There’s such a lot of world to see

In Chau Doc, we decided to take a tour of the Mekong Delta, which would take us all the way up to Saigon. We were promised floating fish farms, minority villages; all in all, it sounded like a tour to remember. Rookie error.

The first stop, with me hobbling along after the rest of them, was a fish farm. Now, what do you envisage when you hear the words ‘floating fish farm’? I was thinking large rooms, different grades of fish. I was not expecting one room with three holes in the floor. Judging by the stunned but bland looks on the rest of the group’s faces, I don’t think they were, either. We all stood round and looked at three holes. Even our guide sort of gave up, and just said “Erm, so this is the fish farm. There are a lot of fish here”. The most exciting thing was when a fish made an escape bid, and had to be kicked back into the hole by Richard and Dean.

Next on to the minority village. Even worse, if that was possible. “So now, this woman is weaving a towel”. Cue woman springing into life and weaving about three lines of a piece of fabric. “Erm… so that’s it. Look around the village. You can go into the mosque, no problem”. I asked if it was ok for us females to go in. “Yes, yes, no problem. And you can take photos, no problem. Because you are tourists!” We went, we saw, we ended up sitting on a bench because there was nothing else to do or see.

And that was our exciting tour for the day. We got on the bus to go to Can Tho, the capital of the Mekong Delta area. This was actually a lovely town, not very touristy (apart from people stopping off on similar tours to ours), but mainly it was just a load of families, out for the weekend. We did have some excitement when we stopped for lunch on a balcony overlooking the Mekong. I looked up and saw flames shooting up from one of the houses in the shanty town situated along the river. The flames got really high, and it looked quite hairy at one point as all the houses along there were wood. People a few houses along started throwing all their posessions in boats, which was pretty heatbreaking to see. Buckets were being chucked on the fire which didn’t look as if they could make a difference but fortunately it must have done, as the flames died down after 10 minutes or so.

We were under instructions to be up early the next morning, so we duly set our alarms and were waiting downstairs at 6.30am. Slightly annoying, then, when the bus didn’t set off until nearly an hour later. This day had better be better than the last one.

Our first stop was some floating markets. Now these were good, and quite fun to see all the people heading out on their boats to do the day’s shopping. All the boats selling things had bamboo sticks with, say, a pineapple on the top, to display what they were selling from a distance. Much more fun than going to Asda. We then went onto a rice noodle factory where, you’ve guessed it, they make rice noodles. It was hot and steamy, but quite interesting – good to hear that they look in disdain on the dried noodles that are exported overseas. Only fresh noodles will do for the Vietnamese, apparently.

Back on the (cramped) bus, we set off in the direction of Ho Chi Minh City (though most people still call it Saigon. Most people started dropping off to sleep, only to wake when we stopped at an incense factory. Not so much ‘factory’ as ‘room’, though. We’d all pretty much given up by this point – I only went in, took a few photos of the pretty pink incense sticks, and went back out.

Our final stop was at a Bonsai Tree place. This turned out to be a restaurant, surrounded by trees. And pretty big trees, frankly. None of this little bonsai nonsense – these ones would put Pennington Park to shame. Not really on a par with, say, the Taj Mahal or the Terracotta Warriors or Angkor Wat. To say the least. Still, they sold Pringles and Cornettos, so every cloud and all that.

Luckily, before any other horrors or dullness could be inflicted on us, we were arriving in HCMC. And just from one look out the window at the hoardes of people and streams of motorbikes flying by, I could see this was going to be the very opposite of dull.

On my last night in Cambodia, my plans were to have a relatively quiet night so then I could get up fresh and early for the boat to Vietnam.  Of course, these all went up the wall.  I’d had a slight altercation with a guy in an internet cafe – no real drama, he just tried to charge me waaaaaaay too much money, which had left me in a bit of a downer.  I was sitting in the guesthouse, feeling a bit glum, when a lovely friendly face came over to say hello.  ‘Twas James, who hails from just outside of Newcastle, and who has the best job in the world ever (circus performer!  Why did my careers advisor never tell me that was an option?).  He and his friends have been travelling through SE Asia before making their way over to Australia.  The guys were such a lot of fun to be with, they put the bad internet man right out of my head, but they made me stay up far too late. 

