China 'blog entry

Hey Folks - so our time in the Zhong Dimension of China has been quite "an experience" - it's been 6 months already - with a some new lovely friends, a bit of time on the bikes, a touch of employment, a drizzle of travel and an absolute bumload of pollution.

On the beach in Beidaihe, Hebei - 300km or so ENE of Beijing

First off there was the Teach & Travel China (TTC) course in August - a one-month course ELC put on for a hundred or so mostly-European 20-somethings spending a gap-year type thang teaching English in the Middle Kingdom. Despite the politically-charged house-arrest / quarantine in a hotel well away from the centre of the city for the first week, (then a uni campus) it was pretty good, and Gaby and I made some good new friends. While I was working as a trainer, Gaby spent her time sitting in on the course and did her best – sometimes frustratingly so - what with the flat being tiny and her being quite the perfectionist on the course assignments.

Then off we toddled round Hebei province on the bikes - 750km or so, over two weeks, via Tianjin to Xingtai, where we left the bikes to get dusty with friends while we were subsequently off travelling. We had considered a short jaunt to UB in Mongolia but the flights there were extortionate. Gaby also found a heavily discounted flight to Athens but nothing came of that after all.

In TianTan Park, Beijing

In October both of our mums came to visit, which was lovely - together we saw Chengdu & the abso-f@#in'lutely ginormous carved stone Buddha in Leshan, in Sichuan Province; the Terracotta Warriors in Xi'an; the reconstructed seaward end of the Great Wall at Shanhaiguan; and the regular same ol' sights of smoggy Beijing.

In the Summer Palace, Beijing

Over Nov & Dec I put up with 6 weeks of seat-warming in the poorly-constructed newly-minted abject facsimile of a 'school' start-up. One might imagine that the school's MasterCard styled advertisement runs something like this:

5 4th floor classrooms

the boss

1 Suit always on the phone

2 university placement officers

3 computer guys

1 Chinese Engrish Teacher

1 receptionist

1 driver

1 maintenance guy

1 random old woman

3 Foreign English Teachers

2 water machines

a broken copier

and only TWO students - priceless!!

Despite the rather decent pay and provided accommodation, however dubious, I should mention that the teaching staff had no business experience and the business staff had no experience of education – the perfect situation really. The first three weeks were a thorough waste of time (9am: "Hi David – take a rest !" until 6pm's "Hi David – let's go home !" ) whereas* the second half (with all two of the school's vapidly dull, bland & vacuous students) didn't measure even half as highly.

'Michael' - a pic from the school's dodgy and dishonest website...

Special mention really has to made of Chinese "Teacher Kuang" aka Michael ("you know Michael Jackson!?") who would meander aimlessly into my office once a day, urally* around 11am, to make the most banal and clueless small-talk before eventually launching into some poorly-formed & equally clueless question-statement on teaching strategies and syllabus design. When presented with an idea he'd never heard of, much less understood, his standard face-saving reply was invariably "I know that!" As an example of dumb, blatant, small-time Machiavellianism I cannot think of a better example than Michael's shonky shennanigans. I have abso-fu*#in'lutely no confidence whatsoever that what he presented to me as from the boss was an accurate translation/ representation, nor, moreover* that what I asked to be passed on to the boss in return was without Michael's ulterior-motive-laden dodgy manipulation & distortion, and so on*...

[* required vocab in any piece of writing it seems...]

Oops – almost forgot to add that he's prolly off to the Sudan in Feb to teach English to the local oil-workers. Ha ! When first we met he proudly told me that he'd previously been there to teach – but found that the students didn't understand much of what he had to say... And they didn't even properly appreciate his teaching them the popular English idiom "i'cosanarnanaleg" which is apparently commonly used to express that an item was rather a bit pricey...

Gaby found well paid teaching work with the school downstairs from my own – and they even have students – where she did a bit of one-on-one IELTS speaking practice. The bloke was apparently rather sweet, but lazy and well short of his desired IELTS 6.5 goal...

Anyway, our flubulous new-found winter-fat is getting a bit much, and Gaby has been sick for the last 2 ½ months, and hasn't the tolerance for any more of China's smog, (and it's way too damn cold to hit the road through Mongolia & Kazakhstan just yet), so here we are off to the more pleasant climes of Mexico.

Cuernavaca to Quebec via Atlanta.

Any route advice / ideas / suggestions etc readily accepted...

But first it's a month or so in Germany to fix the bikes, see friends, and get a bit more fit & healthy again – and shower with my mouth open even ...

Vietnam 'blog - Caveat Emptor !

