Originally written on November 24, 2004

At 7:00 am our taxi picked us up from our guesthouse. We started our three hour journey to Siem Reap. We decided to pay the extra money for a taxi over the bus to save time both on the road and in line ups at the border. The first 45 minutes was as we expected, a paved road full of bicycles, motos, trucks, pedestrians, carts, cows, etc and our driver weaving in and out of each obstacle while honking the horn. This is the norm, and the expected, albeit a taxi goes much faster than the bus (ranges from 40 to 110 km/hr through these conditions). Fourty five minutes out of town the trip changed dramatically, the paved road ended, and was replaced with a super potholed dirt road with all of the obstacless of the first road. This is where the fun began! Add many swear words!

To be continued…

Today we got up early to watch the sun rise over the King’s baths (a lily pond) and spent the day visiting temples. See pictures for the sights we saw today.

Originally written on November 22, 2004

See photos.

Originally written on November 21, 2004

We purchased a three day pass to visit the temples. Words cannot really describe the place, so for these three days we will put pictures up of the temples that we visited.

Originally written on November 19, 2004

We awoke and got downstairs to order some bread and jam before leaving the Sunday guesthouse at 640 am in a dirty cramped mini bus. Just what we ordered!

From there we transfered to another bigger bus in makeshift bus station. When we got on the bus there was LOUD dance music pumping, and not the good dance music either, the kind with weird voices - very thai. We sat down and I evaluated the situation, the bus was quiet except for the LOUD blaring dance music, we were at the front, tired, and the seats where big. Still way to loud for before 7am. So I got up, walked up to the front and turned the volume on the radio down to zero. There was an audible sigh from the passengers, as I turned around I said “sorry”. Several cambodians smiled at me and no one was unhappy about the new peace. Unfortuneatly the peace was short lived. Some guy got on the bus and told us to move seats and move to the end of the bus, ostensibly so we could be together with the other foreigners. The catch was that we would have to sit apart. I casually mentioned that we had actually been assigned these seats (they were numbered). The wheels in his head began to spin. He changed his tactic, ‘this is not your bus, your bus is there’ (pointing to another one). We wanted the 7:30 bus, and it was 7:23 am so we were on the wrong bus. I said we’d be happy to move if we sat together near the front on a bus going to Siam Reap with our bags on the same bus we were travelling on. Again the wheels in his head churned, ok he said. Heather got on the next bus and figured out the seating arrangments while I negoitated with another gentleman to ensure we got our bags off the wrong bus and onto the right one — not as easy as it sounds. Meanwhile, Heather was duking it out in the bus to make sure we sat together, she won making another lady sit in the ‘jump’ seat. Once we were up and going they put on Jet Li movie (not so bad). Then some karoake thai style, but not loud (ok). Then when we saw “Best Chinese Classics” go into the machine we hit bottom. Thank goodness we had the mp3 player. Heather almost peed listening to David Cross explain how drunk he was in KC and trying to find the phone.

