Old habits die hard and I decide to spoil myself yet again and take the Mekong Express Limousine Bus, rather than the ordinary stopping one with chickens, back to Phnom Penh. I make my way by tuk tuk through the quiet streets of Sihanoukville at 7am to the bus station (see pic), smaller obviously than Phnom Penh, but bustling with tea and coffee sellers in makeshift cafes with colourful plastic seats, their pots steaming away in the very slightly cooler morning air, various food stalls, beggars and people milling everywhere, tourists and locals alike. The buses here, as well as local, also go to the Thai Border as well as Phnom Penh. I find my bus – there are lot of different bus companies here in Cambodia, and I can now add the Mekong bus company to Paramount Angkor Express and Soraya Transport. For my $6US (about a 250kms journey) I get aircon, breakfast (bread rolls with unidentified pate type filling), cake with Vitamin C (!), a bottle of Mekong Express water (I hope not direct from the river….) and of course the refreshing towel. There is also a loo on board. And as well as the onboard entertainment in the form of the ever present karaoke, there was also a film about a chimp – a western film, but dubbed in Khmer, so I was sadly unable to follow the plot. The hostess, dressed in a uniform reminiscent of Singapore Airlines was also very informative. Just as the karaoke video quietened down and you were about to nod off, on she came again with information about the areas we were passing through – first a long speech in Khmer followed by the same in pidgin English. This was repeated several times as she (I assume) extolled the virtues of each area…. It was the express – the only one stop we made on National Route 4 was the one with the temple where all transport stops, every car, lorry or bus, to make an offering of bananas for a safe trip. Am pleased to say the offering worked and we arrive safely and exactly on time 4 hours later at the Riverside bus station. I feel like an old colonial hand now as I leap into my tuk tuk for the FCC, but when I answered the usual question from the driver “where are you from”, I was immediately offered “smoke, skunk” – I did my best British memsahib bit and refused his kind offer with pursed lips to show my disapproval. Perhaps Sihanoukville has rubbed off on me and I now look like a real backpacker. He was surprised – he obviously does a good trade with the English and tells me his English teacher smokes it all the time… his English was very good, so perhaps it helps his teacher do his job… On arrival at the FCC I am greeted with a huge smile from my Barbie pink tuk tuk driver of last time I was here – perhaps he’s been waiting in hope ever since…. Another lovely stylish room here at the FCC with a huge marble/stone bath and huge rain shower. Just hope the hot water is up to it. And on to Raffles Phnom Penh for a stylish farewell to Cambodia and a champagne cocktail in the rarified atmosphere of the Elephant Bar. Followed down the main street in my tuk tuk by an elephant, fitting as I was on my way to the Elephant Bar, he must have known! (see vid). Raffles really is another world, beautiful, but you could be anywhere in the world, totally isolated from the outside. And obviously not a tuk tuk kind of a place, it took me ages to find one to get back to the FCC – but when I do, we drive past a very small naked child playing with the rubbish in the dusty gutter – quite a way away I then see his mother who was sitting in what looks like her “home” with another small child. It was a platform of wood on the pavement with her few possessions surrounding her. It really brought home the gap between the rich and the poor here. I will remember so much else about Cambodia too – a society that has no coins, just notes, and mainly they are dollars (even the ATM’s give out dollars now) – riel notes are only used as “change” in small denominations. The great scenery, the history both ancient and modern, people cooking and selling all sorts of food on little charcoal stoves, the bus journeys on the manic roads, the miles of paddy fields. But the people seem lovely, and always friendly. And whilst the tuk tuk drivers and market stall holders are always up for the highest price they can get (and who can blame them), you still get the feeling that they are generally very honest. I bought some things from the Supermarket the other day and left a large bottle of water behind by mistake. 2 days on when I next went in, the girl beamed at me and told me she had been waiting for me to come back so she could give me my water. And while the 30p or so it cost was not a lot to me, it would have been a lot to her. I remain as charmed by Cambodia now as I was on Day One.
