My 5th trip to CambodiaIt was time to go see my sweetheart again.
Because I'm not a glutton for punishment, I upgraded my tickets to the "Deluxe" level for the trip. In short, it was well worth it- the seats are bigger, recline more, and the in-flight service is far better. Because I've accumulated about a billion air miles with EVA, I get to make use of their VIP lounges in the airports, and that's damn nice too. You get to hang around in a private little VIP lounge with all the snacks and drinks you can eat for free, plus free wireless as well. They also serve all sorts of full meals there too (kung pao chicken, twice-cooked beef, hotdogs, salads, etc etc).
The flight this time was flawless- we took off on time, the connections went perfectly, and we landed on time as well. Total flight time from liftoff in Seattle to touchdown in Phnom Penh was about 17 hours and 45 minutes. The landing in Taiwan (Taoyuan International Airport) was done in
absolute pitch-black, zero-visibility conditions and it was also raining like hell.
I've made over 1,000 landings in commercial airliners and this was the smoothest landing I've ever experienced. We descended through the rain and fog without being able to see a damn thing (not even the airport lights), and suddenly we were taxiing along to the gate. It was flat-out amazing. If I didn't know better I'd swear we taxied all the way from Seattle, it was that smooth of a landing.
My fiance had been chatting with a group of people outside of the airport in Phnom Penh waiting for me to arrive. When I finally appeared she came up and hugged me and the crowd of people she'd been talking with all started clapping and cheering. It was damn funny, and I had no idea what it was all about until she told me. They were just happy to see her meet me.
We checked in at the Phnom Penh Hotel and just relaxed for a while, then took the requisite nap. I'd been up for 45 hours at that point and I wasn't good for much except holding down a pillow.
Over the next couple of days we cruised around the city, did a little shopping, and visited a few people. We went to visit her folks and they were glad to see me.
With a little bit of whining I finally convinced my sweetheart to let me drive the moto around this time. Traffic in Phnom Penh is chaotic at best and friggin' scary at worst- it's totally unordered and free-form. You can drive on any side of the road at any time and go in any direction you like. You can stop whenever and wherever you like at any time, and turn wherever the hell you feel like it without regard for anyone or anything. You can make a full u-turn in the middle of the street across 4 lanes of traffic and no one bats an eyelash. Needless to say, this takes a little bit of getting used to.
To turn left, for example, you
don't wait until you come to the intersection and then turn- instead, about two or three hundred feet
*before* the turn you just drift across the center line and
pull into oncoming traffic (!!), and then work your way over to the left where the streets cross. You cut the corner and turn directly into the oncoming traffic on that street and then work your way across the street to the right until you merge with the flow of traffic.
I should add that you pay absolutely no attention to the stoplights, red or green, you go if you feel like it. If you're at an intersection and want to turn left, you simply turn to the left (straight into the oncoming traffic!) and weave your way up the street, cutting to the right repeatedly until you cross the center line and merge with the traffic flow in the direction you want to go.
I'm not making this up. This is how you drive in Phnom Penh, and it's the same way if you're driving a car or truck. Please refer to this extremely high-quality traffic diagram for a visual example:
(//vny!://discoverseattle.net/cambodia/traffic_turn1.gif)
Green: traffic flow of cars, trucks, and motos
Blue: How normal people make a left turn
Red: How to make a left turn in Phnom Penh
It only works because Phnom Penh drivers are very cooperative, not like in the US where it's always a race to get in front of your enemy (the other drivers). You beep your horn
a lot to let people know you're moving over or coming up behind them or whatever.
It's a friendly thing, not like in the US. In the US when you beep your horn it means one thing: "
F*CK YOU, A**HOLE!", whereas in Phnom Penh beeping your horn basically just means "
I have a horn, isn't it nice?". You beep your horn and lots of people beep back: "I like your horn, please listen to the wonderful melody mine also makes."
It's like echo-location; you beep and then you hear three or four (or twenty) horns beeping back. The horns in the US are also very offensive- quite loud and strident sounding. The horns in Phnom Penh are actually kind of cute little "
beep beep" horns instead of the
BEEEEEPF*CKYOUBASTARDhorns typical in the States.
So anyway, I drove the moto around, and to be honest it scared the pants off of my fiance more than a bit. She was worried I'd hit something or someone and she was always cautioning me "
Easy, easy!" or "
No hurry, no hurry honey". Lol. I will say that to my credit that although we had a couple of close calls, I never hit anything, ran over anyone, and we never fell off the moto or fell over in the street.
