APRIL 10 - 16, 2002: One of the many memorable scenes from Apocalypse Now is where Willard reveals the details of his mission in pursuit of Colonel Kurtz: from Vietnam he takes a boat up the Mekong river, into Cambodia.  So we decide to take the same route.  Except Willard didn’t have to endure the border check. Willard had it easy.

We have joined a tour -- the best way into Cambodia as they handle all the paperwork -- starting from Chao Doc, Vietnam.  With another six people, we board a speedboat.  After about two hours, we get a sudden rain shower.  The boat roof leaks.  Lots.  Another hour and we are at the border.  The rain now dissipated to a light drizzle, we head up a dirt riverbank to a few huts where we fill out some forms, wait awhile, and go through a police check.  We think we might be done, but alas, we have only exited Vietnam, and are in a Danteian No Man’s Land.  Back to the boat, another hundred yards, and this time we are to disembark with our bags.  This is an old-style border crossing: another waiting area, more forms, different frowning uniforms checking our papers, carry our bags 100 feet down a narrow dirt road, stop at a small booth, squint at the guard, stumble over the uneven dirt ground past the barbed wire and young guys holding large guns, and there you have it: Cambodia. 

Which just means another three hours on a different boat, then to a makeshift harbor.  We are to disembark again, with bags, but this time to do so requires walking on a plank about one foot wide and 20 feet long, from the bow of the boat to the muddy riverbank.  The plank, fairly old, bows under the weight of each passenger, in fact bending about a full six inches under the brown Mekong, which rolls on about mid-calf.  At least nobody falls.  Up the slippery bank, we bundle tightly into a van and bounce along a dirt road for another two hours.  Three vehicles and eight hours later, we arrive into the armpit that is Phnom Penh.

Central Phnom Penh is Third World, with a column-cracked, leaning-to-one-side, plaster-crumbling, capital “T.”  It does not help that we are here in April, the hottest month of the year.  After initially being solicited by some menacing young guys with eyes redder than goblins, we hop in two rickshaws and go a few kilometers to check for a room at the Foreign Correspondent’s Club (FCC), mainly a bar but with three large rooms to rent, along an attractive stretch of the river. They have a cancellation.  They have free internet access and local phone calls.  We take it.  Both of us as grimy as we have ever been, the Mekong still dripping its unknown bacteria from our sneakers, we shower, deliciously, and head one flight up for a marvelous western burger and beers. What can we say: We are soft.

Transportation around Phnom Penh is primarily by moto: a 150cc or so scooter.  We hop on one the next day, me behind the driver and Heather sidesaddle on the rear.  With only three people we are pretty normal; we count several motos with entire families of five or six (at least three children under 10).  We do some errands (bank, visa) and pop into Wat Phnom, which is notable mainly for the monkeys who loiter around the ground.  Tamed, they clutch my finger in search of food, and frown at me when none is forthcoming. It is early in the afternoon.  Heather grabs my finger and frowns.  So we go to lunch.

Afterwards we head to Tuol Sleng, a former school turned into an interrogation house and prison by the Khmer Rouge (KR) under Pol Pot, and now a museum.  We are offered a tour, which we gladly accept.  Our guide is a woman of perhaps late 30s, and like virtually all Cambodians of her generation, she has felt the KR genocide personally: both her father and brother were among the estimated 2 million executed.  The museum has been maintained as it was found just after the regime fell and the KR fled, with a photo of what the liberators first saw there: usually a prisoner, bloodied, dead or just barely alive.  Another room has row after row of portrait photographs, taken by the KR for documentation.  The instruments of detention and torture here are very simple: iron bars, buckets, electric wires and pliers.  All of it horrible and very real.  We leaved numbed.

The next day we see the Grand Palace.  It is mainly remarkable by contrast: an oasis of sprawling green, leafy grounds, clean and with a quiet beauty.  Within it, we see the Silver Pagoda, so named as its floor is made of tiles of silver.  We also go to the market, which is like many others, except the entrance is populated with amputees, the legacy of the millions of land mines planted in Cambodia by various parties.  One is tragedy enough, but seeing so many is chilling.  There is a band of musicians playing with a hat out, and one does a double take when you realize they are all amputees.

Now to the part where my parents disown me.  Growing up, I was not allowed to have any toy guns, or anything even remotely resembling a gun (I wasn’t allowed to have a skateboard either, but I avenged that as an adult by eventually buying a motorcycle).  So this being Cambodia, and since I am the 50% of my marriage who has never fired a gun, we head to a shooting range.  When we get there, we sit at a table and are given a menu – in exactly the same style and font as those we see at local restaurants – which list our choices.  Various kinds of American, Russian and Chinese guns are detailed, with the number of bullets and price for a round.  Not listed is the special item: a rocket launcher, which costs $200 a pop.  When we ask they say they average about three per month.  Although tempted by the M16, we settle for the AK47 as our entrée, and will think about dessert.

