We really did enjoy Phnom Penh. It was such a laid back city and the area we stayed in was very relaxing. It's kind of strange being in Cambodia and everything is priced in US dollars. Everywhere from department stores to restaurants to pharmacies, the dollar rules. Any denomination under $1 uses Cambodian Riel instead of cents, so your change usually comes back as a mixture of dollars and riel, which gets a bit confusing after a few beers. Speaking of beer, which I usually am, I've recently discovered Cambodian stout. Being a Guiness drinker back home, I danced a little jig to discover Cambodians make their own versions, one called ABC and another called Black Panther. ABC is okay and very drinkable, especially after having to make do with lager since we came away, but my favourite by far is Black Panther. Now Guiness it most certainly is not, but considering that we are in the back of beyond in South East Asia I'm going to count my blessings anyway. It tastes great. Somewhere between liquorice and old engine oil, and so strong you almost have to chew it. At 8% alocohol, just a few cans will go a very long way and after dinner I'm usually to be found with a huge cheesy grin on my face, in the middle of the road, trying to teach the cockroaches to dance. Cara isn't overly impressed because I'm reduced to communicating through grunts, clicks and whistles. Fine if I'm chatting to a dolphin but not so great for holding a sensible conversation with my girlfriend.
After about 5 days we finally managed to get our lazy backsides out of Phnom Penh and up to Siem Riep, which is the jumping off point for visiting the Angkor temple complex. Having booked tickets on the bus, we obviously had to be up at about 6am. Nice one ! After about fumphty six hours on bumpy roads we arrived at Siem Riep bus station, which is a few kilometres outside of town. Nothing prepared us for what was to happen what we got off the bus. As soon as we stepped foot off the coach, before we even managed to get our bags off, we were surrounded by what seemed like 50 tuk tuk drivers. They completely mobbed us ! Beatlemania was tame by comparison. They all piled in at once and tugged, pushed, harried and cajoled us. They pushed signs in our faces with the names of obscure guesthouses written on them. They tried to pull our bags off us and run off to their tuk tuks. The only mental image I can offer you, that will in any way convey what happened, is to ask you to imagine 50 shouting men, each one trying to fight the other 49 using a piece of cardboard as a weapon, and into the middle of this Battle Royale plonk Cara and myself, looking like a couple of rabbits caught in the headlights of a truck. It was hilarious. At first we just laughed. Then we spoke assertively. Then we shouted. Then we shouted louder and eventually we just screamed at these guys to back off. No response whatsoever. We quickly realised the only way of getting out alive was to choose one of the drivers and get the hell out of there. We spotted one driver holding a sign for a guesthouse whose name we recognised, so we picked him up by the ears, threw him over my shoulder and legged it for the car park. Once out of the bus station it all quietened down and we both had a good laugh about the whole episode. It turns out that these guys fight each other tooth and nail to be able to take us rich westerners to our hotels for free, in the hope that we will hire them as private drivers to take us around the Angkor temple complex. A driver on retainer is guaranteed a few days work and won't have to tout again for a while, so we pasty westerners are quite a prize. It's nice to feel so wanted ! Our driver for the next few days was called 'Rosa', or rather he was called the noise you would make if you tried to say the word Rosa after first having your tongue and most of your teeth removed. Actually even that is not accurate. Our real driver was Rosa's brother, but he spoke almost no English so Rosa negotiated on his behalf. Obviously, we only found this out after we had finished our negotition and we thought it was all in the bag for the next day. Even after you had removed your tongue and all of your teeth you would still not be able to pronounce the name of Rosa's brother, but he was a nice lad and was very eager to please so all was well in the end.
The next morning was something I have never experienced before in all my 34 years. We had to be up at 4 O'CLOCK IN THE MORNING !!!!!!!!!!! Let me repeat that to remove any chance of misunderstanding. FOUR O'SODDING CLOCK IN THE BLOODY MORNING. Now don't get me wrong, I've seen four AM many, many times in my life. But so far it had always been at the end of the day. It was one of my favourite hours as a youth. It was the time of day that indicated you'd just had a great night out, but would soon be in a comfy bed. I had never seen it at the beginning of the day before, and let me tell you, it looks very different when looked at from that angle. It gives you a heavy-lidded, confusing, feels-like-you've-been-tethered-to-an-oxcart kind of sensation which was very strange.
Howdyhoo, the reason for getting up at that laughable time of the morning was to see the sunrise over Angkor Wat, the largest and most impressive of the temples in the complex. The Angkor temple complex is essentially a large group of temples, reservoirs, mausoleums, monastaries and other assorted religious buildings built by the Khmer (Cambodian) empire, which ruled an area covering Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam and Thailand between the 9th and 14th centuries. The empire fell toward the end of the 14th century and a great majority of the buildings were left derelict, waiting for the jungle to cover the area. Although the locals were continually occupying the area for the whole time, Angkor was "rediscovered" by the French in the 1860's and has subsequently become known as one of the main wonders of the world.
