Wednesday, 20 April 2011
Travel update
Folks, this is not a contemporaneous record. We are currently in Hanoi and have fallen a bit behind with the writing. Tomorrow morning (21 April) we will be on our way by bus from Hanoi to Nanning (hopefully) and from there probably pretty much straight into Beijing (about 28 hours by train). We are not sure whether we will be able to update the blog in China (or, for that matter, how easy it will be to access gmail). We look forward and are excited about Beijing and the last two months have just been fantastic. Ian promises to bring the blog up to date and to continue once any technical hurdles have been overcome (strories will include Phnom Penh, Hh Chi Minh City, diving again (on Whale Island), more trains and, of course, Hanoi).
Siem Reap and Angkor
The transition from southern Thailand a few days previously to Cambodia was quite striking. April is the height of the dry season and normally the hottest month in Cambodia. While southern Thailand was bright green the drive to Siem Reap was through an unrelentingly flat, brown and dusty landscape. The flatness ensures that the horizon is distant; the harvested or fallow paddy fields are visible in outline because of the low earth walkway barriers that demarcate them, but almost all were drained of water. A few water buffalo still congregated around muddy ponds to wallow but there seemed to be many more Brahma cattle grazing in the stubble of the rice fields.
Apart from the villages the only people were occasional individual figures, tiny in the distance, digging in a field or herding cattle. The scenery is more reminiscent of north India before the monsoon. No doubt once the rains begin the landscape is transformed, but in April it remains pretty desolate.
Slightly incongruously to my mind, we drove past several small groups of Western tourists pedalling expensive-looking touring bikes along the seemingly endless straight road - sooner them than me, but at least not much need for gears.
After the drive the entry into Siem Reap is a bit bizarre in a Las Vegas-y kind of way. Suddenly several dozen brand new, luxurious multi-story hotels appear, strung out side-by-side along the road. Siem Reap is the base for, I think, about 2 million tourists a year visiting the Angkor temple complex a few miles out of town.
True to out flashpacker status, while Jessica and Gerold peeled off in search of cheap backpacker accommodation Birgit had booked us into a smaller boutique hotel - the Golden Banana - a few minutes walk from the center of town. Described in the Lonely Planet guide as being popular with the gay crowd it was one of the nicest hotels we've stayed at on the trip - friendly, stylishly but not ostentatiously designed, and with good food.
Once evening had falled and it had cooled down a bit we strolled into "downtown" Siem Reap. Quite a revelation! It's an old French colonial outpost that has survived wars and Khmer Rouge. The old town is a grid of streets probably less than a kilometer square around a central market. The houses are almost all two-story, solid colonial structures, with arches and verandas on both floors, most of them now converted into shops, restaurants and bars. Most striking, after the traffic chaos and intensity of Bangkok, Siem Reap is largely car-free. The streets are populated of course by the ubiquitous scooters as well as cyclists and tuk-tuks, all flowing in the usual apparently chaotic fashion but at a steady few miles an hour. The town is therefore comfortable for pedestrians and despite the thousands of tourists and locals milling around there was none of the sense of crowding you get elsewhere as pedestrians, street stalls and street life generally are all jammed onto narrow and badly-build pavements.
The sense of elegance and calm also extends to the small river that flows through the town: it's lined by ancient trees, gardens and parks - one of France's cultural victories in S.E. Asia. From a purely practical point of view it seemed to me that, whether by accident or good planning, the town has been adapted extremely well to absorb the huge flows of tourists, most of whom arrive and leave by air and spend only a few days. This impression was reinforced by the very high level of spoken English among most of the young Cambodians there: ok, it's an utterly tourism-dominated town but language and hospitality industry skills require planning and infrastructure. Coincidentally Birgit had been on the Thai-Cambodia border 20 years ago doing research in the refugee camps. She remembered that it had been rumoured at the time that, although hundreds of thousands of refugees were being sent back to villages and fields that had not yet been de-mined, priority for de-mining resources was being given to the site of Angkor to get the foreign-exchange earning golden goose up and laying. If so pretty cynical but maybe not wrong.
We'd been advised that the best way to see Angkor was to start before dawn, beating (most of) the crowds and watching the sun rise over the ruins. So we succumbed to the packaged tourism, got up at 4.30 the next morning and hopped into the tuk-tuk we'd booked via the hotel for the half-hour ride out to Angkor. We were glad to have fleeces - it was pretty cold in the wind on the tuk-tuk. The poor youngsters at the hotel looked absolutely numb - they said it was almost unheard of that it was so cold at that time of year. When added to the floods we'd just avoided in southern Thailand ut certainly seems to have been volatile weather - either global warming or a more localised side effect of the Japanese tsunami?
We arrived still in pitch dark at a large parking area with a few coaches and a few dozen tuk-tuks already parked, and joined the stream of a few hundred early-bird tourists walking over a stone causeway towards the first temple site. I'm sure there are a number of man-made and natural wonders that easily transcend the touristy trappings into which they've been necessarily packaged. The Taj Mahal definitely - maybe Macchu Picchu and Ayers Rock. Angkor is stunning. The sight of the ruins emerging into the first pre-dawn light, accompanied by the sounds of the surrounding forest was magical (cliche unavoidable).
What really astounds you about Angkor is the scale: it's not a temple (Angkor Wat is only the best-known site) but an entire complex of cities, with religious, royal, administrative and military buildings at their core. We spent a couple of hours at each of three of the main sites; in between the tuk-tuk would putter along at 20mph through the forest to deliver us to the next site maybe 5-10km distant. We could have spent days on the various sites, all of which are in varying states of decay and restoration. The stone ruins themselves are really just the bare skeleton of what was build in the 11th and 12th centuries by the Khmer empire. It's worth checking Wikipedia for a detailed history - some researchers think now that the wood-build urban area, long since rotted away, that surrounded the stone-build cores may have covered 1,000 sq km and held a million people, making it by far the largest city in history at the time.
