To allay some concern re the last couple of days... I am in a prehistoric internet place in Siem Reap, Cambodia... this post is dedicated to John Darnielle of The Mountain Goats and Mr E. 0f The Eels for showing us the beautiful in the tragic and the tragic in the beautiful, the ordinary in the magical and the magical in the ordinary... yes, I had music for once! Blessed protector of sanity... My battered little mp3 player actually worked for the whole bus ride yesterday instead of crashing half way through one song...
Anyway... Went to Muai Thai (Thai kickboxing) at the stadium Wednesday night, not too bad, rather chaotic... yesterday I jumped in a cab to the northern bus terminal and left Bangkok on the first bus that was going the right way, around 12.30 in the afternoon - ok there were earlier ones but I dont get up earlier unless I have to - this keyboard has no apostrophes or brackets by the way... The bus was non-eventful, about five hours to the border town of Aranyaprathet. Scenic enough if you like rice, although there were a lot of mini-garden centres, east Thailand is all about the rural stuff, so for hundreds of metres in long stretches every house is surrounded by little shrubs and plants and such that you can buy for your garden. Aranyaprathet is, as I said, a border town, which in SE Asia usually = scummy... my hotel was basic to say the least, but it was all I needed. I elected not to wander in the evening for once, primarily as I didnt want to leave my pack unattended. The next morning I rose early and headed for the border, to get there ahead of the buses and buses of Thais coming in their thousands to cross over and gamble at the casinos about 100m across the bridge... There are a million horror stories of the Thai-Cambodia border crossing including some I heard from Canadians I met in Bangkok... some of these are a bit exaggerated and some probably due to inexperienced travellers getting into trouble... I will not waffle on but I will encourage you to have a quick read of:
www.talesofasia.com/cambodia-overland-bkksr-self.htm
... this is a pretty accurate but not overstated account of what it is like, and how my morning went. Fun fun!!
I put on my sunglasses and my seriously dont mess with me face and made my way through. By coincidence I bumped into a German couple I had seen the night before on the bus and asked if they wanted to split a cab, which started off as a good idea until I realised they had already fallen for the charms of a nice young Cambodian who was "helping" them through... so we ended up getting loaded onto a "courtesy" bus that took us (via dirt track that is the road) (hey I found a key that makes brackets... not the bracket key of course) to their taxi depot... I tried to convince the other two that we should go for a walk down the "road" to find a cheaper cab but all this guys lies had them convinced and the girl clearly didn't want to be there any more (the apostrophe key is the one next to the key where the apostrophe would usually be) and from the looks on their faces I could see they didn't have the fortitude to press the issue... so I was left with the choice of getting ripped off, paying for a whole car myself, or waiting the maybe four hours until some more tourist types came across from Bangkok. I relented and we shelled out 800 baht each for the trip... after I got in a near-yelling match with the scummy guy doing the dealing... two or three times.
I have heard the ride from the border to Siem Reap compared to a scene from Mad Max, which is completely unfair. In Mad Max they have roads, and the ride here is longer than the movie. The "taxis" are in fact all nearly-destroyed Toyota Camry's with jacked-up suspension. The normal speed is around 70 up to 100km/hr on road, if you can call it that, which varies from something that possibly used to be asphalt, down to dirt with potholes of the type that would bottom a normal car and leave you stranded. Basically the 180(?) odd km is a "work in progress"... you are flanked on both sides by endless rice paddies, and every few km there is a nice new bridge which will probably, one day, be connected to the road, but until then the road diverts down a bank, across rutted dirt and potholes, back up a bank, onto the road, which is rutted dirt and potholes. Along this road are entire towns covered in thick red dust thrown up by trucks, cars, scooters and various other vehicles I have trouble describing. Picture dozens of little school children in white shirts walking home, every few seconds entirely swallowed by a wall of choking red dust. While a Camry roars past at about 80kph. Being overtaken by another Camry doing 100kph. Both of which are overtaking several scooters, with a bus coming the other way. And then of course you are belting down the road following another car, but you can't see it due to the dust, and you also can't see the metre-high concrete culvert until you hit it at about 80 and everything becomes very Dukes of Hazard.
