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NYE! A great night was had by all (even Sharj who heroically made it out despite feeling like sh*t!) on the beach. Some of the bars had some sound systems up and running with some cool tunes so we danced, eat, drank, made friends and watched fireworks!
Crawled home at 5am. Gulp. Supposed to be going back to Phnom Penh at 6:30!
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Decided a ride through the national park was a good way of breaking up the days on the beaches so Stephen, Gill and I hired 2 mopeds. Sharj, Yvey and Teresa all fell ill and were trying to keep low for a while to get better for New Year.
It was my first time riding a motor bike and I have to say it was a blast! The park itself was 30km outside Sihanoukville and was quite dull after Nepal. We went for a trek up Meditation Mountain which could easily be renamed Meditation Bump as it was hardly a mountain. As you can see from this photo, it was HOT!
We decided as a group to do a boat trip to a deserted island that supposedly had some nice beaches. I didn't quite bank on the sea being quite so rough and spent most of the day going a lovely shade of green and purple. Cuttlefishes, eat your heart out!!! :-)
Did make some nice sandcastles though...
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Had a nice beach day today. Playing frisbee in the sea and troughing on freshly bbq-d squid and lobster was a nice antidote to all the city travelling I've been doing for the past 3 months.
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Bye bye Phnom Penh, hello Sihanoukville. I took up T&Y's offer to join them in Sihanoukville for New Year. Sounded too good to miss!
Finding a room on the beach was difficult but we eventually found a room for 3 people. Some English people we met on the bus were also having difficulties finding a room so we decided to all share the same room (6 in a 3 bed hotel room!). Cheap and fun! Say Hello to Stephen, Gill and Sharj (photo 1 and photo 2)!
Lazy day today. Teresa and Yvey invited me for dinner with a local moto driver they had met at their hotel. I didn't realise it would be at the driver's house but it was great.
The guy shared a 15'x8' toom with his wife, child and sister. We had a beautiful Amok fish dinner (fish cooked with coconut similar to Thai green curry) and sat on the floor with his family and 3 of his friends. Ironically I was telling Yvey that day that I didn't have many dinner parties in London because my place wasn't big enough... Looks like I'll have to find a better excuse!
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It's weird to think it's Christmas Day today. In Bangkok, Christmas was everywhere. In Phnom Penh, it's just another day.
So, to underline the fact, I went to the shooting range and fired a few rounds from an AK47.
Found Teresa and Yvey at lakeside in Phnom Penh. Man, is it chilled there! Why does everyone else find the cool places to stay? Check out this view of lakeside from the bar...
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Finally gave in and went to the Tuol Seng museum. This is the school that was converted into a torture/interrogation facility by the Khmer Rouge between 1975-79. It's beyond grim and I'll leave the descriptions about the Khmer Rouge and S21(the offical name for Tuol Seng) to David Chadler and his excellent article, "Killing Fields".
After a nice lunch with CK, my moto driver, we went to the Killing Fields, where the bodies were buried. Nowadays it is a pleasant green field with some ditches showing the uncovered burial grounds of the murdered and a large monument. After Tuol Seng, it was shocking, but nowhere near as bad.
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Saw the Golden Palace which was OK and talked to some nice monks...
Got the bus in the morning to Phnom Penh. My butt had definitely improved and I didn't have to sit at stupid angles to get comfortable. On the way I got chatting to an American OAP who whored his way around Vietnam and was now doing the same round Cambodia. Why do I always sit next to these guys!?
Tried to find Eric in Phnom Penh but no luck.
I asked a moto driver to take me to the Heart of Darkness bar but he took me instead to a seedy bar called the same name with loads of pros there. I get the feeling that any single guy in Cambodia is assumed to be a sex tourist until proved otherwise... Luckily the real Heart of Darkness bar was close. Unluckily it was rubbish....
We(Eric and I) were due to get the bus to Phnom Penh at 6:30am but due to my huge butt-blister there was no way I was going anywhere. Telling Eric was the most embarrasing thing I had to do all year.