We’d been out for a few drinks by the lakeside (including my farewell Long Vodka at Moskito – I am in mourning and am now only wearing black, a la Queen Victoria), and headed back to the guesthouse for a few nightcaps.  The guys decided they were hungry, but there was a problem – the cook had gone to sleep.  I asked the barman if I could fix them something to eat (nothing ever changes, eh?) and he said yes, no problem.  Cool!  Only trouble… what to make?  I wasn’t sure in my addled state I could remember the recipes for Chicken Amok or Beef Loc Lac, but looking round I could see some baguettes.  For the filling, I discounted a scrawny looking banana, limp lettuce and a stick of rhubarb like an oversized dog bone, and decided on straightforward tuna mayo.  Poor James wandered into the kitchen and got the job as my commi chef – anyone who’s cooked with me in the past will no I get seriously bossy at times; I’m sure I even rapped him over the knuckles with a spoon at one point.  I added a large squeeze of lime and some black pepper, and we were ready to rock.  And I tell you – no one’s ever appreciated tuna mayo sarnies like those guys did.  They made me feel like Nigella Lawson.  And to top it all off, James refused to believe that I was 30 in August (and no, sarky mind, he didn’t think I was 40 either).  So my bad day turned into a good last night in Cambodia – albeit one that finished way too late, about 2 hours before I had to get up.  Joy of joys.

So it was with a very bleary head that I got on the bus which would take us to the boat which would take us to Vietnam.  The mini bus was crowded, but fairly uneventful, as these things go – and I am a master of the eventful journey.  The best bit was either hearing the driver use his horn, as it sounded like something out of an arcade game, or the Khmer guys squashed in next to me telling me they loved me.  My response?  “Oh, that’s nice”.

One of the girls on the boat was panicking quite a lot – she was only away for two weeks, and had been given misinformation about the length of time the journey took – because of that, she was missing a whole day of her holiday.  This was stressful for her, but equally stressful for the rest of us, who had to hear it every 5 minutes.  She was relatively dim, as well (although I’m making no comment on the fact that she was from Essex) – she looked at me in surprise when I handed my passport over and asked, “Oh, do you have a British passport?” “Erm, yes”.  “Oh.  Are you from London?”

I do not have a London accent.  Maybe you couldn’t pinpoint me as Manchester per se, but I’m a proper northerner.  Eee by gum.

But yeah, apart from the constant chatter about how late we were (which after a while faded into a generic background hum), the rest of the journey passed without incident.  Even the border crossing was insanely easy – we paid the mandatory bribe (2000 Dong, and at 16,000 to the dollar I wasn’t whinging like in Thailand)(and, incidentally, whoever coined the name ‘Dong’ for the Vietnamese currency is an evil genius), wandered over and had a cup of tea, and that was it!  Through.  No problem.  All rumours we’d heard of evil border soldiers and their x-ray machines were thankfully just rumours.

In the late afternoon, we pulled into the port of Chau Doc – described in the Lonely Planet as ‘sleepy’, although it seemed anything but – a teeming, bustling little port town, not on the tourist map, but a nice place to hang out for a while.  I’d got chatting to two English guys on the boat, Dean from Essex and Richard from Yorkshire, and as we were staying at the same guesthouse, we arranged to go out later for something to eat.

I was still pretty tired from my late night – I’d got another hour or two’s sleep on the boat, and had shut my eyes for another half hour before I went out.  I’m actually trying to build a defence of sleep deprivation for what happened next, but the fact is, I’m on shaky ground.

All my life I’ve had a history of injuring my legs, and ESPECIALLY my feet.  All the time.  I got into the habit early, when I’d just started to walk and fell down the stairs, which sent me back to crawling for a while – and of course, the most recent injury was my spectacular catapult in Siem Reap which left my leg bleeding.  Other injuries inbetween have included falling at an ice rink and busting my knee, stepping on glass and getting a piece embedded in my foot, and, the most painful one by a long shot, walking barefoot smack into my stone hearth last year.  So you see, when it comes to injuries of the lower extremities, I’m a pro.

