Mmmm okay, so being new to blogs... guess we didn`t realise you had to update them. It`s now 5 countries later and almost 2 months and we haven`t updated jack. We can`t type, we`ve forgotten what work feels like and we can`t even get the apostrophes to go the right way. Still.... let`s do a retrospect.... just pretend the screen is going all wavy and you are recalling a time long past.....
Arriving in Vietnam (Sometime early Feb) we arrived into Saigon. It`s not surprising the Vietnamese are so obsessed with luck, surviving 10 minutes on the streets requires divine intervention. Scooters everywhere are ridiculous numbers of the same family, shopping and big yellow new year blossom trees. It`s Tet (Chinese, Vietnamese, Cambodian New Year and everyone is barking Chuc Mung Nam Moi meaning `Happy New Year` which is probably the only words we learnt in 2 weeks in Vietnam. The party builds up for about 2 weeks prior and goes for about 4 days. It`s the year of the rat, extra good luck for rats, hit and miss for anyone else and pretty bad news for any born under the year of the cat. Give all your old money away to children and hope that your yellow blossom tree flowers over the New Year holiday to improve your chances if you were born under any other year so we were told.
Changing from US dollars in Cambodia to the perfectly named DONG in Vietnam meant adding about 7 zero`s and becoming instant millionaires '. A man could never tire of paying for things with Dong. Nor being told to `put your dong away` when taking your money out in public.
The next day we headined for a tour of the Cu Chi Tunnels guided by `Mr Bean`. He looked more like the old guy that owned gizmo in Gremlins than Rowan Atkinson, but he insisted we all called him that as he was as ashamed of his American name Michael Buyen, as he was fighting for the US as a half American - half Vietnamese man, during the war. The Cu Chi Tunnel experience was pretty gripping. For those of us who grew up on China Beach, Tour of Duty and Platoon it gives a whiole different perspective to see the devastation the Vietnam war caused for the country and it`s people. The tour starts with a black and white propoganda film where the damage caused to plants, people, chicken and `pots and pans is vividly portrayed along with the story of a young peasant girl who tended crops by day and single handedly wiped out US platoons by night.
Building 3 US army bases on 200 kilometres of already established tunnel systems, a nation who were used to and prepared to fight for their country, and sending a bunch of 19 year old american soldiers fighting after 16 weeks training, meant horrid loss of life. Mr Bean had spent 5 years in a `reeducation camp after the war and seemed genuinely remorseful of his part fighting against his own poeple. He eloquently described Oliver Stone as being all bullshit and cited Americas lack of aid for the 500000 children left disabled following its scorched earth policy of agent orange and napalm when losing the war.
The tour offers the chance for your own tunnel experience. 130 metres long, 60 cms wide and 1.3 metres tall, about 45 degrees, pitch black and with only one way in and one way out. They should have one of those ìf you fit in this hole you can go on this ride type things before but Mr Bean was keen to get everyone (particualrly the fat ass americans he loved so much) in there to feel the joy. Todd bailing out after 60 metres and Nic didn`t even attempt to go in.
After crazy Saigon bandit country, we headed for the coastal spot of Mui Ne for a few days. The 3 hour bus trip took 8 hours, but after that it was pretty smooth sailing with a perfcet beachside bungalow. It was sleep, eat, drink and repeat in a town still not yet aware of what it`s got, so devoid of beach sellers, tourist bars and largely devoid of people. The only downside was the beautiful beach it promised had all but vanished for the summer. Global warming or just freak weather no one seemed to be sure.
What Mui Ne does have is a Wellington strength breeze so its quickly establishing itself as a kite boarding mecca. Feeling we should do something other the aforementioned we did take a jeep tour around the geological wonders of the region. The great red canyon was about 5 feet deep and full of rubbish, the magic fairy stream was about 3 inches of water in a creek and while the red and white sand dunes were impressive, trying to slide down them on the hired boards resulted in sliding one foot and sinking two. Our guide picked up his girlfriend for a romantic jeep ride half way through leaving us the uncomfortable backseat voyeurs for young vietnamese love. Back to the eat, drink, sleep......
Thursday, 14 February 2008
Thursday, 7 February 2008
The Khmer #2
Siem Reap - January 30th - February 3rd, 2008
From Phnom Phen we took a boat 5 hours up the Ton Le Sap river to Siem Reap. For any females taking the bumpy dirt road away from the dock Nic suggests you wear a sports bra. All along the banks of the river families are living in shelters, some little more than a few peices of corregated metal, the filty water the only source for cooking, cleaning and drinking. It's a 16km ride into the town. Our Tuk tuk driver stopped about 5km in to discuss whether we would need him the next day or prefer to make our way from there but some vague promises got us back on the road.
