Andrew & Brigitte in Indochina

Our last day today as we are leaving for Hong Kong tonight and we’ll be sad to leave.

We spent the morning wandering around the city in various tuk-tuks.

Phnom Penh really is a phenomenal city.

It’s home to 3 million people. It has ultra-modern skyscrapers alongside imposing old colonial buildings.

There’s beautiful architecture, mixed together with old street markets. It’s almost a mix between Hanoi and Ho Chi Min City and, out of the three, we thought it the most beautiful, but you have to get around the city to appreciate it.

It’s so inexpensive to move around (about a dollar per tuk tuk ride) and take in the atmosphere of the city.

We visited the Royal palace…

…then strolled along the riverside..,

where many people were buying lotus flowers..,

… and incense, and taking them into a small ornate building.

It was a Buddhist temple where the people go to pray and give thanks.

I have no idea what they do with the hundreds of lotus flowers left there each day,

…though I suspect some high-ranking government official’s wife owns a rather large vase collection.

New feature – People asleep at their jobs.

We’ve come across this quite a lot – but they do work very hard.

Usually we’re ready to go home after a couple of weeks but I don’t think we have even thought about that on this trip.

We’ve loved Cambodia but we both preferred Vietnam, and we agree that the reason, is that we liked the more confident character of the Vietnamese.

All of the Cambodians that we met and spent time with are lovely, kind and courteous and gracious, but much more reserved than the Vietnamese.

There’s a sadness about the Cambodian people. They seem haunted by their recent past and fearful about their future.

The atrocities that happened under Pol Pot and the subsequent civil war, which lasted until 1991, are still fresh.

Nearly every adult has lost family and still remembers the bombing and bloodshed.

Cambodian communism is very different to that of Vietnam and, as I am now writing this on the plane to Hong Kong, I will expand.

This is the communist state that I imagined them all to be. It’s a dictatorship, ruled by a government who rigs every election and imprisons or kills any opposition that tries to stand against them.

Yes, the modernity and obvious wealth of Phnom Penh seems at odds but, unlike Vietnam, entrepreneurship is not allowed and the rapid expansion is driven by corruption and ‘friendly’ countries like China who see it as a strategic foothold.

The only time elections with a bona fide opposition took place was in 2003. The Royalist Party actually won but the Communists threatened another civil war and so they ‘reached agreement’ to rule jointly. You can guess what that meant.

Every election since has been rigged with no observers allowed. (If you want to know the kind of things that happen here, Google ‘National Rescue Party’)

Everyone is ‘encouraged’ to vote so as to show the world it’s fair. Voters must dip their forefinger in indelible ink at the voting station to prove they voted.

However, the vote count is ignored and the communists always win 100% of the 125 seats.

The population are forced to join the party as soon they reach 18. They also get bribed to vote for the party ($5 or a bag of rice is the going rate), though I don’t understand why that’s necessary.

Most people don’t support the government as they want a free society and corruption is rife, (we’ve seen Mclarens, Bentleys, Range Rovers, Lamborghinis etc and we are told that they are all owned by corrupt officials or their family).

The people, however, choose not to dissent as it would mean arrest so, as long as they can live in peace, people accept the corruption rather then object and go to jail, which would jeapordise their entire family.

Their other fear is that Vietnam want Cambodia and they believe they already control it by stealth by controlling the government.

The Cambodians we spoke to all said that they believe Vietnam will take over the country and this was their biggest worry.

Sorry if that’s a long assessment but I found it fascinating. It is harder here to get to what probably is the truth, as people are less willing to talk. There is a law that tour guides cannot discuss politics with foreigners which, of course, they don’t, through fear of reprisal.

If I had to pick one version of communismthen it’s Vietnam’s I’d choose.

And so that’s the end our adventure. We never imagined we would like this part of the world so much.

The Cities, the countryside, the jungles, every part was fascinating.

Yes, there’s a lot to be wary of if you live here but, from purely a tourists perspective, it’s a fabulous region to visit and we highly recommend it.

Fruit Quiz

The answer to the final fruit quiz was, of course, Dragon Fruit. It sounds fiery and dangerous but it’s the most tasteless, boring fruit. It should be renamed Koala fruit.

Well done on winning Adam, you also broke the fastest reply record, answering within a minute. So eager.

The sheer number of fruits they have here meant that I could’ve carried on the quiz easily for a couple more weeks.

Maybe Netflix will approach me to licence the format, I’m sure Michael Macintyre would do it justice. Let’s wait and see.

Oh, and I finally figured out why Brigitte’s suitcase was so flippin’ heavy.

To finish off:

Birthdays – Five out of six ain’t bad although I thought the last restaurant had a bit of a cheek just sticking a candle in her dessert and denying me free cake!

Massages – They just petered out. I think Brigitte was like a child in a sweetshop to start with, but maybe it was a massage too far. That, or she became so relaxed she just couldn’t be bothered.

Photos – I have taken 2,640 photos on my camera and 691on my phone, so that’s just 3,331 photos to sort out. That should keep me busy for a while.

Thanks again to Jacquie at Bakewell Travel. I know you don’t arrange everything personally (you don’t, do you?) but, considering the number of connections this trip had, and the number of people moving us around plus all the guides, together with planes, cars, boats etc there was a lot that could’ve gone wrong. However, once again, everything went absolutely to plan so a big thank you for an incredible experience.

A few of you have asked if the Japan blog is still available and it is. You can still read it here …

https://abjapan.news.blog/category/blog/

….if you really have nothing better to do with your lives!

Thank you for taking the time to read my ramblings – I know I can go on a bit. I hope you enjoyed reading and maybe I’ll do another one the next time we travel somewhere interesting.

Tạm biệt bây giờ

Hong Kong – 1st December 2024

We weren’t particularly looking forward to today as we were going to visit the Killing fields and Genocide museum, which is one of the things that you must do but really don’t want to.

I touched on the history of Cambodia and Pol Pot’s genocide a couple of days ago, but I didn’t mention the Killing Fields. You may have seen the movie but actually being there is both terrible and moving.