We had been told the bus would arrive at 12:30 pm, but who believes those times anyway. The bus broke down an hour out of Phnom Penh, overheated. Water was pouring out of the large dirty radiator. Luckily, there was a tube of superglue (no joke) in the bus drivers tool set. Once applied we waited while it dried (the whole time water was pouring out). Once done, water was taken from local rice patty, by large buckets (that just happened to be inside the engine hood) and added to the radiator resevoir by using smaller bottles filled with the paddy water from the buckets. Various bathroom stops (pulling over where there are bushes or a hill) and a 15 minute lunch stop which turned into an hour break eat into the time. During lunch the driver took a hose to the radiator to cool it down, all better! Back on the road we stopped again only once to splash water on the radiator to get the temperature guage back down to ‘middle’ on the dial. Incidently, the odomoeter read over 2 million, the spedometer zero the whole drive. Anyway, we arrived in Siem Reap at 2pm to a scene out of some movie. A dirty, dusty, parking lot filled with tuktuk drivers with signs, right in your face. All of them yelling at you, tuk tuk 500 riel, take you anywhere. No disturb. What do they mean???? And I mean in your face, they where so close with their signs that you phyiscally couldn’t read the sign because you couldn’t see all the letters. Heather and I became German almost immediately, not talking any English, and trying to ignore the 30 or so people trying to catch our attention. Once we had our bags it became obvious we would not be allowed to leave without a tuktuk driver. Somehow we chose a driver, we have no idea how it was decided. It turns out the reason why the fare is so cheap, is that the tuktuk man wants to be the driver, I.e in and out of Angkor for day. We got him first to take us to the bank as we envisoned 2 days of living off of our remaining liquid assests of 6 US to be difficult. We got enough money for the 3 days we will be here (quite pricey! almost 80 US a day) and began our search for a place to sleep. On the 4th try we found a place that had a room available, 20 with AC and 13 with just the fan. Personally, I think they were trying to milk us for more money thinking that 13 was to low for our stature or something. They where very hard to get a price out of until I saw the room. Maybe they wanted to read my reaction to see how happy I was? Kirk ‘Stone face’ Montgomery didn’t give them anything to work with. The room is nice and very big, great water pressure and a nice fan. Most importantly it has sheets instead of towels for sleeping under. Off to the internet to check how the tuktuk system works here and and also how to leave this place without dealing with insanity again. Dinner at some place with 0.80 cent pints playing the best of the worst elevator music. Over dinner Heather and I came up with the worst elevator songs of all time:

* 1. Music box dancer, david foster
* 2. Endless love
* 3. Bridge over troubled water, garfunkel
* 4. Stand by me
* 5. Bodyguard theme song/ michael bolton stuff/ titanic theme

Dinner was a big pizza served on a really heavy portion of a tree trunk. Back to base for an early start tomorrow.

Originally written on November 19, 2004

We woke up around 8am looking forward to our day of seeing where mass genocide happened. Unfortunately, Heather was under the weather but was enough of a tropper to manage the 9am start time. (Heather, was recalling the dinner from the night before, food poisoning) Off we went to see Cheung Ek, the killing fields.

Going through Phnom Penh was like driving through a dump with buildings in it. Shit was everywhere, the ground rank with pollution, and the rivers a nasty grey colour. We saw kids playing with containers of gasoline. They managed to spill half a container all over the ground.

Halfway there on the outskirts of town the road became even worse, very very dusty and bumpy. Then “I will survive” came on the radio really kind of weird to listen to that song on the way to the mass graves. Maybe fitting? Cheung Ek was the village that the Khmer Rouge turned into a mass grave site. Today, the area is little more than a few sign posts, a large poster telling the history of the place, and a stupa like structure. First we went and read what the poster had to say then we toured the grounds. Its hard to know what to think when you stand in a spot where nearly 9000 people where killed less than 3 decades ago. Then we went and visited the stupa/ building. It was filled with skulls arranged by age. Most of the skulls where missing their front teeth, many had large gashes in them, some had bullet holes.

After this we went to Tuol Sleng or S-21. ‘Tuol Sleng’ when translated means, “a poisonous hill” or “a place on a mound to keep those who bear or supply guilt.” This is the place where those who opposed the Khmer Rouge were brought to be tortured, interogated, and exterminated. Between 1975 and 1978, 10 499 people where killed here along with an estimated 2000 children. The compound was a high school before it became S-21. I took a few pictures, but it didn’t seem appropriate. In several large rooms, thousands of pictures of people are on display.

The Khmer Rouge documented the physical attributes of all those who entered. This included taking pictures of everyone. Also on display where pictures of prisoners post-interrogation. Their faces bring you back to their world, their experience. We were free to roam room to room to almost the whole compound. Again, its difficult to comprehend why so many people were killed here.

(Continue by Heather) I was still under the weather so we headed home for an afternoon nap and some TLC (tender loving care). Kirk bought some water and bread from the guesthouse restaurant (my breakfast/lunch) and coupled with some advil and tums I went to lulla land for an afternoon nap.

While I napped, Kirk was out on the town, in search of dry salty crackers that I could stomach and other such goodies. He witnessed some dank and dirty markets and made his way back to the main street to the supermarket. He returned, after a hamburger with his stash of goodies. A croissant, banana bread, butter crackers (Keebler club house), sugar crackers (dry crackers with sugar on them) and chocolate crackers (yes crackers, not cookies). I had some food and more napping and lazying around.