And so, when I fell off a kerb (it was dark!), twisting (or possibly breaking – I’ve done both before and can’t tell the difference) the big toe on my right foot, I should have been expecting it.  I knew straight away (from the searing pain) that something was wrong – and to top it off, the next day it turned a delightful shade of black, with the bruise heading down into my foot.

Luckily, because I’ve done this so many times, I knew the drill back to front – ice (which the hotel charged me for!), ibuprofen, raise it, strap it – but it still put a dampener on my entry into Vietnam.

I wonder what the Vietnamese for ‘Hopalong Cassidy’ is?

And so it came to pass that I should leave Cambodia, after a whirlwind month in every corner of the country. It actually doesn’t feel like I’ve spent a month here, despite it being much, much smaller than some of my old haunts like India and China.

So – what to say about a country that has been through what can only be described as hell on earth, and still somehow managed to come out the other side with dignity and smiles? I can’t think of anything that won’t sound patronising, so I’ll simply state my admiration for the lovely, lovely Khmer people. They are delighted to welcome visitors to the country, and proud to show it off – and rightly so; it’s a country rich with treasures.

I’ve had several lows and many highs during my month here. My stupid self-inflicted injury actually scuppered a few plans, and shook my confidence about getting on a bike again for a while. I realise now that this meant I didn’t get the best out of places like Battambang – apparently, the best way to see it is to get out on a motorbike into the countryside. Still, I did what I had to do at the time to keep sane with a gammy leg, miles from the nearest decent medical care. So, no regrets on that front.

Another low – but only because it could never be classed as a high – was visiting the old Khmer Rouge Killing Fields and S-21 Prison in Phnom Penh. The images haunt me to this day, so I can only start to imagine what hellish nightmares the people who survived, and who lost loved ones, are living with even now. It’s made me so very determined to do my bit, to add my name to the list of those who will not sit in silence while such brutality remains in the world. After visiting the Landmine museum in Siem Reap, my determination was further strengthened. Despite the majority of countries signing a declaration to stop the use and production of landmines, several big hitters (to name and shame – the USA, China, Russia – I’m looking at you) still produce these vile, cowardly weapons to this day. Again, I’d urge you to please click the like on the right for the Aki Ra Landmine Museum, read a bit more background, see if there’s anything you can do.

But to dwell on the lows would be to do a major disservice to this fabulous country. In Angkor Wat, they have a stunning, truly mind blowing temple, which deservedly draws people from all over the globe. I’d add it to any list of things you absolutely must see before you shuffle off this mortal coil. And not just Angkor, but other temples nearby – Bayon, Ta Phrom – all beautiful and wonderfully unique. Phnom Penh is a great city to visit, as well. Mainly because it still feels very much a ‘real’ city, where people live and work and play and shop and eat. It’s not geared up for tourists much, but mainly for the inhabitants – which, of course, is exactly as it should be. Other highlights include fun at the seaside, the gorgeous old riverside town of Kampot – including Bokor Hill Station which I would make a mandatory second stop for everyone after Angkor – my trek on the elephant in the faux-Welsh countryside of Mondulkiri, and, my personal highlight, finding true nirvana in a bungalow in Kep.

Cambodia is so very underdeveloped compared to many other places, even in Asia – I think, infrastructrue wise, it’s closest to India (and possibly my continuing love affair with that country explains why I fell for Cambodia so) – but it surely can’t be long before the developers go to town. And it really has a choice – to give into the corruption that is sadly starting to show in the upper echelons of the government and throughout public figures; to become some kind of Costa Del Cambodia; or, to do the people and the places true justice, and to become an ancient yet modern and forward-thinking country that it has the potential to. And God, I hope it’s the last.

Going along for my cheap, quiet dinner at the Lazy Gecko, I was thinking about night life here in PP.  I’ve had some great nights at Moskito bar courtesy of Eddie and the now-legendary Long Vodkas, but I haven’t seen any of the other in/famous spots that are known throughout Asia.  In particular, I was intrigued by the Heart of Darkness bar.  It promised working girls, drunk locals, and a little bit of edge that sounded great.  Still, it wasn’t the kind of place I’d go to alone, so, chances were, I wouldn’t get a chance to go. 

