London arrival

We arrived in London at about 6am London time. We were fairly tired and not in the mood for the dickhead Kiwi customs officer who berrated us at customs. He basically insulted us by saying that Australians were a drain on British society, we contribute nothing, get a British passport and then go home. THen to top it off he banged on about how apparently there were a lot of problems with foreign teachers not being at the same standard as British teachers. What a nobwanker. I'm still not over it. The strangest part was that he himself came over on an Ancestory Visa!

Once I put on my pair of jeans and one lame jacket I had I was mustering some excitement. This quickly dissipated when we got outside at Kensington Tube station and walked to our hotel in the freezing minus 2 degrees temp of 7am London. After 2 months of tropical weather this was a shock to the system. I was so cold I thought my butt was wet! Anyway we spent the day trying to stay awake.

We have now been in England for 3 weeks and are starting to settle in. We moved into the first place we found- boarding at a house owned by a woman in her 30s. She is lovely but hardly ever home so we have free reign which is great.

My first week of school was extremely interesting and I will write more details when my brain is functioning better. Its 1.30 am right now.

We had a lovely Christmas with Tim's Grandparents although we both felt a bit homesick throughout the day missing everyone.

Belated updates. Leaving South East asia

So on the 5th of December finally we were to say goodbye to Cambodia. So the night before we decided a goodbye night at the Angkor What? Bar was in order. We thought a couple of beers and back to our hostel for a good nights sleep before our early bus trip the next day. It didn't quite work out that way. As we were onto our second and what we thought would be our last beer we were joined by a Welsh guy and an Aussie girl with a bucket of redbull and vodka and a bucket of scotch and coke complete with sharing straws. We thought it would be impolite to decline their offer. So long story short we got fairly wasted, at some point Tim helped the Welsh guy climb up to the cieling to write their names and then we stumbled home at about 2.30 or so in the morning leaving our new friends behind. Gareth the Welsh guy was going to Bangkok on the bus the next morning as well. Upon waking up early the next morning feeling like complete shite we vowed never to drink from a bucket again. We were picked up from our hotel and taken to the bus. The bus was tiny, and there were only 2 seats left- so TIm and I were split up for the journey. Bags were in the aisles and there was no air con so all windows were left open for breeze. It was stinking hot and Cambodian roads are all dirt and incredibly dusty. With a hangover I tried to sleep but kept waking to find my mouth full of dirt and my neck sore from the potholy road. It took us about 6 hours or so to get to the Poipet border crossing. By this stage we were buggered and cursing the Welsh guy's buckets and wondering where he was because he wasn't on the bus. We lined up at the border to cross into Ayathua Prathet on the Thailand side. It was hot and smelly and we were all dirty. Crossing the border was fairly simple and quick except for the bus drivers strange systems. We were all given different coloured stickers and not told why but that we had to wear them on our shirts. Once on the other side we were all congregated together (still no understanding of coloured stickers) and told to wait. After about 30 mins we saw our old mate Gary wander over with a coloured sticker on. He then told us that he had actaully partied until 5.30am and slept for an hour then got up and got on another bus that was travelling behind us. So we hung at the border with him commiserating on our shared hungover miseries. after another hour we were led to a bus and then given more coloured stickers with numbers. By the time Tim and I got to the bag are it was full and so the guys said "Just leave it on the ground"- we weren't so sure what would happen to them but were so hot we didn't care and boarded the bus. this bus was much nicer than the last but had been sitting in the sun and was excruciatingly hot. We sat here another 20 mins before actually leaving and no one could figure out why. Things were becoming quite tense as no one knew what was happening. When we did finally leave there was a communal sigh of relief- but we hadn't gotten further than about ten mins down the road when the bus stopped for a half hour break! They make money off commissions so it was no great surprise. So we all sat around eating icecreams and looking more like we were eating frozen poo from Coogee bay hotel we were all so sour at our long journey. while we were there the driver got a call saying someone had been left back at the border so they had to go back and get him. It never ended. Then it took us about 5 hours to drive to Bangkok. When we did get there we realised it was the King's birthday and it took us about 2 hours to get through the traffic to Khao Shan Road where we were being dropped off. The lights of the city for the King were incredibly beautiful- I've never seen anything like it but we were so tired it was hard to care. We eventually found a hostel and ran into old Gary again. So we went and had a great Indian meal with him but this time decided not to involve any buckets!

It was sometime the next day while we were hanging around Kha San Road that we think we must have lost our camera! Damn it!

Anyway we got on our flight to London at about 1am Bangkok time.

