24 Sept 2015
21. Cambodia - Kingdom of Wonder - Pt.1
As I ride up to the border-patrol post a couple of friendly officials point me toward the building on the opposite side of the road. After completing their no-hassle application form and paying the U.S. $35.00 to the friendly official I’m stamped into the tour’s country no’16.
Apart from vaguely remembering the news stories concerning its 70’s famine I really new little about the country. Whilst in Laos, talking to other travellers at hostels I’d heard great experiences and worthwhile places to visit within Cambodia so included it on the ’must visit’ list. Their currency is the Riel - about 6140 to the pound…yes, another ludicrously high exchange rate, and population at about 15 million - the 69th most populous country in the world. The official religion is Theravada Buddhism, practised by the majority of the nation. Minority groups include Vietnamese, Chinese, Chams, and 30 hill tribes. The capital and largest city is Phnom Penh, (pronounced Nom Pen).
I’d been in the country for literally less than 60 seconds and taken this photo. Surely one of the last countries you’d expect to be americanised? But, no, they were simply cashing-in on one of Viet Nam’s disadvantages whereby gambling’s illegal, so made perfect sense to build a hotel/casino slap-bang on the border within their country and attract any gamble-hungry Vietnamese to win loose their money.
Stopping a few kilometres further along I take the following photo, only there realising that with all the excitement and uncertainty of a new country I’d over-looked a little something. Albeit choosing this border crossing as it was the lesser travelled, therefore quieter…or for now up until the casino’s built that of the few vehicles that had passed by one thing was s-l-i-g-h-t-l-y amiss…. TOOOOOOOTTTT!!! Surely not?, really?, could it be true? Unlike gambling, maybe horns were outlawed in Cambodia? I suppressed my immediate feelings of excitement to test the situation a little further and rode a few more kilometres. Another vehicle...silence, another one….silence <repeat><repeat><repeat>. Yeeeee-bloody-hooooooo!! My ears could begin their long awaited healing process, I was like a ten year old in McD’s, lovin’ it! Little did I know the good times would being staying a while.
Aware that Lithuanian Tom, whom gets that name because he’s, well, Lithuanian, would also be in Cambodia around the same time as myself meant I should firstly find some Wireless Fidelity to try and arrange a rendezvous.
I intended to visit the capital Phnom Penh, but, as with the previous South-East Asian countries also spend a month here. Being quite a small country meant I could ride a loop around it, effectively circumnavigating it, so with ample time I firstly planned to head west toward the coastal city Sihanoukville, then a ferry across the bay to Khum Thma Sa, then east through / across some of the mountainous national parks, before heading to the capital.
The following day’s mid-afternoon I reach the city of Sihanoukville and with no particular reason to visit its centre head straight for the port area to find what options (if any) to cross the huge bay. As I’m cycling along at a leisurely pace I notice across the road a fellow cycle-tourer heading toward me, and just as I shout a 'hello mate' I notice who it actually was, Dave, of Ozy + Brit duo Dave + Holly! I guess, in my finest Ozy accent I should've shouted “G’day mate! Get some shrimps on the Barbie!” Holly, ahead of Dave had obviously activated her ‘invisible mode’ button, or, possibly slipped by unnoticed under the ‘shade’ of a big truck. Nevertheless it was excellent to see them both! Having previously parted company t-h-o-u-s-a-n-d-s of miles away in Kyrgyzstan’s capital, was strange to think that from there, to where we now stood, reunited, of the different experiences we’d each encountered, the different people we’d met, and all the other happenings, it really did make the world feel quite a small place.
With so much to talk about our only option was to camp together. They, as I, had also been informed about a suitably quiet beach location on the edge of the city, so grabbing a few bites along the way we head for it.
Talking about their plans, things get even better. Travelling with a mobile phone (Personnel note: must buy one of those for my next tour!) they’d arranged the following morning to meet up with Tom! Being a no-brainer I join forces, so soon there would be five of us, yes, my sums are correct, you’ll see…
Aborting the ferry plans, the next morning we ride a back-route toward the main road I’d previously travelled and patiently wait on a garage forecourt for an hour or-so. Soon Tom ambles around the corner…followed by his new cycling buddy. This was excellent, now four of us from the original Georgian ten, plus a new addition, Lieke. Cambodia was proving to be spot-on; so far reasonably good roads, pleasant horn-free drivers, and some refreshing company. More drinks, snacks and plenty of gossip at the garage forecourt.
With so much to talk about, considering cycling any further hadn’t even crossed anyone’s mind and now late afternoon we decide to stay put, asking a few locals we’re shown an open patch of grass opposite the garage to set camp.