The entire culture was dependent on a system of reservoirs and canals that stored, transported and regulated water supply through the seasonal fluctuations and supported the paddy rice and aquaculture economy. I hadn't previously realised that the Mekong River is a rough barrier separating the primarily Chinese-influenced culture of Vietnam from the south Asian Indus-Ganges civilization, of which Laos, Cambodia and Thailand were the furthest easterly outposts. "Angkor" is a derivation of "nagara", Sanskrit for "city". The deities and iconography originally represented at Angkor are all familiar Hindu gods - Rama, Vishnu, Ganesh et al. These were overlayed by Buddhism later, but you can see the fundamental influence of India throughout Khmer culture - music, dance, cuisine.
https://picasaweb.google.com/101224237690804823445/UploadInPhmonPenh?authkey=Gv1sRgCLrq2uPw08zW4QE#slideshow/5591269876490138690
Try the link to a slide show for the Angkor photos. Next episode ... we move on to Phnom Penh.
Apart from the villages the only people were occasional individual figures, tiny in the distance, digging in a field or herding cattle. The scenery is more reminiscent of north India before the monsoon. No doubt once the rains begin the landscape is transformed, but in April it remains pretty desolate.
Slightly incongruously to my mind, we drove past several small groups of Western tourists pedalling expensive-looking touring bikes along the seemingly endless straight road - sooner them than me, but at least not much need for gears.
After the drive the entry into Siem Reap is a bit bizarre in a Las Vegas-y kind of way. Suddenly several dozen brand new, luxurious multi-story hotels appear, strung out side-by-side along the road. Siem Reap is the base for, I think, about 2 million tourists a year visiting the Angkor temple complex a few miles out of town.
True to out flashpacker status, while Jessica and Gerold peeled off in search of cheap backpacker accommodation Birgit had booked us into a smaller boutique hotel - the Golden Banana - a few minutes walk from the center of town. Described in the Lonely Planet guide as being popular with the gay crowd it was one of the nicest hotels we've stayed at on the trip - friendly, stylishly but not ostentatiously designed, and with good food.
Once evening had falled and it had cooled down a bit we strolled into "downtown" Siem Reap. Quite a revelation! It's an old French colonial outpost that has survived wars and Khmer Rouge. The old town is a grid of streets probably less than a kilometer square around a central market. The houses are almost all two-story, solid colonial structures, with arches and verandas on both floors, most of them now converted into shops, restaurants and bars. Most striking, after the traffic chaos and intensity of Bangkok, Siem Reap is largely car-free. The streets are populated of course by the ubiquitous scooters as well as cyclists and tuk-tuks, all flowing in the usual apparently chaotic fashion but at a steady few miles an hour. The town is therefore comfortable for pedestrians and despite the thousands of tourists and locals milling around there was none of the sense of crowding you get elsewhere as pedestrians, street stalls and street life generally are all jammed onto narrow and badly-build pavements.
The sense of elegance and calm also extends to the small river that flows through the town: it's lined by ancient trees, gardens and parks - one of France's cultural victories in S.E. Asia. From a purely practical point of view it seemed to me that, whether by accident or good planning, the town has been adapted extremely well to absorb the huge flows of tourists, most of whom arrive and leave by air and spend only a few days. This impression was reinforced by the very high level of spoken English among most of the young Cambodians there: ok, it's an utterly tourism-dominated town but language and hospitality industry skills require planning and infrastructure. Coincidentally Birgit had been on the Thai-Cambodia border 20 years ago doing research in the refugee camps. She remembered that it had been rumoured at the time that, although hundreds of thousands of refugees were being sent back to villages and fields that had not yet been de-mined, priority for de-mining resources was being given to the site of Angkor to get the foreign-exchange earning golden goose up and laying. If so pretty cynical but maybe not wrong.
We'd been advised that the best way to see Angkor was to start before dawn, beating (most of) the crowds and watching the sun rise over the ruins. So we succumbed to the packaged tourism, got up at 4.30 the next morning and hopped into the tuk-tuk we'd booked via the hotel for the half-hour ride out to Angkor. We were glad to have fleeces - it was pretty cold in the wind on the tuk-tuk. The poor youngsters at the hotel looked absolutely numb - they said it was almost unheard of that it was so cold at that time of year. When added to the floods we'd just avoided in southern Thailand ut certainly seems to have been volatile weather - either global warming or a more localised side effect of the Japanese tsunami?
We arrived still in pitch dark at a large parking area with a few coaches and a few dozen tuk-tuks already parked, and joined the stream of a few hundred early-bird tourists walking over a stone causeway towards the first temple site. I'm sure there are a number of man-made and natural wonders that easily transcend the touristy trappings into which they've been necessarily packaged. The Taj Mahal definitely - maybe Macchu Picchu and Ayers Rock. Angkor is stunning. The sight of the ruins emerging into the first pre-dawn light, accompanied by the sounds of the surrounding forest was magical (cliche unavoidable).
What really astounds you about Angkor is the scale: it's not a temple (Angkor Wat is only the best-known site) but an entire complex of cities, with religious, royal, administrative and military buildings at their core. We spent a couple of hours at each of three of the main sites; in between the tuk-tuk would putter along at 20mph through the forest to deliver us to the next site maybe 5-10km distant. We could have spent days on the various sites, all of which are in varying states of decay and restoration. The stone ruins themselves are really just the bare skeleton of what was build in the 11th and 12th centuries by the Khmer empire. It's worth checking Wikipedia for a detailed history - some researchers think now that the wood-build urban area, long since rotted away, that surrounded the stone-build cores may have covered 1,000 sq km and held a million people, making it by far the largest city in history at the time.