The second most embarassing thing all year was going to the doctor and explaining my predicament. It didn't help that the doctor didn't speak English and a cute young girl was translating.... Luckily I was told it would be better in a couple of days and I was given some very, very dodgy looking huge pills that came in bright capsules with no writing on them. NO WAY was I going to take those. No way man.
I was far too embarrased to tell Teresa and Yvey what had happened so I left them a cryptic note along with the $3 that they had lent me the day before to get me by until I could get some more money out.
What I needed was a "special night out". Something like "Les Nuits d’Angkor", a night of dance at a specially illuminated Angkor Wat! Sounded like a great way of seeing some culture and photographic Angkor Wat at night. The event itself was pretty spectacular, but in no way thanks to the pitiful French ballet company that performed something straight out of Fat Boy Slim's Praise You video. The Cambodian ballet, however, was fantastic, traditional and a perfect foreground to the magnificent scenery.
Later that evening I bumped into Jan who I met on the bus from Chitwan National Park in Nepal! He'd just been doing a visa run after his expired and was relaxing in Siem Reap for a few days. Bizarre!
What an incredibly bad day!!!
Eric and I had finished our 3 days at Angkor after cycling the 26km long route that day.
My butt was killing me after cycling as I had been sitting awkwardly on the seat while taking photos on the move (proof photo 1, photo 2!!).
We met up with Teresa, Yvey, Michael and the moto riders the girls had met previously to go down to a free pop concert in the city. Cool!
Bad luck #1, I caught my fave Annapurna trek T-shirt on some barbed wire outside the Smiley Guest House(!) and ripped it. Bugger, but no biggie and only a taster of what was to come.
We hired a couple of tuk tuks to take us to the gig and get us there more or less together (photo).
Bad luck #2 happened. When I was getting out of the tuk tuk I jumped rather than stepped out and cleverly fell flat on my face, spraining my ankle! Great, not only do I not look cool, I'm also in agony!
Then bad luck #3! Walking into th festival we got involved in a classic crowded push forward as many people were trying to get into a small entrance to the gig. While this happened (in the space of 10 seconds), my wallet got stolen from my pocket, Eric had his bag taken (but managed to get it back!), and the girls got groped. We decided to head back after this and drowned our sorrows in Martinis night club (a sh*thole). Full of young (really young!) boys and girls who all looked like they were dancing for the first time. Too tired and ashamed to show them how it was done...
Then bad luck #4. During this time my butt had stared to gurt more and more and I found it difficult to sit down. This was getting ridiculous. By the time we got home I was in agony and knew there was no way I would be able to handle an 8 hour bus journey to Phnom Penh the next day. Aarrrgghhh!! Went to bed a very unhappy, pained, poor man....
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Hired some bikes(2USD a day) to see Angkor Wat, one of the wonders of the world. OK, it's not on the offical list but it is generally considered one of the modern wonders.
It's about a 10km ride to Angkor but the road is flat and the traffic only moderately hectic.
Angkor is nothing short of incredible. Built around 10th century AD (I'll leave it to the Angkor Wat Information pages for a history lesson!) it is at once immense, beautiful and engaging. There are many temples here, spread out about 30 square km. Some of the recetnly discovered ruins have to be seen to be believed. Having been left to rot hundreds of years ago the jungle grew around them and eventually destroyed parts of them but also in other places became almost part of the temple itself. Check out this picture of me from my Angkor gallery for proof.
With India it was forts. With Nepal it was mountains. With Angkor though, I couldn't get bored of this place if I tried.
Just for added effect you get the seranading of the Cicada beetle, a long constant high pitched note that is very eerie.
The young touts that litter the area can be pushy to be sure, but the smiles, the laughing and joking and the interest they show in you (once they realise you won't buy!) is genuine enough. One girl I continually bantered with over 3 days could pull this heartbreaking "Why you not buy from me? You make me so sad..." look until I stared her out and she burst out laughing. She'd clearly forgotten I'd bought some postcards from her the first day and wasn't falling for that one again!
