Nina's Journal

From ScottWiki

This is transcribed from the journal I kept on the trip. It's a work in progress.

I mention money a lot, since we were keeping a strict budget. Here's a conversion

B40 (Baht, Thailand) = $1
4000 R (Riel, Cambodia) = $1 (but they mostly dealt with dollars)
10,000 K (Kip, Laos) = $1

5/26/03

We had quite an adventure last night getting to the airport. Joel and Heather drove us and we couldn't figure out how to get on the highway!! the entrances were NOT obvious. But we made it, it ended up, w/ plenty of time. We left at 1:30AM on the 25th, and we’ve arrived at 7:15AM on the 26th. We both slept most of the flight. The food was bad. As we started to arrive in the airport people took out their surgical masks. SARS is hardly a risk here anymore though. But lots of people still have the masks. I can’t imagine what it must have been like here a month ago.

We’re already frustrated w/ the ‘’Rough Guide to Thailand’’ and we haven’t even arrived. We have to figure out what we want to do whe we get to Bangkok, go straight to Krabi, somewhere in between, or stay the night in BKK and get an early start. I guess we’ll see soon.

It’s now 7:00pm here and we’re on a train headed for Krabi. It will leave in 15 minutes. I think I’ll have plenty of time to write in a journal each day, as we’ll probably spend lots of time in transport, or resting. All we’ve done today is transport. We arrive in BKK @ 11:00 or so, and then had a bit of a complicated time trying to get into town to the train station. It’s so hot here. I mean, I was expecting it to be hot, and it’s not worse than I was expecting, it’s just harder than I thought to spend so much time in the heat. We finally figured out how to take a train from the airport, when we realized it would be 2 hours till the next train. So we splurged on the tourist’s way of doing it and spend B100 on a bus. WE round the train station and bought tickets. Everyone here wants to sell you something but not in an irritating way, they all seem to be really helpful. So far we haven’t gotten ripped off, which is good. Hopefully it won’t make us so trusting that we do get ripped off.

So after we bought our tickets we walked around China town. It was miserably hot. I can’t see to explain the experience, it was definitely like nothing I’ve ever seen. It feels 3rd world in some indescribable way. Or I guess second world, or something. But I can’t express the difference. It’s in things like crossing the street. It’s impossible to do. The cars don’t stop. And you see little children walking straight ito the hell hold of traffic. And there’re motorbikes everywhere. And everyone looks like they’ve had more hardship.

We were hot and tired and ended up spending 3 hours just sitting at the train station people watching. White people really stand out. Like sore thumbs. This whole train is full of whities. Some Brits, Aussies, Germans, and more. They have MUCH more luggage than we do. We have packed soooo lightly. We have a daypack full of stuff, a bag of climbing gear, and a really empty daypack with some food.

I’m soooo tired. I really want to sleep, but the sleeper beds aren’t set up yet. I’ll have to wait a bit longer. Tired, tired.. no good food today. Too hot to be hungry really… zzzzz

5/27/03

Sleeping in the sleeper car was actually quite nice. I woke up too early, but other than that, quite nice.

But after the train got to Surat thani, the most tragic thing happened. So, we’d bought the tickets for Surat thani to Krabi (against our will) and the T.A.T. in Bangkok. What I understood was: we look for “Dereak Tours” and pick up our bus tickets there. We had a pink slip from T.A.T. saying we’d bought these tickets. But Scott understood that the tickets got us straight on the bus, and so I was eventually convinced of this as well. So, when we got off the bus, there were millions of buses, all selling tickets for B30 less than we’d paid. We began to suspect something. Well, none of the buses had the tour name on the time (and I’d forgotten that my original idea was to look for a storefront). So a guy convinced us that we’d been scammed and that “Dereak Tours” did not exist. So we bought another set of tickets from him. As the bus was rounding the corner we saw Dereak Tours?!? We were convinced into thinking we were conned. I was so mad at myself for being so stupid. We’d been in Thailand for less the 24 hours and we’d already lost $9!! How useless!!

Well, after a long bus ride we arrived at Krabi. But not in Krabi town. It took all sorts of more finagling to figure out how to get into Krabi town. We ended up catching a local bus (paying B2 more than a local). Once in town we had some yummy Pad Thai then caught a boat to Rai Lai Beach. We walked over to Tun Sai Beach where we have accommodations for B100 /night. We climbed a bit at Ton Sai, but it’s all very steep and overhung, very hard for me. We took showers (how nice!) and had some ad See Ew for dinner.

