Malaysia to Cambodia

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Arrived on the other side of the bridge, and found the bus into town. On my bus were Sara-Jane and Simon from England and we found a place to stay and went expolring. We visited the replica Portuguese ship and marine museum and got a free ride across the river because we couldn't be bothered to walk all the way down to the bridge. I complained to them that I only had 10 weeks left so for the whole of the rest of the time taking the mickey out of me! There was a really funny man who broke a coconut with his elbow at the night market, very good night market too. The guesthouse I was staying at had really great people staying and we had a few fun nights. There was a family from India who were teaching their two daughters backpacking so that they could go backpacking around Europe when they are a bit older. How cool is that?
In Melaka I also hired a bike and had a nice ride around, went on a riverboat cruise down the river and ate delicious food. It was quite an effort to leave to go to Kuala Lumpur as the staff even tried to get me to stay! Luckily I made it and found a really lovely place to stay that was brand new only opened that day, lush and cheap. What a find. There were a couple of girls already staying there so I found some food with them and had a few drinks at Reggae Bar, a bit of an institution in KL and met the owner and we went to the second branch with him too. The next day I went on the obligatory wanderings around the city and saw Merdeka Square, also known as independence square, there is a huge flag flying there that was installed in 1957 replacing the British flag that had previously been there. I went to the National History Museum and had a lovely chat with the security guard lady about her having two religions, slightly confusing but basically I think she wants to be a Christian but isn’t allowed because her family would disown her or beat her, so she remains a Muslim with an extra faith. Had a good look around the museum and read a lot about the different cultures and clothes that have been around. Then it began to rain, really hard so I sat in the entrance on the steps for a while and waited for it to stop. It eased off which was good enough and I went to the National Mosque, which is huge, 3000 men can fit into the main prayer hall and very beautiful and got dressed up to go inside. I was lucky to arrive at the time that tourists were allowed in as it was a Friday and there was only about an hour where I would have been allowed. I had a look around and met another lovely lady to talk to. I walked on to the old railway station and then got slightly lost and found the monorail station and caught that to an area of town called Bukit Bintang. It is the touristy area of town so I behaved as tourists do and had an ice cream and a foot massage, it was lovely. Back at base I got changed and met Andy, from my Western Australia tour for dinner. We realised whilst on the tour that we were both travelling some of the same route so with a little coordination we managed to meet up and we are currently travelling together. It’s fun, though it took a while to adjust to travelling with someone and having to consider someone else’s plans, it’s working out well. We had some dinner in China town and went for a drink before turning in. The next day I had intended to get up and go up the Petronas Towers but I overslept and decided just to go and see them instead. Bumped into Andy on his wanderings so he came too. Got monorail from near there to Bukit Bintang where we had a fish spa, basically where you put your feet in a fish tank and the fish eat the dead skin off your feet. It tickles like anything, and I’m not ticklish! It was funny but a bit pointless so I don’t think I’ll be doing that again. In the evening we bumped into Adam and Paul, two brothers who I had met in Melaka and we later went to fins a bar for the first England match which was on at 2.30am local time. By the time it started we were all quite merry and didn’t actually watch a lot of it but it was a fun evening. Didn’t get to bed until 5am though. This would have been fine of I could have had a lie in but I had booked to go to the Kuala Gandah elephant sanctuary the next day so had to be up bright and early for the bus to collect me. It was painful. Luckily I slept on the bus. I loved the elephants they were so cool! I got to feed them and stand next to them and I even had a ride on one of them! The sanctuary runs a program to relocate elephants that are destroying plantations to Taman Negara National Park where they can live without the threat of humans shooting them for trampling their crops. It was a really fun day out and I was exhausted by the time I got back. Haing said that I then went to see the Petronas Towers all lit up and then went back and finished packing to go to Cambodia the next day.