Hooked up with a couple of Chinese-English girls(Teresa and Yvey) and a chap called Michael (from san Fran) for drinks in the evening.
My alarm bell rings at 4am and up I get in order to make the 6am train to the Bangkok-Cambodia border. The train from Hua Lamphong to Arunyaptrathet (the Bangkok border) is only 58B (just over 1 dollar, beat that Connex!). We had read the Tales of Asia website and printed off a 26 page guide on how to get to Siem Reap, Cambodia (hom of Angkor Wat) without getting ripped off. When we reached the border around 12pm Eric and I were ready to put on camouflage paint, let off flares and smoke to distract the enemy and advance in a 10 metre attack pattern.
In the end we just caught a tuk tuk to the border from the station and got our entry and exit visas. Can't help but feel the Tales of Asia website is a bit paranoid!
The taxi ride to Siem Reap (10000Baht between 2) was something else. Quite frankly I have never been on such a bumpy road. Ever. India, all is forgiven! It was impossible to hold a conversation as by the time you had opened your mouth to say anything the air had been knocked out of your lungs and/or your head hit the ceiling! Had about 10 seconds of relief when we crossed a bridge but other than that it was 4 hours of driving hell!
Saying in the Popular Guest House. Crap but cheap!
I'm going to spend as little as possible today, just to prove I can. Cheapest way seemed to be by going on a photography walkabout.
First four hours were really difficult. Walked around and saw some great photo opportunities but was too shy to take any pictures. You have to be a bit forward to shove your camera in someone's face and I haven't got it yet.
On the way I found the Museum of Imaging Technology that has a stunning range of old cameras (drool!) and some nice photos on display. The museum is located in a university buidling on the 3rd floor and has virtually no signs guiding you. I was the only person there and it looked like I was the only visitor this year which was a shame.
Freshly invigorated from seeing some nice photos, I headed down to the river, hoping to find some interesing shots. Waliking behing the Sheraton Hotel i found this industrial estate where they specialised in scrapping and recycling machine parts for cars and bikes. There were sooo many things to photograph I couldn't stop. I knocked off about 3 rolls in 2 hours, a lot for me! In the end the photos weren't that great when I got them developed but they definitely rekindled my enthusiasm.
Eric's still up for tomorrow so Cambodia here we come!
I'm finally going to leave Bangkok and get my butt down to Cambodia on Monday. It's great in Bangkok, but expensive. All that damn sushi, camera stuff and women is taking its toll. Buying 30 rolls of film (20xFuji Superia Reala ISO100 and 10xFuji Superia Xtra ISO400 didn't help either....
Tried to get some money out of the ATM but got consistently rejected. First 12000B(160GBP), then 10000B then 7000B then I chickened out in case of the nuclear scenario where my card gets eaten. D'oh. If I can't get any money from ATMs I'll have to go to a bank on MOnday and leave on Tuesday instead...
Met Eric(from Canada) and Lisa(from Wales) and Teri(from NY who is writig a book about a time travelling humanoid rabbit!) at Suk11 and chatted with them while we watched Saddam being paraded on TV. Eric was on his way to Cambodia as well so we decided to go together! Looks like the ATM fiasco was a blessing in disguise...!
Bought another camera lens today. I'd already bought a Nikon F65 and a 50/1.8 lens but decided I needed a wide angle lens to capture the magnificence at Angkor in a few days. So, my latest addition is a 28/2.8.
Said bye to Darcy who is off to Myanmar which sounds great...
Met Darcy Lee Tucker, an upfront but pretty easy going (for New York) American the previous night and we got on very well and decided to visit Ayuthaya together. Loi need not worry as not only is she getting married in July, she is also getting married to a woman so the chances of anything happening were not entirely high! I'll quote Darcy's email to her friends about the day....
