Thursday, 25/10/2012 – 133 A.D.
"Saigon...sh*t: I'm still only in Saigon..."
Nope, we weren't in Saigon yet, still in Phnom Penh, but not for long. The alarm went off at 06:30 and in our minds we both yelled, "Ouch!" I've got a bad case of the Qatar [SIC] and Tim has a sore throat - the kind that you could get off school with for a whole week. Seems strange that these two conditions have come on after we've been staying still in the same place for five whole days, but there you go. The Road works in mysterious ways.
Yep, it was back onto every south east Asian's favourite bus service - the good old Mekong Express! They picked us up from our hotel at 07:30, a hotel which had been okay (great location), but not nearly as good as the one we had in Siem Reap. Oh well, swings and roundabouts, isn't it? And a little worrying to have the maid come bursting in just as I was about to have a last wee to check if we'd drunk anything from the mini-bar. Given the local ale prices, fat chance!
It was billed as a six hour trip to our next port of call, and crossing the Cambodian-Vietnam frontier about halfway along the route. This time I had the aisle seat so the tassels dangling from the top of the window didn't bug me and I had a bit of legroom, almost tripping the attendant as she strode up and down the bus, collecting passports and handing out snacks. Once again the Mekong staff were well organised, checking that we had the appropriate visas before setting off, lest we end up stranded in no man's land with luggage and tears. In fact, the whole border crossing was pretty straightforward - we all alighted the bus to be exit processed by the Cambodians, then grabbed our luggage and had it scanned through at Vietnamese immigration, as well as getting the stamps on our passports. When my bags went through the machine the border guard was on his mobile phone and not even watching the screen. Then we got back on the bus and, in my case, fell asleep again. Wot no looking at the scenery of a new country? Nah - it's just the same as the last one.
Fortunately no Bangkok-style hangover this
morning! But we were fed and watered by a little after 10 and into a tuk-tuk to
get to Mao Tse Soung Boulevard. Yep, it was time to pick up the visas we
dropped off four whole working days ago. Had the Chinese accepted us into their
lands? What would we do if we were rejected? And would we cry? Here’s the
answer…
Success! 30 days roaming had been granted, so long as we enter their realm before January 2013. Not a problem, guvnor, just let us get Vietnam out of the way and we'll be right over.
Not a great deal went down for the rest of
the day. We’d planned to visit the Royal Palace which is only a two minute walk
from the hotel. It was closed. For the last five days we’ve seen people dressed
in the mourning colours of white and black making their way to what was the king's official
residence. The week of mourning ended two days ago, so we thought it would now
be open to the public, but alas no. Instead, we passed pilgrims sitting outside
and still paying their respects.
And I guess I should finish with some closing observations of Cambodia before leaving the country. It's tragic that the main visitor draws in this land are the ruins of a once great civilisation that crumbled centuries ago, and the brutal legacy of the Khmer Rouge, but you can't understand the current state of the country without acknowledging these things, particularly the last one. There are 2 - 3 currencies in use, no local buses or national passengers trains, few old buildings of grand design, barely any monasteries left, more dust on the streets than in the entire Sahara and you're not supposed to put paper down the toilets, yet they still have a vastly superior internet service to a country like Australia. The people are incredibly polite and friendly and even in the most downtrodden parts of town you don't feel under threat. In many ways I found it similar to Thailand, but with less of an infrastructure and therefore less tourists, but the fact that there are less tourists made me prefer it to Thailand! If they give it ten years, rebuild the railway line, encourage tourists like crazy and stop their officials asking for that extra 100 baht at the border crossing, they just might do okay here. The fact that I knew barely anything about the place before setting out on this trip gives me a huge buzz. It was always going to be the most rough `n` ready leg of the Asian journey, but I think we coped with the baking hot Cambodian hospitality just fine.
And would I come back here? Maybe in the long term, but for now simply spin your Best of Lynyrd Skynyrd LP, listen to Freebird, and the lyrics of that song will tell you all you need to know.