The entire culture was dependent on a system of reservoirs and canals that stored, transported and regulated water supply through the seasonal fluctuations and supported the paddy rice and aquaculture economy. I hadn't previously realised that the Mekong River is a rough barrier separating the primarily Chinese-influenced culture of Vietnam from the south Asian Indus-Ganges civilization, of which Laos, Cambodia and Thailand were the furthest easterly outposts. "Angkor" is a derivation of "nagara", Sanskrit for "city". The deities and iconography originally represented at Angkor are all familiar Hindu gods - Rama, Vishnu, Ganesh et al. These were overlayed by Buddhism later, but you can see the fundamental influence of India throughout Khmer culture - music, dance, cuisine.
https://picasaweb.google.com/101224237690804823445/UploadInPhmonPenh?authkey=Gv1sRgCLrq2uPw08zW4QE#slideshow/5591269876490138690
Try the link to a slide show for the Angkor photos. Next episode ... we move on to Phnom Penh.
Saturday, 16 April 2011
Welcome to Cambodia!
The first time we saw relatively empty Bangkok streets was in the 5.00am taxi to the east-bound bus station for the run across the Thai-Cambodia border to Siem Reap. We had checked out the bus station the day before and had bought tickets then: actually one of the most pleasant walks we took in Bangkok - via Skytrain (the raised light rail line) to Mo Chit and then across an almost deserted park and botanic gardens.
There was a good reason behind the early start and the careful preparation. Birgit had been researching the border crossing and the results had set all alarm bells ringing and red lights flashing. The internet commentary was voluminous and detailed: the crossing into Cambodia is, the consensus holds, a scrofulous den of iniquity populated by teeming throngs of child pickpockets, touts, scam artists and border officials of dubious provenance and minimal morality. The entire enterprise was said to feed off the profits of the flow of people and goods across the border, with a hierarchy of vulnerability going from white tourists through Thais and Cambodians to the lowest of all, non-white foreigners, but with white tourists providing the richest, hard currency, revenue stream.
In short, I expected a terrestial version of the Star Wars "bar scene" except with two green and credulous Luke Skywalkers with backpacks.
The drive to the border was fairly comfortable, uneventful and dull. The landscape was flat, dry and punctuated by dusty little agricultural market towns. As usual a DVD western movie was played after the obligatory local musical selection: this one being a realist Swedish bank robbery movie. I guess the subtitles were Thai but I don't think the Thais were much wiser as a result. Somewhat surprisingly there was only one other westerner on board - Jessica, a young Swedish backpacker doing S.E. Asia after having worked in an outback Australian town for a year. (Maybe the movie was in her honour). Since she had already spent a couple of months travelling in Laos, Thailand and Burma she was definitely the more experienced, but having done the same research she was equally nervous. We agreed to team up on the principle that three "chumps abroad" were better than one or two.
The most detailed and amusing of the accounts of the border crossing is by Gordon Sharpless. He is clearly what used to be called an "old Asia hand". I shall let him pick up the narrative: "If by any chance some tout wants to get in the tuk-tuk with you, don't let him. His aim is to redirect you to the tourist buses or rip you
off on a visa, though the tuk-tuk driver himself is just as capable of trying to redirect you somewhere. Aside from sometimes having to deal with this unwanted guest, it's also become more common for the tuk-tuk
drivers to try taking you not to the border, but to a so-called "Cambodia consulate" where they will try to sell you a way over-priced visa. Do not allow any of this to happen. Be polite, but be firm. But most important - you have absolutely no obligation whatsoever to allow anyone else into the tuk-tuk with you nor be taken anywhere but to the border, so don't. I'm sure back in your home country if you flagged down a taxi and some stranger tried to jump in with you or the driver tried taking you somewhere other than your chosen destination, you'd boot his you know what out in a second, so why do any different here?"
The script unfolded almost to the letter - the only amendment being the fact that the buses drive into the centre of Aranyaprakhet leaving a tuk-tuk ride of only a couple of hundred meters to the border. Not being aware of this the three of us piled into a tuk-tuk, clutching rucksacks and bags, all senses on high alert and expecting trouble. Sure enough, after puttering along past a line of parked lorries for a hundred meters or so the tuk-tuk pulled into a layby and stopped in front of a new-looking, whitewashed 2-room building ... something that could pass for an official building like, maybe, a border post?! Out sauntered a youngish chap, neatly dressed, wearing the broadest of smiles: "Welcome to Cambodia!"
I had not previously realised how much a single smile could convey: this one brimmed with good feeling and reassurance; we were among friends now; any negativity associated with the devious and unscrupulous Thais could be put behind us; the order of the day in Cambodia would be brisk efficiency. Forewarned and forearmed thanks to Gordon we remained glued to the tuk-tuk seats, with intensified grips on rucksacks. "How could we possibly already be in Cambodia when we haven't yet even gone through Thai border control?" To give him credit there was no real debate, just a shrug and the tuk-tuk accelerated back onto the road: I guess it's a numbers game and there would be another couple of buses along later in the day.
After that we passed smoothly through the Thai border exit post and strolled across to the Cambodian side. At this point my concerns began to rise: where were the throngs of Asiatic Artful Dodgers and taxi touts that Gordon had described? Instead we were directed over to an over-large, imposing hall, empty except for the three of us and four or five Cambodian border officials sharing one fan. Several of the officials participated in examining and stamping the passports, but the fee charged - $20 per visa - was the correct one and there were no proposals for, for example, an additional fee for "expedited service". At this point a young guide speaking good English attached himself to us - he shepherded us helpfully through the next stage, filling out of the health questionnaire, and onto a shuttle bus for a 15 min ride through the Cambodian border town of Poipet to the taxi station where, as ordained by Gordon, a Toyota Camry would take us on to Siem Reap.
