We are currently on the second night of a three day two night tour.  It’s gone quite well but there are a few things I’d like to tell you about.  First of all, this whole organized tour thing is a new experience for us.  Until this point, we’ve been die hard independent travelers, no tours or agencies for us.  What we’re finding in Vietnam however is that it’s considerably cheaper and a lot easier to take a tour rather than do it yourself.  For example, our present tour cost 56$US (although the tour guide told us in no uncertain terms that the currency in Vietnam is the Dong, not US$ nor Cambodian Riel).  The price includes two nights accommodation, a few bus journeys, all entrance fees, some boat rides and a couple of breakfasts, we thought that was a good deal.

The tour started off in Chau Doc, a nice little town bordering Cambodia.  The first thing on the tour was a boat ride to a fish farm and then to a Cham minority village.  The fish farm was quite interesting.  It’s a floating house with a sort of fish cage under the house.  It’s quite ingenious because it’s a farm and a place of residence all in one (yes, the entire family lives in the house).  As far as the Cham minority village is concerned, well, I’m not exactly sure how much of a minority the village is since the people seem to live a lot like all of the other people do around here, but what do I know?  I did learn, well sort of, how a weaving loom works and I had a bunch of young women follow me around the village (ok, the young women were small girls trying to sell me buns, 1 for 2000 Dong or 8 for 1$US which of course works out to the same price).  It was kind of fun and Bry bought a really neat folding bag.  So the morning was going well, we saw interesting stuff, had a good tour guide and we were only about an hour into the tour.  This is the point were the tides started to change.  When we got back to the boat we were informed that the group was being split into two; us and another woman were going back to town and everybody else was going to Cambodia.  This was our first lesson of Vietnamese tours, there are people coming and going from different tours and boats and busses at all times.  I’m not sure how they keep it straight.  Anyways, we got back into town and we were supposed to take a bus to Can Tho.  I assumed that since we were on a tour, we would be going with other tour people on a tour bus.  Wrong!  We were dropped off at the local bus station and crammed on a local bus with the locals.  Now there’s certainly nothing wrong with the locals but have you ever seen one of those little clown cars that they pack with twenty or so clowns?  That’s kind of what the local busses are like and they don’t leave the station until all of the seats are full.  And of course they are completely willing to pick up extra passengers along the way.  So we’re jammed on this bus, actually it’s not a bus but a minivan, and our driver must have been a former F1 driver; if he wasn’t passing someone, he was honking at someone else, it was an experience.  Once we got into Can Tho, we were dumped off the minivan into a frenzied crowd of taxi drivers, nothing new there.  However this time we were supposed to be picked up but how do you know who is supposed to be picking you up?  This one particular driver seemed to know that he was supposed to be picking up three people, but he couldn’t speak english so we didn’t really know if he was the guy or just one of the other drivers.  He brought us to a hotel, and we tried to confirm that it was the right place and of course no one could speak any english.  Something else I’ve learned is that the Vietnamese seem to be very insistent people and when you don’t do as they want they tend to get very loud very quickly.  Things got a bit noisy until they found someone who spoke english and called the tour agency for us.  Once that was all settled, we had a bite to eat, explored a bit and it was then that my body started to ache.  It was a bit of a long night, diarrhea, vomiting, one thing that was really neat was shivering and having goose bumps in a 30+ degree room plus humidity.  My ailment, which of course also turned into Bryana’s, wasn’t too bad, it went away within a couple of days.  The real problem was that we weren’t able to go on the tour like we were supposed to.  Bryana went down the morning when we were supposed to commence the tour to explain I was sick and if we could continue the tour in a day or two.  Our english speaking tour guide indicated that this was no problem but Bryana wasn’t really sure he understood since he really didn’t speak english that well.  Anyways, our sick days went pretty well partly due to the fact that we managed to get a free wireless internet signal and turn on the ‘locked’ A/C unit in our room (never leave home without your American Express or a screwdriver).

The morning arrived that we were healthy, or at least tired of being sick.  We had breakfast and then boarded a very nice tour bus.  We were seated and ready to leave when our tour guide, who could speak very clear and loud english announced that there were two extra people on the bus.  We knew it was us so we explained that we had been sick and were resuming the tour.  After repeatedly asking us the details, he told us that if we had gotten healthy just one day earlier everything would have been fine.  But since it took us one day too long, the current tour was being run by a different tour company.  That was another lesson for me, not only are people coming and going in your tour but there are multiple tour companies coming and going as well.  As he was explaining this to us he told the bus driver to go which I thought was a good sign.  Anyways, we were allowed to go on the tour of the floating markets.  It was interesting.  The people in southern Vietnam use their canal systems probably as extensively as they do their roads.  I think that what happens is instead of loading their goods into their boats and then unloading them at a market, they simply leave them in the boat and float around from boat to boat and do their shopping.  It wasn’t a spectacular sight, but something new for me.  After nearly frying in the sun and then ironically nearly getting drenched by the 10:00am thunderstorm, we boarded our bus which, surprise, had about 10 new people and no new seats.  No problem since we were going just a short distance for lunch.  After lunch a second bus and tour guide appeared and the group was split.  As we were getting on the bus our tour guide informed me that everything was now ok and we could continue the tour, thanks for letting me know!  He also wanted our ticket.  A lesson I’ve learned in Asia is that little pieces of paper mean everything; they are your tickets, your proof of payment, your visa, etc.  If you lose that piece of paper, the tour company isn’t going to look up your name on their computer.  The tour guide was very insistent that I give him the ticket and reassured me that everything was fine.  We’ll see how that goes.

After a pleasant ride with our new Australian accented Vietnamese tour guide, we arrived in My Tho.  Immediately upon arrival we were dumped off the bus, two new busses appeared along with a bunch of new tourists and our group was split up (I think I’m starting to see a pattern).  A guy drove us and a couple of other tourists to our hotel…which wasn’t our hotel since it was full.  We’re actually not sure it was a hotel or that it was full, the guy didn’t really speak great english.  The hotel man then led us on foot down the road to our actual hotel.  We were informed that we were really lucky to get a room because this hotel wasn’t informed that we were coming until really late in the day or something like that – again, the language barrier makes it impossible for us to be sure.

