There are some days when the only thing that keeps you going is knowing that what is happening to you is blog gold, Friday was another one of those days.
Lou met me in Siem Reap on Thursday night and the plan was to bus it over to Kratie the following day to visit Gill and the river dolphins. As we were staying in my (formerly) favourite guest house we thought for the extra dollar, which we'd pay in tuk tuk fare anyway to get to the out of town bus station, we may as well just buy our tickets there at the guest house - this was our first mistake that resulted in a domino effect and resulted in an 'interesting' journey.
The following morning we were cheerfully told by the (formerly) lovely guest house staff that they didn't have the paper bus tickets but the receipt they gave us would get us on the bus - we shrugged, 'ok' we thought after all this is Cambodia.
All was boding well for us as the transfer mini-bus arrived dead on time but then things started to unravel as it spent the next one and a half hours quartering the small area of Siem Reap town in an apparently uncoordinated and random fashion. This was punctuated by Louise jumping out at every stop to visit the toilets of various hotels and guest houses and under-toned by my increasing transport related anxiety. The American in his cowboy hat talking in a loud and mis-informed manner about road trauma in the states compared to south east asia and how all safety precautions (e.g. safety belts, crash helmets, drink driving and speeding laws) made absolutely no difference, helped to distract me a little from the fact that we now 30 minutes late for our bus.
Meanwhile the Australian couple and their 9 year old son who had thought they were going to Laos and had been up since 4am waiting for their overbooked bus, now had no clue to where they were heading, were also helping to calm my missing a bus related anxiety.
The next circle of hell involved the man at the bus station refusing to acknowledge the receipt as a valid ticket, whilst 'noompang' man tried to sell us bread refusing to understand 'NO!' in a multitude of languages and decibels. As ticket man shouted at us, Lou smiled and I calmly and assertively told him not to shout at us because although I understood he must feel frustrated and angry, so were we, but we weren't the ones shouting. Years of dealing with angry patients and relatives has built up my expertise for this one moment of Cambodian transport tension conflict resolution.
After various attempts at ringing said guest house, in Phnom Penh first (less helpful) then Siem Reap, the ticket man finally got the confirmation that we had paid and weren't pulling a backpackers fast one. As we climbed on board with one last 'NO!' to noompang man the ticket collector muttered something about 'this will get you out of Siem Reap but not as far as Kratie...trouble....grumble, grumble, grumble' then he disappeared with our only proof that we had paid for a bus tickets.
The Australians were now feeling a whole lot better about their situation thanks to us.
We then had the joy of sitting in the back seat literally on top of the bus engine, with the hot air from it being blown up at our legs and the AC failing in any way to counteract this. This was for the 6 hour journey to Kampong Cham which was helpfully broken up by the repeated attempts of driver's best boy/ticket collector to collect our bus tickets. It would seem that we couldn't say "we don't have them, it was a receipt which the man at Siem Reap bus station took from off us" in khmer/english/english-khmer/sign language/interpretive dance, enough times for him. Each time Lou's smile got wider and my clipped ultra-polite but assertive response got shorter.
We arrived in Kampong Cham and had the bizarre experience (mentioned in previous blog) of being recognised (this time through a bus window) by Gideon the tuk tuk driver. We waved madly as he had a simultaneous double take and then carried on through KC feeling rather proud of ourselves that we appeared to be on a direct bus to Kratie and all transport related troubles were behind us.
This was short lived and the other side of the Spean Kizuna we were kicked off the bus by the side of the road with our equally screwed commonwealth brethren.
"Where is you ticket?" - by now my response was well rehearsed. When we were told we couldn't go any further without a ticket I changed my tactics.
Conversation carried out on side of road in midday sun somewhere in Kampong Cham province;
Me "do you live in Kampong Cham?"
Obstructive bus man (suspiciously)"yes"
Me "Are you married?"
Obstructive bus man "yes,"(clearly worried now about my motives) "why?"
Me "Well if you can't get through (to formerly favourite guest house in Siem Reap) we will just have to stay at your house and your wife can cook for us!"
This appeared to work because after jokingly (I hope) giving me a machete to use the next time I went back to my (formerly) favourite guest house he also relented and let us on the connecting bus muttering 'we can sort this out once you are on the bus'. We never did.
