Saturday, August 28, 2004

Phnom Penh




Phnom Penh is one of the most bizarre places I've ever been. It truly is a 'Wild West' kind of town that revolves around girls, guns, and ganja. Needless to say I like the place... a lot.

My bus arrived in the center of town at the Capitol Tours travel agency about half four. The building was three stories high with an open air cafe on the ground floor and apartment rooms for rent on the top two stories. I went upstairs to scope out a room, but it looked like a dump.

Back down on the street with my backpack that has become heavy with knick knacks, I hailed a cyclo, a Cambodian three wheeled taxi, to take me to a lakeside guest house that was recommended by Dan, a guy from my jungle trek in Laos.


The lakeside road

The cyclo took me to Guest House Number 9 just north of downtown. The rooms and the atmosphere were much better due to the enormous westward deck overlooking the lake, so I booked a room. As I was checking in and carrying my bags around, a young guy asked me if I needed a big bag of grass.

After the initial shock and double take, I went into my room, took a shower, and made it back out to the deck just in time to watch the sunset over the lake as fishermen paddled by with their days catch.


Sunset over the lake

Later I walked around the corner from my guest house into an area that caters to backpackers with several CD/DVD shops and a wide variety of restaurants along with other guest houses.

I opted for Indian Curry because the sign outside boasted a free beer with your meal. My knowledge of Indian food was absolute nil, so I didn't understand a single item on the menu. Luckily, they offered a set meal for about $3 (with a free beer). It was delicious, and I even taught them how to make candle holders using used water bottles, so the candles on the tables would be safe from all the fans twirling over head.

The next day I woke up very early( about 5am). For some reason I couldn't sleep.

I rolled out of bed about 6am, took a shower, ate breakfast on the patio by the lake, and organized for a scooter driver named Tom, a very soft spoken guy, to give me a tour of the city for $5.

I hoped on the back of Tom's scooter and away we went into the streets of Phnom Penh.

The first place he took me was the Royal Palace and the Silver Pagoda. It was early in the morning, so there were very few people. The weather was absolutely perfect; without a cloud in the sky, and it actually seemed cool.


Silver Pagoda


Royal Palace grounds

No words can describe the beauty of this place. The architecture and colors were very similar to the Grand Palace in Bangkok, but the atmosphere was much more relaxed. Not to mention the stupas that jutted upwards into the big bright blue sky.


Roof top stupa





My next move was something I would normally never do. Maybe it was because I'd just left Vietnam and needed to blow off some steam, or maybe it was because I'd just finished reading The Beach, whose main character Richard romanticizes the Vietnam War through movies, or maybe it was because it was available. I don't known why, but I fired thirty rounds from an AK-47.

My driver, Tom, took me about 20km outside the city limits to what he called a commando base. Basically, it was a Cambodian army base where they had a firing range for people who want to shoot guns for fun.

As soon as I got off the scooter, a man approached me with a full menu of guns with prices and number of rounds along the right-hand side. It had everything you'd ever want to shoot. Machine guns, hand guns, and even artillery rifles.


Guns to chose from


Or would you rather try a handgun?

I chose and AK-47 for reasons unknown to me. The man then led me into a dark, long, narrow, sound proof room, and set up the AK with a full clip on a shoulder high stand. He then told me if I paid him $5 more dollars, under the table, he'd take pictures of me while I shot the gun. I agreed and started counting out money. I'm not sure how much I gave him, but I think it was more like $3.50. ( He later told me for $400 you can shoot a cow with a rocket launcher!)


Me & my AK



After finishing the clip which also depleted the funds I'd allotted myself for the day, I needed to go and cash a travelers check. The Phnom Penh International Airport was nearby but a little out of the way, but Tom took me there without a second thought. On the way down the main road, we passed a group of about 50 factory workers striking for higher wages. They were waving to all the passer-bys and chanting something I didn't understand.

After getting my money at the airport and starting to head back in the direction we'd come from, a police flat bed truck loaded with officers in the back dressed in army fatigues and full riot gear (AK-47s included) passed us. Tom wisely decided we should pull over and have a cold drink in order to avoid any disturbances that might ensue.