After checking in we decided to go out for a bite to eat.  Unfortunately our Lonely Planet guide wasn’t very optimistic about My Tho’s eating establishments.  It didn’t recommend the place on the river because the décor was lacking as well as the food.  Not good praise.  It did however recommend a couple of places were you could find local food.  This is something I don’t understand about the book; when you’re in Vietnam finding Vietnamese food is easier than finding a bad smelling bathroom.  What I really need the book to tell me is how to find a good pizza or a decent burger in a country that probably doesn’t have a word for either of these.  After finding and then passing by the books’ recommended eateries, well, we were really hosed.  Let me take a moment to give you a sense of what a typical local restaurant is like.  The first thing you notice is the glass food cabinet at the front of the establishment.  This is typically where they keep the cooked chicken, duck, pork, vermin, etc on display.  They also typically have bubbling pots and bowls filled with soups and pastes and who knows what else.  My biggest problem with the food cabinet is that it’s not refrigerated or kept hot, the food just sits there, usually in the sun, and you have no idea how long it’s been there.  My philosophy is if you love your colon, skip the food cabinet.  Unfortunately all of the eating enterprises in this town seemed to only have the food cabinet…but wait!  Someone offered us a menu and spoke a few words of english.  That was all we needed.  After ordering a couple of items from the menu that no longer existed, we managed to get chicken and rice and some spring rolls.  The food came and we’ll just say that the rice was excellent and there weren’t many flies.  The real kicker is that it was one of the most expensive meals we’ve had in Vietnam, it would have easily paid for 2 pizzas!  After eating a meal like this you always are left wondering if the suffering is over.  They say an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure so we decided to consume the last ounces of our $2, and yes that was for the big bottle, whisky that we keep for these types of situations, we’re both feeling fine.  Well I feel fine except for the hair the whiskey burnt off of my toes, but other than that…  Tomorrow we’re moving on to Saigon and there’s no way I’m going to be sick enough to spend another day in My Tho.

We've both been sick for a couple of days. Probably another flu bug, but not that bad. Rich was sicker than I was; it was only bad for 36 hours or so. Neither of us had a fever high enough to require a hospital trip.

But we did end up missing day 2 of our three day tour. We hope we can just resume our trip in the morning, now that we're feeling better.

Since we slept most of the last two days, there isn't much in the way of news, so I'll just leave you with a story about our lunch.

For lunch we had pizza, again, Rich needs pizza at least once a week. I'm starting to wonder if he has a dependancy. Anyway, as we were chatting and enjoying the view, Rich suddenly started emptying his pockets.

He asked, “So, what kind of dong do you have?” (Still love those dong jokes).

“Not much,” I said.

“Enough to pay for our meal?”

“No. You?”

“I have 22,000.”

“I have 30,000. Close, but not enough.”

“Hmmm. So?”

“Maybe they’ll take US dollars? Or maybe there is an ATM around here?”

“There might be.”

“One of us could go.”

Rich looked at the map and found an ATM nearby. “Yeah,” he said. “There’s one just over here. I’ll make a run.”

“Okay.”

Rich stood up. “If I’m not back in half an hour…”

“Order more beer?”

“No. If I’m not back in half an hour,” he grinned, “I’ll see you in Canada.”

 Rich did come back, eventually, and he had a wad of dong. I guess he got lost on the way to the airport.

We’re now in Vietnam. We took the slow boat – very enjoyable - no pirates!

The border crossing went rather smoothly except that the Cambodian Immigration Officer forgot to stamp Rich out of the country. Thankfully, we checked our passports before getting back on the boat. We went back to the window to point out the error. The officer looked very confused, as if he couldn’t possibly have forgotten, but he stamped Rich’s passport without a fight. It was the first thing they checked when we got to the Vietnam border. It’s not that big a deal really, the worst that would have happened is that Rich would have had to take a 5 minute water taxi back for the stamp.

We were really happy that our visas were okay.  When we went to the Vietnamese embassy in Phnom Penh, the guard wouldn't let us go into the office. He wanted to see our passports and then told us he would have our visas processed for us. And he did. He charged us the same price as in the office, but somehow he got a cut, we're sure of it. But we're in, all is well, no worries.

Before we were officially in Vietnam, we had lunch. That, and everything since, has been really cheap. We can eat at a cheap restaurant for well under a dollar, partly because there are no more US dollars, it’s all Dong. (The currency has a really great name that has been fuel for many jokes in the last couple of days. For instance, ‘I keep my Dong in my pocket’ or ‘where’s your Dong?’)

Hotels are cheap too. We ended up in a really great hotel in Chau Doc that was only 5 bucks. It was on the 3^rd (actually 4^th) floor and we had a corner room with big patio doors and a balcony. Since it was one of the tallest buildings in town, we had great views (especially of the thunderstorms).

Chau Doc was a great place to explore, or just sit and relax. Vietnam has a different feel from the places we’ve seen thus far so it’s fun just to watch the people and listen to the sounds.

The people here are really aggressive. They not only shout at us, but they point at our faces and grab our arms. They are very insistent; we say, “No, we don’t want a tour of the city.” They reply, “Yes! One hour. Very cheap. OK? Come now!” as they re gripping our arms and leading us toward their bicycle drawn cart. The women at the restaurants are really scary and they don’t have to say a word. Their gestures and scowls clearly indicate what they want - like sign language. When I walk by they make me feel like I’m 8 years old and being scolded by my mother and I’d better go in and sit down on that chair, right now… or else.

We had a great time fighting with motorbike taxi drivers at Sam Mountain. The mountain isn’t exactly huge, but it’s the type of mountain I’d want to climb when the forecast is “Frost overnight, partly cloudy throughout the day with an expected high of 22 Celsius.” The only way we were getting to the top of that mountain was by a motorbike taxi. And we think the taxi drivers knew that, because they wouldn’t leave us alone. Eventually, as we were starting to draw a crowd of curious onlookers, I asked, “How much?”

I think the guy that answered was something like the motorbike taxi gang leader, since he seemed to handle all of the negotiations. There were several other drivers parked around us, just watching the spectacle. His reply sounded something like, “Hie maa, hie maa…” I think he was trying to repeat my question, ‘how much’. Then he shouted at a young girl and beckoned her over. He spoke to her.

She turned to us and said, “Two people, sixty thousand dong.”

“No,” said Richard. “Too much.”

The girl translated it back into Vietnamese and the reply came back, “For two people, fifty thousand dong.” She had some trouble saying fifty, but with a show of fingers we figured it out.

“Too much,” I said. “Could we walk up?”

Everybody was talking at once, and I mean a lot of people. There were the women from the restaurant behind us, several drivers, a few curious passers-by and somebody’s grandmother who seemed to be loudly opinionated.

The girl was listening to everybody talk, but she eventually replied, “Walk is possible, but is very difficult.” No news there. I tried to ask her where the path was to walk up, but she didn’t understand, or hear, possibly, on account of the shouting.

The girl leaned forward to listen to the lead driver. Then she translated, “Two people, forty thousand.”

Not a great bargain, but fearing a riot, we accepted. We thanked the girl, complimented her on her English and gave her a Canadian flag pin, which she seemed to like. The ride up was fun (or if you want Richards opinion, substitute the word ‘fun’ with ‘terrifying’). The views were nice. And since the rice down didn’t appeal to Rich, we decided to walk down the mountain; a rather sweaty, exhausting walk despite our cooperation with gravity.