Banteay Srei

These shots where taken with the video camera.




In these carvings there are always nagas vomiting some creature or another, often out of all five of their mouths.


Lots of the ancient temples have the logo for chang beer on them

Banteay Srei & Kbal Spean

Kbal Spean plus gecko

The lingas at Kbal Spean




One of the geckos hanging out in our room





I think this is some sort of locally made bio-diesel, you see kids selling it on the side of the highway.

Nature shots

Cock River and other less phallic adventures

So again we started out fairly late. We secured a tuk tuk driver as we wanted to check out this weird temple river bed and another temple that are 50km from Siem Reip but still covered by our three day temple pass. It took about an hour and a half to drive to Kbal Spean or in translation "River of a thousand doodles". Actually the term traditionally used is "linga"which is basically a carved phallic shape symbolising fertility. The trip there was really dusty partly along a dry dirt road. But we observed some interesting country life along the way. Its weird here there are some petrol stations but you can also buy fuel for your motorbike basically anywhere along the road in old pepsi and jack daniels red labels bottles. We watched as this little boy no older than 4 ran out with the bottle and started to fill up the tank. Weird. But I digress again- back to the penis river. We had to walk 1.5 km's through the jungle and up a bit of a mountain to get to the river. The river bed is carved with 1000 of these phallic linga shapes. There are also some carvings of different deities both under the water and on rocks around.It was pretty cool and the jungle walk was beautiful. Tim got to check out some more fungus and interesting insects along the way and used all our camera battery photographing tree trunks.

After this we drove back towards Siem Riep and stopped at a temple called Banteay Srei or the "citadel of Women"". This is a temple dedicated to Shiva and although the temple itself is much smaller than most we have seen the carvings are by far the best. They are incredibly detailed and beautiful.

Now we have one day left in Siem Riep and we intend to chill out. Maybe some beers at a pub followed by fish foot massage! Then off to Bangkok on Friday and hopefully London here we come!

Angkor Wat photos pt3

Angkor Wat photos pt2

The naga statues had a very 'little shop of horrors' look to them


One of the best of the 300 or so monkey photos we have taken

Angkor Wat photos pt1

The Bayon at sunset


The ruins are a sacred site, the 'eighth wonder of the world' and has lots of sign prohibiting flower picking, yelling and wearing sleeveless tops but they also have people wandering around letting their cattle graze, burning rubbish on the side of the road and playing R'nB pop songs at full volume.


Personally I(Tim) found the some trees growing amongst the temples even more fascinating than the ruins. This tree looked so eerily like a Zdzislaw Beksinski painting. I'm pretty sure it was a strangler fig that had been chopped down, had fallen on a pile of stone blocks and then had re-established itself.




We didn't ride any of the elephant/cow/naga statues or take photos of the beheaded budhas with our heads in place, so I think we can get away with this one.

Dead Fish Tower

A bad photo of the Dead fish tower, it is hard to tell form this photo but the place has about 7 levels, with ladders all over the place.


Warning signs near the crocs




We watched someone fork up the 50c to feed them. They were so please with the spectacle that they payed for another 2 lots of fish. The crocs were clambering over each other to get the fish.


The place had a lot of FAQs on the walls, one of them read:
snakehead fish bite?
yes, the biggest one bited us three times.
I'm pretty sure this is the one they were talking about

The temples of Angkor Wat again plus some other ruminations

Today Tim and I have been chasing Thai airlines to see if we can indeed leave next saturday night for London. After calling about 4 different Thai numbers, the Cambodian number and the Australian number for the airline we have been told we have to keep trying this one number for Thailand (that we never get through on) and there is no other way of rescheduling our flight. So we have been in and out of next cafes making calls and getting nowhere! Its getting a little frustrating. If we have to spend Christmas in Phuket that's not so bad but I would like to know about it soon seeing as I'm due to start my new job in a week and a half. Because we have been doing this its made us think more about our arrival in London. I think we are expecting to be shocked by the cold after tropical heat but I think we will also suffer a little culture shock. Its weird how easily we have become accustomed to these very different places. For one ridinng bikes through the crazy traffic of all three countries we've visited is no longer traumatic and I have stopped thinking in road rules and now follow the way of South East Asian roads which appears to be keep riding no matter what, don't give way, don't stop, just keep inching through the hordes of motorbikes, trucks, cars and buses and don't even worry if you're on the wrong side of the road- you are allowed to make your own personal lanes here going in any direction. Going back to the structured control of a road system like that in the UK will trouble us greatly. As will the blandness of bangers, mash and baked beans! Oh well its all an adventure!