When the Khmer Rouge, Pol Pot’s communist army took power, their directive was to wipe out all those who weren’t ‘pure’. The idea was to transform Cambodia into a rural, classless society.

They abolished money, markets, schooling, private property, foreign clothing styles, public transportation, religion, and all culture.

They killed all the intellectuals, teachers, soldiers, civil servants and, for some reason, farmers, basically everyone who has had an education and might be a threat to them.

When they killed a family, they also killed all the children so that they couldn’t take revenge on them later.

Their method was to transport all the people they didn’t want to be part of their pure society, in trucks, to a large area of land and murder them, usually by pickaxe or beating with farm implements, because bullets were expensive. They also did much worse and I won’t go into the detail but it wasn’t a quick death for most.

They then dug mass graves and buried them all. Some, believed to have been the opposing soldiers, had their heads removed and put in a different pit.

These areas became known as the Killing Fields and there have been 343 found so far. Seventy seven have been preserved and, in the one we visited, Choeung Ek, which was a former orchard they found 8,895 bodies.

In Cambodia, rather than a headstone they build ornate monuments on top of individual graves which can contain one person or a family and they are called a Stupa.

Here, they have have built one large monumental Stupa to honour those killed.

This stupa contains the skulls of the 8,985 murdered here. As you stand inside it’s chilling when you think about what you’re actually looking at.

I’m going to stop the story here. We left the Killing Field but we didn’t go into the Genocide museum. I can never get past the first room at Holocaust museums, it’s the same story every time and just too painful.

These museums are there so humanity remembers, and doesn’t make the same mistake again.

Unfortunately they don’t seem to work.

To lighten the mood…..

The funniest moment of our trip (for me at least) happened at the Genocide museum toilets.

We both had to ‘go’, and we used adjacent cubicles.

After a moment I heard Brigitte give a surprised yelp, and she shouted “Zere’s a big Frog in ze toilet!” – I know she’ll dispute her accent, but that is how she sounds 😀

I couldn’t help thinking that at the exact same time, the Frog was shouting exactly the same thing to its mates!

Sorry, I realise it’s a racist joke but I haven’t stopped giggling all day!

After that, we spent the afternoon in the Russian market, so called because at one point there was a large influx of Russians and this market catered to them. Now, its just a typical, huge market, so we spent a few hours both here and at central market down the road buying things we didn’t really need, but they were a bargain, and then you could barter another 50% off so I couldn’t resist.

There’s incredibly cheap branded goods here and, while most are obviously cheap copies, some are such good quality that I suspect that they are genuine and found their way out of the rear door of the factory.

Birthday No.6

Tonight was Brigitte’s final birthday celebration

Don’t you love the way she acts genuinely surprised every time!

Five out of six of the restaurants that I booked went the extra mile and were kind enough to remember that we were celebrating.

Only one didn’t bother, even after confirming our celebration meal back to us in writing.

I know that I can’t complain as we’re getting free cake by nefarious means, but the cynic in me can justify free cake when they demand so much unnecessary information from you to populate their databases which they probably share and sell on.

Fruit Quiz

Yesterdays answer was Orange. It couldn’t get any easier. I know they’re green but if you’d been paying attention in previous posts you’d have known that that’s the colour of oranges here.

Today is another really easy one as you all seem to be struggling. In my opinion it has the most exciting name of any fruit but it’s probably the most boring…

Tomorrow will be sad as we pack up and leave Cambodia 😞

Phnom Pehn, 30th November 2024

We checked out of our hotel at Siem Reap at 7:30am for what turned out to be a leisurely drive to the capital, Phnom Penh, a journey of 330Km (206mi) which, with stops, would take 10 hours!

Once again, 4G all the way, even though Cambodia is considered more of a third-world country than Vietnam. 

The reason that we went by road was so that we could see more of Cambodia and stop at some of the landmarks along the way. 

It’s very noticeable that Cambodian homes in general are much more substantial than those in Vietnam where the majority are just corrugated roofs on scaffolding with a few nice, modern houses sporadically interspersed. 

Here, houses are still small, but built of wood and occasionally brick, in a distinctive style and quite attractive. 

Along the road in one area there were around twenty or more stalls which seemed to be selling fat bamboo sticks about a foot (30cm) long. They can be seen on the shelf in the photo below above the lady’s head.

We stopped to take a look, and they are actually selling steamed rice. They stuff the bamboo with rice, pour in coconut milk, palm sugar and black beans, stuff the top with rice hay to seal it, then they put them in the fire for twenty minutes.

Once cooked they shave off the burnt outer charcoal, which is what she’s doing in the first photo, and then put them on the stand to sell. People driving past take them home for a meal, like a takeaway. It tasted really nice and must be extremely popular as there’s so many sellers.

We then arrived at the famous stilt houses along the canals and riverbanks. The stilts are necessary as the local water table can rise 4 meters. I thought there would be just a few houses but there were miles and miles of them. 

After a couple of hours we arrived at Kampong Khleang

There’s three things to see here. The first is ‘Wat Kampong Khleang’ a golden temple complex, and I’ve never seen such bright golden temples as they have in Cambodia but, to be honest, we are templed out. 

The second is the street market, which is unlike anything I have ever seen. 

There are probably fifty or more ‘stalls’, though I use that term loosely as almost all are just one person sitting on a rug, offering for sale whatever they’ve caught or grown. 

Usually these places are the same,  targeting the tourists, but this is definitely not a tourist market as no tourists would want to buy anything they sell, unless they were going to live here. It’s called a street market but there isn’t even a street, it’s just a clearing with a dirt road.  

There’s all the basics of village life for sale. Rice piled high that you buy in scoops, a lady gutting small fish on the floor,

an old man chopping firewood,

another riding his scooter along with 5 metre-long bamboo canes attached, apparently to sell to the rice steamers.

There’s chickens being slaughtered, fruit in piles and all the while children playing around you, and scooters and bicycles driving through. 

I’ve visited many markets as I really enjoy them, but I’ve never experienced anything like it. 