What are the odds, then, of when I sat down, a couple of Canadian guys at the next table leaned over, asked me if I’d been to “the Heart” (as locals call it); it turns out they hadn’t either, and were contemplating going that night – they very kindly invited me along.  We chatted some more over dinner and drinks, and soon they had me spitting my drink over the table with laughter.  They’re a couple of brothers, Jamie (snr) and Jason (you guessed it… jr), and have that kind of sense of humour that bounces off each other.  Brilliant guys.

We got a tuk tuk along to the HoD, and were immediately impressed when we were frisked on the way in.  That tells you something about the place, eh?  At 10pm, we were waaay, waaay too early but, undeterred, plonked down at the bar anyway and settled in to a few of the incredibly strong drinks that they serve there.  The boys also very kindly introduced me to shots of Jagermeister, after which the night became something of a blur.  From chatting with them, and from reconstructions from the photo, I can report the following:

– I spoke a lot of French to a guy from DR Congo, who was either called Tony or Mohammed or possibly both

– I got a marriage proposal from aforementioned Tony/Mohammed.  I think I said I would think about it.

– Jason added a shot of JD to his already paint-strippingly strong rum and coke.  Afterwards he described it as basically coke-coloured rum and whiskey.

– Before 11pm, a girl was carried out by the bouncers, out cold.

– I got two come-ons by hookers. 

– Jamie had his hat stolen more times than he remembers by a hooker.  A sitting duck, wearing a hat to a place like that.

– We danced a lot.

– We jumped around a lot, and had our own mini mosh pit.

– We took photos in kung-fu poses.

– Apparently, judging by photos, I had a wad of dollar bills in my hand for a lot of the night, like I was at a strip club.

– We had lots of fun, until Jamie got threatened.  I think the exact words were (to Jason), “tell your brother to be careful”.

– This stopped the fun for a while and we scarpered, getting in a tuk tuk that got blocked by a car, movie-style, until we nigh on offered the guy money to ram the car.  He backed up onto the pavement so we could make a getaway.

– No-one is still sure what happened.

– We got away ok, and made it to the haven of the Moskito bar, where we settled in until the early hours, including Jason and Jamie ordering kebabs from the restaurant across the street, which the sweet guy brought across on a tray for them.

And yes, the next day was pretty much a write-off.  For me, anyway – Jamie and Jason went go-karting; kudos to them for not killing themselves driving with the hangover shakes.

It was a very fun night indeed, and I can now proudly say that I have experienced (and survived) the true Heart of Darkness.

On the morning I was due to leave Mondulkiri to head back to Phnom Penh, it looked as if there was a problem – quite apart from the rain that was turning everything to mud.  The guesthouse had booked me a seat in a pickup (again, I wimped out and stiplulated inside) for $10.  However, the allotted time came and went, and Sambol started to get a worried look on his face.  Turns out something, somewhere had been lost in translation.  One guy said he would take me for $20… too expensive.  By this time, all of the pickups had left for Phnom Penh.  My only choice, unless I wanted to stay another night in Sen Monorom (not especially, I was getting anxious being parted from my technology for too long), was to get a shared taxi.  These are imported Toyota Camrys that have their suspension whacked right up (necessary on these here roads).  I’d have preferred the pickup, with their big wheels, but it was that or another night in the sticks.  I went for the Toyota (even though I was still ripped off at $17 for the whole front seat).

Anyway – I remember the road on my way to Mondulkiri, in a pickup, was pretty hairy.  Imagine a freshly ploughed field, with up to two feet of mud deep, in the rain, on a hill, and…well, that’s it.  Not much fun.  We started out on the flat, which was bad enough, and then some downhill sections, where we were showing skills on a par with Eddie the Eagle Edwards.  Slipsliding away, as Paul Simon might (and indeed, did) say.  But that was nothing compared to the uphill section.

In a nutshell, there was no grip on the road whatsoever, and the car got stuck.  We flagged down a passing 4×4, and persuaded them to tow us up the hill, but no dice.  The rope snapped, and even the 4×4 got stuck.  It was all rain, mud, whirring and smoking wheels, and skreeching.  Suddenly, another night in Sen Monorom didn’t seem to bad compared to a night on the road out of Sen Monorom.  With all of us out of the car, knee deep (and I’m not exaggerating) in mud, and pushing, there was a bit of movement… and a bit more… and, miraculously, half an hour later, the car moved.

