I thought I would take the time to finish the blogging adventure now that I am home and settled.
I last left you in Sihonoukville, after having way too much sun and looking like a piglet. Fortunately, no one mistook us for bacon and we arrived safely back in Phnom Penh, looking a little less English Tourist Lobster and a little more Sun Kissed Aussie. We decided to take the cheaper bus this time, the difference was about $3 and the cheaper bus had no toilet (considering I avoided the toilet on the more expensive bus like the plague (it was really, really tiny and smelled of urine and farts) there really wasn't much difference). It turns out the cheap bus driver thought he was a rally driver, and manoeuvred that sucker like Meatloaf did in the Spice Girls Movie when they thought there was a bomb on their double decker bus. Fortunately, there was no bomb or Spice Girls (I would have had to kick Posh Spice in the skinny little shins), and we got to Phnom Penh in record time, 4 hours on the dot.
We checked into the Waterview and then into Bogie and Bacall's, making sure they had space for us to head to the Dump again the next day. John went to the Psar to get some soccer balls and I headed back to the Waterview to indulge in some quiet time, watching a movie (there was a channel on cable that was the "DVD Channel" and it consistently just played random DVD's). It was here that a movie called Americano came on. It's about a 22 year old guy holidaying in Spain, he becomes fascinated by Spanish culture and wants to stay however he as a great career waiting for him at home. Therein lies his personal dilemma, should he follow the beaten path and head back to his promising career and "Live the Dream", or stay in Spain and experience adventure by following the road less travelled?
The next morning it was time to visit Beautiful Dump Kids again. With soccer balls in hand, we eagerly jumped in the back of the truck for another rewarding and grounding day. This time I was on first aid duty, however, someone forgot the gloves. Here lies Shannon's moral dilemma: "Do I risk my health and possibly my life to administer first aid without gloves to these amazing children who just need to be cared for?" or "Do I refuse to administer first aid and attempt to help in other ways so I can protect myself?" Taking into consideration that these children are exposed to medical waste (used swabs, syringes, used gloves and other surgical paraphernalia) on a regular basis, I decided to protect myself and be the first aid assistant. Someone did have to administer first aid that day, the adorable little faces already lining up to have someone look at their scraped knee, administer a bandaid and let them know that someone cares. So Richard took the bullet, ensuring that he first did not have any cuts or abrasions on his own hands, then making sure he thoroughly washed and disinfected his hands after every patient. Fortunately that day there were no serious injuries to attend to, just some minor cuts and abrasions.
Being the first aid assistant meant I got to distract a few of the patients in pain by singing songs with them, handed out iodine, gauze, tape and bandaids. A couple of the little girls were fascinated with what was going on and decided to become the assistants assistant. They learnt very quickly what items were needed for what type of injury, made sure the patients were comfortable, stroked their hair if they were crying and also sung songs with them. These kids are truly beautiful.
Once all the food had been handed out, it was time to hang out with the friends we made last time and hand out the soccer balls (which went down a treat!). I gave out a couple of bamboo bracelets I had picked up in Angkor Wat to a few of my friends, they loved them and there were a couple of unhappy faces for those who had missed out. As David was saying goodbye, I noticed that the little girls were handing him some bracelets to say thankyou, they were the same ones I had just given them! These girls had absolutely nothing and were more than happy to give away what they did have to say thank you. The situation these kids are in truly breaks my heart. Their attitudes are an inspiration.
We said our goodbyes and when they said "We'll see you soon" I really, honestly hoped I would be back again soon.
Back at Bogie and Bacall's it was time to drown our sorrows at having to leave soon. David invited us to dinner with himself and his girlfriend Allie at his favourite pizza place. We met them out the front at 6pm and headed into "NGO Land". NGO Land stands out from the rest of Phnom Penh, in NGO Land, there are no street side food stalls, no rubbish on the side of the road and no Khmer people. NGO's are Non Government Organisations, basically charities who are based in Cambodia to help the less fortunate. Unfortunately, when travelling through NGO Land, you notice that their offices are quite luxurious, the 3 Hummers, 4 Lexus's and 2 Security Guards parked out the front are where your donations are going.
The pizza place was called Freebirds, and although quite nice, the food was double what you would pay in Phnom Penh. David informed us that it was frequented by NGO Staff. This was evident by the Lexus's parked out the front. Corruption isn't just rife within Cambodia's government, it's also rife within the "Not for Profit" organisations who are stealing donation money and attributing their gratuitous spending to "Administration Fees". Disgusting.
Even though Cambodia is a victim of corruption, there is some unbelievable good within the country. David and Allie are some of that good. While chatting to Allie over dinner (she is still learning English) she told me about how she had to drop out of school early so she could get a job and earn money. Even though she didn't attend school she managed to learn to speak Korean and Chinese fluently! She wanted John and I to come with her to visit her family back in Kom Pong Thom Province for Khmer New Year, unfortunately, Khmer New Year isn't until April and we would be back in Australia.
Allie decided over dinner that John and I were "good people" and that she would be very sad when we left. She gave me a photo of her to have so I wouldn't forget her. She's the same age as John and I but has this beautiful childish sweetness about her. David and Allie were heading to Sihonoukville the next day to check out the Rubbish Dump situation there. It's David's hope that he can find someone to set up the same project that he has going on in Phnom Penh. I hope he can find someone.
We decided to have a quiet last day in Cambodia, John and I were both not feeling 100%, starting to get runny noses and praying we hadn't caught Bird Flu! We had grand plans to visit an orphanage on the outskirts of Phnom Penh but the kids were at school so our plan was foiled. Mr Thai suggested the Russian Psar and then beers at a great bar he knew of (his payment would be in beers).
Mr Thai is a great Tuk Tuk driver in Phnom Penh, recommended to us by Richard. You can't miss him on the corner of St. 136 and Sisowath Quay, he has a Thai made tuk tuk (instead of a trailer in the back of a motorbike, Thai tuk tuk's are more like a golf cart, the driver sits behind a window on a bench and it has gears on the dash). He has adorned the front of his tuk tuk with some very fashionable bull horns. We did some last minute souvenir shopping at the Russian Psar, scoring cinematic brilliance with the likes of Eagle vs Sharks (The plural must mean it's a sequel, or Cambodilish), Burn After Reading, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Confessions of a Shopaholic, Valkyrie and Slumdog Millionaire. Brilliant.
From there it was off to Maxine's, on the other side of the Tong Le Sap, run by an Australian Expat called Snowy. We were immediately greeted by the melodic tunes of The John Butler Trio and sat down to watch the sunset over the Tong Le Sap. Mr Thai is an incredibly interesting man. His English is great and his sense of humour event greater. He had some T-Shirts made up, the front saying "Tuk Tuk Driver Phnom Penh", with the Cambodian flag on the front. The back reads: "Not tonight ladies, I'm just here for a drink" it then has a picture of the bull horns from the front of his tuk tuk and the words "Oh Ok, Why not!!!"
The next morning it was off to the airport, chauffeured by none other than Mr Thai. He gave me a present just before we left, a black cotton handbag with gold elephants stitched around it.
I was feeling pretty ordinary that day, my nose was running like a tap and my head was aching terribly. Mr Thai made me promise I would get checked out by a doctor at home to make sure I hadn't picked up anything serious.By the time we got to Kuala Lumpur I had a fever. It turns out that not just KL airport smells like a musty cupboard crossed with urine, the bus we were transferred to our hotel smelled and then our hotel also smelled. The Concorde Hotel was a bit of a cultural "Melting Pot" which funnily enough was the name of the hotel restaurant that served "Beef Bacon" instead of real bacon. I found it very amusing that they were being culturally sensitive to the Muslim community by not serving pork, yet not to the very prevalent Hindi community who believe that cows are sacred? Just a sidenote: Beef bacon is terrible. Don't do it to yourself. It's just wrong.
Back in Brisvegus, it turns out I don't have bird flu, just some regular sniffles and some heart sickness for the amazing people we met.
Since then I have had the pleasure of getting stuck back into work. Part of this was a casual leasing gig at a local shopping centre for my work. While handing out free balloons to kids passing by, we ran out of the clips that go on the bottom of the balloons to help attach them to the sticks. In a sheer stroke of genius, and finger dexterity to rival that of a brain surgeon, I managed to tie a balloon onto the end of the stick. A small boy came up to ask for a free balloon, I happily handed him my invention, in which he promptly proceeded to turn his nose up at, make horrible squawking noises and convey through these noises that this balloon was not good enough for him. He wanted one that has a plastic connector. Resiting the urge to shove the balloon, stick and all down his throat sideways. I handed him another balloon, this one with our last plastic connector. As I handed it over, I thought back to the little kids at the dump, who were happy even though they had absolutely nothing. I wish I could have sent them all the balloons.
Love, hugs and a million balloons,
Shanngelina.
Saturday, 21 March 2009
Saturday, 14 March 2009
Its coming to a close.. the final hoorah.
Since we talked last.
We headed back from Sihanoukville to Phnom Penh. This time we took the $5 shitheap bus and it took 4 hours.Go figure. The bus barely had brakes, but really, I think that made hills much more interesting and a little intriguing, not to mention full of suspense. Everyone loves a bit of edge and mystery, I hear thats why the girls love Johnny Depp. So I guess the bus was a lot like Johnny Depp.
We arrived back in at midday and back to our hotel, the Waterview. We dropped our stuff off and decided to go for a stroll. We strolled all about Phnom Penh, before heading to Bogey and Bacalls to see if they were still having a dump run on friday. Luckily for us they were, and we stayed there for a few hours, drinking 65c beers before heading off.
As we were heading out the next day, I headed down to the Russian Markets on the back of a moto to buy some soccer balls for the kids. When we got to the market and I went to give the driver a dollar he said
Moto: "Where are you staying?
Me: Paragon ( a devious lie so he wouldnt try and mug me or something equally as lame )
Moto: I know a hotel that has free accomodation
Me: I bet it does
Moto: And girls. Sexy girls. All the girls you want. I will take you there.
Me: GFY.
So I met a pimp who moonlights on a motorbike. This place is full of surprises. Haha. I grabbed the soccer balls, and headed home, then later on we went for some beers.
The dump was good yesterday, a really rewarding day. This time we were accompanied by a couple of Germans, a couple of Brits and an Irish guy. The dump smelled a lot worse this time, like really really fucking reeked. I had the job this time of distributing the food in the boys line. So each little tacker came up, grabbed 2 apples, a loaf of bread, an orange and 2 bananas. Absolutely amazing that for $150, 450 kids can get a decent vitamin-packed meal.
While we were up there, a couple of Japanese tourists came up in a tuktuk and started taking photos. Didn't even get out of the tuktuk. Its quite disheartening to see that there are some people who think some good holiday snaps are those containing 450 kids living on a rubbish dump.
After we handed out the food, we distributed the soccer balls. One word only can desribe it: SHITSTORM. Haha. The kids went mental for them. We only took 10 so we made sure to remind them to share them, but even if they get a bit of fun out of them, then thats ok by us.
From there we had the obligatory 10 beers at Bogey and Bacalls, and as we were leaving, David, the owner of Bogeys and the Founder of the Dump Run invited us to dinner at his favourite pizza parlour with his lovely girlfriend Allie. So we agreed to that, came home, showered and met them there at 6. We all took a tuktuk took a took down, had some pizza, laughs, etc before bidding adieu to them both as we won't get a chance to see them before we leave.
We then headed back to Bogeys where we met Richard (the barmy English guy who accompanies David on most of the dump runs). Richard insisted on taking us on a walking tour of the Riverside bars, so off we went. Stopped in a few bars, had a few ales, before heading to the pontoon. The Pontoon is a bar, thats on an actual Pontoon. Its got a fullsize lounge, a fullsize dance floor, a fullsize bar.. and its actually a really cool place to hang out. Unfortunately for us, we'd been in the sun all day, were tired (Shannon was recovering from her delhi belly the night before) and we bailed at about 10pm.
Today we rose late, and then headed for some soup at our favourite little place on the corner of 136 St, opposite Huxleys. After breaky we headed to the markets with our main man Mr Thai, bought some cheap DVD's, thongs etc, and made plans to meet Mr Thai for a drink this afternoon, which is where I am headed now. Obviously won't get a blog out before our pretty uneventful flight home, maybe after if something slightly entertaining popped up.. We've certainly had a great time, and until the next trip, thanks for reading.
Cheers
John.
We headed back from Sihanoukville to Phnom Penh. This time we took the $5 shitheap bus and it took 4 hours.Go figure. The bus barely had brakes, but really, I think that made hills much more interesting and a little intriguing, not to mention full of suspense. Everyone loves a bit of edge and mystery, I hear thats why the girls love Johnny Depp. So I guess the bus was a lot like Johnny Depp.
We arrived back in at midday and back to our hotel, the Waterview. We dropped our stuff off and decided to go for a stroll. We strolled all about Phnom Penh, before heading to Bogey and Bacalls to see if they were still having a dump run on friday. Luckily for us they were, and we stayed there for a few hours, drinking 65c beers before heading off.
As we were heading out the next day, I headed down to the Russian Markets on the back of a moto to buy some soccer balls for the kids. When we got to the market and I went to give the driver a dollar he said
Moto: "Where are you staying?
Me: Paragon ( a devious lie so he wouldnt try and mug me or something equally as lame )
Moto: I know a hotel that has free accomodation
Me: I bet it does
Moto: And girls. Sexy girls. All the girls you want. I will take you there.
Me: GFY.
So I met a pimp who moonlights on a motorbike. This place is full of surprises. Haha. I grabbed the soccer balls, and headed home, then later on we went for some beers.
The dump was good yesterday, a really rewarding day. This time we were accompanied by a couple of Germans, a couple of Brits and an Irish guy. The dump smelled a lot worse this time, like really really fucking reeked. I had the job this time of distributing the food in the boys line. So each little tacker came up, grabbed 2 apples, a loaf of bread, an orange and 2 bananas. Absolutely amazing that for $150, 450 kids can get a decent vitamin-packed meal.
While we were up there, a couple of Japanese tourists came up in a tuktuk and started taking photos. Didn't even get out of the tuktuk. Its quite disheartening to see that there are some people who think some good holiday snaps are those containing 450 kids living on a rubbish dump.
After we handed out the food, we distributed the soccer balls. One word only can desribe it: SHITSTORM. Haha. The kids went mental for them. We only took 10 so we made sure to remind them to share them, but even if they get a bit of fun out of them, then thats ok by us.
From there we had the obligatory 10 beers at Bogey and Bacalls, and as we were leaving, David, the owner of Bogeys and the Founder of the Dump Run invited us to dinner at his favourite pizza parlour with his lovely girlfriend Allie. So we agreed to that, came home, showered and met them there at 6. We all took a tuktuk took a took down, had some pizza, laughs, etc before bidding adieu to them both as we won't get a chance to see them before we leave.
We then headed back to Bogeys where we met Richard (the barmy English guy who accompanies David on most of the dump runs). Richard insisted on taking us on a walking tour of the Riverside bars, so off we went. Stopped in a few bars, had a few ales, before heading to the pontoon. The Pontoon is a bar, thats on an actual Pontoon. Its got a fullsize lounge, a fullsize dance floor, a fullsize bar.. and its actually a really cool place to hang out. Unfortunately for us, we'd been in the sun all day, were tired (Shannon was recovering from her delhi belly the night before) and we bailed at about 10pm.
Today we rose late, and then headed for some soup at our favourite little place on the corner of 136 St, opposite Huxleys. After breaky we headed to the markets with our main man Mr Thai, bought some cheap DVD's, thongs etc, and made plans to meet Mr Thai for a drink this afternoon, which is where I am headed now. Obviously won't get a blog out before our pretty uneventful flight home, maybe after if something slightly entertaining popped up.. We've certainly had a great time, and until the next trip, thanks for reading.
Cheers
John.
Wednesday, 11 March 2009
This little piggy went to Sihonoukville
Chum reap sua from Snooky!
After finding a bar on the beach yesterday afternoon, there were a few lady's on the beach (and even a ladyboy) touting manicure's, pedicure's, sarongs, bracelets, bleached decorative coral, shells, massages and a thing called "Threading" (You may have heard of Threading before, I think it may originally have come from India, but it has found its way to Cambodia, on the beaches of Snooky. Threading is a form of hair removal, using a piece of string, formed into a loop, the string is twisted, and it then pulls hair out by the root, usually quite a few hairs at a time). So there, at the beach bar, we met Mom (one of the touts, not the ladyboy), who kindly pointed out that my legs were looking a bit shabby and she had the answer to my problem. So for $15 for both legs, I got Threaded. It is then that I learnt the words Choo (pain, or ouch!) and Tik Tik (a little), I also learnt the word for a lot, but I forgot (stupid brain only has the capacity for 2 or 3 Khmer words or sentences a day).Mom was fabulous, teaching me some more Khmer and being very chatty and friendly (I have arranged to call her when I get home so she can teach me more Khmer and I can help her with her English). She also suggested a tour company do do our Bamboo Island Tour with and she negotiated $2 off the price for us. I love Mom :)
Today we headed across to Bamboo Island on the BICAT (no, this is not a sexually confused feline), it is the Bamboo Island Catamaran (when I say catamaran, I really mean a single hulled wooden boat that looked like it should be smuggling us from Indonesia to Australia, possibly with a Children Overboard scandal involved).
There weren't any children thrown overboard today, but I wanted to throw a couple of pommy girls over, along with an American lady (who was the spitting image of Lady Sarah Ashley (Nicole Kidman) from Australia, goggle type glasses, stupid hat and nose stuck up in the air. I didn't have the heart to tell her that we were indeed not heading to Australia to drove 1500 head of cattle. She would also not find love in the Outback from a previously heartbroken drover who was tough on the outside but kind hearted on the inside, or a surrogate child, a half cast aboriginal child on the run from the authorities who were trying to place him in a mission. We were in fact just heading to Bamboo Island to do a spot of snorkelling and lazing around the beach.
We were picked up from Makara (our hotel in Snooky, $9, clean, about 100m from the beach - but no air con, tv or fridge - how rude of you SE Asia!) and dropped about 400m down the road. Had I have known it was this close, we would have walked. We were treated to breakfast, really strong coffee, a freshly baked bread roll and some jam, then we headed off to the boat. A very rickety old thing, and as I mentioned above, it looked more like it should be smuggling us back to Australia then taking us on a snorkelling tour. Needless to say, we were a bit apprehensive, especially when I saw the amount of water in the bottom that they were bailing out!
However, I am in it for the adventure, I have travel insurance (for my camera), memory cards can dry out and there was a handful of life jackets. The plan was to punch Lady Sarah Ashley and the pommy girls should they try and reach them in the case of an emergency. Luckily, operation "Australia", never came to fruition. We made it to the snorkelling area just fine - I was perhaps a little green around the gills. Yes, I work for a boat and yes I do get sea sick, I think this is because I am not a Pirate. The snorkelling areas was not the best choice, it was a bit choppy and the viability not good. I gave it a quick go, Andrew from Get Wet would have an absolute heart attack if he saw their safety measures. No wet suit, no instructions just, "Here's your snorkel now jump off the boat. Oh, and by the way, don't stand on the coral, there are sea urchins". After floating around in the water for a few minutes and getting smashed in the face by waves, I decided that it was enough adventure for me out there, in the ocean, with the sea urchins, and promptly hopped back to safety in the rickety boat (the boat was actually quite good and speedy considering the size of the motor, we didn't have any trouble with it at all).
At Bamboo Island, John and I frolicked in the waves, like whales (occasionally breaching and blowing water into the air) and ran into some lovely Khmer people we had met the night before. The frolicking was the best part of my day. I much preferred to frolic in water than to lurch, roll and pitch on the water. We had another quick snorkelling stop off on the way back to Sihonoukville and John tried his hand at fishing (which was really just an exercise in fish feeding, resulting in him covering the white hotel towel in squid ink and making himself smell like fish BAHAHAHAH). John is not the new Rex Hunt.
We resemble piglets at the moment though, with very pink skin and curly tails.
Tomorrow, the piglets are heading back to Phnom Penh. This little piglet will be crying (yom) all the way home.
