Hello y’all,
Let me start where I left off in my last email, way back in April. At that time I was about to go to Vietnam. Well I went to Saigon and the Mekong Delta (all in the very southern part of Vietnam) and the top 3 impressions I come away with were:
According to the guidebook no self-respecting backpacker should be without, the CIA World Factbook, Vietnam is 1 of the world’s 5 communist states. Those states are China, Cuba, North Korea, Laos, and SRV (The Socialist Republic of Vietnam – not to be confused with Special Reconnaissance Vehicle or Safety Relief Valve). According to the same CIA World Factbook, Communism is “a system of government in which the state plans and controls the economy and a single – often authoritarian – party holds power”. The SRV government has less and less of a hand in planning the economy these days, but it is still a one party state where you can be arrested for publicly criticising the government on grounds of being an “agitator” or “endangering national unity”. So I had to keep my tendencies to agitate and endanger national unity in check.
In June I returned to New Zealand for about 3 weeks. I spent my time with friends, family and the International Film Festival. It had been 1.5 years since I was last in NZ and I noticed that time has an effect on things. When things are slowly changing around you, you don’t really notice it but 1.5 years on I saw new businesses, new roads, and that some of the places of my old memories do not exist. As well as that, I had changed, which all added up to the NZ I left not being the NZ I returned to.
Back to Ratanakiri and I have been a bit of a celebrity lately, after my premier on provincial television (it runs for a good solid 30 mins each day) in an advertisement for an English school. I am the tourist who walks up to a shop but the vendor cannot speak English. Her daughter can and closes the sale – and that’s why you should send your children to Krou Yoeung Centre to learn English (so the ad goes).
There’s been a recent promotion for the “Tiger” beer brand in Cambodian, you flip the tab on the can and underneath you can win various prizes. A friend and I went to a restaurant where we proceeded to win about 3 free cans of Tiger beer. Great we thought, until the bill came and we weren’t given the beers free but had to pay half price. Why? Because the Tiger company gives you the beer free, but you still have to pay the restaurant their profit. Not quite my definition of “free”, but this is Cambodia.
Speaking about restaurants, one of the more interesting (or should I say bizzare) restaurants I have been to is Pyongyang Restaurant in Phnom Penh. The restaurant is North Korean, which you should know by now as 1 of the world’s 5 communist states. The waitresses wear strange ball gowns and try the hard sell with the North Korean wine. When they are not trying to sell the wine they break out into revolutionary song, dance, and harp playing. A strange place, not doubt as is North Korea.
I’ve caught up with a few visitors in the last couple of months. The first was a friend I had made while hitch hiking in France last year. Congratulations for being the first person I know from outside Cambodia to make it to Ban Lung, Ratanakiri! Her and her friends were the first to take the new tours being offered in Virachey National Park were I work. The second visitor was international man of mystery Mr Steve S. Previously shoulder tapped to study the Bogs of Belarus for British American Taboo, Mr Steve declined and instead packed up for a world trip. He was on the road when he stopped into Phnom Penh. Most recently my father visited in early November and we travelled to Siem Reap, and Hanoi and Hoi An in Vietnam. I think my father’s highlight was a ride we took on motorbikes along tiny dirt tracks and through villages to reach an overgrown temple some 2 hours out in the countryside.
Cambodia has a new king! At the start of November the new King was crowned. Whilst the previous King liked to sing to the public, the new King can sing and dance. Before becoming King he was, among other things, a ballet dancer. The streets were packed with people and a public holiday declared during the 3 day coronation. As for the old king, you can visit the royal blog in French here.
My contract is finishing at the end of this year, after which I will be unemployed and looking for the next opportunity, which could include study. I am thinking of travelling in Asia during Jan and Feb and then heading back to NZ in early March.
