Mark’s Vagabonding Blog

I had a heck of a time trying to post this as there were problems with the site, and it took me days, but it looks like it will work now (part of it may have been somewhat my fault, but not really).

Okay, I know these pictures don’t seem to have much to do with traveling, but in a way they do. It was during Songkran in Thailand, and I wanted to stay dry (after having been soaked earlier), so while sitting in my room bored, I took these pictures. In a previous post, after showing one of the photos, I did a survey asking if you would like to see the series. The results were in favor of posting the series. So if you didn’t want to see them, but didn’t vote, you should have voted, and you must look at them. If you voted no, you can choose to look or not. If you voted yes, then here they are, enjoy. If you just randomly clicked on this post, and you don’t know me, welcome to my insanity.

Well, that’s it.

You might have noticed that my last post, (Legally) Qualified, is gone. That’s because the site lost all posts from Aug 17 to some date (unrelated to the problem of trying to post this), so I didn’t delete it for some reason. They suggested ways to get our posts back, but none seemed to work for me. I have no back ups of any of the posts I’ve written, so I guess I’m lucky I only lost one post. I wonder if any of you have saved some of my posts? Maybe it would be a good idea for me to have back ups, for the inevitable big crash.

Anyhow, if you didn’t already know it, now you all know that I’m weird.

Mark (Desperado) Schraeger

P.S. I still have no idea what the hell I’m doing with the rest of my life.

If you have traveled in Southeast Asia (SEA), or have done any research into it, you are probably aware of the reputation of Poipet, Cambodia, a border town with Thailand. If not, here’s what Lonely Planet: Cambodia had to say:

“Viva Poipet! Long the armpit of Cambodia, famous for nothing but mud and mess . . . during the wet season the roads become rivers of mud and detritus . . . There is no reason to spend any time here . . . Poipet is also emerging as scam central and many tourists are being ripped off on overland travel . . . Don’t judge Cambodia on your first experiences in Poipet . . . should you for some masochistic reason decide to stay in Poipet . . . (so and so hotel) is a good option if you are unlucky enough to get caught in town for the night.”

And if that’s not enough, here are a few more quotes from Bootsnall members:

“Poipet is a toilet,” Bubbha

“Poipet really is hell,” Static

” . . . poipet is a shit hole…get in, get the hell out,” Gooner

So for any sane person who is aware of this information, and has passed through before himself and seen the truth, and is also not with a volunteer organization that stuck you there, spending 4 days and 3 nights in a row in Poipet…by choice…would be unthinkable. UNTHINKABLE! Like running through an active slaughterhouse naked with your mouth wide open and flippers on your feet. Well, crown me insane, because I’ve just returned from my 4 day, 3 night vacation in sunny Poipet, Cambodia. And I did it by choice.

Why would I do something so masochistic, as Lonely Planet calls it?

Well, my Thai visa expired on Aug 8, so I had to leave Thailand. And I also signed up for the class to get my teaching certificate. The class is in Bangkok and it starts on Aug 14 and ends on Sept 8. Thailand allows you to stay in the country for one month upon arrival, but it’s not a calendar month. For example, if you arrive on Aug 9, you can stay until Sept 7–always 2 days short of your arrival date the following month. So the earliest I could return to Thailand and be able to stay for the duration of the course was Aug 11. So I had to spend 3 days in another country.

Sure I could have gone to Malaysia or Singapore, but that would have been too costly by plane, and too time consuming by land. And I certainly could have gone to a better part of Cambodia for just a little more time and money. So why didn’t I? Why did I choose to swim in the cesspool? Well, I had 3 other choices: Siem Reap; Battambang; or Phnom Penh. I’ve been to all 3 of those cities already, and if I could have snapped my fingers and ended up in either of them, I would have chosen Phnom Penh (At least for the reason that that is the only place I’ve been to that sells my brand of deodorant). But I haven’t attempted that trick since 1992 when I snapped my fingers for Fiji and ended up in the jungles of Guam–boy was that family startled, not to mention their monkey.

Phnom Penh is the farthest away of the 3 cities, and the buses leave from Poipet at 6:00-7:30am, which would mean staying overnight in Poipet anyway. And I’d only get two days in Phnom Penh then have a very long trip back to Bangkok, and would not arrive until late in the evening. It is also a pain in the ass to get to the other two cities, over horrible roads.