We checked into a place called River Garden, luxury villas set in the Siem Reap jungle with frogs, rats, lizards and other beasts moving too fast to be identified keeping us company. The reason everyone goes to Siem Reap is the temples - the most famous being Ankor Wat where we watched the sunset over the sprawling stone structure and hindu sculpture. With few other tourists around we were able to wander the place undisturbed, except by the hordes of kids selling books, postcards and bracelets. The kids are very clued up, able to tell us Wellington was the capital of New Zealand, we had 4 1/2 million people and 45 millon sheep, and that Helen Clarke was the Prime Minister - 'a very good Prime Minister but she's not very pretty'.
There's so many temples it would take a month to see them all - and by the end of a couple of days you are feeling pretty 'templed out'. We hired a driver for the next day who took us to the best of them which included Ta Phrom (also famous for appearing in Tomb Raider). At Ta Phrom the huge trees have grown through the temple stones and it look slike they are melting into the stone work. Moving between the temples you get to see them at all stages of repair, paying tribute to many different hindu and buddist gods, and that each king tried to 'big up' his predecessors making both a statement on their superiority but also to ensure their pace among the divine. No matter how far into the jungle or how high up the temples you scale, there's plenty of bracelets and postcards available and some old guy has managed to get a drinks trolley with ice up / in there.
In Siem Reap town there's a place unumbiguously called Cambodian BBQ with almost any type of meat to cook up at you own table top BBQ. (NB: Veggies and Aussies may want to skip the next bit). The '6 meats' of Kangaroo, Crocodile, Squid, Fish Pork and Chicken was all class, and the base of the BBQ has a tray of boiling water for noodles and your veg. Anyone thinking we are bad people for eating skippy - you are not alone. Some of those divine powers took charge and Skippy was to wreak his revenge for the next 24 hours. At some stage (after a few wines, beers and cocktails) we mixed the raw meat / cooked meat chopsticks - they are all conveniently white and the stomachs took a hammering from skippys right hoof.
Siem Reap is a fantastic town, with huge local markets, cheap beers / food / accom, ultra friendly locals (and nice clean air!). Of course we weren't so far away we missed the football - catching the arsenal man city game (3 - 1 arsenal :) at Goodysaurus - where the owner spent the night trying to convince us he was a Jordy - putting on a crazy attempt at a Newcastle accent every time he spoke. We also managed to try Cambodias infamous Happy Pizza while we were there.
Leaving Siem Reap wasn't as easy as staying there - a power failure at the airport meant no ATMs (cue bizarre mix of currency to pay departure tax), no check in, no lights, no announcements. We also had our first flight delay as our Vietnam airlines plane had a technical fault that delayed us 5 hours and we were greated onto the plane by the captain apologising and saying the fault had 'probably been fixed'.
From Phnom Phen we took a boat 5 hours up the Ton Le Sap river to Siem Reap. For any females taking the bumpy dirt road away from the dock Nic suggests you wear a sports bra. All along the banks of the river families are living in shelters, some little more than a few peices of corregated metal, the filty water the only source for cooking, cleaning and drinking. It's a 16km ride into the town. Our Tuk tuk driver stopped about 5km in to discuss whether we would need him the next day or prefer to make our way from there but some vague promises got us back on the road.
We checked into a place called River Garden, luxury villas set in the Siem Reap jungle with frogs, rats, lizards and other beasts moving too fast to be identified keeping us company. The reason everyone goes to Siem Reap is the temples - the most famous being Ankor Wat where we watched the sunset over the sprawling stone structure and hindu sculpture. With few other tourists around we were able to wander the place undisturbed, except by the hordes of kids selling books, postcards and bracelets. The kids are very clued up, able to tell us Wellington was the capital of New Zealand, we had 4 1/2 million people and 45 millon sheep, and that Helen Clarke was the Prime Minister - 'a very good Prime Minister but she's not very pretty'.
There's so many temples it would take a month to see them all - and by the end of a couple of days you are feeling pretty 'templed out'. We hired a driver for the next day who took us to the best of them which included Ta Phrom (also famous for appearing in Tomb Raider). At Ta Phrom the huge trees have grown through the temple stones and it look slike they are melting into the stone work. Moving between the temples you get to see them at all stages of repair, paying tribute to many different hindu and buddist gods, and that each king tried to 'big up' his predecessors making both a statement on their superiority but also to ensure their pace among the divine. No matter how far into the jungle or how high up the temples you scale, there's plenty of bracelets and postcards available and some old guy has managed to get a drinks trolley with ice up / in there.
