Cambodia - Part 1

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Hello!

It is a tough life drinking 50p pints in a bar next to the beach... he he.

We’re now in beach-side resort of Sihanoukville, Cambodia. After arriving late last night it was great to wake up to both glorious sunshine (not necessarily a given as rainy season here) and relief that we had managed to pick a decent place to stay the night before.

As I write this a baby gecko is climbing over the laptop.

Sihanoukville is very relaxed and chilled out, exactly what we need to unwind from the manic week leading up to the wedding. The beach is 5mins walk away and lined with ramshackle bars and cafes all desperate for your trade. The second you sit down you then get hassled lots by children selling anything and everything on the beach. After a while you manage to block it out and I amassed a friendship bracelet from Mali whose English was amazing for a 9yr old. Plan is to stay here for a couple more days (at least whilst the sun is shining) and then head up to Siem Reap and Angkor Wat.

Before arriving here we had 2 days in a very nice hotel in Bangkok (thank you Sean for finding and booking) and did very little bar a night time trip Khao Sand Road. We then flew into Pnom Penh and had 1 day there in (half in torrential rain!!). We visited the killing field Cheung Ek and the prison S-21. Both were harrowing and the latter especially as the prison was a converted secondary school and it all still felt very real and raw. The killing fields were very hard to comprehend, but they had 8,000 human skulls on show which brought home the enormity of it all.

To lighten the mood we stopped at the “Russian Market” on the way back to the hotel. A vast, hot, covered market, it sold everything you could imagine and Andy got a new rucksack as the zip had already broken on his original one! A bargain at $20!!!

A 6 hour bus trip then got us to Sihanoukville and dinner tonight on Serendipity beach. Last night we had dinner and drinks in “Monkey Republic” and Andy battled at pool with a Cambodian (midget) woman with the most interesting pool technique ever - but it worked - she whipped a guy who hadn’t lost all week and beat Andy twice although to be fair he won two games as well!

Thanks for all the tips and suggestions - keep ‘em coming; Vietnam is next...

Enjoy work; we’re enjoying the beer for you all,

Mr & Mrs Brown!!!

Marc & Howard - hope you enjoyed the footie, Ames & Pols - hope the kids are behaving

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Photos

Bangkok
The Honeymoon Suite!

Killing Fields, Cambodia
Memorial where the skulls are displayed

sihanoukville, Cambodia
Serendipity beach

Bangkok
Rooom with a view...

Bangkok
Proof that we are there if you look closely at the boat

Killing Fields, Cambodia
8,000 skulls are stored in a memorial to honour the dead at the killing fields we visited in Choenk Ek. Here over 17,000 people were murdered under the Khmer Rouge reign between 1975-1979. Altogether over 2m people were killed during the mass genocide.

Killing Fields, Cambodia
One of the mass graves

Killing Fields, Cambodia
Mass Grave

S-21 Prison, Cambodia
An old class-room that was modified to become a prison cell

S-21 Prison, Cambodia
Photogrpahs of the prisoners who where sent to the death - there were thousands of these people that were all very young

S-21 Prison, Cambodia
Prison cell that was formerly a classroom

Sihanoukville, Cambodia
The guesthouse where we stayed

Comments

[Gean Wynne]

your travels
following your travels closely. am quite envious cos never been to that part of the world. keep the news coming. thanks for blog , loads of love to you both gran x