So the main advantage of staying in Poipet, was that on the 11th, I could walk out of my guest house at 7:00am, turn right, walk 100 yards and get stamped out of Cambodia. Then walk another 50 yards and get stamped into Thailand, and a few minutes later be sitting on a bus heading to Bangkok, and arrive around noonish. Because I had things to do when I got back. (But I didn’t set my alarm correctly and ended up leaving at 8:30 instead of 7:00. Still okay though.)

The assessments of Lonely Planet and the Bootsnall members are indeed accurate, the place is a cesspool. An ordinary traveler should never choose to stay longer than the few minutes it takes to pass through to their next destination. But if you have some time, an open mind, can stand some filth, and you are not just there to see the ruins, temples, mountains, and museums; if you want to see real life at a bustling Cambodian border town, then I recommend spending a night or two in lively Poipet. It certainly won’t kill you. I think the biggest threat is getting hit by a car or motorcycle. And if you are a photographer there is a great opportunity to enhance your portfolio.

The folks there are good people, just like any you’ll see in Siem Reap or Phnom Penh. They just live in squalor. Not that Siem Reap and Phnom Penh are Beverly Hills or anything. And you will come across the occasional shady character trying to sell you sex or something, but that’s no different than anywhere else in SEA. And there are the rip offs that LP mentioned, but that’s for the onward travel crowd.

There are actually a couple of decent places to stay in Poipet. I stayed at The Poipet Guest House (not mentioned by LP). For 400 baht/night I got a relatively clean, big room, with AC, refrigerator, TV w/cable, including HBO, Cinemax, Star Movies, ESPN, CNN World, and a few other English language channels (and they came in clear), a balcony to watch all the action on the street, and I was supposed to have hot water, but the heater didn’t work. But that’s okay, I’m finally getting used to cool showers. Sometimes they’re nice when you’ve been sweating in the hot, humid air. And there were some stains on my bed too that I didn’t want to think about. But overall, it wasn’t bad.

If you want greater luxury you can stay in one of the casinos for as little as 1000 baht/night. At least at the one I checked out. The casinos were where I chose to eat. When you see the squalor in the streets, the hole in the wall restaurants seem about as appetizing as a happy meal that had been sitting the sun for 16 days . . . after an elephant pooped on it.

My second night there I went to the Poipet Resort Casino for dinner. I asked where the restaurants were and the guy pointed me upstairs. The upstairs people told me they were downstairs. Finally, in the basement, I found a small food court with a buffet. None of the signage was in English (Which has got to tell you something), so I wasn’t sure how it worked. I approached the woman at the desk, and we had trouble communicating. It seems I had to get a coupon upstairs, after joining G Club International, or checking in or something. Eventually she told me to pay her 100 baht and I could go in (I did see something that said, “100 baht”). As I was getting out my 100 baht, a lady came from out of no where and handed me a coupon. The lady at the desk said, “okay,” and directed me toward the buffet. When I went to the buffet to thank the lady for the coupon, she gave me another one and said, “For tomorrow.” So I ended up getting 2 free buffet dinners from the generous stranger. And the food was pretty good too. I had two big plates each time.

One day I was walking down the street, and an SUV stopped next to me. The driver said, “Excuse me?” I turned to see a white American man in the driver’s seat. As I was turning my head he continued, “Are you the doctor?” Then immediately after seeing my face he said, “No you’re not.” Hmmm, if he thought I might have been the doctor, and had to ask, he had probably never seen him before. Why then did he immediately know that I was not the doctor after seeing me more clearly? Do I look like I could not be a doctor? This will haunt me for some time.

Anyway, I am one of the few who discarded all rational thought and went swimming in the cesspool that is Poipet, and I did not drown.

But I did find a new definition for the word “ruthless.”

Ruthless: Pawn shops in casinos.

It’s bad enough for people to open pawn shops near casinos, like in Atlantic City, NJ. But for a casino to operate one on the premises is just wrong! “Aww, was that your last baht . . . Hmmm, that’s a nice shirt.”