Friday, 26/10/2012 – 134 A.D.
"Saigon...sh*t: I'm still only in Saigon..."
- Martin Sheen speaking the first line in the film Apocalypse Now.
Nope, we weren't in Saigon yet, still in Phnom Penh, but not for long. The alarm went off at 06:30 and in our minds we both yelled, "Ouch!" I've got a bad case of the Qatar [SIC] and Tim has a sore throat - the kind that you could get off school with for a whole week. Seems strange that these two conditions have come on after we've been staying still in the same place for five whole days, but there you go. The Road works in mysterious ways.
Yep, it was back onto every south east Asian's favourite bus service - the good old Mekong Express! They picked us up from our hotel at 07:30, a hotel which had been okay (great location), but not nearly as good as the one we had in Siem Reap. Oh well, swings and roundabouts, isn't it? And a little worrying to have the maid come bursting in just as I was about to have a last wee to check if we'd drunk anything from the mini-bar. Given the local ale prices, fat chance!
It was billed as a six hour trip to our next port of call, and crossing the Cambodian-Vietnam frontier about halfway along the route. This time I had the aisle seat so the tassels dangling from the top of the window didn't bug me and I had a bit of legroom, almost tripping the attendant as she strode up and down the bus, collecting passports and handing out snacks. Once again the Mekong staff were well organised, checking that we had the appropriate visas before setting off, lest we end up stranded in no man's land with luggage and tears. In fact, the whole border crossing was pretty straightforward - we all alighted the bus to be exit processed by the Cambodians, then grabbed our luggage and had it scanned through at Vietnamese immigration, as well as getting the stamps on our passports. When my bags went through the machine the border guard was on his mobile phone and not even watching the screen. Then we got back on the bus and, in my case, fell asleep again. Wot no looking at the scenery of a new country? Nah - it's just the same as the last one.
The approach into Saigon took a long time - already I could see this place was far more built-up than Phnom Penh. It may not be the capital of Vietnam, but it is the biggest city. Tim calls it Ho Chi Minh City, but it will always be Saigon to me, and not just because of Apocalypse Now. In fact, if you want to split hairs about it (you probably don't, but I do), the metropolitan area as a whole is officially called Ho Chi Minh City, but the central part of it, where our hotel is located, is still known as Saigon. And if the locals calls it Saigon, then by Mekong I'm going to call it Saigon. Harrumph.
We arrived in Ho Chi Minh City just before 16:00, shooing away the taxi drivers hanging around because we figured it was easy enough to walk it to the hotel. Pulling out the straps on our rucksacks and heaving them onto our backs, it was a flashback to the old days when we regularly trekked for kilometres at a time to reach our destinations. Ever since cheap tuk-tuks have been available, we've become soft, and we can't afford to let that happen, because that's when one gets the sore throats and the guitar [SIC].
Our hotel is called Ha My 3. Ha My's 1 and 2 are just down the road, and they're all pretty much of a muchness. The receptionist smiled and said that they would keep our passsports behind the desk until we checked out. Really? Is that standard policy in Vietnamese hotels? If so, we're going to be in trouble come Hanoi because we need to submit them for our India visas! Nyeargh, we're knackered now, let's worry about that later. The room was okay, but windowless again, and I swore from the booking reference that we should have had a bath tub. Never mind, for now we just need to kick back on the ultra soft beds and watch a bit of south east Asian television, which is either historical soap operas, complete with Samurai swords and big droopy moustaches, or karaoke channels. Strangely enough, I can't decide which I like / hate most.
With a windowless room, you have to go out at some point, but our efforts to find somewhere to eat suffered from First Night Syndrome, i.e. it's dark in a strange city, you've got a crap map from the hotel, and you're working with a new currency and need to get your head around the value of things. The Vietnamese currency is the amusingly-named "dong" and there are approximately 33,000 dong in one British pound. When we went to a cash machine and withdrew 300,000 dong each, we felt like millionaires...until we realised we had close to a tenner in our pockets. Plus you get charged 20,000 dong for every withdrawl you make - doh! Like I said, First Night Syndrome (FNS).
