The Ghost of Thomas Hardy and Kamikaze Hookers

My last few days in Ho Chi Minh were a wondrous time. We took a day trip to the Cao Dai Great Temple, 100km north of HCMC. Cao Daism is a perplexing religion, something to do with seances and the spirit of William Shakespeare, Joan of Arc and Thomas Hardy. I've seen a lot of temples recently, but this one took the freaking biscuit. A cacophony of colours, music and a ceremony like I've never seen, they believe in "the existence of the soul, the use of mediums to communicate with the Aspiritual world, and belief in one god".

Blew my mind.

Onwards to the CuChi Tunnels, where I conquered my claustrophobia to get down and dirty in the 200km of tunnels dug during the Vietnam War and saw traps laid for the Americans with spikes up to your eyeballs. We ate a weird tunnel dinner of some kind of nutty sweet potato with sugar and peanuts and I lost my fear of dysentery.

Waving goodbye to Saigon, we headed up to the Central Highlands, this was the first time I've worn socks in a month. While the others took an early start in the mountains, I opted for a day in the city. It was cold. And if you thought I was shitting myself in a tuk tuk, you should have seen me on the back of a motorbike. Clinging. On. For. Dear. Life. I took a cable car up to a Chinese pagoda, and paid a visit to the local's "crazy house". Kind of like Disneyland but a but shitter. It felt good to not be sweating in 30 degree heat and I think it's at this point that I give a shout to my lovely travel buddies The Laxton-Badleys and Jo-Jo.. Thanks for taking me under your wing. Drinking vodka under a mosquito net will never be the same. I'm praying for immunity to Japanese Encephalitis.

A cramped bus ride later, we've arrived in Nha Trang.. THE BEEEEEEEACH! I sat today on paradise sands, burning my belly, reading my Kindle (I'm on The Help- nailed One Day in two bus rides- I heart you, Dex), drinking beer and fighting off kamikaze hookers. "You want pringles?" "no". "you want massage?". "no". "you want chupa chup?" "no." "you want bracelet?" "no". "you want ladyboy?" " NO!". I bought a lucky Buddha bracelet. It was the least I could do.

The Vietnamese are the cheeriest, cheekiest people I've ever met. The Beef Pho is to die for and the diversity of the country is sending me crazy. I don't want to leave but I've booked a flight for November 5th back to Thailand. I'll be sorry to say goodbye.

Yo Chi Minh!

My last day in Phnom Penh was spent mingling with the sex tourists on the riverfront. After the trauma of The Killing Fields, I thought I would spend a quiet day wandering the city, but couldn't really escape the pervy old men with their giggling lady friends. After trotting merrily through a Buddhist temple for an hour thinking it was the Royal Palace, I then found the Royal Palace. Seen one Royal Palace, seen them all. After meeting Chris and Mangesh for dinner in a restaurant that trains street kids in cookery and hospitality (great to see some familiar faces), it was time to get out of dodge. I've taken a delightful souvenir of a leg full of bed bug bites - who knew that in my room with air con and Glee on cable TV and a minibar and crisp cotton sheets I would have been mauled by these little bleeders, looking like I may as well be carrying a frigging bell round my neck.

The border crossing into Vietnam was much more civilised, and I arrived in Ho Chi Minh City to a great family run guesthouse. I spent the first day on a tour of the Reunification Palace, a bizarre time warp with a wisecracking tour guide who I wanted to wrap up and ship straight home to keep me entertained with one liners when I get back. Onto the War Remnants Museum, which was reasonably harrowing, but which I soon managed to erase from my mind with a hilarious dinner on a boat. I'm getting better - I'm eating meat and not fearing instant salmonella so much.

We ended up in Lush, a club in central Ho Chi Minh, which can only be described as Vietnam Does Garlands. A Michael Jackson impersonator abseiled from the ceiling into the crowd to the strains of Beat It. A line of 1920's flapper girls doing the conga trying to sell you cigarettes. A gangsta Vietnamese rapper. 4 guys with boxes on their heads doing a synchronised dance to Adele.

I love you, Vietnam.

