst of Ibiza, Thailand and Cancun all rolled into one..." .you snobby mothafuckers.