Had sex and went to sleep.

5/28/03

We slept in this morning. I slept badly last night, too many mozzies!! My knuckles felt like fire at one point. I was very grumpy this morning because I was hungry, and we took a long time to decide where to eat. Then we took a long tie to decide to spend B600 on the (climbing) guidebook. The day had a bad start. But we climbed at an area on East Rail Lai called 1, 2, 3.I was a bit frustrated, but overall it went well. WE climbed a few 5’s and Scott climbed a 6b. It was very very hot and we were going to go back to the bungalow during the heat. We took an alternate route back and came across some climbers. We stopped to look at the routes and ended up staying for a frew hours. The area was called Diamond Cave North Face Wall. It wasn’t climbing on the beach, but it was nice and shady in the afternoon. We met a Canadian and American woman and a Brazilian guy. They climbed about the same grade as us and gave us some tips on th where to eat which was very helpful. We also met some Brits and Swiss. I was proud of being able to pick out the Swiss-German. The climbing was very good for me because it was not too steep. I had lots of fun because of that. Then we headed back to the clean up for dinner. We ate at Andaman, which was very very good. And there were lots of vegetarian options, which was something new, and a big relief. We had vegetarian spring rolls and vege pad thai and fresh fruit. Yum Yum Yum. Sex after dinner, then sleep.

5/29/03

I slept very very badly last night. I had som many fucking mozzie bites. I spent literally hours just sitting and crying miserably. I have put Benadryl by my bed for tonight in case the same thing happens.

We had an excellent breakfast this morning. On the recommendation of the American yesterday we went to a place on Ton Sai Beach called Papa Mama. It was small and dirty compared to the other paces we’d been eating, but the breakfast was unbeatable. Mango and sticky rice!! Yippee!! After breakfast, which was sort of late due to a storm this morning, we headed off to look for the lagoon. First we went to a lookout pt. Then we went down to the lagoon. It was sooo gorgeous, but had a steep, muddy, super scary approach. I guess Scott didn’t think so, but it made we very uncomfortable. But the lagoon was worth it. It was beautiful and secluded with impressive limestone stalactites surrounding it. We swam back and forth and took lots of pictures. We hiked out, basically soloing muddy 5.3 or so and parts on the way up.

Then we went to check out Phra Nang beach. The only people with direct access to this exclusive beach stay at a really fancy expensive resort. I was a very nice beach. There were lots of people selling pineapple, soda, doughnuts, banana bread, spring rolls, and bracelets though. I guess they’ve learned where the rich tourists are. We swam across to an island filled with coral then swam back. I was very sore and tired and salty by this point and getting a bit grumpy.

We decided to eat lunch at the same place we ate breakfast, which was a mistake; their lunch items weren’t nearly as good. We headed back to the bungalow afterwards, me feeling more tired than ever. Scott have me a massage, which alerted me to how extremely sore I was. We had sex which was great and Scott was going to go climbing. I’d just decided to go with him when wind go gusting and rain blowing sideways in every which direction. The power went out and the rock is wet, so now we’re sitting at the restaurant we ate at last night, watching a bad video and drinking tea. I’m absolutely covered in mosquito bites. I can’t accurately express my frustration last night trying to sleep. No wonder I’m so tired.

This caffeine is perking me up a bit, and I’m even starting to be interested in the bad movie we’re watching. We had lunch too recently to have dinner yet.

I haven’t been hungry in the middle of the day like I usually am, and my shit has been more solid. I think I get an excess of fiber in Berkeley that keeps me more than regular.

Everything would be absolutely idyllic here if it weren’t for the mozzies!!! Damn mosquitoes!!