On the whole Vietnam didn't at all live up to the expectations we'd formed having heard friends' glowing recommendations of the place. More so than anywhere else I've ventured, road rights vastly favour might over right. Despite (and compared to) my initial misgivings at the disorganisedness of dodgy Cambodian traffic (if a few dozen rickety, rattly and rusty trucks and the sporadic overloaded Madmax-esque motorbikes actually count as traffic), Vietnamese road-use is a-bloody-bominable in the extreme. I s'pose that I should temper this with the reminder that unlike anyone else from whom we'd heard rumours of Vienam, we were on heavily-laden pushies slap in the thick of it all...

Our first night, having spent a afternoon pedaling through a monsoonal downpour via the somewhat corrupt Viet border post at Moc Bai & their "health check" shenanigans (exiting Cambodia was a cinch), we found ourselves at the only lodgings available – of course another overly & pink'ly festooned brothel, ahem sorry Massage Hotel, given our luck and seeming prediliction for such things...

Something we often encountered were passing motorbikes laden with the odd trussed bundle of pigs on the rear rack. Apparently they give them a solid whack, or three, on the head to stun them sufficiently for a thoroughly ingraceful trip to the local butcher...

It's quite a pity to arrive at such a conclusion of a country, yet coming away from the experience my greatest feeling was that Vietnam and its people certainly wouldn't have been much worth fighting for or over...

Throughout our crazed trip so far, I've come to be really proud of the way li'l Gaby has grown into quite the Energizer-esque cycle-bunny of late - From the dyed hair, polished artificial nails, over-riding German'ly pedantic scheduling, and an insistence on matching underwear when I met her, she's come to be the fit & muscular, coconut, avocado & pomelo obsessed, mozzie-scar riddled, let's-cycle-through-the-night-anyway world-traveller I've got today...

The heroine of the tale...

[Though had she perhaps not been carrying the entire works of Agatha Christie in paperback (and the extra-jumbo bulk bottles of shampoo, baby oil, conditioner, moisturiser <"they're cheaper by the litre!"> as well as all those redundant ridiculously extra-long USB cables etc) on her bike maybe the riding might not have been quite so physically demanding...]

The trip into HCM was unlike anything I've ever seen – it had alrady been a long day when we hit the outskirts – and -POOF- we somehow became part of the thickest, least organised, most organic stream of traffic one could imagine – and even then only when enduring a drug-induced, traffic-themed disaster movie. We stayed in HCM for a week or three or so, hanging out with a friend from home on occasions at the cheap and cheerful ubiquitous bars and otherwise sightseeing and shopping slowly for new t-shirts and books for the road.

The ride to the coast – from HCM to Mui Ne was easy enough and straight-forward, with only one or two nights spent in brothels; otherwise it was the regular local hotels – especially after we worked out how to read the word for 'hotel' in Viet script...

The coastal resort town of Mui Ne is a couple of hundred k's NE of HCM and was a welcome respite from the hussle and bustle of the big smoke. We arrived late into town and, to the amused horror of some suitcase tourists, made short shrift of enough food for 5 at the only restaurant still open at that hour. Not being the right season at the the time meant we got a room (for USD 18) right on the beach, with a great view out over the water and the fishermen in their unlikely-looking woven bamboo coracles. The circular craft are about 1 metre deep and 1.8m in diameter, with a reinforced gunwhale though without a rudder or anything except a coating of tar to detract from the minimal gestalt aesthetic. Steering and propulsion is achieved by means of a single bloke on the forward side with a Canadian type paddle and a 'J' stroke.

In the fishing village to the North of MuiNe town...

From MuiNe we headed inland and uphill towards Dalat. The trip was harder than we'd expected and late in the afternoon, after having met a wonderfully hospitable band of Happy Clappies, we took advantage of a tour bus, labouring up the hill behind us, to get us to the next decent town, about 40km further up the hill. The folk on the bus were the nicest we'd met in the country up til then, and cheerfully looked after us with snacks and drinks. Had we not met them I'm sure the remaining ride to find a bed would have been thoroughly miserable. The following day was a looong one but saw us all the way to Dalat by late into the night, and the cool offered by the elevation was a pleasant change. While in Dalat we stayed at the wonderfully hospitable Dreams Hotel - WiFi, secure bike storage, delicious brekky included, book exchange and friendly staff.

The Happy Clappy Clan we met in a small village up in the hills - wonderfully lovely folk...

Perhaps the most memorable experience while there was the Dalat Crazy House. As a concept I think it's great - the idea would have made Willy Wonka, Mr Topsy Turvy or Mr Kite proud - in theory - but to actually try to actualise the bloody thing...It's a wonderfully creative though unfinished, fibreglass & raw concrete experience; think Antoni Gaudi's worst nightmare, cutsified by Dolores Umbridge, and built as badly and cheaply as only shoddy unskilled Vietnamese labour can achieve...

WTF ? Bear in mind this is apparently a hotel. Would you like to wake up to a maniacal concrete 'roo with glowing red eyes in the middle of the night?