Oink.
Shanngelina
After finding a bar on the beach yesterday afternoon, there were a few lady's on the beach (and even a ladyboy) touting manicure's, pedicure's, sarongs, bracelets, bleached decorative coral, shells, massages and a thing called "Threading" (You may have heard of Threading before, I think it may originally have come from India, but it has found its way to Cambodia, on the beaches of Snooky. Threading is a form of hair removal, using a piece of string, formed into a loop, the string is twisted, and it then pulls hair out by the root, usually quite a few hairs at a time). So there, at the beach bar, we met Mom (one of the touts, not the ladyboy), who kindly pointed out that my legs were looking a bit shabby and she had the answer to my problem. So for $15 for both legs, I got Threaded. It is then that I learnt the words Choo (pain, or ouch!) and Tik Tik (a little), I also learnt the word for a lot, but I forgot (stupid brain only has the capacity for 2 or 3 Khmer words or sentences a day).Mom was fabulous, teaching me some more Khmer and being very chatty and friendly (I have arranged to call her when I get home so she can teach me more Khmer and I can help her with her English). She also suggested a tour company do do our Bamboo Island Tour with and she negotiated $2 off the price for us. I love Mom :)
Today we headed across to Bamboo Island on the BICAT (no, this is not a sexually confused feline), it is the Bamboo Island Catamaran (when I say catamaran, I really mean a single hulled wooden boat that looked like it should be smuggling us from Indonesia to Australia, possibly with a Children Overboard scandal involved).
There weren't any children thrown overboard today, but I wanted to throw a couple of pommy girls over, along with an American lady (who was the spitting image of Lady Sarah Ashley (Nicole Kidman) from Australia, goggle type glasses, stupid hat and nose stuck up in the air. I didn't have the heart to tell her that we were indeed not heading to Australia to drove 1500 head of cattle. She would also not find love in the Outback from a previously heartbroken drover who was tough on the outside but kind hearted on the inside, or a surrogate child, a half cast aboriginal child on the run from the authorities who were trying to place him in a mission. We were in fact just heading to Bamboo Island to do a spot of snorkelling and lazing around the beach.
We were picked up from Makara (our hotel in Snooky, $9, clean, about 100m from the beach - but no air con, tv or fridge - how rude of you SE Asia!) and dropped about 400m down the road. Had I have known it was this close, we would have walked. We were treated to breakfast, really strong coffee, a freshly baked bread roll and some jam, then we headed off to the boat. A very rickety old thing, and as I mentioned above, it looked more like it should be smuggling us back to Australia then taking us on a snorkelling tour. Needless to say, we were a bit apprehensive, especially when I saw the amount of water in the bottom that they were bailing out!
However, I am in it for the adventure, I have travel insurance (for my camera), memory cards can dry out and there was a handful of life jackets. The plan was to punch Lady Sarah Ashley and the pommy girls should they try and reach them in the case of an emergency. Luckily, operation "Australia", never came to fruition. We made it to the snorkelling area just fine - I was perhaps a little green around the gills. Yes, I work for a boat and yes I do get sea sick, I think this is because I am not a Pirate. The snorkelling areas was not the best choice, it was a bit choppy and the viability not good. I gave it a quick go, Andrew from Get Wet would have an absolute heart attack if he saw their safety measures. No wet suit, no instructions just, "Here's your snorkel now jump off the boat. Oh, and by the way, don't stand on the coral, there are sea urchins". After floating around in the water for a few minutes and getting smashed in the face by waves, I decided that it was enough adventure for me out there, in the ocean, with the sea urchins, and promptly hopped back to safety in the rickety boat (the boat was actually quite good and speedy considering the size of the motor, we didn't have any trouble with it at all).
At Bamboo Island, John and I frolicked in the waves, like whales (occasionally breaching and blowing water into the air) and ran into some lovely Khmer people we had met the night before. The frolicking was the best part of my day. I much preferred to frolic in water than to lurch, roll and pitch on the water. We had another quick snorkelling stop off on the way back to Sihonoukville and John tried his hand at fishing (which was really just an exercise in fish feeding, resulting in him covering the white hotel towel in squid ink and making himself smell like fish BAHAHAHAH). John is not the new Rex Hunt.
We resemble piglets at the moment though, with very pink skin and curly tails.
Tomorrow, the piglets are heading back to Phnom Penh. This little piglet will be crying (yom) all the way home.
Oink.
Shanngelina
John in Cambodia.
From Phnom Penh we headed to Sihanoukville. Luckily we paid the extra $3 for the $9 express bus, and it only took 5 1/2hours to travel the 250km to Sihanoukville.
We got here, and with nowhere to stay, had a look at the trusty Lonely Planet, no help there... So we enlisted the services of a tuktuk driver. His name was Doctor Raymond. Doc took us to his favourite guesthouse (the one he gets a commission from), the Markara Guesthouse, right on the beach at Occhueatal. We grabbed a double room with cold water only, and two fans for $9 a night.. although we're not really pinching pennies, everyone loves a bargain.
Shannon wanted to hit the sand, so we walked down to the 999 Bar and Bungalow, pulled up a seat and had a few beers. A few touts came past, including one selling lobster. We bought 10 lobsters for $4, absolutely delicious and fresh, and drank some more beers. A lady named Mom came past, selling sarongs. After telling Mom we had no sarongs, she offered to give Shannon the "threading of a lifetime". Basically its a form of hair removal for the legs using only string. As you can imagine while Shannon was having her minute leg hairs pulled out by string, and chatting with Mom (who is the nicest woman EVER, better than my own mother) I drank more beers.
I turned around as there were some local Cambodians at the table behind us making a ruccus. I waved and said "Sues day" which is hello. Because of my elite Cambodian language skills, the ringleader, a man named Vun asked if I would like to drink some wine with them.
So I ditched Shannon and Mom, and took two steps to their table, and sat down. Vun introduced me to his family... his wife, his uncle and aunt, his sister in law, and her husband. He told me that his uncle was visiting from France and they were down from Phnom Penh to celebrate. As I love a tipple, and a yarn, I decided to settle in for the evening.
Turns out the wine he was drinking, was actually Hennessey VSOP. Partial to a good cognac, my christmas's had all come at once. We sat there talking the usual shit making sure that we never experienced "Chui Ah" (empty glass), when Shannon joined us. We all sat around a table, eating barbequed fish, mango with some kind of salty paste, and drinking cognac and beer, for a while, all talking about everyday life, Vun's recent wedding, Claude's (Vuns uncle from France) recent trip back to Cambodia, only the 4th in 30 years and they helped us with learning more Khmer. Many more "Chui Moi" (cheers) were done, the Cambodians we have found love to Cheers. They will even Cheers a cheersing. And so on.
We drunk, got drunk, and when I put my head through the wooden part of the chair, and broke it, I knew it was time to head home. Not just that, but we had been drinking non-stop for 6 hours, in the sun, and had to get up at 7am to catch the boat to BAMBOO ISLAND to see pandas*.
At about 1am, Shannon and I both woke up to very pasty mouths, and a hot, hot bedroom. No worries, we'll just grab water.
WRONG DUMBASS TRY AGAIN.
No water. Thats ok, we'll go get some from reception. Shut. Can't drink from the tap, the water is not potable. Ask the security guard... can't speak english. So John grabs a shirt, jumps on the back of a seedy guys motorbike and says "STORE". Off we go, from Occheutal Beach, towards the Sihanoukville CBD. Seedy guy says "Chicken farm, chicken farm" whilst taking one hand off his handlebars to point at a casino. Tired, drunk, and thirsty I tell him to shush and we pull up beside a stall.
I get 6 Litres of drinking water for $2, and we head back. Halfway back a massive dog runs out of a vacant lot and towards the moto. The dog is gaining on us, so I tell the seedy guy to step on it. We finally get back to the hotel where Shannon meets me and sculls 2 L of water.
Woke up this morning, seedy and pasty and ready to go out into the Gulf of Thailand. We get to the boat.. which can only be described as .. a people smuggling vessel. As Cambodia is a standout for human trafficking, I wonder where we will end up. But all is ok and we end up chugging out to a small island, where they throw us some snorkels, a coral reef, say "watch out for urchins" and everyone jumps in. The sea was a bit rough, and being seedy, tired and lazy I jumped in and then pretty much back onto the boat. From there we headed to Bamboo Island. At Bamboo Island we lazed, drank some beer, swam and relaxed while our crew made us a delicious barbeque fish lunch. We ate that and then headed back towards the mainland, stopping once to snorkel and fish.
As we were in the open sea, most people will assume a small boat (15 passengers) will experience some kind of motion. There were these whingy English girls who were like:
"Oh me, oh my, I do say this water is awful rough. Jeeves, can you make the water calm? Pip pip hoorah"
We got back to the beach, disembarked, and went down to Bar RU for a beer, where Shannon met Mom. We had some more lobster (the same woman as yesterday sold us 16 for $4 today) and chatted to Mom. Some kids came up and had a chat, we gave them some lobster (everybody had matching towels), as well as a black cat that jumped in my lap, meowed and laid down. I fed the cat some lobster and we chilled out, talking to Mom and the kids. Haha.
Eventually we made tracks back here to our hotel, where we are writing this blog right now. This one here. That's the one.
Tomorrow morning back to Phnom Penh at 8am.. and then Friday we have another appointment at the Phnom Penh rubbish dump.
That's the haps.
Johncrest out.
* there were no pandas at bamboo island. there was also no bamboo. weird.
We got here, and with nowhere to stay, had a look at the trusty Lonely Planet, no help there... So we enlisted the services of a tuktuk driver. His name was Doctor Raymond. Doc took us to his favourite guesthouse (the one he gets a commission from), the Markara Guesthouse, right on the beach at Occhueatal. We grabbed a double room with cold water only, and two fans for $9 a night.. although we're not really pinching pennies, everyone loves a bargain.
Shannon wanted to hit the sand, so we walked down to the 999 Bar and Bungalow, pulled up a seat and had a few beers. A few touts came past, including one selling lobster. We bought 10 lobsters for $4, absolutely delicious and fresh, and drank some more beers. A lady named Mom came past, selling sarongs. After telling Mom we had no sarongs, she offered to give Shannon the "threading of a lifetime". Basically its a form of hair removal for the legs using only string. As you can imagine while Shannon was having her minute leg hairs pulled out by string, and chatting with Mom (who is the nicest woman EVER, better than my own mother) I drank more beers.
I turned around as there were some local Cambodians at the table behind us making a ruccus. I waved and said "Sues day" which is hello. Because of my elite Cambodian language skills, the ringleader, a man named Vun asked if I would like to drink some wine with them.
So I ditched Shannon and Mom, and took two steps to their table, and sat down. Vun introduced me to his family... his wife, his uncle and aunt, his sister in law, and her husband. He told me that his uncle was visiting from France and they were down from Phnom Penh to celebrate. As I love a tipple, and a yarn, I decided to settle in for the evening.
Turns out the wine he was drinking, was actually Hennessey VSOP. Partial to a good cognac, my christmas's had all come at once. We sat there talking the usual shit making sure that we never experienced "Chui Ah" (empty glass), when Shannon joined us. We all sat around a table, eating barbequed fish, mango with some kind of salty paste, and drinking cognac and beer, for a while, all talking about everyday life, Vun's recent wedding, Claude's (Vuns uncle from France) recent trip back to Cambodia, only the 4th in 30 years and they helped us with learning more Khmer. Many more "Chui Moi" (cheers) were done, the Cambodians we have found love to Cheers. They will even Cheers a cheersing. And so on.
We drunk, got drunk, and when I put my head through the wooden part of the chair, and broke it, I knew it was time to head home. Not just that, but we had been drinking non-stop for 6 hours, in the sun, and had to get up at 7am to catch the boat to BAMBOO ISLAND to see pandas*.
At about 1am, Shannon and I both woke up to very pasty mouths, and a hot, hot bedroom. No worries, we'll just grab water.
WRONG DUMBASS TRY AGAIN.
No water. Thats ok, we'll go get some from reception. Shut. Can't drink from the tap, the water is not potable. Ask the security guard... can't speak english. So John grabs a shirt, jumps on the back of a seedy guys motorbike and says "STORE". Off we go, from Occheutal Beach, towards the Sihanoukville CBD. Seedy guy says "Chicken farm, chicken farm" whilst taking one hand off his handlebars to point at a casino. Tired, drunk, and thirsty I tell him to shush and we pull up beside a stall.
I get 6 Litres of drinking water for $2, and we head back. Halfway back a massive dog runs out of a vacant lot and towards the moto. The dog is gaining on us, so I tell the seedy guy to step on it. We finally get back to the hotel where Shannon meets me and sculls 2 L of water.
Woke up this morning, seedy and pasty and ready to go out into the Gulf of Thailand. We get to the boat.. which can only be described as .. a people smuggling vessel. As Cambodia is a standout for human trafficking, I wonder where we will end up. But all is ok and we end up chugging out to a small island, where they throw us some snorkels, a coral reef, say "watch out for urchins" and everyone jumps in. The sea was a bit rough, and being seedy, tired and lazy I jumped in and then pretty much back onto the boat. From there we headed to Bamboo Island. At Bamboo Island we lazed, drank some beer, swam and relaxed while our crew made us a delicious barbeque fish lunch. We ate that and then headed back towards the mainland, stopping once to snorkel and fish.
As we were in the open sea, most people will assume a small boat (15 passengers) will experience some kind of motion. There were these whingy English girls who were like:
"Oh me, oh my, I do say this water is awful rough. Jeeves, can you make the water calm? Pip pip hoorah"
We got back to the beach, disembarked, and went down to Bar RU for a beer, where Shannon met Mom. We had some more lobster (the same woman as yesterday sold us 16 for $4 today) and chatted to Mom. Some kids came up and had a chat, we gave them some lobster (everybody had matching towels), as well as a black cat that jumped in my lap, meowed and laid down. I fed the cat some lobster and we chilled out, talking to Mom and the kids. Haha.
Eventually we made tracks back here to our hotel, where we are writing this blog right now. This one here. That's the one.
Tomorrow morning back to Phnom Penh at 8am.. and then Friday we have another appointment at the Phnom Penh rubbish dump.
That's the haps.
Johncrest out.
* there were no pandas at bamboo island. there was also no bamboo. weird.
Monday, 9 March 2009
A Little Khmer Goes a Long Way...
Siousdey!
So yesterday was Sunday and also International Women's Day, this meant mainly one thing - everything was shut - except the pubs (Encouraging us to drink? I think so). We had grand plans to go and visit an orphanage in Siem Reap, but it turns out the woman who runs it had taken all the kids to Snooky for the long weekend. That's OK, we'll go and visit the free silk farm instead - INCORRECT, it was shut. So, all that was left was to grab some beer from a shop around the corner, sit out the front of our guesthouse and drink it. And we did. All day.
It was so fucking hot and there was a wedding that had been going on for the past two days next door (Khmer weddings start just before dawn and finish up around midnight, they generally run for about three days straight) so we had been woken up quite early and were feeling a bit lazy. We sat around and chatted to Ly (who turned out to be the owner of MotherHome). He was a really nice Khmer gentleman who asked us if we wouldn't mind proofreading his menu for the new restaurant and bar he was putting in. As we were just sitting there, drinking beer and composing a couple of Haiku's, we didn't mind at all (as you can tell from the writing of Haiku's, we were a little on the bored side).
Haiku Number One - Entitled Chicken
Chicken's chicken's all around;
Not a one to eat;
Achoo! Bird Flu! Bless.
More to come later, I know, you're riveted. That was one of mine, a master wordsmith if I do say so myself.
Then it was time for dinner! Pit came and picked us up from MotheHome at about 6.45pm. We had bought a slab of coke cans earlier to bring as a gift (for $9.00), when he saw the slab, he nearly fell over. Hilarious. Some American man walking past the tuk tuk thought it wise to make comment, "You sure got a lot of coke there mate!" Well spotted American. Why are you using Australian colloquialism?
We headed out of town on the road to Angkor Wat, and just after all the ritzy hotel's stopped, we turned down a little dirt track (a little bit more narrow than the one our guesthouse was on). At the end of this track was a house, which is where we stopped, Pit and his wife rent one of the rooms in the house. Mrs Pit came out to meet us (she was a bit surprised, because Pit was supposed to call and let her know we were on our way- he forgot :)). She was so lovely and welcoming, they were a little bit shy about their "small room" but it was beautiful. It's true, they do just live in one bedroom (about the size of our bedroom at home), but it it lovely and cosy and they obviously take pride in their home and achievements (on the wall is a photo of Mrs Pit at her graduation from college where she studied English).
There was a little kitchen set up to one side of the room, with a gas burner and some shelves with general ingredients on them. She had laid out so many plates with different dishes for us. We all sat on the floor around the amazing food and tucked in. There was boiled rice, some catfish (which was my favourite, she's going to teach me how to cook them next time), some pork (steamed with some vegetables, like the inside of a pork bun without the bun), another pork dish, some fresh vegetables, and some mango salad. When I thought I couldn't possibly eat anymore, Mrs Pit served up some dessert, coconut milk, corn and tapioca - DELICIOUS.
They also taught us some more Khmer, so I now know how to say the following;
Hello
Greetings
Please
Thank you
No Thank you (this has helped us immensely when not wanting to buy things, it's absolute magic!)
Bye
Farewell
Sorry
Yes
No
On the bus today I also taught myself how to count from 1 - 10 Whoo hoo!
And as suggested above, a little bit of Khmer does go a long way. They really appreciate you taking the time out to learn some of their language. A lot of the sounds are similar to Japanese, so if you know some Japanese sounds, Khmer is not too difficult (I'm no expert though).
We headed back to Phnom Pehn today, the 5 hour express bus, which took 7 and a half hours! This trip we had seriously pimping seats! We must have booked early because we had seats 1 & 2, right up the front of the bus, leather (all the other seats were the normal Brisbane City Council Bus material in the blue pattern), green, with a leopard strip down the middle. Like I said - pimping. So we donned our Fedora's, white tailored suit jackets and bling to the hilt and sat down, stretching our legs out in front of us with all the extra leg room. Once again, spoilt.
It was a fairly uneventful trip sleep, look out the window, sleep, talk shit, look out the window, sleep, watch a bit of the Kung Fu movie in Khmer (I may be able to count to 10, but I definitely couldn't understand what the hell was going on in that movie). I now have a lot of respect for the bus drivers who have to navigate the National Highway, the roads are really fucking bad. So bad in in fact that as we approached Phnom Penh - I saw a dead body for the first time.
We must have arrived just after the accident happened. A woman had been riding her moto (we couldn't work out exactly what had transpired), but as we drove past, she was unfortunately dead, still in the middle of the road. A tuk tuk driver was covering her body with some leafy branches from a nearby tree, but as we drove around, her legs were splayed and her helmet was poking out the top of the leaves. It was very sad and a very real reminder that we are not here forever and we have no choice in how we leave the world.
Life unfortunately does have to go on and our bus trudged along as though nothing had happened (I'm not sure if our eyes can be stapled open anymore, but they were).
We got back to Phnom Penh and found a new Guesthouse for just $15, (instead of $17 at the Paragon) the room is slightly bigger and the bathroom laid out a little better (They don't have proper showers here, it's more of a shower head sticking straight out of the bathroom wall, without a shower curtain or glass. When you shower, the whole bathroom gets covered in water, if the toilet is sitting in an annoying spot, the seat and toilet paper gets saturated. Annoying, but definitely live able).
After dumping our bags we headed to trusty old Bogie and Bacall's to organise another Dump Run on Friday. Tomorrow though, it's off to Sihanoukville for two days, to chill out by the beach, relax and reflect on our adventures. BOOYA!
Ley Huey!
Shanngelina
So yesterday was Sunday and also International Women's Day, this meant mainly one thing - everything was shut - except the pubs (Encouraging us to drink? I think so). We had grand plans to go and visit an orphanage in Siem Reap, but it turns out the woman who runs it had taken all the kids to Snooky for the long weekend. That's OK, we'll go and visit the free silk farm instead - INCORRECT, it was shut. So, all that was left was to grab some beer from a shop around the corner, sit out the front of our guesthouse and drink it. And we did. All day.