In the evening I had a soup at the guesthouse restaurant and together we watched the movie the Killing Fields. To bed by 11pm.

Originally written on November 18, 2004

After a crappy sleep, under oversized towels (provided as sheets), we awoke and realized that sometime during the night the air conditioner had turned off. We had our bread and jam breakfast and spent the morning looking for a better guest house in our price range. Perhaps not so far from the main road, as our current guesthouse is situated on a dark, dirt road created by tossing bricks, rocks, whatever and compacting it into a road. Much of the city is like this, dirty and kind of creepy, especially at night.

We went guesthouse/cheap hotel hunting closer to more restaurants in a nicer area of town, only a 20-30 minute walk away. Although the places we saw were on a paved back road, one block off of the main road, the condition inside each room was the same and the price was more. So, we decided to stay with our current residence.

We went to the international bookstore and bought a book on Angkor, with maps of each temple and a description of buildings and bas-reliefs (images carved on the walls). Further along the main street we found a quiet restaurant for lunch, curry soup and sweet and sour pork. Still expensive, but less than at some other places. The waitress negotiated a moto ride for us to the national museum, about 60 cents US for a 15 minute ride.

The national museum is dedicated to Angkor statues. Many of the statues have been stolen from the sites, so the museum was created to store the precious pieces. Kirk and I encountered the first of many flower offerings to buddha, and placed the jasmine flowers beside a statue. Statues date between 9th and 15 century, amazing. Other artifacts, bowls, etc from 9th to 20th century.

A short walk to the Royal Palace, where the newly crowned young King resides. Palace grounds are clean and buildings lovely, however none of them matched the beauty of the Laos temples in Luang Prabang or the Royal Palace in Thailand. Once you’ve seen the best it’s really hard to compare, or appreciate another similar place for its own face value. Within the palace grounds is the silver pagoda, which without reading the guidebook appears to be a pagoda (temple) full of silver coloured buddha’s and other gifts to the king. However, all of the buddha’s in the temple are made of silver, gold or bronze and the main life size buddha (gold) has hundreds of diamonds embedded in it, one is 25 carats! Their are two other smaller gold buddha’s also share the same feature. The floor itself is made of pure silver, 5000 tiles worth.

Upon exiting the palace grounds we made our way along the main streets taking in the sun set and enjoying the wide paved sidewalk and manicured walkway (trees, shrubs, fountains). We ate dinner, a set plate (.50 US per person). The food was good, (see tomorrow’s blurb for the after effect). We each had a soup (Kirk’s sour salty fishy yucky!!!, mine curry chicken!), vegetable plate (Heather fried mushrooms, Kirk mixed veggies), Kirk - fish cakes (actually good!), Heather barbecued pork ribs (yummy). For dessert, sticky rice (tastes like coconut with mango). Back home to bed.

Originally written on November 17, 2004

Breakfast at Kim Caf? Onto sh*tty bus. Bus was late getting there. It went around the backpacker district picking up other passengers. Then back to Kim caf?45 minutes later. So glad I woke up early! Turns out two Canadian girls slept in, then we later found out they were hungover. Bus to border about an hour and a half. Stopped at gas station 20 minutes from the border. Bathroom break and time for the tourists to spend the remainder of their dong (Vietnamese currency). The bus did not get any gas. The bus pulled up at the border and a cart pulled up alongside. Two guys started unloadeding all of the bags onto a cart. They never asked if we wanted this service. Kirk and I knew this was not for free and kept our bags. Be without our bags, I don’t think so.

Before we left the bus our guide told us that we would go through three rooms at the Vietnamese border, rooms 12, 9, and 7. He also said it should take 1/2 hour. So, at 11am we all made our way to the first room. Along the way we were accosted by shouts of you change money dong to dollar by a handful of persistent women. Carrying all of our luggage,I with backpack and Kirk with two bags, as we bought too many clothes in Hoi an and were to cheap to ship them. Kirk kept this extra bag on top of his backpack (as he carried it).