5/30/03

Once again tried to wake up early to get to the crags, but we couldn’t ge breakfast that early so our plans were deferred. We decided to climb on Ton Sai until breakfast, and then head over to East Rai Lai. But it started storming when we began to climb and I had to clean the route in the rain. It was a very emotional day for me. I cried when Scott was pissy cleaning half the route. Well, like I said, I cleaned it in the rain, but stayed dry because the route was under a big overhang. Scott, however, had a very wet belay. We ate breakfast until the rain cleared at Papa Mamas. Then we climbed some more on Ton Sai. Scott did a really hard overhanging thing with some effort. I could live vicariously through him… Then Scott did Stelgasaurus, which he said is the best sport route he’s ever done. Of course I couldn’t get up it… We went to wash our hands and use the toilet at the bungalow. We were going to climb some more at Ton Sai, but were shocked by the super low tide when we got to the beach. We decided to go to Eagle Wall, which is only accessible at low tide. But once there I freaked out that we wouldn’t be able to get back. I was upset about this, and even more upset for being so conservative, I totally broke down into tears. I belayed Scott on a climb while being eaten alive by mosquitoes. I was completely in tears by the time he got down. My lip was swollen and I had 20 new bites. I stung all over and I was seriously pissed off. We left as fast as we could and I cheered up a bit. We climbed until dark (just one route) and then went to dinner. Nothing too exciting, a cheap day overall. We’ll only be here one more day, and I hope it doesn’t rain. We’re heading to Ko Phi Phi the day after tomorrow. Hopefully there will be some easier climbing there.

It’s very odd here, we’re quite surrounded with white people. Tourists, backpackers, and climbers from all over. In some ways I feel like I’m in a very foreign country, and in some ways I might never have left.

The English language is of great interest to me here as well. There are people from all over: Britain, Australia, Spain, Germany, Thailand, Denmark… But everyone communicates with each other in English. It truly functions here as an international language.

I itch everywhere!! More Benadryl for me tonight.

6/2/03

Well, the 31st was about the best day so far, and the 1st was one of the worst. On the 31st we did some awesome climbs. We did a great 3 pitch climb at 1,2,3 and I lead a 5 at 1,2,3. Later we walked to Happy Isle at low tide and we did a spectacular climb there. The beginning was too hard so we had an elaborate scheme for me to prusik past it. It was a lot of work, but totally worth it, the climb was spectacular. And Phra Nang beach is so spectacular in general. And the day ended with our favorite dinner, spring rolls and phad thai. The 31st was our last full day at Ton Sai. I already miss it. On the 1st we packed and took the boat to Ko Phi Phi. I got quite ill on the boat sot that I was pretty miserable by the time we got there. Nothing could have prepared me for PP, I hate it. It’s so commercial and built up. I can’t believe that it is an island. Rai Lai feels so much more remote. We rented a kayak at PP, but I got terribly sick on it and ended up laying on the each with my face in the sand feeling awful. We had bad luck with dinner, I felt self-conscious the whole time there, and the whole place was so fucking commercial and I felt sick most of the day. And our room was a bit depressing, and we spent soo much money.

Today I’ve felt sick all morning, just dizzy, headachey, exhausted, and generally out of it. Standing was making me feel sick. We went to do some climbing, but I felt too ill. A few Thai pancakes and fruit shakes later I felt well enough to go get papaya salad with Scott. It worked wonders. I think I really need fresh vegetables. We’re back on the boat now headed for Krabi then BKK. So I feel a bit sick again, of course.

I think it’s a general combination of lack of sleep, lack of water, lack of food, and too much sun. It’s amazing what traveling will do to you. My appetite has been alarmingly small. The heat, and traveling often does that to me, but usually only for a day or so. I’m not feeling particularly well, so back to sleep I go.

6/4/03

We’ve been through a whirlwind. I’m getting very excited about our trip. As depressing as PP was, we’ve come quite a long way since then. I call it “Ko Phi Phi to Siem Reap in 48 hours.” It’s really been something. The boat from PP was uneventful, except that the bus was not at the dock as promised, but we had to take a minibus to the bus station to the real bus. We were left at the bus station restaurant (owned by the tour company of course) so that we could give them more money. Oh well, I guess it’s standard practice. The bus was quite uncomfortable, NOT a sleeper as they’d promised. In fact, sleeping was a nightmare. I felt bad putting my seat down because it crushed the person behind me, and I really needed a pillow. Plus Scott made it quite uncomfortable later into the night with the way he was sleeping. We arrived (not at Khao San Road as promised) a little after 6am. We’d made two more stops at designated restaurants during the night. One, at about 1:30am, no one got out because we were sleeping. Then he said the bus was going to stop for an hour just to make sure people got out!! Anyway, we were plopped into BKK, close to KSR, but we had no way of knowing. Of course there were a million taxi and tuk tuk drivers willing to take us what ended up being 800m or so. KSR was very different at 6:30am than it was a few hours later, when we left. It is full of signs, but not the sidewalk shops that dominate later in the morning. We had half a breakfast at a tourist place. It wasn’t that great. We walked around a bit and got fresh OJ and fried coconut things for less than the price of our first breakfast, but much much better. We walked around the outskirts of KSR where things are a bit calmer. We did some shopping; I got fisherman pants, which I’d been wanting.