In Siem Reap town there's a place unumbiguously called Cambodian BBQ with almost any type of meat to cook up at you own table top BBQ. (NB: Veggies and Aussies may want to skip the next bit). The '6 meats' of Kangaroo, Crocodile, Squid, Fish Pork and Chicken was all class, and the base of the BBQ has a tray of boiling water for noodles and your veg. Anyone thinking we are bad people for eating skippy - you are not alone. Some of those divine powers took charge and Skippy was to wreak his revenge for the next 24 hours. At some stage (after a few wines, beers and cocktails) we mixed the raw meat / cooked meat chopsticks - they are all conveniently white and the stomachs took a hammering from skippys right hoof.
Siem Reap is a fantastic town, with huge local markets, cheap beers / food / accom, ultra friendly locals (and nice clean air!). Of course we weren't so far away we missed the football - catching the arsenal man city game (3 - 1 arsenal :) at Goodysaurus - where the owner spent the night trying to convince us he was a Jordy - putting on a crazy attempt at a Newcastle accent every time he spoke. We also managed to try Cambodias infamous Happy Pizza while we were there.
Leaving Siem Reap wasn't as easy as staying there - a power failure at the airport meant no ATMs (cue bizarre mix of currency to pay departure tax), no check in, no lights, no announcements. We also had our first flight delay as our Vietnam airlines plane had a technical fault that delayed us 5 hours and we were greated onto the plane by the captain apologising and saying the fault had 'probably been fixed'.
Monday, 4 February 2008
The Khmer #1
Phonm Pehn January 28th - 30th, 2008
Okay so we didn't quite land in Phnom Pehn as the plane hit the runway. We were out into the madness that is the Cambodian capital in the back of our first Tuk tuk, a novelty at the time but over the coming week our arses would be permanently glued to them. The place is pretty grimey, with a thick layer of smog constant so no need for sunscreen, and no risk of a tan.
Other than millions of tuk tuks and motorbikes, the only other vehicle we were to see was the trusty Toyota Camry... In cambodia you aren't judged by the car you drive it seems, more the year of your Camry.
Cambodians are genuinely nice people, a smile in the eyes when they see you, which is amazing given the fact the country is still coming to grips with 160 odd years of occupation and civil war. You can't miss the desperation, with a lot of poverty and begging from those who have lost limbs or been left disabled and unable to work due to landmines that still pepper the country.
We had gone from our brand spanking 5 star hotel about 100 metres from the new Bangkok airport to the slightly less luxurious, but much friendlier 'Sunday Guest House'. We took an afternoon tuk tuk to the killing fields, about 14 kilometres out of Pnohm Pehn and the setting of mass executions under the Pol Pot Regime. It's pretty grim and pieces of bone and clothing are lying next to the paths and partly excavated mass graves. We also went on to the S21 Tuol Sleng genocide museum - Pol Pot's biggest prison and main location for interogations. You get a flavour for what a stunning setting it must have been when it was a school, and seems cruelly ironic that most of the warders, those who conducted the questioning and the executioners were 10 - 15 year old children, brainwashed into Pol Pot's new world order. All education, as well as arts, were banned under Pot, and visible in the main courtyard is a list of 10 rules (pretty twisted shit) that read not unlike those of Nazi Germany.
Our second day in Phonm Pehn we hooked up with Boral - a tuk tuk driver recommended to us by Andy and Kylie who has had him only a week or so prior. Boral was great at telling us about his family, life growing up, as well as doing the driving bit. He also had a pretty pimped dirt bike as his ride, rather than a scooter, so we made some pretty good time.
Over lunch he told us of his 6 brothers and sisters who had died over the Khmer Rouge years, leaving his farm to move to the city, being ostracised and reunited with his family, and having a child out of wedlock - not too good by Cambodian standards. The story of his grandfather who had a knife grow out of his chest (later passed on to his brother), and that of his brother who was sacrificed to the gods of the sea to make another man rich kind of left us a little puzzled.
We spent some time at the royal palace - the most notable feature the number of Buddha statues everywhere so you are constantly feeling his divine gaze. The one we couldn't quite get our heads around was Nu Rave Buddha complete with techno outfit and glow sticks around his head.
With some time left Boral suggested we take some food to a 'small' neighbourhood orphanage, where we could go and meet the children. The Khmer Developmenty of Freedom Orphanage was so heartbeaking but a special memory we will keep with us forever. We had picked up a 50kg bag of rice and some fruit at the market to take with us. Nic managed to survive being slapped on the shoulder by a slightly disturbed local woman in the market. Apparently it couldn't have had the power behind it of a kick to the shoulder by a Thai lady boy (we were told with confidence by a recipient of said kick at our hostel that night).