Anyway, much fun, my neck is now, I am sorry to say, wrecked and giving me a lot of grief but should come right. I have checked into a nice... possibly even fancy by my standards... guesthouse for the night... pricey at US$22 but not really caring at this point... I am now going to find food... yet again I didn't really get the chance to eat since... um... Wednesday... and see what there is to see of the town. The continuing story of last Tuesday shall have to wait again, but I haven't forgotten, don't worry... Take care all.
Saturday, November 22, 2008
Friday, November 21, 2008
Back on the road...
No time to chitchat I am finally off to the east today, will check in when I get some internet... as constantly proven there aren't many places that don't have it these days... take it easy, will be in touch..
Thursday, November 20, 2008
Just FYI - all is well
Hi all... just briefly while I stop for lunch - there has been further violence in Bangkok today, re the current political trouble, there was a bombing and/or grenade attack a few blocks over from where I am at around 3am, but it is mostly business as usual here in the capital. It remains a lot safer than the south where I have already been so don't be worrying.
It is flamin HOT here today, hottest day in Bangkok so far, sun finally got through the smog. I am getting my culture and history etc done with temples, palaces, shiney gold guys sitting with legs folded, shiney gold guys reclining, etc etc etc. Will continue the far more interesting story of Tuesday/Wednesday later hopefully. Take it easy all.
It is flamin HOT here today, hottest day in Bangkok so far, sun finally got through the smog. I am getting my culture and history etc done with temples, palaces, shiney gold guys sitting with legs folded, shiney gold guys reclining, etc etc etc. Will continue the far more interesting story of Tuesday/Wednesday later hopefully. Take it easy all.
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
God knows the lonely souls...
Adventuring... we are adventuring... there ya go, two OMR before you even knew what was going on...
Well I am back in Bangkok, it is half four on... Wednesday afternoon, according to the computer... The last couple of days have been among the more memorable I have had for a very long time for a variety of reasons. I am sitting down to rest and gather sanity from doing some writing. Where to start... well, yesterday...
I got up around 8 after a pretty short and average sleep (as they all are at the moment for some reason) and caught a minibus (actually a pretty nice new van) north with assorted other euro types to Kanchanaburi, about a two hour drive in the usual "entertaining" SE Asian traffic. Once there I left the others to their assorted tours and hotels and wandered down the road to where a rather solid but unremarkable looking black bridge spanned a shiny brown river... which was of course the Kwai, the big black bridge being one of many, but the only one which is THE Bridge on the River Kwai.
Far from being a remote spot in the jungle the bridge is now on the northern edge of Kanchanaburi township and, I am rather sorry today, the usual tourist-trap commercial B.S. is all around it. Ice cream stalls, food places, about 500 shops hawking all manner of souvenir crap, a wooden cartoon-looking "train" ticket booth selling tickets on a 15 minute tourist ride over the bridge... but it was still a pretty surreal feeling to walk out over the river on the narrow stretch of black steel and actually to be standing on THE bridge. It was a weird mix of emotions for me, it was kind of hard to take in. To me I guess the bridge is not really a monument to those who built it, but it does bring sadness, and anger. I walked back and forth a bit, trying to get a feeling for the whole thing, and trying to take photos that didn't contain fat tourists in bright clothes, but the coaches must have left Bangkok just after we did because it wasn't long before they came in their droves. I left and made my way over to the "Death Railroad Museum" which claimed all sorts of things on the signs but was in fact a rather pathetic collection of miscellaneous World War II related rubbish and a bunch of copied photographs, plus a glass case which apparently contained the remains of 106 Thais who died working on the Japanese railroad.
Somewhat disheartened by the whole affair I wandered down the road a bit, looking for but not finding a bus station where I might get a ride north. The man in the little wooden train had advised me that sadly the proper "Death Railroad" train that does a two hour trip over the actual railroad laid by allied soldiers working as Japanese slave labour was not running again until the next day. With no minivans seemingly heading in that direction and feeling like I really hadn't seen as much as I needed to see, I figured I would have to find my own way to where I was going. After a while down the main road I figured I may as well keep on walking to the Kanchanaburi Cemetary, I had initially planned to get a tuk-tuk or taxi but I was already on the way... this ended up taking some time, but when I got there I was greeted by a tasteful little plot with a white stone gate, next to the smokey noisy main road, being carefully tended by a group of local gardeners. I walked the rows for a long time, as I tend to do, and managed to find a Kiwi, a young air force Pilot Officer, aged 23. I wondered what his story was to end up a lonely Kiwi sharing the suffering of all the Aussies and Brits and Dutch and Thais and Indians and various others.
