Sen Monorom

What a journey… Like the weekend trip to Kampot, we went out the night before and having only a few hours sleep got up with omelette sarnies to get the coach to Kampon Cham, then we planned to get a pick up truck for the rest of the journey to Sen Monoron, in the very east of Cambodia. I had the worst moment of 6 months during his journey, I actually overheated. Our bus broke down at around 1pm, the hottest part of the day. We sat on the bus for ages silently hoping that the engine would eventually start after so many times of trying. I had to get off and sit under a tree across the road as I was so so hot. Finally another bus comes along and all the passengers from our broken down bus get onto this other one, which was already full. I was squished right in the back basically sitting above the engine which was boiling, I had a family squished next to me. Not the nicest for me who is pretty claustrophobic. The others had to sit on the floor down the isle. I actually overheated and got pretty stressed when we arrived and had no idea where we could get a pick up truck from to take the second half of our journey. Randomly we asked a Khmer man for a taxi, at that second a minibus was driving passed, he put out his hand and there it was. We hopped in, arranged a pretty good price and we were off, the 4 of us in our own minibus to a place called Snoul, apparently this was where the pick up trucks left from. By then we were starving so the minibus stopped and old ladies shoved hard baguettes and overpriced bottles of water in at us through the window. We were all feeling a little delirious after little sleep, the commotion of breaking down, hunger and the heat. But. We were on our way! It took a lot longer that anticipated, trying to communicate with the two men in the front by using the LP phrase book we learnt to say ‘HELP!’ and other ‘emergency phrases’. Not really useful, we really needed to ask them how long till we arrive and where we can stay when we got to Snoul. All they kept saying to us was ‘Knam Bai’ which translates as ‘Eat rice’. I think they wanted a little rice party with us when we got there. It was a pretty funny journey with miscommunication and language barriers with these two men. We realised that we wouldn’t be able to make it to Sen Monorom till the morning as the broken down bus had delayed our journey so we ended up staying in Snoul. We looked it up in the LP and weren’t too excited to hear that quote ‘the best thing about Snoul is the new road which offers a quick way out’. Great. Found some ‘hotel’ that was just weird, covered in beetles and only served pot noodle for breakfast. Had an interesting moto ride to a restaurant with a guy wearing a lovely blue string vest drenched in a dodgey after shave. The whole time in this Snoul place was just so ridiculous I just couldn’t really stop laughing.

So we booked a pick up for the next morning to sit inside with noone else as we were offered to sit on the outside (no thank you) or inside with as many Khmers as they could fit in. Had a slight break down en route, the truck, not me, but I didn’t expect any different! The driver tied something under the van back with a piece of rope while Sandeep and Nina climbed on the outside of the truck to pose for photos!! Next thing we knew a Khmer family were next to us staring as and intrigued by our cameras, white skin and blonde hair. We really were in the middle of nowhere so thank god the truck was fixed and we were back en route. Interesting bumpy and very dusty orange road but we made it!

The east of Cambodia seems like a completely different country to what I am used to, the countryside is a lot more baron with no green rice fields, but brown trees and orangey brown roads. We wandered a little, had some noodles and bought some ‘gay’ cushions that were recommended for the elephant trek. We thought we’d head to a place that was recommended in the LP for dinner and a drinkie, the map/my map reading was so wrong that we wandered for a while before we finally found the sign, pointing into the woods!! It was pitch black by this time, and there were no lights, we followed the little trail in between the trees and 2 pitbulls came running out at us. We had ended up at this ladies wooden house that she claims is a restaurant. Well, the food was incredible, and it was a nice atmosphere sitting outside in her garden. It was a bit of a surreal night as this lady was pretty crazy, she was Dutch and had lived in Cambodia for years and years. . She had many stories to tell and I have included some quotes that she dropped into conversation whereby Sanna and I would glance at each other quickly to see that we were both worried about her ‘drugging, killing and stuffing us to keep in her bedroom’. These were the thoughts running through my head while Nina was chatting away to her!

Some quotes from the crazy lady…

‘Geckos, they love their booze’
‘Have you ever dealt with snake shit?’
‘Surprisingly many tourists fall off their elephants’
‘Just wee out in the front garden, everyone else does’
‘Have you ever dealt with a python?’
‘If you ever see anyone being strangled by their pet…cold water. Cold water’

While we were there a couple came in, had a drink and left pretty quickly. Wihn, from Indonesia and Crystal from Belgium.

The elephant trek was great, Nina and I named ours Roy and he was a bit of a funny one, he had some itching problems and likes to stop and itch his bum up against the trees, sending Nina and I to one side of the tiny wooden seat, holding on to the front and each other so not to fall out!! We had a little boy mahout, he must have been about 8…there was an older boy but he disappeared after 5 minutes into a hut so we were left with Roy, the little rascal and the little boy to keep control of him. He was a very hungry ellie and liked to pull huge branches off trees and green bamboo out of the ground along the way! Sanna and Sandeep’s ellie just wandered along with no itching or hunger problems.

We stopped off half way for some ant/rice/veg and a swim in the river fully clothes, khmer style. The elephants were led into the river by the mahouts and Nina and I went in with them, helping to wash them down. It was such an amazing experience!! The elephants stood up with us sitting bareback on them and walked back up the bank into the jungle. I actually felt safer bareback on the elephant as when I was sitting on it in the wooden carriage I noticed that the palm that was holding it onto the elephant was so close to snapping, I was pretty scared as the elephants were trekking up a hill through the jungle and I had images of Sandeep and I flying off the back. When we got off at the end, the girls said that I had turned white from fear!

We stayed in the village, in a ‘mushroom hut’ which was made from wood and leaves. We had a bit of a rice wine party with the villagers, whereby if they pour you another shot, you can’t say no! ‘Chol Moy’ ‘Cheers’ ‘Post’ ‘Scholl’ shot after shot after shot. The men went for some late night snacks and came back with whole frogs and peanuts. Interesting combination. They just chewed on the frogs, crunching on the bones. I’ve had frog before but these smelt so bad, I think they must have been cooked the day or two before… I opted out and stuck with peanuts!

Bed time was interesting, we were staying in the chief of the villages mushroom hut, it was getting cold and was nice to find a open fire in the middle of this tiny hut. Half way through the night I woke up to the feeling of ants crawling through my hair, over my face and body. It was such a horrible feeling but there was no light, maybe that was a good thing. I guessed that there was a trail of ants on my pillow! I put my head at the other end of the ‘bed’ and got back to sleep, waking up now and again to the footsteps of rats running our ‘bed’….