We decided to leave that afternoon for the border. We successfully caught a bus to the train station. The 53. At the train station we successfully got our money back fro the tickets we hadn’t actually been scammed for, we successfully bought CHEAP train tickets to Aranyaprathet, and successfully bought a very good lunch of papaya salad (without shrimp), pineapple, and bread. It was shaping up to be quite a good day.

The train wasn’t great, but it wasn’t that bad. We didn’t have much leg room until the end. There was a mother and her retarded daughter sitting across from us. All of us had to keep our legs tucked in tight to avoid kicking each other. The trip took about 5 hours. We arrived in Aran without much of a clue where to go. We needed to find a guest house, and we had a name, but no way to find it.

We knew the location of a couple guest houses, handed out to us by people on the train as we arrived, but they seemed to be a bit of a scam. We wanted to find the one in LP. A teenager came up to us and helped us out. It was just around the corner from where we were standing. With that taken care of, we had some exploring to do.

We were quite near the night market, which ended up being pretty amazing and lots of fun. We had mango sticky rice, vege phad thai, odd sweets, and lots of lychee. And it was all VERY cheap. Phad thai 15B!!! It was just a great atmosphere. I especially liked the unusual fruits. I’d never had lychee before. WE also tried a mangosteen. It’s hard and eggplant-coloured, the size of a small apple. It has almost citrus-like segments inside. They were sweet, succulent, and tangy. It was an actual Thai market, no signs in English. It was cheaper and much more exciting. But I felt a bit as I did on the third class train (and like I’ve continuted to feel all day today) as I tried to eat papaya salad from a bag with two skewers, using them as chopsticks: INAUTHENTIC. It’s like I’m diving into the deep-end of a culture wearing water wings. Or like I’m standing in front of a class naked. It just feel exposed. I feel very inadequate in a way and very inauthentic.

I had a very good sleep, better than I’ve had since the night train. We we woke up, I had to study our border crossing notes—to look at them in the process was to risk looking like first-times. We put the right amount of money in our pockets, packed our bags strategically, and took off… first we had to find breakfast, which proved to be a bit of a difficulty. But we managed to find an “English Menu” restaurant called Little Home, and, ordering “off the menu” had a reasonably good breakfast.

First we had to catch a tuk-tuk the 5km to the border. Without negotiating a price we jumped in and paid B50 without question at the end. We got to the border at 8am, shortly after had opened. First we had to exit Thailand. It ran smoothly.

Then we were in no-man’s land. There was a line of Cambodians stretching as far s the eye could see. They come to the large market on the Thai side of the border on day passes each day. The line was immense, full of children and cars of wares. It was entering another world. There was livestock, carts full of melons, and pots, and everything else.

Next we had to buy our visas. It went smoothly except that we had to pay 1000B each instead of $20. But we encountered no lines, and so far very few touts.

After entering Cambodia we had expected throngs of touts. However there were very few. And anyone who did approach went ignored. We walked 500-1000m before coming upon some pickup trucks. We quickly negotiated an acceptable price to Sisophon and jumped in. We jumped in an empty one, which is not exactly what you’re supposed to do, wince they may wait up to 2 hours to fill up. Luckily it only took ½ hour.

So it was about 9:30 when we finally got going. This pick-up would take us as far as Sisophon, or “Sway” as the locals call it. They got a kick out of it when I tried calling it Sway. It was a fairly easy ride. Our truk was mostly filled with young women and old women.