With Sam Mountain checked off our list, we were ready to move on. The Mekong delta is river country, so in order to really see the sights you need a boat. We decided to take a 3 day tour.

The tour started at 7AM sharp, really sharp. Punctuality… what a treat.

Quick visit to a fish farm, they had puppies, so that was enjoyable. Then we went to a local village where the women weave cloth. We hadn’t been yet, and it was neat. Rich was fascinated by the shuttlecocks.

Then we went to Can Tho by the most insanely driven van – craziest ride ever. The driver would honk the horn every two seconds. We aren’t sure why they don’t just use some kind of intermittent relay for the horn. That way the driver could focus on weaving, dodging and braking and forget about honking altogether. I’m not sure why he was honking in short blasts, come to think of it. All of the other drivers just laid on the horn as we went by. We made good time though.

Once we arrived at the Can Tho Bus station (we were happy to find out later that we did get off at the right place) we followed a man to a shuttle bus and he took us to our hotel. There was one other lady with us who was sure we were at the wrong hotel. We weren’t sure, but since nobody spoke any English, we were having a very hard time confirming that our shuttle bus and hotel were in fact part of our tour. This tour is apparently “self guided” to some degree. Eventually, after a phone call and the arrival of an English speaking employee, we confirmed that we were at the right place. Or so we hope… we’ll find out in the morning.

 

 

Richard’s summary:

Before going to Cambodia there were a number of things I expected to see.  I had heard, or at least I thought I had heard, that the Khmer Rouge would often cut off people’s hands.  Thankfully I can report that I did not see thousands of people with no hands.  In fact I saw nobody missing a hand.  Something else I had heard was that Cambodia has many landmines and that it’s not really safe to walk anywhere except for the road or a well worn path.  In fact, I had heard that when you’re driving down a road and you encounter the call of nature, you should never seek out a private area to do your business for fear of stepping on an unexploded land mine.  Rather, you should let loose on the side of the road where you know it’s safe.  After hearing this I had visions of Cambodian roads lined with squatting people.  Again I’m pleased to report most of this isn’t true.  There are still places with land mines, hundreds of unfortunate people every year step on them, but the problem seems to be diminishing.  I had also heard that Cambodia is one of the poorest countries and unfortunately this seems to be true.  There are constantly people asking for money and food.  Many of them are children, some of them are mothers and many of them are amputees (landmine victims).

I had heard from fellow travelers that Cambodians are some of the sweetest, nicest people around.  And we did meet some.  I remember one of the rest stops our bus stopped at; we were greeted by people selling refreshments and treats of the bug variety (big beetles, grasshoppers, tarantulas, etc).  Not too many people bought any of these snacks, although some people did try a bug or two.  What I especially remember is once the frenzy of selling was over, there were the tourists and the people touting their snacks, nobody could really speak the others language, yet everyone was sort of standing around “talking” and laughing and having fun. 

What Bryana has to say:

It would be wrong to say that I’ve seen Cambodia, because I’ve seen so little. We saw a couple of cities, a few villages, a bunch of highways and a big river. The rest remains a mystery, since we just couldn’t get there. I almost wish we’d had rented a 4X4 (as if I could have talked Rich into that!). We once passed a couple of guys on mountain bikes… not a good method of travel in my opinion.

Cambodia has a dreadful history, shocking and sad. I will never forget the poverty. But there are many good things I’ll never forget either.

I think the Cambodian people are very nice, friendly, a bit curious – not the least bit rude (they stared very politely). Customer service is really over the top. We ate in little places with $2 entrees and even there the waiter would pull out my chair for me and flap our napkins into our laps.

We saw a lot of rats in Phnom Penh, live ones, dead ones, flat ones, green ones. All big though.

The internet access in Phnom Penh was terrible. We couldn’t pay bills because it took so long to load a page we’d be logged out by the time we got logged in (not that you care, I’m just venting).

We visited the Royal Palace – boring! We didn’t get to visit the palace at all, just the gardens around the gardens around the palace. And then there is the Silver Pagoda. It has an all silver floor which would be cool if it weren’t covered completely with carpet. We weren’t allowed to take pictures of anything, but I’m not sure there was anything picture worthy anyway.

The National Museum was rather boring too. Just a bunch of Angkor artifacts, but without the really cool backdrop, they weren’t all that interesting. Besides, there was no AC. The only thing I learned at the museum (the only information I call still recall) is that women (at some time in history) prayed that in their reincarnated life they would NOT have pendulous breasts.  I guess that prayer is probably still in use today.

We did have fun looking for a place to eat one night. We stopped to check out a pizza menu and were joined by one of the employees who explained that all of their pizzas were happy. Richard innocently replied, “That’s good.” The employee said that they could make any pizza unhappy and Richard shook his head, “Why would we want them unhappy?” Richard had decided by this point that we should have pizza, but I managed to drag him away. I explained that we should find out what makes the pizza happy before we eat it for dinner. We checked it out in our guide book, it’s Ganja. All we will say is, you’d probably have to eat a lot of that pizza in order to notice any effect whatsoever. We also noticed a lot of people eating there and we’re not so sure that they knew what makes the pizza happy.

And if you’re looking for something really crazy to do in Phnom Penh, why not check out the shooting range? They have AK-47’s, M-60’s or whatever and a whole bunch of other guns. We weren’t about to spend a lot of money on something like that, so we just bought some Cokes and browsed. If you’re not into guns, you could always lob a grenade, or for $200 bucks, why not try out the rocket launcher?

All I can say is, Cambodia is really different!

Today we went to the Tuol Sleng Museum.  Tuol Sleng was a prison that was created in 1975 by Pol Pot’s security forces.  Apparently out of the 14000 or so people to go to Tuol Sleng, less than half a dozen survived.  The prison was used mostly for ‘so called’ political prisoners.  I say ‘so called’ because the political prisoners included people from all walks of life; men, woman, children as well as grandmothers and babies.  Life at the prison consisted of horrendous living conditions, torture and eventual death.

When we first arrived at the prison we sort of wondered if we were at the right place since Tuol Sleng was never built as a prison; instead they took a school and converted it into a prison.  This means it’s in a sort of residential neighborhood in the middle of Cambodia’s capital of Phnom Penh. We were standing in a modest looking school yard knowing that thousands of people were tortured here.  It’s very chilling, I could almost imagine the sights and sounds of the children playing superimposed over the sights and sounds of the prison.  It’s also hard to believe that such a terrible event took place only about thirty years ago.  This means that there are people living their lives today, guards, officials, a handful of prisoners that have direct knowledge of what took place at Tuol Sleng.

