Time to go home!

With four weeks of constant touring on a not too comfortable (the polite version) motorbike under our belts (or bums!) we were quite enjoying playing the simple tourists. So after our day at the museum and fantastic night at the Traditional Dance Show, we opted for something a little less mentally taxing but rather more energetic the next day and set off on a walk to the Russian market some 3 miles from our hotel. We had been told that it was a good place to look for presents and souvenirs, although some haggling had to be the order of the day as starting prices were always “tourist” prices. With our time in Cambodia rapidly coming to an end we had yet to pick up anything much due to the limitations of what we could carry on the already overloaded little bike. Of course, haggling was nothing new to me having spent so much time in North Africa, where it is also very much expected and necessary if you don’t want to pay way over the odds for everything.

Family Transport Asian Style

How many can you get on a Scoot?

It was quite a long walk in the heat of the day, but still enjoyable as it took us through a part of the city that that we had not previously seen. The market itself was interesting but probably due to the Chinese New Year, many stall weren’t open, however that didn’t stop us picking up a few silk items at around 1/3 less than the first asking price and under a quarter of what we would have paid in the smarter tourist shops!  Most of the stalls, as at all the other markets we had seen were selling fresh produce; varieties of fruit and vegetables we had never seen, and much less would know what to do with them! Fish, crabs, lobsters and other seafood still flapping and flopping around in big bowls of fresh water that the vendors changed regularly. Our supermarkets may have high-tech refrigeration facilities, but their produce will never ever be as fresh as that you can buy at markets over here.  After a nice cold drink it was time to head back. We talked about getting a tuk-tuk but eventually decided to take a slow amble back; we were now in the hottest part of the day.

Using my new free map app, maps.me (which I would heartily recommend to all travellers), I headed us down towards the river with a view to then just walking along the bank towards the Royal Palace and our hotel. It was a good route as once more it took us through yet another entirely different part of the city, past huge hotels and casinos; office and apartment blocks. This was not an area which your average Cambodian would even recognise! This was where so much of the billions of dollars of UN aid had ended up, lining the pockets of the politicians, generals and their cadres! Money that was destined to improve the lot of the people as a whole but which had been spirited away by the very people that were supposed to be helping them!

I had been recommended to read a book by a lady we had met at our beach cabin in Kep; Hun Sen’s Cambodia, which I managed to pick up for just $5 from a Phnom Penh bookstore; it’s £24.95 on Amazon! In many ways I wish I had read it before we set off, but in another way, it is better read having seen so much of the country. One thing is sure, my naïve view of politics and particularly the UN will never be the same again. Nor will I be quite as critical of our political system; whilst it may well be corrupt and imperfect, at least our politicians (to say nothing of our monarch) don’t go around slaughtering their opponents with AK 47s and rocket propelled grenades. Written by a well respected, prominent journalist, it makes most works of fiction seem very tame. Whilst most in the West know at least something of the genocide perpetrated by Pol Pot’s Kymer Rouge, that isn't even half the story! If you like a good read of political skulduggery and intrigue I would urge you by buy the book or borrow it from you local library, believe me you won’t be disappointed, and I speak as one not generally into politics or such writings; it makes compulsive reading!

Development in the city is pushing on at a huge rate on knots, funded it appears by principally by Japan and China (as well of course, as the misappropriated funds), although just who is going to patronise the fantastical developments God (or perhaps Buddha) only knows. Most of the gigantic hotels appear to have only a handful of guests and since the withdrawal of the UNs huge contingent, one wonders just who is going to replace their spending power!  Phnom Penh even has, against all odds, a theme park called Dream Land, although like so many other things out here it appears to be abandoned and very run down.  Perhaps that too is a victim of the UN withdrawal

The Silver Pagoda

Next morning it was back to the culture theme with a visit to the Royal Palace and the Silver Pagoda. We had been staying within a stones throw of them on all three visits to the city, but whilst we had viewed and photographed them from the outside we’d never got around to the tour! Now it was probably just case of us being “templed out” but I must confess that neither of us found it as interesting as we expected. No parts of the actual palace were open to the public so it was just case of wandering around the grounds and visiting, yes, you guessed it, the various pagodas. Even the silver pagoda was a bit of a let down.

I had read that the entire floor was paved with 5000 solid silver tiles, which I had read somewhere, each weighed about 5kg. Although only a small proportion was on view with the rest being covered by carpet, I think someone is telling porkies! Firstly, I cant see anyone sticking down real solid silver tiles with 2 inch wide clear sticky tape (and badly at that!). Secondly, if even just the ones under the carpet were solid silver, I don’t think they would give a hollow rattle when you tap then lightly with your toe !!! No, sorry your Royal Highness, I think that dastardly Hun Sen, has legged it with them and replaced them with cheap Chinese stainless steel ones!!!

We had taken the sunset cruise whilst passing through Phnom Penh on our way north to Koh Kong and had thoroughly enjoyed it, so had promised ourselves that when we got back to the city we would take the longer, Silk Island cruise. At a little under $30 each, it included lunch, drinks and a tour of the Silk Island and Silk farm; a total of 4 ½ hours, so didn’t seem bad value for money. I booked on line with Viator as it was a little less than from the Hotel and included a buffet lunch rather than just a snack. Again, we weren't disappointed. From the welcome cocktail to the cruise itself, the crew couldn’t have been more pleasant or helpful. The tuk-tuk tour of the island, whilst a bit dusty, was very interesting, with the driver pointing out all the different crops from the ubiquitous banana trees, to aubergines and ginger; we also saw the biggest bull I've ever seen in my life.

