Epic Journey Part 2: Cambodia (Phnom Penh)

Studying Biz Law alone in the library is not fun. So I decided to continue with my epic journey journal logs! So for the moment of the day...

Day 4: Staring at the guest book at Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum (S21 Prison) for so so long, not knowing what to pen down...









People familiar with the history of Cambodia, esp the Khmer Rouge should know roughly what happened during that period from 1975 to 1979. However, reading about it, and seeing it is two very different things.

What really moved me about this museum (which used to be the S21 torture prison during the Khmer Rouge) is that it really appeals to the emotions of the visitor. More than just showing pictures and statistics, there were a lot of personal stories of individuals (and their families), who were tortured under the Khmer Rouge, and of people who were working under them. It made me realised that it really didn't matter whose side you are on, everyone suffers.

And of course the gloomy weather that day added to the gloominess of the place.

So yes, I really did sit there, looking at the guest book (for visitors to fill in their thoughts), reading the entries written by other visitors, and finally penning down my thoughts after I spent a long time thinking.

Day 5: Chilling at Number 9 Sister Guesthouse, listening to the rainfall.





As you can see in the pictures, the guesthouse I stayed at in Phnom Penh is on a lake (and it only cost USD$5 per night for 2 people!). And among all the places I went for this trip, Phnom Penh is the only place where I would unsafe going out at night. That's why we decided to just spend the night at our guesthouse.

A banana milkshake, a comfortable chair, a nice movie, light drizzle, that's the perfect combination for a chillax lazy night.

Now for the photos of the day...

Day 4: 背影


Day 5: Chi Weng & Kay Siong on a tuk tuk!

Epic Journey Part 1: Cambodia (Siem Reap)

It's been so so long since I last wrote something in this space. I kind of miss writing, not that I can write very well to start with. I must admit it feels kind of sexy to be typing this entry on my new macbook, it's almost like Julie (from "Julie and Julia") typing her daily blog entries, or Betty (from "Ugly Betty").

But I digress.

I know this is kind of long overdue, and it is kind of weird to be doing this now at this kind of unearthly hours, but I guess that's what 3ams do to people. I thoroughly enjoyed my 23 days trip with chiweng and I though it deserved at least an entry in this space. But learning from my mistake from the Japan trip, which I foolishly assumed that I would be so inspired by the trip that I would immediately blog abt it when I return, I decided to keep travel journal this time round.

There were lots of downtime where we would just sit down, order a drink and chill. These were the best moments for me to consolidate my thoughts and pen them down. Reading those entries now brought me back to the exact moment when I wrote them. Knowing that I would be too lazy to type out all 23 entries, I decided to capture a moment of the day in each entry, so here goes...

Day 1: Sitting down at Khmer Kitchen after a long morning to enjoy some superb Khmer curry



We touched down in Siem Reap around 7am, and we spent most part of the morning walking around exploring the area. Come lunch time, we were both starving, thirsty, and tired (esp with the hot sun). So we were trying to look for a place to eat when we pass by "Khmer Kitchen" and we saw 3 groups of natives inside.

And before I continue, let me just define some of the terms which may be quite confusing. By "natives", I was refering to Singaporeans. Chiweng and I love to people-watch, and our favourite past-time over there was to attempt to identify the nationality of tourists. And being signallers, we came up with this set of codewords so that it won't be THAT obvious that we are talking about them. So...

Natives = Singaporeans
Neighbours = Malaysians
Tom Yum = Thais
Sushi = Japanese
Kim Chi = Koreans
Dim Sum = Hongkees

We were hopeless at guessing what countries the ang mohs were from, so we didn't even bother coming up with codewords for them.

Back to the natives, so we saw a whole bunch of natives inside Khmer Kitchen, we figured the food can't be that bad and we went in. I was glad we did cause the curry was probably one of the best (if not the best) curry I had during the trip (and mind you I had A LOT of curry during the trip).

Day 2: Epic tuna bread lunch on top of Phimeanakas







Angkor Wat was impressive, and the sheer age of the ancient ruins made it such a epic place to have a picnic lunch. I admit the reason why we bought tuna and bread and brought it along was because we were afraid that food prices there would be severely inflated considering it's a major tourist attraction (we were wrong by the way). But since we brought it, we might as well eat it right?

Phimeanakas is one of the tallest temple that can be climbed, and having this tuna with bread lunch on top of it felt...familiar. We were both sweaty and tired by the time we reach the top, and eating that tuna (which is the exact same brand as the one in the combat rations pack) in this kind of condition felt exactly like outfield (less the camou cream). But still, it was a rather nice moment.

Day 3: The ultra durable camera





We decided to rent a bicycle on the third day to explore places that are slightly out of walking distance. As you can see in the picture, all my belongings are in the basket in front. I put my camera right on top for convenience sake because I would stop to take pictures whenever I see something interesting. By now, you should know what happened to the camera. It was a really really hot day and we spotted this aircon coffee joint, so we decided to chill there for a while. On the way there, I probably hit some rocks or something that caused the camera to fly out of the basket (I screamed while it did), it landed right in front of my bicycle, and my bicycle wheel went right over it (that's when I screamed even louder).

Apart from the moment of the day, I also chose a photo of the day for each day. It may be a nice photo taken from a interesting angle, or just a funny photo in general.

Day 1: Watching the day fade away...


Day 2: Kay Siong, Chi Weng, S3, DYS3 & S3 Spec


Day 3: Writing journal at 8th Street Bar