The entire process for us on the Cambodian side was smooth, efficient and free of the hassle and unpleasantness we had been led to expect. Thinking about it later we guessed that there have been a couple of changes since the posts were written a couple of years ago. Firstly I would guess that the central government has imposed more discipline and order on the formal transitting procedure; certainly the Cambodians seem to have built or are building more grandiose official buildings, probably to raise their status vis-a-vis the Thai side. Also I suspect that monopoly order has been imposed on the previous free-for-all by some combination of local political fiefdom, "mafia" or taxi trade union. In any event the entire transfer from Cambodian entry to Siem Reap, about 4 hours drive, is obviously now controlled as a single, seamless process.
So this episode ends with Birgit, me, Jessica and Gerold (a Berliner from Prenzlauerberg - small world) sharing the taxi ride to Siem Reap.
But I have to leave you with Gordon's description of Poipet which i.m.h.o. is a minor classic of pithy, acid judgementalism - as well as being apparently accurate, at least from the perspective of a passing bus:
"Poipet is the end of the line in Cambodia - a filthy border town of casinos, cheap hotels, knock shops, and a market I wouldn't eat at even if I were coming off a hunger strike. It is not a pleasant introduction to Cambodia, nor is it representative of the rest of the nation. Poipet is one of my least favorite places in all of Asia. Simply put, Poipet more or less rhymes with toilet and the two are virtually indistinguishable."
There was a good reason behind the early start and the careful preparation. Birgit had been researching the border crossing and the results had set all alarm bells ringing and red lights flashing. The internet commentary was voluminous and detailed: the crossing into Cambodia is, the consensus holds, a scrofulous den of iniquity populated by teeming throngs of child pickpockets, touts, scam artists and border officials of dubious provenance and minimal morality. The entire enterprise was said to feed off the profits of the flow of people and goods across the border, with a hierarchy of vulnerability going from white tourists through Thais and Cambodians to the lowest of all, non-white foreigners, but with white tourists providing the richest, hard currency, revenue stream.
In short, I expected a terrestial version of the Star Wars "bar scene" except with two green and credulous Luke Skywalkers with backpacks.
The drive to the border was fairly comfortable, uneventful and dull. The landscape was flat, dry and punctuated by dusty little agricultural market towns. As usual a DVD western movie was played after the obligatory local musical selection: this one being a realist Swedish bank robbery movie. I guess the subtitles were Thai but I don't think the Thais were much wiser as a result. Somewhat surprisingly there was only one other westerner on board - Jessica, a young Swedish backpacker doing S.E. Asia after having worked in an outback Australian town for a year. (Maybe the movie was in her honour). Since she had already spent a couple of months travelling in Laos, Thailand and Burma she was definitely the more experienced, but having done the same research she was equally nervous. We agreed to team up on the principle that three "chumps abroad" were better than one or two.
The most detailed and amusing of the accounts of the border crossing is by Gordon Sharpless. He is clearly what used to be called an "old Asia hand". I shall let him pick up the narrative: "If by any chance some tout wants to get in the tuk-tuk with you, don't let him. His aim is to redirect you to the tourist buses or rip you
off on a visa, though the tuk-tuk driver himself is just as capable of trying to redirect you somewhere. Aside from sometimes having to deal with this unwanted guest, it's also become more common for the tuk-tuk
drivers to try taking you not to the border, but to a so-called "Cambodia consulate" where they will try to sell you a way over-priced visa. Do not allow any of this to happen. Be polite, but be firm. But most important - you have absolutely no obligation whatsoever to allow anyone else into the tuk-tuk with you nor be taken anywhere but to the border, so don't. I'm sure back in your home country if you flagged down a taxi and some stranger tried to jump in with you or the driver tried taking you somewhere other than your chosen destination, you'd boot his you know what out in a second, so why do any different here?"
The script unfolded almost to the letter - the only amendment being the fact that the buses drive into the centre of Aranyaprakhet leaving a tuk-tuk ride of only a couple of hundred meters to the border. Not being aware of this the three of us piled into a tuk-tuk, clutching rucksacks and bags, all senses on high alert and expecting trouble. Sure enough, after puttering along past a line of parked lorries for a hundred meters or so the tuk-tuk pulled into a layby and stopped in front of a new-looking, whitewashed 2-room building ... something that could pass for an official building like, maybe, a border post?! Out sauntered a youngish chap, neatly dressed, wearing the broadest of smiles: "Welcome to Cambodia!"
I had not previously realised how much a single smile could convey: this one brimmed with good feeling and reassurance; we were among friends now; any negativity associated with the devious and unscrupulous Thais could be put behind us; the order of the day in Cambodia would be brisk efficiency. Forewarned and forearmed thanks to Gordon we remained glued to the tuk-tuk seats, with intensified grips on rucksacks. "How could we possibly already be in Cambodia when we haven't yet even gone through Thai border control?" To give him credit there was no real debate, just a shrug and the tuk-tuk accelerated back onto the road: I guess it's a numbers game and there would be another couple of buses along later in the day.
After that we passed smoothly through the Thai border exit post and strolled across to the Cambodian side. At this point my concerns began to rise: where were the throngs of Asiatic Artful Dodgers and taxi touts that Gordon had described? Instead we were directed over to an over-large, imposing hall, empty except for the three of us and four or five Cambodian border officials sharing one fan. Several of the officials participated in examining and stamping the passports, but the fee charged - $20 per visa - was the correct one and there were no proposals for, for example, an additional fee for "expedited service". At this point a young guide speaking good English attached himself to us - he shepherded us helpfully through the next stage, filling out of the health questionnaire, and onto a shuttle bus for a 15 min ride through the Cambodian border town of Poipet to the taxi station where, as ordained by Gordon, a Toyota Camry would take us on to Siem Reap.
