Cambodia at first glance

AFter leaving Krabi, we took the bus back to bangkok. Bangkok is sort of feeling like a base now. We have arrived here 3 times now, and its starting to grow on me. We used our time in bangkok sort of like a rest, relax and compose our selves time.

We got into bangkok at 6 am, and decided to be brave and walk from the down town area to the back packery area of town call khaosan road. I was a little nervous. bangkok at 6 am is sort of grimy, all steel bars, and strangley vacant. We sort of knew the area, because we had been driven around that area many times by tuk tuk drivers in the previous weeks. We were lucky enough to run into this well traveled euro man that pointed us in the right direction, and after about 20 minutes, we made it! We checked into our trusty inn: sawasdee house. If any one is travelling to bangkok, i would suggest it! www.sawasdeehouse.com . We then proceeded to sleep untill the afternoon. That night we just lounged and got some grub, did the internet cafe thing and relaxed.

The next night was a little but more intersting. We find our self at a nice pub sat next to this british guy named adrian and his thai wife named cat. The evening gets a little foggy from here on out, but here are some highlights in the order that i remember.
1. Adrian and cat introduce themselves and warn us of the dangers of drinking thai beer (it is supposedly fill of formeldehyde)
2. They also warned us about thai cigarettes, doctors, hospitals and traffic
3.Cat is a huge fan of Linkin park and wanted adrian to compete in an air gituar contest to win tixkets
4. we are at a strange bar watching a small german man perform the maddest air gitaur routine to black sabbath??
5. The order many buckets of vodka and red bull
6. Fortune telling starts
7. Cat performs a feice air gitaur routine to red hot chilli peppers and wins the tickets to linkin park!
8.me and shiv wake up with white string tied around our wrists.

It was such a strange, but interesting evening. The next few days in bangkok, we spent at the internet cafes and sampling new food establishments around town.

We decided to book our tickets to Cambodia through sawasdee house, and Im sort of glad that we did because they were very helpful and literally "walked" us over the border.
Walking into cambodia was an experience like none other. The first thing i saw was this huge arch way that was carved so inticately like the archways you might find at the ruins of ankor wat. Surrounding the border crossing were so many people pulling wooden carts, and the main road leading away from the border was a huge red dirt road. The thai side is pretty much freeways, paved roads and shopping plazas. The cambodian side was dusty, smelly, and full of people wanting money, anything really to help them out just a bit. It was really heart breaking. I honestly could not belive my eyes. You don't want to stare, but its hard not to. And you want to give some children money, but when does it end. You cant give every street child money. And then it just perpetuates the cycle of begging and being dependent of forigners for money. It was so hard.

Our bus driver took us the long bumpy way to siem reip, The bus we were in was "defying the laws of physics" as shiv said, because it was basically "off roading", but we were on the high way. It was insane.

The thing about cambodia that has stuck in my mind so feircely was the fact that in the poor areas, there was hardly no light and the smell of wood burning. there were no street lights, no paved roads, no lights (as in bulbs), only candle light and the occasional lamp. You could se dinner being cooked out side on a fire and it just seemed that you had stepped back in time a good 50-100 years.

I wont forget that any time soon, as soon as you hit the out skirts of the city, the road is paved, street lights appear, as do the most amazing 5 star hotels I Have ever seen. Being part of the bangkok-seim reip scam, our tour guide was also affiliated with a guest house in Siem reip, so of course as soon as we get into the city, he drops every one off at his guest house.

Im just glad that the place was nice, clean and well priced. The aim is to have you arrive so tired and worn out, you will basically just pay waht ever they say because you are to worn out to barter or get a cab and try looking for a place on your own. We won out this time! and our room had hot water and the movie channel.