The Dalat Crazy House

The Dalat Crazy House

At least in principle the trip from Dalat, high in the hills, at 2000 metres or so to the beach at Na Trang (er, sea level maybe ?) should have been largely downhill. BUT NO ! We spent a tiring day taking a 'short-cut' on the more-direct and newly unfinished highway heading NE which kept going up until just 50km from the coast and then plunged down at a ridiculous incline (for not nearly long enough to enjoy it) before undulating its way to the beach. Being the gung-ho early-risers we just aren't we didn't hit the road til 11 am and finally rolled to a stop by the beach at 6 the next morning - 142km and 17-odd hours of riding later... To really make matters even more comfy it was a National Public Holiday, and we had found ourselves at one of Vietnam's top beach holiday towns - so no readily available hotels when we needed one...

From NaTrang we decided to jump a train northwards to DaNang. Depositing our bikes was easy enough at the railway station, though when the staff put them out on the pavement until the train was due several hours later we felt a bit nervous for their safety. Anyway the train trip was provided a Hellish soundtrack by the tinny yet deafening Muzak system onboard playing WTF's greatest hits, which we had great difficulty ignoring. Getting the bikes back out however was a lovely exercise in agonising frustration-restraint. The workers unloading the goods car had already dropped another bike, causing the handlebar to get twisted to one side, and were yanking hard to get the thing right, and meanwhile a few other workers had dropped a bale of fabric onto a motor scooter making it fall over, shattering the headlight and indicators. So I really wasn't all that keen on them treating our bikes in a similar fashion and stubbornly had to press just to get to roll them away myself. Needless to say I refused to pay the paperwork fee being levied by a swarthy mafioso in the carpark.

Hoi An - Caveat Emptor !

Everyone it seems has heard the old "When you're in Vietnam make sure you go to Hoi An for cheap shoes and tailored clothes" but here is a polite'ned account of what those same bums failed to mention until after the fact...

Don't shop here...

Anyway, the whole Hoi An shoes & suits experience – hereafter referred to in only the worst, most impolite, expletive-laden and pissed-off language was quite the . . . . fiasco. To save destroying my keyboard with pissed-off typing rage, here/ now isn't the place, save it to say we 'enjoyed' shonky merchandise segueing into something involving fisticuffs, cuts & scratches, torn clothing, irate hammer & shear-wielding storekeepers, sneaky crooked cops and a host of amused spectators...

The storekeepers off to pay the cops for a favourable outcome...

And while on the way home a teenager on a motorscooter zooming along on the wrong side of the road bumped into me. Neither of us was hurt but that really was the last straw - I was rather inclined to express my dissatisfaction and (oops) somehow his keyring fell out of the ignition and sailed over a high fence into the jumble of a nearby construction site...

So what with Vietnam being far from our cup of tea, Gaby and I just decided to cut our losses there and then, head back to HCM and grab an onwards flight to Beijing to get there a few weeks ahead of the next teaching job.

At HCM airport - All packed up and about to head out...

A bit about our time in Cambodia

On crossing the border into Cambodia at Poipet, our first impression was that we'd warped into some post-apocalyptic Asian / Mad Max / western / outer-planet etc frontier town. The previously wonderful Thai road had given way to a vast expanse of poorly-linked pot holes.

What with gambling and such being illegal in Thailand and Vietnam the Cambodian border towns run monstrous ca$inos to bolster the sometimes-parasitic local 'economy'. Once out of town, heading east, the road re-satisfies, having been newly repaved, though the 'drivers' wouldn't even qualify for the type of licenses found on the back of a box of cornflakes. Private ownership only seems to have re-emerged from the yoke of the Khmer Rouge as recently as 1993, so socially there hasn't been a lot of time in which to develop any noticable road-rules, nor even notice that there's a brake available - the horn is just soooo much more convenient!!

Siem Reap, the jumping-off point for the splendid ruins of Ankor Wat, lies not so far by daemoniacal hell-bus from the border (a good bit further by harried bike however). Thanks mainly to a thorough lack of any overly restricive requirement to cover the loads of trucks hauling dust and grit, there's an abundance of each spread well over everything in the towns. With a bit of a stiff breeze, such banal everyday activities as breathing and opening one's eyes become all the more varied and interesting.

Perhaps more than the crumbling rock piles that are Angkor, one of the delightful highlights of Siem Reap was the gastronomically splendiferous cuiine. After several weeks of bland-o side-of-the-road Khao pad (vegie fried rice) we were thrilled to feast on four-cheese pizza, brekky burritos, vego burgers, four-cheese gnocchi, fresh blue-cheese salads and such. MMMMMmmmmmm.... And all with free (if speed-of-dark) WiFi...