So today we took the morning easy (which we have been doing rather stupidly as when we do start the 6km ride to the temples its very hot!). Then we headed out to see the Angkhor Thom temples. Again amazing and there is no point describing them- we will just post some pics.

We rode nearly 30km again and have returned to Siem Riep very sweaty and dirty. Feeling less than clean has become second nature as well. In both Vietnam and Cambodia we haven't been able to get our clothes washed in a machine but instead have been hand washed. There's something a bit weird about letting perfect strangers handwash your undergarments and its even weirder that they will do it for US$1 per kilo! But there isn't mkuch choice- today we got some clothes back that smelt like old tea. I suppose its better for the environment than washing powder but it doesn't make you feel that fresh!

Tarantulas and crickets.

Closest to the camera: fried spiders, on the ground: fried crickets, in the bucket live spiders.


me unable to keep my eyes open in any photo as usual.


You can see one of the street peddlers coming in with another tarantula in this one.





Steph samples a cricket

Angkor Wat

Last night we were tuk tuked out to one of the temples near Angkor Wat to climb up and watch the sunset. Unfortunately it was fairly cloudy and the sunset was less than spectacular. Even worse was the look on our drivers face when we told him we wouldn't need him to drive us the next day as we wanted to hire bikes instead. Oh well can't please them all.

So today we eventually (after a leisurely breakfast and coffee at a bakery that would impress my Dad) set out on our rather dodgy bikes to the entrance to the temple complex. Its about 6 km to the starting point and then about 3 km to Angkor Wat after that. We went the wrong way around the route and approached Angkor Wat from behind which made it seem less impressive but it was also cool because there were less tourists and a whole heap of monkeys. We got some good footage of a couple of monkeys grooming each other.

Angkor Wat was pretty cool- the carved images along all the walls were pretty amazing. After this we biked around (about another 3 or 4 km) to the next temple called (insert name here when I have map with me and can remember). It was more ruins and in many ways more interesting- full of jungle vines and little kids playing amongst the old stones. A little girl tried to sell Tim and bag and when he said no she quickly moved onto her next mission which was to extract lollies in any form from us. We remembered that we had some weird coconut lollies in our bag we bought somewhere in Vietnam and so we emtied a pile into her hands and then attracted a few more kids like bees to the honey pot (is that the right expression?). With handfulls of sugar to rot their teeth even quicker they thought it was Christmas. By this stage of the day the sun was getting low and we wanted to bike back into town before it got really dark. We have a three day pass to the temples so we are taking it fairly slowly and just biking around as we feel like it.

We have tried called Thai airways but no answer. We heard that some planes were leaving the airport and heading to other airports to mvoe poeple out. We aren't sure what that means exactly and will wait until tomorrow to try calling again. Hopefully we will know if we are stuck here or not very soon. At the very least I probably have to inform my new employers that I might not make the start date!

cricket consumption and spider loving!

So today we headed to Siem Reap by bus. The most exciting part of the day came when we pulled in a roadside food selling stop- kind of like a truck stop but way more fun. As soon as we were off the bus we were surrounded by cute little girls trying to sell us pineapple. We couldn't help but notice one little girl had a giant tarantula crawling all over her shirt- we thought it was a pet until she dragged us over to a woman with a giant bucket ful of live tarantulas and a big pan full of deep fried tarantula's for your culinary pleasure. Before we could argue one of the women had thrown a live tarantula in Tim's direction- next he had one on his shirt and another in his beard. The women thought it was truly hilarious! Before I could join in the laughter i had one thrust upon my bosom. It wasn't nearly as horrible as one might imagine. Although I was quietly thankful it wasn't a frog. NExt we bought a couple of deep fried crickets and had a taste. As soon as i had popped it in my mouth the children said "no don't eat that bit!"I hope they were having a lend of me. The Khmer people have a fairly Australian sense of humour and Tim and i are really enjoying meeting these people who (not sure if I should make the call so early) are the best we've met so far. great fun genuine and warm people.
While we chomped on fairly average grasshoppers we were surrounded by the little pineapple sellers who were equally fascinated by both Tim's beard and my fair skin. They kept saying "White skin you very beautiful lady"- wow imagine if they met someone who actually had really beautiful skin. They were fairly deligthed when we said they were all very beautiful and chatted to them about how old they are etc.

