We arrived in Cambodia yesterday and after figuring out a few logistic issues (finding a new place to stay since the first one sucked) we settled in and have been having a pretty good time. Something about Siem Reap just seems more manageable and your not at the mercy of the hotel or some tourism company. However, before I get into the details about our time here in Cambodia I should probably go back to our last day in Saigon, which we spent getting screwed by yet another tour.
We set up the tour through our hotel with one of the local companies to go out and see the Cu CHi tunnels, which were used by the Viet Cong during the Vietnam War. The tour ended up being the second worse yet.. a very close second and is probably only second because it cost 6 bucks instead of the 40 bucks it cost in Thailand to ride elephants in a circle around tortured monkeys in 98 degree heat. The tour had a lot of the usual crap you get on a tour and honestly I could have tolerated the 4 hours of anti American rhetoric; we were in Vietnam and we were going to a Viet Cong site so it goes without saying. I probably could have even tolerated the fact that the trip had hidden costs (the tickets to get in cost 10,000 dong more than advertised) and we stopped at a local handicapped craft factory on the way out to the tunnels to get ripped off. Hell, I probably should have even expected those since I have yet to go on a tour that has not had a hidden cost and that has not stopped us at some local factory that tries to rip you off selling cheap goods. I let the factory stop get me twice in China, I will be damned if I ever buy anything on another tour again. Honestly, all of those things would have made it just another tour in Asia. What really put this trip over the top was the fact that we spent 5.5 hours out of the 7 hour tour on the damn bus ( 30 minutes went to the handicap handcraft factory). Yup, we basically paid 6 bucks for a round trip bus ticket from Saigon to Cu Chi. The first 3 hours were the worst. We spent them listening to a bitter old man grumble through a microphone, which made it sound like he was screaming, about how he got the shaft during and after the war. I am not saying he did not have anything to be pissed off about. He had driven swift boats for the U.S and after he chose to stay at the end of the war had ended up in a government prison for 4 years. I am sure it sucked, but I really did not want to hear about it at 8 o'clock in the morning. In addition he contradicted himself constantly and was sure to tell us that all Americans are arrogant and everything written about the war was bullshit. After 3 non stop hours of this and a short stop at the handicapped factory we finally arrived at the actual site we paid to see. It cost roughly 5 bucks each to get in ( not included in the tour) and we had about an hour to see it. Honestly, the hour was probably more than enough, there was not all that much to see. The tour started with a nice short 1960's propaganda film about the evil American empire. I think I counted the words "American killer hero" and "killing Americans" about 300 times in the 15 min film. It was so over the top that everyone on the tour could hardly keep a straight face.. even the Europeans. Once we had our fill of that the group split and thankfully we got a new tour guide. Best part about the guy is he did not talk much and even made fun of the other tour guide for talking about himself all the time.
From there we made quick work of the rest of the place and after a short break to shoot some automatic weapons we headed for the grand finally, a chance to crawl through the tunnels. Lets just say at 6'3 it was no small feet to get into a tunnel that came up to Chris's waste and were designed for 5ft Vietnamese people. I tried to video it best I could, but it was way to dark. The tunnel ran 100 meters, but you could get out every 15... of course we got out after the first 15. I figure once you have seen one tunnel you have seen them all and I had no desire to crawl another 85 meters sweating my ass off. After that it was back to the bus, where else, and we headed back for Saigon. This time we were free of our favorite tour guide, but not of annoyances. I had not noticed it earlier, probably because the old guy never shut up, but our bus driver loved his horn. It is common practice to honk as you pass hear in Asia, but this guy just laid it on every time we got close to another car or motorbike and since there were motorbikes about every 15-20 seconds the honking basically never stopped. It was great.. a nice 2 hour ride listening to the horn non stop. Finally, back in Saigon we got the last surprise. We were picked up at the hotel, but apparently our 6 dollars did not buy drop off service so everyone on the bus was just dropped in the park near the hotel. I swear if I can avoid it I will never take another tour. They suck. Even the best ones make you conform to someone else
schedule and the worst ones make you feel stuck while you spend most of your day looking at your watch wishing it was over. Honestly, the real issue here is the tour companies know they have you and there is nothing you can do if you actually want to see the sites. Very few things are in the actual city and unless you know the language or have a means of transportation you have to go through them. Thus you get 6 hours of shit to see the one thing you paid to see.
After the torture finally ended we grabbed some dinner. It ended up just being one of those days since the food sucked, the waitress got Chris's order wrong, and then finished it off by trying to over charge us by two meals. I was pretty much at the end of my rope by then when on the way home we ran into the two Aussie guys (David and James) we met on our Ha Long Bay boat trip. I know my first impression was not the best, but they ended up being pretty nice guys and we grabbed a drink with them for about an hour. We exchanged some stories and warned them against a few of the tours. We also made plans to try and meet up with David in Nairobi. He is doing some internship there for 6 months and should be there when we get there. After we finished up there we headed back to the hotel to just relax. It had been a pretty shit day and the next day we had to fly out to Cambodia.
Yesterday we got up and headed for the airport around 1:30. No real rough spots other than the plane we flew on was a prop plane not a jet. We got to Siem Reap (Cambodia) around 5pm I think. Our hotel pickup never materialized so we had to pay for a taxi. The taxi driver tried to convince us the hotel we were going to was not good, but we thought he was trying to scam us so we ignored him and told him to just drop us off. That ended up being our first mistake. The hotel was awful. They managed their reservations by a white board and while Chris was checking in the clerk had some guy head up to our room with an AC remote and a can of raid. The rooms ended up being disgusting with mold and dirty sheets. You could see where he had sprayed the raid in the bathroom and washed everything down the drain. At that point we made the decision to get the hell out of there. We left our stuff behind and headed for an internet cafe. Once we found a hotel we grabbed a tuc tuc driver and explained we needed him to drive us across town, then back to the hotel and then back to our new hotel. He ended up being a pretty nice guy and got us where we needed to go. The only real loss is the new hotel is fairly costly and we had to give the other place 10 bucks for the 4 hours we did not use the room. In the end I am not sure what we were thinking checking into the other place. With the going rate here around 25 bucks a night, we were paying 10, they were going to pick us up for free, and when we got there no one else was staying there.
We grabbed some food after that and made a deal with our tuc tuc driver to take us around the next day to some of the sites. He had helped us out and had been pretty honest with his price earlier so we figured he would be a good choice to take us around.
It has ended up working out pretty good and we paid him 20 bucks to drive us around all day today. We saw the land mine museum and several of the smaller temples today and he will pick us up tomorrow around 1pm so that we can do the sunset tour at Angkor Wat, which is one of the larger temples here. The land mine museum was not much to write home about, but it seems to be a good cause trying to clear the mines here in Cambodia. After 20 years of war they estimate millions of landmines are all over the country. The temples were really cool... finally. They were actual ancient ruins.. not something where the paint was still wet from being rebuilt 30 years ago like most of the palaces and temples we have seen here in Asia.
I must say Cambodia has been quite refreshing after Thailand and Vietnam. Not to take anything away from those places, but everything here is just more relaxed and manageable. That and you can get your own driver to take you anywhere you want on your schedule. Overall it was a pretty good day and I am actually excited about seeing the larger ruins tomorrow.
