Evening one and all! After days of wandering we’ve made it to Siam Reap in Cambodia. Well, we’ve actually been here a while now but I was after a bit of drama. Always a good start with a bit of drama. Rambling apologies are the second best. I’ve managed to combine both into a kind of hybrid super-intro. Impressed? Eh? Hmmm.
Well, we flew out of sunny London on Wednesday (I think). Me and Rich arranged to meet at 12 in Paddington but both of us managed to be 1:45 late, which was quite an auspicious start. We then flew to Vienna: “You know, the place with the canals. No Mike you fuck-wit, that’d be Venice. Oh yeah.” That little confusion aside, Vienna turned out to be… a shit-hole. We had to sit in the transfers lounge with what appeared to be a Status Quo audience (i.e. a significant number of people displaying the tell-tale mullet/jeans/tucked-in-and-buttoned-up shirt with optional cardigan combo) for hours with nothing to do except watch people amuse themselves by wheeling their trollies around the small fountain in the middle. Honestly. One guy managed several dozen laps before losing the will to live.
Our connecting flight was with Lauda Air which was actually surprisingly funny. The safetly announcement was read out by a female porn voice-over woman which gave a whole new meaning to “adopt the recommended safety position” and “masks will drop automatically”. Plus they call business class “Amadeus” class and have fake wood panelling for the plane’s interior… Maybe you had to be there. I spent the whole announcement giggling. I think that makes me purile and immature but it seemed like the right thing to do at the time.
We had a night to stop over in Bangkok… We intended to stay on the Kau San road but first we walked the wrong way and then we got slightly lost so we ended up one road over. As it turns out, this was a blessing. The Kao San road was like a 18-30s holiday camp for wanna-be hippies. There’s only so much tie-dye one man can take… I did spot my first lady boy though. Damn, they make them well out there! No, not tempted, just impressed in a kind of “Holy shit, that can’t be a guy. Surely.” kind of way.
Bangkok was followed by a quick 12 hour bus ride over the border. Well I say 12 hour… It turned out to be closer to 17 hours on the bumpiest ‘road’ on earth after being royally screwed by the driver but that’s another story. And not a very interesting one. I know that’s never stopped me before but frankly I can’t be arsed.
Anyone still reading? Nothing better to do? Ah well. I’ll continue then.
Siam Reap has been wicked so far. We spent a day just getting orientated - i.e. eating and drinking with some limited walking in between and then a boat trip out to see the floating village and sunset on Tonle Sap lake. Our boat was driven by a 9 year old! Said kid then foolishly let Rich drive… I was scared. Very scared. Somehow we survived, saw the sunset and made it back to dry land in time for a motorbike ride through the darkness with a distinct lack of headlamps and lane discipline. Then a day of temple watching… Which was awesome!!! Up for dawn over Angkor Wat (as spectacular as you can imagine) followed by 8 hours in the back of a motorbike-drawn carriage (because we’re classy like that), tootling round about a dozen temples and spotting scenes from Tomb Raider.
Today was some more temples, lots of chatting to random locals and monks, with motorbike rides in between. I’m not sure yet but I think I prefer being on the roads at night because while what you can’t see can hurt you it doesn’t scare you so much… Tomorrow it looks like we’re going to hire motos for ourselves and brave what passes for roads out here. If no one hears from me again, I love you all and I wish you all the best for the future. For now I though, I’m going to assume that I will survive so I’ll just wish everyone a Merry Christmas. Catch you all around New Year somewhere!
I’m done.