Ayuthaya was a bit of a letdown, I must say. And I'm glad that we didn't waste a whole day at the end of the trip going there. I also think that after Cambodia/Angkor, most things of that ancient ruin nature aren't as mesmerizing anymore, you know?Even my travel pal for the day, Chris, who hasn't been to Angkor yet, wasn't THAT impressed either.
We started out 8am armed with the wrong train times, as I guess the train is always changing...it wouldn't have been an issue except that we had one of those taxi drivers who wanted to NOT use the meter and then drove you in a big out of the way circle getting you to your destination. I point out that he was going in a circle and he played dumb and said, "circle? you want to go to train station? where is this circle?" I smiled and kept my cool Asian head and said, "the circle that you just drove us around b/c you want the extra baht!" Oh ha ha ha.
Then, he wanted to know where we were going and we were dumb once again and told him the truth. Well, then of course, he wants to know why we don't want him to take us there? Now, here is the difference between the New Yorker traveler and the Brit traveler. To this question, I say, "because we're taking the train." End of story. That's that. But no....Chris is all, "oh we're meeting some friends and they wouldn't all fit in your car and I we have to go to the train station to see them" and blahblahblah. Soooo polite and apologetic about the whole business. And why were we taking the train? Because it's 14B (35 cents) and you've driven us in circles for 20 minutes and already gouged us for 80B ($2)!
He does (eventually) get us to the train station and then claims to not have any change. So, we scrambled around and because we didn't have any more small coins and the bastard ended up with a 10B tip even though he'd already ripped us off.
And...we've just missed our train by two minutes.
11am and we're finally in Ayuthaya. Coming out of the train staion we are, in that typical tout fashion, attacked. Once again, in my typical New Yorker fashion, I ignore all calls of attack and proceed forward, knowing the the 2B (5 cents) ferry transporting me cheaply across the river, lies directly ahead of me. But...I've lost Chris who is too polite to say no or ignore then and is practically having a cup of tea with one particularly aggressive tout. He's gotten so far that Chris is now looking at photographs of where this man will take us (for how much money??!!) and is commenting nicely of them.
Finally.
The taxi/tuk tuk mafia is so oppressive that they make you lose sight sometimes and you want to escape them so badly, you blindly wind through the crowds.
This is a mistake, because then you don't realize you are walking past all of the good, cheap, bicycle rental shops.
The heat was rather oppressive and I think we rented the villages crappiest bikes to tool around with for the day. Lonely Planet had said that you could walk to the major ones but if you wanted to really see others, you'd be best off with a bike or going with a moto(expensive).
We thought, OK, we'll go around by foot and then find a bike....wellllll...all of the bike rental places were at the beginning by the town (naturally) and by the time we started looking for a bike, there really weren't any or, like the place we eventually found, they were shit. And the owner wanted 40B ($1) each for them and it was a half day by that point. We'd heard that it should only be 30B (75 cents) for the day, so we got him down to that at least, but oy.
At least we got a giggle watching him takes our bike locks out of the freezer! They weren't cold at all, so remember when this when your fridge breaks down, it probably has a thousand uses you've never even thought of. Need a place to organize those messy tools laying around in your garage?!
For the rest of the day, we longingly gazed at everyone's brand new shiny bikes as we cursed our rusty overpriced pieces of shit. They were so bad you wobbled taking off. I'm surprised we made it back without blowing the ancient tires. I never even bothered to lock it up.
We did see some nice ruins, but there was little information about them in our guidebook and even less at the sites themselves.
Basically we spent the entire day cursing the heat and wondering if that was yet another chedi or stupa.
Chris was bound and determined to find the ones listed far away on the LP map and that's when they wild dogs came at us. Luckily we escaped and they were probably more bark than bite, but at least it took us off down a village road that doesn't see too many 'farangs' and the cries of "hello" and giddy children waving and running down the street made the day worthwhile in itself.
