v's virtual vacuum
Wednesday, May. 04, 2005
phew
he's fine:Hello Van !
Yeah, I am fine . I am in Cambodia , been all day at the temples of Angkor Wat ...amazing but it is about 110 degrees here and I am knackered! Am staying the town of Siam Reap but I have to get one of the guys to take me on a moped to the nearest internet place.It's all really spread out here and no centre . I really like Cambodia though , it is an incredibly poor country and have been hearing about the Pol Pot era (That was Nikki Scotts nickname!) which was horrendous . The people are so nice here but you get a lot of hassle from hawkers.
Had a bit of trouble leaving Laos last week . I noticed that there was a guy behind me with a machine gun on the bus going up to Luang Prabang...he was an armed guard and that turns out was with us because there have been some attacks by guerillas on buses on that road (Route 13 funny enough). Anyhow, I decided to spend 50$ and fly back and save time in the process (45 mins instead of 10 hours on bus).
The plan was that I would get the flght at 2pm , fly to Vientiane and then get the overnight train to Bangkok and then onto Cambodia .
To cut along story short , turned up at the airport , was told ""solly sir ..plane broke" ..."�ou fright 6 hours time" . Eventually left at 8pm on an 16 seater turboprop with all our luggage stacked up in the aisles behind the cockpit , it was dark by this stage and we flew through this thunderstorm and really bad turbulance . I love flying and am never nervous but this time I was shitting myself especially as Laos Aviation have a piss poor safety record. (Sounds like a Dr Ovaries story doesn't it?!)
It was a very long 45 minutes and was glad to get to Vientiane safely , where I had to spend the night cos I missed the train connection . I arranged for the train ticket to the following night but when I went to collect they told me it was full and ended up getting a sodding bus the 12 hours to Bangkok , overnight there then was up at 4.30am for train to Thai/Cambodia border ....the Cambodian border guards are corrupt though and did rip me off on the visa charge but it aint worth getting into hassle with them.
Anyhow chickun ,FANKS for sticking that dosh in I really appreciate it !!
Gotta dash as I only had half hour and the driver has just arrived to pick me up to go back to the hostel...
I shall be in Pnomh Penh in a few days time and so hope to catch up on line Sat.
Hope you and the other housemates are rrrrrkay
Love
Kev
xxx
oh and I just realised he sent me this