Day 15 Bus to Phnom Pen

Actually, the day is not worth its own entry, because a bus ride can be quite long and monotonous. In the morning, said goodbye to the others at the hostel and took the bus towards Cambodia, the least developed country in Southeast Asia, getting a little closer to the main destination of the trip, Angkor Wat.

The border crossing was a complex and bureaucratic process that I didn't understand. Luckily, they had everything prepared on the bus and I just had to sign a few incomprehensible papers. We had to get off the bus several times, walk 10 meters, and then get back on. Bored officials who don't even bother to look if the people fit. Baggage check: bus driver opens luggage compartment, bus driver closes luggage compartment. It's somehow surreal. But the main thing is to collect the $35 entry fee. Quite a lot, considering that you just want to visit the country.

Behind the border, there are a lot of casinos. It actually looks almost like Vietnam, except that here they don't use the Latin script and you see a lot more Buddhist buildings.

First surprise, they use dollars (well, I didn't do my research, you can only get dollars from the ATM here). As change, you get the local currency. So now you have 2 bundles of money, what a nonsense. Second surprise, the hotel is a dump, but it's too late to do anything about it. But I immediately booked something else for the next day.

In the evening, I explored the area a bit and had something to eat. That's where I met Marcel from the Netherlands. He has been living in Cambodia for 30 years and comes to Germany for 3 months every year to earn money at festivals. Nice guy, we had a few beers together.