7 hours later, we limped into Phnom Penh dirty, sweaty, smelly, but glad to be there.  I went and got a room in my now-usual Lakeside Inn, and headed out for a quiet dinner and then an early night.  Or so I thought…

When I realised I would be in Cambodia during the world cup, I have to admit that my heart sank a little bit.  I didn’t realise, before I came here, how bonkers most people are about football in South East Asia and, although Cambodia is not known for its footballing prowess, they still love it as much as anyone else in the sane world.  Now, due to my incompetence at staying awake I missed the England v Sweden match (very much hypocritical on my part when I think back to what a song and dance I made about watching the matches), and due to incompetence on the tv’s part I missed most of the England v Ecuador game.  So my determination to watch the quarter final match between England and Portugal was absolute.  Even though I was in Sen Monorom, a village so small and quiet there is no internet for miles and miles and miles, and only electricity for a few hours a day.  Still, I was in a place with both a tv and a generator; bring it on!

Apart from a group of French people (who had gone to bed early, planning to get up to watch their team beat Brazil, as it turned out), I was the only guest at the guesthouse.  Quite a contrast to the last few matches where I had watched it surrounded by a drunken mass of England fans.  Two of the guesthouse staff, Sambol and one other guy, stayed up to keep me company (they’d also both bet some money on the game – gambling is HUGE over here, and one guy in Kampot had $50 riding on England to beat Ecuador – considering the average wage, that’s a massive chunk).  And, God love them, they were both cheering for England.  I like to think it was on my behalf, but I reckon that at least some of it was money-driven.

There was a slight panic in the first few minutes when the signal was lost, yet again, and once more I was staring at the logo of the world cup, a cruel reminder of what I should have been watching.  Fortunately it came back after about 15 minutes or so. In enough time to see nil-nil at half time.

And the second half – well, I’m not going to talk you through minute-by-minute.  If you care enough, you’ll have watched it (or at least know what happened, in case you are in a remote corner of SE Asia, for example), and if you don’t care, well, you don’t care!  Still, it was not good.  I saw Beckham cry and go off in a sulk, saw Rooney stamp on Carvalho (and yet, according to the rest of the England squad, it was Ronaldo who was out of order for telling the ref).  Still, we held them to nil-nil after full time and extra time.  Which meant the inevitable penalties, as in three of the last four World Cup efforts.  And we all know how well that worked out.

There are some matches that you know you’ll remember forever (and, being a weary Evertonian and cynical England fan, more often it’s the losses rather than the wins).  The Germany game in Italia 90 is another example.  So yes, we lost and yes, we were completely unimpressive and mediocre.  But you know what?  That match, watching it in remote Cambodia with two foreigners supporting my side – that really is one to remember, and not just for the bad reasons.

I had my first ride in a pick-up on the way to Mondulkiri.  These are big 4×4 monster trucks (well, the ones that ply this route are anyway – any other vehicle just can’t cope with the shockingly bad roads), that get piled high with people and packages, and only leave when they are seriously, dangerously full.  You see about 20 people piled on top of the goods at the back, people on the roof – my word do they jam ’em in tight over here.  I wimped out and bought a seat inside the cabin, and I ended up with the swish front seat all to myself – a rare treat over here.  Although at times I wished I couldn’t see so clearly out of the windscreen – Cambodian roads take no prisoners.

Mondulkiri province is unlike anywhere else I’ve seen in Cambodia.  Usually the landscape here is quite flat, but Mondulkiri looks for all the world like Wales, say, or the Lake District – lots of rolling hills, greenery, and bucket loads of rain.  It rained pretty much non-stop from the time I got there to the time I left, so everything was sodden and damp.  Lovely.  Still, my enthusiasm couldn’t be dampened, because as soon as I got to the Long Vibol guest house, I booked an elephant trek for the next day.  I love these animals, and spending a whole day with one was my idea of bliss.