We waited for about 30min then decided to take an optional route when we saw another truck loaded with even more officers drive by. The optional route we took ended up putting us back out on the main road at precisely the place where the protesters and police had met. Fortunately, nothing was happening. It was just a stand off as we cruised by and took the corner.


Protesters stopped by the police

With that behind us, Tom took me to the Killing Fields in Choeung Ek (only about 15km south west of Phnom Penh), and my knowledge of Cambodian history got a sudden wake up call. Never in my wildest dreams could I imagine people were so sadistic.


The Killing Fields

The Killing Fields is a mass burial ground for countless numbers of Cambodian artists, teachers, monks, and a few foreigners who opposed the rule of Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge during the late Seventies.

The first thing I saw when I entered the grounds was the Memorial Stupa packed with over 8000 skulls, arranged by sex and age, of the people that were exhumed from the mass communal graves scattered around like sand pits around a golf green.


Memorial Stupa filled with skulls


One of many mass graves

There were fragments of human bones and clothes littered around the site, and even a sign on one big tree where children were bashed to save ammunition.


Read the sign

To make things even worse, many young children from a village that was a stones throw away came and offered to guide me around the outskirts of the field in exchange for a dollar. They spoke several different languages and were all smiley kids that just wanted to play games or entertain me. Anything for a dollar to share.


Playful little girls from a nearby village



Feeling very speechless and a bit morose, Tom and I headed back into town. On the way a huge rain storm blew in that completely drenched us on the road.

Tom took me to a great restaurant called the Boddhi Tree opposite the Tuol Sleng Museum (aka S-21). When I entered the restaurant soaking wet, the staff looked genuinely surprised and gave me a towel to dry off. Then when they realized how wet I really was, one waiter gave me his dress shirt from under the counter to wear until my shirt dried off.

I ate lunch and noticed on the menu that the restaurant was established to give down and out street kids a place of employment. It occurred to me the guy who gave me his shirt was probably an orphan whose parents were killed at the Killing Fields. He told me to go across the street to the S-21 Museum wearing his shirt and I could come back to collect by dry clothes afterwards.


Gates of Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum (S-21)

The Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum was almost more shocking than the Killing Fields. It was originally a High School, but under Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge they transformed it into a massive prison used for torturing captives before shipping them off to the Killing Fields.

Some classrooms were used for detaining only one prisoner strapped to a bed. In each of these classrooms there were black and white pictures depicting what had happened. Mind numbingly awful.


Bed and instruments used for torture

Other classrooms were converted into many tiny cubicles using brick or wood; just enough space for one person to lie down lengthwise.


Classrooms made into solitary confinement cells


Faces of children detained

Outside in what used to be the playground, there were some elements of torture. Like how they strung people up to the chin-up bar for interrogation.

I couldn't take any more that day, so I asked Tom to please take me back to the guest house. We made it back just in time for another spectacular sunset over the lake, and then I ate dinner and watched a couple movies on the deck before going to sleep.


Another sunset over the lake

The next day I slept in. By the time I woke up, Tom was busy driving someone else around, so I got another driver to take me to Wat Phnom. It was interesting to see, but what was more interesting were the many land mine victims scouring about asking tourist for money and the big elephant grazing in the courtyard.

Next I went to the National Museum just next to the Royal Palace. The museum was very well displayed with many treasures from the Angkor Era of Cambodian history, and strangely not crowded at all. I almost had the place to my self.


Courtyard at the National Museum


Inside the museum

My driver then took me the Russian Market for lunch. To my knowledge, the only reason it's called the Russian Market because it's located on Russia Street. There's nothing Russian about the inside packed with more Asian knick knacks, t-shirts, and lots and lots of junk.

Last but not least, I went to get a massage from the 'Seeing Hands'. The massage parlor, located on the round-about circling Wat Phnom, is operated by blind Cambodians who can't find work in the normal workforce. All the proceeds from their business goes to helping other blind Cambodians.

That night, after yet another sunset, I went to another restaurant near my guest house called the Lazy Gecko. I had an excellent Khmer curry with chicken that was very similar to a Thai green curry.