After a hilarious trip to a water park, I had to say goodbye to my glasses. It's okay - I didn't lose them, just stored for safekeeping while I shot down waterslides which thank god I couldn't see. I swear I've picked up Typhoid but as I said, I know I was having fun, I just couldn't see it.

30p beers on plastic kindergarten chairs in the street and a guy swallowing a saw, followed by eating hot coals, followed by shoving a live snake up his nose and bringing it out of his mouth and flossing his sinus, I have to stay here. Going to meander up to Hanoi in the north. Thailand can wait.

The Killing Fields of Choeung Ek.

I've arrived safely in Phnom Penh after a reasonably hideous 6 hour bus ride. I caught up with Fran and Beckie who I am basically stalking round Southeast Asia (sorry girls). Phnom Penh is a bustling city, with a beautiful riverfront and lots of bars and restaurants. Visited the National Museum yesterday, followed by cocktails on the riverfront and the most amazing traditional Khmer Amok, a White fish curry served in a banana leaf. I'm seriously going to leave my heart in Cambodia.

My first stop today was The Killing Fields, around 15km south of the city. The Killing Fields were basically a mass execution site where the Khmer Rouge would take prisoners from the city for execution and burial. It's estimated a million people, up to 300 a day at this particular site, were killed in the 4 years of the regime. Doctors, teachers, lawyers, pop stars, movie stars. People who wore glasses or spoke a foreign language were killed, deemed "intellectuals" and a threat to this fanatical regime.

The memorial site is set within an old orchard, and is incredibly peaceful. But it is difficult to even begin to put this place into words. I took the audio tour, and at one point was instructed to look down at the ground. There were fragments of bone, teeth and old clothes coming up from the mass graves below, revealed by the heavy rain. The caretakers of the site collect the newly uncovered remains every few months.

Perhaps the most difficult part was the so called "Killing Tree", which was situated next to a mass grave where the remains of women and children had been discovered. The officers of the Khmer Rouge would swing the babies by their legs and smash their heads against the tree until they were dead. A Khmer Rouge slogan was that "to remove the grass, you must also destroy the roots".

As I emerged into the quiet daylight, red eyed and exhausted, my tuk tuk driver Chey asked me how I felt.

I couldn't answer him.

I continued on to the Genocide Museum in the centre of Phnom Penh, to piece together some more of the history at the Tuol Sleng prison,or S-21. It is a former primary school, used by the Khmer Rouge as a detention centre and torture house. The instruments of torture remain in the cells, along with galleries of the prisoners' faces. I read that in Cambodian tradition, without a proper burial, the ghosts of the dead remain present on earth. It was a startling and terrifying experience. Perhaps what I find most incomprehensible is how a people could ever recover from something like this. The Cambodian people are without doubt the friendliest, most welcoming I've ever encountered, but I'm finding it hard to put into perspective.

On to Vietnam on Wednesday.

Water Water Everywhere..

..And not a drop to drink. Unless you want Dengue Fever. It is with a rather heavy heart that I have decided to leave Siem Reap and head to the capital of Cambodia, Phnom Penh. The novelty of wading through a foot of floodwater to get anywhere has kind of worn off, and although I would have liked to have stayed longer, I've seen all the temples I wanted to see and decided it would be better to leave on a high. I'm tagging along with a guy from my guesthouse on the 7am bus tomorrow. Apparently it's a step up from the bus the locals use which usually has chickens in the gangway, but still, 6 hours will be a treat. Hopefully I can sleep.

After deciding to have a day in the city yesterday, and stopping on Pub Street (think South East Asia meets Magaluf) at lunch to write in my journal and "reflect", I got sloshed on my own on the super strength local beer and had to have a 3 hour nap.I did stumble across a number of specialist crocodile leather shops on the main strip though, which is where it turns out the crocs have got to, in the shape of gross handbags and purses.

Today was Day 3 of temples, which started in the most almighty thunderstorm and a moto ride to Bayon. This place was immense, and an early morning start in the rain meant it was almost deserted. It felt like an area in Disneyworld, and in my bright yellow poncho, I half expected to turn the corner and see a neon sign saying WELCOME TO ANGKOR WORLD, GET READY TO GET WET! and for Mickey to be there trying to sell me a ten dollar shake. But it was real, or maybe unreal is a better description.

