So I promised a blog about my vacation that now happened about, oh, 3.5 months ago. I may have forgotten a few things, but I'll tell you what I do remember. Pretty much, it was totally crazy, but here goes.
Jess and I started by flying into Bangkok and arriving at our hostel sometime around midnight. We were the only 2 girls in a room with 4 boys and it smelled AWFUL. It was hot and the guys were sweaty, just the worst BO/dirty sox and feet smell. But we were only there for a couple of hours.
We got up early the next morning and hopped on a bus for something like a 6 hour ride that would take us to Aranyaprathet, a town close to the Thailand/Cambodia border. From there we took a tuk-tuk to the border and crossed into Cambodia. It was surprisingly easy, there wasn't really any control going on, it was definitely an interesting experience. Once we were in Cambodia we got out visas and caught the last government bus to the taxi stand about an hour away. On this bus we met a Cambodian man who worked for the bus company and who talked to us the whole way and got us a cab once we were there. One thing I learned in Southeast Asia: everyone expects to be paid/tipped for anything they do for you. So I paid him.
Jess and I ended up sharing a taxi with 2 Canadians who were also going to Siem Reap and who were pretty interesting to talk to. Another observation from traveling:people really like to brag and overly exaggerate the things they have done and how
amazing those experiences have been. Fortunately, I can usually figure out who is full of shit since they are also, generally, really pretentious. Anyway, I'm digressing. Back to the taxi ride. First of all, the taxi to several hours, something 2 or 3, so we all spent some quality time together. The woman told us about how she went to Tanzania to teach English and ended up living in the bush for several months with a tribe. Pretty cool story, though I'm positive the awesomeness of it was exaggerated.
Still, it was interesting talking to them. The other good thing about the ride was that we really got to see the Cambodian country side, which is quite beautiful. There are rice paddies everywhere, its generally flat except for some random mountains so you can see really far in the distance to some great landscape. And people in SE Asia drive like absolute maniacs. Seeing 3 adults, a child of maybe 5, and a baby on a motorcycle is totally normal. I swear I thought we were going to die 20 times in cars/buses/tuk-tuks during this trip, but luckily we survived :-)
By the time we made to Siem Reap it was dark and we were pretty tired. The cab dropped us off at some random place right outside of the city where we had to get a tuk-tuk who proceeded to take us to the hostel of his choice. We did have reservations for everywhere we were traveling but for the most part those went out the window. It's much better to just get what you can there and go with the flow. I'm sorry to be using so many cliches, but I just cant help it...
The hostel we got was actually pretty nice. We had our own room and bathroom for only $10 a night ($5 each). So cheap. We went ad got food since we were starving and headed out to the night market. I LOVE the markets in SE Asia. They are somewhat outside, full of crazy stuff, and a ton of fun to look around. Unfortunately my budget was much smaller than I would have liked and I had to restrain myself. And speaking of money, I didn't bring much with me as I'd planned to transfer money home from my Korean bank account while on vacation because I didn't get paid until then. Minor panic attack. None of the computers in Cambodia would let me transfer money and I had to wait and got extremely luck in Vietnam when it went through. That was terrifying.
Back to the main story here. We got up at 4 the next morning and took a tuk-tuk to Angkor Wat to see the sunrise, which was magnificent. There are pics on fb, I'm not exaggerating lol. We spent that day touring around and seeing some really cool temples, it was definitely one of the highlights of the trip. However, it was exhausting, so when we left it was nap time. The dinner. Another highlight of the trip. The food in Cambodian is some of the best I've ever had. I would actually consider going back just to eat some more of it, it's that delicious. Especially the curry.
During all this I was also getting tan, which made me very happy as I have reached new levels of paleness here in Korea since I rarely see the sun being inside all day. From Siem Reap we took a long (like 6 hr) and not very comfortable bus ride to Phnom Penh, the capital. We bought the more expensive tickets (like $8) for the VIP bus. What a joke. I would hate to see what the cheaper buses were like. Two 50-year-old men in front of us kept fighting because one had his seat reclining and therefore the other didn't have enough leg room. Ridiculous. Funny side note: I don't know if it was this bus trip, but on one of them Jess managed to lock herself in the little, stinky, bus bathroom. Hilarious! For me, anyway :-)
We did, eventually, make it the Phnom Penh. Now, Phnom Penh has a completely different atmosphere than Siem Reap. For those of you who don't know, Cambodia had a genocide in the 1970's generally known by the government of the times name, Khmer Rouge. If any of you are interested in really a good book about it, I strongly recommend
"First They Killed My Father" by Loung Ung. Phnom Penh, being the capital and home to the S-21 prison and many a killing field, still has a feeling of...fright? I'm not sure what the right word is, the the feeling is different then that of Siem Reap. Siem Reap was further removed from the genocide and has an up-beat fee to it that is quite enjoyable.
We went and toured the S-21 prison as well as the killing field. It stuns me what people do to each other. We should all be able to accept others for what they are rather than people killing others, their own countrymen, to attempt to create their version of a "perfect" society. What really hit me was that many of the people living in Cambodia, especially in Phnom Penh, are living their lives intermingled with the same people who may have killed directly or contributed to the killing of their mothers, fathers, even their children.