We ended up staying there for two weeks after all, what with the reading time afforded by the lingering results of that side-of-the-road Khao pad, and then a 7day pass to see the Ancient city. I'd kinda heard it was big - in fact perhaps too large to walk around - but it really IS, actually, too large to even cycle around thoroughly in less than a good few solid days. Our first day there - on the pushies - racked up 46km and we only really saw maybe three or four of the temples, and just in passing at that... For the remainder of our stay we alternated between riding out, taking a local take on the 'tuk-tuk' (moto-remorque actually) just to get there, and a one-day 'tuk-tuk' tour of the bits we'd previously missed. The extortionate entry price is charged in US dollars at $20 for one day / $40 for three days / or $60 for seven. Had we been a bit more gung-ho, or gotten out of bed a bit sooner, maybe the three-day ticket would have sufficed, but the lure of all that tasty food...
For a sampling of the 2000-odd photos Gaby took, follow the links on the right to our picture sites.

Drafting has a Feels-Like Index.
I'd always though of racing cyclists' drafting as a wanky pursuit of just another 0.742% in speed/ efficiency, until we had the chance to draft on and off behind a couple of tractor-dragged timber wagons on the highway. Ordinarily we usually cruise at 14 - 21 kph on the flats, though with a stiff headwind, in the rain, that can drop quite a bit... Anyway, we easily managed to keep up a solid 21kph for about 25km, and the Feels-Like Index was somewhere around a mere 12kph or so.

For the last 130-odd km into the capital, we decided to jump on a passing bus because Gaby's guts were again rather inconvenient (good thang that there was a toilet aboard), and I had broken yet another spoke. Which prompted me to wonder exactly why my guaranteed-to-be-indestructible wheels were somewhat markedly less than satifsfactory...

I had made a point of purchasing the most reliable, robust and regular-sized components deemed suitable by the touring community, however the 'professional' wheel builder who promised to get it done perfectly in a few days failed to get it right. Long story short, _really_ don't bother with Anthony at Velofix [742 Darling St, Rozelle, http://www.velofix.com.au/] for your touring needs. Nice, friendly, charming guy, but hardly a reliable professional. Kinda makes me wish we'd had enough time to just go with the boys at Cheeky Monkey in Newtown.

Phnom Penh itself is actually quite compact, everything within a walkable distance. Nevertheless, the omnipresent Tuk Tuks flock like rabid seagulls to anything remotely touristy...

Highlights of Phnom Penh, in my opinion:
* The food at the Okay Guesthouse - while kinda staid - made for reliably tasty fare, notably without any gut'icularly uncomfortable repercussions...
* The National Museum has perhaps the best range of pre-Angkorian figurative stone and bronze sculptures around. Absofuckinlutely fanbloodytastic...
* Otherwise, our most memorable visit was to the Tuol Sleng S21 Genocide Museum. The sobering, macabre exhibits expose the terribly ruthless side of Cambodian dictator Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge. I guess it ranks with Auschwitz on the list of 20th Century evils. There are hundreds of photos showing newly recieved prisoners. It seems the photos were part of the detailed documentation considered necessary so as to prove to Pol Pot that none escaped to survive the ordeal. Actually, exactly only seven of the roughly 20,000 brutally tortured inmates got out alive...

The road from Phnom Penh to the border was relatively uncomfortable - poor roads, and headwind - making for the THIRD broken spoke in only 2500km. As a result of narrowly avoiding a maniacially-driven bus, Gaby rear-ended me, knocking her overboard, and sending one of her front panniers flying. The bag was ok, but Gaby got another few cuts and bruises to add to her already-sizable collection so far.

Health-wise, Cambodia was a bit of a roller-coaster. Between, and perhaps due to, courses of antibiotics to treat the dysentry, Gaby found the time to somehow swell enough in her thighs and buttocks that people on the street asked when the baby was due - images of Willy Wonka's Violet Beauregarde sprang to mind - but it's all back to normal now...

At the moment we've been in Saigon / HoChiMinh City for about two weeks, and tomorrow we're off northwards, bound for Dalat and a spot of elephant riding....

Our mobile number while in Vietnam is 0122 651 0422

Kampuchea/ Kambodscha/ Cambodia

Meine Erwartungen an Kambodscha waren sehr hoch. Dieses Land stand auf meiner Liste der Dinge, die ich auf dieser Radtour mitnehmen wollte, ganz oben.

Am 24. April haben wir die Grenze bei Poipet passiert und was soll ich sagen … Man kommt aus der neu-gefundenen Zivilisation in Aranya Prathet nach Poipet. Man stelle sich eine Western-Szene vor, 2 Cowboys auf der Straße, kurz vor’m Duell, da kommt noch mal so’n Heuballen durch’s Bild geflogen. Poipet ist so ähnlich, nur ohne die Cowboys, dafür aber mit mehr Menschen, die täglich mit voll beladenen Ochsenkarren, Fahrrädern, Motorbikes oder FW-Drive/ Jeeps über die Grenze huschen, ein paar Touristen, die am Zoll anstehen, um ein Visum zu bekommen, jeder Menge Casinos (weil Glücksspiel in Thailand verboten ist, trifft man hier vorwiegend Thailänder an) und natürlich, nicht zu vergessen, aufwirbelnder Sand/ Dreck/ Staub (oder wie man es auch immer nennen mag). Ich muss ehrlich sagen, dass ich noch nie so viel Sand in den Augen hatte, nicht mal in den windigen Dünen auf Grand Canaria. Aber, was will man meckern. Ist man erstmal raus aus Poipet, dann wird die Straße schön (neu geteert), alles ist flach, d.h. wir hatten 1 Hügel, und Radfahren war easy … all the way to Siem Reap. Wäre da nicht der Verkehr, der wie folgt beschrieben werden kann: Jeder A*** hat ne Hupe und weiß sie auch zu benutzen. Schrecklich!!!