Oh, and we thought this was cooking oil but it’s not, it’s the petrol station. The bikes pull up, buy a bottle and pour it into their tank.

The third thing to see here is the floating village on Kampong Khleang lake. The unusual thing about this lake is that because it is connected to the Mekong river via Tonlé Sap lake, the water flows in and out depending on the season, so it can go from being four metres deep to being virtually dry. 

Floating on the lake is an entire village. Complete buildings, but on on boats. 

In the dry season, when the water flows out, the floating village simply starts its engines and moves itself towards Tonle Sap lake.

The houses, schools  and shops are mainly self-propelled, though some need towing but off they go and park up, downstream until the water returns in June and July. 

All kinds of boats travelled around us, people just going about their daily life on the water

Tonle Sap lake itself is vast. The name means Great Lake and it’s the largest freshwater lake in Southeast Asia and one of the most productive ecosystems in the world.

It looked like the ocean as we arrived, we could see as far the horizon everywhere ahead.  It’s 2700 square kilometres, although that halves when summer comes and the water drains into the Mekong.

Continuing our journey, half an hour away from Phnom Penh, we arrived at Skuon Market where they sell some very nutritious products indeed.

Tarantulas are eaten here because food was very scarce during Pol Pot’s regime so people ate them rather than starve. They then got a taste for them, so this is where they come to buy.

Personally, after eating Rat the other day, I decided spiders was a step too far.

My justification is that you wouldn’t eat a pet and I did once keep a Tarantula, though it was a Mexican Red, so, thinking about ‘Terry’, I just couldn’t do it.

Also, the fact that I had read that they are disgusting didn’t help either.

Crunchy legs with a gooey centre, so not for me.

Even Brigitte, who routinely eats things with more than four-legs wouldn’t have a nibble.

They are cute though, and so I let a few have a walk up my arm before they got fried, and I suddenly realised how much I missed Terry.

…and fried water cockroaches garnished with a scorpion or two.

I would have eaten all the others but I’m trying to lose weight so I’m avoiding fried food!

Then it was back in the car and onto Phnom Penh where we received a customary greeting…

… and where it’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas

We ate at the hotel. We knew that we would arrive late so I booked in advance, at the same time as all the others and, because they’d asked, I told them we were celebrating Brigitte’s birthday.

They confirmed the reservation by email and even confirmed our celebration meal.

We are staying at a very famous hotel, purportedly, the best in Phnom Penh but, the reality has been, what we call in Yorkshire, fur coat but no knickers!

It’s the only one where we have told them about Brigitte birthday celebration and they didn’t even mention it, plus I didn’t get free cake 😩. I do realise that I’m obtaining cake by fraudulent means but nevertheless…

Fruit quiz

Thank you for pointing out that I forgot the fruit quiz yesterday. I don’t know what happened but I’m sorry to cause you all to miss one of your five a day.

Here’s an easy one if you’ve been paying attention..

Tomorrow we tour Phnom Penh.

Phnom means ‘Hill’ and Penh means ‘Grandmother’, so it’s Grandmother’s hill, named after a wealthy local lady in the 14th century.

Granny’s Hill, 28th November 2024.

The average temperature since we’ve been in the region has generally been mid to high 30’s with humidity in the high 90%. So it was nice to spend time in the pool this morning and get completely wet instead of just being constantly damp. 

And then we went to see the Elephants! 

Firstly we had to sign the disclaimers which were similar to those for the scooters.

If an elephant tramples on us, it’s our fault, if it sits on us, it’s our fault, if it gores us with its tusks, it’s our fault, if any harm whatsoever comes to us – all together now – it’s our fault!

Kulen Elephant Forest is located about an hour north east of Siem Reap in the foothills of the Kulen Mountains. 

It is a sanctuary to protect the elephants that spent their lives working at Angkor in the tourist industry and a place where they can once again roam free in 1,100 acres of their natural habitat.

There are only 300 wild elephants left in Cambodia plus 75 in captivity and ten are here at the forest, one male and 9 female.

Each elephant has a Mahout who traditionally, was responsible for training them for combat but, at the sanctuary, each is responsible for the Elephant’s welfare and he is also their best friend and, they say, can communicate with them.

The Mahout loves his Elephant and the Elephant loves his Mahout.

One of the Mahouts told us that he had two wives, the first is his Elephant the second is at home with his children – and the first pays for the second.  

Vets visit twice a month so the elephants are very healthy and their life expectancy, which is around 40-50 years in the wild is around 75-80 here.

They grow all their own food for them as it has to be organic so as not to make them ill.

You quickly realise how well treated they are, the Elephants look so happy when see their Mahout. 

The Mahouts are like a horse-whisperer for Elephants although whispering is pretty useless because they have such big ears.

The Elephants are washed every morning and evening, pampered and preened, nails filed, teeth cleaned, and well fed, (they eat 300-400Kg of food, that’s 10% of their body weight, each day (which is an awful lot of grass).

It was such a fabulous and uplifting experience spending time with these majestic animals. We made their food, (sticky rice cakes with bananas and tamarind paste), fed them with cakes, bananas and pumpkin then we walked with them and washed them. 

Have some photos….

It was one of our favourite days, and one that I stumbled across on google after deciding I’d like to see Elephants.

Note to Jacquie – you need to add this to future tours, it’s a fabulous experience, unless you have Pachydermophobia!

It was so good that I really considered staying with the Elephants and become jungle boy but, sadly, my days swinging from tree to tree are now behind me, so we returned to Siem Reap for dinner. 

I completely forgot about filling in the information about celebrations on the booking, so it came as something of a surprise when a cake turned up, that I nearly didn’t have time video it…

Strange things

Not had one for a while so here’s a motorcycling dog!

Oh, and a wide load, Cambodian style…

Food quiz

I thought yesterday’s two for one food quiz was being too kind. Well done James for spotting that it was, of course Papaya and Guava (Papaya is the big one).

I keep saying I’m not going to fruit shame but ‘Cucumber’? Cucumber? Really? Hang your head in shame, you know who you are!

