Down for breakfast in the hotel at 6.30am this morning. Was a decent breakfast too - fresh omlette and scrambled egg, toast, fruit, cereal, noodles with chicken...

We met at 7am to make our way to Cambodia. We also met the other 3 people who hadn't arrived last night. Bit of a nightmare for the Irish couple though - delayed twice and then....there baggage hasn't arrived! Fortunately they put some spare clothes in their day bag. But they don't know when they will actually get their luggage!

We had a long day ahead of us. 4 hours by private mini bus to the Thailand/Cambodia border with a 30 minute toilet stop. And because of the bad rain last night, some of the roads were flooded - still passable though. First toilet we've encountered that is a western toilet but without flush...it was just this "mini bath" at the side of the toilet that had a scoop/jug that you used to flush the toilet yourself...

We finally got to the border - it was a very busy area with a huge market. We had a break to get some lunch and I had Pad Thai, which wasn't very good.
There's lots of children around the border and in Cambodia. We were told not to give them money because it only encourages their parents to send them out begging on the streets as they get more money - over 50% of Cambodia's population are under 18.

There were then a lot of formalities at the border. First fill out a form to get out of Thailand, then passport control. Then fill out a health form and give that in. Then fill out another form for Cambodia and passport control. It was very tedious and frustrating in the heat!
...we're in Cambodia! The first thing you see when crossing the border are casinos! No idea why this is, forgot to ask. I don't mean a plush street of casinos like Las Vegas though! Lots of people and vehicles around too.

We took a free tourist bus to a tourist centre where we picked up the next private mini-bus to get to our hotel. The roads out from there were filled with shacks - most were old rickety things, with the odd newer one here as there. There was a lot of litter around as well. As we got further from the border and out into the countryside, it was very flat with lush greenery all over - could see quite far into the distance. A lot of the land was flooded - most homes seemed to be protected as they are on stilts but some were not and we went past a primary school which was flooded. The roads are crazy here too - people on mopeds with loads of bags hanging off, one guy on a moped was towing a trailer...with a horse in it, another guy seemed to have made his own motorised trike! Lots of cows tied up to the side of the road too.
That journey took another 2.5 hours.

Finally got to our first stop in Cambodia, Siem Reap, just before 4pm. We had an hour to freshen up before meeting up again to go to the New Hope Cambodia charity (www.newhopecambodia.com). It's a school for children from nursery up to people in their 20's even, all from the slums. They also now have a free surgery for children and pregnant women, and have recently set up a restaurant serving local dishes. This is all paid for as part of our tour.

We met in the lobby at 5, but while we were waiting for everyone, I saw a couple of tuk-tuk drivers outside playing a game. It was a plastic slightly weighted thing with three feathers in and they were kicking it and using their hands to hit it up into the air to pass it to each other - kind of like a shuttle c*** but it's a bit springy. I wanted to have a go so went outside to show them my skills and they let me join in! It's a fun game and very popular in Cambodia and Vietnam apparently. It's like playing keepy-uppy with a football. I kicked thin air a few times and tried to hit it with my left hand but threw my hand at it like a girl and slapped thin air! I did manage to hit it with my head to control it and then kick it to the next person a few times though - they were well impressed!! It was good fun, but I was really sweating afterwards...and then we were going for a meal!

So, I'd finished playing, then we went on the craziest tuk-tuk ever - cooled me down anyway! It was a moped with a carriage attached and could seat 4 people...and four of us actually got in. Then we went on this road called Dancing Road, that was totally filled with potholes so the tuk-tuk was rocking side to side really bad and tilting and their were puddles everywhere. I swear we nearly fell out a few times and I can't believe it didn't just fall flat on it's side!

We made it to New Hope in one piece. And the very first person who shot over to greet us to say hi and shake our hands was a boy called Tuin - he has downs syndrome and his mother doesn't want anything to do with him. He found out about tour companies starting to come to the New Hope centre, so for the past 3 weeks he has been there everyday from when visitors get there and until they leave. He really loves to see people plus the charity keep him fed.

We all got split up and me and Therese went to sit in an English class. When we walked in, they all stood up and said together, welcome teacher... They're really happy to have visitors and they did already have two volunteers from Australia helping in the class. There were students in their aged from 13 up to 22 - about 18 in the class. They were learning things that I don't even understand about superlatives and comparatives etc. Teaching them American English too.... They do a good job of teaching them and they can all speak English pretty well - enough to communicate. We sat in the class for about 30 minutes and had a little chat with them.

After we learnt some English (!), we were taken to their little restaurant for our traditional Cambodian meal - Khmer food. They've recently started renting the little building and have done it all out. It's all basic and run by the local people. We had to take our shoes off and sit at a little low table. So had to sit on a flat cushion with our legs crossed - I can't cross my legs! First dish was fried whole snake and sugared peanuts...yeah, I know, sugared peanuts is weird isn't it? They tasted good actually. As for the snake, that tasted good too - we both tried it! Guess what, just like chicken. The next dish was a type of soup with big pieces of fish and bamboo in there. Then a vegetable curry dish which was lovely. Then thinly sliced pieces of beef with green beans and spinach, and a peppercorn like sauce on the side which was also nice - it's called morning glory. All with rice too. And for desert, tapioca and banana in coconut milk. It was a good meal and we were given information about what the charity does and about the the poverty in the area, by one of the people who help run the place called Ron (I think). It's obviously very sad and wasn't easy to listen to all the awful things that happen hear, from things like malnutrition to no medical care to sex trafficking which includes children. And there are a lot evil westerners that come here for the worst things, preying on the vulnerable children.

Whilst we were having our meal, Ron took some food from ours (all on big places so we just helped ourselves) to give to Tuin. He loves his food and eventually we could hear him asking for more (he just kept pointing over to our table and saying more). So Therese to him some of one of the dishes over. A little later there was another dish that he obviously loved so I took him over some of that. When giving him the food he always said yes and more, and rarely said no - funny little chappie!

We finished up our meals and our tuk-tuks were ready to take us to our next stop - we had to go back on Dancing Road but this time in the dark!

We had a look around the night market (by the way, pretty much everything is in American dollars here - they prefer it other their own currency, Riel). Therese was looking at buying a skirt for the temples. I feel sorry for the people so when they say $8 for a skirt I think oh just give $10 I'm useless at bartering. Therese got it for $5.50!
We then had a look down Pub Street - very very western mainly selling western food. Couldn't believe how many westerners were here and how different that one small area was to the rest of the town. There's loads of fish massage places, massage places, and loads of bars and restaurants.
You also get all the staff from these places trying to get you in their place. They have a really sad look on their face and just seem so disappointed when you don't go in. It must be so demoralizing asking 100's of people and maybe getting one into your place - it's really sad. And the tourist season is only just starting up really.

It's the first place we've been to that's not filled with skyscrapers too.

We headed back to our hotel as we have another early start tomorrow...4.30am!
We decided to sleep in our JagBags (silk sleeping bag) tonight - the room has a few bugs around! I got my JagBag out and was really cringing - its the first time I've used it since the cockroach got into bed with me. Fortunately there were no baby cockroaches in there waiting or me!