Update from Battambang, Cambodia

Cambodia has been our favourite country so far. Strangers are always saying hello in the street, especially cute kids. Tourists are still a novelty here, rather than being seen as an opportunity to be exploited. That isn’t to say that the Cambodians aren’t enterprising, but they’re not aggressively so like the Vietnamese.

It wasn’t always this way. The Khmer Rouge killed over 2,000,000 people between 1975 and 1978 for no good reason. The two of us would probably have been killed by this regime, Emily for being a teacher and Phil for wearing glasses (perceived as an intellectual trait, and therefore a threat). The civil war continued from 1978 to 1998, and the country as a whole is still coming to terms with peace.

It is interesting to see what enterprising transport systems arise in the absence of anything organised by the local authorities. This morning we shared the back of a battered old Isuzu pick up truck with 20 other people, plus their luggage which included two huge marble urns and 20 sacks of rice. We couldn’t fall out because we were jammed in so tight. It took an hour to go around town picking up this cargo, then 30 minutes to get to our destination! Parts of us were very numb…

When they want to transport pigs to the market, they store them in a big pick-up truck on their backs, with their legs in the air - apparently this stops them from squealing. Phil is considering testing the theory on Emily.

We were visiting one of the most unusual sights we’ve seen so far; a floating town (Photo). Everything was on wooden pontoons - petrol stations, dentists, government buildings, all kinds of shops - you name it. It’s located on the banks of the huge Tonle Sap lake (100km long - can be seen on this map of Cambodia), which rises and falls with the wet/dry seasons. The banks of the lake are shallow, with the net result being that the location of the town changes by 5km depending on the time of year. Fun and games for the postman!

In other news: Emily was offered an insect to eat, and felt obliged to accept to avoid causing offence to our hosts!! It had been deep-fried and looked like a cross between a locust and a cockroach. Needless to say, her face was a picture as she gingerly chewed her snack! Phil’s beard developed sufficient substance to hold bits of food that missed his mouth, much to Emily’s horror - it has since been shaved off. Phil has had an inner and outer ear infection, from the scuba diving in Vietnam - since cleared up thanks to antibiotics picked up in Saigon (cost $70 - but worth it!). And since we wrote last time, we’ve visited Sihanoukville (white, sandy beaches), Kampot (gateway to Bokor National Park, home to abandoned hotels and hill stations) and Phnom Penh (which has a ‘wild west’ feel to it, dusty roads and a great atmosphere).

Up next: Angkor Wat, then onto Bangkok where Phil can finally watch the Matrix 2 (!), then Northern Thailand. We’ll next write from there.

(2023 Update: photos from Cambodia can be found here)