Hey Lady
Siem Reap, Cambodia.
We’re busy travel planning again, and things are changing daily, almost, so we’ve been pretty busy (and a little stressed). We had an okay time in Phnom Penh, Cambodia’s capital. It was incredibly hot, which we’ve learned makes Gina very unhappy. It was almost impossible to get out and walk around between 11 am and 3 pm, and it got dark at 5:30, so there wasn’t much sight seing done. But we did go to the Palace area which was nice. It would have been nicer if the gardens were open because then we could have walked under nice, shady trees. We did see some beautiful architecture and more Buddhas, though.
Our bus ride across from Vietnam went pretty smoothly. It was our 6th overland border crossing of the trip, but the first time that the bus drivers took our passports and did everything for us. It was strange and made us a little nervous, but it worked out okay (although we’re pretty sure they overcharged us about $5 each for our visas, but we couldn’t do anything about it). As soon as we boarded the bus they took everyone’s passports, checked them for Cambodian visas, and then got money from people who needed to get a visa at the border. When we got to the Vietnamese border our bus driver gave all of our passports to the dude who I swear was only allowed to process one passport every couple of minutes. He would look at a passport and then put up his arms to relax and look around a while. And then stamp it vigororously, hand it back to the bus driver (who called out the person’s name to come through) and then repeat the process until he got through the fifty or so passports. It was strange. When we got to the Cambodian side he gave our passports to another lady and then we all went to eat lunch. They processed the visas and gave us back our newly stamped and visa’ed passports on the bus before continuing on. It was an uneventful and sort of boring bus ride. I don’t know if it’s the landscape or the fact that we’ve spent so many hours of our lives on buses during this trip, but bus rides aren’t as entertaining as they once were. I think that maybe there’s just something special about South American bus rides. They were dirty and packed to the max with people but there was always something to look at both in and out of the bus. So far in S.E. Asia we’ve only been allowed (really) to take tourist buses. They’re all clean and air conditioned and decidedly less comfortable than the broken down public buses in Peru and Ecuador. I think it has something to do with the seats. They’re all leather and when you try to recline you just sort of slide down them until your butt is almost off of the seat. Hard on the tukkus and irritating to boot. And they’re all so incredibly air conditioned that they’re uncomfortably cold. Oh well.
Our first afternoon in Cambodia we walked around a bit, ate some corn on the cob (which was delicious) and sat by the Mekong River. We’d finally crossed over to the other side and felt like it deserved a little relaxing by. On our stroll we passed a giant elephant walking down the busy street being led by her mahout. We barely paused to take notice, and then realized that we’re becoming terribly jaded. There was an elephant in the road, for heaven’s sakes! It should have been awesome. I didn’t even take a picture. We’re just burnt out. There’s no two ways about it. And S.E. Asia isn’t really either of our cup of tea, really. After Laos everything seems so crazy and touristy. And I’m tired of people calling me Lady. It just sounds so rude. Even though I know they’re not being rude (or I assume not, at least) I just can’t help it. It makes me prickle. I want to tell all of the taxi drivers and guesthouse attendants that Miss or Madame or Ma’am are all acceptable things to say to a female. No one will take offense. But Lady is obnoxious. They call Stephen Man, but it’s so commonly used as a friendly term (hey man) in the States that it doesn’t have the same affect.
But we’re winding down on our travel plans. We’ve decided not to get an extended visa for Thailand. We’re just going to accept the 15 day visa you get on arrival and we’re going to go lie around some islands and snorkel for two weeks, drinking coconut juice out of the coconut and relaxing. Then we’re going to fly to Europe (either Greece or Turkey) and WWOOF (I’ll explain in a minute) and travel. WWOOF stands for Willing Workers On Organic Farms and it’s an awesome worldwide organization where organic farmers (of all kinds–livestock, plants, cheese!) post their information online and potental workers sign up for countries where they’re interested in working and contact the farms that sound interesting. In exchange for the slave labor, the workers get free room and board for the duration of their stay. It sounds completely different than anything we’ve ever done before and maybe just what we need to round out our trip. Not only will we save tons of money, but we’ll get to know a place and its people very well while learning how to ride horses and build houses. The places we’re looking at now are in Greece and Croatia. We chose these two countries because they’re more southern Europe so they’re a little warmer (at least Greece is) and they’re part of WWOOF Independents which consists of all of the countries that don’t have their own WWOOF organization so you pay one fee and have access to all of them. Greece is our first choice–working on an olive grove on a Greek island sounds incredibly romantic. But we’ve recently added Croatia to the mix because it sounds neat. We’ve heard back from two places so far. Neither one is ideal for our time frame–the one in Croatia would need us to stay for two months, but otherwise it sounds wonderful. It’s at a retreat so we’d be staying somewhere where people pay lots of money to go. We’d be learning to ride horses and building houses until the snow breaks when we would start with planting. The place in Greece is also on a horse farm and sounds lovely, except they don’t need us until the middle of March. This is difficult because what will we do until then? We’re going to wait another couple of days to see if we hear back from anyone else (we’ve gotten a bunch of no responses as well) and to ask some more questions of these two places. Then we’ll make a decision and a game plan. I think either one, if it came down to it, would be fun and interesting and, of course, really hard work. I don’t have any misgivings about how hard this will be. But I think it’ll be great, too. And if it sucks, we can leave. It’s not like you’re locked into a contract or anything. It’s all voluntary. (I wish I could have seen my family’s faces when they read that paragraph. I doubt they’d think I’m farm material. But we’ll see!)
Whatever we decide, we need to buy a plane ticket soon. We’re going to fly from Bangkok to somewhere (I love it!) at the end of January, once our Thai visa runs out (we can always extend if the dates get tight). But tomorrow we’re going to put planning aside for a day in order to go see the temples of Angkor. The most famous of these is Angkor Wat, but there are tons of temples all around in various states of reconstruction and being eaten by the jungle. We’re going to do a pretty typical touristy loop tomorrow to get our feet wet and decide if we want to stay longer. There are one, three, and week long passes for the temples. You get a discount for more days, of course, but we’re a little afraid that we’re going to get quickly templed out. It’s happened everywhere we’ve gone so far. It’d be a shame to spend all of that money just to half-heartedly walk around, not really appreciating them. But we’ll decide if we want more after tomorrow. Today there was beautiful weather here, not too hot and blue skies. Hopefully tomorrow will be more of the same–perfect photography day! I have an empty memory card with Angkor Wat’s name on it!
We’ve arranged a driver without a guide for $12 total through our guesthouse (Home Sweet Home–nice, quiet place away from the center of town). He’ll pick us up tomorrow at 8 am for a full day (including sunset) of temple hopping. I can’t wait! Hopefully we’ll have a monkey spotting (and hopefully they don’t rob us blind!).
Tags: Angkor Wat, Cambodia, Phnom Penh, Siem Reap
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