We made it to Angkor Wat whilst still dark and altough fairly impressive, much of the sunrise was lost behind a thick curtain of cloud. The Angkor temples were one of the main highlights of the trip that Cara and I were looking forward to and it was definately worth the wait. With the possible exception of being surrounded by 50 sharks whilst diving in Tiputi Pass, Rangiroa in French Polynesia, Angkor Wat is probably the most impressive thing I have ever seen in my life (sorry for the shameless name dropping). It truly is staggering the first time you see it. We spent hours on that first morning looking around Angkor Wat alone. It wasn't the best weather but still very hot and climbing up, around and over the temple was excellent fun. The steps up the five main towers are extremely steep and very high (a feature of all the temples at Angkor) so Cara wasn't a huge fan of going up and down them and I have to say even I got the heebie-jeebies a few times. the rest of the day was spent making our way around some of the other main temples and buildings. It was a cracking day and by the time we arrived back at the hotel we in the late afternoon we were shattered, sweaty and stinky (that was our appearance, not our roles in the local adaptation of Snow White!).
In all we spent 3 days wandering around the area, and all the time transported in comfort by our own personal driver Tgmntxcvrtertpqwkmnt (that's my best approximation of his name. When you pronounce it, it has less vowels!). For both the second and third days we had fantastic sunshine, which makes he photos look great, but made the climbing and trekking very hot. You'll all be pleased to know I was back on top form in the sweating department and was at one instance approached by a former Olympic perspiration coach asking me if I had ever considered turning pro. I kindly turned down the offer as it would have required me to spend weeks at a time living inside a sumo wrestlers thong and I just don't have that kind of spare time !
We stayed in Siem Riep for 4 nights and the last day was just spent taking it easy, mooching around the markets and eating more food. We also both visited the Seeing Hands Massage centre, which trains local blind folk in various massage techniques so they can earn a decent living, rather than begging on the streets. (Anybody who thinks the welfare system in the UK is lousy should try living with some kind of disability on the streets of Asia. Not easy !). So we both booked ourselves in for an hour's massage, which was more than welcome because all this eating, drinking and taking it easy was doing nothing for my bad back. Cara had a great time and came out afterwards feeling fantastic. Unfortunately my hands started itching almost as soon as I lay down on the slab and caused a distraction for the whole time. When we had finished I had about a dozen bites on my hands which I assume came from some sort of bedbug, flea or other related invertibrate parasite. The masseuse was a great guy though, and gave it his all. When he first discovered me on the slab with his 'seeing hands' I think he suspected I was two people trying to sneek one past him and get it half price, so he quickly counted all the limbs on the bed to make sure. Bless him, by the end of the hour he looked like he needed a massage himself and he had to go and lie down. Before we went outside to pay the staggering sum of $3 each, we slipped each of them an extra dollar. I'm sorry to say we didn't realise they hadn't the faintest idea what we had just given them, and they both scarpered to ask a trusted colleague whether it was money or a thank you note !The next part of our journey was a real humdinger and I'll let Cara fill you in on that one. Sorry for rambling on a bit with this entry, but we've been on the road a while since our last postings and we need to spill it out of our heads before we forget where we've been.
Hope all is well where you are,
Mik the Black Panther Threlfall
Extra from Cara :
We may not have mentioned the legend of the grey/green ape creature since the highlands of Vietnam but there have been numerous reoprts of sightings in Angkor Wat, Cambodia. In fact one monk actually managed to get his photo taken with the tall creature, and it towered over him. This was how it happened. There was a group of monks sitting quietly by the walkway to Angkor Wat when they spotted said creature and called it over. They wanted a photo with it but Mik was a little confused and thought they were giving him permission to take a picture of them. Anyway,I then bounded over wanting to get the same shot, speaking to the monk in the process which is rumoured to be the wrong thing to do for ladies - oops!
There have been many other occassions when Mik has recieved strange and rather longing looks and many men have commented on what a good looking man he is. Now obviously I agree with this but have just worked out why they are so infatuated. It was while a group of local men sat on the back of a pick up were staring at us in our coach and pointing at Mik that I realised they had no facial hair whatsoever. You may be wondering why this made the penny drop. Well, we haven't been able to put many pictures up recently so you won't be aware that Mik hasn't shaved since we have been away and is now sporting a substantial amount of hair on his chin. So you see all these men here who can't grow a beard are very envious of Mik's. I don't really get it myself! ;-))
Extra extra from Mik :
That's obviously bollocks ! They just recognise a fine figure of a man when they see one.
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