Coming back into town we stopped at a stoplight and waited for the light to change...as did the elephants and cars and motos. Yep, four elephants waiting at the stoplight. You don't see that everyday. We asked someone and they said the elephants were going back to their camp and well...that's the road! So it is...
Naturally we missed the Bangkok bound train by two minutes again and were eaten alive by mosquitos while waiting another hour and a half for the next train.
I think I've been represented a little harshly and ended up being described as Higgins from Magnum! It was a fun day out though...
Spent the last few days updating the web site and watching some movies. In summary:-
Afte a nice lie in, decide to walk aroun and orient myself. The Sukhumvit road takes you right down to the city centre. It was during my walk there that I realised I was staying in hooker central. So many bars, all loaded with young things in skimpy outfits, lots of old western men around. It did take me a while to wonder how some of these old, fat, greasy guys were with young girls but the penny dropped eventually! And there was me thinking they had really good conversational skills.... ;-)
Found a great sushi place that did an all you can eat for about £3. The sushi was great but they have an additional feature on the table by the conveyor belt. You get a recessed bowl of clear chicken stock and a stove underneath it. Then raw ingredients such as meat (pork,chicken,seafood etc) and vegetables go round on the conveyer belt and you just pick up the dishes and put the contents in the bowl and wait a minute or so for it to cook. Works really well and compliments the sushi nicely.
When I was well and truly fed, I grabbed a tuktuk to the Grand Palace (pictures and info). This is the main attraction here but I felt too crowded in here. Everything is very shiny indeed but very close together. One guy in the hostel captured the place in one word, Disneyland. There's no sense of age or majesty about the place, it's a little too overdone and artificial as a result.
In the evening I went for a wander through Chinatown where I hit upon an excellent outdoor seafood restaurant (me and the food). I had the King Prawns with fermented Lemon Grass which blew my head off (due to the chilies) but which was the finest meal I'd had in ages!
After an uneventful journey and possibly the worst in-flight movie in history (Good Boy), I landed in Thailand at 6pm. I'd already booked a room at the Suk 11 hostel. The airport bus took me straight there and was a piece of cake to use. On the bus I met the crazy guy from Varanasi, India who had motorcycled his way from Holland to India. He's such an interesting guy. The plan was to head east until he ran out of road. Nice!
I had an e-mail from Loi that Ant's mum would be in Bangkok the same night I arrived so check into my hotel then went straight out again to meet her. Luckily her hotel was only 3 blocks away from me. We had a good laugh together after admitting to each other we couldn't remember what the other looked like. Had some coffee in her room (she had a wonderful room on the 8th floor with a glass wall and spectacular views of Bangkok at night) then went to a 24hr eaterie down the road. Had 2 meals there. Fantastic. The first time I'd eaten beef in 2 months!
Nepal is an excellent country to visit. Some may say it is a soft option compared to India but I'd disagree. Nepal has some of the finsest scenery around. Add in friendly people and more or less the "right" amount of tourists/touts (except for Thamel, Kathmandu) and you have everything to offer the trekker/nature enthusiast.
The highlight of my stay in Nepal was the Annapurna trek. So full of highs and lows. The highs were the wonderful scenery, being with a great group and meeting lots of interesting people on the way. The low was my AMS (obviously).
I would definitely go back to Nepal again, to finish the Annapurna Circuit, see more of Chitwan and to see the World Elephant Polo Championships that I missed by a few days!
Staying in Kathmandu for a few days before my flight to Bangkok, Thailand on Friday 5th.
Can't wait!!
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Got up really early (5am!) to get to the elephant breeding centre as the safari went on too long the day before.
What a magical few hours. Played with baby elephants and their mothers for an hour or so. The babies love to barge you and you barge them back! They are so strong, even the one who was 15 days old! The mothers love a banana or two. The area was very foggy and I managed to get some excellent photos if I say so myself!
Back to Kathmandu later in the morning...