It was so fucking hot and there was a wedding that had been going on for the past two days next door (Khmer weddings start just before dawn and finish up around midnight, they generally run for about three days straight) so we had been woken up quite early and were feeling a bit lazy. We sat around and chatted to Ly (who turned out to be the owner of MotherHome). He was a really nice Khmer gentleman who asked us if we wouldn't mind proofreading his menu for the new restaurant and bar he was putting in. As we were just sitting there, drinking beer and composing a couple of Haiku's, we didn't mind at all (as you can tell from the writing of Haiku's, we were a little on the bored side).
Haiku Number One - Entitled Chicken
Chicken's chicken's all around;
Not a one to eat;
Achoo! Bird Flu! Bless.
More to come later, I know, you're riveted. That was one of mine, a master wordsmith if I do say so myself.
Then it was time for dinner! Pit came and picked us up from MotheHome at about 6.45pm. We had bought a slab of coke cans earlier to bring as a gift (for $9.00), when he saw the slab, he nearly fell over. Hilarious. Some American man walking past the tuk tuk thought it wise to make comment, "You sure got a lot of coke there mate!" Well spotted American. Why are you using Australian colloquialism?
We headed out of town on the road to Angkor Wat, and just after all the ritzy hotel's stopped, we turned down a little dirt track (a little bit more narrow than the one our guesthouse was on). At the end of this track was a house, which is where we stopped, Pit and his wife rent one of the rooms in the house. Mrs Pit came out to meet us (she was a bit surprised, because Pit was supposed to call and let her know we were on our way- he forgot :)). She was so lovely and welcoming, they were a little bit shy about their "small room" but it was beautiful. It's true, they do just live in one bedroom (about the size of our bedroom at home), but it it lovely and cosy and they obviously take pride in their home and achievements (on the wall is a photo of Mrs Pit at her graduation from college where she studied English).
There was a little kitchen set up to one side of the room, with a gas burner and some shelves with general ingredients on them. She had laid out so many plates with different dishes for us. We all sat on the floor around the amazing food and tucked in. There was boiled rice, some catfish (which was my favourite, she's going to teach me how to cook them next time), some pork (steamed with some vegetables, like the inside of a pork bun without the bun), another pork dish, some fresh vegetables, and some mango salad. When I thought I couldn't possibly eat anymore, Mrs Pit served up some dessert, coconut milk, corn and tapioca - DELICIOUS.
They also taught us some more Khmer, so I now know how to say the following;
Hello
Greetings
Please
Thank you
No Thank you (this has helped us immensely when not wanting to buy things, it's absolute magic!)
Bye
Farewell
Sorry
Yes
No
On the bus today I also taught myself how to count from 1 - 10 Whoo hoo!
And as suggested above, a little bit of Khmer does go a long way. They really appreciate you taking the time out to learn some of their language. A lot of the sounds are similar to Japanese, so if you know some Japanese sounds, Khmer is not too difficult (I'm no expert though).
We headed back to Phnom Pehn today, the 5 hour express bus, which took 7 and a half hours! This trip we had seriously pimping seats! We must have booked early because we had seats 1 & 2, right up the front of the bus, leather (all the other seats were the normal Brisbane City Council Bus material in the blue pattern), green, with a leopard strip down the middle. Like I said - pimping. So we donned our Fedora's, white tailored suit jackets and bling to the hilt and sat down, stretching our legs out in front of us with all the extra leg room. Once again, spoilt.
It was a fairly uneventful trip sleep, look out the window, sleep, talk shit, look out the window, sleep, watch a bit of the Kung Fu movie in Khmer (I may be able to count to 10, but I definitely couldn't understand what the hell was going on in that movie). I now have a lot of respect for the bus drivers who have to navigate the National Highway, the roads are really fucking bad. So bad in in fact that as we approached Phnom Penh - I saw a dead body for the first time.
We must have arrived just after the accident happened. A woman had been riding her moto (we couldn't work out exactly what had transpired), but as we drove past, she was unfortunately dead, still in the middle of the road. A tuk tuk driver was covering her body with some leafy branches from a nearby tree, but as we drove around, her legs were splayed and her helmet was poking out the top of the leaves. It was very sad and a very real reminder that we are not here forever and we have no choice in how we leave the world.
Life unfortunately does have to go on and our bus trudged along as though nothing had happened (I'm not sure if our eyes can be stapled open anymore, but they were).
We got back to Phnom Penh and found a new Guesthouse for just $15, (instead of $17 at the Paragon) the room is slightly bigger and the bathroom laid out a little better (They don't have proper showers here, it's more of a shower head sticking straight out of the bathroom wall, without a shower curtain or glass. When you shower, the whole bathroom gets covered in water, if the toilet is sitting in an annoying spot, the seat and toilet paper gets saturated. Annoying, but definitely live able).
After dumping our bags we headed to trusty old Bogie and Bacall's to organise another Dump Run on Friday. Tomorrow though, it's off to Sihanoukville for two days, to chill out by the beach, relax and reflect on our adventures. BOOYA!
Ley Huey!
Shanngelina
Your mother has a loose tongue.
Farewell Siem Reap.
Well they say you reap what you sow, and if thats the case, I siem to have misplaced my temple seeds.
Siem Reap was amazing. Angkor Wat, Dead Fish Tower, Dr Fish and Pit, what a rad combination. As I write this, I am sitting in our new guesthouse, the Waterview in Phnom Penh. We took the Paramount Express bus today, 7.5 hrs to find ourselves back here.
Yesterday we had the misfortune of being in Siem Reap for International Womens Day (its a public holiday here) so pretty much everything was shut. We took the opportunity to chill out, relax, went for a leisurely stroll by the Stung Siem Reap (River) and wrote a collection of haiku poems, mainly for shits and giggles.
We waited the afternoon away until we finally met up with Pit, and gave him his present. 23 cans of coca-cola. It would have been 24, but one can fell out on the walk back to our hotel, hit the ground, exploded, and covered me in the delicious beverage we know as COKE.
Pit was floored by the amount of Coke, assuring us it would be more than a months supply. It was a 40minute ride north, through traffic back to Pit's home, which was actually a bedroom in a larger house.
We met his wife, whose name currently escapes me and she welcomed us into their home. She had prepared a feast for us.. consisting of:
Catfish
Steamed Pork Dumpling
Pork Rib Soup
Mango Salad
Rice
and...
Dessert.
The dessert was a mixture of tapioca, coconut milk, and sweet corn. It was absolutely delicious. The catfish was tasty- some of the best fish in my life, the mango salad was again, just amazing... and the soup, to die for.
We stuffed ourselves full and sat there for the next 3 hours chatting away like old friends. Pit's wife is an english teacher and her english is amazing. We chatted about local Khmer tradition, their culture, Khmer politics, and then Mrs Pit started to teach us some Khmer words, to make our stay easier.
We have been dropping these all day, and the Khmer's seem to be lapping it up. It also helps us build more of a rapport, and is paying dividends socially already.
We awoke early to take the 930 bus, and were quite surprised when Ly (The owner of Motherhome, our guesthouse in Siem Reap) gave us $8 off our bill. Yesterday afternoon he asked Shannon and myself to peruse and make suggestions to the menu of the new restaurant he was putting in. Obviously Shannon and I ooze culinary intellect, and we gave him back a revised edition with additions and corrected grammar.
Whilst it was our absolute pleasure to help him with this (he is a top guy) we were by no means expecting a discount (unexpected but appreciated). Ly went out of his way to make sure we were comfortable during our stay, including insisting he drive us to the bus station this morning in his own car (for free), none of this tuktuk shit for us.
It was a pretty uneventul trip (we were given seats 1 and 2 on the Paramount Express). Now for you people who are not in the know I will explain the differences between seats 1 and 2, and all the others.
Regular seat: Fabric covering. 2 air conditioning vents. 40cm seat pitch.
Seats 1 and 2: Green leather with a stripe of leopard print. 6 air conditioning vents. About 200cm seat pitch, enough room for me to lay flat and still have room.
From seat 1, and also seat 2, we had panoramic views of the countryside. We were about 1 hr from Phnom Penh when we suddenly slowed. Turns out a lady had been killed on the highway, fallen off her motorcycle. As our bus drove around the corpse, the locals were covering it (she was laying in the middle of the road) in leaves. Rest in peace lady.
From there a quick cruise into Phnom Penh where our guesthouse tuktuk was not waiting at the bus station. No biggie, we just walked. Down the riverside, through the streets, passing a policeman with a Kalashnikov, and past the Waterview. Although we'd had good experiences at the Paragon, we decided we'd have a look. At the bargain price of $15 per night we have a nice big room, air con, cable tv and a nice bathroom, right on the river.
We have booked our bus for tomorrow morning, for we are heading to Sihanoukville to relax by the beach. S Tac is hoping to get some snorkelling in, I am hoping to get some beers in. We come back Thursday (only 2 days) as on Friday we are heading to the dump again to see our little buddies.
Thats the update, thats the latest, by any rate, I am the greatest.
Rhymoceros John.
Well they say you reap what you sow, and if thats the case, I siem to have misplaced my temple seeds.
Siem Reap was amazing. Angkor Wat, Dead Fish Tower, Dr Fish and Pit, what a rad combination. As I write this, I am sitting in our new guesthouse, the Waterview in Phnom Penh. We took the Paramount Express bus today, 7.5 hrs to find ourselves back here.
Yesterday we had the misfortune of being in Siem Reap for International Womens Day (its a public holiday here) so pretty much everything was shut. We took the opportunity to chill out, relax, went for a leisurely stroll by the Stung Siem Reap (River) and wrote a collection of haiku poems, mainly for shits and giggles.
We waited the afternoon away until we finally met up with Pit, and gave him his present. 23 cans of coca-cola. It would have been 24, but one can fell out on the walk back to our hotel, hit the ground, exploded, and covered me in the delicious beverage we know as COKE.
Pit was floored by the amount of Coke, assuring us it would be more than a months supply. It was a 40minute ride north, through traffic back to Pit's home, which was actually a bedroom in a larger house.
We met his wife, whose name currently escapes me and she welcomed us into their home. She had prepared a feast for us.. consisting of:
Catfish
Steamed Pork Dumpling
Pork Rib Soup
Mango Salad
Rice
and...
Dessert.
The dessert was a mixture of tapioca, coconut milk, and sweet corn. It was absolutely delicious. The catfish was tasty- some of the best fish in my life, the mango salad was again, just amazing... and the soup, to die for.
We stuffed ourselves full and sat there for the next 3 hours chatting away like old friends. Pit's wife is an english teacher and her english is amazing. We chatted about local Khmer tradition, their culture, Khmer politics, and then Mrs Pit started to teach us some Khmer words, to make our stay easier.
We have been dropping these all day, and the Khmer's seem to be lapping it up. It also helps us build more of a rapport, and is paying dividends socially already.
We awoke early to take the 930 bus, and were quite surprised when Ly (The owner of Motherhome, our guesthouse in Siem Reap) gave us $8 off our bill. Yesterday afternoon he asked Shannon and myself to peruse and make suggestions to the menu of the new restaurant he was putting in. Obviously Shannon and I ooze culinary intellect, and we gave him back a revised edition with additions and corrected grammar.
Whilst it was our absolute pleasure to help him with this (he is a top guy) we were by no means expecting a discount (unexpected but appreciated). Ly went out of his way to make sure we were comfortable during our stay, including insisting he drive us to the bus station this morning in his own car (for free), none of this tuktuk shit for us.
It was a pretty uneventul trip (we were given seats 1 and 2 on the Paramount Express). Now for you people who are not in the know I will explain the differences between seats 1 and 2, and all the others.
Regular seat: Fabric covering. 2 air conditioning vents. 40cm seat pitch.
Seats 1 and 2: Green leather with a stripe of leopard print. 6 air conditioning vents. About 200cm seat pitch, enough room for me to lay flat and still have room.
From seat 1, and also seat 2, we had panoramic views of the countryside. We were about 1 hr from Phnom Penh when we suddenly slowed. Turns out a lady had been killed on the highway, fallen off her motorcycle. As our bus drove around the corpse, the locals were covering it (she was laying in the middle of the road) in leaves. Rest in peace lady.
From there a quick cruise into Phnom Penh where our guesthouse tuktuk was not waiting at the bus station. No biggie, we just walked. Down the riverside, through the streets, passing a policeman with a Kalashnikov, and past the Waterview. Although we'd had good experiences at the Paragon, we decided we'd have a look. At the bargain price of $15 per night we have a nice big room, air con, cable tv and a nice bathroom, right on the river.
We have booked our bus for tomorrow morning, for we are heading to Sihanoukville to relax by the beach. S Tac is hoping to get some snorkelling in, I am hoping to get some beers in. We come back Thursday (only 2 days) as on Friday we are heading to the dump again to see our little buddies.
Thats the update, thats the latest, by any rate, I am the greatest.
Rhymoceros John.
Sunday, 8 March 2009
BACK TRACKING - Letters from Kampuchea 1st Post
Hello! I forgot to post my first blog on here, so I am doing a back track :)
Are you ready to Time Warp?
Time is fleeting, madness takes its hold...
So it's only 3.30pm Cambodian time (5.30pm Brisbane) on Monday afternoon and we've managed to stay up for about 36 hours now, with only 10 minute power naps to keep us going! Don't worry, the $1.00 beers have helped get us through.
We've gone from Brisbane to Kuala Lumpur and happily spent 8 hours on a Malaysian Airlines flight with a choice of 20 new release movies, tv shows and games - all accessible through a remote control - best thing since sliced bread. We then spent 4 hours in KL airport. There are three main things I noticed most about KL (airport, as I'm not fit to judge the rest of the country yet) 1. the sun didn't rise until about 7.30am 2. It smells. It's a weird sort of smell, like a cross between a cupboard at my nanna's that hasn't been opened since 1940 and urine. 3. They are the proud owner of a bar in the airport called Cheers, where everybody knows your name.
After trying to have a kip in some awesomely designed recliner chairs, it was time to leave for CAMBODIA! Or CAMBOOYA!! as I like to call it. See the clever use of Camb (the first syllable in Cambodia) and BOOYA! As in supremely awesome. I knew you would.
Malaysia Airlines have looked after us fantastically, feeding us and entertaining us at every opportunity. Unfortunately, there was a f*ckstick of a Frenchman on our flight making this strike 2 against French men when traveling abroad (see the first travel blog on Vietnam, namely in Sapa). They are extremely rude (ordering the flight attendant around like a dog, refusing to listen to the obligations of people sitting in the exit rows (thankfully he was moved because I sure didn't trust him to step up to the responsibility of saving me in an emergency!) and then cutting in front of us in the visa line - f*cker (luckily, it was the line for visa's NOT for fighting, or Chutney)).
So we made it to Kampuchea, through the visa line (we had to bribe the customs official US$1 to let us through without a pre arranged passport photo!), then through customs, which consisted of:
Customs Official with Gun: "Anything to declare?"
Us: "No"
Customs Official with a Gun": "Head straight through"
No bag search, no X-ray - nothing. I think John and I must be the luckiest people ever when it comes to customs - touch wood.
We had arranged to be picked up by our hotel - the Flamingo in central Phnom Penh. It's not too bad, comfy, clean, maybe a little bit over priced (which happens when you book before you get here) and FULL of SLEAZY Britich Expats, scamming all over the local girls (but from what I've seen, it seems to everywhere in Phnom Penh). I LOVE what I've seen of South East Asia, I mean LOVE it. The locals are fantastically friendly, the food is AMAZING (just to overuse CAPS here like a 14 year old on MSN... lyk OMG LolzorZ!) and the things to see and do are completely out of anything I would see in my normal world. There's just one thing - I HATE (there's the overuse of CAPS again) the underbelly and seediness of the older male expat community. They are vile. Like Kyle Sandilands - on crack.
Unfortunately that comes with 3rd world and developing economies, even developed economies if you look in the right places in Australia. So I'm going to continue to love South East Asia like it's my home away from home. With cheap beer & food, rich & proud culture, and interesting people - like Kim - the owner of The Flamingo who we met this afternoon.
We're heading to some touristy places tomorrow, the Killing Fields, S21, some pagoda's and the Royal Palace and Elephant rides. The day after, it's off to see the RIEL (see my pun there? No? Look it up) Kampuchea with our new friend Daka.
Peace, Love and Rainbow's.
Shanngelina.
Are you ready to Time Warp?
Time is fleeting, madness takes its hold...
So it's only 3.30pm Cambodian time (5.30pm Brisbane) on Monday afternoon and we've managed to stay up for about 36 hours now, with only 10 minute power naps to keep us going! Don't worry, the $1.00 beers have helped get us through.
We've gone from Brisbane to Kuala Lumpur and happily spent 8 hours on a Malaysian Airlines flight with a choice of 20 new release movies, tv shows and games - all accessible through a remote control - best thing since sliced bread. We then spent 4 hours in KL airport. There are three main things I noticed most about KL (airport, as I'm not fit to judge the rest of the country yet) 1. the sun didn't rise until about 7.30am 2. It smells. It's a weird sort of smell, like a cross between a cupboard at my nanna's that hasn't been opened since 1940 and urine. 3. They are the proud owner of a bar in the airport called Cheers, where everybody knows your name.
After trying to have a kip in some awesomely designed recliner chairs, it was time to leave for CAMBODIA! Or CAMBOOYA!! as I like to call it. See the clever use of Camb (the first syllable in Cambodia) and BOOYA! As in supremely awesome. I knew you would.
Malaysia Airlines have looked after us fantastically, feeding us and entertaining us at every opportunity. Unfortunately, there was a f*ckstick of a Frenchman on our flight making this strike 2 against French men when traveling abroad (see the first travel blog on Vietnam, namely in Sapa). They are extremely rude (ordering the flight attendant around like a dog, refusing to listen to the obligations of people sitting in the exit rows (thankfully he was moved because I sure didn't trust him to step up to the responsibility of saving me in an emergency!) and then cutting in front of us in the visa line - f*cker (luckily, it was the line for visa's NOT for fighting, or Chutney)).
So we made it to Kampuchea, through the visa line (we had to bribe the customs official US$1 to let us through without a pre arranged passport photo!), then through customs, which consisted of:
Customs Official with Gun: "Anything to declare?"
Us: "No"
Customs Official with a Gun": "Head straight through"
No bag search, no X-ray - nothing. I think John and I must be the luckiest people ever when it comes to customs - touch wood.
We had arranged to be picked up by our hotel - the Flamingo in central Phnom Penh. It's not too bad, comfy, clean, maybe a little bit over priced (which happens when you book before you get here) and FULL of SLEAZY Britich Expats, scamming all over the local girls (but from what I've seen, it seems to everywhere in Phnom Penh). I LOVE what I've seen of South East Asia, I mean LOVE it. The locals are fantastically friendly, the food is AMAZING (just to overuse CAPS here like a 14 year old on MSN... lyk OMG LolzorZ!) and the things to see and do are completely out of anything I would see in my normal world. There's just one thing - I HATE (there's the overuse of CAPS again) the underbelly and seediness of the older male expat community. They are vile. Like Kyle Sandilands - on crack.
Unfortunately that comes with 3rd world and developing economies, even developed economies if you look in the right places in Australia. So I'm going to continue to love South East Asia like it's my home away from home. With cheap beer & food, rich & proud culture, and interesting people - like Kim - the owner of The Flamingo who we met this afternoon.
We're heading to some touristy places tomorrow, the Killing Fields, S21, some pagoda's and the Royal Palace and Elephant rides. The day after, it's off to see the RIEL (see my pun there? No? Look it up) Kampuchea with our new friend Daka.
Peace, Love and Rainbow's.
Shanngelina.
Saturday, 7 March 2009
I see the sunrise, all you see is it fall, fall, fall...