Afterwards, I went to a bar in the center of town called Heart of Darkness. This place was completely off the wall.


Heart of Darkness

A majority of the clientele were backpackers and travelers, but there was a large percentage of young local females perusing around. After talking with a few people I figured out the girls were actually employed by the bar to 'entertain' guests. They were talking and dancing with anyone that looked at them. A few even had a monopoly on the pool table.

Total shock came when I looked across the bar and saw two girls that couldn't have been more than 13 years old drinking beer and chatting with the bartender. I could only assume they were there to attract any pedophiles in the pub, but Gary Glitter was absent that night.

After being shocked and chagrined and making friends with a 42 year old drunk Irishman on vacation that wanted to offer me a job, I finally made my way out of the Heart of Darkness and back to my guest house for a few hours of sleep.

Early the next morning I caught a bus to Siem Riep to visit the temples of Angkor Wat.

Tuesday, August 24, 2004

Mekong Delta



I was unable to catch the last chopper out of Saigon, so I opted for a boat ride up Mekong River into Cambodia. My last days in Vietnam along the Mekong Delta were two of the most relaxing days, next to Halong Bay, I spent in the whole country. I desperately needed to get out of the cities. The masked marauding bandits with lamp shades for helmets that clogged up the streets with their scooters and ceasless horns were driving me nutz.

My tour bus left Saigon about 7:30am from the Sinh Cafe. I was still tired from the night before hanging out with the Italians at the disco tech.

The bus drove about two hours south through the flat lands of never ending rice fields to the town of Mytho where all the passengers boarded small ferry boats and putted through rivery streets watching merchants moving goods of all kinds. Mainly fruits, rice, and even sand from the river bed.




Inside one of the boats

The boat did a big loop around the canals so all us tourist could get a look and then started up a small channel with several huts along the riverside.


Mytho

We stopped for lunch somewhere around Vinh Long at a small pavilion with tables set up around what looked very similar to a Japanese garden. Two musicians started playing traditional instruments that looked like guitars with a female singing in Vietnamese, it reminded me of Japanese Inca, as everyone was finishing their lunch.

We started back up the channel for a couple more hours before pulling into a dock and boarding the bus again to take us to Chau Doc near the Cambodian border.


Going up river

Everyone checked into a hotel provided by the touring company and then went down the street to restaurant. I was a little late, so I sat by myself and ordered grilled shrimp and rice. I got a small portion of rice and two shrimp, shells, heads, tails, legs and all, straight off the grill.

The next morning I woke up at 6:30am and had an omelet and baguette in the hotel lobby. We boarded our bus that drove us about two blocks to the river, where we boarded narrow row boats with expert drivers and paddled through to the small Cham Village.


Japanese guys in my boat


Heading towards the Cham Village

The entire village was floating on the river in small bamboo and wooden huts. We weaved around the huts and saw various fish hatcheries until we arrived at a small dock. We got off the row boats and walked through part of the village located on the banks of the river.


Floating village


One of the boat drivers

It turned out the entire village were Muslims the specialize in weaving sarongs and scarves. We had a brief visit to one of their mosques and walked around the roof of the building.


Cham Village Mosque

Then we walked back to the row boats that took some people further up the river, but dropped myself and a few others heading into Cambodia off next to a small ferry with lawn chairs set up for us passengers.


Saying goodbye to the rowboats

I sat in the very front and could stretch my legs and listen to music with my discman in total comfort as the rice fields and the muddy Mekong River went sliding by. I was not equipped with a Doors soundtrack, but I was armed with Dr. Johns' Zu Zu Man and a more modern Jay-Z's Black Album.


Scene from the boat

The boat trolled along for a couple hours before arriving at the border crossing. We were herded off the boat with our bags on our backs and paraded into a small building where our bags were scanned with an x-ray machine. I don't think the official was even looking at his monitor. Then we handed our passports to the tour guide while we were being taken to a restaurant for lunch. I suppose the guide took them to get stamped while we ate tasteless portions of fried vegetables and rice, but I have no idea where he went.

