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The SE
Asia tour 27 May 2000: Ho Chi Minh CitySamantha and I arrived
safe and well in Hi Chi Minh City - formerly Saigon, though many of the
people who live here still call it the old name. We're off to Nha Trang
overnight on the bus in about 3 hours time. As I forgot to mention
these before: the last things we did in Bangkok were to go to Wat Pho, one of
the largest temples in Thailand. A visit to the massage school/centre there
saw us paying to be beaten up by slight women in nifty white outfits. Some of
it really was painful. Traditional Thai massage relies on the masseur using
their body weight a lot to move your muscles. They wouldn't let us into the
Grand Palace as we were 'improperly attired'. We greatly enjoyed our
trip along Khlong Bangkok Noi, one of the many canals that ruins through Bangkok
- the Venice of the East? The long boats blast up and down the canals at
around 20 knots creating a huge wash and an almighty stink. The canals are
seriously polluted - you would probably die within 10 minutes of falling in.
Little drawstrings that pull up plastic sheeting save you from the wash
splashing up when other boats pass. They were much more fun that the dreaded
tuk-tuks. I shall not miss those little motorised bug(ger)s that buzz around
Bangkok like flies around a smelly, diseased and dying old man. After an uneventful
journey to Poipet on the Cambodian border, we said our farewells to Thailand
and plunged straight into the mud. They don't have tarmac in this part of
Cambodia - or so it seemed. It looked like some kind of semi-timewarp or perhaps
it was pre-post apocalyptic. Mediaeval meets...well a lot of motorbikes and
some agricultural vehicles that were just engines on bits of wood with four
wheels thrown in for good measure. Our transport for the
first 2 hours of the journey to Seam Riep (the town nearest the Angkor site)
was pick-up truck (bakkie for you South Africans) with 16 people and a full
load of market produce. It was a very uncomfortable ride as it was so
cramped. The view was good though as we were outside and there are no electricity
of telegraph poles to obscure the view. The whole of Cambodia is almost
completely flat - apart from the roads. Our Dutch travelling companion
remarked on it's similarity to his homeland. At Sisophon we
transferred to another truck, slightly less crowded pick-up. The next four
hours were undoubtedly a highlight. No it wasn’t that comfortable, but
watching the world go by with my legs dangling out the back was very
peaceful. Little kids would wave and shout hello as they rarely see
foreigners. Some would come up and pinch your hair as they don’t know anyone
with hairy arms or legs! Other parts of the
journey were much less than peaceful and were pretty hair-raising. The road
is in terrible shape. There was no tarmac - only mud. This road was heavily bombed
when the Vietnamese pushed the Khmer Rouge back. Large sections of the road
had huge craters - some the size of large trucks - that each had to be
negotiated...slowly. Many bridges had not been repaired for decades. Many had
minor repairs consisting of planks that had been roped together to keep the
bridge functional. They also required small children to guide the pick-up
across, lest a wheel fall down a hole in the bridge. The view down was a
little unsettling. 200 riel (about 3p) was the standard fee to the unofficial
"tollbooth" attendants. We had to leave the road entirely a few
times and drive through dried rice paddies. These roads see very little
traffic - we probably passed something every 5 minutes. Eventually we made
it. Surprisingly, we only got stuck once. We enjoyed Siem Reap a
great deal. We had been looking forward to getting away from the incessant
hassle of Thailand and we found it with the gentle and very friendly people
of Cambodia, and Siem Reap in particular. It's a large provincial town that
is relatively cut off. It is the base for exploring the temples of Angkor -
the original capital of the Khymer kingdom that prevailed over much of
South-East Asia from 800-1300 AD. We spent one day at the temple sites -
enough for us philistines. We enjoyed exploring things and some of the
temples are pretty impressive. We especially liked the great Angkor Wat and
the more obscure Banteay Srei the most. The other two full days
we spent in Siem Reap were relaxed. I bought an old Cambodian Ikat - a sarong
made of woven (rather than printed) silk to hang on the wall. Not cheap, but absolutely
beautiful. We often ate out very cheaply in places where those tourists at
the $320 night hotel wouldn't dream of going, but we know who had the better
(and more authentic) experience. One night was spent trying to teach our
waiters some English pronunciation. They, somewhat curiously, wanted to know
how to say 'archaic', 'aeronautic' and 'archaeology'. Obviously they were at
a certain point in their little book! they got better anyway. We had less
success with the correct way to say the 'sh' sound at the 'th' sound. It was
always "sank-you". Khymer doesn't really use the tongue. We couldn't afford the
fast boat or the plane so it was on to Phnom Penh by road. 10 hours in a
mini-bus - averaging 30km/h (20 m/ph). Again the road was pretty rough but
not nearly as bad as the earlier one. I was unfortunate to sit next to the
smelliest man in the world, who despite the cheapness of the bus, had the
latest £300 mobile phone. Phnom Penh was also full of
very friendly people. I guess our problem with the Thais was that they seemed
to view all westerners as suckers/wallets. Nobody spoke to us that didn't
want something out of it. Cambodia was the opposite. We spoke to many people
who were just interested and didn't want to sell anything or try and rip us
off. Even the taxi/cyclo drivers were fine. Our polite refusal of their
services was greeted with a smile. We had quite a chat with
an old guy down by the river. He was a retired civil servant and was looking
for more work. He laughed mightily when we told him that the British national
dish was fish and chips and that Britain's favourite dish was the Indian
Chicken Tikka Masala. He wasn't sure what to make of my description of
putting fish in batter. Still, they eat some pretty strange stuff. When
Samantha tried to get a boiled egg from a street vendor, they laughed and
shooed her away. Another couple who had just ordered the same showed her the
inside. Her double-take revealed that it contained an about-to-hatch chick.