We made it to Sisophon around 11:00am (or a bit earlier). The landing zone was a large dusty parking lot, full of people and trucks. We got our first sight of roasted crickets for sale. When we got off the truck w were immediately surrounded by 10 people, some trying to push us onto trucks, some trying to sell us something, and some simply watching us eat watermelon. Those people must be used to seeing tourists, but maybe not tourists on pick-up trucks. We hadn’t seen any tourists at the border, and none since the train the day before. After the sales pitches stopped they all just stared. We ate lychee and drank water, but seemed to be making a bit of a spectacle out of ourselves. When we decided to find a pickup Scott got on one, but I was physically moved towards another. Not in a way that I felt threatened, but n a way that I felt I couldn’t get back to Scott. I eventually broke free and headed towards Scott’s pickup. We were not the only one’s treated this way. Customers where something to fight over, and the customers were usually physically involved in this battle and the drivers would pull her left and right. There were some huge arguments too.

We picked the wrong tuck. It was almost tow hours before we left. But it was a chance to soak up the chaos.

People were selling sunglasses, cigs, chewing gum, purses, sparrows, crickets, lychee, water, and baguettes. We talked with some kids trying to sell us things. They asked us our names, our ages, and where we were from. They were really charming. We bought some baguette from one. Anotherm who didn’t speak any English, tried to give us a drink in a bag. I didn’t know what it was, so I didn’t buy it. Eventually she gave us one for free. I felt bad so I paid for it, but then I got another. They were all incredibly cute. They asked if Scott and I were married. No, I replied.

The truck had 17 people in the back, as well as a couple of chickens and a motor bike!! The ride was long and hard. This part of the road was worse, the distance was longer, and I had less legroom. About half way through, my legs were positively aching. It was completely unbearable. But at a stop (which only happens when someone gets off) I stood up, my legs barely supporting me. When I sat back down my legs were fine, leaving me to enjoy the rest of the ride, which I did until the last 10 minutes when it rained pretty hard.

The road was straight and flat. We were passing mostly through rice fields. We passed shacks and houses and a little stall by the side of the road selling gasoline in coke bottles, as well as some stuff I didn’t recognize. The open pick-up truck let us really view the scenery. Here, as in Thailand, motorbikes on the road totally dominate. Besides motorbikes were bigger trucks and Toyota Camrys. Yes, every car is a Toyota camry, I have no idea why.

6/7/05

Well, I sort of never finished the last entry. Oh well, maybe details are not so important. Maybe it’s more about impressions. At least, that is what my mom would say.

We’ve spent the last two days at the Ankor Temples. They are very imposing, but I think I would like to know more about the architecture academically, in order to appreciate it. As we walk around there is lots of Cambodian music, instrumental and singing. I enjoy that a lot. It is very easy to listen to.

I’m having a hard time dealing with money here though. All over the temples are kids and adults trying to sell you postcards, flute, scarves, food, cold drinks. It becomes absolutely exasperating.

And the little kids are the most persistent. Our first day at the temples a group of little kids accosted us. They charm with their English. “How old are you?” “Where are you from?” I know your capital,” “There are 50 States in your country,” they quote, beam, and chatter. When we came back out we needed water. Scott bought it from one kid, causing the other to follow him calling him, “fucking man, fucking dog, fucking cat, fucking cow… Get out of my country, you’re a bad man.” There seem to be rules of fairness we didn’t do right. But what animosity!!

It is so hot here. We sweat buckets the whole day. I have heat rash at the end of each day.

I’m a bit templed out. I’m glad we’re moving on. I like the town of Siem Reap though. It’s full of baguettes and café’s, bars, bookstores, lots of good food. I think it’s a very nice place, but rather Eurocentric. I don’t think the Khmers get to enjoy the benefits of the place.

There are beggars every night at dinner. A couple of men with out legs and lots of children carrying babies. We give them food instead of money, especially the kids, since the money might just go to someone else.

The pickup truck and the border crossing in general was a brief break from tourists, now we’re back on the beaten tourist track. WE leave on a bus tomorrow morning for Phnom Penh.

6/8/03

We had a very relaxing day yesterday. We did almost nothing. We never made it to the temples. But we got massages and ate.