In the evening we decided to make use of the garage’s neighbouring restaurant. Talking about our plans, Dave + Holly had an appointment with friends in Thailand, so in the morning would be heading in opposite directions to Tom, Lieke and myself. Lieke was several months into her tour, heading towards China - as was Tom, but her next country was to be Vietnam…I forewarned her of what awaited but she was adamant on finding out for herself.
Albeit a rather brief reunification, being totally unplanned made it all-the-more memorable. Here we are just before the goodbyes.
Some photos I take are not so good, whilst others are. This one seemed to capture a curiously cheeky smile on the girls face, along with a typically seen mode of Asian transport.
Sitting at the entrance to a wood-working company was this humongous swinging ‘chair’, and it was for sale! Made from hardwood, simply pushing it to swing was hard work, it must have easily weighed over a ton.
Ortlieb panniers, also available in boring dull colours like dark blue and black…as I use!
I’ve always loved cats..of any size!
On the second day we reach Phnom Penh. Entering at the south of the city we pass the infamous 'Killing fields’, renowned as a place to visit. Having previously proposed a visit we call in. So far, Cambodia had brought smiles and happiness, but our moods were about to abruptly change. It was quite clear the name 'killing fields' would reveal part of Cambodia's dark history, but none of us new just how dark and evil this had been.
At the ticket-booth visitors are advised to pay an additional amount to hire a pair of headphones along with an electronic message box, whereby entering numbers displayed at key points around the trail starts an in-depth narration as to what had occurred.
Within the trails first few numbers the general mood of most, if not all visitors was clear, in shock as to what was they were hearing. These pictures give an indication of the atrocities that had been carried out under the evil, barbaric, tyrant Pol Pot, leader of the Khmer Rouge revolutionary party. From hereon I simply refer to him as 'it', for is not worthy to be given a name.
'it', successful in over-turning the government was planning to turn the country into a communist state, taking all-and-everything that anyone owned, declaring it property of the state. Homes, land, jewellery, clothes - anything they had was taken, including many of their lives. First to go were the intellectual people such as doctors, lawyers, businessmen, anyone who could be seen as a threat to the revolution. ‘it’ was only interested in manual labourers, farmers and such like, those that would provide food.
Some of the narrations were told by ex-victims, fortunate enough to have lived. One such story was from a [now] old man whom at the time was a young boy, telling his story in clear detail. Given the choice of death, or working within the camp he's performing his chores and remembers seeing a guard questioning a nearby lady. The guard, screaming at the lady, repeatedly asking her “where did you get this!?, where did you get this!?”, her answer each time being the same “another guard gave it to me”, “No! You're lying to me! You're lying”. In the end the guard grabs her gardening tool, hitting her hard on the back of the head - instant death. As she fell, in her hand, a banana.
To kill anyone for any reason is bad enough, but to kill a helpless, weak lady, a lady from one's own country, is barbaric. The country's regime had installed fear and paranoia into each and all, and everyone had become fearful of loosing their life, even the soldiers new that saying just the slightest 'wrong' word against the regime to another soldier could lead one's death.
Toward the end of the trail was a tree, and for myself proved the saddest part of all. It looked like any other tree, .a large patch of grass just past it, but when the camp was active the patch of grass had been a large pit, used to throw the dead victims into, although not all were dead, but too weak to move. The tree had been used to smash the heads of infants and babies against before throwing them into the pit with their parents. The idea behind killing the young was to ensure they would not grow up seeking revenge for their parent’s deaths.
I walked away feeling numb, tears welling in my eyes.
Pausing at a bench near the exit with Tom and Lieke, we sat in silence, trying to comprehend it all. We’d taken few pictures, the narrated stories were more than enough to remember this place by, and this was one of many killing fields that during the peak had been dotted around the country.
The United Nations (the UN), sounds like a global neighbourhood-watch group, looking out for any nasty events, ready to intervene and rectify problems...or so the name would lead one to believe. On my African tour, in Congo’s Kinshasa I met an American UN worker who gave me the low-down on them, and the reality of what they’re really for. This was confirmed in Cambodia when I’d read that ten years after committing the crimes ‘it’ was invited - and attended - a UN conference in New York City. There, 'it' could have been detained, held under crimes against humanity - the U.S. intelligence agencies new what had happened in Cambodia - but no, whilst there 'it' was treated with respect and dignity, then allowed to return back home.
Back to my blog…
After navigating, or rather zig-zagging through several kilometres of more-dust-than-a-Dyson work-in-progress city road-improvements we arrive within the centre and book in for two nights at a reasonably priced room. Being a food-market junky, Lieke was soon en-route to the night market with Tom and myself in tow. Spoilt for choice of eateries, walking past fried beetle ‘snacks’ and other tempting foods. Here we are just after our main course, washing it down with our favourite - a sugared ice-coffee.
