Finally, a Nice Beach!

Awkward camera pose in front of the

Patong Beach sign. You're welcome, internet.

This might seem hard to believe, but travel is exhausting. Cry me a river, right? I'll be the first to admit this is totally a first-world problem (despite my presence in the third world at the moment). Don't get me wrong, it's incredible. But exhausting. Today was my first real vacation vacation day. I mean... this whole thing is kind of a vacation, but today was the first day in long time without tons of traveling or a crazy schedule of sightseeing, without a schedule at all really,  just a day to relax. And it. was. awesome.

That big, yellow thing in the sky is a parasailor. So. Cool.

I woke up on the later side and met up with MM and his German friend and we grabbed a quick bite to eat on the street before walking down the whopping, grueling five minutes to the beach from our hostel. Life is hard sometimes, you know?


The beach here is gorgeous. I mean... I'm on a beach in Thailand. There's absolutely no comparison to be made between this beach and the ones I saw in Bangladesh and India. We walked down a ways and found a good spot a little bit away from the crowded area (though none of the beach was really all that crowded). We paid to rent some beach chairs/umbrellas which was well worth it. The water looked fine and it felt great. The sun was pretty strong today so we definitely felt it. The water was warm enough to feel good being in but cool enough to help with the heat.

The beach was full of people trying to sell stuff. Mostly food and trinkets. But there were also these women carrying buckets of aloe. Not aloe in a bottle, but actual leaves (are they called leaves when they're aloe? They're huge.) of aloe. What they do is cut the aloe leaves, and this disgusting slimey ooze leaks out which they then rubs all over your body. You come out looking like a dinosaur just sneezed on you (and I'm not talking a dainty sneeze here, I'm talking the kind where your friends get super grossed out because you don't have a tissue or even a tissue substitute that could handle the quantity of snot you just inadvertently ejected from your body), but I imagine it feels great.

We spent a few hours on the beach, mostly lying down in our chairs, but I also went for a walk for a while. On my walk, I ran into LI, the mysterious Norwegian girl from the hostel last night. We chatted briefly about my upcoming meditation retreat and there was a glimmer of "ooo maybe I want to do that with you" so we decided to talk more about it that evening.

When I got back to my friends, I discovered that the German girl was Icarusianly fried to crisp. Which, ok here's the thing, if you're complexion leads you to often be confused with Casper the Friendly Ghost in your daily life, and you've been that way all of your life, shouldn't you know how to apply sunscreen by this point? I guess not. As it so turns out, one of those Thai aloe ladies was getting aloe handsy with the three European dudes sitting next to us, and when she saw the sad state of our German friend, she took pity and decided to use her last two aloe leaves on her for free. Which was incredibly generous of her and something I'm sure our German friend very much appreciated (and needed). Soon thereafter, we all headed back to the hostel.

Also this was a thing I found on my walk.
Which, obviously I had to share with
the world.

I wanted to explore Phuket a little more, so I headed out on my own to go for a walk later that afternoon. There are few things more striking walking the streets than the sheer number of massage parlors there are here. All of them have between two and eight women standing or sitting outside of the doorway trying to entice you to come inside. In front of one of them, one of them actually grabbed my arm and wouldn't let go when I tried to pull free. Aggressive. And then they acted like I was the weird one from wanting her to let go of my arm. This is a totally foreign culture to me. While I was in Cambodia, a fellow traveler told me that she had talked to one of the massage women there, who told her that they actually hate foreigners. Which struck me as odd at first, because... doesn't most of your money come from rich foreigners? But she said that they hate them because those dudes are terrible, terrible people who treat them with no respect. Oh, right, that, yea, okay I get it now. It's a sad commentary on and reality of the global sex trade. The other thing that struck me as I walked through the streets here is that, aside from the massage parlor women, the vendors here weren't nearly as aggressive in their sales tactics compared to the people I had encountered in Cambodia, which made for a much more pleasant experience of just walking around the city.

A little slice of home.
Again.

That night, I went out to dinner with BK (the Texan) and NS (the French girl). Remember how I said the French girl had given me a super cold reception? It turns out it was because she thought I was someone else! Apparently the night before last, someone who had been staying in my room got really sketchy with her friend BK. Womp womp. Mistaken identity at its worst (...probably not it's worst, but definitely not its best). It struck me as odd that two girls who were so young from totally opposite ends of the world were traveling together, but I think they knew each other from college. Yet another reason why it's worth the investment to send your kids away from college if you can. I doubt this would have happened if they had been living at home. I'm a little biased here, but I stand by my point. Dinner was fine, good company, meh food. BK and NS told me they were traveling to an island off the coast called Koh Phi Phi (hehe) tomorrow. Today hammered home the fact that I definitely didn't want to spend another three days here, so I decided I was going to join them on their island adventure tomorrow.