When we eventually arrived in Siem Reap we were picked up by Martins cousin and taken to his brothers guest house. WE went to this crazy palce for dinner called the "dead fish Tower". It used to be a crocodile farm and now the crocs swim about beneath the dining areas. Dumb waiters lift food to the many open split level dining areas and Traditional dancers entertain.

next we wandered through the night market- the classiest we've ever seen. The fish massage tanks were hilarious- you stick your feet in and let the fish eat your dead skin. We're yet to try!

Phnom Penh - crazy mixture of emotions

So we set out this morning with the friendly tuk tuk driver Martin who helped us find a hotel last night and insisted he take us around the city today- he had such a big smile we couldn't say no. In fact most of the people here are all smiles- which has surprised me I don't know why.

We went straight to the Tul Sleng Museum to satisfy my appetite for modern history. This was a highschool that was converted into a prison in 1975 under Pol Pot and Khmer Rouge- they drove the people out of the city and into the country side to work while taking all the educated people from both city and country and locking them here where they were tortured in the cruelest of ways and eventually taken to the killing fields and executed (if they didn't die in prison first). I can't reall express in writing what this place felt like- but as soon as we faced the entrance I knew why Martin had chosen to park his tuk tuk and himself around the corner and away. The atmosphere and energy were unlike anything I have ever felt before and I very nearly couldn't get past the ticket booth. I felt nauseated and headachey before we even got inside. But something inside me pressed me on- I think its important to understant this history so we don't let it happen again (even though it is happening in various places around the world- sadly!). The buidlings were as they were and you could tell it had been a school at one point which only added to the eerieness- a place of education and innocence usually. We wandered through the classrooms turned cells which were dirty and not really sanitised for "tourist consumption". But the worst part was the photo exhibition. Every prisoner to come to this place was photographed - even the children and babies. Women were not excluded from the prison either. These photographs lined the walls and the vacant stares of the people was haunting. I can't really write much more because it overwhelmed me in such a way that I think I have already blocked some of it from my mind. I found it extremely hard to breathe and got quite teary. It was not a pleasant experience but I don' t regret going- it has enlightened me so much about Cambodian history and given me a new insight into the contemporary people.
When we returned to Martin he opened up and told us about his experiences as a child under Pol Pot. His emotions were still extremely raw and I still can't beleive he told us so much. His father was killed by the Khmer Rouge soldiors and Martin witnessed it. He had his hands bound, blindfolded adn while music played to cover the sounds of murder he was pushed down a well to drown. Martin also lost other members of his extended family. His father was killed when his mother was 7 months pregnant. His little sister is now 31 and her birth marks the year of their fathers death. MArtin was about7 or 8 and he was also forced to work- all the children had to collect both the animal and human shit to use as fertilizer on the rice fields. They were woken up at 6am and worked til 12- have an hour to eat rice soup (about 10 spoons each which was mostly water) and then back to work until 6. Then more rice soup and meetings of indoctrination- then sleep at 9- wake at 6 again. They weren't allowed to talk at niht- they would be killed. Basically the Khmer Rouge aimed to break up family groups, destroy connections, remove educated people so there was no risk of an uprising.

After this Martin took us to the killing fields which are slightly out of town. Neither of us were sure we really wanted to go after this but we didn't say anything. TheKilling fields were where people were taken to be killed and thrown into mass graves. These graves were dug up in the 1980s and now the skulls of the dead are displayed in this massive monument. Its quite weird but I didn't feel as off at the fields as I did at the prison even though such horrible things happened here. The energy here was more peaceful and calm- I suppose once your dead nothing can hurt you anymore.

After this we had had enough of depressing history and Martin took us for lunch at a local (very local) eating house. There were no other tourists and no english menus so Martin ordered some dishes for us- which turned out to be very tasty. I was surprised considering we were sitting at tables with rubbish all on the ground. Not really bad rubbish just paper but I'm keeping my fingers crossed that i don't get sick. Martin was such a cool genuine guy he just chatted on about Cambodian history, culture and his own life and family. He is dedicated to giving his 3 daughters a good education and is paying for the eldest to attend public school as well as English and Chinese schools. he also helps his community as he was involved in setting up water wells for country villages etc. He hates the political party here which is completely corrupt and is saddened by the fact that many of his peers spend all their money gambling and drinking and complain when he has a house and his daughters are at school. But he only earns about 80 US dollars per week. We gave him 20 bucks for the day (he asked for 15) and we shouted him lunch and a drink etc. through the day adn still felt like we were ripping him off.