I sat down for a while and contemplated, then got up and started looking for the mythical northbound bus that I knew was supposed to be heading in the right direction. This took a lot longer than anticipated (every thirty minutes my ass), and I had all but given up as the clock ticked on and on, mindful that the minibus driver had told me to be back by 1630 for a ride to Bangkok. Finally a local bus approached and I flagged him down, but it was the wrong one... I waited some more and another appeared and this one was right... I knew it now had to be near on three, and the bus ride alone was going to take an hour and a half one way... but I thought "screw it"... I hadn't come all this way not to do things properly had I? Not like I was going to be back to do it again in a hurry... so I paid my 50 baht and settled back. Maybe there would be another way home. If it didn't take toooo long to get there...
The kilometer markers passed achingly slowly, and the tired old bus struggled and groaned up the winding roads as we gradually gained altitude. Stops were frequent as people got on and off at dusty little bus stops, and the usual women came aboard trying to sell home made snacks and drinks in plastic bags.. I was tempted to grab one as I had had only one coke all day and hadn't eaten... But I decided to wait for now, there is really no telling where that water comes from... If I was going to catch some evil parasite I figured I would wait until I was already dying. We chugged on, passing several police security checkpoints similar to the ones in the south (we were now on the Burmese border rather than the Malaysian), once again I the token white guy and the subject of some curiosity.
Finally we passed kilometer stone 64 and with my total lack of Thai and the ticket man's total lack of English we agreed this is where I wanted to get off, and he called the bus to a halt. I was stoked there was still some light left but the sun hung low so I didn't waste any time... I had seen a watch on the bus and it had said quarter past five... I had heard the place closed at four thirty but I didn't care. The two soldiers at the gate looked slightly bemused as I casually wandered past but didn't object. A tiny sign told me I was in the right place (I was worried for a minute there) and I continued down a narrow sealed drive, past a herd of dairy cows, round a corner, down a hill, under trees... Until I saw the carparks, big enough for a dozen double decker tour coaches but tonight wonderfully empty... the museum was closed and locked but I didn't care, and the sole minibus driver standing next to his vehicle was the only person watching. I didn't hesitate as an old guy I presumed to be the caretaker wandered around a corner, busy tidying up after the day. Without looking back I rounded the corner of the building eyeing up anything that looked like a trail, and saw some stairs that led down the steep hillside. Expecting to be called back at any second I started trudging down the wooden stairs and raised walkways, trying to keep my bootsteps light so as not to attract attention. The light dimmed even more as I got into the jungle, and I thought about how humorous it would be if I tripped and ended up in a tangled heap at the bottom with nobody there til morning... I reached the bottom and my boots crunched onto the gravel of the track, and I waited for a yell from up above... but none came. I started off with some pace, camera snapping as I went, trying to get everything I could before I lost the light entirely. The occupants of the minivan waiting above, probably Aussies looking at them, walked past and smiled and climbed the stairs back to the top. And I was alone. I was there... I had made it... and I was alone, on Hellfire Pass. So I walked on, stoked, savouring the incredible view between the trees and bamboo, as the sun set over mountains beyond a vast smokey valley, the beauty painfully ironic considering the suffering that had created the place. Here and there scatted railway sleepers still lay where they had been placed by the prisoners of war 60-something years ago. Twisted trees grew from both sides and atop the solid stone walls, cut from the hill by the allied soldiers forced to work and die there by the Japanese.
I walked on for a while longer, wall to the right side, trees and a steep drop to the other, wondering at the sheer manpower required to dig this godforsaken track, and finally rounded a corner to be greeted by the pass itself, a long deep gouge in the rock, carved through the middle of a hill, named for the infernal glow of the campfires and lanterns used as the prisoners worked through the night. Solid vertical stone walls rose up on either side and dwarfed me as I entered and followed the path where the rails once lay, to the middle point, where a solitary tree had somehow since grown out of the rocky floor, reaching upward toward the fading strip of light overhead. I stopped there and my boots became silent, and all there was to hear were the familiar sounds of the jungle, crickets and bugs and the occasional bird... a gentle breeze in the treetops... peaceful, quiet, still. And I thought about the spirits of the men who had died here and along the track in either direction... in their hundreds, ordinary guys like myself, made great by their decision to stand up and fight, and made to suffer unimaginable horrors as a consequence. I wondered if they were still here, among the jungle shadows, sitting atop the high walls of the pass looking down, or moving back and forth along the path they had carved like a silent river. And I was alone, a long way from home, as they had been, where they worked and fell, as the dark rose around me... and I put my hand on one hard rock wall, the same hewn by their hands, and soaked in their blood, and sweat, and tears. And I bowed my head. And I stood there, for a long, long time.