I was up early, excited, with the air of a person whose time has come.  The rain didn’t let up, so I gratefully nabbed yet another plastic poncho from the guesthouse (this time in lime green – I was une vision).  My guide from the guesthouse, the lovely Sambol, would accompany me all day, and he drove me there on the mud-slippy roads.  The treks start from a minority village.  The Pnong minority group are based in Mondulkiri, and make up the majority of its inhabitants.  It was fascinating to see how they live, and how different it is elsewhere.  Most Cambodian houses are built up on stilts – to save against the rain, I guess, and to provide a shady area underneath for protection against the sun – but these people live in low huts, with about 14 people in each hut.  Nor do they speak Khmer, but have their own language.

I was introduced to my elephant for the day, a lovely little lady called Rhum.  She was older than me at 35, and I hoped this would make her more responsible, and less likely to stampede.  I climbed up the steps, and, apologising to Rhum as I stepped on her neck (I’m not being cruel, it’s the only way to get on), clambered into the bamboo basket that had been strapped onto her back.  Sambol climbed in after me, and I began to realise just how snug it was up there in the basket.  No, actually, not snug, because that implies some element of comfort.  I believe the word I’m looking for is squeeze. 

Now, let me get this straight from the start.  I loved Rhum, she was a star.  But the ride was possibly the most uncomfortable experience of my entire life.  And this is from a girl who regularly throws herself of bikes, breaks toes on stone hearthstones, falls down stairs – you get the picture.  Imagine, if you will, being in a bamboo basket that any which way you move bangs into your body.  The basket is too small to sit properly, and so your legs are hunched up in an uncomfortable, not to mention unflattering, position.  That’s bad enough.  Throw in the movement of the elephant, and you’ve not exactly got a ride on the Orient Express.  The movement is so strange.  Sort of a figure of eight, but jerky, with side-to-side motions as well as up and down.  So there I was, thrown about like an oscillating ocelot, all the while trying to take in the whole experience, and remembering vaguely seeing pictures of Queen Victoria prancing about on the back of an elephant.  If she did – kudos to her, it ain’t a joy.

Bad enough on the flat, but, as I’d mentioned before, Mondulkiri is hilly.  And the slopes are very, very steep indeed.  So going down, you’re virtually vertical, pressing your feet against the front of the basket to stop yourself falling out, and going up, you’re hanging on to the front for dear life, all the time having the bamboo poke you in the back. 

Oh, and Rhum – likes the food.  Especially bamboo, but she isn’t all that fussy.  So every few steps, she’d stop and eat.  And stop and eat.  And stop and eat.  Often, while we were on a slope, so the agony of trying to keep in the basket was drawn out.  The world is Rhum’s picnic basket, and she was determined to make the most of it.  (Oh, and a word to the wise – if you’re ever near an elephant eating bamboo, don’t hang around at the back for too long – the noises that were coming from Rhum afterwards were none too pleasant)

I strangely enjoyed it, though.  Not too sure I’d do it again, but I might convince myself over time that it can’t possibly be as bad as I remember.  Despite the bruises, though, I’ve come away from it loving elephants even more than I did already – they’re gorgeous, peaceful animals who just happen to like the food.  Next time I might just stay on the ground.

I had the idea to head up to Mondulkiri, in the North East of Cambodia.  However, no buses go up that way, which tells you two things – firstly, not enough people go up there to justify a bus, and secondly, the roads are so bad that a bus wouldn’t make it.  Rather than make the trek all in one go, I decided to stop overnight at Kratie (pronounced Krach-eh for all those of you who read out loud).  The bus goes that far, and I was duly dispatched at Kratie without incident.

After grabbing a room in a guesthouse, I headed straight out again on the back of a moto.  Kratie is the best place to see the rare Irrawaddy dolphins (google it if you’re interested!).  There are about 20 that live in the Mekong near the town, and there’s a little industry in taking people out on the river.  I was accompanied by Anouk, a Belgian NGO living and working in Phnom Penh, who was brilliant company – so interesting and interested.

And the dolphins… erm, well, we saw them.  Or rather, we saw their backs.  They weren’t all that friendly to be honest, and my dream of merrily hitching a ride on the back of one, like Flipper, was shattered.  They sort of swam about at a distance but didn’t really get close enough to have a proper look.  Still, I went, I saw.  They were there.  Good good.

