First I had the good fortune of learning just the night before I was to leave for Phnom Penh that my friend Gretchen has Foreign Service friends stationed there who would maybe be willing to host me for a couple days. And being the housing mooch I am and quite shameless about this at this point in my travels, gave her friend a call that morning on the bus ride with a borrowed cell phone from the kind Cambodian next to me. Sure enough, Janet and Gary would be kind enough to host me and I got directions to their apartment, and was nearly beside myself when the tuk-tuk driver dropped me at the impressive complex, complete with pool—heaven. Janet showed me to my room when she got home from work that even—my own queen bed, cable TV, air-conditioning, and bathroom with bathtub! A backpacker’s dream come true. Also, n my bus ride, I had chatted with a lovely young Argentinean couple who had been at my Siem Reap guesthouse and hung out with for the afternoon and made plans to visit the killing fields together early the next morning.
The next morning we took a tuk-tuk to the killing fields which are 15km outside of the city. It was a very tough place to visit and learn the horrors that the Khmer Rouge inflicted on so many innocent people and the fear, horror, and torture that reigned during their regime. The killing fields were basically the old dug-up mass graves of the victims, men, women, and children who were tortured and killed and a pagoda filled with recovered skulls eerily looms over the sight. It was a chilling return to the emotions I experienced in Rwanda and a reminder of the importance of preserving the memory of the atrocious events although too horrible to fully comprehend. After the killing
fields, I took the common tourist path to the Tuol Sleng Museum, quite literally meaning Poison hill, a former high school that had been turned into a prison and torture facility by the Khmer Rouge. The victims at the mass grave of the killing fields were brought from Tuol Sleng. There were still old classrooms containing rusty metal beds with torture instruments that had been left as they were some 30 years ago, and also an exhibit of room upon room of the mug shots of all of the victims held at Tuol Sleng and later executed—many of them just children. After such a heavy morning, it was time for some delicious Khmer food by the riverfront with my Argentinean friends and an afternoon by the pool, what a treat! 
The following day I had been planning to apply for a Vietnam visa, but of course arrived at the office just a few minutes after it had begun its three hour lunch recess. Instead of moping around the area, I caught another tuk-tuk up to the northern end of the city to explore the backpacker enclave area surrounding the lake and grab some lunch before heading back to the embassy that afternoon. I wandered into one guesthouse and ordered some lunch and started chatting with a few other backpackers who sat down nearby. One was also interested in checking out the visa situation, so after some delicious amok curry, we headed back down to the embassy, where we ran into some people she knew from previous travels—the world of travelling in SE Asia keeps proving to be incredibly small. I decided to forgo the visa in favor of getting it at the consulate at the beach the following week. The woman at the embassy was not too encouraging about this notion, saying that if the visa there really took only 15 minutes to process there then it couldn’t be real and even Xeroxed the page in my Lonely Planet where it claimed that because she was so amused. (In fact, in Sihanoukville it took 5 minutes, so there.) We parted ways with the other travelers and made plans to meet up later that night before heading off for some bargain shopping at the Russian Market, yet another massive structure filled with everything from light fixtures to pork innards to North Face backpacks, clothing, and ceramics. That night after a lovely, highly civilized dinner at a nice riverfront restaurant, I did the backpacker thing and hung out at the shabby comfy bars in the backpacker ghetto for a trivia games and drinks.
My last day in Phnom Penh I wandered the city a bit and enjoyed my last day in luxury before packing up and catching a bus south to the coast and the smaller rural towns of Kampot and Kep.
I spent just two nights in Kampot soaking up the small town ambiance perched on a wide river with some crumbling French architecture, and my one day hiring a m
oto driver to take me out into the countryside and then to the port of Kep. It was really nice to be out of the hustle and bustle of such touristy big cities and see the farmland and distant mountains of Bokor National Park. Much to his credit, my moto driver did manage to track down these caves that I hoped to visit that housed a 7th century brick Hindu cave. 
We passed by a salt farm, a small fishing village, and numerous rice paddie fields on our 24km drive to Kep, a small town on the coast which was the launching point for Toh Russey (Rabbit Island), one of the more undiscovered and unique islands I’ve ever visited. The difficulties of travelling solo reared its ugly head briefly as I had to cough up $15 to charter a return boat on my own or wait an indefinite amount of time for others to arrive to share it. Luckily the wait wasn’t too bad, and an hour later I was on the boat to island with a nice Irish couple. After a delicious lunch of fresh peppercorn crab on the beach, I layout on a straw mat and enjoyed the very low-key ambiance complete with cows and goats roaming the beach (very strange really) and small restaurants that each ran a handful of makeshift bungalows. 
