... and it's getting even hotter :O (Day 113 of the world trip)

26.12.2019

Yesterday evening we had a Christmas food frenzy :D :D We went to Big C and bought almost exclusively products that contain chocolate^^ Pretty delicious ;-)

This morning I got up at 7:00 am to pack. Jonas always packs the night before but I'm still not convinced :p For breakfast we had milk, oatmeal, and a fruit (a pear) for probably the last time in a while.

To save money on the expensive taxi fee, we took our favorite bus, line 56, to the city. Interestingly enough, our bus provider for the onward journey to Phnom Penh has his office exactly where we met Singha a week ago!

That made it very easy - we drove to the Central Market, where we had taken a picture of the owl as Christmas decoration, and since we were early, we sat on a bench in the park for a while :) All very relaxed!

To get rid of our remaining money, we finally went to the shopping center itself and I bought some food at the supermarket while Jonas ordered a vegetarian dish for both of us (once with rice, once with noodles), even though it was only 10:10 am^^

Some of the shops in the food court hadn't even opened yet, but that didn't matter - so we got our food very fresh ;-) I took the noodles, Jonas took the rice and of course he poured the spicy sauce, which contained a bit of red chili, over his dish. When we swapped after half of the portion, the rice was already too spicy for me :D :D So Jonas took it away as a take-away for the journey :p

At 11:00 am we went to the office of our travel provider, with whom we were already very satisfied on the journey from Nha Trang to Saigon. But when we were led to the bus half an hour later, there was a completely different provider, but no matter^^

The bus was almost full - the back seat was of course occupied by luggage. I had already wondered why we weren't allowed to put our big backpacks in the bus's luggage compartment, but then I remembered that we were in Vietnam and that the actual luggage compartment was probably filled with other goods ;-) :D :D

Most of the passengers were Asians (I think they were Vietnamese) and somehow they seemed to know each other or were a whole family. In any case, there were some well-fed children who were constantly eating sweets like gummy bears, chocolate, or candies and running around in the bus :D Not bad ;-)

After a while, the collector/conductor (I have to find out sometime if these people have a real professional title^^ They're not the driver, but rather a "bus companion" like a train conductor) asked us if we already had a visa for Cambodia.

For Germans, there are several ways to get a visa for Cambodia. Besides the rather cumbersome way at the embassy, there is now also an e-visa that can be applied for online. This costs almost 40 USD including processing fees, whereas the visa on arrival costs only 30 USD. So it was clear which option we had chosen ;-) We boarded the bus in Ho Chi Minh without a visa^^

To speed up the process at the border, our collector collected both the visa fee and our passports. Instead of the 30 USD, he then demanded 35 USD per person, but we didn't want to haggle over such a small amount and saw it as a service fee for him^^

A few rows in front of us were two men who were also white. One of them was unfortunately quite uncooperative. He had a big problem giving his passport and the money to our collector in advance. Obviously, he was afraid that something fishy was going on and was the only one in the bus discussing it...

If you look online for information about the process, you will find many reports that describe exactly this - the bus companion collects everything BEFORE the border and hands it in as a "collective process". But this one gentleman obviously hadn't read that and even though all the other passengers complied, he didn't want to see it :D :D

About 30 km before the border, we suddenly heard a loud bang and after a short inspection, it was clear that one of the rear tires had burst :O We stopped twice, looked at it, but then continued driving. The other passengers got off each time, whether as onlookers or out of boredom, I don't know.

At the third stop, we stopped at a real workshop and there they managed to change the tire ;-) Yay! :D

At the border itself, our collector then handed in our collective order (while we could simply wait and snack on some snacks instead of standing in the long line) and then went through the process together with the troublemaker, as the gentleman did not speak Vietnamese and could not manage on his own... Oh dear. Some people... :p

After leaving Vietnam, where you got a long, intense look in your eyes again before you got your passport back, we went 200m to the Cambodian border.

There, the previously received passport was handed back after a quick face check and then the bus drove us away from the border without our passports, past countless casinos (this must have looked like that movie Casino Royale!!! Flashback: We wanted to visit the Bolaven Plateau in Laos but that didn't work out^^) to a restaurant.

Although we had read about it, it still felt a little creepy that we were just driving away without our passports :O But we had trust in our bus company and had a small lunch with our snacks.

The man who seems to feel a strong connection to his passport was not with us. He was probably personally at the border waiting while everyone else could relax, have lunch, and use the restroom. Well :p

He then made one last scene when the rest of us finally received our passports back, but then it was all good^^

Vietnam, it was nice with you - hello Cambodia!!!

