July 1st, Siem Reap, Cambodia to Kampot, Cambodia
This morning we had to leave our haven, and travel by bus to Phnom Phen and then onto Kampot. We requested Mr. T to be our tuk-tuk driver to the bus station, but we got someone else instead. After the bumpy ride to the bus station, we arrived at a place in the road where buses parked, and touts came rushing at our tuk-tuk to get us to buy a bus ticket from them. Usually it is the children that act like this, and I don’t think Kyle feels threatened by them, but when we were sitting, trapped in this tuk-tuk with all of our worldly possessions I think he was a little thrown off. He actually put his arms out, and got his scary voice out, and yelled at them to back off! Well of course, seeing Kyle react like that worried me, but we ended up following the lead of our tuk-tuk driver, who I didn’t trust like I had trusted Mr. T, bought two tickets for $8 each and got settled in on the bus with uncomfortable seats.
This bus didn’t have a bathroom on it so I had to make sure to go before we left the bus station. I think it was a 5 hour bus ride. So when I went to the bathroom, I only had a handful of American change, and two baht coins. Cambodia doesn’t use any coins, they only have paper bills and 4000 Reil is $1 USD. It usually costs 500 Reil to go to the bathroom, so I tried to give her 50 cents in American coins, which is double what she was asking for, but no luck. I dug out the baht I had and they gladly took that, I think I paid like three times as much as I needed to. Now what bothers me the most about having to pay to use the bathroom, is that they are disgusting, they have never been cleaned, they are usually totally wet everywhere, they have squat toilets (not the Japan/Korea squats where you get to stand on the floor, here you have to balance on a liitle ledge about 4 inches off the ground), no sign of toilet paper (luckily I have learned to always bring my own) and there are usually 10 mosquitoes flying around my ass.
Well anyway, the bus ride was uneventful. We made a few stops the couple next to us ate a large bag full of bugs (crickets and tarantulas), and the overweight American girl with her boyfriend in the seats behind us complained most of the way. When we got to Phnom Penh we were again bombarded by drivers trying to get us to hire them for a ride. We decided to walk, well it was my idea, and a bad one. One of the tuk-tuk drivers followed us for about a half an hour, even waited outside while we went on the internet to figure out where to catch the bus to Kampot.
We eventually realized that we needed to take a taxi since the last bus of the day had already left. We were walking around trying to find a place to eat, I was starving, and I knew the taxi ride would be about 4 hours! We could not find anything to eat, and then when we had given up and wanted to find a tuk-tuk to take us to the taxi (there would be no way of knowing what cars were taxis, they are usally Toyota Corollas, but they are no markings, they talk a lot about the taxi mafia out here in the guide books) well of course when we want a tuk-tuk there are none in sight. The first one we found didn’t know where the taxis were, I guess not everyone is a scammer.
Finally we got back to the taxi area, and struck a deal to share a taxi with other people for $10 per person, but we had to wait 20 mins. Ok so I needed to find some food, and nothing seemed good, either I could have gotten a baguette from a little stand that had flies all over it, or some questionable fruit that we didn’t have a knife to peel, so no good.
Finally I saw a street vender with a cart, and what looked like noodles. He made them fresh right in front of me, no meat only an egg (kept at room temperature, of course but I think my body is now used to this) some chillis, sauce of some kind, bean sprouts, and some type of green vegetable. It was so yummy it hit the spot. So it was time to pile into the car, Kyle and I in the middle of the backseat, with a man to Kyle’s right and a woman to my left. Then the driver in front with two other men in the passenger seat. They had loaded some large white bag in the trunk, for a minute Kyle and I thought we may have picked the wrong car. We drove for about 4 blocks, and then everyone got out of the car except us.
Kyle got out to see what was going on. He grabbed out bags from the trunk, they wanted us to switch cars, and this ones trunk was really dirty and full. I did not like the looks of this, so I said we were not taking this new (but actually quite old) car. We said we wanted one taxi 2 people for $40, the driver wanted $50, after some negotiations we settled on $45. After making one stop where the driver went into this warehouse and came out with a wad of cash, at least 4 inches tall, we made it to Kampot in a record time of under 2.5 hours! He took us right to our requested guesthouse, and then we had a nice dinner at a little restaurant by the river called Coco’s.
The room here is ok, it smells like a Korean bathroom, but it is fine, and only $15 a night. For dinner Kyle got curry steak with fries, and I got some spaghetti. When my food came I looked at it, took one bite and said “ I think Robyn came to Cambodia and cooked my dinner! This tastes just like her goulash!” (Anderson don’t print this part for Robyn) Then Kyle said “oh no!” No, it was actually quite good, I love Robyn’s goulash, but she thinks everyone in the family loves it way more than they actually do. But it helped with my homesickness to eat something yummy, that reminded me of my childhood. Kyle’s steak was good. Then it was off to bed, oh and we discovered a Cambodian dark beer, called ABC stout, it is really good, it actually reminds me of Surly Bender.
