One-month Catch-up (Part III)

Well, while I was travelling with the group, I stayed in Cambodia for three days and then went to Vietnam. We went south from Phnom Penh (Cambodia's capital) on a Mekong River boat, which was wonderful! We then spent one night in Chau Doc, a small Vietnamese town not far from the Cambodian border. That was the 4th of July, not exactly a typical way to spend Independence Day! There really wasn't much to see or do there, but we did go to a karaoke bar and then to play pool with some locals (they slaughtered us!).

The next morning we left early for Ho Chi Minh City. HCMC is very modern and exciting, it reminded me of Shanghai in a lot of ways. I have, however, never seen such insane traffic! There is a 12 lane highway (6 in each direction) going through the center of town and there are no crosswalks. Everyone just darts through the cars and motorbikes, and apparently there are a very large number of accidents there. No surprise!

I really only had about a day and a half in HCMC before it was time for me to go back to Phnom Penh. I went to the Cu Chi tunnels, which was very interesting but way too clausterphobic for my taste! Other than that I did a lot of exploring on foot to the different markets.

Then, on Friday (yesterday) I arrived back in Phnom Penh. The hotel I was suppossed to stay at was far too filthy for my taste. I knew right away that it was not going to work out - the white walls were brown where they met the side of the bed - EWW! I don't even want to know what THAT is! So I left to find another hotel, and I found a decent one right in the middle of the town. It has such a spectacular view out over the royal palace, national museum and it is right across the street from the organization I am working with. On top of that, it is cheaper!

I did, however, wake up this morning with ants all over my stuff (gross, but not the end of the world) and a cockroach in the shower (super-gross, and a much bigger deal than the ants!) I am going to go buy some heavy duty bug spray and hope that all these little buggers go away. Is clean and bug-free really too much to ask? Maybe in Cambodia it is!

I met my two research assistants this morning. I did not plan on having two but now I have two anyhow! I had agreed to hire one but she brought along her friend... I am such a sucker. I know I could have put my foot down and hired only one, but neither's English is 100% and they are far more outgoing and comfortable when they are together. I could see right away that they would be better as a team, so now I have two! (and for $5 a day each, it doesn't make a tremendous difference to me)

Tonight I am going to a Cambodian shadow puppet performance, and taking along my two new assistants. They are really excited because they say that they have never been to the theatre before! Should be fun! More to come soon...