Phnom Penh (Dec 29-31am)

The road south from Siem Reap was bordered with little shacks and acres of field and wet rice paddy, punctuated by the occasional lone palm tree. The bus stopped twice for refreshments and washroom breaks, each time at a little roadside market with dusty stalls selling fruit and drinks. On one such occasion, the fare was a little different - fried tarantula. I had to try. It was coated with a sauce not unlike blackened chicken, and tasted quite good when not distracted by the revulsion of what it was you were eating. The locals were buying bagfuls, and I watched to see how they nibbled. It was like the precise methodology of an Oreo cookie or chocolate Easter Bunny. Pick the legs off first, then pop the fat abdomen into your mouth and give it a hardy crunch.

I arrived in Phnom Penh to find that my previous hotel had arranged to have me met at the bus stop, as there was a cyclo driver waiting to drive me and another to their sister location. We took the cyclo just to get ourselves into the thick of accomodations. It turned out that the place was a bit of a dive, so my companion headed off to look elsewhere in the area by the river, while I did the same, leaving both the cyclo driver and hotel manager sputtering and yelling out renewed sales pitches.

Walking north through run-down, tightly packed chaos of curbside transactions, I checked out a few places that were unfortunately booked, and arriving at Last Guest House. The landlady was Cambodian, but spoke better French than English, so I finally got an opportunity to practice speaking another language. My French isn't great, but it is a heck of a lot better than my Khmer.

After a much needed shower, I sat down to figure out my plan of attack. The way my timing had worked out, I had late afternoon of this day and all of the next to explore Phnom Penh, far too little time to absorb more than the superficial layers of this city. Still, I wanted to work efficiently with the time I had, and charted out a rough schedule while I dined on a "happy" pizza from Happy Herb's pizza. Felt kinda funny. Decided it would be fun to play some music, and so I went to a venue and spoke to the musicians playing that night. Soon, it was back to the guest house to retrieve my horn.

As I was leaving, I happened to ask the landlady how I late I could get back in. She said, "Oh, late, 11pm." Eleven? I explained that I (now) had a show to play, and that 11 was waaay too early. She said, "OK, 12." Twelve? After some deft bartering with times, reminding me of my pleas to stay a bit longer at the high school dance, I ended up giving her an out-and-out bribe, something which didn't seem to work as a teen. Talk about pay-to-play. I vowed that closing time would be one of the first things I would investigate when sizing up future accomodations. I arrived back at the Memphis Pub, and played three songs of the band's second set. Not my best work, but the gap in playing I'd had taken Thailand was catching up with me.

The next morning, I started at a respectable time, and began to work through the city as per my strategy. First, I hired a motorbike, and entered the stream of motos coursing along Sisowath Quay. I cruised along Tonle Sap, the river which connected the complexes of Angkor to Phnom Penh to the ocean. While there wasn't a lot of concern for lane markers, or even which side of the road to drive on, for that matter, the traffic was fairly simple to negotiate, as everyone kept at a speed of 50 km/h. I checked out my primary destinations, which were further afield, then headed back into the central area to fill my remaining time with the ranked items on my list.

First, I hit Psar Tuoi Tom Phong, also known as the Russian Market. My hunger for knick-knacks and souveniers had apparently been sated by my shopping frenzy in Siem Reap, so I moved on to the National Museum. The museum is home to many of the treasures recovered from Angkor. After about an hour of wandering through the displays of fine jewelry and statues, I decided I'd digested enough Buddhas, nagas (multi-headed snakes), garudas (half-man, half-bird creature ridden by Vishnu) and apsaras (elegant traditional dancers) to hold me for a while in that department as well.

I wound the rest of the day eating and drinking in the restos along the Tonle Sap strip, touristy places which offered local and Western dishes at fairly cheap prices. By Canadian standards, anyway. A shame to not stray beyond the tourist ghetto, but it had been a full day, and I did pretty good with the time allowed.