Now to say that the second bus had been overbooked would be an understatement. The australian family and Lou were squeezed on without even have the customary plastic stools to sit on in the aisle. I was told by the driver on numerous occasions as I stood out side sweating and watching our bags fail to be loaded, that I was "too big" for his bus. After the 10th time I had to explain to him that calling someone fat once in my culture is generally considered rude but ten times is unacceptable. This prompted me to be ushered on to take pride of place on a rice sack by the driver's side with a further 4 people standing in the stair well of the bus exit beside me.
As I sat with my left armpit being skewered by a Buddha statue, my face squashed against the windscreen unable to avoid witnessing every overtaking near miss and corner taken too fast, the gear stick digging into me with every gear change and being deafened by Khmer Karaoke I thought to myself, "Esther, this is blog gold".
With each unscheduled stop passengers alighted until it was just me the big, fat barang sat up front on the rice sack, who was without a seat. This was made even more entertaining by the fact that every time someone alighted I had to get off the bus (because of my hugeness blocking the whole exit) which invariably involved me banging my head, dropping my helmet, falling down the steps etc, much to the merriment of the slapstick fans in the front 4 rows. The Mr Bean they showed later on the bus didn't even get the laughs I got on that journey. Also as a result of my repeated humiliation, mine and the bus drivers relationship was thawing. When he took my crash helmet off me and put it on his head and I responded 'You need it with your driving', I really felt we were getting somewhere.
Two hours into the journey and a seat finally became available, well half a seat, so for a further hour I sat with one cheek perched on the edge of a seat, the rest of which that was accommodating a father, son and luggage. The khmer girls opposite commandeered my iPod so I spent a good half hour attached by headphones to them whilst they dictated the playlist.
I finally revolted and guessing we were close to Kratie, due to the bus drivers increasing speed and sharpness of corner taking, made a bid for another seat. Hence I spent a total of 15 minutes of an $11 journey in an AC comfortable bus seat - not bad for a 10 and a half hour bus trip!
We arrived in time for beers by the Mekong watching the sun set and the bus driver even held my shoulder and thanked me very much (I presume for all free entertainment)!
The endangered river dolphins were awesome, Kratie has a decaying charm which I love and you can't beat the Mekong river for beer and sunsets but none of these are the blog gold of that 10 hour journey from hell.
Lou met me in Siem Reap on Thursday night and the plan was to bus it over to Kratie the following day to visit Gill and the river dolphins. As we were staying in my (formerly) favourite guest house we thought for the extra dollar, which we'd pay in tuk tuk fare anyway to get to the out of town bus station, we may as well just buy our tickets there at the guest house - this was our first mistake that resulted in a domino effect and resulted in an 'interesting' journey.
The following morning we were cheerfully told by the (formerly) lovely guest house staff that they didn't have the paper bus tickets but the receipt they gave us would get us on the bus - we shrugged, 'ok' we thought after all this is Cambodia.
All was boding well for us as the transfer mini-bus arrived dead on time but then things started to unravel as it spent the next one and a half hours quartering the small area of Siem Reap town in an apparently uncoordinated and random fashion. This was punctuated by Louise jumping out at every stop to visit the toilets of various hotels and guest houses and under-toned by my increasing transport related anxiety. The American in his cowboy hat talking in a loud and mis-informed manner about road trauma in the states compared to south east asia and how all safety precautions (e.g. safety belts, crash helmets, drink driving and speeding laws) made absolutely no difference, helped to distract me a little from the fact that we now 30 minutes late for our bus.
Meanwhile the Australian couple and their 9 year old son who had thought they were going to Laos and had been up since 4am waiting for their overbooked bus, now had no clue to where they were heading, were also helping to calm my missing a bus related anxiety.
The next circle of hell involved the man at the bus station refusing to acknowledge the receipt as a valid ticket, whilst 'noompang' man tried to sell us bread refusing to understand 'NO!' in a multitude of languages and decibels. As ticket man shouted at us, Lou smiled and I calmly and assertively told him not to shout at us because although I understood he must feel frustrated and angry, so were we, but we weren't the ones shouting. Years of dealing with angry patients and relatives has built up my expertise for this one moment of Cambodian transport tension conflict resolution.
After various attempts at ringing said guest house, in Phnom Penh first (less helpful) then Siem Reap, the ticket man finally got the confirmation that we had paid and weren't pulling a backpackers fast one. As we climbed on board with one last 'NO!' to noompang man the ticket collector muttered something about 'this will get you out of Siem Reap but not as far as Kratie...trouble....grumble, grumble, grumble' then he disappeared with our only proof that we had paid for a bus tickets.