After lunch everyone got their stamped passports back, and we walked about 200m up the river and boarded a different ferry boat, this one was big, long and yellow. It took us up the river a few minutes to the Cambodian entry point.

As soon as I stepped off the boat and into the immigration officials office the atmosphere changed. Everything became much lighter all of a sudden.


Cambodian border crossing

We got back on the boat and went a couple more hours up river, just watching farm land and more rice drift by with all the debris floating down the Mekong. A Shrek looking guy sitting in front of me had very pungent body odor and kept finding reasons to lift his arms and burn my nose hair.

Eventually we stopped at the side and boarded a bus drove us down a bumpy, gravelly road running next to the Mekong River and into Phnom Penh, the Cambodian capital (Col. Kurtz country).

Monday, August 23, 2004

Saigon

My time in Saigon was so short I didn't even have time to form an opinion about the city. To me it was just another noisy place with lots of traffic.

I arrived in Saigon about 9am. The bus from Nha Trang was set to arrive at 6am, but we had a fender bender about an hour outside Saigon that delayed everything.

The first thing I did was drop off my bags at a travel agency and walk around to research a trip through the Mekong Delta. That task was fairly easy due to the number of travel agencies around. I chose Sinh Cafe because it came recommend from other people I'd talked to. I then checked into a nearby hotel to facilitate my departure the following morning.

I got cleaned up, ate a late breakfast, and then walked to the War Remnants Museum, also known as the American War Crimes Museum.


War Remnants Museum

The museum wasn't very big, basically just a parking lot, but it was full of US war machines. Tanks, artillery guns, helicopters, an F-5 jet, etc. Everyone was free to explore the machines as much as they liked.







The actual museum was broken up into a few small buildings. The first building consisted of a gallery of gut wrenching black and white photos taken during the war. Everything from injured GIs to Vietnamese civilians scarred by Napalm.

The second building was full of newspaper clippings from all over the world in various languages. Some for, some against the war in Vietnam, but most showed student protests in America.

There was also a recreation of the prisons used to hold Vietnamese detainees. Very similar to what I saw in Hanoi at the Hoa Lo Prison.

Next I walked to the Ben Thanh Market, a huge train station like building full of what I like to call junk. I poked around a bit and was able to find some cool knick-knacks and interesting T-shirts, but most of it looked like a thrift store.

The very back of the market was set up like a grocery store with some food stalls scattered around. I ate a bowl of shrimp noodle soup and spring rolls in the middle of the shopping mayhem.


Eating lunch in the Ben Thanh Market

On the way back to my hotel I stopped off at a CD shop to have a look. To my surprise all the discs were illegal copies that sold for $1 or $2. Some even less. There were listening stations set up, so I checked a few discs just to make sure they would play, and ended up buying about four hip-hop CDs I would usually never spend money on.

Back at my nondescript hotel room I laid down for a nap. As I lay on the bed, all I could think of was Martin Sheen. I've been traveling for over a month, and I'm only in Saigon.

When I woke up it was dinner time. I walked around the block, down a small alley, and ate a bowl of vegetable soup at a vegetarian restaurant called the Bodhi Tree as it started to rain.

Next I poked my head into a nearby bar made out of bamboo. I bumped into the Italian guys I'd met on the bus from Hoi An to Nha Trang; I don't know their names. They'd just arrived in Saigon and were looking to have a good time.


Shangrila

We flagged a taxi down and went to the one place I had to check out. A bar called Apocalypse Now. It turned out to be a cheesy night club, the horror, so we only had one beer and split to another place the Italian guys read about in their guide book.


Entrance to Apocalypse Now Bar

I believe the next place was called the Rainforest. It was a disco tech with lots of people partying and dancing. That made the Italians very happy. They were out to chase women, so I just stood back and watched them work.

A scooter gave me a ride back to my hotel once the disco closed down around 12am. I had to wake up early the next day to start my trip through the Mekong Delta and into Cambodia.