The prison consists of four main buildings that are arranged in a U shape with a sort of court yard in the middle.  Each of the buildings looks like a three storey motel with each storey having a sort of walkway/balcony along its entire length, this seems to be how many of the schools are constructed here in Asia.  The tour of the prison includes walking along the balcony of each level and peering in and entering many of the rooms.  I wasn’t exactly sure of what to expect at Tuol Sleng.  I thought there would be all sorts of devices used to ‘make people talk’.  Some of these existed but for the most part the prison was very bare.  Most of the devices were ordinary objects like sticks and shovels.  Many of the rooms consisted only of a metal bed frame with an accompanying large black and white photo on the wall.  The photos were of somebody lying on the bed after having had who knows what done to them.  The beds and their accompanying (thoroughly gruesome) photos were probably the worst things that we saw at Tuol Sleng.

Another area at the prison consisted of thousands of mug shots of the prisoners.  Apparently the officials kept detailed records of all of the inmates including their pictures, biography and of course their ‘confessions’.  As I looked at all of the pictures I was surprised at the cross section of people that were represented.  Many of the pictures were of boys in their early teens.  There were pictures of women with their babies.  There were pictures of people in their sixties or maybe even their seventies.  Apparently no one was spared.

I think everyone leaves Tuol Sleng wondering how something so horrible could ever happen.  I obviously don’t know why atrocities like Tuol Sleng happen but I think one of the key reasons is fear:  From the stories we heard, many of the guards who carried out the acts were fearful of their own lives as well as those of their families.  I think the people that gathered up the prisoners, often by the cover of night, had the same fears.  I think that the officials in charge were afraid that if they didn’t instill fear in the public they might lose control.  I think every visitor leaves Tuol Sleng hoping that such a place could never exist again but I’m not that optimistic.

After spending some time touring Tuol Sleng the next site that the obliging tourist has to see is the Killing Fields.  This is only one of the many mass grave sites in Cambodia, but it is well known because of it’s proximity to Phnom Penh and its connection to Tuol Sleng prison. Most of the prisoners weren’t actually killed at Tuol Sleng, rather they were driven fifteen or so kilometers out of the city to a mass grave area where they were killed.  This area is referred to today as the Killing Fields.

Like Tuol Sleng I wasn’t sure of what to expect upon arriving at the Killing Fields.  There were of course the obligatory tour busses and tuk tuks lining the entrance as well as beggars.  Once inside of the Killing Field area one of the first things to hit me was the tranquil park-like atmosphere.  It’s a beautiful area with green grass as well as massive trees.  Something else I noticed was how small the area was, perhaps one square block or so.

The mass graves themselves don’t look like much.  They’re simply depressions in the ground with raised paths so that you can walk around them.  The way it would work is they would bring the prisoner in on one of the paths next to a dug out area (today’s depressions), have them kneel or squat down and then they would typically club them over the head (they clubbed them since they didn’t want to waste precious bullets).  And that was about it as far as the mass graves were concerned.  They had a tree with a sign indicating that they beat people against it and another tree where a loudspeaker was hung from it to cover up the sounds of the killing.  There were also signs telling some of the other details of the area.  One sign marked the location of a holding area where some prisoners were kept before they were killed.  The holding area was removed many years ago.  Another sign indicated that the mass graves were covered in chemicals to help control the odor as well as kill any of the prisoners that survived their initial execution.

The final item we saw at the Killing Fields was the large memorial building holding the skulls of 8000 or so inmates whose remains were uncovered.  The building is tall, square, and skinny with glass going up each of its four sides.  The inside consists of glass shelves going to the roof with a sort of narrow hallway around the inner perimeter.  Each shelf is then completely filled with skulls.  After having viewed the park like setting of the actual mass graves it was the memorial building, with all of its skulls, which really brought home that thousands of people were killed right around where I was standing; all I would have had to do is turn the clock back thirty or so years and I would have been standing in the middle of…I’m not sure there are any words to describe what it could have actually been like to be there.

The people of Cambodia remember the atrocities and they hold a lasting hatred of Pol Pot. But from what we can see they have put the past behind them and they remain hopeful that they will have a brighter future.

We’ve been in Phnom Penh for nearly a week now. It isn’t exactly the type of place where one would want to spend a week, but we’re finding travel in Cambodia is difficult and expensive, so exploring this city is the only way we’re going to see anymore of the country before moving on.

This is the first South Asian country we’ve visited where public transportation is non-existent. There is a train - or there isn’t - we don’t know if it runs often or at all anymore, but we do know it’s not considered safe. Air travel will only take you between major cities (all four of them). We’ve heard that slow boats can be overtaken by pirates – speed boats are safer but will cost $25 per person. There are several bus companies but they don’t have many routes. We’ve read through our travel guide and it seems that to get anywhere interesting you need to take a taxi. We considered it; we’d need to figure out which bus passes closest to our chosen destination and convince the driver to let us off there. If he does (and lets us retrieve our backpacks from below before driving off) then we’d be in good shape – provided, that is, that we can find a taxi in the area. If not, we can always give up and hope to wave down the next bus that may or may not come that day. If we find ourselves without a ride, we’d have to walk far enough to find a place to sleep, which may not be anything like a hotel, depending on the town. We’ve only seen a little bit of rural Cambodia and I’ve decided that rural travel is – well, I won’t say it’s impossible, or that I don’t find it enticing, but I would best describe it as – not Richard friendly. He doesn’t want to wander in Cambodia. I was easily swayed since the hot, humid weather has me too exhausted to face such a challenge.

So, here we are, Phnom Penh. We spent a couple of nights at a guesthouse in a rather authentic part of town. We only saw one or two other tourists while we were out and people seemed to stare at us like we were an unusual sight. There weren’t many restaurants either. It wasn’t a very inviting part of town and there were a lot of stinky garbage piles that made our stomachs turn. We liked our guesthouse though. We were on the top floor and since the building had 4 floors, we were at the top of one of the tallest buildings in town. There were balconies on both sides of the building and the view was incredible. There were fireworks one night and a thunderstorm the next. One lightning strike was really close and we heard static next to us before the thunder a moment later. We found ourselves hoping that our building, being one of the tallest in town, was fitted with a lightning rod that had been checked at least once in the last few years. We’ll never know.

But, every good guesthouse has its drawbacks. Like, for instance, the four storey climb to our room, or the ants that covered half the floor. But, in this case it was the crickets that drove me to the edge of sanity and convinced me to pack my bags on day three. I don’t know how they were getting in, but I do know they liked me because they kept jumping on me in the dark. (The nice thing about ants is that they’ll find and remove any carcass while you sleep).