The entire process for us on the Cambodian side was smooth, efficient and free of the hassle and unpleasantness we had been led to expect. Thinking about it later we guessed that there have been a couple of changes since the posts were written a couple of years ago. Firstly I would guess that the central government has imposed more discipline and order on the formal transitting procedure; certainly the Cambodians seem to have built or are building more grandiose official buildings, probably to raise their status vis-a-vis the Thai side. Also I suspect that monopoly order has been imposed on the previous free-for-all by some combination of local political fiefdom, "mafia" or taxi trade union. In any event the entire transfer from Cambodian entry to Siem Reap, about 4 hours drive, is obviously now controlled as a single, seamless process.
So this episode ends with Birgit, me, Jessica and Gerold (a Berliner from Prenzlauerberg - small world) sharing the taxi ride to Siem Reap.
But I have to leave you with Gordon's description of Poipet which i.m.h.o. is a minor classic of pithy, acid judgementalism - as well as being apparently accurate, at least from the perspective of a passing bus:
"Poipet is the end of the line in Cambodia - a filthy border town of casinos, cheap hotels, knock shops, and a market I wouldn't eat at even if I were coming off a hunger strike. It is not a pleasant introduction to Cambodia, nor is it representative of the rest of the nation. Poipet is one of my least favorite places in all of Asia. Simply put, Poipet more or less rhymes with toilet and the two are virtually indistinguishable."
Across Thailand
After having arrived in Thailand these two flashpackers became rather restless. Ian has already described the beauty spots of Hat Yai where we spent an evening and afternoon sampling the local cuisine and doing 'admin' stuff. We ended up - using Ian's description at the time - as 'shopping mall rats' for half a day while waiting for our onvernight train to Bangkok. In true Balham 'mall rat' style we did not purchase a thing and cruised in and out of internet and other cafes. Unfortunately, I could not convince Ian to spend some time in the the games arcade with me - pity.
The overnight train to Bangkok was very comfortable (2nd class sleeper; btw if you do not know this website yet, have a look at 'the man on seat 61', fantastic source for information on trains anywhere in the world; combine this webpage with the one offered by 'Deutsche Bahn' and you will never go wrong on train travel again). After a good sleep on the train, we arrived well rested in Bangkok mid-morning. Actually, in hinsight we were very lucky to have rushed through southern Thailand as one or two days after our arrival in Bangkok the South experienced the worst floods in decades which brought the region to a standstill for a week or so.
Bangkok was quite an experience. I have always liked this mad city and that has not changed; nevertheless, even the busy Bangkok that I knew from 20 years ago was restful compared to the city of today. We stayed about four days, and explored the central parts by foot, metro, boat, skytrain and only very occasionally by tuk tuk. I attach a few touristy pics, unfortunately, we did not take any from a very charming restaurant, 'Cabbages and Condoms', which could have shown some creative ways of using condoms for non-primary purposes (ie as lampshades, ties, etc). When leaving the restaurant you could grap a 'democrat' or 'republican' seize condom - the former being significantly more in demand than the latter. What this means remains a happy mystery to us as a we rejected to go along with such an old fashioned binary concept of politics.
The overnight train to Bangkok was very comfortable (2nd class sleeper; btw if you do not know this website yet, have a look at 'the man on seat 61', fantastic source for information on trains anywhere in the world; combine this webpage with the one offered by 'Deutsche Bahn' and you will never go wrong on train travel again). After a good sleep on the train, we arrived well rested in Bangkok mid-morning. Actually, in hinsight we were very lucky to have rushed through southern Thailand as one or two days after our arrival in Bangkok the South experienced the worst floods in decades which brought the region to a standstill for a week or so.
Bangkok was quite an experience. I have always liked this mad city and that has not changed; nevertheless, even the busy Bangkok that I knew from 20 years ago was restful compared to the city of today. We stayed about four days, and explored the central parts by foot, metro, boat, skytrain and only very occasionally by tuk tuk. I attach a few touristy pics, unfortunately, we did not take any from a very charming restaurant, 'Cabbages and Condoms', which could have shown some creative ways of using condoms for non-primary purposes (ie as lampshades, ties, etc). When leaving the restaurant you could grap a 'democrat' or 'republican' seize condom - the former being significantly more in demand than the latter. What this means remains a happy mystery to us as a we rejected to go along with such an old fashioned binary concept of politics.
 |
| Ian at the Oriental |
Some sightseeing and essential shopping trips later (Ian is now equipped with a pair of Birkenstock like sandals, they seem to work their magic on him as he has stopped cursing them as 'hippie' shoes, but then his peaceful mind may also be the product of the recent yoga exposure - more of that later) we tumbled out of bed at 4 am one early monring to board a six am regular bus to Aranyaprathet to cross the Cambodian border at Poipet.
Sunday, 10 April 2011
We find there is a cliche to describe us ...
One of the responses to an email enquiry from Birgit mentioned in passing: "There are a number of hotels and restaurants nearby that are too expensive for the backpackers but are popular with the flashpackers."
So there we are: somewhere between the package tourists with their airport-friendly roller luggage and the young kids out for a year or two working in Australia/Europe and backpacking around Asia .... the FLASHPACKERS.
So there we are: somewhere between the package tourists with their airport-friendly roller luggage and the young kids out for a year or two working in Australia/Europe and backpacking around Asia .... the FLASHPACKERS.
Into Thailand
We said goodbye to Petani early one morning, ferried out from the beach to rendezvous with the larger boat for the crossing to the mainland. Transferring rucksacks from boat to boat was slightly unnerving since having to send a scuba diver down to recover one would certainly secure one's reputation on the island. We had also packed a change of clothes in plastic bags in case of a downpour, since a day's travel in soaked clothes wasn't a pleasant prospect, but the trip was thankfully dry.