More tomorrow when we travel to Phnom Penh.

Siem Reap 28th November 2024

Some of you will know that one of the few things that I really excel at, is attracting mosquitoes. They absolutely love me so, as Cambodia is considered a Malaria risk, I did the research and bought the best reviewed repellant Jungle formula maximum strength – No. 4 – lasts 9 hours. 

Last night we went out for the first time and this morning I am covered in bites. That repellant is as much use as mudflaps on a tortoise. 

I’m still waking up at precisely 4:28am, so our 6am start to visit Angkor Wat was no problem. 

First port of call was the local laundry. 

Determined to travel light, I only took enough clothes for one week and then I have them washed. 

Yesterday I realised that I had ‘simply nothing to wear darling’ so I popped my washing in the hotel laundry bag and then noticed it was $5.60 to wash a single shirt! I totted up all the items and it was well over $100! It’s cheaper to buy new here! (‘Genuine’ Ralph Lauren Polo shirts, only $5 sir! 😊). 

I Whatsapped Sukon, our Cambodian guide, he knew a local laundry, and I dropped everything off. 

The whole lot came to three dollars! More than Hanoi though. Must be a tourist trap here!

I’m ashamed to say that I had never heard of Angkor Wat until I researched this trip but I soon found out that it’s considered one of the seven modern wonders of the modern world and for good reason.

It is a complex of 72 major Hindu-Buddist temples (and over two hundred more minor ones) set in 402 acres, surrounded by a moat of over 3 miles and protected by an inner wall 2.2 miles long. 

It is the largest religious structure in the world. Construction began in 1150 on the orders of King Suryavarman II as a Hindu temple and it was the capital city of the Khmer Empire and latterly the kings mausoleum.

According to the reports of a Chinese explorer of the 12th century, the temples were covered in gold and silver and precious stones.

It became a Buddhist temple in the 1200’s after the Kymer/Cham war but fell into disuse in the 19th century and was largely forgotten and left to be reclaimed by the jungle as you’ll see in the photos.

We visited the three main temples, 

Angkor Wat, Tiprohm and Angkor Thom.

If it’s starting to look familiar, it’s probably because you saw the movie, Tomb Raider. It was filmed here before its star, Angelina Jolie adopted most of the children in Cambodia, installed them in her French vineyard chateau and sold it to the Russians without telling poor Brad (allegedly). 

It’s completely spectacular, it even has photogenic monkeys.

We spent hours here and some people spend weeks. There is so much history which I’m not going to go into because (a) there’s too much of it and (b) There was more than could fit into my brain so most of didn’t go in, but please Google it, it’s very Interesting.

After Angkor Wat we visited the Landmine museum (I misread it as ‘Landline museum’ and expected to see a collection of old Cambodian telephones).

The story of the Landmine exhibition is almost as astonishing as Angkor Wat.

I said yesterday that I’d mention the recent history so here is an extremely condensed version but it’s very important for context:

The civil war was fought by the Communist Party of Kampuchea (Better known as the Khmer Rouge) supported by North Vietnam and the Viet Cong, (remember them?) against the Government forces of the Kingdom of Cambodia, who were Supported by the US and South Vietnam. 

So, pretty much the same as the Vietnam war. Communists v Capitalists.

It lasted 8 years from 1967 to 1975 and was one of the most brutal, savage and cruel wars ever fought. 

The Khmer Rouge were victorious and established ‘Democratic’ (Haha!) Kampuchea. 

30% of all property had been destroyed, almost 300,000 people killed and two million displaced.

Just when you think it couldn’t get any worse, it did. Much, much worse.

The leader of Democratic Kampuchea was Pol Pot, a murderous dictator (probably in the top three all-time list) who perpetrated Cambodian genocide and, in the following four years, he wiped out over a quarter of the population of Cambodia, around 2 million people.

It ended in 1978 when Vietnam invaded, occupied the whole country in two weeks, toppled Pol Pot, ended the bloodshed and put in place a new government (which it still has a strong influence over today).

(According to the Cambodians who I have talked with, there’s a much more sinister side to this alliance but that’s for another day….)

The terrible legacy however of these and previous wars is that Cambodia today still has somewhere between 4-6 MILLION live landmines across the country (some estimates say 10 million), which are still killing people every day, 45 years after the war ended. It has 40,000 amputees , the highest rate in the world. 

The Landmine museum is the story of a Cambodian child whose parents were both killed in the civil war. He was recruited by the Khmer Rouge and became a child soldier at 10, given an AK47 and told to go shoot everyone. He also laid thousands of landmines. 

He saw the horrors of war, particularly as the landmines mutilated most of his friends. (They are designed to mutilate, not kill, as it costs a lot more to treat the wounded).

He defected aged 17 and after the war trained as a de-miner and worked with the UN. 

He took the name Aki Ra from a Japanese journalist, (it means Clear or Ideal) and in his one-man crusade has personally cleared over 50,000 mines. He set up his museum in 1997 to make the world aware of the legacy they leave behind and was instrumental in the Ottawa treaty banning landmines which most countries now adhere to.

He’s been honoured all over the world for his work and there he was, just sat at his desk, in the corner of the museum, smiling but not introducing himself. We had no idea it was him until our guide told us who he was. He is very humble and unassuming and responsible for saving thousands of lives.

Our next stop was to Herorats, an organisation that trains rats to sniff out landmines.

I’m distraught, what if my dinner the other night was one of their star pupils? So upsetting. I vowed never to eat Octopus again after watching ‘My octopus teacher’ on Netflix and I now solemnly swear that I will never eat another rat. 

Fruit Quiz

No winners yesterday.

Nicky, you were correct insofar as you said that you couldn’t win twice in a week 😀

You were close though, so maybe half a point. It’s called a Calamansi which is sometimes called a Philippine Lime or Philippine Lemon but it’s actually a hybrid between a kumquat and a mandarin orange.

Okay, lets go easy on you today. Two points up for grabs…

I’m very excited about tomorrow, we’re going to see the elephants!