So, we moved to a guesthouse near the river where we bump into tourists all day long. The locals hang out along the river in the evening; it’s not only fun but the crowds make it safe to be out after dark. The food in this area is good and easy to find, just a bit more expensive.

Speaking of food… we really haven’t eaten much street vendor food in Cambodia. It’s not out of concern for our health, strictly speaking, it’s just that we haven’t seen much that looks appetizing. Cambodians eat some really disgusting stuff. Durians are still a favorite here and Rich will say that’s some of the worst food you’ll find. But I’d eat durian for breakfast lunch and dinner before I’d eat a cockroach.  We’ve seen people eating worms and roaches before, but the roaches here seem even bigger. There are some new beetles, with shiny, phosphorescent shells; crickets that could have been harvested in our last guesthouse room; tarantulas are a favorite here; they look boiled and only half furry. We watched a woman skin a live frog, but we’re glad to see they don’t eat them raw. We see about a hundred snail carts everyday; steaming snails are shoveled into a plastic bag and served with toothpicks. We’ve seen the snails being harvested from muddy, stagnant waters.  They also sell whole, baby ducks that are sometimes just embryos. I think the worst are the eggs that look like chicken eggs outside, but have something black inside. I haven’t had a really good look at the eggs, but I’ve seen people picking things out with long, skinny forks and I’ve seen the discarded shells – it’s not something I’m going to try.

I did buy a couple of boiled eggs from a woman walking around with a basket. They usually have one egg on display, cut in half, so I knew I wasn’t buying embryos or anything rotten. And we’ve had some good donut-like things and excellent corn on the cob which took forever to cool to safe eating temperature.

The shopping is good here, especially if you’re looking for clothes. There are a lot of brand name rejects; shorts, shirts, hats and underwear that didn’t pass inspection and never made it to North America. I bought pants, a shirt and a sports bra (huge score!) – all for $6. Richard bought a compass which is now attached to his watch band. He looks like a dork. He keeps telling me which way is north. Sometimes the bubble in the compass gets stuck and he has to shake it, and for some reason, talk to it, “come on little bubble, come out of there.” We both think the $1 he paid was way too much.

Oh, and there are rats. We haven’t seen any live ones (yet) but we really enjoyed watching a woman pluck three green rats from a platter with tongs and place them in the gutter. We don’t know why the rats were green. Maybe they fell into some dye? Maybe it was a restaurant and they fell into a vat of brewing seaweed? At any rate, the green color probably had something to do with their demise. It seems perfectly acceptable to discard your dead rats in the street. We’ve also seen some really, really flat ones - except for their tails which is rather resistant to flattening.

So we’ll stay here a few days more, then we’re off down the Mekong River one more time to Vietnam!

We ended up spending a week in Siem Reap. We were staying at a guesthouse in the most touristy part of town, so we didn’t meet many average Cambodians. Most of the people in the area were working in the service industry, at guesthouses, restaurants, internet shops. There were of course souvenirs for sale everywhere, but they looked familiar, much like what we saw in Thailand or Laos. Oh, and there are tuk tuks. The tuk tuks are nicer in Cambodia though, because they aren’t tuk tuks at all. They are motorcycles with carts in tow – not one of those ugly, smelly, creatively welded concoctions that never seem to be equipped with a muffler.

But the tuk tuk drivers in Cambodia are just as annoying. You can walk by a string of them and every single driver will shout out “tuk tuk sir?” But Richard’s quick with the replies. “You think I just said no to the other 8 guys because I was looking for you?” Or, “Whoa! A hundred dollars? You could take us to China for that!”

We ended up finding a really good driver who quoted respectable rates – we just paid him without bargaining and used him for three days. And he didn’t pull u-turns in heavy traffic or play chicken with trucks, a definite bonus.

One tuk tuk moment that turned out to be interesting was our refueling stop. We simply pulled over to the side of the road and a woman poured gas from a glass soda bottle into our driver’s tank. These “gas stations” are everywhere. Our driver explained that the roadside gas was from Thailand and while the quality is lower, it’s much cheaper than the gas at the pumps.

One of the things we’ve learned about Cambodia is that the central regions are really flat. And, since it’s started to rain several hours a day, a lot of the land is under an inch of water, great for the rice paddies, not great for crossing the streets in town, unless you’re Cambodian, in which case, you don’t pay any attention to how wet you might be. We try to stay clear of the water because we have irrational fears about hookworm.

If you look at a map of Cambodia, you’ll see it has one enormous lake, Tonle Sap. What we’ve learned is that – late in the rainy season - this lake doubles in area. The reason is not just the rainwater in the area, but the river draining the lake (also called the Tonle Sap) runs into the powerful Mekong River - and when the Mekong is high, the Tonle Sap reverses direction and carries water back to the lake. We think it’s fascinating J

Unfortunately, since the lake doesn’t have firm boundaries there are no lake side towns and the city of Siem Reap is several kilometers away. So, anyone interested in seeing the lake (yes, that means us) needs to visit by way of tuk tuk or tour bus. We got our driver to take us as close to the lake as a land vehicle could get, which wasn’t close enough to see the lake… so we bought expensive boat tickets that would take us down a river to the lake. We ended up enjoying our boat trip more than we’d hoped. We went down the winding, muddy river and watched fishermen work in waist deep water, saw children swimming and waved at the school kids returning home in tiny boats. But it was the village we visited that was most impressive. The people who live on the lake, live - very literally - on the lake. They have small floating homes and shops and restaurants all anchored in the relatively shallow lake. But they live much like the Cambodians on land – they have televisions and mobile phones, but everything is run on 12 volt batteries (which are charged on the battery charging boat).

There are a few things about Cambodia that are emotionally disturbing. Landmines are still a problem, and we’ve seen a lot of people with missing limbs – unfortunately, crutches are far more common than prosthetics. We hope that landmines won’t be a problem here much longer. Progress is still being made, but we’re told it takes only $3 to buy and plant a mine, but about $100 to locate and remove it. I was shocked to find out that the landmines in Cambodia were planted over a period of nearly 20 years by various regimes and armies from several countries. We are a bit comforted that we’ve only seen one child victim, which seems to indicate that accidental detonations have been less frequent in recent years.

Many Cambodians are very poor. One of our waiters said that he makes $40 a month. People who aren’t lucky enough to have a job will sift through garbage all day everyday, collecting recyclables. One kg of plastic earns them 2000 Riel (that’s $0.50). But there are a lot of people who can’t or won’t work - they’re out begging on the streets. The thing we find shocking is that many of these people aren’t begging for money, they’re begging for food. We’ve seen people going through dumpsters and kids sneaking into restaurants to grab food from the floor. We’ve browsed the shelves in convenience stores while people stood outside with their faces pressed against the glass. One young boy (half my height, no more than 10 years old) was carrying around an infant and asked for food for the baby. Not able to say no, we bought him a can of formula. He was incredibly grateful, which made it even more depressing. Richard and I now carry packets of crackers or cookies with us so that we have something to give to at least a few of the hungry people we encounter during the day. Any doubts I may have had about their hunger is gone now that I’ve watched a blind man immediately rip open the packet with his teeth and wolf down the crackers in one mouthful.