So I still have my feet, after letting the Dr. Fish piranhas eat them! HOORAY for me. They came in handy for all of the walking we have done over the past 2 days. Considering the Khmer people are so small (I am actually quite tall here, a regular Kate Moss, except not British, shorter and fatter and without the drug habit and million dollar contracts, so not like her at all really), they seem to build ridiculously high steps to their temples. These steps are about 15cm wide (small feet a pre requisite for climbing) and each step reaches my knee. As well as not being Kate Moss, I am also not a Mountain Goat. This makes it very difficult to climb the temples at a speed faster than a snail. Once at the top though, the Mountian Goat impersonation is forgotten completely, these temples truly are amazing!
Then it's time to climb down...
Many of you may not know this, (contrary to popular belief that I am so fabulously amazing that nothing scares me, unfortunately I do have just one Kryptonite) Shannon doesn't like heights. I think this comes for two reasons 1. Once again, I am not a Mountain Goat and 2. I am short, so genetically, I'm not supposed to up high.
Luckily for me a Mountain Goat lives on top of the particular temple I'm talking about and whilst giving us some brief commentary on the temple he showed us the easiest way down. For a small fee. I more than happily paid him for his services though. It only took me 10 minutes to get down instead of 5 hours!
We encountered a few little scams at the temples that day, a woman had shaved her head to look like a monk and when we got to the top of a temple she shoved incense into our hands. Standard practice when praying to Buddha is to light incense, bow your head and place your hands in the prayer position, you then move your hands 3 times in the direction of the statue. If you wish, you can give a small donation (whatever you can afford) in the donation tray. Unfortunately, all we had on us was Riel, but the woman with the incense insisted we could only place US dollars in the donation tray. Feeling a little perplexed and not sure if I had culturally offended her by not having the correct money (she wouldn't take the riel so I put it back i my pocket), I asked Pit if this was usual. He was pretty upset, he said the woman was just taking it for herself and that it shouldn't matter how much you give. I was very glad she refused the riel, I'll give to Pax on our way back to Phnom Penh.
We've come across some awesome people so far on our trip, and one of these awesome people is Pit, our new friend and tuk tuk driver. He calls himself Angkor Wat Pete, for his website angkorwattaxi.com. Pete is really very smart and funny! He wants to be a tour guide as well as a tuk tuk driver but the tour guiding licence costs US$3000! The same amount as a car here! He also doesn't think his English is very good, but he understands my sense of humour (not many people at home understand!), so it's pretty damn good. We're heading to his place tomorrow night for dinner. I'm so excited, I can't wait to see inside a Khmer home. I asked if we should bring anything with us, he said, "Just bring Coca Cola, my wife and I really like Coca Cola". Coke - it even dominates South East Asia!
Today, I saw the sunrise over Angkor Wat, and you know what, it was well worth every minute of our 5am departure. We woke up with the crow of the roosters - literally. It may be because I don't get to see the sunrise very often, but there is something brilliant about seeing a new day being born, even more so when you're sitting on a 1000 year old temple made from hand carved sandstone.
Pete, picked us up in pitch blackness to make sure we got to the temple just before sunrise. I think dawn is now my favourite time of the day, it's where the world is slightly confused about whether it is night time or day time. The sky is getting lighter, but the stars are still trying to shine. The crickets and cicadas have a moment when neither wants to give way to the other, but as the sky begins to turn from black to navy to pink, the crickets fade away and finally give in to the daylight.
This was our second day at Angkor Wat, we started exploring at 8.00am yesterday and are only going for two days. You can buy one day, three day or weekly passes, however I think you would need to spend a year there everyday to fully find all of the temples and secrets hidden in the massive grounds. Pit had a great couple of days planned for us, he has sussed out all of the "better" temples, what time of day to visit them and what order to see them in to avoid the crowds. The temples are like stepping into another world. These places are massive, each stone carefully carved with Hindi or Buddhist deities and placed to create intricate hallways, and giant towers. The detail is breathtaking.
You can tell the difference between the rebuilt temples (destroyed by the Khmer Rouge or just by time and nature) and the original temples as soon as you take a step inside. It's like the original temples, dedicated to kings and religion, with carefully carved blocks, each hoisted into place by hand have a 'life' to them. These temples are so old, massive trees (that look like Moreton Bay Figs) have taken hold and grown in and around the doorways. I find the walk ways fascinating. I wonder how many people had walked through here before me?
I'd say about 100,000,000 (half of those would be Korean tourists travelling in groups of 100 or more, clogging the walk ways and stair wells).
Outside the temples the stall areas have a bit of a "Dreamworld" feel to them, like most places heavily frequented by tourists. There are LOTS of souvenir stores, and the food is a bit more expensive inside the gate then out. We ordered noodle soup this morning for breakfast - and we seriously got 2 Minute Noodles! The best version of 2 Minute Noodles I've ever had!
Speaking of food, we ate dinner at a place called Deadfish last night. It is like a warehouse with heaps of different levels. One of the levels has a complete drop off the edge and about a story below sits about 10 or so crocodiles! Not the best area to get drunk! I got a photo of me next to the drop pit, you think I don't like heights normally, wait until there's 10 crocodiles below!
Tomorrow we're going to visit the floating village and also the landmine museum.
Hopefully there's no crocodiles at the floating village.
Love, Hugs & Rainbows,
Shanngelina.
P.S. I'm not coming home.
Then it's time to climb down...
Many of you may not know this, (contrary to popular belief that I am so fabulously amazing that nothing scares me, unfortunately I do have just one Kryptonite) Shannon doesn't like heights. I think this comes for two reasons 1. Once again, I am not a Mountain Goat and 2. I am short, so genetically, I'm not supposed to up high.
Luckily for me a Mountain Goat lives on top of the particular temple I'm talking about and whilst giving us some brief commentary on the temple he showed us the easiest way down. For a small fee. I more than happily paid him for his services though. It only took me 10 minutes to get down instead of 5 hours!
We encountered a few little scams at the temples that day, a woman had shaved her head to look like a monk and when we got to the top of a temple she shoved incense into our hands. Standard practice when praying to Buddha is to light incense, bow your head and place your hands in the prayer position, you then move your hands 3 times in the direction of the statue. If you wish, you can give a small donation (whatever you can afford) in the donation tray. Unfortunately, all we had on us was Riel, but the woman with the incense insisted we could only place US dollars in the donation tray. Feeling a little perplexed and not sure if I had culturally offended her by not having the correct money (she wouldn't take the riel so I put it back i my pocket), I asked Pit if this was usual. He was pretty upset, he said the woman was just taking it for herself and that it shouldn't matter how much you give. I was very glad she refused the riel, I'll give to Pax on our way back to Phnom Penh.
We've come across some awesome people so far on our trip, and one of these awesome people is Pit, our new friend and tuk tuk driver. He calls himself Angkor Wat Pete, for his website angkorwattaxi.com. Pete is really very smart and funny! He wants to be a tour guide as well as a tuk tuk driver but the tour guiding licence costs US$3000! The same amount as a car here! He also doesn't think his English is very good, but he understands my sense of humour (not many people at home understand!), so it's pretty damn good. We're heading to his place tomorrow night for dinner. I'm so excited, I can't wait to see inside a Khmer home. I asked if we should bring anything with us, he said, "Just bring Coca Cola, my wife and I really like Coca Cola". Coke - it even dominates South East Asia!
Today, I saw the sunrise over Angkor Wat, and you know what, it was well worth every minute of our 5am departure. We woke up with the crow of the roosters - literally. It may be because I don't get to see the sunrise very often, but there is something brilliant about seeing a new day being born, even more so when you're sitting on a 1000 year old temple made from hand carved sandstone.
Pete, picked us up in pitch blackness to make sure we got to the temple just before sunrise. I think dawn is now my favourite time of the day, it's where the world is slightly confused about whether it is night time or day time. The sky is getting lighter, but the stars are still trying to shine. The crickets and cicadas have a moment when neither wants to give way to the other, but as the sky begins to turn from black to navy to pink, the crickets fade away and finally give in to the daylight.
This was our second day at Angkor Wat, we started exploring at 8.00am yesterday and are only going for two days. You can buy one day, three day or weekly passes, however I think you would need to spend a year there everyday to fully find all of the temples and secrets hidden in the massive grounds. Pit had a great couple of days planned for us, he has sussed out all of the "better" temples, what time of day to visit them and what order to see them in to avoid the crowds. The temples are like stepping into another world. These places are massive, each stone carefully carved with Hindi or Buddhist deities and placed to create intricate hallways, and giant towers. The detail is breathtaking.
You can tell the difference between the rebuilt temples (destroyed by the Khmer Rouge or just by time and nature) and the original temples as soon as you take a step inside. It's like the original temples, dedicated to kings and religion, with carefully carved blocks, each hoisted into place by hand have a 'life' to them. These temples are so old, massive trees (that look like Moreton Bay Figs) have taken hold and grown in and around the doorways. I find the walk ways fascinating. I wonder how many people had walked through here before me?
I'd say about 100,000,000 (half of those would be Korean tourists travelling in groups of 100 or more, clogging the walk ways and stair wells).
Outside the temples the stall areas have a bit of a "Dreamworld" feel to them, like most places heavily frequented by tourists. There are LOTS of souvenir stores, and the food is a bit more expensive inside the gate then out. We ordered noodle soup this morning for breakfast - and we seriously got 2 Minute Noodles! The best version of 2 Minute Noodles I've ever had!
Speaking of food, we ate dinner at a place called Deadfish last night. It is like a warehouse with heaps of different levels. One of the levels has a complete drop off the edge and about a story below sits about 10 or so crocodiles! Not the best area to get drunk! I got a photo of me next to the drop pit, you think I don't like heights normally, wait until there's 10 crocodiles below!
Tomorrow we're going to visit the floating village and also the landmine museum.
Hopefully there's no crocodiles at the floating village.
Love, Hugs & Rainbows,
Shanngelina.
P.S. I'm not coming home.
We're going to Bonnie Doon.
Bonnie Doon is Cambodian for Angkor Wat.
Nah, just kidding.
So since we've been in Siem Reap, the following has happened:
1. We met Pit, who was to be our tuktuk driver for the Angkor temples.
2. John drank 168 cans of Angkor, and about 1241417 pints of Angkor Draft..
3. We checked out the temples.
4. We went to Dr Fish.. again.
5. We booked our bus back to Phnom Penh, and our hotel.
6. We learnt enough Khmer to get the little hustlers to back off..haha.
... and all these things go together so well.... so the story shall be told:
Siem Reap has been great. We are staying in a BEAUTIFUL hotel, with fantastic staff, free internet, free coffee, it has cable, air-con, 90c cans of beer, it really is a top spot... We''re only a little ways from Pub St, the Old Market/Night Market etc, as well as being in a nice quiet back street. A lot of the streets here are dirt, so everything has a nice layer of dust on it...
Today and yesterday we went to Angkor to see the temples... Day 1, we set off at about 9am, and by 2 in the afternoon I nearly died of heatstroke.. turns out 100 bottles of water is no compensation for not wearing a hat and trudging through temples.. The detail of the carvings, along with the beautiful assembly, the way its all put together is magical, breathtaking, awesome, really to be perfectly honest, cannot be described in words.
At the same time as being so amazing, it is heartbreaking, and gutwrenching to see some of the vandalism that has taken place at the hands of the hindu people and the Khmer Rouge.
On Day 2, we set out for the sunrise tour, meeting our new friend Pit at our hotel at 5am. Through the dark, dusty streets of Siem Reap, Mr Pit navigated his reliable and poweful tuktuk, arriving by our sunrise vantage point at 515-ish.
Watching the sun appear over the distant trees and hills, with rays of light beaming across the bath, was a picture I will never forget, mainly due to the fact Shannon captured it all on camera.
From there we set off on the Small Circuit, after knocking down the Grand Circuit on Day 1. There are some amazing temples, my favourite actually being Ta Keo (not Angkor Wat, believe it or Not - I just rhymed). Ta Keo is a huge structure, that hasn't actually been finished yet, apparently due to it being struck by lightning about 95% of the way to completion. Fearing the lightning strike was bad luck, the workers abandoned it, until it became a buddhist temple (temples changed from hindi to buddhist praise back and forth)
We grabbed some breakfast with Pit- a pretty standard overpriced ($2) noodle soup, and a coconut to drink.. from there, we continued templing, including the Bayon, which it would appear is a meeting place for the "Slow as shit Korean Club". From there, we headed to some smaller temples, including the toilet temple... free for ticketholders, 50c for nonticketholders. After draining the main vein, we headed back to Siem Reap town, conversing with our friend Pit.
From a few things Pit had told us, we really wanted to meet his wife, and get to know them both better. We invited Pit and Mrs Pit to dinner, and he accepted, before instead inviting us to his house tomorrow night for some Khmer tucker.
So after bidding adieu to Pit, I wandered the streets of Siem Reap on my lonesome, looking for a nice shady place to read the Cambodian Weekly newspaper. Found a little chair, had a read, and headed back to have some lunch with S-Tacular at STAR RISE (Best. Food. Ever).
And here I am now. Tomorrow we have the landmine museum, as well as dinner with Pit, and then Monday we head back to Phnom Penh, and the plan is to head to Sihanoukville for a few days to chillax on the beach.
Giggity.
John.
Nah, just kidding.
So since we've been in Siem Reap, the following has happened:
1. We met Pit, who was to be our tuktuk driver for the Angkor temples.
2. John drank 168 cans of Angkor, and about 1241417 pints of Angkor Draft..
3. We checked out the temples.
4. We went to Dr Fish.. again.
5. We booked our bus back to Phnom Penh, and our hotel.
6. We learnt enough Khmer to get the little hustlers to back off..haha.
... and all these things go together so well.... so the story shall be told:
Siem Reap has been great. We are staying in a BEAUTIFUL hotel, with fantastic staff, free internet, free coffee, it has cable, air-con, 90c cans of beer, it really is a top spot... We''re only a little ways from Pub St, the Old Market/Night Market etc, as well as being in a nice quiet back street. A lot of the streets here are dirt, so everything has a nice layer of dust on it...
Today and yesterday we went to Angkor to see the temples... Day 1, we set off at about 9am, and by 2 in the afternoon I nearly died of heatstroke.. turns out 100 bottles of water is no compensation for not wearing a hat and trudging through temples.. The detail of the carvings, along with the beautiful assembly, the way its all put together is magical, breathtaking, awesome, really to be perfectly honest, cannot be described in words.
At the same time as being so amazing, it is heartbreaking, and gutwrenching to see some of the vandalism that has taken place at the hands of the hindu people and the Khmer Rouge.
On Day 2, we set out for the sunrise tour, meeting our new friend Pit at our hotel at 5am. Through the dark, dusty streets of Siem Reap, Mr Pit navigated his reliable and poweful tuktuk, arriving by our sunrise vantage point at 515-ish.
Watching the sun appear over the distant trees and hills, with rays of light beaming across the bath, was a picture I will never forget, mainly due to the fact Shannon captured it all on camera.
From there we set off on the Small Circuit, after knocking down the Grand Circuit on Day 1. There are some amazing temples, my favourite actually being Ta Keo (not Angkor Wat, believe it or Not - I just rhymed). Ta Keo is a huge structure, that hasn't actually been finished yet, apparently due to it being struck by lightning about 95% of the way to completion. Fearing the lightning strike was bad luck, the workers abandoned it, until it became a buddhist temple (temples changed from hindi to buddhist praise back and forth)
We grabbed some breakfast with Pit- a pretty standard overpriced ($2) noodle soup, and a coconut to drink.. from there, we continued templing, including the Bayon, which it would appear is a meeting place for the "Slow as shit Korean Club". From there, we headed to some smaller temples, including the toilet temple... free for ticketholders, 50c for nonticketholders. After draining the main vein, we headed back to Siem Reap town, conversing with our friend Pit.
From a few things Pit had told us, we really wanted to meet his wife, and get to know them both better. We invited Pit and Mrs Pit to dinner, and he accepted, before instead inviting us to his house tomorrow night for some Khmer tucker.
So after bidding adieu to Pit, I wandered the streets of Siem Reap on my lonesome, looking for a nice shady place to read the Cambodian Weekly newspaper. Found a little chair, had a read, and headed back to have some lunch with S-Tacular at STAR RISE (Best. Food. Ever).
And here I am now. Tomorrow we have the landmine museum, as well as dinner with Pit, and then Monday we head back to Phnom Penh, and the plan is to head to Sihanoukville for a few days to chillax on the beach.
Giggity.
John.
Thursday, 5 March 2009
Angkor Wat?
Chum reap sua!
That was Greetings, Cambodian style (I didn't actually remember that this time either, I have a book to cheat from).
What a fabulous 48 hours I've had! We got to Bogie and Bacall's on Street No. 136 nice and early to help load the truck with supplies for the Dump Run. There was quite a good turn out, an Australian couple who didn't say much (the woman looked like she was a Bretheren, so here on in they shall be known as "The Bretheren Couple"), a young couple, Matt from Caaaaalifoooooooooornia (that was my attempt at his long drawn out accent, being Californian he was so darn relaxed) with a girl from Canada who had a cherry blossom tree tattooed on her shoulder (I forget her name, lets call her Tattoo, like from Fantasy Island except from Canada in Cambodia). There was an American man and his family (he actually donated $150 for the entire trip and provided some basic medical supplies, because of this donation, I thought he was a doctor, he's not, but we'lll call him The Doctor. Not at all as funny as Triple J's The Doctor). Then there was Niomi, the "Photo Journalist", I put this in quotations marks to point out the legitimacy of this job title is questionable. My main reason for questioning her is because she was rude and she pissed me off, that's really all the evidence I have for questioning her though. I'm sure it would stand up in court somewhere...
So our rag tag bunch of volunteers were accompanied by David (the owner of Bogie and Bacall's and founder of the dump runs), Richard, a pommy expat with many a story to tell and a local police officer. We all jumped in the back of a truck with the equipment. This was an AWESOME way to travel around Phnom Penh, except when there were low hanging branches. The first stop was to the markets to purchase 400 loaves of bread, crabapples, bannana's, apples and cordial, all of this came to around $148.00 - very cheap considering it was to feed an entire village.
As we pulled into the dump, my heart broke. Hundreds of little kids rushed out of the school and down the piles of rubbish to chase after the truck. The dump has been set on fire in parts and the whole place has an eerie, smoky cloud hanging over it. We stopped the truck and all the kids made 2 lines, a girls line and a boys line. We all scrambled out of the back of the truck pushing through the kids who were trying to get as close as possible to the front.
John and Richard's job was crowd control (like security at the fenceline of a moshpit, they make sure no one is getting squished). My job was to stop line jumping and pushing. I hated this job, the poor hungry little faces would try and cut in with their friends and I had to be the big meanie who sent them to the back of the line. Understandably though, if people cut in or came up for more than a serve it meant someone else had to miss out on food.
The children are amazingly resilient, happy, polite, friendly and smart. As they were standing in line they would reach out to hold my hand. Their arms were so tiny that most of them couldn't hold all of the food, so they were picking up plastic bags, sheets of cardboard and pieces of material from the rubbish piles to help them carry it all. These children truly have nothing. I honestly can't describe how adorable they all are, you'll have to see for yourself in the photos or maybe in person one day.
After all of the food had been dished out, injuries and illnesses attended to as best the first aiders could (alot suffer from scabies, septic wounds, some have broken bones or burns from falling through soft rubbish piles or standing on coals), about 20 or so kids hung around to play. One little girl took a liking to me so she would stand there just holding my hand or giving me a hug. She taught me how to play a hand clapping game and then a few of the girls sung "The Wheels on The Bus". John and I decided on the way back to Bogie and Bacall's to volunteer again before we leave.
Back in Phnom Penh, we drank lots of beer, chatted to David, Richard and two hilarious Aussie guys called Paul and Daryl. We headed off to The Happy Herb Pizza Place for dinner and tried out one of Cambodia's "Happy Pizza's". My pizza was extremely tasty, the "Happy" part was a bit over rated but was definitely worth a go!