FNS continued as we tried to find somewhere to eat, heading for the river and finding ourselves in the plushest part of town. We passed the opera house for chirssakes! Goodness knows how many dong made up a meal in those parts! We only read one menu and shied quickly away. And so we ended having a bit of a walky-walk, but a walky-walk in Saigon involves crossing roads. Now, I know how much I went on about the ker-azy traffic in Phnom Penh, but given that Saigon is much closer to a metropolis , it's even more extreme. Vietnamese people cross the road very slowly. The trick is to boldly go one small, but brave step at a time and let the million-zillion motorbikes heading your way see you and swerve around you. If they beep, you step back. If a car comes, it doesn't need to beep, you just step back anyway. And as for buses, well, get back the way you came, pronto!
We eventually found somewhere to serve us up some decent Vietnamese cuisine for the right price. Well, I say "Vietnamese cuisine", but rather perversely we both ordered Singapore-style noodles. And as you can see from Tim's face, he loved every minute of it!
Vietnam...the 11th country so far on this trip...I'm happy to still be in Saigon.
We arrived in Ho Chi Minh City just before 16:00, shooing away the taxi drivers hanging around because we figured it was easy enough to walk it to the hotel. Pulling out the straps on our rucksacks and heaving them onto our backs, it was a flashback to the old days when we regularly trekked for kilometres at a time to reach our destinations. Ever since cheap tuk-tuks have been available, we've become soft, and we can't afford to let that happen, because that's when one gets the sore throats and the guitar [SIC].
Our hotel is called Ha My 3. Ha My's 1 and 2 are just down the road, and they're all pretty much of a muchness. The receptionist smiled and said that they would keep our passsports behind the desk until we checked out. Really? Is that standard policy in Vietnamese hotels? If so, we're going to be in trouble come Hanoi because we need to submit them for our India visas! Nyeargh, we're knackered now, let's worry about that later. The room was okay, but windowless again, and I swore from the booking reference that we should have had a bath tub. Never mind, for now we just need to kick back on the ultra soft beds and watch a bit of south east Asian television, which is either historical soap operas, complete with Samurai swords and big droopy moustaches, or karaoke channels. Strangely enough, I can't decide which I like / hate most.
With a windowless room, you have to go out at some point, but our efforts to find somewhere to eat suffered from First Night Syndrome, i.e. it's dark in a strange city, you've got a crap map from the hotel, and you're working with a new currency and need to get your head around the value of things. The Vietnamese currency is the amusingly-named "dong" and there are approximately 33,000 dong in one British pound. When we went to a cash machine and withdrew 300,000 dong each, we felt like millionaires...until we realised we had close to a tenner in our pockets. Plus you get charged 20,000 dong for every withdrawl you make - doh! Like I said, First Night Syndrome (FNS).
FNS continued as we tried to find somewhere to eat, heading for the river and finding ourselves in the plushest part of town. We passed the opera house for chirssakes! Goodness knows how many dong made up a meal in those parts! We only read one menu and shied quickly away. And so we ended having a bit of a walky-walk, but a walky-walk in Saigon involves crossing roads. Now, I know how much I went on about the ker-azy traffic in Phnom Penh, but given that Saigon is much closer to a metropolis , it's even more extreme. Vietnamese people cross the road very slowly. The trick is to boldly go one small, but brave step at a time and let the million-zillion motorbikes heading your way see you and swerve around you. If they beep, you step back. If a car comes, it doesn't need to beep, you just step back anyway. And as for buses, well, get back the way you came, pronto!
We eventually found somewhere to serve us up some decent Vietnamese cuisine for the right price. Well, I say "Vietnamese cuisine", but rather perversely we both ordered Singapore-style noodles. And as you can see from Tim's face, he loved every minute of it!
Vietnam...the 11th country so far on this trip...I'm happy to still be in Saigon.
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