Rich and I don’t have any delusions that we’re really helping these people, we’re just hoping to be able to sleep at night.

We’ve seen a lot of rocks in the last few days. Some of what we’ve seen has been little more than a big pile of rubble, but for the most part, it’s easy to imagine what the ruins had once been. Some of the cities and temples are still in great condition (as with Angkor Wat). We’ve seen some really great carvings, wandered through narrow halls, climbed steep staircases, ducked through windows, and stood on tower platforms high above the jungle that stretches out to the horizon in every direction.

It’s been a bit difficult for us; up at 4 AM, mosquito attacks at 5, sweating by 8, trying to keep the camera dry in the downpours, enduring the searing heat of the sun and drinking about 3 liters of water before noon. And then there’s the walking and climbing! We walked tens of kilometers each day through mud and rubble and climbed so many steep staircases that our legs were quivering by the time we were done.

But it’s all been worth it.

The ruins around Siem Reap are incredible, immense, intricate and impressive. Sure, Angkor Wat is arguably the best site (well preserved and restored, certainly enormous) but we had a great time visiting the other sites in the area too. Each site had its own unique qualities and some of the sights were breathtaking.

One of the more surprising things we’ve learned is how the ruins are being restored. It’s a little hard to imagine that rebuilding a temple could be a good thing; it’s like replacing the real thing with a replica. But actually, restoration involves careful documentation and labeling of each stone, dismantling and then rebuilding the structure with the same stones. It sounds wrong to me, but when you see the difference it makes sense. The ground beneath many of the structures is shifting and there are big gaps between stones. Some walls and towers are leaning a bit too much. The only way to prevent collapse is to restack everything so that there is a tight fit again. Of course, some stones have to be replaced, but usually they are the structural bricks behind the façade. The restoration we’ve seen is very good, not as artificial as I would have thought.

We’ve got some pictures, though we won’t bore you with too many names and details (you really need to see it for yourself, and you should if you ever get the chance). Besides, we’re really clueless; we still have to refer to our book’s glossary when we see words like lintel and gopura.

It’s been an overwhelming three days and we will never forget the Angkor ruins – definitely one of the highlights of our trip.

 

Today we visited Angkor Wat.  It is truly a wonder to see, which is appropriate since it’s one of the seven wonders of the ancient world (although I haven’t checked the official list in some time).  I think what surprised us most was the size of the place.  Not only is Angkor Wat itself huge but there are many other temples spread over hundreds of square kilometers that are amazing sites all on their own.

Because of the sheer size of the Angkor ruins, you need to have some sort of transportation.  We decided to go with a tuk tuk.  And of course you have to see Angkor Wat at sunrise which around here is around 5:30am which meant we were getting up around 4:00am.  And of course when we went out into the dark streets to meet our driver…he wasn’t there!  After waking up our guesthouse receptionist (who was conveniently sleeping on a cot in the lobby) and explaining to him the situation, he called us another tuk tuk driver and eventually, sometime after sunrise, we got going.

The area around Angkor Wat which contains many of the temples has been turned into a big park.  As you enter you can tell that you are about to see something good.  First of all there’s the entrance fee of up to 60US$ per person (depending on the number of days); somewhat expected if your going to Disney World but a bit steep when your guesthouse is costing $8 per night.  After a short while of driving we came upon what seemed like a large river, about 200 meters across.  As we drove a bit further we realized it wasn’t a river but the moat that surrounds Angkor Wat.  After parking we walked over the bridge crossing the moat until we entered the wall which surrounds Angkor Wat.  Once crossing through the wall, which is actually two walls spaced apart with a stone roof, we then had to cross another 200-300m to get to Angkor Wat.  This was the point where we got our first good look of the Wat.  It’s somewhat hard to describe, (fortunately we have pictures).  Angkor Wat has three tiers, five main towers and many walls which surround the various tiers.  It took me quite a while to understand how the maze-like Wat is constructed.  Unfortunately because of the sheer size of the place it’s hard to get a picture or even a couple of pictures that show how it all fits together, you really just have to wander around for a while.

There are a number of other items that stand out in my memory of Angkor Wat.  I mentioned that it consists of three tiers.  To ascend some of the tiers you climb the original stairways or what’s left of them.  Since Angkor Wat is about 1000 years old, a lot of it, including the stairs, has worn away.  In addition to the stairs being severely worn away in many places, the stairs themselves are very steep.  You end up crawling up the stairs on all fours, kind of like going up a ladder.  Something else that’s incredible about the Wat is the intricate carvings that are found everywhere.  Unfortunately much of the carving has completely worn away over the years but I suspect that almost every square inch of the walls probably had some sort of carving on it at one time.  Much of the ceiling is carved as well and I’m sure at one time there was carving on the floors too.  In addition to the carvings on the walls there are intricately carved statues on the outside.  In the galleries on the lower levels of the Wat there were carved murals that described various religious events.  These murals alone were nearly 1km long.

After spending several hours on two separate days we never did see all of Angkor Wat.  Angkor Wat is only one of many other sites in the area which Bry will write about in the next blog.

Well, here we are in Cambodia. We really can’t say much about the country just yet, but the border crossing was interesting. Good? No. Not really. But definitely interesting.

We started our day by finding a tuk tuk to take us the 8 km from Aranya Prathet to the border. Once there, we found the area to be really busy. There is a cross border market there called the Friendship Market and it was crawling with Thai and Cambodian people. Many of the Cambodians were on their way back to Cambodia, you could tell who they were because they were pulling huge, wooden, dilapidated carts by hand and most of them were barefoot.

We joined the crowd of people walking through the gates. It’s a good place to cross on foot because there are very few vehicles and it’s a short walk. The border guards directed us to the right buildings and the local people were very insistent that we jump the queue and walk up to the desks designated for foreigners. Everything went very smoothly on the Thai side, as always, but once we crossed over the tiny, muddy creek and found ourselves in Cambodia, things got a little more challenging.

We’d read that the border guards are always looking to pocket a bit of cash. For years, the men at the “Visa On Arrival” desk have been demanding 25 USD or 1000 Baht for processing, instead of the 20 USD that it should be. They sometimes charge an extra 5 dollars for paperwork that doesn’t need to be done. Sometimes they claim you need to use a currency you don’t have, forcing you to exchange money at poor rates. But everything I read said that it’s possible to get your visa processed for 20 if you are willing to put up a bit of a fight, so I was prepared for exactly that, on principle, if nothing else. We were happy to see a large sign over the desk that said tourist visas were 20 USD and we had nice, new 20 dollar bills ready to hand over when we got to the desk. As expected, the man on the other side of the glass asked for 1000 Baht. The “conversation” went a little like this:

“1000 Baht,” the guard said.