At the silk farm itself we had the entire process explained to us, from the laying of the eggs, through the pupae stage to the actual weaving of the cloth on traditional hand looms. The experienced weavers manage just 10cm of finished fabric per day; no wonder it’s so expensive, even given the stupidly low salaries in Cambodia. Speaking of which; going back to my earlier comments about the UN, it seems that on top of their already high salaries, the UN staff were paid $130 per DAY living allowance whilst in Cambodia, which equates to the ANNUAL wage for the average Cambodian. No wonder that inflation ran riot whilst they were in the country…

The French Colonial Central Market in Phnom Penh

And so we arrived at our final day in Cambodia. The bike had been taken back, most of our kit was packed and there seemed to be just one place of note that we hadn’t visited; The Central Market! Yes, yet another market, although this one was more famous for its French Colonial architecture than for its contents! We didn’t mind another long walk as the following two days would see us sat on our backsides on a variety of planes for hours on end, so a walk would be good. It wasn’t as far as the Russian Market and through an area we had visited before, just a couple of blocks further on. Again, possibly due to Chinese New Year, only the perimeter stalls were open, but I did manage to buy a replacement for my very scruffy and torn little Deuter rucksack for $10 as against about £50 in the UK; I know it’s probably a Chinese copy but that’s where the genuine ones are probably made anyway. We had planned for an early nigh as we had to be at about 4.30am, but as is often the case it didn’t quite turn out as planned. At a little bar/restaurant just along from our hotel where we took our eveing meal, we discovered that whilst they didn’t have any Scotch, they had Bacardi! We returned to base a little worse for wear for the first time on the entire trip… and somewhat later than intended.

Flight Day!

Our alarm was set for 5am as the taxi was due to collect us at 6am for our 8am flight. We needn’t have bother as we were both wide awake by 4.30, albeit a little hungover! With most of the packing already done it was just a case of showering and sorting the few bits to go in our cabin bags; toting the lot down to hotel lobby and waiting. But not for long; our cab arrived 10 minutes early and off we went to the airport which was about a 20 minute ride away. Traffic at that hour of the morning was fairly light; certainly the lightest we had seen in the city so we arrived with plenty of time to spare. I can’t say either of us was particularly looking forward to the long flight, particularly as we had discovered on the way out, we would have three rather than the expected two, stops. On the return we also had a much longer layover in Beijing; nearly 15 hours but then China Southern would give us a free hotel and transport for the night as it was over 8 hours, wouldn’t they… Well, no actually, on arrival we searched high and low (literally!) over the three floors of terminal two for the Transit desk. We asked at countless “information” desks, none of whom could give us any information! So finally we bit the proverbial bullet and went to the hotel reservations desks and coughed up for our nights accommodation. In truth it wasn’t too bad at $38 including breakfast and free transfers, but I had been assured when I spoke to China Southern Airways after booking that hotel would be provided.

Now THATS what you call a canoe - it holds 60 paddlers! 

We dined in the hotels almost deserted Chinese (there’s a surprise!) restaurant at a very reasonably 100 Yuan, about £10, which even included a couple of rather warm beers and toddled off to bed. Breakfast, which was taken in the same restaurant, was aimed fairly and squarely at their indigenous guests with no concession to western tastes, so was more than adequate but “interesting”. So back to terminal two for our long 9 ½ hour haul across to Amsterdam; well that was the plan but somehow we along with a local lad heading back to Uni in Cambridge, manged to get off at terminal Three; Doh! Fortunately our new friend, whom we had met at breakfast, managed to sort us all out and we still got to check in with plenty of time to spare. Which is more than could be said for the final transfer! We only had just over an hour for the transfer at Amsterdam and by the time our KLM flight left the tarmac at Beijing we were already running half an hour behind schedule… this was looking tight. As on the outward flight, we read and slept and eat and read and eat and… It all gets a bit monotonous after the first couple of hours. Usually when we land we take our time and let the rush go before we even try to get our bags from the overhead bins, but this time I was like an athlete out of the starting blocks; no sooner had the seatbelt light gone off than I was up, bags down, coats on and we were ready to move. Once out of the plane it was a mad dash through the airport and short transfer channels, along the moving walkways (which Allie hates!) and we arrived at the gate just as boarding commenced ! We were even more please when from our little window we saw that our bags had arrived from the Beijing flight and were being loaded.

A little over an hour later we were back in Birmingham, Airparks meet and greet service brought our little Wagon R across to us and off we went into the maelstrom that was the Birmingham Rush hour… Hmm, not sure quite what had happened to the usual Friday night mayhem on the M5, but it was clean and green all the way home, which made for a very pleasant surprise ending to an amazing trip. The house, watched over by my good friend, Paul Evans, in our absence was still in one piece, although due to the stupid heating system (which had just been repaired) eating over half a ton of pellets whilst on “frost watch” it was, shall we say, a little chilly.

The body is an amazing thing, I awoke this morning, fresh as a daisy, without a hint of jetlag at my usual stupid waking hour of 6am as though nothing out of the ordinary had ever happened. Off to collect our little Staffy in a bit and then a nice quiet Valentines day tomorrow; our first together for  few year. Then it’s just a case of Let the Planning Begin!!!!