27th November 2024

Siem Reap

After travelling for ten hours, we arrived at the hotel in Siem Reap and we were greeted with a gift of traditional Cambodian scarfs, called a Krama (I’m not sure who decided a scarf was a good gift idea when it’s 36 degrees outside). We were also given a ceremonial foot cleaning massage which was just what we needed. (Spoiled? Who? Us?) 

As soon as we had landed at Siem Reap airport it felt completely different to Vietnam. 

As I said in the prologue blog, we had absolutely no idea what to expect, but I had lumped Vietnam & Cambodia together in my head. Similar countries, similar cultures, same people, same customs, divided by the usual river or mountain border.

As usual, I was wrong.

To start with the people look quite different, the customs are different and the history is different. Also I have a horrible feeling that they don’t have coconut coffee 😱!!

The reason that the Cambodians look different is because they are an entirely different race.

The first inhabitants of the Indochina region were the Khmer people who came from Malaysia. They came in the 1st century.  Then the Cham, (Remember the Cham museum we visited on day 8 in Da Nang?), who were also from Malaysia, arrived in the 2nd century. They lived in relative peace together until the 12th century when the Cham attacked the Khmer, lost, and were expelled. 

Add a bit of Indian genetic material and that is the ancestry of today’s Cambodians. Khmers still make up 95% of the 17 million people here.

The Viets, on the other hand, originated in south China before they were kicked out and moved to the area that is now Vietnam from where they expelled the Chams. (I’m using the word ‘expelled’ kindly).

So the reason that they look different, is because they are a completely different race.

About 80% are Buddhist or Hindu and whereas the Vietnamese, who originally spoke mandarin, chose  to use the Latin alphabet, Cambodians chose to use Sanscrit.

So all the street signage and therefore our surroundings also look different.

The Vietnamese greet you with a western hand shake, Cambodians with a hands-together 🙏 bow of the head and, first impressions are that they are more reserved and not as forthcoming to express themselves, but let’s wait and see.

Oh, and it’s much more like the type of Communist state that I was taught about in school.

I’m sure I’ll go into the history more in a later post as it has a huge bearing on Cambodia’s identity but to summarise, although the constitution proclaims itself a liberal, multiparty democracy, and it does have three parties, since 1984 no party, other than the Communist party, has ever won an election. The Cambodian Peoples Party always wins every single seat, the two other parties have been banned and no outside observers are allowed in.

It’s also a Kingdom, so the King gives his power to Parliament to run the country. It’s a bit like the UK, only their King has smaller ears.

Enough politics/history for now.

We were shown to our room and I’d entirely forgotten that, because we were arriving late, I’d booked dinner in the hotel restaurant and yes, they had the silly questionnaire asking if we were celebrating so I had, of course, (truthfully at that time) said ‘Brigitte’s Birthday’.

This was the scene in our room…

We then had dinner and….

Some of you who know that I have a sweet tooth have suggested that I’ve done this deliberately to get free cake. I didn’t, but do I wish I’d thought of it.

I’m starting to feel a bit guilty but free cake? That can never be a bad thing.

Fruit Quiz

The anonymous winner of the fruit quiz from Day 14 has now come forward to claim her prize (It’s just like the National lottery isn’t it?).

Well done Nicky! A few others also got it right but Nicky answered first!

For your prize, I’m sending you a conker when we’re back in England. It looks very similar plus it won’t go off as quickly.

Yesterdays answer:

Not one of you got it!

It was a Thot Not, sometimes also called a Toddy Palm. The name comes from Kymer so it’s topical for today.

It has a chestnut husk, segments of white fleshy fruit and is used as a snack or a beverage.

Todays quiz:

It’s small, it’s green, but what can it be?

រាត្រីសួស្តី។

Siem Reap – 26th November 2024

Forgot to say last night about the lovely little night market that we found just before it dark so here’s a few nice photos..

And we had a quick snack in luxurious surroundings…

I got up early this morning to go to the local food market to try and find some lemongrass with the roots still attached. 

It’s really difficult to find fresh lemongrass in Spain so I’m going to take some back to have a go at growing it.

The food market was typical. If you read my Japan blog I think I described the full horror of it. 

A bustling market with all manner of unrecognisable creatures wriggling around in vats, bowls or just on the floor and a huge selection of fruits and vegetables. 

Unfortunately, they ‘dress’ lemongrass by cutting off the roots, so it was quite difficult explaining what I wanted and why but, thanks to Google translate, I managed to procure some and the kind lady wouldn’t even let me pay for just four sticks as she sells a huge bunch for less than twopence. 

So I’m now officially a grass smuggler. 

Afterwards we had a leisurely breakfast. 

Don’t ever be tempted to try salted eggs, they may look like normal eggs but, as the kids say, OMG!!  My lips are so shrivelled that I look the exact opposite of a Manchester girl, and I still have the awful taste in my mouth.

We had oranges for breakfast:

Why aren’t they called ‘Greens’ here?

Then said goodbye to the spa..

We then left to drive back to Ho Chi Minh airport to leave Vietnam for Cambodia.

We have absolutely loved Vietnam.

Warm, welcoming people, full of character, opinions, happiness and optimism. 

Out of the hundreds of Vietnamese that we have interacted with only one was rude. A lady in a leather bag bag shop in which Brigitte was having a quick browse. (Big mistake! As Julia Roberts would say 😀) she was completely disinterested and deliberately ignored us. 

Maybe she’d had an argument with her boyfriend that morning, maybe her cat had died, who knows, so I will forgive her, especially as the other 99.999% have been an absolute delight. 

Revelations

No, it’s not a Bible class. It’s revelations following my ’investigations’ about Communism, Vietnamese style, plus a few observations.

Firstly, although we have travelled the length of the country, we have seen no overt poverty and no begging on the streets.

Yes, there are some obviously very, very poor people when measured against western standards, but food is so bountiful in the countryside that I don’t think anyone would ever go hungry.

However, that doesn’t explain the lack of people begging in the city streets. I can’t think of any large city where I have ever been and not seen one person asking for money.