“The sign says twenty dollars,” I replied

“No, before the gate, sign says 1000 baht.”

Even if we could have gone back to look for this alleged sign, I’m sure we’d never have seen it. I pointed up at the sign above the window. “But this sign says twenty.”

He just shook his head.

“We have US dollars,” I said.

“No have Baht, can exchange over there.” That of course being a money exchange booth with terrible rates.

“We want to pay in US dollars.”

“25 US dollars.”

“But it’s supposed to cost 20 dollars,” I repeated.

“No. Go to embassy, 20 dollars for 2, 3 days. Here, fast processing, $25.”

I turned to Rich and said (loud enough for the guard to hear), “That’s a new one.” I was about to suggest that we’d pay 20 dollars at this desk and wait for slower processing since we weren’t in a big hurry, but I thought better of it because I knew he could make us wait all day if he wanted to. I asked Rich, “How much is 1000 Baht in USD?”

“I don’t know,” said Rich. “Just pay it.”

Which I really didn’t want to do. I grabbed our papers, passports and 20 dollar bills from the desk and walked away. I was thinking about waiting for another backpacker to come through and help me in the battle since Rich had crossed over to the dark side. But Rich was already looking for a couple of 1000 Baht bills. I could see that he was reaching his limit, so I ever so reluctantly went back to the desk and with a few harsh words about changing the sign I paid 2000 Baht (Which works out to 50 USD). Then I called the guard a bad name, but not to his face - though I doubt he would have understood it.

We only had to wait about 1 minute for our visas to be processed. But I doubt it was so fast because of the extra 5 dollars. I really hope that guy is saving to put his kids through university.

Anyway, we eventually made it past the gates. It was hard to trust anything anybody said because I was still fuming, but we ended up on a complimentary shuttle to a bus terminal. The fares were outrageous, and the bus wasn’t leaving for another 4 or 5 hours. We decided to go for a walk and look for something cheaper. Poipet, by the way, is all mud right now. No concrete, asphalt or bricks on the ground anywhere. Just mud. A couple feet deep in places, though there’s only one way to find out how deep any given spot is - and I found a few deep spots.

There are supposed to be several bus companies that go to Siem Reap from Poipet, but we couldn’t find any that had a bus that day. We asked around a bit and what we finally pieced together from several conversations is that the roads are so bad that the busses no longer travel that way. We could take the one, overpriced bus we saw, or we could take a taxi. We still don’t understand how that’s possible. There were several busses traveling that route just a few days before we arrived, we’d talked to travelers that had just come from Siem Reap and they’d only paid $4 per person. The only bus in town was charging $10. We think that it is either due to the recent rain or the direction of travel on that road.

We decided that $10 for a long and possibly troublesome bus ride (another scam involving “breakdowns”) was just too expensive so we ended up spending a bit more and splitting a taxi with two Korean girls. It got us to Siem Reap at least 7 hours sooner than the bus would have.

The road to Siem Reap has quite a reputation for being horrible. And it is. 150 km, 4 hours. We’re talking pot holes so big that there are pot holes in them. We started out moving so slowly that I wondered if walking was a viable alternative. We passed at least a couple of trucks with flats, a truck stuck in a pot hole with part of it’s load dumped and a group of tourists huddled in the shade of a big tree a few meters from their bus, which was in the ditch. I think the road might have been fun in an off road vehicle, but not in our Toyota sedan. We were tossed around like rag dolls inside the car, I hit my head so many times on the window that I was considering opening it - despite the air conditioning inside and the mud outside. There had been a lot of rain the night before and in places, the road was really slick; like a Canadian road in freezing rain.

Eventually, the road improved a bit, and our driver sped up. So why is this road (which is traveled by so many foreigners) so bad? Our Lonely Planet book says an airline is paying certain members of the government to stall improvements. It probably works, we read about the road and we considered flying.

We were a little shocked when we arrived in Siem Reap.  This is a tourist town and there are a lot of tourist dollars being spent here. The hotels, restaurants, tour companies, and souvenir shops are not only plentiful, they’re big and beautiful. We probably won’t get to know the true Cambodia here, but the Cambodian people are real, and they’re friendly, not at all like the men we met at the border.

We spent a day exploring some ruins around Nang Rong. They are Khmer ruins, from the Angkor period. We will soon be visiting Angkor Wat, the most well known ruins in Cambodia, but there are many ancient Khmer temples, tombs and cities scattered throughout Cambodia, Northern Thailand and Southern Laos. The two sites we visited near Nang Rong, Phanom Rung and Meung Tam, are two of the most amazing sites in Thailand. They are well preserved and beautifully restored.

We started our day early, so we could get to the ruins before the tour busses arrived. We rented a motorbike and got a bit drenched in the early morning rain. We had no trouble finding the extinct volcano, upon which the ruins are built, and had a great time putt-putting up the winding road to the top. We missed the entrance, not seeing it in time to stop, but decided to keep going and possibly see the Meung Tam ruins first. We turned in at the next gate and bought tickets that said Meung Tam. We stood under the roof of the gatehouse for a good ten minutes, watching a Humming Bird suck nectar from just a foot away and waiting for the rain to let up a bit. Eventually it did, and we set off on foot to see the ruins.

The first thing we saw was labeled as a pavilion, a place to change costumes before entering the temple. It was nice, not too spectacular, but we weren’t expecting much at this site. We wandered up a small hill to a brick plaza that was once the floor of a wood building. From there we got a great view of the countryside, since we were at the top of a volcano. Rich said something like, “wow, that’s really amazing” and I agreed, though I was a little confused by his enthusiasm, since we’d seen the view from the motorcycle just 20 minutes before. And then I turned around…

It just so happens that I was in the exact center of the brick plaza when I turned around and saw Phanom Rung, exactly the way it was meant to be seen. I was shocked by the view and I will never forget the image – the long, mossy pathway lined with sculpted columns leading to a series of steep staircases at the top of which was the amazing stone sanctuary of Phanom Rung, shrouded in mist.

I let out a bit of a gasp and said “Look!”

Rich said, “I know.”

I turned to Rich who I think was laughing at me. “You saw that?” I asked.

“Yes.”

“I thought you were talking about the view. Why didn’t you tell me?”

Rich just smiled back triumphantly.

So it turns out, we weren’t at Meung Tam at all, we were at Phanom Rung and the ticket was merely advertising it as another site to visit. We entered the park from the back gate. But it was a really nice surprise.