With Lieke now heading south to Vietnam Tom and I plot our next section. Choosing to meander along a quiet river-hugging road toward Krampi, a well known area where fresh-water dolphins can be seen in the Mekong.
On the first night we found a crackin’ camp spot, perched on a high river bank. As with other countries, the children were as intrigued by us as we were by them, my evenings ‘entertainment’ antics continued much-the-same, ensuring they’d be talking to their friends about the crazy foreigners that’d camped close-by to their village.
Sunrise over the mighty Mekong.
Many of the houses in Cambodia were on stilts, as seen in this collage.
Every day these vehicles would pass by, either clad with people or goods galore, ferrying them between one village and another, or in the fields working away. I never found out the name of them but one purchase’s the engine / steering unit along with a rear-axle then builds it onto a home-made wooden frame to suit. The steering arms are so long because the drive-wheels are without a differential unit i.e. both the wheels spin at exactly the same rate, making steering almost impossible if any shorter.
Here a seller has the drive-units standing upright, along with the rear-axle units ready for sale.
Our dolphin visit proved rather unsuccessful. We managed to find the riverside location okay and even reduce the boat cost by sharing with an English couple but, as tourists were as common as a double-decker bus in London the dolphins were about as excited by our presence as a five-year old receiving a Charles Dickens novel. Along with the five or six other boats circling around the wide river we soon realised the chance of having the camera zoomed in at the right spot, at the right moment, was as likely as winning the lotto without buying a ticket.
Through much of the next section of Cambodia we witnessed many forestry areas that had been cleared by-the-way of burning. Considering many of the trees are of hardwood species this appeared such an excessive waste. One area we rode through was something like a scene from an apocalyptic movie. (Whilst writing this a quick bit of research reveals they just use the tree’s roots in a distillery process that enables the released Sassafras oil to be extracted, used to make the recreational drug MDMA, otherwise know as ecstasy).
Our next destination was Saen Monourom, nuzzled in the south-eastern corner. Perched on top of a mountain range it was a tedious ride to get to, albeit the roads proving a real treat of smooth tarmac, the undulating two metre’s up, one metre down hills teased us in the hot humidity, still, we’d be rolling back down t’other side in a day or so! The town’s renowned for its surrounding picturesque waterfalls so had its fair-share of westerners and therefore hostels, but Tom and I camped within the town’s temple. Taking the following day off we hired a moped in search of said waterfalls, but soon found that sign-posts were yet to catch-on in Cambodia!....okay, unfair comment, in general they did have road signs but as far as any for the waterfalls not-so. Along with the actual road-layout differing significantly to our tourist-map we managed to notch-up a grand waterfall count of just one, nevertheless we still had a great day zipping around the place under the power of a combustion engine!
Leaving the town on a northerly route we’d be passing close to another waterfall so made it our mission to get our waterfall count to two! The route down the mountain was a total contrast to the way up. A dusty, corrugated bumpy route, certainly not the free-wheeling hands-off-the-brakes approach I’d envisaged. Arriving at the waterfall junction we stop at a café for a drink and plan how best to get there as the waterfall road was a dead-end and didn’t want to cycle there then come all the way back (~20km) so the obvious was to leave our bikes at the café and hitch a lift there and back. After food and drink we’re soon sitting in the back of a passing 4x4 pick-up truck en-route to the waterfall.
Albeit the dry season it was an impressive waterfall that comprised two separate falls along with dense greenery that was a haven for wildlife - including elephants. To reach the bottom of the second fall was an extremely steep set of old wooden stairs, or expect some may have called it a ladder! Being extremely popular with tourists we soon managed to catch a lift back to the cafe aboard a pre-arranged hotel-minibus with several back-packers keen to hear about our bicycle trip.
Back at the café to the total astonishment of the proprietors their cat jumped onto my shoulders and promptly settled down as though it had always lived there, nuzzling up to my chin for a good rub-a-dub. Tom suggested I ride away with it, and to be honest reckon’ I could’ve done as I felt it had found its soul-mate in me!
Ban Lung was the next big town we arrived at, up in the north-eastern corner. The roads in this part of Cambodia were not so good but present work-in-progress would soon see them finished. Taking two days top reach here we’d be parting company as Tom would head across the border to lovely-little-Lao, and I would continue back across Cambodia to the far western side for Thailand. Arriving at the town after just a 30km ride from our camp we soon find a hostel then manage to find some great tasting food (second photo-slide). Ban Lung is popular with back-packers due to a crater-lake within an extinct volcano. Checking on-line as to its visit-worthy-ness was clearly seen as low lying volcano with a tree smothered / forested circumference thus dwindling any appreciation of its roundness, therefore decide to pass. Back at the hostel we crack a few beers and swap onward travel advice, Tom questioning me on his not-too-distant China section, and myself on his previous Thailand transit.