An hour's taxi drive took us to the border and a fairly straightforward and efficient crossing into Thailand. After a few hundred sweaty meters up the main road into the border town on the Thai side we put down our rucksacks, picked up some cash at a cashpoint, and asked directions to the main bus station for public buses to Bangkok. The response was friendly, even though it was in fragmentary English - why not try the minibuses parked 50 meters back down the road instead? These were privately-run air-conditioned Toyotas, perfectly comfortable and efficient. After a somewhat circuitous start as we scooted around town picking up the last few passengers (company motto obviously "No Passenger Left Behind") we set off fully laden on the 4 hour drive to Hat Yai (for anyone following the trip on a map).
The drive was fun and also fascinating in the sudden contrasts with Malaysia. You notice immediately that southern Thailand is much more prosperous than north-eastern Malaysia: the road is a high quality 4-lane semi-motorway; the traffic wasn't very heavy but consisted almost exclusively of brand new-looking Japanese pickup trucks rather than the smaller, and usually slightly decrepit, locally-made Protons on the Malaysian side; and the shops and restaurants in the towns and around the petrol stations were much more often glass-fronted, air conditioned and fitted out to Western levels of quality, many being franchises of Western brands.
Slightly more oddly the whole area seemed more generously proportioned: the farms seemed to be much bigger, with paddy fields stretching to distant lines of palms rather than consisting of small clusters of mixed-use, somewhat patchwork, fields; the houses were similarly much more substantial and set farther apart. It was similar in a way to driving from a poorer rural area of Europe (southern Italy say) into a Holland or Germany. In a strange way the landscape corresponded more closely to my Western cliche of a south-east Asian landscape - bright green expansive paddy fields, distant treelines, water buffalo accompanied by delicate white egrets, white herons patrolling the paddy.
There was however one major negative difference - a very intensive, ominous and "in-your-face" military presence. In Malaysia I can't really remember seeing any weapons - maybe the occasional cop with a pistol. As soon as one crosses the border however the situation changes - in town military uniforms and automatic rifles are visible seemingly at every street corner, and you see plenty of military trucks and Humvees rumbling through the streets.
On the drive to Hat Yai the minibus had to slow down every few miles to around 20 mph to negotiate a slalom-type military checkpoint, the sort where barricades are placed across alternating lanes of the highway forcing all traffic to slow down and weave between them. Our bus wasn't stopped but presumably anything suspicious will be. Not all the checkpoints were manned but most had at least a few soldiers with automatic weapons close to hand, many had additional sandbagged pillboxes. One even had a few flower boxes placed around the barricades - a nice domestic touch I thought.
All in all it seemed like a quasi-occupation. I'd read that the Thai government had been facing what it termed "Islamic terrorism" in the south. Certainly the culture is as obviously Muslim as in Malaysia, and to the casual passerby it seems just as relaxed and non-doctrinaire.
But in particular given that we didn't see any obvious public military presence in Bangkok or on the drive to the Cambodian border it seemed bizarre, and probably counter-productive, that the south is being treated to such a display of force.
Anyway, in the next episode we spend a day in Hat Yai, a nondescript little town, and take the overnight train to Bangkok. Oldies among you might remember Peter Seller's comedy sketch "Balham: Gateway to the South". Hat Yai is about as memorable as Balham.
An hour's taxi drive took us to the border and a fairly straightforward and efficient crossing into Thailand. After a few hundred sweaty meters up the main road into the border town on the Thai side we put down our rucksacks, picked up some cash at a cashpoint, and asked directions to the main bus station for public buses to Bangkok. The response was friendly, even though it was in fragmentary English - why not try the minibuses parked 50 meters back down the road instead? These were privately-run air-conditioned Toyotas, perfectly comfortable and efficient. After a somewhat circuitous start as we scooted around town picking up the last few passengers (company motto obviously "No Passenger Left Behind") we set off fully laden on the 4 hour drive to Hat Yai (for anyone following the trip on a map).
The drive was fun and also fascinating in the sudden contrasts with Malaysia. You notice immediately that southern Thailand is much more prosperous than north-eastern Malaysia: the road is a high quality 4-lane semi-motorway; the traffic wasn't very heavy but consisted almost exclusively of brand new-looking Japanese pickup trucks rather than the smaller, and usually slightly decrepit, locally-made Protons on the Malaysian side; and the shops and restaurants in the towns and around the petrol stations were much more often glass-fronted, air conditioned and fitted out to Western levels of quality, many being franchises of Western brands.
Slightly more oddly the whole area seemed more generously proportioned: the farms seemed to be much bigger, with paddy fields stretching to distant lines of palms rather than consisting of small clusters of mixed-use, somewhat patchwork, fields; the houses were similarly much more substantial and set farther apart. It was similar in a way to driving from a poorer rural area of Europe (southern Italy say) into a Holland or Germany. In a strange way the landscape corresponded more closely to my Western cliche of a south-east Asian landscape - bright green expansive paddy fields, distant treelines, water buffalo accompanied by delicate white egrets, white herons patrolling the paddy.
There was however one major negative difference - a very intensive, ominous and "in-your-face" military presence. In Malaysia I can't really remember seeing any weapons - maybe the occasional cop with a pistol. As soon as one crosses the border however the situation changes - in town military uniforms and automatic rifles are visible seemingly at every street corner, and you see plenty of military trucks and Humvees rumbling through the streets.
On the drive to Hat Yai the minibus had to slow down every few miles to around 20 mph to negotiate a slalom-type military checkpoint, the sort where barricades are placed across alternating lanes of the highway forcing all traffic to slow down and weave between them. Our bus wasn't stopped but presumably anything suspicious will be. Not all the checkpoints were manned but most had at least a few soldiers with automatic weapons close to hand, many had additional sandbagged pillboxes. One even had a few flower boxes placed around the barricades - a nice domestic touch I thought.