Well I am back in Bangkok, it is half four on... Wednesday afternoon, according to the computer... The last couple of days have been among the more memorable I have had for a very long time for a variety of reasons. I am sitting down to rest and gather sanity from doing some writing. Where to start... well, yesterday...
I got up around 8 after a pretty short and average sleep (as they all are at the moment for some reason) and caught a minibus (actually a pretty nice new van) north with assorted other euro types to Kanchanaburi, about a two hour drive in the usual "entertaining" SE Asian traffic. Once there I left the others to their assorted tours and hotels and wandered down the road to where a rather solid but unremarkable looking black bridge spanned a shiny brown river... which was of course the Kwai, the big black bridge being one of many, but the only one which is THE Bridge on the River Kwai.
Far from being a remote spot in the jungle the bridge is now on the northern edge of Kanchanaburi township and, I am rather sorry today, the usual tourist-trap commercial B.S. is all around it. Ice cream stalls, food places, about 500 shops hawking all manner of souvenir crap, a wooden cartoon-looking "train" ticket booth selling tickets on a 15 minute tourist ride over the bridge... but it was still a pretty surreal feeling to walk out over the river on the narrow stretch of black steel and actually to be standing on THE bridge. It was a weird mix of emotions for me, it was kind of hard to take in. To me I guess the bridge is not really a monument to those who built it, but it does bring sadness, and anger. I walked back and forth a bit, trying to get a feeling for the whole thing, and trying to take photos that didn't contain fat tourists in bright clothes, but the coaches must have left Bangkok just after we did because it wasn't long before they came in their droves. I left and made my way over to the "Death Railroad Museum" which claimed all sorts of things on the signs but was in fact a rather pathetic collection of miscellaneous World War II related rubbish and a bunch of copied photographs, plus a glass case which apparently contained the remains of 106 Thais who died working on the Japanese railroad.
Somewhat disheartened by the whole affair I wandered down the road a bit, looking for but not finding a bus station where I might get a ride north. The man in the little wooden train had advised me that sadly the proper "Death Railroad" train that does a two hour trip over the actual railroad laid by allied soldiers working as Japanese slave labour was not running again until the next day. With no minivans seemingly heading in that direction and feeling like I really hadn't seen as much as I needed to see, I figured I would have to find my own way to where I was going. After a while down the main road I figured I may as well keep on walking to the Kanchanaburi Cemetary, I had initially planned to get a tuk-tuk or taxi but I was already on the way... this ended up taking some time, but when I got there I was greeted by a tasteful little plot with a white stone gate, next to the smokey noisy main road, being carefully tended by a group of local gardeners. I walked the rows for a long time, as I tend to do, and managed to find a Kiwi, a young air force Pilot Officer, aged 23. I wondered what his story was to end up a lonely Kiwi sharing the suffering of all the Aussies and Brits and Dutch and Thais and Indians and various others.
I sat down for a while and contemplated, then got up and started looking for the mythical northbound bus that I knew was supposed to be heading in the right direction. This took a lot longer than anticipated (every thirty minutes my ass), and I had all but given up as the clock ticked on and on, mindful that the minibus driver had told me to be back by 1630 for a ride to Bangkok. Finally a local bus approached and I flagged him down, but it was the wrong one... I waited some more and another appeared and this one was right... I knew it now had to be near on three, and the bus ride alone was going to take an hour and a half one way... but I thought "screw it"... I hadn't come all this way not to do things properly had I? Not like I was going to be back to do it again in a hurry... so I paid my 50 baht and settled back. Maybe there would be another way home. If it didn't take toooo long to get there...