Angekommen in Siem Reap, wird man von losem Sand auf der Straße begrüßt, der einem, dank des zufällig aufkommenden Wirbelsturms der Klasse 3, auch schon wieder in die Augen fliegt und obendrein auch noch an Armen und Beinen zwiebelt. Der etwas später einsetzende Regen kam dann als willkommene Erlösung. Klatschnass und relativ erschossen vom Tag, haben wir uns dann in einem kleinen Gasthaus, in ruhiger Umgebung, 300m von der Pubstreet, niedergelassen. Und zu unserer Überraschung gab’s ein „western“ Restaurant neben dem anderen … Italiener, Mexikaner und was man sonst gern noch so essen möchte. Das war mal wieder „richtiges Essen“ nach all den langen zehrenden Wochen des fried rice. Außerdem gab’s free wifi in fast jedem Restaurant!!! Spitze!!! Möchte man da rufen. Nur schlecht, wenn das wifi so langsam ist, dass man nicht mal google auf kriegt oder einen gar nicht erst in net-adressen rein lässt – ergo kein gmx und kein studivz (facebook auch nicht, weil zu großer Datenstrom). Das sollte sich übrigens auch im restlichen Cambodia nicht ändern. Letztendlich sind wir 14 Tage in Siem Reap geblieben, nachdem wir die ersten 7 mit Durchfall zu kämpfen hatten und die zweiten 7 Angkor Wat widmen konnten.

Unseren ersten Tag des 7-Tage-Tickets haben wir auf dem Fahrrad verbracht. Wir haben das Gelände unsicher gemacht, geguckt, wie weit die Tempel auseinander liegen und abends einen Plan erstellt, was wir in der kurzen Zeit alles besichtigen wollen. Natürlich wussten wir vorher, dass das Gebiet groß sein würde, aber so riesig … 46 km hat unser kleiner Fahrradcomputer am Ende des Tages angezeigt. Angkor Wat ist der Name des Haupttempels in der Ancient Angkor City. Unserer Meinung nach, und nach ausgiebiger Begutachtung Angkors, war dieser „gar nicht so beeindruckend“, sprich: alle anderen Tempel imponierten uns viel mehr – wie z.B. the Bayon, Ta Prohm und Ta Keo oder auch Thommanon sowie the Leper King Terrace. Aber das ist, wie gesagt, unsere subjektive Meinung. Macht euch selbst ein Bild … Fotos sind jetzt im Netz.

Die $60 für die 7 Tage haben sich voll und ganz rentiert. Wer nicht so lange bleiben will und auch nicht zu viel Geld investieren möchte, kann sich immer noch für das 1-Tag-20$-Ticket oder das 3-Tage-40$-Ticket entscheiden. Man muss aber auch hier beachten, dass das 1-Tag-Ticket bei weitem nicht ausreicht, um alles zu sehen. 3 Tage sind schon besser und wenn man sich beeilt und alles straff rafft, dann schafft man Angkor auch in 3 Tagen.

Der Weg nach Phnom Penh gestaltet sich schwierig, aufgrund starken Gegenwindes und Regens. Trotzdem haben wir einen 95 km-Tag dabei – unseren ersten. Und ausgerechnet an dem Tag streikt mein Fahrradcomputer! So ein Dreck aber auch!!! Zugegeben, wir haben ein wenig Hilfe an dem Tag – ein Traktor (mehr ein Traktorverschnitt) lässt uns 25 km in seinem Windschatten mitfahren. Das waren 25 km fast ohne Wind und Regen, d.h. aber auch ½ Meter hinter’m Hinterrad fahren, was irgendwann Konzentrationsfähigkeit kostet. Für die letzten 130 km vor der Hauptstadt haben wir uns entschieden einen Bus zu nehmen, da es mir mal wieder (wie an so vielen Tagen in Kambodscha) nicht gut geht und David (schon wieder) eine gebrochene Speiche hat. Wer sich jetzt noch erinnern kann, wie sehr ich Busfahren mag, der weiß auch, wie die 2 Stunden Bustour endeten – Gott sei Dank war der Bus modern mit Klimaanlage und Toilette.