The visa for Cambodia was stuck in our passports, along with a stamp, and the card with the entry information was stapled to one of the pages in the passport. In Jonas's case, it was cleverly stapled to the side where his Laos visa is, so now it's covered but well :D :D

After just a few minutes, it was already clear that we were in a different country. The casinos gave way to a cityscape that reminded me of a mix of all the countries we have already visited^^

There were tuk-tuks like in Thailand. There were rural areas and villages that looked somewhat poor and very simple, where children ran around naked in the backyard and helped with various tasks - similar to Laos (Jonas doesn't see it that way, but he also dozed off occasionally, so maybe he just missed it :p). But there are also larger buildings, an asphalted main road, and you can occasionally catch a glimpse of something industrial - like in Vietnam.

Oh, and unfortunately, one thing strongly reminds me of India: the trash :O Sure, Cambodia is a very poor country, but after the last three Southeast Asian countries, I thought they would handle their trash problem a little better than India. But I was taught otherwise here, because there is trash everywhere by the side of the road!!

But other than that, looking out the window is as cool as always. Two action movies were also played in the bus one after the other, but they were a bit too crazy for me^^ So I stuck with the view, which I really like to give me a bit of a feel for a country :)

Around 7:00 pm or so, we finally reached Phnom Penh and when a few passengers were getting ready to get off, Jonas saw on Maps.Me that it was only about 2 km to our accommodation from there. So we also decided to get off :)

Normally, these buses always have a fixed final stop, but locals can somehow also be dropped off at locations of their choice. Fortunately for us, this fit perfectly, as the actual final stop would have been much further away from our accommodation and we would have had to take a tuk-tuk ;-)

Our getting off immediately attracted some tuk-tuk drivers and as we walked away, we were asked every few meters if we wanted to get in^^ But after over seven hours of travel, I was glad to be able to walk

The only thing I didn't like at all was that despite the darkness, it was still a humid 30°C :O In Ho Chi Minh, it had at least cooled down to a pleasant 25°C in the evening, but not here. Phnom Penh is hot!!!! Oh dear :p

But the first impression of the city is actually quite positive. It's noisy and crowded like in all Asian cities, but there were two really cute supermarkets

The closer we got to our accommodation, the higher the police presence was :D :D Jonas said earlier that he felt a bit like we were in the Bronx or Harlem :D I naively said that we would be particularly safe here because the police are watching :p

Past a few street food stands, we went into a side street where we found our guesthouse. It is run by a family and the man of the house greeted us kindly and then brought us to our room.

Everything is great actually: the room is really really big, clean, quite pretty, and there are mosquito screens on the windows (mosquitoes are quite common here apparently). Our host is super sweet and patiently answers our questions (especially about the two different currencies that are in circulation here^^) and has a really cute son of maybe 3 years old, who happily climbed around in our room while his dad explained everything^^

The only downside is that the room is super hot!! It's even more extreme than in Ho Chi Minh already :O We have a window, but I think the room temperature is at least 30°C... We have a fan on the wall that will probably be running at the highest speed all the time while we're in the room. But honestly, it doesn't help much :D :D Even without moving, you sweat from every pore :p

After checking in, we went out to get dinner and water (!!!). Although it's still super warm outside, it was a relief because it was an upgrade from our room temperature :D :D

Our host kindly warned us that our stomachs might need some time to get used to the street food and that we should proceed step by step. That was very caring! For first-timers in Asia, this is a valuable hint! :)

On our way here, we had seen a small pizza stand, but unfortunately it was already closed. So it would be street food after all (we would have had to walk further for something else, which we didn't want to do tonight^^)!

We ordered a portion of cabbage/vegetable mix and two small bowls of rice by pointing and showing the number of fingers

But you can also pay in US dollars and usually get the change in Riel. Since everything here is quite cheap, USD only makes sense if you have small bills. A market stand probably can't change a 20-dollar bill for you...

Fortunately, Jonas and I ordered USD before our departure and have a lot of 5-dollar and 1-dollar bills, so we should be able to manage with them for the first few days :)

So instead of paying with 5,000 Riel, I paid with 2 USD (4,000 Riel is 1 USD) and got 3,000 back. For many, this may sound trivial, but I found it interesting and think that we will calculate back and forth with the next purchases (by the way, we are always estimating in Euros, whereby we always equate 1 Euro to 1 USD because it's easier^^).

Anyway :D :D :D

For 3 USD, we also got some water and then we ate the bought dinner in our room (our host offered us plates and cutlery to borrow. He is so accommodating!!!

The shower water is cold, but it feels great. But unfortunately, I'm already sweating again - a fan doesn't help either :(

Well - Cambodia will be a hot country ;-) We will probably call Jonas's family soon and tomorrow we will explore the city in daylight :)