The kilometer markers passed achingly slowly, and the tired old bus struggled and groaned up the winding roads as we gradually gained altitude. Stops were frequent as people got on and off at dusty little bus stops, and the usual women came aboard trying to sell home made snacks and drinks in plastic bags.. I was tempted to grab one as I had had only one coke all day and hadn't eaten... But I decided to wait for now, there is really no telling where that water comes from... If I was going to catch some evil parasite I figured I would wait until I was already dying. We chugged on, passing several police security checkpoints similar to the ones in the south (we were now on the Burmese border rather than the Malaysian), once again I the token white guy and the subject of some curiosity.
Finally we passed kilometer stone 64 and with my total lack of Thai and the ticket man's total lack of English we agreed this is where I wanted to get off, and he called the bus to a halt. I was stoked there was still some light left but the sun hung low so I didn't waste any time... I had seen a watch on the bus and it had said quarter past five... I had heard the place closed at four thirty but I didn't care. The two soldiers at the gate looked slightly bemused as I casually wandered past but didn't object. A tiny sign told me I was in the right place (I was worried for a minute there) and I continued down a narrow sealed drive, past a herd of dairy cows, round a corner, down a hill, under trees... Until I saw the carparks, big enough for a dozen double decker tour coaches but tonight wonderfully empty... the museum was closed and locked but I didn't care, and the sole minibus driver standing next to his vehicle was the only person watching. I didn't hesitate as an old guy I presumed to be the caretaker wandered around a corner, busy tidying up after the day. Without looking back I rounded the corner of the building eyeing up anything that looked like a trail, and saw some stairs that led down the steep hillside. Expecting to be called back at any second I started trudging down the wooden stairs and raised walkways, trying to keep my bootsteps light so as not to attract attention. The light dimmed even more as I got into the jungle, and I thought about how humorous it would be if I tripped and ended up in a tangled heap at the bottom with nobody there til morning... I reached the bottom and my boots crunched onto the gravel of the track, and I waited for a yell from up above... but none came. I started off with some pace, camera snapping as I went, trying to get everything I could before I lost the light entirely. The occupants of the minivan waiting above, probably Aussies looking at them, walked past and smiled and climbed the stairs back to the top. And I was alone. I was there... I had made it... and I was alone, on Hellfire Pass. So I walked on, stoked, savouring the incredible view between the trees and bamboo, as the sun set over mountains beyond a vast smokey valley, the beauty painfully ironic considering the suffering that had created the place. Here and there scatted railway sleepers still lay where they had been placed by the prisoners of war 60-something years ago. Twisted trees grew from both sides and atop the solid stone walls, cut from the hill by the allied soldiers forced to work and die there by the Japanese.
I walked on for a while longer, wall to the right side, trees and a steep drop to the other, wondering at the sheer manpower required to dig this godforsaken track, and finally rounded a corner to be greeted by the pass itself, a long deep gouge in the rock, carved through the middle of a hill, named for the infernal glow of the campfires and lanterns used as the prisoners worked through the night. Solid vertical stone walls rose up on either side and dwarfed me as I entered and followed the path where the rails once lay, to the middle point, where a solitary tree had somehow since grown out of the rocky floor, reaching upward toward the fading strip of light overhead. I stopped there and my boots became silent, and all there was to hear were the familiar sounds of the jungle, crickets and bugs and the occasional bird... a gentle breeze in the treetops... peaceful, quiet, still. And I thought about the spirits of the men who had died here and along the track in either direction... in their hundreds, ordinary guys like myself, made great by their decision to stand up and fight, and made to suffer unimaginable horrors as a consequence. I wondered if they were still here, among the jungle shadows, sitting atop the high walls of the pass looking down, or moving back and forth along the path they had carved like a silent river. And I was alone, a long way from home, as they had been, where they worked and fell, as the dark rose around me... and I put my hand on one hard rock wall, the same hewn by their hands, and soaked in their blood, and sweat, and tears. And I bowed my head. And I stood there, for a long, long time.
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Anywhere I lay my head is...