Phnom Penh an sich ist eigentlich recht kompakt, alles in laufbarer Entfernung. Trotzdem kann man sich auch hier im Tuk Tuk die Stadt ansehen. Auch Kambodschas Hauptstadt kann einen Palast, ne Silver Pagoda und ne Menge Wats aufweisen, die wir aber nach kulturellem Übermaß an Tempeln etc. einfach nicht mehr besichtigen konnten. Dafür war ein Besuch im National Museum ein interessantes Ereignis und die Besichtigung des S21 Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum durfte nicht fehlen. Wer nicht weiß, wer Pol Pot ist und was der gute Mann alles Schreckliches vollbracht hat, kann das gern mal ausgooglen.

Der Weg von Phnom Penh zur Grenze war relativ beschwerlich – schlechte Straßen und Gegenwind. Resultierend daraus habe auch ich nun eine gebrochene Speiche. Außerdem hatte ich nach dem 1 Tag geschwollene Striemen am Hintern, als hätte mir David eins mit der Peitsche übergebraten – trotz eines Gelsattels … zszszs – wo soll das mal noch hinführen. Die Schwellungen waren Gott sei Dank am nächsten Tag weg, aber der Schmerz bleibt …

Gesundheitstechnisch haben wir Kambodscha, wie schon oben angedeutet, nicht ganz astrein überlebt. Die erste Woche in Siem Reap quälten wir uns mit Diarrhöe, die bei David so schlimm war, dass wir ihm Antibiotika in der Apotheke besorgten, die man in Kambodscha auch ohne Rezept bekommt. Die zweite Woche in Siem Reap konnte ich einen Bauch vorweisen, der mich aussehen lassen hat, wie 6. Monat Schwangerschaft. Als ich dann auch noch auf der Straße gefragt wurde, wann es denn soweit ist, war dies das eindeutige Zeichen, wiederum besagte Apotheke aufzusuchen und nach Antibiotika zu fragen. Der Blähbauch ging dann auch nach einer Woche weg, dafür gab’s kostenlos Wassereinlagerungen in Oberschenkeln und Po, was relativ lustig aussieht, wenn man bedenkt, dass der Oberkörper normal ist – ich sage nur Stichwort: Kegelstumpf!!! Wir warten jetzt ab, dass auch dieses Erscheinungsbild abklingt. (Nachtrag: Nachdem ich aufgehört habe, das Zeug zu nehmen – insgesamt 3 Wochen – kann ich sagen, so langsam schwillt alles ab … laaaaannnggggssssaaaam)

Alles in allem kann ich aber sagen: Kampuchea ist einfach ein einmaliges Erlebnis.

Thoughts on Thailand...

We're almost about to cross over into Cambodia, so here goes with some of the highlights of our time in Siam....

The food in Thailand has been a welcome respite to the bland & nasty fare of Hong Kong (a few HK vego-specific restaurants aside). Here we've enjoyed an absolute plethora of vego delights. Despite previous vehement assertions to the contrary, Gaby's attitudes to coconuts have taken a turn to the positive, to the point that she's pretty much hooked on them... And it's cheap - even in a restaurant, several courses each, with drinks etc rarely runs over 450 baht all up - that's something like nine Aussie dollars each at most for our biggest meal of the day. Too many times we've had to politely insist that enough food for maybe four regular patrons is just about right for our cyclo-touring needs....

The roads here are pretty good, and the traffic flow would prolly be best described as 'organic' - where else in the world would trucks on the highway politely slow down and gently swerve so as to allow cyclists to cross 3 lanes of sparse traffic just to get away from marauding wild dogs and the splash-happy bucket-wielding mobs celebrating Song Kran (the New Year's water festival) On the whole we've been perfectly well-respected on the roads - much in contrast to our experiences in Australia, particularly in NSW.

One thing though that kinda pissed us off is the unacceptably selfish way in which a few key geographical features of interest have had the galling temerity not to position themselves within even 20km of where the Lonely Planet GuideBook, and our plastic Canadian-made Map quite clearly locate them...

One night a bit East of Bangkok we found ourselves directed to the appropriate local motel. At first it seemd mostly harmlessly kitsch, but on closer inspection turned out to be quite 'romantic'.
Now that we're experienced in such things,and would like to perhaps avoid such places in future, here are some distinguishing features that might help one to determine whether it's actually a brothel...

• The street sign is the silhouette of a stripper leaning erotically on the Eiffel Tower, in pinky-red neon.
• The Check-in process involves no paperwork/ID, and you pay by the hour- through a tiny slot.
• There are heavy curtains over the entrances to the covered parking spaces.
• There are no windows, other than the enormous voyeuristically candid one that makes using the bathroom a whole lot less private.
• The bed comes only with a slippy pink synthetic sheet over the lumpily stiff and uneven vinyl-covered 'mattress'. And a top-sheet/blanket for which costs extra, since it's unnecessary.
• The 'shower' is a hose that doesn't reach any further above the waist than absolutely necessary for a quick rinse.
• There are upholstered interlocking hearts on the walls and ceiling.
• The walls are papered in a dizzying embossed vinyl straight from the imagination of the acid-wasted bastard love-child of Willy Wonka and Dolores Umbridge. And the carpet was even worse.
• Oh, and there's a bunch of girls discreetely hanging around out the back...

