Angkor WHAAATT!!!

OK, so it's been about 10 days since I left Cambodia, and if I don't write something about my final vacation week soon, I'll never get around to it. On to the highlights!

Alone with the waves and the cows.

So in the last entry I mentioned that I took a bus from Phnom Penh to Sihanoukville, which is in southern Cambodia along its relatively short stretch of coastline. I'd heard a lot of negative things about Sihanoukville, along the lines of it being crap or dirty or a waste of time, but I really enjoyed my 2 days there. I think the beaches are underrated, honestly, and I didn't even get a chance to go see any of the offshore islands which are supposed to be stunning. I stayed in a guesthouse in the main tourist area of Serendipity Beach and I honestly wish I'd taken the time to find something more off the beaten track, as some of the isolated clusters of huts and bungalows I saw on my long long beach walks looked pretty damn enticing. Serendipity is at the far western end of Occhuteal Beach (I still don't know how to pronounce that), which is a white sand beach probably a couple of miles long. On my first day, I walked along the water's edge, feeling the warm waves lap up around my ankles as I directed myself eastward, watching the string of bars and restaurants gradually peter into nothingness as I marched further and further down the coast. At the end of the beach, I ran into a big headland that separates it from the next massive stretch of sand, Otres Beach. So after walking over the giant hill, I naturally decided to walk the full length of Otres as well, basically just going until I could go no more. By the time I reached the end of Otres, I had been walking for 2 hours and there was no one around but me and a bunch of cows (yes, cows on the beach, which is awesome). The water was shallow for quite a long way out and I just wandered in, basking in the unbelievable weather and quiet solitude. It's so rare to be in such a beautiful place, especially a beach, and just have no one in sight. Man, I loved it.

Things Get Heavy

Whoa. Well, I guess this vacation couldn't all be frivolous fun.

The view from my bus window for a full 2 hours.

On Friday afternoon, I was scheduled to take a bus from Battambang to the Cambodian capital, Phnom Penh, a trek which should usually take about 6 hours. Sam, my couch surfing host in PP, was supposed to pick me up from the bus station. Unfortunately, our bus broke down on the side of the road in the afternoon heat about 2 hours into the trip, leaving me and a bunch of Khmer people (no other foreigners) stranded until another bus could be sent to fetch us. In the end, the trip took a full 8 1/2 hours, which ate up my entire day and resulted in Sam missing my pick-up. Upon arriving in PP, I had to hunt down a guesthouse to sleep for the night. If there was one good thing about the breakdown, though, it's that it helped me realize that I am indeed capable of being in such situations without stressing or freaking out. I mean, I was stuck in the middle of nowhere in Cambodia with nary a soul that spoke more than a couple words of English, and truly had no idea what the hell was going on, or if we were going to get picked up, or how I was going to contact Sam (my Korean phone doesn't work in this country)... yet precisely because of the complete impossibility of getting any answers, I just sat back and listened to my iPod and zoned out, having no other choice but to just trust that something would work out. If this had happened in a place where everyone spoke English, everyone would be throwing fits and my stress level would subsequently be up to here. On that note, it was also somewhat enlightening to see the way Khmer people just sat back and waited, almost shrugging as if these things happen all the time. No freaking out or shouting here. Just acceptance and patience. Says a lot about the culture and also says a lot about the country's level of development that bus breakages are just par for the course. (I should note that about half of all the country's buses are old hand-me-downs from Korea, as evidenced by all the hangeul written on everything. So clearly these buses are not in the fresh stages of life.)