I had assumed that the authorities hauled them off somewhere but that’s not the case. Begging is allowed, it’s just that it’s not really done here just because as people are proud. Apparently, there are a few in the large cities but we never saw them.

Talking of travelling, in the west we have Uber, here they have Grab.

A very similar experience but it works every single time here. We used it a lot, the car, (you can also choose a scooter) always new and spotless, always arrived in minutes and our average fare was about £1.

The app worked perfectly in English and the driver communication and tracking, coupled with constant information about your trip is far superior to Uber.

Onto communism…

It’s very well hidden. If I were to think of a communist state, it wouldn’t look like Vietnam. As I’ve previously said, everyone is happy and optimistic about their own, and their country’s future and I’m absolutely convinced that’s real.

People are encouraged to better themselves, there’s an entrepreneurial spirit and the people want to work hard and succeed (again, both for themselves and their country).

If I had to describe it, then it’s capitalist communism.

However, now I am out of the country I can say more. Not to protect me, I don’t think they could care less what I or anyone else says about Vietnam.

It’s just that a few people said a few ‘interesting’ things so, just in case I mentioned any of them in the blog (I don’t think I did), I thought I’d do this at the end of the trip so they couldn’t be identified by the timeline.

I was told that the internet and social media is closely monitored and censored where the government thinks it may ‘harm national security’ or it ‘opposes the government’. It’s known as the ‘Bamboo Firewall’. 

This obviously also extends to foreign TV as Brigitte was watching BBC worldwide news in the hotel when the transmission stopped and this message appeared.

As she was watching the BBC which, as most Brits will know but maybe no-one in Vietnam will, it never has commercial advertising so the message can’t be true. (Censoring the BBC is probably not such a bad idea though!)

There’s cameras everywhere, almost as many in the UK and I was told they monitor the people and that many police speak good English so they can listen to conversations to check what is being said to tourists.

I was also told that there are ’rules’ and there are certain taboo subjects, the people know what they can and cannot talk about. 

If someone transgresses then they will be arrested and probably imprisoned for 1-2 years for a small offence. However, they will find it difficult to find employment after that and their families will also have a ‘bumpy’ ride in future.

So, it’s not as open a society as we were led to believe.

However, even though there are rules in place, the people understand what those are and, as long as they stay within those defined boundaries, they are looked after, protected, live good healthy lives that they have full control over, travel freely and are allowed (and encouraged) to thrive and succeed. 

Besides, they all seem to genuinely trust and believe that their government is doing a good job (and how many people in western democracies would ever say that about their own government?) and, judging by their economic growth and the incredible country we have experienced, it seems their belief is justified.

It all seems to work a lot better than the chaotic west. Especially as free speech now seems to mean hate-filled ranting, and most of the democratic governments have no long term vision and corruption is rife. 

I don’t think we’ve been here long enough to absolutely confirm what I think but it does all seem to work well and it seems a great society to be a part of. 

So, unfotunately, that’s the end of our Vietnam experience. We both would highly recommend it as a safe, beautiful and always-interesting place to come to.

I’ve taken 1,566 photos on my camera and about 500 on my phone – that’s going to be a lot of editing when we get back.

Final Vietnamese fruit quiz.

Well, the response was better today both in quantity and accuracy but I did make it easy for you.

And the winner is…… Anonymous!

All the comments attached to the blog are marked ‘anonymous’ because I don’t require you to subscribe or log in.

Whoever wrote “can’t believe you ate Rat 🤮is the fruit Rambutan?” Is the winner – maybe let me know by Whatsapp who you are.

If I had a pound for all the people who couldn’t believe I ate rat….

Today’s mystery fruit….

Coming soon – Cambodia

Ho Chi Minh City – In transit.

25th November 2024

We were awakened at 5:30am by the mechanical clank of the boat’s anchor being raised. It’s a grating sound but nicer than the noise my iphone makes in the morning. I should have recorded it. 

By 7.30 we had breakfasted and arrived at Can Tho’s floating market.

It’s a wholesale market, so it’s where the middlemen, who buy from the producers, come to sell their produce to the local traders. 

They bring enough stock for up to three weeks and they just live on their boats during this time.

Old wooden boats filled with pineapple, coconut, pumpkin, in fact most fruits and vegetables you can imagine (and, judging by the fruit quiz, many you cannot).

Occasionally, a smaller craft pulls alongside the tourist boats to try sell them pineapples at inflated prices, (I like to imagine that there’s a floating toy market just down the river where they sell inflatable pineapples also at inflated prices). 

I was thinking how lovely it was to see that these traditions still survive here. However, our guide later in the day explained that it’s actually not surviving and they think that the floating market will be gone in a few years.

A combination of Covid, which put a lot of the traders out of business, and modernisation, as the producers are using the improved road network to reduce delivery times, plus selling from warehouses, makes it less cost-effective to bother with the boats.

It’s a shame for the city of Can Tho, which depends on tourism, much of which is driven by having an authentic floating market (unlike those in Thailand which are created specifically for tourists).

I have to be honest and say we didn’t spend too much time in Can Tho. It was around 38 degrees and 96% humidity so the hotel pool and spa was just too tempting!

We did have a walk around town for an hour after our massage and swim, but I can’t say it’s our favourite place.

It’s very touristy around the little port, lots of ‘tat’ shops selling straw hats, cheap jewellery and the ubiquitous waving cats (I thought those were Chinese?).

Although we did see a bit of the city centre later at night and it looked better, (though most places with electricity look better at night) so I may be being unfair, but the pool and spa won hands down.

We did yet another food tour in the evening.

This was the only activity that was not arranged by Jacquie, our travel agent, but we had a free evening so I booked it ages ago and I wished I hadn’t as it was the first thing we haven’t enjoyed.

I think we’d already sampled most of the food with the exception of Chuot Chein Sa Ot.

For those of you who can’t read Vietnamese, that’s fried Rat with lemongrass and chilli!

I’m told these rats are a local delicacy. They live, and are caught, in the paddy fields and they eat the rice so they have a special taste.