Today we caught a bus to Siem Reap (not far from the temples at Angkor Wat), it cost us just $9.00 and took about 5 hours in a super comfy bus. Siem Reap is only 317kms away from Phnom Penh, but the conditions of the roads drag the travelling time out. We had a little stop over on the way and met this beutiful litle boy (who I'm going to call Pax, because I want to adopt him). When he realised we were't going to buy some pineapple from him to eat, he showed us a little monkey that had been chained up, so we fed some pineapple to the poor little thing. I can see why it had been tied up though, it was a cranky little fucker. We jumped back on the bus and as we were pulling away, little Pax stood there waving and blowing kisses. I want one.
Siem Reap is great! We are in such a nice Ph'teah Som Nak (that was Guest House in Khmer, BOOYA!). It's called Mother Home and is $15 a night, the room is huge and we have a bath! Plus the plumbing is actually inside the wall! We are spoilt! I feel like we're cheating on Asian experience a bit.
All of the roads here are pretty much dirt, which makes taking a tuk tuk a bit like 4WDriving. We headed off to the night Phsar (that was market in Khmer, I'm getting clever!) tonight and I have bought HEAPS of goodies for everyone. We also got to try out Dr. Fish. These are a small type of pyrranah that eat all the dead skin off you're feet. It sounds disgusting and I'll admit, the first 2 minutes are pretty unpleasant. I HAVE MY FEET IN A FRICKING TANK OF PYRRANAHS!!! WHY IS THIS!!?? Then it's kind of like a foot spa, except with flesh eating fish from Turkey.
New counrty, new experiences.
Loving every minute of it,
Shanngelina
That was Greetings, Cambodian style (I didn't actually remember that this time either, I have a book to cheat from).
What a fabulous 48 hours I've had! We got to Bogie and Bacall's on Street No. 136 nice and early to help load the truck with supplies for the Dump Run. There was quite a good turn out, an Australian couple who didn't say much (the woman looked like she was a Bretheren, so here on in they shall be known as "The Bretheren Couple"), a young couple, Matt from Caaaaalifoooooooooornia (that was my attempt at his long drawn out accent, being Californian he was so darn relaxed) with a girl from Canada who had a cherry blossom tree tattooed on her shoulder (I forget her name, lets call her Tattoo, like from Fantasy Island except from Canada in Cambodia). There was an American man and his family (he actually donated $150 for the entire trip and provided some basic medical supplies, because of this donation, I thought he was a doctor, he's not, but we'lll call him The Doctor. Not at all as funny as Triple J's The Doctor). Then there was Niomi, the "Photo Journalist", I put this in quotations marks to point out the legitimacy of this job title is questionable. My main reason for questioning her is because she was rude and she pissed me off, that's really all the evidence I have for questioning her though. I'm sure it would stand up in court somewhere...
So our rag tag bunch of volunteers were accompanied by David (the owner of Bogie and Bacall's and founder of the dump runs), Richard, a pommy expat with many a story to tell and a local police officer. We all jumped in the back of a truck with the equipment. This was an AWESOME way to travel around Phnom Penh, except when there were low hanging branches. The first stop was to the markets to purchase 400 loaves of bread, crabapples, bannana's, apples and cordial, all of this came to around $148.00 - very cheap considering it was to feed an entire village.
As we pulled into the dump, my heart broke. Hundreds of little kids rushed out of the school and down the piles of rubbish to chase after the truck. The dump has been set on fire in parts and the whole place has an eerie, smoky cloud hanging over it. We stopped the truck and all the kids made 2 lines, a girls line and a boys line. We all scrambled out of the back of the truck pushing through the kids who were trying to get as close as possible to the front.
John and Richard's job was crowd control (like security at the fenceline of a moshpit, they make sure no one is getting squished). My job was to stop line jumping and pushing. I hated this job, the poor hungry little faces would try and cut in with their friends and I had to be the big meanie who sent them to the back of the line. Understandably though, if people cut in or came up for more than a serve it meant someone else had to miss out on food.
The children are amazingly resilient, happy, polite, friendly and smart. As they were standing in line they would reach out to hold my hand. Their arms were so tiny that most of them couldn't hold all of the food, so they were picking up plastic bags, sheets of cardboard and pieces of material from the rubbish piles to help them carry it all. These children truly have nothing. I honestly can't describe how adorable they all are, you'll have to see for yourself in the photos or maybe in person one day.
After all of the food had been dished out, injuries and illnesses attended to as best the first aiders could (alot suffer from scabies, septic wounds, some have broken bones or burns from falling through soft rubbish piles or standing on coals), about 20 or so kids hung around to play. One little girl took a liking to me so she would stand there just holding my hand or giving me a hug. She taught me how to play a hand clapping game and then a few of the girls sung "The Wheels on The Bus". John and I decided on the way back to Bogie and Bacall's to volunteer again before we leave.
Back in Phnom Penh, we drank lots of beer, chatted to David, Richard and two hilarious Aussie guys called Paul and Daryl. We headed off to The Happy Herb Pizza Place for dinner and tried out one of Cambodia's "Happy Pizza's". My pizza was extremely tasty, the "Happy" part was a bit over rated but was definitely worth a go!
Today we caught a bus to Siem Reap (not far from the temples at Angkor Wat), it cost us just $9.00 and took about 5 hours in a super comfy bus. Siem Reap is only 317kms away from Phnom Penh, but the conditions of the roads drag the travelling time out. We had a little stop over on the way and met this beutiful litle boy (who I'm going to call Pax, because I want to adopt him). When he realised we were't going to buy some pineapple from him to eat, he showed us a little monkey that had been chained up, so we fed some pineapple to the poor little thing. I can see why it had been tied up though, it was a cranky little fucker. We jumped back on the bus and as we were pulling away, little Pax stood there waving and blowing kisses. I want one.
Siem Reap is great! We are in such a nice Ph'teah Som Nak (that was Guest House in Khmer, BOOYA!). It's called Mother Home and is $15 a night, the room is huge and we have a bath! Plus the plumbing is actually inside the wall! We are spoilt! I feel like we're cheating on Asian experience a bit.
All of the roads here are pretty much dirt, which makes taking a tuk tuk a bit like 4WDriving. We headed off to the night Phsar (that was market in Khmer, I'm getting clever!) tonight and I have bought HEAPS of goodies for everyone. We also got to try out Dr. Fish. These are a small type of pyrranah that eat all the dead skin off you're feet. It sounds disgusting and I'll admit, the first 2 minutes are pretty unpleasant. I HAVE MY FEET IN A FRICKING TANK OF PYRRANAHS!!! WHY IS THIS!!?? Then it's kind of like a foot spa, except with flesh eating fish from Turkey.
New counrty, new experiences.
Loving every minute of it,
Shanngelina
Selamat Pagi Tuan Puan
The above is Malaysian for Good Morning Ladies and Gentleman. I learned this on our flight. It is much more hilarious to hear, because it sounds like:
Selmat Pangi Toing Poing.
Well. What a day and a half it's been. We wake up bright as buttons on Wednesday, keen as mustard to head to the dump and run around the trash.
We meet David, the English owner of Bogey and Bacalls at his pub, and along with Richard (another Pom, sounds like Richard Thornhill, also loves pork-pies, must be the name?) as well as a young brethren couple (very awkward, didn't say two words, but looked down their noses at us when we got back for post-dump lagers) a girl name Cherry from Victoria in British Columbia, as well as Wayyyyyyyyyyne, a surfer dude from Cali-forn- yaaaaa. The local village policeman was there as well, as well as a photo journalist called NY-OH-MEE, who turned out to be an uppity snob. Stupid poms.
Anyway, we get to the pub and immediately start loading the truck with supplies, water, chairs, medical equipment... there are about 10 of us.. and only 2 seats.. where to sit? In the tray.
We rode through the streets of Phnom Penh, atop the tray of a truck, holding onto the rickety tray. We got to a womans roadside bread stall, a woman David calls Mama, where we bought 400 baguettes. From there we went to the wholesale market where we picked up 50kg of bananas, 60kg of crabapples, 40 kgs of regular apples, loaded them up and off to the Phnom Penh City Dump.
Myself and Wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyne had been asked to stand at the back of the truck and swat the kids back as we drove through the dump. I must of underestimated what he meant, because as soon as the truck entered the dump, about 50 kids came out of nowhere, from all directions, chasing our truck. Wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyne and I then had to unpry the little kids fingers from the truck (whilst we were driving up a mud road, in a dump, not holding onto anytthing...) until we stopped.
We pulled up in a quiet part of the dump, surrounded by two huge trash walls, and Operation Feedkids was underway.
About 450 kids, ranging from new-born baby to 15 years old, as well as some older ladies, young mothers to grandmothers, lined up in 2 orderly male and female lines to receive some tucker from the trucker.
We handed out food while the awkward brethrens (the woman was a medic) treated minor ailments such as cuts, scratches, infections, scabies and so on. There were a lot of cute little kids, including one naked little baby boy, probably 6mths old. He was in the line, being held by his mother, but reached out and grabbed my finger. So then his mother gave him to me to hold. That was awkward. Holding a naked stinky sweaty Cambodian child. But the kid was the cutest I've ever seen so very much ok.
We packed up and had a bit of a play with the kids. I had 2 little brats hanging off my arms asking me to pick them up, little ruffigans that they are. We packed up, said goodbye, and headed back for Phnom Penh City.
Once back at the pub, we unloaded, got everything sorted and sat down for a beer with David (the owner). We got back at about 2pm...One Angkor Draft turned into 20, then some guys from QLD turned up (Daryl and Paul) and they had some beer too. Next time I look at my watch its about 6pm, and Im absolutely pickled. So what to do? We head to HH Pizza.
It was good pizza.
Then the next logical step is... BACK TO THE PUB. So we head back, chill out with Daryl and Paul, two hilarious top blokes, and drink more beer. It gets to 10pm, and its time to pull stumps.. for we had a 9am bus to Siem Reap to catch.
Woke up today at about 6am, seedy as ever, and went for a jog through the city, probably about 3 or 4km. Even at 6am, its very hot and humid. Got back, had some breakfast and boarded an "express bus" to Siem Reap. It was a good trip, cost $9 and was very comfortable. We went for dinner at a little place called Star Rise right near our hotel (Motherhome Hotel) and then jumped onto a tuktuk to go to the Night Markets where we caught a movie and bought some souvenirs. (Rob I bought you a present)
Back at the hotel writing this but up early tomorrow to head to Angkor Wat with our tuktuk driver, Pit.
It should be good.
Til next time,
John.
Selmat Pangi Toing Poing.
Well. What a day and a half it's been. We wake up bright as buttons on Wednesday, keen as mustard to head to the dump and run around the trash.
We meet David, the English owner of Bogey and Bacalls at his pub, and along with Richard (another Pom, sounds like Richard Thornhill, also loves pork-pies, must be the name?) as well as a young brethren couple (very awkward, didn't say two words, but looked down their noses at us when we got back for post-dump lagers) a girl name Cherry from Victoria in British Columbia, as well as Wayyyyyyyyyyne, a surfer dude from Cali-forn- yaaaaa. The local village policeman was there as well, as well as a photo journalist called NY-OH-MEE, who turned out to be an uppity snob. Stupid poms.
Anyway, we get to the pub and immediately start loading the truck with supplies, water, chairs, medical equipment... there are about 10 of us.. and only 2 seats.. where to sit? In the tray.
We rode through the streets of Phnom Penh, atop the tray of a truck, holding onto the rickety tray. We got to a womans roadside bread stall, a woman David calls Mama, where we bought 400 baguettes. From there we went to the wholesale market where we picked up 50kg of bananas, 60kg of crabapples, 40 kgs of regular apples, loaded them up and off to the Phnom Penh City Dump.
Myself and Wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyne had been asked to stand at the back of the truck and swat the kids back as we drove through the dump. I must of underestimated what he meant, because as soon as the truck entered the dump, about 50 kids came out of nowhere, from all directions, chasing our truck. Wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyne and I then had to unpry the little kids fingers from the truck (whilst we were driving up a mud road, in a dump, not holding onto anytthing...) until we stopped.
We pulled up in a quiet part of the dump, surrounded by two huge trash walls, and Operation Feedkids was underway.
About 450 kids, ranging from new-born baby to 15 years old, as well as some older ladies, young mothers to grandmothers, lined up in 2 orderly male and female lines to receive some tucker from the trucker.
We handed out food while the awkward brethrens (the woman was a medic) treated minor ailments such as cuts, scratches, infections, scabies and so on. There were a lot of cute little kids, including one naked little baby boy, probably 6mths old. He was in the line, being held by his mother, but reached out and grabbed my finger. So then his mother gave him to me to hold. That was awkward. Holding a naked stinky sweaty Cambodian child. But the kid was the cutest I've ever seen so very much ok.
We packed up and had a bit of a play with the kids. I had 2 little brats hanging off my arms asking me to pick them up, little ruffigans that they are. We packed up, said goodbye, and headed back for Phnom Penh City.
Once back at the pub, we unloaded, got everything sorted and sat down for a beer with David (the owner). We got back at about 2pm...One Angkor Draft turned into 20, then some guys from QLD turned up (Daryl and Paul) and they had some beer too. Next time I look at my watch its about 6pm, and Im absolutely pickled. So what to do? We head to HH Pizza.
It was good pizza.
Then the next logical step is... BACK TO THE PUB. So we head back, chill out with Daryl and Paul, two hilarious top blokes, and drink more beer. It gets to 10pm, and its time to pull stumps.. for we had a 9am bus to Siem Reap to catch.
Woke up today at about 6am, seedy as ever, and went for a jog through the city, probably about 3 or 4km. Even at 6am, its very hot and humid. Got back, had some breakfast and boarded an "express bus" to Siem Reap. It was a good trip, cost $9 and was very comfortable. We went for dinner at a little place called Star Rise right near our hotel (Motherhome Hotel) and then jumped onto a tuktuk to go to the Night Markets where we caught a movie and bought some souvenirs. (Rob I bought you a present)
Back at the hotel writing this but up early tomorrow to head to Angkor Wat with our tuktuk driver, Pit.
It should be good.
Til next time,
John.
Tuesday, 3 March 2009
The Paragon
Konichiwa - I did learn how to say hello in Khmer yesterday, but now I forget, sorry.
We've moved hotels! This has made me extremely happy. It turns out Cambodia is not FULL of sex tourists HOORAY! After drinking many $1.00 beers on Monday we went upstairs to have a nap, which turned out to be a 12 hour nap! So we woke up at 6.00am the next morning and decided to go on a hunt for a new hotel. Being so fabulous, Courtney lent us her Lonely Planet Cambodia Guide and had been highlighting certain things in it for herself. Thanks to this, we are now staying a a much cheaper much nicer hotel called the Paragon. Which reminds me of the name of a ship in a book I once read.
We explored Riverside (kind of like Brisbane's Riverside except with more Cambodian people and no Story Bridge). I love it here, there are bars and restaurants (with minimal sex tourists) and food markets just around the corner.
While stinging around Phnom Penh on a tuk tuk, we ran into a tuk tuk, car and moto driver (a man of many talents a vehicular transport) named Dara who was introduced to us by Kim the day before. Dara is hilarious, he is so happy (he reminds me of Cho in Hanoi, Chotally Awesome!).
First up, Dara took us to the Killing Fields. May I just say, tuk tuk's are awesome. Except when we rode past the "Bog of Eternal Stench''. Labyrinth fans, this Bog does indeed exist, and it is located underneath a bridge, spilling out into grass fields on the way the The Killing Fields. Watch out of Hoggle and Ludo. ""Smeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeells Baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaad!!!"
Walking through the Killing Fields was a very sobering experience. There are massive ditches in the ground the once were mass graves, holding hundreds and hundreds of Khmer people. Unfortunately, during school no one ever mentioned the genocide that occurred quite recently in Cambodia. I'm not sure if this was the case for yourself, but I will briefly explain. Some absolute loony called Pol Pot, put together a 'political party' whose aim was to create a 'new improved' Cambodia. The way to this 'new and improved Cambodia' was to slaughter educated people, old people (over 60), politicians, families of educated people, families of old people, families of politicians, doctors, lawyers and their families, anyone suspected of being a traitor, and their families. You may see a slight problem in their categorizing of who dies - it's everyone.
So after rounding everyone up, sending those that didn't fit into the categories above to work in rice fields (the aim was to have no industry except for rice, again, another problem), he sent the remaining people to S21, a school turned prison to be "interrogated" (read: tortured) then to the Killing Fields, to be finished off by a blow to the back of the head. All of this occurred between 1974 though to 1978. So I ask the question - when the complete genocide of the Khmer people was being committed, where was the rest of world? And the answer: Nowhere, because it wasn't happening on the door step of a super power and because silk and rice just doesn't earn the dollars that oil does.
After having our eyes firmly stapled open forever, we headed back to Phnom Penh. Dara had offered to take us to lunch at a RIEL (see there it is again - fuck I'm funny) Cambodian restaurant. After lunch we headed back to our new hotel and came across a sign in the foyer "THE NEXT DUMP RUN IS THIS WEDNESDAY". Cambodia is a very poor country and there are some of the living conditions are HORRENDOUS. Just out of town there is a rubbish dump and in this rubbish dump hundreds of people live. They are scavengers, who sort through the rubbish for bottles and cans to hand in for small amounts of money (about 100 cans will get you US$1.00) to help them feed themselves. A group of people have started running volunteers up to the rubbish dump to bring food, fresh water and medical assistance to the children that live in these appalling conditions. So today, being Wednesday, we are off to the rubbish dump to help out. It costs just $15 per volunteer and they end up feeding around 400 people a couple of times a week.
So I'm off to Bogie and Bacall's now to catch the truck up there!
Love, hugs and rainbow families.
Shanngelina
We've moved hotels! This has made me extremely happy. It turns out Cambodia is not FULL of sex tourists HOORAY! After drinking many $1.00 beers on Monday we went upstairs to have a nap, which turned out to be a 12 hour nap! So we woke up at 6.00am the next morning and decided to go on a hunt for a new hotel. Being so fabulous, Courtney lent us her Lonely Planet Cambodia Guide and had been highlighting certain things in it for herself. Thanks to this, we are now staying a a much cheaper much nicer hotel called the Paragon. Which reminds me of the name of a ship in a book I once read.
We explored Riverside (kind of like Brisbane's Riverside except with more Cambodian people and no Story Bridge). I love it here, there are bars and restaurants (with minimal sex tourists) and food markets just around the corner.
While stinging around Phnom Penh on a tuk tuk, we ran into a tuk tuk, car and moto driver (a man of many talents a vehicular transport) named Dara who was introduced to us by Kim the day before. Dara is hilarious, he is so happy (he reminds me of Cho in Hanoi, Chotally Awesome!).
First up, Dara took us to the Killing Fields. May I just say, tuk tuk's are awesome. Except when we rode past the "Bog of Eternal Stench''. Labyrinth fans, this Bog does indeed exist, and it is located underneath a bridge, spilling out into grass fields on the way the The Killing Fields. Watch out of Hoggle and Ludo. ""Smeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeells Baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaad!!!"
Walking through the Killing Fields was a very sobering experience. There are massive ditches in the ground the once were mass graves, holding hundreds and hundreds of Khmer people. Unfortunately, during school no one ever mentioned the genocide that occurred quite recently in Cambodia. I'm not sure if this was the case for yourself, but I will briefly explain. Some absolute loony called Pol Pot, put together a 'political party' whose aim was to create a 'new improved' Cambodia. The way to this 'new and improved Cambodia' was to slaughter educated people, old people (over 60), politicians, families of educated people, families of old people, families of politicians, doctors, lawyers and their families, anyone suspected of being a traitor, and their families. You may see a slight problem in their categorizing of who dies - it's everyone.
So after rounding everyone up, sending those that didn't fit into the categories above to work in rice fields (the aim was to have no industry except for rice, again, another problem), he sent the remaining people to S21, a school turned prison to be "interrogated" (read: tortured) then to the Killing Fields, to be finished off by a blow to the back of the head. All of this occurred between 1974 though to 1978. So I ask the question - when the complete genocide of the Khmer people was being committed, where was the rest of world? And the answer: Nowhere, because it wasn't happening on the door step of a super power and because silk and rice just doesn't earn the dollars that oil does.