Saturday, August 21, 2004

Nha Trang

I arrived in Nha Trang after a 12 hour journey from Hoi An on a night bus. The bus ride was easy, except for some strange tattooed guy from Seattle with some very feminine qualities who got sick on the bus and asked to be dropped off in the middle of nowhere at a nondescript hotel.

When I got off the bus in Nha Trang I was a bit groggy and not in the mood to deal with all the sharks trying to get me to stay at their hotels, so I made a bee-line for a beach side cafe to eat breakfast, consult my guidebook, and get my head together.


Nha Trang

Nha Trang is not what I was expecting. I wanted beach side bungalows and relaxed restaurants showing DVD movies, but what I got was another big, noisy city with a 6km beach next to the main road.

After checking into a hotel as near the beach as I could get, I walked around town to suss out some of the scuba diving operations. I booked a dive for the following day with a company called Rainbow Divers because it looked very professional and most the office staff were all from Australia.

Next I made my way down to the beach and rented a beach chair. The actual beach was very nice with white sand and silhouetted mountains all around, but the problem was that I couldn't relax due to all the vendors trying to peddle books, newspapers, cigarettes, sunglasses, etc.


Sunglasses vendor


Cooking crabs on the beach

Eventually I lost my temper with one poor young girl selling books. I vented all my frustrations about how the vendors see tourists as walking dollar bills and have no tact when it comes to begging. She had no idea how to respond. It made me feel a bit guilty because I know Vietnam is a poor country, so I went back and bought an unauthorized, hard bound photo copied version of Howard Marks' Mr. Nice for twice her asking price.

That night I ate seafood at a place called Red Star and then went across to the street to a pub called Crazy Kim's. The proceeds from this bar go towards helping street kids that have fallen victim to pedophilia.

In Crazy Kim's I bumped into two Italian guys that were on the night bus from Hoi An with me. We joked about the guy who got sick on the bus, and then they told me they were leaving Nha Trang the next day because it wasn't what they were expecting either.

The next day I went scuba diving bright and early. Rainbow Divers came to pick me up at my hotel at 7am and took me to the Nha Trang harbor where we boardrd their big ferry boat and met about 18 other people going diving as well.


Scuba diving at Madonna Rock

Rainbow Divers ran a great operation. Everything was on time and very organized; the dive masters were all friendly; and there was plenty of fruit, sweets, and sandwiches on the boat, but the actually dive was not so spectacular. Too few big fish.

My dive master was a young local named Huang, a very funny guy, and my dive buddy was a guy named Tristan from Switzerland, a complete spaz underwater. Our first dive was at a site called Madonna Rock where we swam through a small cave and saw schools of small fish, but that the only highlight. The second dive was a place called Debbie's Beach where we saw a big Puffer Fish and that's about all.

In the afternoon I met up with James, Enda, and Andy at a beach side cafe. They had arrived earlier that morning from Hoi An, and we talked about how disappointed we were with Nha Trang.

In the evening I guided our entire group back to the Red Star for a huge seafood dinner. We had crab spring rolls, fresh shrimp spring rolls, spicy squid, white fish slow cooked in a brown sauce, and jumbo shrimp cooked in lobster sauce. Delicious.

Things got a bit out of hand when we went across the street to Crazy Kims and started drinking buckets of rum loaded with Red Bull and some concoction called jungle juice that was served in a green canteen.


Nick with the Jungle Juice

We ended up at a Sailor's Club located on the beach with loud dance music and lots and lots of people. Everything culminated late in the evening when we went streaking down the beach and into the ocean, only to have the police come and tell us swimming was prohibited after dark.

On the walk home James and Nick were propositioned by a couple prostitutes for massages. In they're refusals and trying to make a getaway they caught the girls trying to pick they're pockets.

My last day in Nha Trang was spent entirely on the beach reading. I discovered that some cafes have private beaches where vendors are not allowed. Nothing exceptional happened except I did get a proper medicated massage from the cafe staff that made me feel much better and will help me get through my next overnight bus ride.

Just before my bus left, I met up with everyone at Crazy Kim's for one last beer. It was difficult to say goodbye, but the memories will live forever.


My final farewell to the Fellowship

Next stop Saigon.