I headed back into town and grabbed a delicious dinner on the riverfront of another traditional Khmer dish of Beef Loc Lak, which is cooked in a rich gravy and served with a fried egg on top (Asia's answer to Charlottesville's Gus Burger, if you will), and a brownie sundae (okay, not traditional Khmer, but boy was it good!).The next day I ended up sharing a private taxi with three guys I had met briefly on Rabbit Island who were also heading to Sihanoukville. We checked into a recommended guest house called Monkey Republic (which would prove to be quite the party place), had a few beers, and I made a visit to the nearby beach. That night, over drinks and pool, our group of four (two young British guys, one Scottish guy) expanded to include two British girls, and three Canadians. And it seems that every time I walk up to the guest house, there are most likely several people from this impromptu group hanging out, eating, drinking a beer, or playing pool, and so I’ve started to feel pretty at home very quickly. Things were moving along nicely.
My mom had asked me what is there to do in Sihanoukville besides the beach and diving. Not a whole lot I replied—but I did forget about the good ol’ police report. That’s right, friends, after a hiatus from thefts (and some major luck with one aforementioned lost wallet), I have returned to the land of the police station. Not necessarily a place I was hoping to revisit. Along with it go the now routine cycles of disbelief, bewilderment, anger, frustration, self-hatred, guilt, embarrassment, and so forth—at least these days I know to expect them and their staying time is ever decreasing. Short story is that I was sitting on the Serendipity Beach section of Sihanoukville with some fellow travelers chatting and my bag on the sand next to me, and next time I looked down it was gone, surely thanks to the many children and women wandering about endlessly tormenting all sun-worshippers with offers of massage, leg hair removal, pedicures, and the like.
What followed was the panic walk up and down the beach, the kind comfort of the girls I was with, the closed police beach post (of course, it was lunch time!), and the frantic moped ride (how many of these have there been?!) to the town where after a stop at one other post, I was greeted by an officer and after some time of much discussion in Khmer, told to go back to where I’d come from and get my passport. Upon my return, I was shown into a different room, and told to, get this, WAIT. I’m much better at this now of course, but still in these instances make whimpers and surely tap my forehead against the wooden table repeatedly. The officer offered a cigarette as he took one out for himself. Now if you know me, you know I am not a fan of smoking in the least, but at that moment, I will be honest (sorry Mom) I really could use a cigarette. Plus, how often do you get to share a smoke with a Cambodian police officer? After my passport and visa were photocopied, the strangely familiar police report was brandished in front of me. I filled it out in a snap as I am now an old hand at this. The lines were drawn, the signatures secured, and the stamps pounded and I had insurance claim #4. Who knows what happened next. I believe I was told that a perfectly smiley, petite, and wrinkled officer in uniform would go with me to help look for the bag. This seemed dubious as the event was now a good 2 or so hours in the past, but never the less, off my moped driver took me, followed closely by the officer.
So am I just unlucky I’m asked? Maybe, but no, I truly don’t think that’s even a possibility. I mean, how could I say anything so blasphemous when I look at the year I’ve had. There have been ups and downs a plenty that’s for sure, but they just go hand in hand, and if I have good times, well then, as my Buddha teachings will affirm, there will be equal suffering. I am improving in some respects—my goods are now separated.
Not a credit card or ID was involved, merely my glasses (I have an old pair with me still), my crappy clothes (probably a blessing, less laundry), and though this hurts a bit, my camera (it hasn’t been quite the same since the New Year’s water festivities), and $8 in cash. Not a huge haul actually—the little scoundrel was probably disappointed to be fair. And the street children that sell on the beach are equal parts annoying and heartbreaking, as they really are notorious little salesmen, and one just can’t help considering how much they’d rather be in school. For all the irritation of such incidents in the past year, in retrospect they are just a handful of tales showcasing the roller coaster ride I’ve been on. As my brilliant old NYC roommate would say would say, a bad day at the beach is still better than a good day at work. Well, I'm not sure today would justify that statement, but hopefully tomorrow will when I swap the police station for a real day at the beach!
No comments:
Post a Comment