I've mentioned traffic signs before, but allow me to state again for the record that they mean
NOTHING. Just like the lines in the road, they are purely ornamental in nature. You could remove all the road signs in Phnom Penh and not only would traffic flow normally, but no one would even notice they were gone.
The police were everywhere and would see me go by but they never batted an eye or stopped me. I mean, it was painfully obvious that I was
NOT from Phnom Penh and that I most certainly did
NOT have a Cambodian driver's license, but they couldn't care less. They just didn't give a damn as long as I didn't hit anything.
I loved driving in Phnom Penh, it was both exhilarating and exciting. It was also very liberating to drive without worrying about any pesky rules or laws or speed limits.
We stopped for gas and because the air was kind of muggy my fiance put on her filter mask.
Here she is, dressed up like a bandit girl. 
(//vny!://discoverseattle.net/cambodia/banditgirl.JPG)
Later we went to a place called the
Dream Garden. (See pics below.) The Dream Garden is a place with all these nice little open-air gazebos on the water. You can relax in them and they'll bring food and drinks out to you, and you can fish from the little gazebos as well if you want. A friend of mine here recommended it highly, so we went to see it.
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Now, although the pictures make it look lovely,
the fact is that the Dream Garden is a messy, muddy, rundown pit of filth. We drove all the way there, got out, and spent 10 minutes walking around in the mud before we left. It should have been named the Nightmare Garden or the Mud Garden. It was gross. After escaping from the Mud Garden we laughed all the way back to Phnom Penh about how awful it was.
We did find another place that was very similar but it was much nicer, it's in a place called "Tablai Battai" (my spelling is almost certainly wrong). It was much cleaner and we intend to go back there during my next trip. The little gazebos are out on the water and you walk on a very skinny little board "bridge" a couple hundred feet to get out to them. It's basically a plank on some little stilts that connects the gazebo and the shoreline.
There were some gorgeous old ruins at Tablai Battai, and I got a few good pics of them. 
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Along the way we passed these places where they carve
life-sized wooden animals. They're bigger than they look- the tigers are about 4 feet high at the shoulder. I want one of the tigers, but I doubt it would fit on the plane. Very cool stuff, though.
(//vny!://discoverseattle.net/cambodia/woodenanimals1.JPG)
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When I drove to Tablai Battai and back, I didn't wear a hat or long-sleeved shirt. That was a big mistake. I got so sunburned I could hardly move. I was bright, bright red and looked like I'd been deep-fried. My scalp was also burned. It hurt so much that I couldn't even brush my hair. (On the plane trip back I wore my hat so as not to scare anyone because my face was peeling really badly and looked pretty f*cking horrible.)
Later we went shopping and I came across
Welfare Barbie. No kidding, see the pics for proof.
(//vny!://discoverseattle.net/cambodia/welfarebarbie1.JPG)
(//vny!://discoverseattle.net/cambodia/welfarebarbie2.JPG)
Okay, so it isn't an actual Barbie, but it's the same damn thing. I have NO idea what this doll was meant to be.
While shopping we saw a place accepting applications for employment. What caught my eye was one of the "essential requirements" to be hired:
you had to be a male or female.
(//vny!://discoverseattle.net/cambodia/nowhiring.JPG)
I guess they don't hire hermaphrodites.
Another pic was worth taking. These are some steps that go up and down to a neighbor's home. The picture doesn't really show it well, but these steps are practically vertical.
(//vny!://discoverseattle.net/cambodia/stairwell.JPG)
They go up about 10 feet in a horizontal space of about 4 feet. It's like climbing a stepladder. And the ceiling is low- only about 6 feet tall at the highest point. It's just weird construction. And of course there are no lights in the stairwells, so watch your footing or else.
We visited my fiance's doctor and let me tell you, it's not like here.
This is the doctor's office, open to the street:
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And this is the street out front of the doctor's office:
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(//vny!://discoverseattle.net/cambodia/dr_office3.JPG)
Nice, isn't it?
My advice is not to get sick unless you really have to. I also got a nice shot of the sunrise from our hotel room. The pic is really big, but well worth the time it takes to load.
Click on the link below to see it full size:
(//vny!://discoverseattle.net/cambodia/sunset01small.jpg)
vny!://discoverseattle.net/cambodia/sunset01.jpg (//vny!://discoverseattle.net/cambodia/sunset01.jpg)
Well, that was about it. We went to several nice restaraunts and buffets, but mostly took it easy this time.
Click here for the story of the Sixth Trip (//vny!://discoverseattle.net/forums/index.php/topic,3388.msg110306.html#msg110306) (just below)