After lunch he took us to a small orphanage. Before we went we stopped off to buy some rice to give to the kids- we got about 25 kilos - wish we could have coughed up the 50 bucks for 60 kilos but I suppose something is better than nothing. When we arrived the 6 kids that were at the Orphanage (the other 17 were at school) rushed out immediately and threw their arms around us- I wasn't expecting such a warm welcome. They tugged at our hands and led us around to show us their beds and one little imp had a great time jumping all over Tim. One of the little boys also was an expert on our camera and had a great time taking shots and videos. I felt sad to have to take it off him when we left. They were so full of excitement it was a nice change to the feelings of the prison. It was weird to have these random kids hugging you and not letting go when in australia you could get arrested for that kind of thing!

Next we went to a temple on a hill in the middle of the city. IT was pretty cool- but coolest of all were the many monkeys on the hill! Monkey Town part 2- oh how I love monkeys! We have many more photos now!

This marked the end of our day. Tomorrow we head to Siem Reip by bus- there are heaps of things to see in that area so we thought we would get there asap. It was sad to say goodbye to Martin who was such a cool guy. When we paid him he was so genuinely grateful that we had employed him for the day and said we were helping his daughters be educated- which was nice to know as an educator and just as a Stephie and a Tim. I have felt so weird that we have been touring around these poor countries and now I feel that we have at least made a very small contribution to someone. I would love to come back here and do some volunteer work at that orphanage. The kids could speak a little English and I'm sure would benefit from help with reading and writing and speaking and just generally some attention- whcih is what they seem to crave the most.

Two days of travel

So yesterday we bussed it from saigon to Chau Doc a Cham town near the border of Cambodia. Basically the bus trip was fairly heinous as it was a mini van not really intended for backpackers but just locals with no luggage and it was a 7 hour trip over raod that barely exists. Probably the bumpiest so far and being wedged in between Tim and two Vietnamese men with limite air con was less than fun. But we arrived in one piece and quickly found our way to the dodgiest hotel we've stayed in so far but I suppose at 8 US dollars per night you can't complain too much. Chau Doc is sort of in the Mekong Delta and so very much about fishing and other watery revenue. We didn't get much of a chance to look around but I don't think we missed out on a lot.

Today we woke up at 5.30 am as we had to be on a boat at 7am to look around the waterways before heading up the Mekong to the cross the border into Cambodia. This proved to be a very entertaining little journey. Tim and I were alone in a long boat steered and rowed by a very fit odler lady. We were guided through the floating villages where children laughed and waved from their floating shacks. Eventually we came to a Cham village. Cham people used to occupy a larger portion of Vietnam but now live mainly in the Delta - they are Muslim but seemingly a slightly different more laid back version of the religion. When we wandered through the village we had about ten kids trying to sell us waffles "Madam, madam 6 waffles, 3 coconut and 3 banana for one dollar, you buy from me, you buy from me please!"

Steph: No thankyou

Tim (silent and skillfully storms ahead)

Children: Maybe later, maybe later, not now for you madam maybe later you buy from me, you have to buy from me.

This chorus continued the length of the street up the the Muslim mosque. Then started again when we reemerged

Children: Madam Madam maybe later 6 waffles! Maybe later maybe later

ME: no thankyou

Children" You make me cry Madam, madam maybe later. You make me cry!

I can't express how funny this actually was and I wish I could have secretly video taped it!

Anyway we then left on a slightly larger (only slightly) boat up the Mekong River taking about 3 hours to get to the border. Aside from the uncomfy board seats we had a good time- there is a lot of life along the Mekong- its too much to describe here and we have some good video.

Crossing the border was kind of weird. We surrendered our passports to this guy who went an got our visas for us along with those of many other people crossing over. But eventually we got across not mcuh stress. Then it was another 2-3 hours on the boat and another 2 hours on bus to get to Pnom Penh where we are now. Very tired.
We had dinner at this great restaraunt called "Friends whihc is a charity restaraunt with all profits going to help orphaned children and street children with education and development of skills etc. Reall great stuff. Anyway too tired for more detail. tomorrow the killing fields, orphanages and torture museums- as Tim would sarcastically put it "uplifting stuff"!

Steph and Tim in the hills around Dalat- central highlands of Vietnam

No one can imagine the joy of finding a handcrafted connect four in the "Before and Now" Bar in Hoi An after 3 days of consecutive rain!

The river in Hoi An floods every evening

Tim challenging the dragon at temple in Dalat

Tim with our motorbike guides Hun and Nam (right to left) in Dalat

Nha Trang. On the beach there were little crabs everywhere and a couple of kids were eager to catch one for us.

Temple in Hue

Crazily happy Buddha at Temple in Dalat

Some ruins of My Son

View from temple in Hue