Had to be up at 3 to get to the airport at 5am for a 7am flight. We arrived in Siem Reap and checked in to a very pleasant guesthouse we then went temple exploring for the rest of the day. It was hot, really hot, unbearably so but the temples we went to see were very beautiful. We started over at Roluos Group as these were built first so we thought we would do that for the sake of chronology and you can see the difference in style as the period or king changed. The well preserved carvings on some of them are remarkable, considering they are 10,000 years old or older. I was glad to get back and do nothing for a while as the flight and the heat had really taken it out of me. Went to a night market later on and to Pub Street for some dinner and a couple of drinks of 50 cent beer.
The next day we were up early again to go and watch sunrise at Angkor Wat. It was a lovely view of the temple in silhouette against the brightening sky. Angkor Wat is huge and was really interesting to look around. There was part of it closed and covered in scaffolding due to restoration works but there is enough of it to look around to keep you occupied. It is magnificent. After we had spent a good hour or so there out tuk tuk driver drove us around some of the other more spectacular temples including those inside the walls of Angkor Thom, the former capital of the Angkor empire. Even the walls and the gates are huge and busy with carvings. It was really good to see them and to learn a little about the history. I don’t know a lot about the history of all the temples only what the guide book told me and what was written on some of the information signs at some of the temples so I won’t bore you by writing out the guide book but I have to say that the number and size of the temples is spectacular, it must have taken a lot of man power a lot of years to complete them all. One question I do have is over the so-called restoration of some of the temples that whichever country is restoring has basically decided to rebuild it almost to its’ former glory. I don’t like the way it looks as the stones they use don’t match in colour and it takes away from the fact these places are ruins and should be appreciated that way. There are a lot of countries with their finger in the Angkor pie, restoring temples (Germany, France, USA, India, Britain…), running the tickets (Japan), and generally profiting from Cambodia’s temples. It does provide a lot of jobs for Cambodian’s in the area though, and the tourist industry is set to grow. There is a lot of very prominent poverty in and around Siem Reap, people that have been maimed by mines and are trying to earn a living, children who beg or try and sell you all manner of things from scarves to musical instruments and people who are poor and simply ask you for money. I felt very useless to help anyone as I was told not to give money or buy things from the children because it encourages begging but it is hard to ignore people and at the same time you know you can’t feed all the street children of Cambodia. Though we did feed one. The same night on our way home some children stole all the t-shirts that Andy had bought at the market and tried to charge him to get them back. We weren’t having any of it and it was clearly a big game for them but once they returned all the t-shirts then started saying they were hungry, we were really quite angry at them but did try and explain that stealing people’s stuff is not the way to get them to show kindness to them. It is that sort of behaviour that can make one very cynical, but I know it is just a fight for survival for these people.
The next place we went to was a place called Battambang. The town is very small with not a lot going on but we met a lovely tuk tuk driver who took us on a tour to see a temple that had a lot of steps up to it that was similar in style to Ankor Wat, very good view of the surrounding country side as well. After lunch we went up the big hill on the back of motorbikes to some caves that the Khmer Rouge used to kill victims they brought up form the rice paddies. They might kill the parents out in the rice fields and then bring the children up to the caves to kill them too so that they would not seek revenge later in life. Very sad places still with an eerie atmosphere. I find it very difficult to understand and all I can do is question why. The Khmer Rouge, led by Pol Pot, who learned about communism while he studied in France, ruled the country and were involved in killing millions of people from 1975-78. In total the Khmer Rouge were killing people who didn’t agree or fit in with their regime for 3 years, 8 months and 20 days. Tony was telling us about how his family was separated and reunited years later, he was a very young child at the time. It makes you realise how recent and prominent still those events are.
The next day we got our visas sorted for Vietnam, 20mins and later went out to the Tonle Sap lake which was formed by Khmer Rouge slaves building a dam and waiting for the land to flood to become an irrigation system for the rice fields. Nowadays it is very calm and peaceful with people fishing from small boats and lotus flowers as far as the eye can see. We went on a boat on the lake, in the rain but it was still and beautiful. That night we caught the night bus to Sihanoukville in the south. A pretty little beach town with lots of lovely beaches and good food and company. Spent half a day on the beach and managed not to buy any bracelets despite the girls’ insistence. Met Lars on the bus and more people staying at the same place at the Dutch football game where the Japanese lost and were celebrating like they hadn’t, buying more beer and cheering and taking photos. They were so gracious. I also bumped into Siobhan and Tony from my Feejee Experience tour, sort of random except that I knew they were in the country. I love moments like that. That night we went down to the beach bars and met lots more people and didn’t pay for any drinks due to free drink offers at all the bars. It was fun and I had a discussion with a guy whose opinion differs so much from mine that it almost upset me because he thinks that it is ok/normal/how it should be that countries like Cambodia live on nothing and we enjoy the luxuries that we have and live in a quite selfish society. Opinions differ but I can’t get my head around that. The next day it rained so I had a Khmer massage and talked to lots of different people around the bar where I was staying. Later on a group of us went for dinner and to watch the New Zealand match with a guy whose birthday it was. I also rang my dad to say happy Father’s Day. Andy, Lars and I went on a day trip to Ream National Park on a bus there and took a boat along the river and went for a walk through the trees to a lovely beach. It was raining again so we all sat under shelter and head back a while later. Had a lovely lunch of BBQ’d barracuda and got back on the boat, went up a communication tower which looked rickety at best and it took us to the canopy but still couldn’t see over. That evening we met up with the gang from the other night again and played some pool and had beach bbq food, which was yummy and then off for some more free drinks. Fun night, some dancing involved.
Caught the bus the next morning to Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia and had a relaxed afternoon spotting sights such as the Royal Palace, the National Museum, Central Market and Independence Monument. Had a night in and an early night. The next day we visited Choeng Ek, the killing fields where they killed 300 people per day. The 126 mass graves are visible from excavation in 1980 and there is a big white stupa containing skulls, bones and clothing from the victims to serve as a remembrance memorial. Then to Tuol Sleng known as S-21 (security centre 21) to the Khmer Rouge it is a prison that from what I can tell mistreated and tortured people so badly that they must have prayed for death. The rest of the day Andy I did light-hearted things as learning about the Khmer Rouge, although important, is heavy, hard-hitting stuff that is difficult not to let in. We had some lunch by the river and went shopping at the market and later on went to watch the last England match at a bar in town. It had a good atmosphere and there were loads of people there. That was our last day in Cambodia. I loved it, Cambodia is a beautiful country with friendly people and it is obviously still recovering.
From Phnom Penh we caught a bus to the river and got a boat across the border to Chau Doc in Vietnam to start travelling around the next exciting country.

Love and blessings,
Jenny xxxx

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