Can you imagine being in the streets or being neighbors with someone you know was involved in the killing of your family? It's absolutely amazing the strength people have to move on and to rebuild. It also really made me appreciate how lucky I am to have been born in a stable, developed society. While I may have issues with America, mostly the politics, I am so grateful to know with some degree of certainty that I'm protected, its unlikely that, in my life time anyway, I am likely to be threatened in the way the Cambodian people were.
Moving on. Abrupt, I know, but I could go on for ages, so its better to move on now. Next up was the flight to Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon),Vietnam. Thankfully, that was uneventful. We arrived safely at the airport, had to pay for our visas for the 2nd time, because apparently paying online isn't good enough despite what we'd heard. No biggie. Vietnam was the one place we went where it was good to have hostel reservations in advance. We were in a neat little backpacker ally in a nice hostel where we once again had our own room and a nice rooftop to read on. Pretty sweet.
We stayed for one night before leaving for a tour of the Mekong Delta. We took a nice little 3ish hour long boat ride down the Mekong River. The poverty that I saw there was staggering. How people live in the conditions that I saw is a testament to what people can cope with and overcome. For pics look on my fb. It was definitely and interesting ride. I saw people fishing in their own little boats, bigger boats loaded down with massive amounts of coconuts and what life along the river is like.
As part of this tour we stopped at several towns and villages along the Mekong. At one of these stops we has the opportunity to sty snake-wine. Its a cobra (I think) that has been soaked in alcohol. The dead snake remains in the wine jug. I tried a small sip, because, really, when am I going to have the opportunity again? What did I learn? Snake-wine is disgusting. I know, shocker. Definitely not something I will ever feel the need to try again, but still worth it for the experience. We also stopped at a place that was making coconut candy. It was DELICIOUS. I bought several packs to take back to Korea for co-teachers, but they were, unfortunately, later eaten by ants.
We did some more exploring around the area, it was a 2 day trip, before heading back to HCMC. Next we went to a war museum. Pretty interesting stuff there. I had the chance to go into the itty bitty, teeny tiny, tunnels that the Vietnamese lived in. However, it was while I was attempting to go through one of these little tunnels that I discovered, that yes, I am claustrophobic. At least, underground I am. I couldn't make it through even one tunnel. I did not like it at all. How people lived down there I will never know.
So we hung around HCMC for another day before hopping on another plane and heading back to Bangkok. Again, we were in the city for just one night. The next morning was another early one. We got a bus that was taking us to Koh Chang, a lovely little island that took us almost a full day to get to. So worth it. We went to a part of the island that wasn't too populated and which was popular with backpackers. We actually stayed at a pretty nice hotel where we had a room with a view and a pool overlooking the beach. Fabulous.
We were only planning to stay there for 1 full day, but once we were there we knew that wouldn't be long enough to we extended our stay a night. Best idea EVER. Our hotel also had a massage stand on the beach. Throughout this trip we were getting hour-long massages for $5-$10. Life doesn't get much better.
We went out into the small town which had some nice bars, met some interesting people, including some very...interesting...German carpenters. These guys were wearing black corduroy bell-bottom pants, long sleeve shits with vests on top and top hats. And Thailand was hot. And Humid. It was crazy, but they were doing it for tradition sake, to that was kind of cool.
One night our hotel threw a party on the beach. Pretty sweet. I won't lie, it was lame at first, but it picked up. They had cheap buckets, so that it wasn't too surprising when we all ended up dancing our hearts out on the sand. Crazy night. Not one that's going to be forgotten any time soon.
We went back to Bangkok after the Koh Chang, but left after just one night. Next up was Kanchanaburi. Here we went to the tiger temple for some tiger petting. Sounds a lot cooler that it actually was. The tigers were all tied down and sleeping. Still, they were cool. We saw the bridge over the River Kwai, which was interesting. That was followed by a war museum/cemetery and a river tour. Best part of Kanchanaburi: elephant riding!
Yes, that's right, we got to ride elephants. First we were on the seat thing on its back, but then we both had turns riding on its neck. Very cool, but it does chafe the legs. We even got to bathe the elephant. In a river. The elephant could go completely under water, briefly, and the first time it did I didn't know what was happening and was sure I was going to fall off. Absolutely AWESOME!
After all this it was back to Bangkok for our last night of vacation. So what did we do? Had some street insects! We were in Thailand, it was pretty much a must. The fried grasshopper was definitely the best and the not-fried, still juicy, scorpion was the worst. Blah. Follow this up with some street shopping and beer drinking and it was a good way to end a fabulous 2-week vacation. Flying back to freezing cold Korea was not fun :-(
While traveling is always stressful, and this trip was no exception, it was still, overall, an amazing trip that I'm so glad I had the opportunity to go on. It was, maybe, worth coming to Korea just for that vacation. If anyone ever wants to go to SE Asia and needs a travel buddy, call me! I would so go again!