We walked around a little after dinner. And much to my surprise (though I guess I shouldn't be surprised by this anymore), we found another Swensen's!

We also explored a little bit more of Bangla Road. Remember that go-go bar I mentioned yesterday? Here's a closer look:

Note the creepy, old, white dude with two young Thai women at the table.
Sadly, this is not an uncommon sight here.

Inside the go go bar. It turns it's this place is
enormous. There for sure were over 100
of these "tables"/dancing poles.

Every so often, a huge chuck of bubbles
would go flying overhead

Back at the hostel, I met back up MM, LI and some other people in the hostel. One of the guys in the hostel has been staying and working here for a few months and he suggested heading to this famous rooftop bar place... called Famous, which sounded pretty cool. So about six of us headed over. We were a pretty eclectic group: American, Norwegian, Chinese, English, and a couple others in the mix. The place was about a 10-minute walk from our hostel. When we got there, we took an elevator to the roof and found... a kind of empty rooftop. Which was fine. We got drinks and headed over to a table. True to it's word, there was a foam party area, but with absolutely no one in it. The place was beautiful. I bet during the high season when there are a lot of people here, this place is probably awesome.

The bubble room. Doubles as an inflatable
boxing ring and the spare air mattress for all
of the Jolly Green Giant's friends from out of
town.

A few minutes after we got there, it started POURING rain, so we moved to a covered section. And then the power went out. Ha! Of course it did. Which meant that the bubble maker also stopped working, so about 10 minutes later the foam room was just a giant wading pool. No matter. We hung out for another hour or two, waiting out the rain and having an incredible cultural exchange. It turns out the Norwegian girl is also Muslim. And China isn't necessarily the totalitarian state you think it is. But sometimes it is. And even among educated people in Sudan, there's debate about whether or not a genocide actually happened. The fact that that's even a question seems ridiculous to me. This was probably the thing about the whole evening that surprised me the most.

After the rain let up, we walked back toward the hostel. But we weren't really ready to call it a night, so we headed out to the beach. Which was still beautiful and mostly empty. I was talking with LI about my plans to join the girls at Koh Phi Phi tomorrow and she decided to tag along as well. Then she dared me to go into the water. I'm not one to back down from a dare (... questionably true at home, but always true when I'm on a year-long adventure to explore the world), so I stripped down, got rid of my phone and wallet, and ran in. Even at 3am, the water was warm and incredible. Here I was, in the Indian Ocean, under the stars in the middle of the night. And it was amazing. This was one of those "life is good moments" that I won't soon forget.

I eventually made my way back out of the water, and joined my friends who were hanging out at a nearby bench. We hung out for another hour or so before heading back home for the night.

Goodnight world, you continue to surprise me in the best possible ways.

CONTINUE ON to Phuket Part 3: Out of Phuket and Not Soon Enough

The Mystery Tour and the War Museum

Around 11am, my Mystery Tour guide arrived to pick me up at my hostel on his motorbike. BT is in his late 30s and is a super jovial guy with pretty strong English skills. He told me I could drive the motorbike if I wanted. Drive a motorbike through the pot-holey dirt roads of Cambodia with no hospital in sight? Thanks but no thanks. The agenda for the Mystery Tour is that there is no agenda. Which at first can seem like a total scam, but it actually works out really well. The day's activities basically follow whichever way the wind blows.

That's not how you're supposed to eat it

Please don't kick my fish,
please don't kick my fish

It might look like a McDonald's hashbrown,
but I can assure your it's not. Actually, this
is Cambodia so I guess anything is possible.

The first thing we did was drive out to a market for some breakfast. This wasn't the typical touristy market though; this was where the locals go to shop and eat. It was pretty much what you would expect from a 3rd-world market: lots of fresh(ish?) meats / fish, some goods, some food. BT took me to a place to eat this... I'm not sure what it is called, but it's sort of like a thin pancake, closer to a crepe but not quite a crepe, and on top it's got some... vegetable-type things and you dip it into a sauce. It was surprisingly good, and dirt cheap, as I assume everything in this market is. For "dessert" he got me this palm fruit / rice thing wrapped in a banana leaf that was mildly sweet and really, really good.