All in all it seemed like a quasi-occupation. I'd read that the Thai government had been facing what it termed "Islamic terrorism" in the south. Certainly the culture is as obviously Muslim as in Malaysia, and to the casual passerby it seems just as relaxed and non-doctrinaire.
But in particular given that we didn't see any obvious public military presence in Bangkok or on the drive to the Cambodian border it seemed bizarre, and probably counter-productive, that the south is being treated to such a display of force.
Anyway, in the next episode we spend a day in Hat Yai, a nondescript little town, and take the overnight train to Bangkok. Oldies among you might remember Peter Seller's comedy sketch "Balham: Gateway to the South". Hat Yai is about as memorable as Balham.
Sunday, 3 April 2011
snorkelling
I guess no-one will be too surprised to hear that beaches aren't my thing. That being said Birgit tracked down a gem in Petani beach. (I'm sure by the way that no-one will be shocked that Birgit is the planning brains behind this trip - she does the research, checks out the alternatives having found the most reliable travel websites and handles most of the email communications along the way). The photo of the beach attached to the last post says it all so no point in a description.
With only 5 2-person huts it's wonderfully calm and quiet. A few people walk past during the day since almost all the beaches on the island are connected by a brick pathway around the coast. From Petani it's about a 45 min walk to the bigger beaches - as usual quite a sweaty walk unless there's a breeze because the tree canopy, although shady, seems to intensify the humidity. Apparently much more of the island had been agricultural a few hundred years ago when the Perhentians had been on the coastal trading routes up the Malay peninsula (Perhentian means something like "stopover" in Malay). But when the Portuguese and later the Dutch took over East Asian trade in the 16th century with ocean-going sailing ships the Perhentians were bypassed. The interior is now pretty impenetrable and left to the goannas (we saw one 2-meter specimen lumber casually off the track where it had been sunning itself one afternoon), snakes and flying foxes.
So sitting on the beach the only regular distraction was the to-ing and fro-ing of the boats that are the main transport between beaches. These are all narrow fiberglass boats powered by outboard motor: the larger 2-outboard models have a sunshade and carry 8-10 people plus rucksacks or scuba gear; the smaller carry 3-4. These are the island equivalent of urban motor scooters or small-capacity motor bikes, the kids steering them would fit in well with the Lambretta-driving youth of Rome or Paris - there's a lot of engine-revving and impromptu racing going on.
I decided to cede the more strenuous PADI diving course to Birgit while I concentrated on catching up with my holiday reading and looking out to sea. I figure if Birgit enjoyed diving and it looked as if we could do regularly it would be worthwhile me investing in the PADI course - until which time a mask and snorkel would suffice.
From time to time I walked or took a boat for the 10 min trip round the headland to the larger beach where the diving schools were located to meet Birgit for lunch or an end-of-the-day beer. I was very glad in comparison to be staying at Petani: the beach itself is not too bad, a handful of restaurants and shops, a fairly substantial hotel and quite a few tourist huts plus a disproportionately large concrete pier. But it was a big step in the direction of the sun lounger culture. Luckily (in my view) the strength of the local Islamic culture seems to have helped to constrain the worst of the sun, booze and drugs scene from becoming too entrenched. The largest beach on the island does apparently have a fairly zoned-out, all-night beach party tourist scene, but apparently the authorities make fairly regular raids on the local bars, subjecting any locals caught in the net to urine tests for alcohol and drugs. Booze is therefore tolerated for tourists so long as it remains at a fairly low level while, although there is no doubt a drug problem as everywhere, it seems fairly consistently suppressed.
Birgit's dive school - Quiver - is a fairly large affair at one end of the beach, next to the hotel and pier, well-shaded and a good spot to hang out and watch the beach life ebb and flow. Scuba diving conforms to the basic principles of a lot of equipment- and technique-heavy sports (certainly skiing and sky-diving) insofar as the instructors and the experienced always seem to carve out their own group spaces, distinct from the hoi poloi, where they can hang out, check equipment, talk shop, gossip and generally chill out. Always fun if one is tolerated and on the periphery.
Observing beach life it did occur to me that there seems to be a fairly infectious - indeed virulent - condition affecting middle-aged men. I believe the correct medical terminology is O.B.D.S. - Old Beach Dude Syndrome. Early symptoms can be quite mild - wearing a wristband incorporating braided leather and/or beads, or growing a goatee. The full-blown syndrome is highly unpleasant and probably incurable short of removing the patient permanently from the beach environment.
One day I joined up with an Australian couple and their young son to go off on a 3 hour tour of some of the snorkeling sites on the two islands. We piled into one of the smaller boats and headed off, watching the water below as it shifted slowly from dark blue through green to the light blue of sand and coral. In my view you can get 80% of the benefits of shallow water scuba diving by gently paddling on the surface with mask and snorkel. The only problem is that if you can't hold your breath for too long you miss some of the larger fish, moray eels etc that tend to stick to crevices or below coral overhangs.
All the sites were good - one I thought spectacular. When we first got there I rolled my eyes a bit: it was only 20-30 meters off the shore and there were already several large tourist boats sitting there with around 20-30 people flapping around in the water. A couple of boats had groups of Malays or maybe Chinese tourists - happily splashing around in bright red life jackets. Even with the crowd the coral and fish were great - parrot, clown and angel fish. Everyone who tries to describe the colours and brightness falls into cliche so I will resist.