After having our eyes firmly stapled open forever, we headed back to Phnom Penh. Dara had offered to take us to lunch at a RIEL (see there it is again - fuck I'm funny) Cambodian restaurant. After lunch we headed back to our new hotel and came across a sign in the foyer "THE NEXT DUMP RUN IS THIS WEDNESDAY". Cambodia is a very poor country and there are some of the living conditions are HORRENDOUS. Just out of town there is a rubbish dump and in this rubbish dump hundreds of people live. They are scavengers, who sort through the rubbish for bottles and cans to hand in for small amounts of money (about 100 cans will get you US$1.00) to help them feed themselves. A group of people have started running volunteers up to the rubbish dump to bring food, fresh water and medical assistance to the children that live in these appalling conditions. So today, being Wednesday, we are off to the rubbish dump to help out. It costs just $15 per volunteer and they end up feeding around 400 people a couple of times a week.
So I'm off to Bogie and Bacall's now to catch the truck up there!
Love, hugs and rainbow families.
Shanngelina
Part 2: The Mini-Series Continues.
So.
Since I wrote last, we left the Flamingo Hotel (where the seedy expat's were) and moved closer to the Riverside, to the Paragon Hotel. It is a nice hotel, not as comfortable as the Flamingo, the blanket is small, the aircon loud, and we have no window, but we are saving nearly 30% and it is in a nicer area with not so much of a filthy expat population.
Also, I forgot to mention, that when we checked into flamingos, they had done a pretty shit job cleaning it as there was a whole packet of Valium (que?) in the drawer next to the bed... wierd.
Yesterday we organized with our tuktuk driver Dara to take us to the Big3 tourist attractions... so we headed off first to the Killing Fields.
It is quite an eye opening experience. As you walk around the dirt tracks of the old genocide paddocks, you are walking over clothing that is slowly unearthing everytime someone new trods the path. It is a red tshirt here, blue pants there, and simply knowing you are walking over the clothes that once adorned a Khmer that died in vain under the rule of an insane regime, is somewhat depressing and uneasy.
There is a tree there called the Killing Tree (or something similar) where apparently children were bludgeoned to death and then thrown in a mass grave beside it (this particular grave held 450 bodies when it was dug-up). Next to the tree there remain a pile about a metre high of human bones.
Back to the start of the circuit they have put in, is a large gold pagoda, about 30metres high, filled top to bottom of skulls of people who had died there. At first it just looked like "skulls"and I was totally ok to see it, but when I got closer and you started to see the teeth etc, it made me queazy and I had to run outside.
We left there and headed to S-21, or Tuol Sleung prison, an old primary school that was converted into a prison/torture centre when the Khmer Rouge took over. They managed to turn simple playground equipment into torture tools. We headed upstairs into the old classrooms that had been turned into both cells and torture rooms. As you walk around these rooms , there is a distinct maroon tint to the stains on the floor, some of the bloodstains have never been removed.
From S-21 we headed to one of Daras local places for a good old fashioned Khmer lunch. We had some tucker, and a lime juice, and headed off to the National Museum. The museum charged $3 entry, and as we were pretty touristed out, decided we'd head for a pub and have an ale.
We had a couple of beers and headed back to our new hotel. We decided we’d book our bus up to Siem Reap, so now we’re heading up on Thursday morning. We also saw a pamphlet advertising a volunteer trip to the Phnom Penh rubbish dump, to feed some of the 1200 kids who live on the rubbish dump. So we went to the pub that the guy owns (Bogey and Bacall on St 127) and met up with one of the guys who helps organize the trips. We got there at about 4pm, and drank, read stories, this guy (Richard) told us stories about his 2 years in Cambodia, saw pictures, eventually got smashed and bounced at about 830 to a western restaurant (Cadillac Bar and Grill) as I was really after a cheeseburger (see earlier comment about being smashed). The owner of the bar was really awesome, nice guy, Kenny from Texas. One of the very few Americans I’ve met travelling who isn’t a douche bag.
After dinner we hit the hay as we had to be up somewhat early for todays trip to the market and rubbish dump.
So that’s where we’re at. It’s now 8am, and we’ll be heading off soon. Just going to go grab some breakfast.
Will update soon.
Cooksley, John.
Since I wrote last, we left the Flamingo Hotel (where the seedy expat's were) and moved closer to the Riverside, to the Paragon Hotel. It is a nice hotel, not as comfortable as the Flamingo, the blanket is small, the aircon loud, and we have no window, but we are saving nearly 30% and it is in a nicer area with not so much of a filthy expat population.
Also, I forgot to mention, that when we checked into flamingos, they had done a pretty shit job cleaning it as there was a whole packet of Valium (que?) in the drawer next to the bed... wierd.
Yesterday we organized with our tuktuk driver Dara to take us to the Big3 tourist attractions... so we headed off first to the Killing Fields.
It is quite an eye opening experience. As you walk around the dirt tracks of the old genocide paddocks, you are walking over clothing that is slowly unearthing everytime someone new trods the path. It is a red tshirt here, blue pants there, and simply knowing you are walking over the clothes that once adorned a Khmer that died in vain under the rule of an insane regime, is somewhat depressing and uneasy.
There is a tree there called the Killing Tree (or something similar) where apparently children were bludgeoned to death and then thrown in a mass grave beside it (this particular grave held 450 bodies when it was dug-up). Next to the tree there remain a pile about a metre high of human bones.
Back to the start of the circuit they have put in, is a large gold pagoda, about 30metres high, filled top to bottom of skulls of people who had died there. At first it just looked like "skulls"and I was totally ok to see it, but when I got closer and you started to see the teeth etc, it made me queazy and I had to run outside.
We left there and headed to S-21, or Tuol Sleung prison, an old primary school that was converted into a prison/torture centre when the Khmer Rouge took over. They managed to turn simple playground equipment into torture tools. We headed upstairs into the old classrooms that had been turned into both cells and torture rooms. As you walk around these rooms , there is a distinct maroon tint to the stains on the floor, some of the bloodstains have never been removed.
From S-21 we headed to one of Daras local places for a good old fashioned Khmer lunch. We had some tucker, and a lime juice, and headed off to the National Museum. The museum charged $3 entry, and as we were pretty touristed out, decided we'd head for a pub and have an ale.
We had a couple of beers and headed back to our new hotel. We decided we’d book our bus up to Siem Reap, so now we’re heading up on Thursday morning. We also saw a pamphlet advertising a volunteer trip to the Phnom Penh rubbish dump, to feed some of the 1200 kids who live on the rubbish dump. So we went to the pub that the guy owns (Bogey and Bacall on St 127) and met up with one of the guys who helps organize the trips. We got there at about 4pm, and drank, read stories, this guy (Richard) told us stories about his 2 years in Cambodia, saw pictures, eventually got smashed and bounced at about 830 to a western restaurant (Cadillac Bar and Grill) as I was really after a cheeseburger (see earlier comment about being smashed). The owner of the bar was really awesome, nice guy, Kenny from Texas. One of the very few Americans I’ve met travelling who isn’t a douche bag.
After dinner we hit the hay as we had to be up somewhat early for todays trip to the market and rubbish dump.
So that’s where we’re at. It’s now 8am, and we’ll be heading off soon. Just going to go grab some breakfast.
Will update soon.
Cooksley, John.
Monday, 2 March 2009
Hello Diary. I'm Ann Frank.
Dear Diary,
Since I last wrote I have left Nazi Germany... oh wait. I'm not Ann Frank at all...
So I got up Sunday morning at 6am to make sure everything was a-ok.. my bags were packed.. my shoes were tied... and I had all my bizniss sorted. So.. it gets to like .. 11pm at night. and we''re at Brisbane International.. and I'm getting tired. So I figure I've got an 8 hr flight ahead of me.. so I'll just sleep?
WRONG.
I didn't get a wink. The douche behind me stole my pillow. I was totally uncomfortable and had movies-on-demand right in front of me. So I watched Quantum of Solace.. and some other movies, some Simpsons etc and before you know we've crossed the Timor Sea and we're in Kuala Lumpur.
Imagine sticking your nose in soeones bottom thats had mothballs stuffed up there. Thats what the KL International smelt like. Furthermore, it was boring as bat shit and rainy, and the sun only just rose before we left at 925 KL time.
We eventually board our flight to Phnom Penh.. again Malaysian Air comes to the party with some AWESOME service etc, and before we know it, BAM, we're in Cambodia.
We disembark at Cambodia, we'd filled in our customs and immigration forms when we come to a small problem. We apparently need a passport photo to stick to our Visa Application. What to do now?
The Immigration officer says "No worries, $1." So I gave him a buck and here we are. Cleared customs, immigration and into our shuttle bus we get... It was a pretty non-eventful ride from the airport to the hotel.. the typical South East Asia driving... honk, swerve, drive on wrong side of road, honk, giggle, honk.
Get to our hotel.. chuck our stuff in the room.. and headed for a walk. Phnom Penh is a poor mans Vietnam, only more expensive? Que? Anywho, we got back to the hotel, tired and dehyrdated so went to the bar for some $1.20 beers. Chatted to the owner of the hotel, Kim, a Cambodian man who lived in the US for 20 years.. very interesting and provided a bit of insight into Cambodia that only a person who'd lived and gone from there could give.
After that, we head off to the Wat Phnom, a 1km walk from our hotel. We get there.. lots of touts and little kids all with their "buy water, one dorrar". We walk up the stairs to the pagoda when some woman starts yelling "GO PAY, GO PAY". Not realizing we'd missed the ticket booth, we went to the "Foreigners Only" ticket booth, coughed up a buck, and had a look. There were a few people, ranging from a 3 yr old... to a 40yr old.. to a grandma all on their knees prayin' to Buddha. The woman prayed for peace in the world. The 40yr old prayed for a stable end to the World Economic Crisis.. the little 3 yr old prayed for a bitchin' new Tonka Truck.
So we get back (via Tuktuk) to our hotel. We're pretty hungry by this stage, so off down the street I went looking for some local tucker. I came across a guy selling sandwiches.. All made before your eyes.. a crusty bread stick, stuffed with Coriander, Tofu, Mackerel in Tomato Sauce, and Chili Sauce. It cost $1 for 2 sangers. They were massive. And delicious. Bargain.
I headed upstairs at about 4pm local time (7pm Brisbane time) to have a nap.. however as it was so bloody hot, I decided to go down to the bar for another beer and a game of pool (on my own, to unwind). I set the balls up, and a hooker comes over and is like "lets play". As I have a severe hooker intolerance, known as "Getawaydirtyslutitis", I told her to fk off and came and started on this blog. There are a lot of filthy faggoty British sex-tourists drinking/staying at the hotel we're at.. so we'll be leaving tomorrow. They are the scourge of the earth and make me dry-retch. Rant over.
Apart from that, this place is awesome. I can't wait to check out S21, the Royal Palace and the Killing Fields tomorrow.
Tonight we might go to the "Black Cat Bar" which is also owned by Kim, the bloke who owns our hotel we're in.
Until we chat again, peace.
John.
Update early on the morning of Day 2:
So... I went for a laydown at about 6pm as I was tired.. and we've only just woken up. It's 638am in the morning. haha. Awesome. Now we're hittin' some breakfast and out on the town.
Letters from Kampuchea (Shannon 02/03)
Letters from Kumpuchea - Too lazy to write on the travel blog today!
Hello!
So it's only 3.30pm Cambodian time (5.30pm Brisbane) on Monday afternoon and we've managed to stay up for about 36 hours now, with only 10 minute power naps to keep us going! '
Don't worry, the $1.00 beers have helped get us through.We've gone from Brisbane to Kuala Lumpur and happily spent 8 hours on a Malaysian Airlines flight with a choice of 20 new release movies, tv shows and games - all accessible through a remote control - best thing since sliced bread. We then spent 4 hours in KL airport. There are three main things I noticed most about KL (airport, as I'm not fit to judge the rest of the country yet) 1. the sun didn't rise until about 7.30am 2. It smells. It's a weird sort of smell, like a cross between a cupboard at my nanna's that hasn't been opened since 1940 and urine. 3. They are the proud owner of a bar in the airport called Cheers, where everybody knows your name.After trying to have a kip in some awesomely designed recliner chairs, it was time to leave for CAMBODIA! Or CAMBOOYA!! as I like to call it. See the clever use of Camb (the first syllable in Cambodia) and BOOYA! As in supremely awesome. I knew you would.
Malaysia Airlines have looked after us fantastically, feeding us and entertaining us at every opportunity. Unfortunately, there was a f*ckstick of a Frenchman on our flight making this strike 2 against French men when traveling abroad (see the first travel blog on Vietnam, namely in Sapa). They are extremely rude (ordering the flight attendant around like a dog, refusing to listen to the obligations of people sitting in the exit rows (thankfully he was moved because I sure didn't trust him to step up to the responsibility of saving me in an emergency!) and then cutting in front of us in the visa line - f*cker (luckily, it was the line for visa's NOT for fighting, or Chutney)).So we made it to Kampuchea, through the visa line (we had to bribe the customs official US$1 to let us through without a pre arranged passport photo!), then through customs, which consisted of:
Customs Official with Gun: "Anything to declare?"
Us: "No"
Customs Official with a Gun": "Head straight through"
No bag search, no X-ray - nothing. I think John and I must be the luckiest people ever when it comes to customs - touch wood.We had arranged to be picked up by our hotel - the Flamingo in central Phnom Penh. It's not too bad, comfy, clean, maybe a little bit over priced (which happens when you book before you get here) and FULL of SLEAZY Britich Expats, scamming all over the local girls (but from what I've seen, it seems to everywhere in Phnom Penh). I LOVE what I've seen of South East Asia, I mean LOVE it. The locals are fantastically friendly, the food is AMAZING (just to overuse CAPS here like a 14 year old on MSN... lyk OMG LolzorZ!) and the things to see and do are completely out of anything I would see in my normal world.
There's just one thing - I HATE (there's the overuse of CAPS again) the underbelly and seediness of the older male expat community. They are vile. Like Kyle Sandilands - on crack.Unfortunately that comes with 3rd world and developing economies, even developed economies if you look in the right places in Australia. So I'm going to continue to love South East Asia like it's my home away from home. With cheap beer & food, rich & proud culture, and interesting people - like Kim - the owner of The Flamingo who we met this afternoon.
We're heading to some touristy places tomorrow, the Killing Fields, S21, some pagoda's and the Royal Palace and Elephant rides. The day after, it's off to see the RIEL (see my pun there? No? Look it up) Kampuchea with our new friend Daka.
Peace, Love and Rainbow's.Shanngelina.
Tuesday, 4 December 2007
Wow. Adventures galore.
BIG JOHN WRITES:
So from where we left off. We went to see some temples, and the first Capital of Vietnam out at Tam Coc and Hoa Lu. After lunch we went for a row in a boat through the rice fields and out to a lake system known as Halong Bay Landing. We went through some very beautiful low caves, I had to pretty much duck under each one. From there we went back to Ha Noi via bus, where we chillaxed until about 7, when we were going to head to the Overnight train to Sa Pa.
Luxurious would be one way to describe the sleeper car- IF- we didn't have to share with 2 other people. We were the first ones into our room, Shannon grabbed the top bunk and I the bottom. Shannon spilled half a bottle of water on the mattress. Due to their being no-one else in our room, we assumed it was just us for the night. I said "No Worries" and swapped mattresses. About ten minutes later, a Vietnamese woman, with not a speck of English came in. She proceeded to get on the wet mattress. This brought a few laughs from me. However, she soon found the wet patch. Not knowing what it was, she rubbed the wet patch with her hand, and sniffed it, realllll close to her nose. She mumbled some stuff in Vietnamese, and then got angry, even though it was only water. She called in a guard, some other guy, and some woman, who along with Shannon, her and myself were all in this room no bigger than a common toilet. No-one in our cabin could speak English, and they just kept yelling. Shannon got her faux concerned face on, but I just put on my cool face and kept going " Whats goin on?". Hahahaha.
Anyway in the morning, after an ok ride to Sa Pa, we jumped on a bus with the most massive wankar of an American I've seen. In Vietnam. So then after an hour, we ended up in Sa Pa, had a quick shower and a bit of a wander. We met some girls from the Black H'Mong tribe who were very cute and polite, and tiny. About 4 and a half feet tall, at 15 years old.. We gave them toy koalas we have been carrying to hand out to the kids, and they gave us some bracelets. Very nice.
Then we were off to the mountainous jungle ranges to see the Tay and Day tribes, down through Lao Chai, and Ta Van. Stopped in at some womans house, as they were setting up for a wedding this week. Drank some tea, while our guide explained to us that the dogs we saw walking around were going to be the main course. Walked another kilometre or 2, and back to Sapa, where me and Shannon chillaxed, got lunch and we decided I should hire a motorbike and ride us both around Sa Pa. So we rode around, it was very fun and relaxing, there was minimal traffic so felt quite safe. Had a blast!
After that, we were at the markets where we met an old drunk from Perth. His name was Alfonso, and he was about 60 and the most hilarious Aussie I have met so far. Had a beer on the side of the road with him. Finished the beers, parted ways, and we headed back to our hotel, had a bit of fodder, then to a little bar called Tau Bar, where we had a few bevvies. They have a rum here called ISC which I am going to try and bring home.. its brilliant. There were some pretty disgusting people in there, so at Shannons advice, we left, and went to bed.
Woke up this morning, had some breakfast and we were off to more jungle. A bit of a trek through the mountains (about 5km) and we ended up at Cat Cat Waterfalls. They were very beautiful, but must admit, am getting a bit jungled out. After walking a couple of km more, we headed back to the road, where everyone got on Motos, back to Sa Pa. Then again, due to us being kickass, we decided to ride a moto. We rented one off a guy, and got about 2 streets away when BAM!
It's about 5 degrees here, so the roads are all icy and wet. I took a corner and BAM! Bike slid out from underneath us. Both hit the road! BAM! Picked the bike up, road it back to the fella I had just hired it from. Moto-man and I rode up to the local Moto Mechanic.. There was damage to brake caliper, fairing, light and the footpegs, and it cost me about VND400000, or about $40Australian. Shannon was ok, a couple of scratches, and I'm ok, a bit of blood on my leg, a couple of grazes on my tattoos, a cut elbow and thats it. Ego is hurting the most, feeling a little bit worse for wear due to my moto skills being superior to the av-e-rage bear. Most importantly no-one was hurt.
Tonight we leave back for Ha Noi. We get to Ha Noi in the morning (train again) and then off to Halong Bay. We are doing one night on Cat Ba island, and then back to Ha Noi for two days to a bit more shopping. After that we fly back to Ho Chi Minh.
Until then, take care. Write soon.
SHANNONEGANS WRITES:
Ok , so we've arived in the beautiful mountainous town of Sapa by train and then bus. The night train was a very interesting experience, we were stoked to find out that we got a room with 4 beds and devastated when we didn't get the whole place to ourselves. John and I were so excited at the prospect of spending 8 hours on a train that we decided to take and "Obligatory Myspace Photo", whilst trying to get the perfect angle to show off our beautiful faces I proceeded to knock over my water bottle spilling it all over my bed. Not wanting to sleep in a puddle of water for the trip John and I cam up with the ingenious idea to swap the mattresses with another bed in the room before someone else came in. This idea turned very badly once a Vietnamese lady came and sat down, realising her bed was wet, she proceeded to put her hand in the mysterious liquid and sniff it (all the while John and I pretending we had no idea what was going on). This then turned into the biggest debarcle when the guard and two other people from the train got involved! The problem was sorted when the woman swapped the matterss with another bed and they just put more blankets on it to soak it up.
Enter young Engish girl called Gemma, she did not seem to notice the wet and we had a great old chat. It turns out she was working at a school in Vietnam during her gap year. She had been here for 3 months and was loving it.
We then arrived in Sapa at around 6.30am we were then bombarded by the children of the local villages asking "Where you from?", "What your name?", "You buy from me?", we gave them some of the toy Koala's and got some bracelets in return. They were very cute and are very small. When we asked them their age I thought maybe 7 or 8, it turns out they were 15 and 16!! I seem big over here! We went on a day trip to some of the villages and were followed by some Black H'Mong women on the way down the mountain, they all find John and I very interesting, I have a hilarious picture of the women standing next to John, they were all about 30ish and look like dolls next to him!