Me trying to harvest some rice... probably the most
entertaining thing these people saw all day

With a full stomachs, we headed toward the next stop. Along the way, we passed by some rice fields. Before I left San Francisco, one the doctors who loaded me up with some vaccines told me very explicitly "don't visit any rice paddies while you're in Asia" for fear of contracting a rare but really awful disease called Japanese Encephalitis. Well... here we were so we decided to stop and check things out (sorry, Mom!). We saw some people harvesting the rice, so we went over to go talk to them. An interesting facet of this culture is the level of familiarity people exhibit toward one another. When BT approached these farm workers, he talked to them like he would old friends. He joked around with them. He asked them if I could try cutting some of the rice. They handed over their extremely sharp cutting tool and BT showed me how to do it (apparently, the way I was doing it almost certainly would have resulted in me chopping off a body part). I was so struck by their conversation that I asked BT if he knew them and he said no, he had never met them before. The people in Cambodia, overall, have been much friendlier than I experienced in Bangladesh and India.

Moooooove out of my way

We kept on making our way down the road. Much like in India, large mammals roam the streets here too.

Omnomnom trans-fatsssss

Out next stop was a Buddhist monastery. Monasteries are incredibly interesting from a cultural perspective. One of the first things we did when we got there was go to this fish pond. Monks believe that feeding these fish is good for your karma. BT had a couple of bags of chips that we tossed out one-by-one into the pond. I guess no one ever told these people that this type of food probably actually serves to kill these fish rather than help them.

Next we went to the cemetery on the grounds. It was incredibly ornate. And this wasn't even the most ornate monastic cemetery I'd seen.

Cemetery at the monastery

We continued to walk around the grounds of the monastery and BT told me a little bit about his history. It turns out that he himself has spent some time in a monastery growing up. He had some lofty dreams though. He left the monastery and went to go work somewhere. And then he started his own tour company. He also taught himself English and how to make a website and he used that to drive people to his business. His real goal is to make sure that all of the children from his village have the opportunity to be educated, in a way that he never really had for himself. Inspiring.

The buildings at the monastery are beautiful, both inside and out. I couldn't begin to tell you the significant of the designs or paintings, but I'm sure they all of their stories to tell.

There are huge murals on the inside of many of the buildings

...and the outsides of the buildings as well

Monks wear their traditional garb and sit on a elevated platform.
These kids obviously don't know what's up

Obligatory meditation pose photo

Watch out, pedestrians, cars, and small animals!

We probably spent around 30 minutes at the monastery. Over the course of the day I changed my mind about wanting to drive. I figured... I'm only here once, so make the most of it (sorry, Mom!). So I told BT that I wanted to try driving and he got really excited. I sat down in front, he hopped on behind, he showed me how to use the controls, and we were off! Driving the motorbike was AWESOME. The dirt roads definitely made for a pretty bumpy ride. Also... there were definitely times when I mixed up the gas and the brake (whoops!) and instead of slowing down into a pothole, I ended up speeding up into it. Yikes! But BT didn't care at all. In fact, he was totally excited about the whole thing. I'm pretty sure he didn't know the actual reason we were speeding up into potholes... I think he just thought I was being adventurous. I'll take it. We started off in an area with no cars, but quickly made our way back onto more populated roads. After about 10 minutes of driving, I was all set, so we switched back and BT drove us the rest of the way back to my hostel to drop me off.

Pina colada: it might not be authentic,
but it was still really good

Back at the hostel, I met up with IR and our other hostel friend JC and we headed out to lunch near Pub Street. We sat up on the second floor, overlooking the street below. It was a great view until it started pouring rain and the wind was blowing sideways so hard that our table was getting wet, so we had to move away from the open air area.

Afterward, we decided to grab a tuk tuk out to the War Museum. I had heard from some other people at the hostel that this place was a must-see, so I was glad to have a chance to see it. When we walked through the entrance to the open-air museum, we were greeted by a field of war tanks. Whoa.

Trees and cannons and tanks, oh my!

There is no fee for the tour guides at the War Museum, it's all tip-based. We got ourselves a tour guide and we were on our way. He seemed like a really interesting guy. There was something about him. He was soft-spoken, but there seemed to be this... pain inside of him. We soon found out why. It turns out that all of the tour guides here are war veterans.

The first place we went to was an enclosure that housed a shelf of huge, huge guns. I held an AK-47 for the first time. It was a lot heavier than I was expecting. But... I probably should have seen that coming. I also held a rocket launcher. Surprise: also heavy! Kind of crazy to be holding a real one. I'll refrain from putting a photo of me holding a large firearm on the web, thank you very much.