The ruins looked really amazing right then in the light rain. It was nearly deserted too, except for a few monks roaming around with umbrellas. Unfortunately, it was hard to capture it on film, we didn’t want to get the camera wet, so we couldn’t stand around in the rain playing with the light settings. But, pictures really don’t do it justice anyway – I’d seen the ruins on postcards and it’s just not the same.

We explored Phanom Rung for a few hours and then went to see Meung Tam, which was more impressive than we’d expected. Again, the pictures don’t do it justice; everything in the ruins surrounds you and you can’t get very much into the frame at one time. And there are so many rooms, linking corridors, towers, sculptures and carvings. Hopefully, I’ll be able to remember the experience, it was great.

We talked to some other people who’d been at the ruins that day. We asked them how they enjoyed it and much to our surprise, they answered, “Mmm, it was ok.” But then they added, “We’ve just come from Cambodia and we’ve seen Angkor Wat which is really impressive.”

If Angkor Wat is better… well, that just can’t be. Impossible.

Internet has been really hard to get the last few days. There have been shops, but none open, so we'll have a few blog entries and albums for you in the next few days. But here's the first one:

We may have forgotten our Wedding Anniversary in the past, but we didn’t forget this one - our 10^th. A trip around the world is a nice way to celebrate it, but we thought it would be even nicer if we could spend the day in air conditioned luxury. We spent hours looking for a resort and decided it was just too hard to get to any of the nice ones (without a car - that is), so we just took a tuk tuk to the nicest hotel in town – The Royal Princess in Korat. Korat is a nickname for Nakhon Ratchasima, the second largest city in Thailand. Not much of a tourist town, but the hotel was quite nice and really not that expensive when you take the exchange rate into account. Two nights on the top floor with buffet breakfast was only about $120 CAD, and there were a lot of nice touches to make our stay enjoyable.

The Royal Princess was a last minute decision. We hopped off the bus at the Korat station, walked to McDonalds for dinner, and asked a girl which hotel in town was nicest. Arriving at the hotel in a tuk tuk was an experience in itself. Imagine a greasy, smelly, noisy machine, soaked inside and out from the rain, dropping a couple of weary backpackers at the door to a very fine hotel. We were greeted by the doorman who helped us out of the tuk tuk without batting an eye. In fact, we weren’t the only tuk tuk to pull up to the door – but the other was loaded with young guys looking for the Pussy Cat, not the Princess (easy mistake for their driver to make). Fortunately, the doorman was familiar with the Pussy Cat and was able to give their driver directions.

One of the things I will always regret not having a picture of was the doorman wearing my backpack. He took us to reception and we dug out a credit card that hasn’t been used for months. It was hard not to freak out over the room rates after being so frugal for so long – but we tried to prepare ourselves beforehand. I don’t think they noticed Richard choking.

Our room was quite nice, much like the Sheraton or Hilton back in America, though we’d completely forgotten what a real hotel was like. There were a few differences, of course, which we’ve documented in the photo album.

We were glad to see that the hotel had a strict “No Durians” policy, since we’re really starting to hate the smell.

This was the first place we’ve stayed that didn’t charge per Kilo for laundry. It was too expensive for us, but I doubt the hotel staff would have expected us to collect our own laundry from the lines at the end of the day. Even so, 120 Baht to have a “Safari Suit” laundered is just outrageous.

We had breakfast at the hotel both mornings. It was a buffet with a rather unusual assortment of items; sushi, congee, squid, and something labeled as “Some Meat” were just a few of the memorable choices. There was plenty of western food too, and we got our moneys worth.

For our anniversary dinner we decided on a three course meal – pizza, beer and ice cream at the window in our hotel room. This was our first experience ordering pizza over the phone in a non-English speaking country (and I used to think it was difficult in Kansas!) The hotel staff gave us the phone number to call and told us that the Pizza Company would have English speaking staff. Sure, they spoke some English… but not very well. It took about 5 minutes to get our simple order straight, but I wasn’t able to explain that we were at a hotel. She wanted a phone number, but I wasn’t sure how many digits she wanted - but she never read them back correctly anyway. Eventually she put me on hold to find somebody who spoke better English, which must have been difficult because I was on hold a long time. When I finally managed to explain that we were at a hotel, they wanted to know what city I was in - scary. I was very happy that the nickname Korat was acceptable. She reconfirmed the order – which was wrong, so I had to do it all over again. The word “olive” does not seem to be in their vocabulary, maybe they don’t have them, but it didn’t matter, the pizza was fantastic.

We also bought each other some convenience store anniversary gifts. I bought Rich a Toblerone and he bought me a Doraemon Pen, which I love very much - it matches my fan. Doraemon is the name of the blue cat (I think). It’s popular like Hello Kitty here, but I don’t know anything else.

We checked out of the hotel late this morning with slightly heavier bags – we just helped ourselves to any of the complimentary items that we thought could come in handy; shampoo, cotton swabs, soap, toilet paper, bottled water and the shower caps (the rainy season is starting) – but it was stuff that was in our room already, mostly, not much came off the housekeeping cart. We also took some bananas and oranges, but I’m sure they built that into the price of the buffet.

We’re now in Nang Rong, not far from the Phanom Rung Historical Park which we will visit tomorrow. We saw a baby elephant while we were out getting dinner, the owners make a small amount of money selling food to feed to her – like at a petting zoo. But she can eat a lot more than a goat.

We’re only a couple of days away from the Cambodia border and Angkor Wat! I’m really looking forward to it… Rich will enjoy it once we’re there, I’m sure.

We rolled into Sukothai a couple of days ago and a bird pooped on my head. So, to make things clear for you, as you have likely forgotten the details of the last few blogs by now, that is the third time a bird pooped on my head. I don't remember a bird ever pooping on me in my entire life, and it happened three times in 8 days. What are the odds?

 

Sukothai isn't much of a city, but it's surrounded by ruins of various ages (1100-1700 AD or thereabouts) and various styles (Khmer and Burmese, for instance). We spent a day dragging 90 pound bicycles around the historic park and exploring old temples and crypts. We've got a few good pictures.

 

We're now in Phitsanulok in a really sweet hotel (AC, TV and Wireless internet). The TV is mostly Thai, but Shawshank just started. I've just spent an hour on hold (via the internet) trying to change a flight date, it's a lot harder than I'd hoped. Everybody I talk to says "You should be able to do that, but you'll have to talk to..." and so I call someone else who refers me back... Then when I finally talk to the person I need, they transfer me back to the beginning before I can finish my sentence. 

 

At least it's free internet access. And it's cold in here so Quark and I aren't overheating.

 

Oh! Good news, as I was typing this I finally got through to someone who knows what Round The World airfare is. I got a flight changed. Now on to number 2...