I thought that where we ate was really special. We listened to Frank Sinatra covers while sitting on the floor and eating really good Thai food. We had a spicy mushroom salad and a sour curry. Yum yum Yum. We arrived at Phnom Penh this afternoon. It was a fairly painless bus ride to get here, which was actually full of locals. WE stopped a couple of times at uninspiring restaurants, but at the second one we had good limeade and a coconut. We’ll get our Lao visas tomorrow and hopefully be on our way in a couple of days.

6/9/03

I can’t believe we’ve been gone so long. It’s been two weeks today and it feels like nothing. I’m afraid the rest of our time here will go much too quickly; we only have five weeks left.

We met up with Juliette’s friend, Bruno, last night for dinner. We had delicious hand-made noodles at a Chinese place. Not hand-cranked, but hand made. There were really delicious.

Then walked along the riverside in a recently cleaned up part of Phnom Penh. Cambodia as a whole seems to be changing very rapidly, cleaning up, building up. From what I gather, it’s changed immensely in the past ten years. Coming back in another 10 years could be like coming to a new country.

We’re headed to the Lao embassy this morning to get our visas. But we forgot pictures, so I’ve been dropped off at a corner while Scott runs to get them. We’ll have an expensive fare at the end.

Notes on (upcoming) border crossing.

Stung Treng

Chief of Local Security of the National Police, 1km from river on main street, 10-20 USD--try without
boat 5-7USD 60 mins
exit 2-3 USD, bargain for $2
Voem Kham – Lao immigration, 5USD (or 1?)
pickup to Ban Nak-Song
get exit and entrance stamps
boat at Stung Treng, Jen Penh GH or boat landing site, 7:30AM

It’s the end of the day now. Getting the visas went smoothly. We even got them back this afternoon!! In between we ran some errands. We went to a market, the bank, the museum and a good Indonesian lunch. I went by myself to the Lao embassy to pick up our passports while Scott got film and some other stuff. I had a big mishap with the moto driver. He didn’t speak ANY English, I was trying to read the maps, gesture, and hold on while I told him where to go. His English was abysmal. We got totally off track before I could convey where I wanted to go. By then we had to make a big circle to get back here. At the end he wanted $3!! Four times as much as I had expected to pay. There was a lot of argument and input from other drivers and we finally settled for $1.50, mostly because I was too emotional to do anything else. Riding a moto is terrifying enough, haggling over the price was just too stressful.

I relaxed a little bit after I got back, took a shower, did laundry. Scott and I spent a long time on the internet researching the border crossing we’ll do in a couple o days. I hope we don’t have to drop too much money; there are lots of bribes involved. Maybe flying to Pakse would have been easier!! We’ll see in a couple of days I guess.

We leave really early for Kratie tomorrow.

6/13/03

Wow, I haven’t written in a while. The night of the 9th did not go as planned. Scott got very sick and puked a lot. So we decided to spring for air-conditioning on the 10th. We slept in in our miserable hot little room until I couldn’t stand it any more. I went to scope out our options. For convenience sake I settled on a dingy sort of room less than a block away. But convenience was a big consideration because Scott was still not feeling well.

I got us our of Capitol Guest House just before check-out. I packed both our bags in total frustration; the heat was totally oppressive.

The air conditioning was luxury. We spent, literally, the WHOLE day in it, sleeping and reading. Wed did absolutely nothing.

Come evening, I was getting a bit hungry because I hadn’t eaten anything all day except a baguette. Scott was feeling a bit revived so we went to look for a bookstore and some pizza.

We found a cute used bookstore and sold one book (The Climb) and bought two new ones: Ben Elton’s ‘’Stark’’, and Peter Mayle’s ‘’Hotel Pastis’’. They won’t last us long. I was 20 pages from finishing ‘’A Passage to India’’ so we couldn’t sell that one quite yet.

We had dinner at a pizza place, some fine mushroom pizza. Then headed home to the fabulous air-con.

Then on the morning of the 11th we left for Kratie for real. (side note: as it ends up, our day delay was inconsequential because, due to some govn’t corruption, no boats were funning on the 10th anyway.)

We caught the boar bright and early, buying tix at the docks. 2/3 of the way there our boat broke down. We waited in limbo for a while. A van came and picked up about half the passengers (not us). And later an antiquated SLOW wooden boat picked up the rest of us. We should have arrived by 12:30. We didn’t arrive until 5:00PM. We hadn’t had lunch. Going on advice from a fellow traveler, we stopped by a restaurant called Red Sun Falling. We had a decent and CHEAP dinner for 7000R.