[Start aside] Before I go on with the rest of this description, I'd be remiss if I didn't share my thoughts on this place as a tourist attraction vs. the reality that lies underneath the attraction (a la my elephant ride in India). I certainly felt conflicted throughout this visit because, well, tanks and big guns are awesome! ...until you remember that these were all used to kill people. Lots and lots and lots and lots of people. Like... real people. Not in the movies. Real people with lives and jobs and families. The 10-year-old inside of me definitely wanted to be like "tanks go boom!" but the 20-something me definitely had to put a muzzle on that little guy for now. [End aside]

His helmet doesn't even fit him, I assume
because they don't make helmets in size
"too young to hold a gun"

Our tour guide told us bits of his story at each station. Even after so many years, the pain in his stories still felt fresh. I guess that kind of pain never really goes away. The same station had some war photos. One of the photos that struck me the most was one of a child soldier. I had heard about child soldiers before, but usually in the context of African wars and I never really internalized exactly what the concept of a "child soldier" really meant. But being here and being a little bit older gave these photos a sense of realness that I never saw before. I mean... children. Literally children. Carrying guns larger than they are. It's hard to imagine, even with the photo staring you in the face.

The next station housed grenades and landmines. The extend of my experience with grenades is:
1. Playing with grenade-shaped water balloons as a child
2. Throwing grenades in various Play Station games
3. Occasionally thinking that the country Grenada sounds like "grenade"

Exploded grenade

It turns out that grenades are filled with tons of little ball bearings that get fired out in every direction when a grenade explodes, kind of like if you had a gun that shot bullets in every direction at the same time.

Our tour guide showing us the wide range of landmines
used in the way by both sides

My experience with landmines was pretty similar to that with grenades, minus there being a country that sounds like the word "landmine." Unfortunately, our tour guide actually had some pretty intimate experience with land mines. One of his jobs in the war was to defuse landmines. One day a landmine that has been mistakenly thought of as dead exploded in his hand. I hadn't noticed until that moment when he showed us, but he was missing a few fingers. It turns out he also had a bunch of shrapnel blown into his body that he's slowly been saving up money to have removed little by little. He showed us a bump on his skin underneath which is the last piece he has left to remove. He says he only feels it sometimes, but that it still hurts. The cost to remove it is paltry by western standards (either in the tens or low hundreds of dollars) but it can take years to save up that much here. Fun not-so-fun fact: Exact information is hard to come by, but as of 2008, Cambodia still had an estimated 4-10 million active landmines; estimates vary from 10-100 years for when they'll be all be completely defused. Here, he also pointed out a photo on the wall of a friend of his that he lost during the war. I can only imagine how hard it must be to point out that photo for every tour group every day. He also shared with us that another one of his friends during the war had lost several of his limbs and that now he takes care of him because there's no one else that will. These stories, these photos, these artifacts, in one sense they make everything feel so real. So much more real compared to watching something on tv or learning about it in school. But in another sense, they're so extreme, so ridiculous, so far beyond what we (I) think of as within the realm of possibility, so real that they ironically start to feel... like just another story. Like none of this actually happened because it's impossible to imagine something so horrible actually happening to real people. This is the stuff that only happens in movies and then after two hours you get up and realize you're in a theater and the floors are sticky and careful, don't kick that cup on the ground because there might still be soda in it and I really need to pee and did I grab my jacket from the seat? Just like that.

You definitely don't want to
mess with these things

Up next were the rockets and bombs. There were a lot of them. In various bomb shapes and bomb sizes. It's always been difficult for me to comprehend the destructive power of something that look so small. One time in college my class too a field trip to the naval base in San Diego. While we were there, we got a tour of a nuclear submarine and I got to touch an actual could-be-used-to-start-world-war-3 nuclear warhead! The thing was the length of a pretty big room and about as wide as a horse. But still... when you think about the fact that a nuclear warhead can literally level an entire city, it's hard to believe that all of that power comes from something so... [relatively] small.

After the small arms, we got to go check out the tanks. And when I say check out the tanks I mean literally do whatever we wanted with them. No fences. No class. No ropes. Nothing. Did I climb inside of a tank? Yes. Did I climb on top for the tank and ride the main gun? You bet I did.

This is how you use this thing, right?