The truly spectacular part was when I decided to swim out a bit to a rocky headland only a couple of dozen meters further out. The coral formations and fish were larger and more striking. As I was floating happily on the surface in probably only 6-8 meters' water a black tip reef shark swam languidly past, close to the bottom, about 6-8 meters away. I have to admit there was a definite "oh shit" moment. Although the site is called Shark Point I had been pretty sceptical about the possibility of an actual sighting. Being alone did, I admit, give me a moment's concern - measuring the distance to nearest boat or shore, both a distant 20 meters, wasn't very reassuring. However you quickly realise that you are irrelevant as far as the black tip is concerned, they cruise checking the sea bottom and are in any event much more active as nocturnal hunters. I won't deny that I did a few 360-degree turns over the next few minutes out of paranoia, I had a huge sense of privilege at have such an opportunity.
With only 5 2-person huts it's wonderfully calm and quiet. A few people walk past during the day since almost all the beaches on the island are connected by a brick pathway around the coast. From Petani it's about a 45 min walk to the bigger beaches - as usual quite a sweaty walk unless there's a breeze because the tree canopy, although shady, seems to intensify the humidity. Apparently much more of the island had been agricultural a few hundred years ago when the Perhentians had been on the coastal trading routes up the Malay peninsula (Perhentian means something like "stopover" in Malay). But when the Portuguese and later the Dutch took over East Asian trade in the 16th century with ocean-going sailing ships the Perhentians were bypassed. The interior is now pretty impenetrable and left to the goannas (we saw one 2-meter specimen lumber casually off the track where it had been sunning itself one afternoon), snakes and flying foxes.
So sitting on the beach the only regular distraction was the to-ing and fro-ing of the boats that are the main transport between beaches. These are all narrow fiberglass boats powered by outboard motor: the larger 2-outboard models have a sunshade and carry 8-10 people plus rucksacks or scuba gear; the smaller carry 3-4. These are the island equivalent of urban motor scooters or small-capacity motor bikes, the kids steering them would fit in well with the Lambretta-driving youth of Rome or Paris - there's a lot of engine-revving and impromptu racing going on.
I decided to cede the more strenuous PADI diving course to Birgit while I concentrated on catching up with my holiday reading and looking out to sea. I figure if Birgit enjoyed diving and it looked as if we could do regularly it would be worthwhile me investing in the PADI course - until which time a mask and snorkel would suffice.
From time to time I walked or took a boat for the 10 min trip round the headland to the larger beach where the diving schools were located to meet Birgit for lunch or an end-of-the-day beer. I was very glad in comparison to be staying at Petani: the beach itself is not too bad, a handful of restaurants and shops, a fairly substantial hotel and quite a few tourist huts plus a disproportionately large concrete pier. But it was a big step in the direction of the sun lounger culture. Luckily (in my view) the strength of the local Islamic culture seems to have helped to constrain the worst of the sun, booze and drugs scene from becoming too entrenched. The largest beach on the island does apparently have a fairly zoned-out, all-night beach party tourist scene, but apparently the authorities make fairly regular raids on the local bars, subjecting any locals caught in the net to urine tests for alcohol and drugs. Booze is therefore tolerated for tourists so long as it remains at a fairly low level while, although there is no doubt a drug problem as everywhere, it seems fairly consistently suppressed.
Birgit's dive school - Quiver - is a fairly large affair at one end of the beach, next to the hotel and pier, well-shaded and a good spot to hang out and watch the beach life ebb and flow. Scuba diving conforms to the basic principles of a lot of equipment- and technique-heavy sports (certainly skiing and sky-diving) insofar as the instructors and the experienced always seem to carve out their own group spaces, distinct from the hoi poloi, where they can hang out, check equipment, talk shop, gossip and generally chill out. Always fun if one is tolerated and on the periphery.
Observing beach life it did occur to me that there seems to be a fairly infectious - indeed virulent - condition affecting middle-aged men. I believe the correct medical terminology is O.B.D.S. - Old Beach Dude Syndrome. Early symptoms can be quite mild - wearing a wristband incorporating braided leather and/or beads, or growing a goatee. The full-blown syndrome is highly unpleasant and probably incurable short of removing the patient permanently from the beach environment.
One day I joined up with an Australian couple and their young son to go off on a 3 hour tour of some of the snorkeling sites on the two islands. We piled into one of the smaller boats and headed off, watching the water below as it shifted slowly from dark blue through green to the light blue of sand and coral. In my view you can get 80% of the benefits of shallow water scuba diving by gently paddling on the surface with mask and snorkel. The only problem is that if you can't hold your breath for too long you miss some of the larger fish, moray eels etc that tend to stick to crevices or below coral overhangs.
All the sites were good - one I thought spectacular. When we first got there I rolled my eyes a bit: it was only 20-30 meters off the shore and there were already several large tourist boats sitting there with around 20-30 people flapping around in the water. A couple of boats had groups of Malays or maybe Chinese tourists - happily splashing around in bright red life jackets. Even with the crowd the coral and fish were great - parrot, clown and angel fish. Everyone who tries to describe the colours and brightness falls into cliche so I will resist.
The truly spectacular part was when I decided to swim out a bit to a rocky headland only a couple of dozen meters further out. The coral formations and fish were larger and more striking. As I was floating happily on the surface in probably only 6-8 meters' water a black tip reef shark swam languidly past, close to the bottom, about 6-8 meters away. I have to admit there was a definite "oh shit" moment. Although the site is called Shark Point I had been pretty sceptical about the possibility of an actual sighting. Being alone did, I admit, give me a moment's concern - measuring the distance to nearest boat or shore, both a distant 20 meters, wasn't very reassuring. However you quickly realise that you are irrelevant as far as the black tip is concerned, they cruise checking the sea bottom and are in any event much more active as nocturnal hunters. I won't deny that I did a few 360-degree turns over the next few minutes out of paranoia, I had a huge sense of privilege at have such an opportunity. 
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