Phnom Pehn

Dear all

Much as I love our time in SE Asia there are some things that really do annoy you after a while..... A parade of tuk tuk driver that ask you one by one if you want to hire they (are they deaf), The constant tourist tax of about 100% uplift (don't get me wrong I don't mind paying for good value its just when they change the rules) & finally other travellers that seem to have this incessant need to wear a singlet publicising the local beer as if its the compulsory uniform of the traveller............ Right got that off my chest so now I can explain where we have been for the last four days. Well I have spent most of it in bed with some sort of virus - yawn.... all OK now. The journey by boat from Chau Doc to the border was a relaxing way to spend three hours, the river was extremely flooded so all the surrounding fields were being used as flood plains or to farm for fish & ducks (don't ask!). The border control had already been taken care of by our guide who took a moto ahead of us & did all the admin. Then we boarded a second boat over the border which only had wooden seats and the journey took on a new dynamic as we fidgeted from one bum check to the other in an attempt to keep the circulation going......... However the one highlight was that the boat tended to hug the riverbank, which meant that we could see all the locals as play/work the kids all ran down to the banks to wave as we passed and Dean spent the rest of the journey making it his mission to wave at every one ( bless!).

We finally arrived at our destination and had a very bumpy ride to the city ( the roads are not as good here). Once we had our digs secured we sped out to discover the delights of PP. First stop was the Foreign Correspondents Club of Cambodia an enclave for most of the expats of the city, but at western prices. It had great views and some eclectic patrons which passed the time, then we decided to walk off dinner and bumped in to an American & a dutch guy who had been on the first two days of  our Mekong tour. A few Anchors later and I was finished.... Dean nobly took me home in in a tuk tuk then 'disappeared' off to check out the bars on our street.....

He finally got back at 6.00 am having been locked out of the guest house and had slept outside (sound familiar boys.... ). A local street kid had taken pity on him and lent him a coat as once again it was lashing down. The security guard kindly showed Dean the buzzer above his head as he let him in.............

Dean woke up as fresh as a daisy & I had the shivers, and was not well at all, so we had a lazy day..... Yesterday we tried to venture out and I struggled around Tuol Sleng Museum which was originally a school but Pol Pot had transformed it into S21, a high security prison, where about 20,000 people were tortured and interrogated as part of atrocities. Only 7 prisoners managed to survive, mainly due to their resourcefulness in painting or photography. Next stop was a journey to the Killing fields of Choeung. This former orchard was one of the 189 'killing' fields located around Cambodia that were the scenes of over 1 million deaths, many of which were savage in their execution. It was another of those very sobering moments , more so for me as I actually remember some of this being relayed on the news when I was young. 

Today, we wondered & took tuk tuk's around the city and the Russian market - of course I had a little spend despite my still being rather shaky.

Tomorrow we are off to Kratie in the north to (hopefully) see some river Dolphins. When I get some decent time & connection on the Internet  I will update the photos.

But as always thanks for looking

Hugs

Sara xx