Hanging out with our tour guide

At the end of our tour, we posed for one last photo with our tour guide. As we were standing there saying our goodbyes to our tour guide, he noticed the shirt I was wearing. So... here's the thing: a few days ago when I was at one of the night markets in Phnom Penh, I wanted to buy a shirt, half out of necessity and half out of the want for a souvenir from Cambodia. So I found this awesome shirt that I really liked with a big map of Cambodia on the back and a funny backpacker-y tagline on the front that reads "I survived Cambodia". Fast forward to this morning: I have basically one clean shirt and it's this one so I put it on, not knowing that today I would end up going to a place called the War Museum and not knowing I would have a tour guide who fought in a war... in Cambodia. Fast forward to right now with our tour guide and he notices the tagline on my shirt and he very genuinely remarks "I like your shirt". The other woman working at the museum standing next to him, however, gives me the worst look of disgust I've ever seen. Cue the wave of shame that washes over me. I very sheepishly say thank you and goodbye, and the three of us head out.

On our way out, I realized that there was a helicopter and a fighter jet here too! Can we climb on those too?! Pshh, this is CAMBODIA, rules don't exist here. And sure enough, there was absolutely nothing and nobody to stop us from climbing all over them, safety risks aside (...sorry, Mom!).

I think she still flies. Wait, no there, just a giant hole where the cockpit should be.

This one however, definitely fl... wait, also a giant hole in place of the cockpit.

Of course I got the chocolatey-est thing on
the menu. Of course it was amazing.

Tonight was my last night in Siem Reap, so JC, IR, and I went out one more time. JC wanted something a little more Western, so we sat down at a pizza place. It was pretty good. Fairly standard pizza fare. But here's the crazy thing: there was ANOTHER Swensen's Ice Cream Shop next door! Apparently, Swensen's is actually pretty popular in the big cities here. So... obviously we had to have ice cream there. The funny thing is the menu is full of San Francisco references (e.g. one of the menu items is called the Coit Tower), but... clearly 0.1% of the population here actually understands what they mean.

Wanted: Fish masseuse.
Piranhas need not apply

After dinner we walked around for a while and decided to try out one of these "fish massages" that we've seen everywhere. You may have seen these occasionally in a mall in the U.S., but basically it's a tank of pretty small fish and you put your feet inside and the fish (warning: this sounds / is kind of gross) start nibbling at your feet. I've never done anything like this and I'm pretty ticklish but I figure I'm here so I might as well give it a shot. It's a pretty odd sensation. It doesn't hurt per say, it's just... weird. It turns out I'm definitely way too ticklish for it, so I didn't really get to enjoy it, but I stuck it out for the 20 or so minutes we were there.

Pub Street in all it's glory!

We had to make our way back to the hostel so I could catch my bus. The vast, vast majority of planes/trains/buses/taxis I've booked on this trip have been at most one or two days in advance. However, I knew what date I wanted to be in Thailand and I figured I'd only be in one city in Cambodia, so I booked my flight a week in advance. Turns out that was a mistake, because I only spent two days in Phnom Penh. So in coming to Siem Reap, I knew I'd have to make my way back down to Phnom Penh to catch my flight. So I'm taking a night bus to get down there. My taxi came and grabbed me from the hostel and took me down to the bus company.

A little while later, I boarded the bus. It's a sleeper bus so there aren't seats, just spaces where you lie down. It turns out... you don't have a private space to lie down. When I got to my compartment there was already a man lying down there. I'm literally spending the night on a bus sleeping about one inch away from a Cambodian stranger. Luckily, the man wasn't enormous, didn't smell, and seemed like a nice guy. We didn't really talk. I climbed into my side of the compartment, and almost immediately closed my eyes so I could get to sleep. It actually wasn't that bad, honestly. The bus was air conditioned. I had a window. And what do I care, it's only a few hours and then I'll be on my way. Goodnight and goodbye, Siem Reap!

CONTINUE ON to Siem Reap Part 4: Goodbye, Cambodia!

Cambodia: New Country, New Friends!

My driver from the Phnom Penh airport was a little standoff-ish at first, but as I asked him questions, he opened up. His English was pretty decent. From his point of view, the government is totally corrupt. No surprises there: I think you could ask a cab driver in any country of the world what they think about their government and they will say it's corrupt, if they know they're speaking in confidence. The ride was about 40 minutes. I was struck by how much more developed Cambodia felt compared to India. Clean, paved roads, for starters. Though it all felt slightly less... colorful. Everything seemed to be coated in a layer of gray. The roads, the sky, the sidewalk.