Onwards on the Grand Circuit, and more temples, I knew I'd seen enough. Tired and wet, it's time to move on.

Cambodian Counselling.

A conversation with a Cambodian street kid went a little something like this:

"You want to buy my book?"
"No thank you."
"How long you been in Cambodia?"
"Just a few days."
"Where you from?"
"England."
"Where you live?"
"London."
"You want to buy my book? Please mister!"
"No thank you."
"The Prime Minister of England is David Cameron. Before him Gordon Brown. Before him Tony Blair. Before him John Major. Before him Margaret Thatcher. Before him Callaghan."
"Oh very good!"
"You know there are 65 million people in Britain and 1 million people in London."
"Oh wow!"
"Britain has four countries. The capital of England is London. The capital of Scotland is Edinburgh. The capital of Wales is Cardiff. The capital of North Ireland is Belfast."
"You're really good at geography!"
"You on your own?"
"Yes."
"Where your girlfriend?"
"I don't have one."
"You know why you don't have girlfriend?"
"Why?"
"Because you don't buy my book. Bye bye."

Angkor WHAT!?

After a restless first night's sleep in a malarone induced delirium, thinking about crocs and snakes and pirates and onward travel, our tuk tuk driver Piri arrived to collect us from the guesthouse at 11am.

I purchased the 3 day temple pass, and for another $12 per day, we were driven around for the whole day to visit the temples of Angkor. Our first stop was of course Angkor Wat, which without exaggerating really does take your breath away. The heat was oppressive , but with each new temple and each new layer of sweat, came another tuk tuk ride with it's cooling breeze and a chance to sit back and take it all in. I resisted doing any Angelina Tomb Raider rolls in Angkor Thom (the 'Great City'), but for the most part did feel like I was on the set of a movie.You have to see this place, it's too difficult to describe in words.

After a long hard days templing, and realising I hadn't eaten anything since breakfast (or, weirdly, been to the toilet), Piri took us to our last stop. Feeling hot, tired, thirsty, sweaty and cranky, the words "ökay, now you climb the hill to watch the sunset" didn't exactly sound like music to my ears. Running on empty, we slogged the last of the way up the hill to the final temple. The cloudy sunset may have been a bit of a damp squib, and the jabbering Korean tourists didn't exactly help, but for a few moments and without sounding like a cheeseball, I really did feel like I'd achieved something, and was at the top of the world.

Today was the second day of touring, which we started 55km out of Siem Reap at Beng Mealea. This was breathtaking. An old, crumbling temple which was once used as a hideout for the Khmer Rouge, the surrounding area had only recently been cleared of landmines. We navigated ourselves through the middle of the building, climbing over rocks and crumbling carvings - again, I'm finding it hard to put into words so will upload a million photos ASAP.

Now, to the floating village. I had no idea what to expect at the floating village. I kind of thought it would be a few crappy souvenir stalls on stilts in water, which you maybe had to get to on an antwacky boat with plastic seats. I was so wrong. We took a dirt track down towards the Tonle Sap, the world's largest body of freshwater, but couldn't get through to the marina where the boats normally leave from. So we were taken on a tiny rowing boat, steered by a 7 year old Cambodian kid, through the flooded forest to catch a larger boat on the Tonle Sap. My sense of geography leaves a lot to be desired, but I didn't even realise we were on a lake it was so vast. The floating village of Kompong Phhluk was incredible; an ethereal, other worldly almost out of body experience. This community of hundreds literally lives on water, for me an assault on the senses and imagination.

Another quick temple, and back into Siem Reap to the night market, where I bought 2 t-shirts and a pair of jarg Ray Bans for about a quid. Some Cambodian street food for another dollar, and 20 fags for 20p (not for me), we headed back to the hostel.

After only a week, I'm getting better at being a traveller. I now only anti-bac 10 times an hour instead of 100 times, and have grown quite fond of the lizards that live outside my room. A cockroach jumped on my neck earlier, and I didn't even scream that loud! Still brushing my teeth with mineral water though.

Having originally been headed to Phnom Penh on Saturday, I've just booked another 3 nights here. I bloody love this place.