The kids were so happy and friendly - crowding around so we could hand out the fruit and fighting amongst each other to get the best pose for photos (we'll get some sorted to see soon). It was hard not to go all Brangelina and take some of them out of the desperate situation they were in. The orphange had 60 full time kids but looked after a steadliy increasing number of neighbourhood kids whose parents could not afford to feed and school them.
We got the tour of the place, small shack classrooms and a library complete with only a few dozen books. We left wanting to support them in a more sustainable way and thought maybe ticket money from the next 'All-Eights' party could be an idea.
The trip ended kinda weird when Boral suggested we could 'help' him (financially) through university - we suggested the best we could do was send future travellers his way!
Todd and Nic
Okay so we didn't quite land in Phnom Pehn as the plane hit the runway. We were out into the madness that is the Cambodian capital in the back of our first Tuk tuk, a novelty at the time but over the coming week our arses would be permanently glued to them. The place is pretty grimey, with a thick layer of smog constant so no need for sunscreen, and no risk of a tan.
Other than millions of tuk tuks and motorbikes, the only other vehicle we were to see was the trusty Toyota Camry... In cambodia you aren't judged by the car you drive it seems, more the year of your Camry.
Cambodians are genuinely nice people, a smile in the eyes when they see you, which is amazing given the fact the country is still coming to grips with 160 odd years of occupation and civil war. You can't miss the desperation, with a lot of poverty and begging from those who have lost limbs or been left disabled and unable to work due to landmines that still pepper the country.
We had gone from our brand spanking 5 star hotel about 100 metres from the new Bangkok airport to the slightly less luxurious, but much friendlier 'Sunday Guest House'. We took an afternoon tuk tuk to the killing fields, about 14 kilometres out of Pnohm Pehn and the setting of mass executions under the Pol Pot Regime. It's pretty grim and pieces of bone and clothing are lying next to the paths and partly excavated mass graves. We also went on to the S21 Tuol Sleng genocide museum - Pol Pot's biggest prison and main location for interogations. You get a flavour for what a stunning setting it must have been when it was a school, and seems cruelly ironic that most of the warders, those who conducted the questioning and the executioners were 10 - 15 year old children, brainwashed into Pol Pot's new world order. All education, as well as arts, were banned under Pot, and visible in the main courtyard is a list of 10 rules (pretty twisted shit) that read not unlike those of Nazi Germany.
Our second day in Phonm Pehn we hooked up with Boral - a tuk tuk driver recommended to us by Andy and Kylie who has had him only a week or so prior. Boral was great at telling us about his family, life growing up, as well as doing the driving bit. He also had a pretty pimped dirt bike as his ride, rather than a scooter, so we made some pretty good time.
Over lunch he told us of his 6 brothers and sisters who had died over the Khmer Rouge years, leaving his farm to move to the city, being ostracised and reunited with his family, and having a child out of wedlock - not too good by Cambodian standards. The story of his grandfather who had a knife grow out of his chest (later passed on to his brother), and that of his brother who was sacrificed to the gods of the sea to make another man rich kind of left us a little puzzled.
We spent some time at the royal palace - the most notable feature the number of Buddha statues everywhere so you are constantly feeling his divine gaze. The one we couldn't quite get our heads around was Nu Rave Buddha complete with techno outfit and glow sticks around his head.
With some time left Boral suggested we take some food to a 'small' neighbourhood orphanage, where we could go and meet the children. The Khmer Developmenty of Freedom Orphanage was so heartbeaking but a special memory we will keep with us forever. We had picked up a 50kg bag of rice and some fruit at the market to take with us. Nic managed to survive being slapped on the shoulder by a slightly disturbed local woman in the market. Apparently it couldn't have had the power behind it of a kick to the shoulder by a Thai lady boy (we were told with confidence by a recipient of said kick at our hostel that night).
The kids were so happy and friendly - crowding around so we could hand out the fruit and fighting amongst each other to get the best pose for photos (we'll get some sorted to see soon). It was hard not to go all Brangelina and take some of them out of the desperate situation they were in. The orphange had 60 full time kids but looked after a steadliy increasing number of neighbourhood kids whose parents could not afford to feed and school them.
We got the tour of the place, small shack classrooms and a library complete with only a few dozen books. We left wanting to support them in a more sustainable way and thought maybe ticket money from the next 'All-Eights' party could be an idea.
The trip ended kinda weird when Boral suggested we could 'help' him (financially) through university - we suggested the best we could do was send future travellers his way!
Todd and Nic
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