A lot has happened in the past day, and I will just quickly give you a rundown as I am trying to get this done before I take a moto-taxi around Phnom Penh for the day. I am going to see the Killing Fields, and S-21, along with some museums.
So… I left my guesthouse and booked my flight to Kathmandu, then jumped on the airport shuttle bus. I had tried to plan it out so that I left with no baht left so I didn’t have to worry about converting it, and I ended up getting to the airport with about $1 worth of baht. The flight was on time, and went very smoothly, taking just over an hour from Bangkok to Phnom Penh. The second I walked out of the airport I was accosted by the moto-taxi line, and proceeded to put myself, my bag, the driver, and my backpack onto a small 100cc motor scooter. We took off down a dusty highway, zipping in and around traffic, making out way into town. I couldn’t keep the grin off of my face. I love riding motor scooters here (Southeast Asia) because you can get anywhere quickly, but when you are a passenger on the back with a guy whose job is to weave through traffic like an insane race driver, it is an even better experience.
I immediately liked Cambodia. The people are friendly, love to speak to you, and help you out. My moto-taxi guy took me to six or seven different guest houses on the lake until we found one that had room. I paid, dropped my bag off, and went down to the floating boat that they have turned into a dock. I got some food, read for a little, and took a lot of photos of one of the most beautiful sunsets I have ever seen. The pictures really don’t do it justice. The sun just hung over the water and reflected everywhere, followed by an explosion of color from the horizon that was mirrored in the lake in front of me.
The people who were on the top deck of this boat were about my age, and I had started talking to one of the girls because we were laughing at the boat children, kids who offer to take you out on their boat for $1. They are persistent little guys. Anyway, I went up there to talk with them and ended up staying there the rest of the night. Everything is priced in dollars here, and I was very surprised to see Jackson’s face staring up at me when I pulled money out of the ATM. Here is a foreign country, a very poor foreign country, that uses our dollar as its currency. They also have the reil (not spelling that right), and it is about 4000r to $1.
Alright, I am off to eat some food and jump on a bike for the day. These places are supposed to be very intense, very solemn areas, and from what I know of the history of the area, I think it will be an eye opening day.
Sunset
Kid who wanted me to ride in his boat.
Another boat kid