You might have noticed above that I snuck in the fact that I signed up for the teaching course. Yep, I finally did it. I’m taking the course with Chichester College. It is an actual college in England, but this is only a branch for the teaching course. So if all goes well, I’ll be spending a lot more time here than I originally planned. At least another year. And my life will change drastically. Also, the course is supposed to be very intensive, so this may be the last post until the class ends. But if I find time maybe I’ll post something.

All better go well, the course costs $1390 US! Plus I had to buy a new wardrobe. In order to get into the class, I had to answer 7 questions:

1) How would you describe yourself?
2) What are your areas of strength?
3) What are your weak areas?
4) What ages would you prefer to teach? Why?
5) What do you usually do in your spare time?
6) Why would you want to teach in Thailand?
7) What is (or are) the professional achievement/s that you are most
proud of?

I hate questions like that. Anyway here was the response of the admissions guy after I sent my answers:

” . . .I don’t think anyone has ever wrote such detailed answers before! It was a pleasure to read.”

Funny, I didn’t think they were detailed enough. Anyway, I thought I’d share my answer to question 5 with you:

5) What do you usually do in your spare time?

Well, the past 9 months has been my spare time. Every minute of it. In fact, if you are doing what you want to do, your entire life is your spare time. To take it even further, as I’m writing this, it’s becoming clear to me that everyone’s entire life, no matter what they are doing, is their spare time. This is the only time we’ve got. And if it is not your time, than who’s time is it? I understand most people would read this question, “What do you usually do when you are not working (for someone else)?” They may respond, “I like to go to the park and read, and go to the movies, and play tennis . . . ” and that may be what the author of the question had in mind. But even if you have an unsatisfying job, you made the decision to use that time–your time–to be at that job. It was time you had to spare in order to make money, and it was your decision to spend that time there. So for me, everything I have ever done in my life, has been done in my spare time. And that’s too many things to list.

What do you think?

Also, I’ve rented an apartment. It’s about a 5-10 minute walk to the school. It’s in a place I’ve stayed several times while in Bangkok, but I’ve never stayed in the apartment suite. I’ve always stayed in the cheap dorm room, which I’ve always had to myself. The daily rental rate for the apartment is 700 baht (approx $18.75). But if you are taking the course, or if you’ve stayed there so often that the lady knows you well, and you rent it monthly, it cost 8000 baht ($214). Plus I have to pay water and electricity. It’s furnished, and includes a bedroom, bathroom (cool water), a living room with a couch, a small tv, a refrigerator, and A/C only in the bedroom. But it has no cooking facilities, not even a microwave. However you can use the office for that, but it’s pretty far from my room.

The TV has HBO, and for two days after I moved in it had ESPN, but that changed to Super Sport, which is not nearly as good. It has no American sports, as far as I can tell. And you know what that means: Soccer, soccer, soccer. Also, HBO, and all movie channels here (all countries I’ve been in so far), show edited movies. The f-word is edited out, as is nudity, and various other things. Anyone who knows me knows that I f#@king hate censorship . . . and love nudity. But what can I do? At least they don’t edit movies in the theaters here. Two things different about going to the theater here are, 1) Before the movie, during the coming attractions and commercials, “Please stand and pay your respect to the King,” shows on the screen, and everyone stands. Then they play a montage of photographs of the king to music that he wrote. 2) Assigned seats.

Anyway, one thing that sucks about not having ESPN anymore is that the New York Mets (my favorite baseball team) are having a pretty good season, so far. And it’s possible they could be playing in October, which means the playoffs and possibly the World Series . . . Oh God I just jinxed them! Possibly in the World Series against the Yankees . . . oh oh, I just jinxed them too. Anyway, ESPN shows the games here. But even if I get a job by then, and move to a new place that has ESPN, it won’t matter, because I’ll be at work when the games are on here in the morning, except on the weekends. So I better not get a job until November. And one more thing. I still can’t get used to seeing Johnny Damon in a Yankees uniform.

Bad news. My camera broke. I can’t use the zoom anymore, so it’s stuck on wide angle. I also can’t zoom pictures I’ve taken to view detail on the screen. I hope I can get it fixed cheaply. Maybe if I get a decent job I’ll buy another, better camera.

Oh, and one other thing about my apartment. It is a part of a resort hotel that is involved, or was once involved with, the sex trade. So my bed is surrounded by mirrors on 3 walls, as well as the ceiling. But you get used to it after a while, and stop walking around naked all time.

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