Getting back to Thailand was a lot worse than I thought it'd be. It took us around 5 hours to get from Sihanoukville to Koh Kong. All of a sudden on the bus it got really hot and there was lots of smoke coming from the back of the bus. Everyone was shouting and I thought we were toast. For some reason the driver didn't stop for about another minute and then there was a stampede to get off the bus. We were right near the back so it took us another couple of minutes to get off. I was genuinely terrified and was shaking when we finally got off. It didn't blow up though. After 10 minutes the driver seemed to have sorted out the problem and we reluctantly piled back on. Thankfully we had to swap buses not long after that as our bus was carrying on in a different direction.
Koh Kong was quite pleasant. We ate over the sea and the surroundings were nice. We stayed in a bit of an overpriced dive but we didn't have much choice. The next day we were up early to take a tuk tuk to the border 12km away and went through the usual suspects and people trying to con you there but exited Cambodia fairly smoothly. That was our last land border (we have done Vietnam-Laos, Laos-Thailand, Thailand-Burma, Burma-Thailand, Thailand-Cambodia, Cambodia-Thailand) and I will not miss them whatsoever. It's too much hard work and I'm not here to work!
We then got messed around for nearly 2 hours until a bus took us to a town an hour away. Next was a bus to the outskirts of Bangkok which took about 6 hours. It was pretty comfy though. And then another bus for over an hour I think to our hotel. It didn't have far to go, the traffic was just unbelievable for 8-9pm on a Friday night! We did get to see parts of Bangkok that we haven't seen before though which was good. Bangkok is a proper onion city, there are so many layers to it and it's always surprising. It's such an impressive city. There were lots and lots of homeless people though. I think after all the countries we've seen homeless people begging in, it now comes as a surprise to realise that there must be so many more homeless people just because you don't see the majority.
Ben's decided he could live in Bangkok. You could certainly live cheaply and there would be so much to do.
After 13 hours of travelling we grabbed something quick to eat, a beer and went to bed.
On Sunday we went to the weekend market. There were over 8,000 stalls and it was mental. Ladies, you would have loved it. It had everything you could think of, including adorable puppies with tiara's on. I did think at one point that I was getting a puppy! I was spending money that Ben's parents had kindly given me for my birthday so we didn't have to budget for a change which was weird! I spent £19 and felt very naughty! Ben thinks I was very well behaved though and that he would have gone mental. I bought 2 vest tops, 2 bikini's, a new pair of sunglasses, some nail varnish, 2 pairs of earrings (but 1 pair had broken in the bag by the time I got back!) and a headband. I was knackered by the time we'd finished! We ended the day with a curry (obviously) a beer and a cocktail.
Yesterday we went to a crocodile farm just outside of Bangkok. It is the largest in the world with over 60,000! It took quite a while to get there and back on public transport but it was pretty good. There was a crocodile show which involved a lot of hands and heads going into mouths. We only caught the end of the elephant show where they were dancing and it looked pretty cruel. We bought some banana's to feed them. We also saw lions, tigers, ostriches, leopards, hippo's, lots of different monkeys, racoons, snakes, lizards, bears and much more. There was a golden retriever in the lion pen and a black dog in a tiger pen. I can only assume they were cubs amd puppies at the same time but I don't think you should cage a dog up with something that could kill it! There was a bird enclosure you could go in and feed the birds. The birds were on their perches but but I think they would have flown on you anyway. There were lots of different kinds of parrots and love birds. One little parrot jumped on me and wouldn't get off, it was loving playing with some tassels coming off my bracelets. The best bit of the day was feeding some crocodiles!! You got some meat on a fishing rod type thing and dangled it over the pen. I went down to a low bridge over a pen and fished away. It was brilliant. The last bit of meat wouldn't come off the string though and this massive croc tried to go underwater. It was well strong!
Last night we got home pretty late, had something to eat on the way back and napped until the football came on at 2am and watched that in our room with a mountain of crisps.
Today is pretty low key. We had beer and curry for breakfast, Ben is buying me a dress, we might get a massage and have a few things to sort out for tomorrow. We'll have a nice meal and some cocktails too.
Tomorrow we'll need to be up to get to the airport through the traffic. It looks like we're staying in quite a nice hotel in Penang and we are going to a revolving restaurant above the city for tea which will be nice. Hopefully we'll be early enough to watch sunrise there.
Reflections on Cambodia-I was quite pleased to leave Cambodia. It poisoned me a lot and the lack of health care was always at the back of my mind, as it was with Laos. Imagine trying to make that long journey to Thailand when you need a hospital. I think Cambodia has been my least favourite country so far. Maybe I've forgotten how hard China was but China certainly was an adventure. I enjoyed our day at the temples and the things we saw and leant about the genocide were both tough to take and interesting and I really liked Kep. We saw an awful lot more things in China though and learnt a lot about travelling there, good and bad, to set us up for the following months. Cambodia is a very poor country yet nothing seems cheap, there's a desperation that comes across badly and our experience wasn't authentic. Laos was a poor country but it was probably the country where we were hassled the least (apart from China where no one cared about us whatsoever!!!) and you could really get involved with the customs. The people in Laos were our favourites too, they were so friendly and respectful. In places like Thailand and Cambodia, you kind of feel like you're just tolerated really and people can get really nasty. That's just what I think anyway. I'm really looking forward to Malaysia and Indonesia, there seems so much to do!!!