Room 12 is hell’s gate, a concrete walled room with a wicker wall on the inside (with a tiny window between the wicker). One fan, on low speed is attached to the right wall and is the only mild sense of relief in the staggering heat. The climate is hot, but more importantly the conditions increase the heat. 50 people crowd in the room facing the wicker window, waiting to give the officer their passport for an exit stamp. There is no line, just a (mass) cluster f**k of people not knowing who has already given their passport to the guy at the window, nor when it is their turn to give the passport to the dude. No one moves, because no one knows how long it takes to get a stamp, so the “cluster f**k” doesn’t move and you just stand there waiting for someone to tell you what the f**k is going on. Eventually we wise up and realise that we will never reach the window. We see some people pass their passports to the front over the mass of poep;e. We follow suit and hope ours reaches the window. It does and the waiting continues..

There is no officer directing traffic or telling anyone what should be done. There are just bribe takers, scummy guys who tell you that if you pay them so much dong they will ensure the passport goes to the front of the line. There is no point in paying these guys because we came as a group so the bus on the Cambodian end has to wait for the slowest person. Money does make the world go round here because others, not from our bus, who do employ the service have their freshly stamped passports in their hot little hands very quickly. This slows down the stampling process for us cheapies. Plus, the stamping process is done at a extremely slow rate, whereby the sound the of the stamper is heard and 20 minutes later one passport is revealed. Remember there are about 50 people in a crowded sweatbox, some carrying their bags, amongst women asking us to change dong to dollar and scummy men suggesting that we pay the bribe. Every once in awhile there is mad stamping. About 7-10 stamps in a 10 second period. This sound brightens our spirt, but we soon realize it is a cruel joke.

One and a half hours later, after every asian, and every other nation from close to far proximity to Vietnam is given their stamped passport Kirk and I receive ours. During our wait one of the Canadian girls, who is the most hungover injures herself (after vomiting all morning). Her friend thinks this is very funny, so she decides to take a picture. Bad idea. Frankenstein, I.e. the the officer in charge of room 12, visible through the wicker window was very upset.Why this name, because he had a huge scar across his forehead, the doctor did a poor stitch up job and it look extra creepy. All of the guidebooks say do not photograph in any government building, and common sense tells you not to drink heavily the night before a long bus trip but what do I know?

After we finally get our stamps, we proceed to room 9 where we get our bags checked and cleared. This consisted of one guy collecting a yellow form that we got when we arrived in Vietnam. On it are things like how much money you have brought in, jewllery, bags, etc. This guy just takes the form without even looking at our bags. We could have had some small children in our 3 extra bags and he wouldn’t care. Then to room 7 where they check that your passport is stamped.

From there a hot walk past a guard post (where they check your passport one last time) and through a construction site. Crappy hard packed clay riddled with old scars of where trucks at one time where stuck. Perfect ankle twisting country especially when carrying two bags under 33 C heat. The walk was about 5-700 meters long. When we got to Cambodia we where sweating like old fat Elvis’s.

Here, we paid the officer 25 US for a 30 day visa, the whole process took about 45 more minutes of mostly waiting in the shade in a more or less orderly line. Bribery was less common here although who knows what the real cost of the visa is seeing as how I was denied a receipt. Whatever, we made it to our new bus, got on, and off we went towards Phnom Penh.

This trip was pretty, although boring. Rice patty and palm tree over and over and over. In the middle some where we had to take a ferry accross the Mekong. Our bus got on right behind a truck full of live pigs. Mmmmm bacon. But not too smelly.

Finally we arrived in Phnom Penh at about 5 PM at the King Guesthouse. The bus parked in such a way as to block us in to try and keep the bus passengers from leaving to find other accomodation. I’m sure the trip was also designed to arrive in the evening and thus discourage people wandering around. Heather stayed with the bags and I went out to roam the streets of Phnom Penh looking for a place to sleep.

After about 30 minutes of climbing up and down the dark, rubble and garbage filled side streets I finally found a decent place just down the street from where we were dropped off. I came back, got Heather and the bags, and we checked in, showered, and left to find some dinner. After looking for quite awhile, we finally settled on a greasy pizza place as it was the only thing that wasn’t serving dinner off of plastic tables for kids with short plastic chairs — apparently we weren’t in the eating out part of town. The place was dark when we got home and hit the hay. By this time the AC was broken in our room so we switched to another bigger room same price. Lights out.