The Australians were now feeling a whole lot better about their situation thanks to us.
We then had the joy of sitting in the back seat literally on top of the bus engine, with the hot air from it being blown up at our legs and the AC failing in any way to counteract this. This was for the 6 hour journey to Kampong Cham which was helpfully broken up by the repeated attempts of driver's best boy/ticket collector to collect our bus tickets. It would seem that we couldn't say "we don't have them, it was a receipt which the man at Siem Reap bus station took from off us" in khmer/english/english-khmer/sign language/interpretive dance, enough times for him. Each time Lou's smile got wider and my clipped ultra-polite but assertive response got shorter.
We arrived in Kampong Cham and had the bizarre experience (mentioned in previous blog) of being recognised (this time through a bus window) by Gideon the tuk tuk driver. We waved madly as he had a simultaneous double take and then carried on through KC feeling rather proud of ourselves that we appeared to be on a direct bus to Kratie and all transport related troubles were behind us.
This was short lived and the other side of the Spean Kizuna we were kicked off the bus by the side of the road with our equally screwed commonwealth brethren.
"Where is you ticket?" - by now my response was well rehearsed. When we were told we couldn't go any further without a ticket I changed my tactics.
Conversation carried out on side of road in midday sun somewhere in Kampong Cham province;
Me "do you live in Kampong Cham?"
Obstructive bus man (suspiciously)"yes"
Me "Are you married?"
Obstructive bus man "yes,"(clearly worried now about my motives) "why?"
Me "Well if you can't get through (to formerly favourite guest house in Siem Reap) we will just have to stay at your house and your wife can cook for us!"
This appeared to work because after jokingly (I hope) giving me a machete to use the next time I went back to my (formerly) favourite guest house he also relented and let us on the connecting bus muttering 'we can sort this out once you are on the bus'. We never did.
Now to say that the second bus had been overbooked would be an understatement. The australian family and Lou were squeezed on without even have the customary plastic stools to sit on in the aisle. I was told by the driver on numerous occasions as I stood out side sweating and watching our bags fail to be loaded, that I was "too big" for his bus. After the 10th time I had to explain to him that calling someone fat once in my culture is generally considered rude but ten times is unacceptable. This prompted me to be ushered on to take pride of place on a rice sack by the driver's side with a further 4 people standing in the stair well of the bus exit beside me.
As I sat with my left armpit being skewered by a Buddha statue, my face squashed against the windscreen unable to avoid witnessing every overtaking near miss and corner taken too fast, the gear stick digging into me with every gear change and being deafened by Khmer Karaoke I thought to myself, "Esther, this is blog gold".
With each unscheduled stop passengers alighted until it was just me the big, fat barang sat up front on the rice sack, who was without a seat. This was made even more entertaining by the fact that every time someone alighted I had to get off the bus (because of my hugeness blocking the whole exit) which invariably involved me banging my head, dropping my helmet, falling down the steps etc, much to the merriment of the slapstick fans in the front 4 rows. The Mr Bean they showed later on the bus didn't even get the laughs I got on that journey. Also as a result of my repeated humiliation, mine and the bus drivers relationship was thawing. When he took my crash helmet off me and put it on his head and I responded 'You need it with your driving', I really felt we were getting somewhere.
Two hours into the journey and a seat finally became available, well half a seat, so for a further hour I sat with one cheek perched on the edge of a seat, the rest of which that was accommodating a father, son and luggage. The khmer girls opposite commandeered my iPod so I spent a good half hour attached by headphones to them whilst they dictated the playlist.
I finally revolted and guessing we were close to Kratie, due to the bus drivers increasing speed and sharpness of corner taking, made a bid for another seat. Hence I spent a total of 15 minutes of an $11 journey in an AC comfortable bus seat - not bad for a 10 and a half hour bus trip!
We arrived in time for beers by the Mekong watching the sun set and the bus driver even held my shoulder and thanked me very much (I presume for all free entertainment)!
The endangered river dolphins were awesome, Kratie has a decaying charm which I love and you can't beat the Mekong river for beer and sunsets but none of these are the blog gold of that 10 hour journey from hell.
Blog gold! I love it. You keep suffering, I'll keep reading!
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