Apparently a great delicacy. We then noticed that many stalls sold small
birds (whole) in various stages of development - usually covered in some kind
of red sauce. We never found out
whether it was regulation but all stall holders and shops like to congregate
together in one area. This was true of Thailand too. For example, driving
along, one might see 15 stalls within 2 miles selling roast chickens - and
then not another one at all. All 12 Pomelo (sort of grapefruity thing) stalls
in Phnom Penh were within 30 metres of each-other, yet there isn't another
one anywhere in the city. Perhaps nobody's figured that spreading out would
help. Hmmm. Whilst in PP, we also
visited the Foreign Correspondents Club - a nice place for a sun-downer
overlooking the convergence of the Tonle Sap River and the Mekong - it's
really wide. We resisted Happy Herbs Pizza next door - despite the liberal
use of 'happy herbs'. Instead we took a hair raising Cyclo ride home where
the driver got stuck in a mud pool and I had to get out. Cambodia has a sort of
strange natural order where the might has right on the roads, but it works.
Even the animals and kids never go on the roads, and if they do people always
slow down obligingly. Everyone and everything seems to have a built-in road
sense and a sense of where they are in the infrastructural pecking-order.
Nobody seems to get run over despite the near anarchy of it all. Our last day in PP was a
bit rushed but we did manage to fit in a massage at the blind massage centre.
Someone had the good idea that blind people would make good masseurs and it
would assist them greatly in employment. It was very good. Perhaps this could
catch on in the UK? We also went to see the monument at the killing fields at
Cheoung Ek. The centre of the monument is macabrely filled with the skulls of
the bodies recovered from the surrounding mass graves. These were the victims
of Pol Pot's regime. A sign says 'never again'. We also visited Tuol Sleng,
the school in Phnom Penh that had been converted into a detention/torture
centre for those who were not deemed part of Pot Pot's vision for Cambodia.
Pretty gruesome and depressing. On the 25th, we were
overland again for 6 hours by better roads and we arrived in Ho Chi Minh
City. It's a big a bustling place but a lot nicer than Bangkok. The Honda
100cc moped rules here - big time. Despite our fears about being ripped off
and the stories we have seen or heard, it's been fine. The Vietnamese have
been very friendly. it doesn't have a communist feel to it here - though I
guess it will more in the north. It's bustling, vibrant and seems to be
pretty efficient. Even the state-run SaigonTourist seems to be well organised
and have hotels, cafes, transport systems etc. all of which seem well run and
very clean. Earlier, we stood outside
the now called Reunification Palace (formerly the Presidential Palace) where
the gates were smashed in 1975 and the flag of the north was placed on the
4th floor for the whole world to see. We then went on to the War Remnants
Museum, formerly know as the Atrocities Museum. It was quite good. They had
lots of American war hardware. There was an excellent exhibition of
American/Vietnam war photos that had clearly been travelling the world until
recently. The older photos in the museum were a little biased in their
caption writing, such as: on a picture of a soldier holding a decapitated
head, "this American soldier seems satisfied" , which he wasn't
really. This one had a sign saying 'never again' too. This rather reminded us
that despite all these promises, it still happens on a pretty regular and wide
scale basis - witness central Africa, Sierra Leone, the former Yugoslavia,
etc etc. Were off up the coast -
gradually wending our way to Halong Bay near the Chinese border. Should be
good. We're seriously low on money but I guess we'll just have to make do.
Perhaps they need good washer-uppers in Vientiane? This page hosted by |