...lumpy... mmm love vinyl covered mattresses... not very much. And noisy guesthouses with noisy backpackers... no Khao San is not exactly the kind of place I generally stay. I guess at best you could describe it as a kind of bohemian "everywhere" type place, full of all sorts of everything... but it is the most "tourist" area I have ventured near so far and I don't fancy it. But the prices are right, and with the slight money flow problem I had up until today, cheap and relatively secure was important when I got off the train from Chumphon. It is also close to things I want which is important when time is limited. So it gets the job done. Compared to Phuket I have to say it has a refreshing lack of old men walking around with Thai girls though. No I am not out sampling the Bangkok "nightlife", not that kind anyway. Even those of my Phuket companions who decided to sample the more "interesting" bars without me came back regretting they had. Some things are best left to the imagination, or in fact, not. There is a nasty element to the place that you can't brush aside or laugh away, and sadly it is fundamental to what Thailand has become.
Having said that there is far more here other than "that stuff", and "that stuff" can be largely avoided if you got to the right places. I branched out today on one of my patented "wanders" after getting over the disappointment of not being able to see the historic sights, and in my travels explored the highways, byways, waterways and alleyways. There is indeed a lot to Bangkok, 9 million people who it would seem all attempt to cross the same bridges over the river at around 5pm. I gave my camera a good workout and took more photos of boats and shacks than anyone could ever want, but paid the price for walking the freeway bridges across the river... I looked in the mirror when I got home and my eyes were red and stinging, my throat raw, from the exhaust fumes. The sun dies with a whimper in Bangkok, burning fiercely down to near the horizon before suffocating in a noxious haze.
But that was all forgotten with my green curry tonight, absolutely fantastic it was... washed down with a couple of Chang (that's "Chung") beers which are bad but cheap... not that NZ$3 is actually that cheap for a beer considering what even we pay in a supermarket at home. Tonight I am again doing some wandering and largely avoiding the "night spots"... I did enough of an imitation of a tourist in Phuket and, while fun, that is all the boozing in places not really any different from anywhere else that I need for now. Tomorrow hopefully holds one of the highlights of the entire journey and I will report back on that soon.
This blog was brought to you from two different internet cafes for reasons best disclosed when I am home...
Once again don't be shy to drop an email to my hotmail and let me know the stories from where you are, it would be good to know what is going on while I am away from the world... I will apologise if I don't reply quickly, blogging takes up most of my internet time, but I am grateful!
Hope again that this finds everyone well and happy and healthy. I am off for a wander and then a shower (you only truely love showers when you are reminded what it is like not to have them... I think ten days is my personal record for not bathing in the tropics, but that was another place and time... be glad you weren't there. You don't appreciate what it smells like until after you get clean and then stand next to one of your mates who isn't yet...). Cheers all.
Having said that there is far more here other than "that stuff", and "that stuff" can be largely avoided if you got to the right places. I branched out today on one of my patented "wanders" after getting over the disappointment of not being able to see the historic sights, and in my travels explored the highways, byways, waterways and alleyways. There is indeed a lot to Bangkok, 9 million people who it would seem all attempt to cross the same bridges over the river at around 5pm. I gave my camera a good workout and took more photos of boats and shacks than anyone could ever want, but paid the price for walking the freeway bridges across the river... I looked in the mirror when I got home and my eyes were red and stinging, my throat raw, from the exhaust fumes. The sun dies with a whimper in Bangkok, burning fiercely down to near the horizon before suffocating in a noxious haze.
But that was all forgotten with my green curry tonight, absolutely fantastic it was... washed down with a couple of Chang (that's "Chung") beers which are bad but cheap... not that NZ$3 is actually that cheap for a beer considering what even we pay in a supermarket at home. Tonight I am again doing some wandering and largely avoiding the "night spots"... I did enough of an imitation of a tourist in Phuket and, while fun, that is all the boozing in places not really any different from anywhere else that I need for now. Tomorrow hopefully holds one of the highlights of the entire journey and I will report back on that soon.
This blog was brought to you from two different internet cafes for reasons best disclosed when I am home...
Once again don't be shy to drop an email to my hotmail and let me know the stories from where you are, it would be good to know what is going on while I am away from the world... I will apologise if I don't reply quickly, blogging takes up most of my internet time, but I am grateful!
Hope again that this finds everyone well and happy and healthy. I am off for a wander and then a shower (you only truely love showers when you are reminded what it is like not to have them... I think ten days is my personal record for not bathing in the tropics, but that was another place and time... be glad you weren't there. You don't appreciate what it smells like until after you get clean and then stand next to one of your mates who isn't yet...). Cheers all.
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