And that was that for Kratie.  My, I’m specialising in short, non-eventful blogs right now!  Still, I went to bed excited, despite the early start I would have to make the next day – I was going to Mondulkiri, and that meant only one thing:  elephants!

Back in Phnom Penh for the second time, it was a relief to say that they were doing something to the road by the lake.  What exactly is unclear – from what I could see, it involved placing medium-sized rocks all over the road, so not really making it better.  I was assured, though, that this was all part of a grand plan to make it driveable.

It was great to be back in the throbbing metropolis that is PP (by Cambodian standards, anyway) as I was planning to indulge in one of my most favourite past-times – shopping.  Yep, shallow to the core, that’s me.  I don’t get much of a chance for it these days – lack of space and lack of funds both put paid to that – but I was shopping for a reason.  My watch strap had broken in Kampot (think it cracked under the strain of so much water) and I could buy a whole new watch for less money than it would take to get it fixed.  Welcome to Asia! 

I commandeered a moto driver, and negotiated a price.  Actually, it was a bit wierd, as he grabbed my nose.  There’s something going on with my nose.  On three separate occasions random people here in Cambodia have grabbed it.  I know foreigners are known as ‘big noses’, but frankly, mine ain’t all that big – I know other people with much more impressive noses than mine, but they have never been grabbed.  My hands, too – but I know why this is, as the first lady who did it spoke enough English to let me know that she loved my fingers.  Apparently the bit below the knuckle is nice and plump (!), which is considered attractive.  So, if I run out of money I could make a fortune here as a hand model.  But my nose… not sure.  I think this guy grabbed it as a flirty thing, as we were mid-negotiation.  So I did the only decent thing, and flirted right back (gotta get that price down, and he was very cute).  My tactic worked.  All hail the nose.

We zoomed off to the Russian market, him trying to persuade me to carry on my world tour with him; we could go and see the world on a motorbike.  Tempting as this was, I think the fact that he didn’t have a passport might have slowed us down.  Once inside the market, I found the watch stands, and, though I know diddly squat about watches, managed to pick up a rather nifty little Rolex.  For $8 – at the current exchange rate, about 4 of your sterling pounds.  I think it must be real.  I also got carried away at the DVD stand, for $2 a piece you can’t argue, although by the time I’ve posted them home I might has well have paid full whack in the UK.  Still, gotta love a bargain.

Back at the lakeside, I got chatting to the lovely Leonie over lunch – she’s from Kent and is a real star.  We bonded over a shared love of shopping and random gossip, and, both of us feeling the need for a lazy day, we wiled away the afternoon watching one of my new DVDs at the guesthouse (The Constant Gardener – and yes, it is as good as they say, but I think it might take a second viewing to get the full story.  I got the jist, though – drug companies = bad, government = bad, Rachel Weisz = good).

And that was pretty much it for the day, apart from a large jug of cocktails back in my old haunt of Moskito – more gossip and chat with Leonie, and slight amusement as we were watching the tennis, every time the Rolex sponsorship logo was shown I’d look at my four quid job and giggle. I’m sure it’s real.

So not the most eventful day of my life, but when a day starts with shopping and ends with cocktails, it’s not too bad at all.

OK, so where was I?  Ah yes I remember – to quote myself (and frankly, who better to quote?):
“In a few minutes I’m going to set off for Kep, about 12 miles further east along the coast, and then I’m going to try and stay on Rabbit Island for a night or two.”  So, did it happen?  I think you already know the answer…

As I was writing, tip-tapping away, the rain started falling, falling, falling, until it was the usual deluge.  I refused to be daunted, though, and splashed my way back to the Blissful guesthouse, Sri Lanka palm-tree brolly aloft over my head, my trousers growing ever more sodden by the minute.  By the time I got back there I might as well have just jumped in a – well, not a swimming pool, they weren’t that wet, but maybe a child’s paddling pool.  Undeterred, I thanked my lucky stars that I’d had the foresight to buy a backpack with a waterproof cover.  This unfolds from a little zipped pocket at the back, and covers the whole thing, so when it’s on, I look like a silver-backed turtle.  Which is kind of cool.  I could look like a silver-backed terrapin, and everyone knows what geeks they are.