I think it was Sir Thomas Beecham who said that you should try everything once in your life, except folk dancing and incest, so I gave it a go.

I reckon there must be chickens in the fields because that’s what it tasted of. I can’t say it was delicious but it wasn’t disgusting either and the lemongrass and chilli disguised any inherent ‘rattiness’. I only ate one piece which was quite enough for my brain to digest.

Surprisingly Brigitte, who has no problem eating gastropods or amphibians was disgusted and refused to even try it. I know she’s eaten rabbit which seems quite close to a rodent in my opinion, so I’m not sure where she draws her line. Twitchy nose, long tail, and whiskers with a hint of bubonic plague I suspect.

Incidentally, eating rat is also good for dental hygiene.

Instead of serving the rat’s tail as part of the meal, the Vietnamese carefully cut the long tails into quarters lengthways, using a special tailing tool, before cooking them and using them to floss their teeth after the meal.

Oh, don’t be so gullible – Of course they don’t!!

Fruit quiz.

I know 83% of you wanted the fruit quiz to return but I must say, the quantity and quality of entries is very poor.

No, it wasn’t a walnut, no it wasn’t a tiny coconut, nor was it a conker.

I’m pretty sure none of those are even fruits but I’ll keep my word and I won’t fruit shame anyone.

The correct answer was the Sapodilla or Chicoo fruit which tastes of molasses.

I feel I need to dumb this down for you so I’m going to give you a really easy one today so that you don’t lose heart….

Sorry, but I have to to leave you now to watch the mighty whites beat Swansea 🤞

Tomorrow we leave Vietnam 😫😫

Night night.

Can Tho 24th November 2024.

Footnote Warning

It’s after midnight now. Exciting game with Leeds winning 4-3 with a last/gasp winner. It’s amazing to think that I’m 6,340 miles from Leeds and yet I can sit here and watch them live.

It was dark, Brigitte was asleep, so I decided to go to the bathroom in the dark so as not to wake her. DO NOT ATTEMPT THIS AT HOME – brushing your teeth with Germoline is really, really disgusting, rat is much nicer.

Sadly, it was time to leave Ho Chi Minh City this morning. It’s the first place that we have felt a bit rushed as we were only here for a day and a half and each half day was full on plus it was like a sauna.

I  think you probably need at least three days to do it justice.

A two-hour drive south East and we entered the Mekong delta where we boarded our little rice barge for the night at Cai Be, arriving tomorrow at Can Tho.

Our boat is called Bassac 2.

The Bassac was a traditional wooden rice barge which was converted for passengers and this boat is a replica built in the same shipyard by the same builder. 

It has ten cabins and, although they are not huge, as there are only six of us on board we have plenty of space to relax. 

We boarded in time for lunch, after which we all jumped in a small wooden motorboat that took us to the shore where, for the third time in twenty years, I went on another bike ride.

So, that’s three times in eight days.

I’m becoming a proper little Lance Armstrong but I guess he didn’t compete much here as the penalty for drug abuse is death. Ironically by lethal drug injection.

I’m thinking of getting one of those Brazilian bum lifts as my bottom seems to be faulty, or maybe it’s Vietnamese bike saddles that are designed for the more petite Vietnamese bum cheek.

Whatever the cause, I’m in pain. If this cycling lark continues I need a solution so our next trip may be to Brazil to have internal padding fitted à la Beyoncé. (Allegedly).

Luckily there was some relief as we made a few stops along the way:

The first was at a local village where a lady called Mrs Ha weaves baskets to supplement her income. The frame and materials are delivered to her by a mysterious middle man (no one seemed to know who runs the operation) and each basket takes her around four hours to complete. She is paid 7,000 Dongs (£0.23) per hour so, that’s less than £1 for half a day’s work. 

She seems perfectly happy to do this in her spare time but it does show the relative poverty of rural Vietnam and yet we’ve seen no-one complaining.

They are all welcoming, smiling and seem happy with their lot, but it did seem like exploitation to some of our party.

My own view is that it’s just local economic forces rather than exploitation as long as they can choose whether to do it or not and as long as they are happy with what they receive – though the mysterious middleman seemed a bit, well, mysterious .

Next time you see cheap foreign products in a discount store though, they are there because of workers like Mrs Ha

Our second stop was at a duck farm. I never knew that was a thing but I’m no ducking expert. 

The duck farmer grazes his flock on the local rice farmer’s paddy field as it’s usually submerged under shallow water.

It’s a symbiotic relationship as the duck farmer uses someone else’s land to raise his ducks which, in return, poo in the rice field and fertilise the rice. 

Incidentally, the ducks often don’t make it back to dry land in time and accidentally lay their eggs amongst the rice. I assume that this is where egg fried rice originates? 🥚 🌾 🥢😀. 

As we are literally in the middle of nowhere,  I had anticipated a quiet few days of electronic downtime, with only the sound of Brigitte’s uncontrollable shaking at the thought of having no phone signal for more than thirty seconds to bother me, but no.

Here we are, on the vast Mekong river, in the middle of a tropical forest on a tiny boat and we have great 4G phone signal plus wi-fi on the boat. If I drive half a mile up the road from my home in Harrogate there’s no signal whatsoever and yet Vietnam is, apparently, the third-world country. 

Incidentally,  they’re building a high speed train system here. 1,300 km of track with 350 km per hour trains at a cost of $70 billion in 10 yrs – and I’d put money on them bringing it on time and budget.

In the UK I think ours was 220km of track at a cost of £70 billion and rising. It’s already taken 7 years and is planned to take another nine and I wouldn’t bet on that one. Another point to the communists. 

As we sailed down the narrower river between the branches of the Mekong, we kept hearing very loud bird song but we couldn’t spot any birds. This happened fairly regularly along the way.

Our guide told us that the bird sounds are the mating calls of the Vietnamese Swift, but the sound is fake.

It’s played through loudspeakers to entice the Swifts to build their nests there because it’s the nests they are after. This is because the nest of the Vietnamese swift is very valuable as it’s used to make birds nest soup, and so that’s why they want to attract them.