It’s a really cute place with good music owned by a flaming gay guy from the States. It was nice to hang out there.

Scot had a headache later so we stayed in a bit and read. I wanted to go out to sell our other book at the Red Sun, since they also have the beginning of a little bookstore. (The whole place is only 3 days old!!)

By the time Scott felt well enough to leave the room, it was quite late, especially by Cambodian standards. Nothing was open and there were very few people on the streets. But the Red Sun was open so we stopped by to sell the book. We traded it for the Dubliners. Scott was ok with staying for beer so we did, staying outside in the cool. We moved inside to watch TV and stayed late, watching The Bodyguard on HBO. It was pretty abysmal.

The boat to Stung Treng didn’t come until 12:30 on the 12th so we still had the morning in Kratie.

We had an alarm clock fiasco because our batteries were dying. Our clock said 6:40. I went downstairs and the clock said 10:00. I was upset that we didn’t have time to see the dolphins. I roused Scott. But when we came down again the clock still said 10:00. Around the corner was the correct time, 8:20. We had time to see the dolphins after all.

We arranged a moto driver with our GH. The guy at the counter was a very jovial Chinese-looking Cambodian. He had a clubfoot, but a great smile. And a silly British-Khmer accent I think he picked up from the owner. We went upstairs to collect water, sun cream, etc. When we came back down we found neither the guy nor a moto driver. He had forgotten about us and gone to get a haircut. He came out with talc still all over the back of his neck.

We took a long and bumpy moto ride to a dock 15 km north of town. We transferred to a boat to go to the middle of the Mekong and see the rare Irawaddy fresh water dolphins. It was fun to see them. They seemed very playful. WE tried to get pictures, but I think it was a lost cause.

We got back just in time to pack, eat and catch our boat to Stung Treng.

6/15/05

We had a pleasant dinner with two British girls in Stung Treng. We also had a room with a TV. I didn’t know at the time that it would be my last indoor running water shower for a while. Time in Stung Treng was short, for we left at 7am the next morning for our much awaited border crossing.

We boarded the speedboat with 2 Brits and 2 locals. It was a fast boat and we were soon at Cambodian exit place, in the middle of nowhere. We’d heard the fee was $2, but he asked for $5. He wouldn’t stamp my passport until I had paid. However, he made the mistake of stamping Scott’s passport before collecting money, so Scott only handed over $2; I thought he shouldn’t have handed over ANY! What a scam. Another short boat ride and we were at Lao immigration. No problems there except the anticipated (yet illegal) $1 stamp fee each.

We caught a local pick-up/bus and were at our island by 10:00am (6-13)

We took it very slow, eating, laying in the hammock, and generally cooling down. We had had quite a few days of travel. In the afternoon Mr. Thon, the owner of our guesthouse, took us out on a boat to see some rapids.

Walking amongst the water-covered rocks my foot fell in between two and something bad happened. I cried like a baby; it was very painful. A bruise formed immediately, but the swelling grew to cover the red and blue, leaving it instead a putty pink. I sat in the water while everyone went ahead to the rapids, since walking seemed totally out of the question for me.

By the time they’d gotten back I could walk pretty much fine, and skipped back to the boat without trouble. But, after a long sit at dinner, walking back to the bungalow became an increasingly hard task.

And after a night of sleep, the pain in the morning was a rude surprise. I wasn’t able to go to the market with the family as I had planned.

I spent the whole day doing nothing. Well, reading. I finished Ben Elton’s STARK, which I thoroughly enjoyed and started on “Stupid White Men,” which I hope to finish today before Frances leaves.

Frances Cornford, francesontour@yahoo.co.uk

Dinner was over some slightly silly conversation with a British Guy (damn Brits! They’re everywhere!)

There are some rather annoying anorexic British girls at our GH. Their conversations remind me of myself in high school. But maybe I’m being too judgmental.

This morning I woke up at 5am to give my foot an hour to warm up before going to the market. I got the rice steamer I’d been wanting for making sticky rice and we had some Chinese doughnuts, which I found yum yum yum.

Sine they I’ve taken a nap.

Sa Bai Di – Hello

Kop Jai (Lai Lai) – thank you (very much)