So that was my backpack sorted.  Now for my other bags – I have a small rucksack that I call my daybag, although this is just to disguise the fact that it’s where I carry the stuff (already too much stuff) that won’t fit in my rucksack and then, because I don’t like carrying such a big bag round with me all day, I bought another small handbag in Beijing.  It’s LeSportSac, which I have never heard of before but apparently is known in the USofA, so I’m guessing it’s another fake.  Still, it’s brown and pink and blue and very pretty and, on a good day, it will fit inside my day bag for moving around.  This was not a good day.

So, eyeing the rain that still insisted on swamping Kampot, I purchased a delightful blancmange pink waterproof poncho thingy, that was voluminous enough to go over me AND my bags.  I think it was my foxiest moment ever.  And off we set on a moto.  Add in the factor that it stopped raining as soon as we were out of Kampot, and the sun resulted in me glowing for England underneath my non-breathable poncho – I tell you, if Prada had seen me then, they’d have called off the search for a new muse.

It’s a 20 minute drive from Kampot to Kep, though some tiny little villages where my attire drew a few laughs.  Kep itself, when we finally arrived, is tiny – just a cluster of houses together, really.  It has a population of about 4,000, and these hardy souls have hung on though the desertion of Kep – the rest is little more than a ghost town, stung badly by the ravages of war. 

My moto took me up to the jetty from where the boats for Rabbit Island departed.  Unfortunately, though, because of the bad weather, no boats were running at the moment.  I was told to come back in a couple of hours, and sped off again on the moto, glumly eyeing the grey sky and building winds.  I went to a beach-side hut (really, that’s all it was – just a mat on the floor for sitting on), and had a delicious meal of crab with local Kampot pepper – claimed by many to be the best pepper in the world and, let me say, I’m not going to dispute that.  Plus, how cool will it be when I’m in the pub and the conversation takes that inevitable turn towards condiments:  “Of course,” I will say loudly, “I refuse to use anything other than Kampot pepper.  It’s the best, you know, and I cannot compromise the quality of my food for inferior peppers”.  Man, I’m going to be Little Miss Popular when I get back!

After I’d whiled away two hours, I headed back up to the jetty, and was told that there was still no luck.  Maybe, she said, after 5.30, but I knew enough about me and jinxed journeys to know when to call it a day – the sea looked pretty rough, and the boats were basic rowing boats.  Didn’t fancy losing all my stuff (or me!) to the deep.  Giving up on the idea, and realising that, by that time I’d missed the second bus of the day to Phnom Penh, I decided to stay the night in Kep.

And wow, if ever the old saying about every cloud having a silver lining was true, this was it.  I found myself at the Veranda resort and, while at $20 it was over my budget, was it ever worth it.  I figured I was prepared to spend $15 on the boat trip, then $5 a night is the going rate over on Rabbit Island – this was merely redirecting the funds.  And also, breakfast was included, so I planned to fill my boots.  The place was gorgeous, just gorgeous.  And this was by my pre-travelling standards, not those depths I’ve sunk to over the last few months.  The bungalow was completely isolated, and had a perfect view down to the sea – I’d have sworn I was the only soul around for miles.  The decoration was lovely, there were definitely no bugs, and the bathroom was something to write home about – or at least blog about!  The wall was head-hight, but the roof was higher, and set on a slope, so there were a few feet round the top of the wall which were completely exposed to the elements.  Taking a (hot water!  Oh my!) shower while it showered outside was fabulous, and I loved it.

The peace was simultaneously energising and relaxing.  It was so utterly dark that I just hung in my hammock for hours, reading with a small light, feeling for the first time in weeks wonderfully, fabulously, alone – and by that, I mean the very opposite of lonely.

Not surprisingly, I woke up with the biggest smile on my face and, reaching for my ipod, put on the most apt song I could think of – “Ain’t got no (I got life)” by Nina Simone, and danced around my room to it, just celebrating – I was in a gorgeous place, my leg is definitely on the mend and so I’m fully bipedal again, the memories of people and places are getting so full I’m going to have to arrange some kind of storage facility for them.  Life is wonderful.

And that, to misquote the genius Ms Simone, is something that nobody can take away.