Check out the pics on flickr

Dies und Das aus Bangkok

Jetzt sind wir schon 2 Wochen in Bangkok und kommen - wie immer - nicht weg. Es gibt immer etwas, was wir noch für die Radtour brauchen, was wir noch vergessen haben oder Sehenswürdigkeiten, ohne deren Besichtigung man Bangkok einfach nicht verlassen kann. Haben schon das 3- Mal unsere Hotelreservierung verlängert - und diesmal endgültig!!! Wir werden morgen endlich in die "wilden Gefilde" Thailands aufbrechen. Wohin es geht, wissen wir zu diesem Zeitpunkt noch nicht. Es stehen 2 Optionen zur Auswahl - gen Norden nach Ayuthaya oder gen Süden, an der Küste lang nach Kambodscha. Also, lasst euch überraschen ...

Rein Visatechnisch steht uns auch nix im Weg. Das Visum für Kambodscha haben wir online beantragt und auch bewilligt bekommen. Das Visum für Vietnam werden wir in Kambodscha beantragen.

Bangkok gefällt mir soweit sehr gut, mal abgesehen vom Straßenverkehr, der keinen Regeln zu folgen scheint (besonders nicht für Motoradfahrer, die grundsätzlich irgendwo durchdrängeln, wo kein Platz ist und dann auch - rel. regelmäßig - die Straßen in die falsche Richtung benutzen) und einer relativ hohen Luftverschmutzung, die dann und wann auch schon mal tränende Augen hinterlässt. Ansonsten ist Bangkok ein kultureller Hochgenuss - Tempel ohne Ende. Werde (hoffentlich heute Abend) noch ein paar Bilder von Bangkok hochladen. Das Essen hier ist übrigens einsame Spitze - keine geschmacklosen Kochnudeln wie in Hong Kong, die letztendlich mit Geschmacksverstärkern aus der Dose aufgepeppelt werden. Hier werden noch Gewürze benutzt!!! Ich war ja schon begeistert vom Thai-Food in Australien und kann jetzt mit sicherheit sagen - Thai-Food ist mein Lieblingsessen.

Eigentlich fällt mir im Moment recht wenig ein, über das ich noch bereichten könnte. Außer, dass ich mir unseren letzten Tag noch mit einer Massage versüßen werde, sodass ich morgen gut radeln kann. Massagen sind hier unheimlich kostengünstig, genauso wie T-Shirts ...

Bis die Tage
Gaby

Part the Second - Bangkok

So, anyway we're in Bangkok at the moment, thinking of heading off in less than a week or so on the bikes to begin the Thailand, Cambodia & Vietnam leg of the trip...

Fortunately Thailand does the civilised visa-waiver thang, Cambodian eVisas are available on the web and in the pipes, and for the Vietnamese visa, we'll just burn that bridge when we come to it.

Gaby is just

"soooo excited! In a few weeks, we are in the country that is on my travel wish list is at the top - Cambodia! So fingers crossed that everything works out! Yippie"(thanks again dodgy google translation )

So far here we've done a good bit of relaxing; enjoyed the absofuckin'lutely fanbloodytastic Thai food (sooo much more satisfying than anything Chinese)...
Yesterday we spent a few hours on the hallowed [or should that be hollowed out] Th. Khao San Rd™ – the Hippy Trail's ™ bland oasis of mainstream flashpacking indulgence. Not bad for a few hours, but hardly somewhere to actually call a destination... Anyway, we picked up some dodgy VCD's, postcards, a plug adaptor for the ridiculous HK laptop cable, some tackily crass almost-disposable T-shirts, and a few too many baby-coconuts – Gaby's newfound fave... I s'pose the highlight of the day was the Thai massage – my back, ankles and stuff all cracked satisfyingly, but perhaps best of all, my stubbornly deformed mutant 2nd toes got so loosened as now to be able to wiggle and even - gasp – kinda straighten...

So PLAN C (revision 19, part 5, subsection iv) is to re-assemble the bikes in a day or three, in the airconditioned comfort of our cheapo outer-suburban hotel. From here we'll meander towards the Cambodian border, spend a week exploring Ankors who. wat, where, when and why, then drift onwards towards Vietnam and HCM. A month or two should get us up the length of the country before we pop over into southern China for as much as we have time for before work in Beijing beckons, there to spend August working (for ELC the regular mob in Sydney) on a Teacher Training Course, and later – who knows ???