The following morning firm handshakes and bear-hugs we part company, suggesting we pair-up on our next world tour….
The next big town for me would be Stung Treng, maybe two days away. My map gave two options; (i) back south down the main road for 20km to a turning we’d previously passed or (ii) west from here along a ‘broken’ trail. Not one for reversing roads I’ve already travelled it’s the latter option…would I soon regret this??
The road out of town was reasonable…for a while, firstly with a good-to-bad ratio of 90:10, then 70:30, 40:60, 20:80 then eventually 0:100. Soon I was riding [trying to] on powdery sand that resembled dust. The particles so fine that my tyres had no chance to grip – A quick physics lesson: Newton’s Third Law of Physics states, “to every force there’s an equal but opposite force”. Lesson over – so without traction there was certainly no opposite force in place, thus forward motion was not happening! Even pushing proved hard as on every pace my feet moved back into the sand dust whilst the front wheel would veer off on a tangent making it even harder. Optimistic this was just a brief bad-patch I press on, taking every chance at riding any bit of ground that looked to be firm - these being few! Believe me, this was certainly no road, but - as the map showed - a broken trail, if anything, I was most happy knowing I’d bought a map that was actually correct…honestly! At times the route forked into several directions - variations that locals had created in order to circumnavigate bad sections, but over the course-of-time the ‘new’ sections had been become just as bad - merging again a while later. With only two vehicles passing in the last hour - these being big tyre’d trucks as a car would’ve had no chance - I soon accepted that I would have to flag-down the next one passing, my previous lift was a train in Vietnam so maybe I shouldn’t beat-myself-up over sticking my thumb out on this occasion.
As a distant rumble eventually leads to a nearby groan a large pick-up truck draws to a stop. With room in the back my panniers are soon detached with my bike firmly lashed upright. Standing in the back with one hand steadying my bike whilst t’other held onto the cab’s roof-top grab-rail, my knuckles were soon grated by the spare wheel’s tyre that was lashed on the cab’s roof, as the vehicle pounded along the route, crashing over rocks and sticks, then down into large pot-holes for good-measure, I’m briefly air-born, whilst at the same time a constant plume of dust passes around me. Informed it was just ten kilometres to the next village after fifteen minutes of [literally] white knuckles - hanging on for dear life - shouting over the drone of the engine we take a break, forearms screaming for rest! Yet again “ten kilometres” is stated, I’m thinking yer, ten kilometres…until the next ten! (Compressing this paragraph!) The village did show up and everyone lived happily after, well, in reality it wasn’t quite like that but after dusting myself, the panniers and bike down I manage to continue cycling, pausing briefly in the remote village for an iced tea.
The main village I’d set as the day’s goal was still (!) ten kilometres away but felt better for getting thus far. Several rivers ran through the area - tributaries that eventually lead into the mighty Mekong River just before Stung Treng - each having a quaint floating bridge, comprising random pieces of wood cobbled together to form a walkway, re-emphasising this really was a traffic-free route.
‘Pushbike’ a word whose origin may have derived from someone else’s similar experiences that I’d encountered, so here maybe a new word is due that I can claim as mine; pushyling, a hybrid of pushing and cycling. Pushyling along, the day’s end draws close, luckily so did the village of Siem Pang, perched on the banks of the Kong River (no prizes for guessing where that leads into!), far too big for a floating bridge a ferry chugs me across t’other side where I soon seek refuge within the grounds of a temple.
The next day back on tarmacadam I easily knock-out the 104km to Stung Treng, bumping into a back-packer I’d previously met in Kyrgyzstan (it really is a small world!). Will was travelling on motorbike with another biker and both keen to hear more about where I’d been, or more-so what route I’d taken. Like-wise preferring the lesser-travelled / more-on-offer routes I guaranteed them they’d get their money’s-worth on the route I’d done!
Not that I explored the city enough to give it any credit, for me seeing where the Kong River merged with the Mekong River proved impressive! Needless-to-say, the smaller of the two, the Kong feeding into the Mekong even made the River Thames look quite feeble. Hearing from another couple of motorbike back-packers that a brand-spanking new bridge over the Mekong had just opened halted my search for the ferry operator…whom was presumably now looking at career options.
Cambodia had two more offerings, in the way of temples, or should that be TEMPLES!!...along with an unexpected hug on my final night. But as you will see, quite rightly deserves a post all to itself. Tune in next time for Cambodia pt.2.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments
(Atom)
0 comments:
Post a Comment