I arrived at my hostel around 10:00am. As soon as I walked through the doors, the staff gave me the most enthusiastic welcome of any hostel yet. I checked in and put my stuff down on my bed. Inside of the lobby area is a huge chalkboard with a bunch of activities and bus schedules. I was asking the staff about what to do around here and they tossed out a few suggestions. Royal palace: sounds pretty standard. S-21: no idea what that is but okay. The Killing Fields: wait, what? This place where you can go and fire rocket launchers and shoot big army guns: awesome! But way too expensive.

A few minutes later I met SR, a friendly English girl with a wonderful smile. She had been traveling for a while and was flying solo in Cambodia. We had both arrived that morning so we decided to go exploring together.

The Royal Palace is totally for the birds

Our hostel was located right next to the royal palace. So we walked down the road but the area around the palace was completely deserted. We found out later that there were supposed to be some anti-government demonstrations happening soon, so they closed it to tours. Womp womp. The palace is right along the river so we walked along the waterfront. Then we passed by a Dairy Queen! I got really excited, obviously for good reason, but SR didn't really understand why because she's never seen one before. Dairy Queen is one of my favorite ice cream places in the world. Literally in the world, because they have them here on the opposite side of the world! Obviously we had to go in and get some. SR chose to resist my peer pressuring and passed on ice cream, though she did say that she'd have to try it before she left. I'll take it.

It turns out the reason that ATM in the airport gave me a US$100 bill is because Cambodians actually prefer to transact in U.S. currency. The Cambodian Riel tends to suffer from instability and inflation. It's kind of crazy to be on the other side of the world an transacting in my own currency.

We continued to walk for a while and I was starting to get pretty hungry for real food because I hadn't eaten since that McDonald's in the Singapore airport at 6am, so we went to find an authentic Vietnamese restaurant. I ended up getting a duck curry. It was pretty decent. Turns out Cambodian food is pretty similar to Thai food. And I love Thai food.

Some other cool buildings we saw on our walk

As we were walking back I noticed... the cars were driving on the right-hand side of the road! What?! How did I not see that before? I drove in a car for 40 minutes to get to the hostel and didn't notice at all. I think because my driver still sat on the right-hand side of the car. SR and I made our way back to the hostel because we were both exhausted and it was definitely naptime. Which was totally the right call.

I got up an hour or two later, left a note with SR, and headed out to go exploring. I walked around for a couple of hours. This is a fairly touristy part of the city, but I did end up walking through some slightly sketchy back-alley area where a bunch of people lived. It was interesting to see that everything was a step up from India, but sort of basically the same. People making traditional food in the streets. Living quarters that were small, closely-packed, and mostly lacking of doors. People in the streets with seemingly nothing to do.

I imagine most Cambodians don't realize that
that's the Golden Gate Bridge

I was making my way back home when I passed by something that blew my mind. Back at home in San Francisco, there's a little ice cream shop called Swensen's in Russian Hill. The ice cream is amazing. Sticky Chewy Chocolate for the win. Anyway, I've never seen it any other city in the U.S. Or anywhere else in the world... until today! In CAMBODIA! Whaaaaat?! I wasn't sure if it was the same Swensen's or not, but then I saw the American flag and picture of the Golden Gate Bridge and there was no doubt in my mind.

I made it back to the hostel, collected SR, and we ventured out to check out this outdoor market the staff had told us about. It was pretty wet outside but we found the place. It was what you'd expect an outdoor Asian market to be. A lot of fresh(-ish) fish, other seafood, fruits, vegetables, all pretty standard fare. It was a lot smaller than I think either of us had expected, so we walked through it in about 15 minutes.

How could it love me,
it doesn't even know me!

After that we found a local spot to grab some authentic Cambodian food. My rice came shaped like a heart and I'm pretty sure most Cambodian foods come with an egg on top (note: based on a skewed, limited sample size).

Pretty Woman, (saw it)
walking down the street

We also found the Pretty Woman bar that night. Yup, it's a thing.

When we got back to the hostel, there were four other people about my age hanging out in the lounge so I went to join them. Two of the guys were engineers from Germany, JN and BE, and then there was a couple from Finland, MK and IL. Funny you ask, why yes, MK and IL were both ridiculously attractive, how did you know? Everyone was really cool. The German guys were both hilarious. Also, JN used to work at an embassy in Bangladesh and went on this crazy hike for several days where you have to get special permission from the government to go. Everyone had been traveling for a little while, but the Germans were on the tail-end of their trip and this was one of their last night in this hostel before living it up big tomorrow night at a really fancy place. We talked for an hour or two and then I called it a night. New country, new friends!

CONTINUE ON to Phnom Penh Part 3: Genocide, What?