The villages were amazing! The scenery is fantastic, it's winter here so a layer of fog hangs over the tops of the moutains, it makes all the terraces with rice growing on them look magical. I bought quite alot of stuff from the women who followed us down the mountain, my favourite was a weaved blanket, it's amazing handiwork. I've also bought some silver bracelets they make as well.
To avoid sleezy men and women (a number of people have been a bit off to both of us) we have been claiming to be husband and wife as they tend to leave us alone once this is said. This has brought many LOLS as I have come across a local village girl who forst tried to buy me from John and now keeps trying to steal me and take me back to her village to marry her brother. She has litterally dragged me down the street! (I think it's all in good fun but John is paranoid they are going to knock me over the head and run away with me).
It's our last day in Sapa and we had a bit of a moto accident today, nothing serious, just the combination of bald tyres, wet ground, a corner and a stupid man John was avoiding hitting. We are ok, just a couple of bumps and scratches. We are off to lunch now and to wade our way through the village children selling things and threatening to cry if we don't buy from them! As much as it is annoying, they are so cute!
So from where we left off. We went to see some temples, and the first Capital of Vietnam out at Tam Coc and Hoa Lu. After lunch we went for a row in a boat through the rice fields and out to a lake system known as Halong Bay Landing. We went through some very beautiful low caves, I had to pretty much duck under each one. From there we went back to Ha Noi via bus, where we chillaxed until about 7, when we were going to head to the Overnight train to Sa Pa.
Luxurious would be one way to describe the sleeper car- IF- we didn't have to share with 2 other people. We were the first ones into our room, Shannon grabbed the top bunk and I the bottom. Shannon spilled half a bottle of water on the mattress. Due to their being no-one else in our room, we assumed it was just us for the night. I said "No Worries" and swapped mattresses. About ten minutes later, a Vietnamese woman, with not a speck of English came in. She proceeded to get on the wet mattress. This brought a few laughs from me. However, she soon found the wet patch. Not knowing what it was, she rubbed the wet patch with her hand, and sniffed it, realllll close to her nose. She mumbled some stuff in Vietnamese, and then got angry, even though it was only water. She called in a guard, some other guy, and some woman, who along with Shannon, her and myself were all in this room no bigger than a common toilet. No-one in our cabin could speak English, and they just kept yelling. Shannon got her faux concerned face on, but I just put on my cool face and kept going " Whats goin on?". Hahahaha.
Anyway in the morning, after an ok ride to Sa Pa, we jumped on a bus with the most massive wankar of an American I've seen. In Vietnam. So then after an hour, we ended up in Sa Pa, had a quick shower and a bit of a wander. We met some girls from the Black H'Mong tribe who were very cute and polite, and tiny. About 4 and a half feet tall, at 15 years old.. We gave them toy koalas we have been carrying to hand out to the kids, and they gave us some bracelets. Very nice.
Then we were off to the mountainous jungle ranges to see the Tay and Day tribes, down through Lao Chai, and Ta Van. Stopped in at some womans house, as they were setting up for a wedding this week. Drank some tea, while our guide explained to us that the dogs we saw walking around were going to be the main course. Walked another kilometre or 2, and back to Sapa, where me and Shannon chillaxed, got lunch and we decided I should hire a motorbike and ride us both around Sa Pa. So we rode around, it was very fun and relaxing, there was minimal traffic so felt quite safe. Had a blast!
After that, we were at the markets where we met an old drunk from Perth. His name was Alfonso, and he was about 60 and the most hilarious Aussie I have met so far. Had a beer on the side of the road with him. Finished the beers, parted ways, and we headed back to our hotel, had a bit of fodder, then to a little bar called Tau Bar, where we had a few bevvies. They have a rum here called ISC which I am going to try and bring home.. its brilliant. There were some pretty disgusting people in there, so at Shannons advice, we left, and went to bed.
Woke up this morning, had some breakfast and we were off to more jungle. A bit of a trek through the mountains (about 5km) and we ended up at Cat Cat Waterfalls. They were very beautiful, but must admit, am getting a bit jungled out. After walking a couple of km more, we headed back to the road, where everyone got on Motos, back to Sa Pa. Then again, due to us being kickass, we decided to ride a moto. We rented one off a guy, and got about 2 streets away when BAM!
It's about 5 degrees here, so the roads are all icy and wet. I took a corner and BAM! Bike slid out from underneath us. Both hit the road! BAM! Picked the bike up, road it back to the fella I had just hired it from. Moto-man and I rode up to the local Moto Mechanic.. There was damage to brake caliper, fairing, light and the footpegs, and it cost me about VND400000, or about $40Australian. Shannon was ok, a couple of scratches, and I'm ok, a bit of blood on my leg, a couple of grazes on my tattoos, a cut elbow and thats it. Ego is hurting the most, feeling a little bit worse for wear due to my moto skills being superior to the av-e-rage bear. Most importantly no-one was hurt.
Tonight we leave back for Ha Noi. We get to Ha Noi in the morning (train again) and then off to Halong Bay. We are doing one night on Cat Ba island, and then back to Ha Noi for two days to a bit more shopping. After that we fly back to Ho Chi Minh.
Until then, take care. Write soon.
SHANNONEGANS WRITES:
Ok , so we've arived in the beautiful mountainous town of Sapa by train and then bus. The night train was a very interesting experience, we were stoked to find out that we got a room with 4 beds and devastated when we didn't get the whole place to ourselves. John and I were so excited at the prospect of spending 8 hours on a train that we decided to take and "Obligatory Myspace Photo", whilst trying to get the perfect angle to show off our beautiful faces I proceeded to knock over my water bottle spilling it all over my bed. Not wanting to sleep in a puddle of water for the trip John and I cam up with the ingenious idea to swap the mattresses with another bed in the room before someone else came in. This idea turned very badly once a Vietnamese lady came and sat down, realising her bed was wet, she proceeded to put her hand in the mysterious liquid and sniff it (all the while John and I pretending we had no idea what was going on). This then turned into the biggest debarcle when the guard and two other people from the train got involved! The problem was sorted when the woman swapped the matterss with another bed and they just put more blankets on it to soak it up.
Enter young Engish girl called Gemma, she did not seem to notice the wet and we had a great old chat. It turns out she was working at a school in Vietnam during her gap year. She had been here for 3 months and was loving it.
We then arrived in Sapa at around 6.30am we were then bombarded by the children of the local villages asking "Where you from?", "What your name?", "You buy from me?", we gave them some of the toy Koala's and got some bracelets in return. They were very cute and are very small. When we asked them their age I thought maybe 7 or 8, it turns out they were 15 and 16!! I seem big over here! We went on a day trip to some of the villages and were followed by some Black H'Mong women on the way down the mountain, they all find John and I very interesting, I have a hilarious picture of the women standing next to John, they were all about 30ish and look like dolls next to him!
The villages were amazing! The scenery is fantastic, it's winter here so a layer of fog hangs over the tops of the moutains, it makes all the terraces with rice growing on them look magical. I bought quite alot of stuff from the women who followed us down the mountain, my favourite was a weaved blanket, it's amazing handiwork. I've also bought some silver bracelets they make as well.
To avoid sleezy men and women (a number of people have been a bit off to both of us) we have been claiming to be husband and wife as they tend to leave us alone once this is said. This has brought many LOLS as I have come across a local village girl who forst tried to buy me from John and now keeps trying to steal me and take me back to her village to marry her brother. She has litterally dragged me down the street! (I think it's all in good fun but John is paranoid they are going to knock me over the head and run away with me).
It's our last day in Sapa and we had a bit of a moto accident today, nothing serious, just the combination of bald tyres, wet ground, a corner and a stupid man John was avoiding hitting. We are ok, just a couple of bumps and scratches. We are off to lunch now and to wade our way through the village children selling things and threatening to cry if we don't buy from them! As much as it is annoying, they are so cute!
Sunday, 2 December 2007
From then until now. The sapa continues.
John :
So since we last left off. The plans for Friday night involved heading to our favourite bar in HCMC, the GO2Bar. We sat down and there were some cute, rambunctious children running about. So we had a bit of a play and giggle, all the while Shannon was trying to take pictures of them. They wanted to charge us 5000VND, about $1 to take their photo. When we said no, they flipped us off. It was pretty funny.
Anywho, then Jetstar (the Aussie airline) came and gave everyone at Go2Bar some cake, because it was their birthday or some crap.
We gave our cakes to the children who immediately became our best friends. Hard to explain but we have some pretty cool memories and pictures of the kids. I got my drunk on, while this bar tender called Viet entertained us. He was hilarious, he insisted on arm wrestling and continually trying to make us dance. Chatted to him about Australia, and about Vietnam and it was eye opening. We gave him a toy koala that we had, and he named it Tim Cahill (Australian Soccer player). It was funny but also kinda sad watching all his mates and work colleagues wanting to play with it. It was very touching. One day I hope to see Viet in Australia. He was a chipper young fellow, and it's kinda hard to describe him. Just all round ace. A bloke from Wales called Cecil sat down at our table, and we talked a bit more, before we headed back to our hotel at about 11pm. The next morning we were up and about, getting some breakfast and chillaxing waiting for our ride to HCMC airport.
We have been in Hanoi since Saturday, after a kickass flight with Vietnam Airlines.. a 2hour trip on a jumbo jet (Boeing B777) doesn't make sense to me, but I'm not going to argue with it.
Did some shopping Saturday afternoon, and headed to a place called Le Pub for some beer. Hanoi had a french occupation for a lot of it's past, and is still very much french orientated. This leads to excellent shopping, great food, very relaxed (in comparison to HCMC) and unfortunately also has the air of pomposity that is synonomous with the French.
Today we did a tour of the City, checked out a couple of Museums, saw the changing of the guard at the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum and then to a Restaraunt in Hanoi's Old Quarter for some great lunch. Me and Shannon decided to call it a day, and headed back to our hotel.
I headed off straight away to find a moto to take me a Doctor, as I had been experiencing ear problems for a couple of days. Woke up this morning with a severely sore ear, and could barely hear. Got to the doctor, and near USD$200 and some drugs later, turns out I have an inner ear infection.
Back on the Moto, with the translating help of an armed Vietnamese soldier in front of arrived back to the hotel, where we didnt stay long before heading to a little place we found in our earlier travels, called Half Man, 1/2 Noodle. I intend to come back here tonight and drink some beers.
Apart from that, we head off to do some more touring tomorrow. I believe we have a boat trip thru some rice paddies and other stuff on the cards. And then tomorrow night we head off to Sa Pa on the overnight train. Looking forward to it.
That's all I have for now, we will write soon.
Shannon :
We got to Hanoi yesterday. It's really different from Ho Chi Minh, John likes it better, I don't really.
It has much better shopping in terms of pretty things to bring home and it is easier to haggle, pretty much say "No thank you" and walk away, then they call after you what price you will pay! So far this isvery bad for me and my buying style as I walk away alot and then end up haggling and then I buy something I wanted but could have definately gone without! I bought some silk scarves and a silk shirt yesterday in total cost me about $20US. They're really pretty. I've also got my eye on some a lanterns and some beads and some cute book marks for presents and really awesome weaving from the H'Mong tribes. I want to actually buy the weavings when we go see the tribes in a few days though so I'm holding off.
The buildings are beautiful and it's alot cleaner and definately slower then Ho Chi Minh, but the people aren't as nice and I find it way too slow after the fast pace of Ho Chi Minh. We got a massage yesterday for 30mins, it cost $5US. I'm thinking about visiting a dayspa this afternoon, for 2.5 hours its like $30US - So cheap!
We went on a tour of Ha Noi this morning part of the set up with Sinh Cafe, it was sadly a little bit disappointing due to the fact that although interesting, it would have been good to do outside of a tour as we had to stick to the tours timelines. We went to some pagoda's where some people were holding a funeral - very different from Western funerals. They all wear white. Then we went to the Ethnology Museum which was all about the different ethnic groups in Vietnam, then itwas off to the Ho Chi Minh Mausuleum, unfortunately this time of year they did not have Ho Chi Minh's body on display. I learnt a fair bit about Vietnamese political history which was cool.
We're off on a boat trip tomorrow and then out to Sapa in the evening. I'm really looking forward to seeing the Black H'Mong tribe and the landscape in Sapa.
We had a pretty awesome last night in Ho Chi Minh and a very cool flight up here! They stuck us on a Boeing 777 for a 2 hour flight and had a camera at the front of the plane showing the view on landing and take off - way cool, not only that but they fed us!
I'm a bit bored today, there really isn't that much to do in Ha Noi and I'm struggling with being forced to be still! Our room is nice but small so I've been getting a bit of cabin fever.
Anyway, I must be off, I think we're going to hit a pub and get some din dins. Most of the tourists here are French and a fair bit snobbish so we haven't met anyone cool yet - not like Viet from the Go2Bar (read John's entry).
So since we last left off. The plans for Friday night involved heading to our favourite bar in HCMC, the GO2Bar. We sat down and there were some cute, rambunctious children running about. So we had a bit of a play and giggle, all the while Shannon was trying to take pictures of them. They wanted to charge us 5000VND, about $1 to take their photo. When we said no, they flipped us off. It was pretty funny.
Anywho, then Jetstar (the Aussie airline) came and gave everyone at Go2Bar some cake, because it was their birthday or some crap.
We gave our cakes to the children who immediately became our best friends. Hard to explain but we have some pretty cool memories and pictures of the kids. I got my drunk on, while this bar tender called Viet entertained us. He was hilarious, he insisted on arm wrestling and continually trying to make us dance. Chatted to him about Australia, and about Vietnam and it was eye opening. We gave him a toy koala that we had, and he named it Tim Cahill (Australian Soccer player). It was funny but also kinda sad watching all his mates and work colleagues wanting to play with it. It was very touching. One day I hope to see Viet in Australia. He was a chipper young fellow, and it's kinda hard to describe him. Just all round ace. A bloke from Wales called Cecil sat down at our table, and we talked a bit more, before we headed back to our hotel at about 11pm. The next morning we were up and about, getting some breakfast and chillaxing waiting for our ride to HCMC airport.
We have been in Hanoi since Saturday, after a kickass flight with Vietnam Airlines.. a 2hour trip on a jumbo jet (Boeing B777) doesn't make sense to me, but I'm not going to argue with it.
Did some shopping Saturday afternoon, and headed to a place called Le Pub for some beer. Hanoi had a french occupation for a lot of it's past, and is still very much french orientated. This leads to excellent shopping, great food, very relaxed (in comparison to HCMC) and unfortunately also has the air of pomposity that is synonomous with the French.
Today we did a tour of the City, checked out a couple of Museums, saw the changing of the guard at the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum and then to a Restaraunt in Hanoi's Old Quarter for some great lunch. Me and Shannon decided to call it a day, and headed back to our hotel.
I headed off straight away to find a moto to take me a Doctor, as I had been experiencing ear problems for a couple of days. Woke up this morning with a severely sore ear, and could barely hear. Got to the doctor, and near USD$200 and some drugs later, turns out I have an inner ear infection.
Back on the Moto, with the translating help of an armed Vietnamese soldier in front of arrived back to the hotel, where we didnt stay long before heading to a little place we found in our earlier travels, called Half Man, 1/2 Noodle. I intend to come back here tonight and drink some beers.
Apart from that, we head off to do some more touring tomorrow. I believe we have a boat trip thru some rice paddies and other stuff on the cards. And then tomorrow night we head off to Sa Pa on the overnight train. Looking forward to it.
That's all I have for now, we will write soon.
Shannon :
We got to Hanoi yesterday. It's really different from Ho Chi Minh, John likes it better, I don't really.
It has much better shopping in terms of pretty things to bring home and it is easier to haggle, pretty much say "No thank you" and walk away, then they call after you what price you will pay! So far this isvery bad for me and my buying style as I walk away alot and then end up haggling and then I buy something I wanted but could have definately gone without! I bought some silk scarves and a silk shirt yesterday in total cost me about $20US. They're really pretty. I've also got my eye on some a lanterns and some beads and some cute book marks for presents and really awesome weaving from the H'Mong tribes. I want to actually buy the weavings when we go see the tribes in a few days though so I'm holding off.
The buildings are beautiful and it's alot cleaner and definately slower then Ho Chi Minh, but the people aren't as nice and I find it way too slow after the fast pace of Ho Chi Minh. We got a massage yesterday for 30mins, it cost $5US. I'm thinking about visiting a dayspa this afternoon, for 2.5 hours its like $30US - So cheap!
We went on a tour of Ha Noi this morning part of the set up with Sinh Cafe, it was sadly a little bit disappointing due to the fact that although interesting, it would have been good to do outside of a tour as we had to stick to the tours timelines. We went to some pagoda's where some people were holding a funeral - very different from Western funerals. They all wear white. Then we went to the Ethnology Museum which was all about the different ethnic groups in Vietnam, then itwas off to the Ho Chi Minh Mausuleum, unfortunately this time of year they did not have Ho Chi Minh's body on display. I learnt a fair bit about Vietnamese political history which was cool.
We're off on a boat trip tomorrow and then out to Sapa in the evening. I'm really looking forward to seeing the Black H'Mong tribe and the landscape in Sapa.
We had a pretty awesome last night in Ho Chi Minh and a very cool flight up here! They stuck us on a Boeing 777 for a 2 hour flight and had a camera at the front of the plane showing the view on landing and take off - way cool, not only that but they fed us!
I'm a bit bored today, there really isn't that much to do in Ha Noi and I'm struggling with being forced to be still! Our room is nice but small so I've been getting a bit of cabin fever.
Anyway, I must be off, I think we're going to hit a pub and get some din dins. Most of the tourists here are French and a fair bit snobbish so we haven't met anyone cool yet - not like Viet from the Go2Bar (read John's entry).
Friday, 30 November 2007
Writing Blogs.
Thats right. Writing blogs.
Friday November 30 by John:
Last night we decided to try to change our Saigon eating habits, and shun the GO2 Cafe. So we went to a place called Allezboo, down the road and around the corner a bit. Sat down, and it was the same company, different restaurant. Same food. Same vibe. But we liked GO2 so we stayed. We had dinner, and had heard about a place called Blue Gecko Bar in Q3. So we jumped on a couple of Moto's, and headed down to Blue Gecko.
The BG is a weedy little bar full of expats- not for us, so we finished our beers and searched for more moto's. By this time it was approximately 10PM. We found our moto's, mine's name was "Tobias", and we headed back to the hotel for some slumber.
Woke up this morning, decided to have a lazy day. So we headed to a Cafe in the next street over for some "Western Breakfast".
The breakfast we both chose was called ::: SCRAM SLAM::: and was exactly what you'd imagine. Scrambled eggs. With extra SLAM. Decent enough.
After Breaky, headed to Sinh Cafe to book our tour to Ha Noi, Halong Bay, Sa Pa etc. There was a very friendly bilingual guy who made the whole process a lot easier. If ever in Sinh Cafe HCMC, ask for "Fabian".
So then we decided to hit the tourist trail and went down to a place called "Saigon Art Museum" It was essentially that, Saigon's art museum. Some very nice stuff, 1400 yr old sculptures, beautiful paintings and a few little stores.
We headed from there, around a bit trying to find a couple of moto's (Shannon and I are both addicted to them) and ended up in Saigon's rudest neighborhood. Eventually we found a couple of jerks who were both up for taking us to the Zoo. After refusing their offer of USD$5 and settling for $2, we headed to the Zoo. Walked in and were immediately charged VND16000, or about $2, but I am sure we were overcharged. Walked around a bit, saw a smoking chimp and a few birds of prey, then headed down to see the Elephant. It spat some crap all over Shannon so we scrapped that, played a piano, and headed down to see the Wildebeest and Deer.
On our way out of that area, a couple of Vina women came up to me, and offered me some carrots to feed the deer. They literally pushed it in my hand, and I had a bad feeling I would have to pay for this. So at the end, after feeding the deer (or was I inadvertently fattening it up??) they say "FIFTYTHOUSAND" (VND50000) which is about USD$4. I laughed this off, right in there face, took out my duelling glove, slapped their faces and gave them USD$1. I walked off as they lay on the ground in sheer shock of my duelling glove owning them.