PS.We each have a temporary mobile for the next 20-something days

David +66 8 7343 8319
Gaby +66 8 7343 8335

The First Bit – Hong Kong

Hey folks, we've been gone a bit over 6weeks so far, and had a kinda interesting time of it already...

From Sydney we went to Hong Kong, where we'd planned to spend a while working to raise a bit of much-needed cash - well, that was the plan anyway... We hopped from one hotel to the next, found on el cheapo last-minute type websites, finally moving for two weeks to a host family's home in the far NW (Ha Che Village, near the Chinese border). Brit Neil and Filipina Marjorie are very nice, but have a fairly spoilt, shitty 2 1/2 year old little primadonna named Charlotte. While it is a good bit cheaper than the hotels, the kid's ranting tanties drove us crazy.

The only place we got any respite from the maddening crowd was on the side of a wild ridge facing the woop-woop village we found ourselves in towards then end of our stay. From our spot an hour's walk up the track we could just make out the house, and really enjoy 'the serenity'.

Finding work and somewhere to live turned out a bit harder than imagined, and of course the day after we finally gave up and booked a flight to Bangkok, I was offered a few interviews – bloody Murphy... Anyway, most of them aren't hiring until Sept, and one of them sounded rather promising so maybe after Beijing in August....

The shopping in HK proved quite adequate. I'm a ruthless haggler when the need arises, so Gaby picked up a great digital SLR Camera kit for a reasonable price, and I got funky new toy computer on which to write my book, watch films, and maybe run the GPS. On each occasion we left the salesman kinda bewildered and almost relieved that we were about to leave him alone...

Rather bravely, only a day or two after we got there, Gaby one day took a trip out into town on her own, only to find the rush-hour pedestrian traffic a bit intimidating, causing her to feel like returning to the relative calm of our shoebox, though even with a map it took her an hour to cover the 5-minute walk from the metro to the hotel.

Here`s a dodgy google translation of what Gaby had to say about HK:

What's left to say: On every street there are at least 2 Seven-Eleven or wellcome markets, MACD is on every street corner, skyscrapers everywhere, old vs. new, there are dried Chinese streets for plants, fungi and animals ( eg, seahorses, abalone or ox penis), electronics and apparel streets anyway, art / antique area (next to the ancient wood carvings also bezoars, antelope horns or offer Elephantenstoßzähne) and night markets. Not to forget the flesh-quarters, then also times where the meat hangs out all day, where you also do not know what animal was the times - maybe cat or dog? Incidentally, 10-dog-dick-soup should be quite tasty. Had I not already a vegetarian, I would be here. Fish and crabs are looking at the restaurant itself - so no more seafood. I will probably still thousands of things forgotten ... but I think you just have to see themselves.

PS: Yesterday evening, we have after a long back and forth, ultimately by finally, about a digital SLR camera to enrich. Thanks to David's good negotiating skills, we have paid less than in Germany or America, and still have a very good Manfrotto Tripods to get.

Sightseeing & Culture-wise, we saw one and a half temples, popped up Victoria Peak and enjoyed just looking around. The pics say it way more eloquently than li'l ole me, so check out our pics...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/tall_dave/sets/72157616177990496/

We're off to Thailand, Cambodia & Vietnam ...

Da es ja nicht besser wird mit der ganzen Jobsituation, haben wir uns jetzt kurzerhand entschlossen unsere Radtour fortzusetzen. Wir haben gestern Abend Flugtickets nach Bangkok gebucht. WIR FLIEGEN AM FREITAG, sprich in weniger als 1 Woche. Visum brauchen wir nicht, weil Visa-waver-system, der Antrag für's Kambodschanische Visum läuft. Ein Visum für Vietnam können wir in der vietnamesischen Botschaft in Bangkok beantragen.

Ich bin soooo aufgeregt!!!! In ein paar Wochen sind wir in dem Land, das auf meiner Reisewunschliste ganz oben steht - Cambodia!!!! Also Daumendrücken, dass alles klappt!!! Yippie

Neues aus Hong Kong

Nach etlichen Hotels sind wir letzte Woche bei einer Gastfamilie im hohen Norden (Ha Che, nahe der chinesischen Grenze) untergekommen. Neil und Marjorie sind sehr nett, haben aber eine recht quirrliche 2 ein halb Jahre alte Tochter namens Charlotte. Es ist günstiger als im Hotel, aber auch leider nur für 2 Wochen, da die beiden das Zimmer danach an eine Französin für 5 Monate vermieten. Wir müssen demnach spätestens am 28.3. ausgezogen sein.

So, die Jobsituation sieht bis dato auch nicht besser aus. Jobs stehen ab August/ September zur Verfügung, nur leider nicht jetzt. hmm. Wir sitzen und überlegen krampfhaft, was wir machen können. Wenn's was Neues gibt, melde ich mich wieder.

Grüße aus Hong Kong