First up was a 7 hour bus trip to Phnom Penh filled, as ever, with the blended harmonies of Cambodian Karaoke on the TV, a man hocking and spitting to the left of me, and a woman violently vomiting to the right. Delightful. Spent the first hour becoming Kirstie the mozzie slayer, ruthlessly Jackie Chan catching and crushing mozzies with my bare hands like my brother-in-law taught me. Life skills.
Fun fact: the dengue carrying mosquitoes are quite easy to see, as their backs have white stripes. Handy.
Gross fact: when you kill a mosquito which has just fed, you get a smear of blood everywhere which is probably not yours. Nazz.
Whilst a night bus would be economically ideal (save a night of accommodation and half a day of exploration time!), the reputation for night buses is truly atrocious. Accidents are often not recorded, being chalked up to 'hitting a fallen log' or 'pot holes', security is terrible with reports of random extra passengers being allowed on to sit in foot wells and pathways so the drivers can get more money, and there have been numerous horror stories of sexual harassment and molestations with solo female backpackers. All in all, then, that'd be a hell to the no.
As soon as I arrived and dropped my bags at the hostel it was straight out to find Daughters of Cambodia and have a 13-years-later reunion with my primary school best friend's Mum! There's a whole post about the wonderful work Daughters is doing: read it here. One of my musts in Cambodia was to educate myself properly on the Khmer Rouge and the genocide which wiped out entire sections of society in wide sweeps. I get quite heated about this so here's the post. I spent an afternoon at the Royal Palace looking at shiny things and eating an amazing fish amok to cheer myself up afterwards, all rounded off with a very indulgent facial for $6!
Another 6 hours on a bus later and my escape to Sihanoukville was a success. I sat on a beach for 3 days and ate at the best restaurant in town: Sandan! It also allowed me to finally do some exercise. I've been getting twitchy and grumpy and restless because I haven't been able to do any exercise whilst travelling. Other than crazy hits of climbing things, it's actually quite difficult to pick up and go for a run: in Bangkok the only time cool enough is sunrise, and even then you'll get mowed down by a motorbike coming the wrong way up the pavement! I thought it would be easy to keep up with exercising because squats, press ups, sit ups, etc are all exercises which can be done anywhere at all, but that hasn't worked out. It's nowhere near the right headspace. Thankfully, then, there are beaches I can escape to! Being able to jog on the short stretch of beach as the sun went down each night was divine - the cool breeze, nice distractions, resistance of the sand... Beautiful. My face not so much, as proven by the hostel receptionist who was so worried about me when I returned from one run that she took me Saint to the bar for free beer! We'll just stick to the sunset photos, yeah?
After all that it was time for that 15 hour bus trip back to Siem Reap and a night hanging out in the markets before the grand arrival of Tom. I got to the airport ridiculously early (as in, before his flight even took off from China...) and waited like an excited puppy hearing the family car pull up and then running and jumping around when the door opens. The taxi drivers found it hilarious as I explained over and over again when they asked just why I was there so early: "I'm excited", "it's our anniversary", "it's my birthday", "HE'S BRINGING FREDDOS".
We had an incredible week: sunrise at Angkor Wat, rooftop candlelit dinner, Cambodian BBQ, finding Belgian beers on Pub Street, taking a Khmer cooking class together, bumping into a classmate from 5 years ago in the middle of the city, exploring Angkor Thom and Ta Phrom (we actually preferred both of these sites to Angkor Wat!), grimacing through a very thorough Khmer massage, wandering around the city museum, and generally lounging around by the pool. It made such a difference to have him there to talk with and hang out with, it was so fun! And having such a thoughtful human (he brought prosecco and Freddos all the way from England - ikr) to make my birthday so special in the middle of it all by bringing out cards from my friends and presents from my family was just the cherry on top. The literal cherry, though, was on top of this incredible cake which the hotel made for me as a birthday surprise, complete with a mini me! In Cambodia birthdays aren't traditionally celebrated until after your 50th, and years are counted from the Khmer New Year in April. Nowadays it's getting more popular to celebrate on the birth date each year, so it's even sweeter of the hotel to make a fuss of me!
I was worried it might be horrid to go back to hostels after being spoilt but it was honestly just such a far cry it was like being in a different world, so the transition was fine. The hardest thing was actually settling back into travelling alone: I reverted to my classic way of filling time I would have spent with people (talking, eating, chilling, etc) with stuff. A lot of it. Which is awesome in that I do a lot of things, but also meant I spent 11 hours walking around Chiang Mai city centre and returned to my hostel with a face which genuinely alarmed the receptionist.
If I were by myself I would have done it slightly differently (probably 4 days Siem Reap covering about a bazillion temples, out to the country to see the Battambang caves and cycle around a bit, then 2 days in Phnom Penh and a few days island hopping from Sihanoukville), but this was just the perfect combination of everything going on at the time! It was ideal to kick back as well. Travelling is stressful and exhausting sometimes and it was great to get out of my own head for a while.
After a sad goodbye at the airport it was off on our separate planes: Tom going home, and I'm going back to Thailand to befriend elephants in Chiang Mai!
No comments:
Post a Comment