I then got very agitated that she tried to rip me off (even though we saw it coming a mile away), so I decided we should go home so I could cry.
We found a couple of motos, and USD$1.20 later, we were back at our hotel, sipping red-bull syrup and coke and talking about this. Don't know what the plan for tonight is, but by this time tomorrow we should be in Ha Noi, exploring another beautiful city of Vietnam.
Until we meet again..
John.
john.shannon.vietnam@gmail.com
Friday November 30 by John:
Last night we decided to try to change our Saigon eating habits, and shun the GO2 Cafe. So we went to a place called Allezboo, down the road and around the corner a bit. Sat down, and it was the same company, different restaurant. Same food. Same vibe. But we liked GO2 so we stayed. We had dinner, and had heard about a place called Blue Gecko Bar in Q3. So we jumped on a couple of Moto's, and headed down to Blue Gecko.
The BG is a weedy little bar full of expats- not for us, so we finished our beers and searched for more moto's. By this time it was approximately 10PM. We found our moto's, mine's name was "Tobias", and we headed back to the hotel for some slumber.
Woke up this morning, decided to have a lazy day. So we headed to a Cafe in the next street over for some "Western Breakfast".
The breakfast we both chose was called ::: SCRAM SLAM::: and was exactly what you'd imagine. Scrambled eggs. With extra SLAM. Decent enough.
After Breaky, headed to Sinh Cafe to book our tour to Ha Noi, Halong Bay, Sa Pa etc. There was a very friendly bilingual guy who made the whole process a lot easier. If ever in Sinh Cafe HCMC, ask for "Fabian".
So then we decided to hit the tourist trail and went down to a place called "Saigon Art Museum" It was essentially that, Saigon's art museum. Some very nice stuff, 1400 yr old sculptures, beautiful paintings and a few little stores.
We headed from there, around a bit trying to find a couple of moto's (Shannon and I are both addicted to them) and ended up in Saigon's rudest neighborhood. Eventually we found a couple of jerks who were both up for taking us to the Zoo. After refusing their offer of USD$5 and settling for $2, we headed to the Zoo. Walked in and were immediately charged VND16000, or about $2, but I am sure we were overcharged. Walked around a bit, saw a smoking chimp and a few birds of prey, then headed down to see the Elephant. It spat some crap all over Shannon so we scrapped that, played a piano, and headed down to see the Wildebeest and Deer.
On our way out of that area, a couple of Vina women came up to me, and offered me some carrots to feed the deer. They literally pushed it in my hand, and I had a bad feeling I would have to pay for this. So at the end, after feeding the deer (or was I inadvertently fattening it up??) they say "FIFTYTHOUSAND" (VND50000) which is about USD$4. I laughed this off, right in there face, took out my duelling glove, slapped their faces and gave them USD$1. I walked off as they lay on the ground in sheer shock of my duelling glove owning them.
I then got very agitated that she tried to rip me off (even though we saw it coming a mile away), so I decided we should go home so I could cry.
We found a couple of motos, and USD$1.20 later, we were back at our hotel, sipping red-bull syrup and coke and talking about this. Don't know what the plan for tonight is, but by this time tomorrow we should be in Ha Noi, exploring another beautiful city of Vietnam.
Until we meet again..
John.
john.shannon.vietnam@gmail.com
Wednesday, 28 November 2007
From the last post until now.. Adventure continues.
DAY 2 by John:
Well on Day 2 in VN, we decided to take a cyclo tour of the town with our Cyclo guy, Son. Son and his buddy, Bai (pron. Bye, By, Buy) Son took us to the War Museum which was interesting, disturbing and I again got targeted by a guy peddling crap. The museum was not too bad, so then we headed to the Ho Chi Minh Pagoda (Buddhist Temples). Bai took us around and showed us how to get good luck from Buddha with the lighting of incense.
Side note: It would appear Vietnamese are fascinated with Big White Men. That's right. They love me. The attention is fantastic.
Anyway, from the Pagoda, we headed to the Hong Kong Market because both Shannon and I needed shoes. After looking around at some crappy shoes that would never fit either of us, ever we headed down to the produce level.
Shannon was buying some coconut candy (best. candy. ever) when a woman approached me from behind, offering me her baby. Unfortunately the hotel we were staying at did not have self-catering facilities, so I could not eat it. I declined on the baby.
We headed to a street that had only shoe stores on it, and I ended up getting a pair of "Tommy Hilfiger" pluggers."Not Copy, Original". Lies!
After that we went back to our hotel, and ended up at a place called the GO2 Bar. There are a lot of other tourists there, so we sat and had dinner. 36,000 VND, or about $2.80 got us a massive Vietnamese Curry, rice, and entree. It is here a Security Guard called "Frederick" took a particular interest in me, so we took a couple of photos of me towering about a foot over him and monstering him. Had a few more beers and headed back to the hotel.
Crashed pretty early because we had a whole day tour of the Mekong the next day...
DAY 2 by Shannon:
We haven't stopped since we got here! On Tuesday we went on a half day Cyclo tour with Son and Bai (those Cylco dudes we met on Day 1). They took us to the War Museum first up, it was quite small and though I wouldn't exactly say it was good, it was definitely educational. They
have the most amazing photography from in amongst the fighting... very confronting stuff. We looked at the usual, tank and artillery and as we were looking at one of the tanks a guy with no arms from the elbows down came up to say hello and get us to buy stuff. He was selling maps
and books. It turns out he sat on a land mine after the war, it was a pretty sad story only made not so much by the fact he had obviously rehearsed it and made quite a bit of money praying on tourists sympathy.
Stuff like that happens a lot here, after the War Museum we Son and Bai took us to the Hong Kong markets, (I wanted to get some shoes but it turns out my feet are massive over here and no one stocks my size. After a quick glance at my feet, then a giggle, they promptly inform
me that my feet are too big). I digress, I was saying how misforunate people play on that alot over here, we were in the food section sampling some awesome Coconut candy, (which I have fallen in love with and want to bring back tons of!) when this lady with a baby came up to John, she didn't speak any English and it appeared she was trying to hand him her baby. At last, it was my opportunity to purchase a small child so as I could carry it around in my handbag and teach it to steal peoples watches! However, we realised that we would have trouble getting the child through customs so we gave that one a miss.
We then continued outside to the Fruit & Veg section and got to sample all sorts of tropical fruits, they had giant grapes but they were very bland, John bought some fruit similar to lychees but not - almost- same same.
We've had an enormous amount of trouble NOT speaking broken English over the last few days and have taken up saying things like "Same same" when things are similar or have the same difference or things like "I go to Mekong", next thing you know I'll be saying "Me sing me
perform for you!".
After the markets we went to a pagoda to put some incense in sand which apparently gives us good luck. At the pagoda there was a lady with a tiny cage full of about 20 or so pretty little birds, she wanted us to pay her to let them go! I have a photo of her to name and shame the woman, although I'm getting used to a lot of things here, stuff like that still shocks me.
Then it was time for lunch so Son and Bai took us to their usual hang out for lunch. Once we sat down about 3 young Vietnamese waitresses pounced on John, wanting kisses from him! He politely declined. We are still not sure what there go was, they hung around the whole of lunch
at our table and kept trying to get a kiss, then they brought over one of their friends, Vietnamese girl (and by girl I mean lady-boy) who had very white skin due to bleach and powder then asked John if he liked her and asked how old he thought she was, he then told her 35, she was pretty upset as she was only 23 - She soon buggered off.
We went to try a few more shoe stores, no luck there with sizes so after booking a trip to the Mekong River for the next day, we went back to the hotel for much needed sleep.
DAY 3 by Shannon:
At 4am I was woken up by the incessant beeping of the traffic, they use the horns as almost a sonar set up. It was the day of our Mekong trip - HOORAY! It cost us like $8 US each and included lunch and afternoon tea.
We met out the front of Sinh Cafe - the tour guide place at 8.30 and after more offers to buy people babies and sunglasses and watches and tissues and gum and all sorts of other crap, we set off for the Mekong River. It was a 2 hour bus trip, which went by quickly due to air con
and reclining seats. The sights from the bus were amazing, there is so much construction going on in Vietnam at the moment, which is great. Our tour guides name was Son (A different Son, I think the name is like John) and he informed us that Vietnam was getting better in terms of its poverty etc. compared to the last 50 years and this was happening because of overseas investing, it turns out RMIT has a campus or something just out of Saigon.
We got to the Fish Sauce Factory and jumped off the bus, much to my displeasure at the STENCH! We then jumped on a little boat that was quite rickety and headed over to one of the islands in the Mekong. The scenery around the Mekong so amazing, you can see such decent houses neighbouring shacks. There are also people fishing along the Mekong and bathing in it.The first island stop was where they made rice paper, we had a look at this and then had some lunch. The specialty was Elephant Ear fish, glad to say John and I passed on this experience as when it came out for other people it was a whole fish standing up and looked like it was covered in maggots - Vomit.
Then it was back on the boat and to another island where we sampled a honey tea drink, tasted some local fruit and listened to some very awful Vietnamese music. We saw a squirrel in a cage and I crossed a very rickety bamboo bridge - fun times to be had.
Then it was a short walk to some horse and carts where we chatted to some lovely old Canadian people and was pulled along to the next destination where we sampled some more honey drink and I got to hold a massive Python. John decided not to partake in this as he felt his
sheer awesomeness would make the Python explode.
As the day was nearly wrapping up, we then boarded some canoes and were paddled up an estuary by a small Vietnamese woman with a bamboo hat - conical -for the wearing of, to a waiting boat to be taken home.
The day was not yet over for Shannonegans and Johntastic, we had beers with the Canadians, then went for a walk to find an elusive bar called the Blue Gecko which apparently sticks Australians, we gave up on this search and found ourselves back at Go2Bar. Luckily we heard the melodious twang of an Aussie accent and met two Australian girls with
whom we consumed more beer. A great day to be had by all.
DAY 4 by John:
This morning we awoke with a hurry as the alarm didn't go off and we were booked into a half day tour to go to the Cu Chi Tunnels. After all the excitement of the day before at the Mekong, we had high hopes. After wading through the usual sellers peddling their crap, Sunglasses, Zippo Lighters, Cigarettes, Gum, Copied Books, and today HAMMOCKS, we made our way to the Sinh Cafe to jump on the bus.
Our guide, a bilingual Vietnamese man named "Graham" told us all about the history of Cu Chi on our 2 hour ride down to the countryside. Of the 2hrs, 1hr is taken up just trying to leave Saigon because the traffic is so busy 24/7.
Eventually we got out to the jungle, after a 2hr ride that left Shannon feeling a little nauseous, we headed into the thick of the jungle and did some sight-seeing.
"Graham" was very good at making politically-incorrect jokes about a sensitive topic, and lots of people laughed. Except me and Shannon (because we are narcs and didn't find it that funny) and whoever didn't understand his accent.
We went all through the jungle looking at all the different sights, Shannon jumped down into an actual size tunnel, I however, could not stick my leg down.
I did however find it necessary to take politically-incorrect photos with mannequins however, and as a result will probably go to hell. Watch this space.
We eventually ended up at the tourist tunnel, which was still bitchin' small, dark, smelly and dirty. We headed down though, completed one level and out again. I have never been happier to see daylight. Didn't help that I had Shannon's derrière in my face the whole time.
A little bit more crap, the usual walk through the merch area, and back on a bus to Saigon.
We had lunch (I dropped mine all over the floor) at what appears to be Vietnamese Hungry Jacks, I did however have some chicken. I use the word chicken loosely, as I am 99% sure it was cat. Delicious nonetheless. MMMMMM.
Now I am here at an Internet Cafe in Saigon trying to figure if we want to skip Cambodia, or visit?
Will post again soon.
John.
Well on Day 2 in VN, we decided to take a cyclo tour of the town with our Cyclo guy, Son. Son and his buddy, Bai (pron. Bye, By, Buy) Son took us to the War Museum which was interesting, disturbing and I again got targeted by a guy peddling crap. The museum was not too bad, so then we headed to the Ho Chi Minh Pagoda (Buddhist Temples). Bai took us around and showed us how to get good luck from Buddha with the lighting of incense.
Side note: It would appear Vietnamese are fascinated with Big White Men. That's right. They love me. The attention is fantastic.
Anyway, from the Pagoda, we headed to the Hong Kong Market because both Shannon and I needed shoes. After looking around at some crappy shoes that would never fit either of us, ever we headed down to the produce level.
Shannon was buying some coconut candy (best. candy. ever) when a woman approached me from behind, offering me her baby. Unfortunately the hotel we were staying at did not have self-catering facilities, so I could not eat it. I declined on the baby.
We headed to a street that had only shoe stores on it, and I ended up getting a pair of "Tommy Hilfiger" pluggers."Not Copy, Original". Lies!
After that we went back to our hotel, and ended up at a place called the GO2 Bar. There are a lot of other tourists there, so we sat and had dinner. 36,000 VND, or about $2.80 got us a massive Vietnamese Curry, rice, and entree. It is here a Security Guard called "Frederick" took a particular interest in me, so we took a couple of photos of me towering about a foot over him and monstering him. Had a few more beers and headed back to the hotel.
Crashed pretty early because we had a whole day tour of the Mekong the next day...
DAY 2 by Shannon:
We haven't stopped since we got here! On Tuesday we went on a half day Cyclo tour with Son and Bai (those Cylco dudes we met on Day 1). They took us to the War Museum first up, it was quite small and though I wouldn't exactly say it was good, it was definitely educational. They
have the most amazing photography from in amongst the fighting... very confronting stuff. We looked at the usual, tank and artillery and as we were looking at one of the tanks a guy with no arms from the elbows down came up to say hello and get us to buy stuff. He was selling maps
and books. It turns out he sat on a land mine after the war, it was a pretty sad story only made not so much by the fact he had obviously rehearsed it and made quite a bit of money praying on tourists sympathy.
Stuff like that happens a lot here, after the War Museum we Son and Bai took us to the Hong Kong markets, (I wanted to get some shoes but it turns out my feet are massive over here and no one stocks my size. After a quick glance at my feet, then a giggle, they promptly inform
me that my feet are too big). I digress, I was saying how misforunate people play on that alot over here, we were in the food section sampling some awesome Coconut candy, (which I have fallen in love with and want to bring back tons of!) when this lady with a baby came up to John, she didn't speak any English and it appeared she was trying to hand him her baby. At last, it was my opportunity to purchase a small child so as I could carry it around in my handbag and teach it to steal peoples watches! However, we realised that we would have trouble getting the child through customs so we gave that one a miss.
We then continued outside to the Fruit & Veg section and got to sample all sorts of tropical fruits, they had giant grapes but they were very bland, John bought some fruit similar to lychees but not - almost- same same.
We've had an enormous amount of trouble NOT speaking broken English over the last few days and have taken up saying things like "Same same" when things are similar or have the same difference or things like "I go to Mekong", next thing you know I'll be saying "Me sing me
perform for you!".
After the markets we went to a pagoda to put some incense in sand which apparently gives us good luck. At the pagoda there was a lady with a tiny cage full of about 20 or so pretty little birds, she wanted us to pay her to let them go! I have a photo of her to name and shame the woman, although I'm getting used to a lot of things here, stuff like that still shocks me.
Then it was time for lunch so Son and Bai took us to their usual hang out for lunch. Once we sat down about 3 young Vietnamese waitresses pounced on John, wanting kisses from him! He politely declined. We are still not sure what there go was, they hung around the whole of lunch
at our table and kept trying to get a kiss, then they brought over one of their friends, Vietnamese girl (and by girl I mean lady-boy) who had very white skin due to bleach and powder then asked John if he liked her and asked how old he thought she was, he then told her 35, she was pretty upset as she was only 23 - She soon buggered off.
We went to try a few more shoe stores, no luck there with sizes so after booking a trip to the Mekong River for the next day, we went back to the hotel for much needed sleep.
DAY 3 by Shannon:
At 4am I was woken up by the incessant beeping of the traffic, they use the horns as almost a sonar set up. It was the day of our Mekong trip - HOORAY! It cost us like $8 US each and included lunch and afternoon tea.
We met out the front of Sinh Cafe - the tour guide place at 8.30 and after more offers to buy people babies and sunglasses and watches and tissues and gum and all sorts of other crap, we set off for the Mekong River. It was a 2 hour bus trip, which went by quickly due to air con
and reclining seats. The sights from the bus were amazing, there is so much construction going on in Vietnam at the moment, which is great. Our tour guides name was Son (A different Son, I think the name is like John) and he informed us that Vietnam was getting better in terms of its poverty etc. compared to the last 50 years and this was happening because of overseas investing, it turns out RMIT has a campus or something just out of Saigon.
We got to the Fish Sauce Factory and jumped off the bus, much to my displeasure at the STENCH! We then jumped on a little boat that was quite rickety and headed over to one of the islands in the Mekong. The scenery around the Mekong so amazing, you can see such decent houses neighbouring shacks. There are also people fishing along the Mekong and bathing in it.The first island stop was where they made rice paper, we had a look at this and then had some lunch. The specialty was Elephant Ear fish, glad to say John and I passed on this experience as when it came out for other people it was a whole fish standing up and looked like it was covered in maggots - Vomit.
Then it was back on the boat and to another island where we sampled a honey tea drink, tasted some local fruit and listened to some very awful Vietnamese music. We saw a squirrel in a cage and I crossed a very rickety bamboo bridge - fun times to be had.
Then it was a short walk to some horse and carts where we chatted to some lovely old Canadian people and was pulled along to the next destination where we sampled some more honey drink and I got to hold a massive Python. John decided not to partake in this as he felt his
sheer awesomeness would make the Python explode.
As the day was nearly wrapping up, we then boarded some canoes and were paddled up an estuary by a small Vietnamese woman with a bamboo hat - conical -for the wearing of, to a waiting boat to be taken home.
The day was not yet over for Shannonegans and Johntastic, we had beers with the Canadians, then went for a walk to find an elusive bar called the Blue Gecko which apparently sticks Australians, we gave up on this search and found ourselves back at Go2Bar. Luckily we heard the melodious twang of an Aussie accent and met two Australian girls with
whom we consumed more beer. A great day to be had by all.
DAY 4 by John:
This morning we awoke with a hurry as the alarm didn't go off and we were booked into a half day tour to go to the Cu Chi Tunnels. After all the excitement of the day before at the Mekong, we had high hopes. After wading through the usual sellers peddling their crap, Sunglasses, Zippo Lighters, Cigarettes, Gum, Copied Books, and today HAMMOCKS, we made our way to the Sinh Cafe to jump on the bus.
Our guide, a bilingual Vietnamese man named "Graham" told us all about the history of Cu Chi on our 2 hour ride down to the countryside. Of the 2hrs, 1hr is taken up just trying to leave Saigon because the traffic is so busy 24/7.
Eventually we got out to the jungle, after a 2hr ride that left Shannon feeling a little nauseous, we headed into the thick of the jungle and did some sight-seeing.
"Graham" was very good at making politically-incorrect jokes about a sensitive topic, and lots of people laughed. Except me and Shannon (because we are narcs and didn't find it that funny) and whoever didn't understand his accent.
We went all through the jungle looking at all the different sights, Shannon jumped down into an actual size tunnel, I however, could not stick my leg down.
I did however find it necessary to take politically-incorrect photos with mannequins however, and as a result will probably go to hell. Watch this space.
We eventually ended up at the tourist tunnel, which was still bitchin' small, dark, smelly and dirty. We headed down though, completed one level and out again. I have never been happier to see daylight. Didn't help that I had Shannon's derrière in my face the whole time.
A little bit more crap, the usual walk through the merch area, and back on a bus to Saigon.
We had lunch (I dropped mine all over the floor) at what appears to be Vietnamese Hungry Jacks, I did however have some chicken. I use the word chicken loosely, as I am 99% sure it was cat. Delicious nonetheless. MMMMMM.
Now I am here at an Internet Cafe in Saigon trying to figure if we want to skip Cambodia, or visit?
Will post again soon.
John.
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