Right. Well. I feel like I’ve been beaten up… and in a way I have… We recently spent 4 hours travelling up and down what some guy described as a ‘road’. Dear sweet Jesus, that was never a road! It was more a cross between a dried up river bed and a bombed airfield, which I think makes it a bad ‘road’ in a country of bad roads. Anyway, 4 hours being beaten about the buttocks with a moto seat has left me slightly tender. Who knows, one day I cold grow to like that sort of thing. It was worth it though. The aforesaid ‘road’ lead up from a little town called Kampot (where ginger people are worshipped as gods) into Bokor National Park where there’s an abandoned French settlement, including a 3 storey hotel which is almost completely intact but utterly deserted. It’s up above the cloud level and the only noise comes from the jungle a hundred feet below…Very cool indeed.
We headed to Kampot from Phnom Penh where we’d spent a few days. I spent most of my time in Phnom Penh without the use of much of my right hand after I managed to inflict upon myself some sort of RSI injury from clinging (in pure terror) to the handlebars of the motos we hired on our last day in Siem Reap. This unfortunately left me unable to open bottles, use keys and zips, or type emails - hence the holiday email drought. I’m sure you’re all gutted. It’s all better now though so here we go!
Our day on the motos in Siem Reap was damn cool, once I’d resigned myself to a horrible truck-meets-moto related death. We headed out into the country-side to check out one final temple and a carved waterfall, both of which were awesome. The best thing about the trip though was getting the chance to see a bit of the country-side… The people were so friendly! Everyone waved as we passed, all the kids shouted hello, and whenever we stopped we’d get a crowd of curious locals testing their English on us. We gave some guy a lift home from the waterfall and as a thank you he bought us some coconut wine from the local police… Best not to ask too many questions. I got back with a feeling of enormous well-being. And a buggered hand.
We caught the boat from Siem Reap to Phnom Penh the next day having seen most of the accessible temples. The boat ride was an experience in itself. We’d been advised to get the fast boat because the slow boat is hijacked every now and again, so we were dropped at this evil-looking, floating metal tube that lurked in the middle of a floating village just outside of Siem Reap. Inside there were about 70 seats, a TV playing Cambodia karaoke disks and only one exit. Hmmm, death trap. So we sat on the roof. Unfortunately, unbeknownst to us, the boat moves fucking fast and therefore generates quite a lot of spray. If you’re foolish enough to be sitting more than half way back you’re going to get soaked; we were sitting more than halfway back. Luckily, loads of people got bored of being wet and cold and moved inside to brave the karaoke. We, the hardcore, moved further and further up the boat until we were in the dry bit from where we could watch the fishing villages slip by us in comfort. The river was absolutely enormous and the scenery gorgeous. We also passed and entire floating town of Vietnamese fisher-folk (including floating schools, post offices and petrol stations!) which was pretty feckin’ cool. I felt a bit sorry for a few of the fishermen though as our boat’s driver treated the journey like a big game of British Bulldog meets Titanic, safe in the knowledge that our boat was bigger than everyone else’s. In fact, that seems to be the primary rule in the highway code over here. The bigger vehicle gets right of way, regardless of which side of the road it’s supposed to be on. It’s an entirely faith-based set of rules in a country that believes in re-incarnation.
Phnom Penh was really chilled. We checked into a guesthouse on the Boeng Kak lake, which has the most surreal natural phenomenon in the form of migrating plant-life. The day we got there, the lake stretched out on either side of us completely unobstructed… When we got up the next morning it was covered with green plants as far as the eye could see. I spent about 10 minutes just trying to figure out whether I was imagining things before deciding I was mad and sitting down for breakfast. Halfway through my pancake I looked up to see the plants making for the opposite bank at high speed! I finished my pancake, skipped back to my room and muttered quietly to myself about baboons and their wives, safe in the knowledge that I was completely insane. I later saw a lonely backpacker walking the streets playing a ukulele. I think that bit might have been real.
We did all the usual stuff in Phnom Penh: visited the Genocide Museum and the killing fields, shot AK-47s and visited the royal palace. We also spent a lot of time just chilling and watching the plants happily wander about the lake. I wasn’t a big fan of the shooting range - I felt I was taking advantage by firing such an infamous weapon for kicks. It’s hard to explain but I won’t be doing it again. Rich loved it though! The palace was interesting too. The outside was awesome, although it was packed with flocks of Japanese tourists carrying with them a moveable forest of tripods and thousands of pounds worth of camera equipment. The inside, however, was a bit of a disappointment. One of the highlights, according to the guide book, is a floor covered with solid silver tiles. For some reason, someone has used selotape to hold them together which kind of detracts from the beauty… Selotape for fuck’s sake!
Anyway, following Phnom Penh we went to Kampot, where we got spanked by moto seats, and after that dubious pleasure we moved on to Sihanoukville for a couple of days on the beach, and that is where we are now. Christmas day was spent sitting in the sun eating pineapple and playing frizbee. Not bad, if I do say so myself.
I’ve gotta head off now to argue with our hotel owners about a broken bath (story another time) so once again I’ll wish everyone a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
See y’all soon!