After two days I have given up trying to pronounce out guide’s name. She’s tried to teach me but my mouth just won’t go there. She’s called Ngoc, which means Pearl in Vietnamese. Put it in Google translate and listen. She said it helps to pretend you’re blowing up a balloon while saying it. It didn’t.

Strange things

This local dish was delicious, it’s called jumping chicken.

You’ve probably heard it’s more common name before and Brigitte obviously loves it. – Frogs legs!

Fruit Quiz

Good news. The people have voted and 83% voted in favour of the fruit quiz!

In the UK we have apples, pears, plums and er, er, that’s all I got. (Before you say Damson, Jeremy, it’s a plum).

Not a day goes by here without discovering another fruit I’ve never seen before.

Most fruits are always in season and the locals live off them. Pop into the street, pick some fruits, some herbs, some morning glory (It’s not rude, it’s water spinach), a few beansprouts. Add a few shrimp that they farm, a chicken or duck and they are totally self sufficient.

No supermarkets, no real need for food shops and it’s all really healthy. An, our fruit ambassador tour guide, said her grandparents are 105 and 103 years old and still work and that’s not at all unusual.

Today’s mystery fruit…

To make it easier this fruit has two common names, I will accept either.

Yet another early night. I’m not complaining as it’s snowing at home, but the humidity is draining and we’re up again early tomorrow to visit Can Tho floating market.

Middle of the Mekong – 23rd November 2024.

Another early start.

Saigon traffic is so dense that a car is just too slow to maintain our tight schedule so, after scooters last night, this morning it was a speedboat down the Saigon river….

We’ve been in Vietnam for almost two weeks now and I’ve not really mentioned the Elephant in the room.

Unfortunately, there’s not many Vietnamese rooms that have an actual Elephant these days as there are only around a hundred of them left 😩😩😩.

The particular Elephant that I’m referring to though is, of course, the Vietnamese war which, in Vietnam, is called the American war. 

Our destination was Củ Chi, a huge underground network of tunnels used by the Viet Cong in their resistance against US forces.

Short history lesson:

Before World War 2 Vietnam was part of the French Empire (But that’s a whole different history lesson).

During WW2 it was invaded by Japan and the resistance against them was led by a certain Mr Ho Chi Minh. 

After WW2 Hoi Chi’s army captured Hanoi and declared Vietnam independent.

The French tried to gain control again but they were defeated and in 1954, the treaty of Geneva was signed, the French left, and Vietnam was broadly split into two, North and South, supposedly to reunite with free elections which never happened.

The North was communist, led by Ho Chi Minh, the South, Capitalist.

China, had become communist in 1949 and effectively controlled  North Vietnam. 

The US were terrified that communism would sweep through Asia so, in 1963 Kennedy sent 16,000 ‘military advisors’ who effectively controlled the South  and following a few skirmishes, marines started arriving in numbers in 1965 to help the South overthrow the communist north.

By 1965 there were over half a million US troops, plus Aussies, Koreans, Thai etc. (Spain sent 12 – no idea why, maybe in case the Vietnamese attacked with bulls!). 

The only other thing you need to know was that there were resistance fighters in the South called the Viet Cong who fought for the communist North and it is these that mainly inhabited the tunnels of Củ Chi.

Oh, and the fact that the Americans got their asses kicked, (although they still maintain they won) and they finally withdrew in 1975, but not before one of the most horrendous wars in which the US used napalm and agent orange.

Look them up if you’re not squeamish but they are truly horrific chemical weapons. One, a skin burning gel to kill and mutilate, the other a nerve agent that continues to cause birth defects to this day, to try and’ cleanse’ the country of Vietnamese.

The Vietnamese, who had far fewer resources. laid ingenious but horrific traps to kill, maime and scare the living daylights out of the young American troops who also didn’t want to be here. (17% deserted!).

The Americans laid so many mines that, at current clearing rates, they wont be gone until 2225 (yes, you read that right).

At the start of the war there were 40Km of the Củ Chi tunnels left over from the French wars. By 1975 there were over 250Km in which lived 12,000 Viet Cong and the thousand entrances are incredibly well disguised.

It’s an entire underground city on three levels with bedrooms, kitchens, escape tunnels, traps (take one wrong turn and plunge into a pit with spikes in the bottom).

There’s thousands of traps in and above the tunnels that mainly involve long drops and very sharp spikes, often made from the remnants of the US bombs.

Turn away now if you’re of a nervous disposition..

These are just a few of the sickening and terrifying but also ingenious ways to demoralise a technically superior enemy.

Many entrances were boobytrapped with grenades that detonated when they were opened. 

The Americans built a huge base on top of one section of the tunnels and never knew what was beneath them. They couldn’t figure out where the Vietnamese, who suddenly appeared to shoot at them, were coming from.

I can’t begin to imagine the terror of the US soldiers (average age 19) walking through a thick jungle in 40 degree heat, in full combat gear, being shot at and knowing at any second they could spring a deadly trap.

The tunnels are incredibly narrow but the Vietnamese were small and agile. I just about managed to crawl a few metres through a section that had been widened for tourists and there’s not much skin left on my knees. 

Then they let us have a go with AK47’s with live rounds 😱

I’ve just realised the cause of my sore shoulder!

After the tunnels were speed-boated back to the hotel with just 5 minutes to spare before our city tour – in 35 degrees heat 😥

It was far too hot and although we visited the palace and other landmarks we were just happy to flop back into the air conditioned car.

The War Remnants museum was harrowing, with vivid pictures and descriptions of the horrors of war so we didn’t spend too long there before deciding a coconut coffee was more appetising.

In the evening we celebrated Brigitte’s birthday…again…

If you don’t know why this is her second birthday this week See Day 10

…more birthdays to come, maybe.

And finally s cocktail on the hotel roof – I think our combined ages equalled the total of everyone else.

…. before retiring so to bed – another cruise tomorrow – it’s a tough life.

Saigon – November 23rd 2024