I’ve never even held a gun before, much less fired one, and I am surprised by how easy it is.  The rifle fits comfortably against my shoulder and I squeeze out a few shots.  When Heather does the same my ear protection is off and I am amazed at the sound: loud and hollow.  We each do a round, hitting our target probably less than ten times.  The ground in the room is covered with spent shells.  For good measure, as an aperitif, we also try a .38 caliber revolver.  I smack two of the three targets.  Heather is somewhat dismayed that, after so much BB gun practice with her brother and cousin she isn’t better at the revolver.  But maybe she is just more of a heavyweight: she kicks ass at the AK47.  We don’t spring for the rocket launcher.  I don’t run out for my NRA membership card afterwards; I still believe that there is a restrictive clause in the Second Amendment.  If anything, the ease and power of shooting make me more supportive of some gun control.  But I can’t deny: it was a rush. 

Back to the FCC and some beer on the bar overlooking the street as night falls.  In the first glimmering of darkness we suddenly see an elephant and rider come into view on the promenade, then suddenly step into the street.  Traffic spurts then continues on around them; the elephant is huge, towering above the cars and SUVs, its lumbering body shifting with each massive step.  None of the locals bats an eye.  In a few minutes it is gone. 

The Cambodians we have met have been, without fail, a cheerful, engaging group, always looking to practice their English.  They also have the funny habit of giggling, often longer and louder the more serious the subjects.  In the book I am reading this is taken as a survival mechanism: the previous 40 years of war, genocide and turmoil can only be addressed sanely with humor.  I’m not sure I buy this, but it is an infectious habit.  As the last light shimmers across the river, I am surprised to find I have a small, grudging affection for Phnom Penh.  One also has sympathy for a city that was completely destroyed and deserted less than 20 years ago, and some understanding of why it is the way it is.  I suspect a few more midday hours at the city center would kill it, but the affection is real.

The next morning we are up at dawn for the boat to Siem Reap.  It is a bright, sunny morning; we sit on the roof of the boat along with many others, all clutching our copies of Lonely Planet Cambodia.  The first hour, still cool as we motor up the river, is quite nice.  Unfortunately it is a seven-hour trip.  After hour three, the heat is too much for Heather, who goes below to a crowded cabin that stinks of urine, perhaps because a little girl pees on the floor.  It is scorching hot. We enter lake Tonle Sap, a lake that, during the rainy season, expands to four times its size.  Unfortunately it is the dry season (cross reference: Really Freaking Hot above).  Finally we get to a sort of floating road stop, where we transfer to smaller boats.  They have about eight seats each.  About 18 people board each one.  Unsurprisingly, we get stuck in the mud.  Our driver jumps off, but can’t free us, so we wait until another boat pulls up, split the passengers and we putter along again.  At the shore the people soliciting for hotels are three-deep.  We have reserved a driver, who takes us to the hotel.  When we get there he is crestfallen to learn we already have a guide for the nearby temples.  It is an odd feeling here, as one’s whimsical desires of where to stay and with whom to tour make so much difference in individual lives.

Early the next morning we head off to the temples of Ankor with our guide Maray, recommended by the Seligs, friends of my parents.  We stroll through the large grounds of Angkor Thom; soon the heat is intense and we take a break at midday, then back in the afternoon to Ta Prohm and Ankor Wat.  The sheer size and majesty of the temples is stunning, as is the intricate bas-relief stone carvings.  Maray takes us outside the usual tourist path, pointing out all sorts of details we should have missed. Ta Prohm, which has been intentionally (and controversially) left to the ravages of the jungle is particularly interesting, with gigantic trees growing from, or around, the large stone structures.  Watching the sun vanish from the towers of Ankor Wat is quite spectacular – if one looks in the other direction of the exodus of tourists heading over the bridge, time seems suspended.

We don’t do much else in Siem Reap: a motorized rickshaw gives us a quick tour of the decentralized town, and we visit an artist’s school, which takes rural youth into a year-long internship program where they learn wood or stone carving, or silk weaving, before returning to their villages.  Started by a foundation, the school is now self-sufficient.   Greeting us at the entrance is an immense stone carving of a seated Buddha, about four feet tall and, if one believes the tag, soon heading to a collector in Seattle.  It is an interesting place, and like the country, now full of hope.  That afternoon, a slight weariness sets in – we have been on the road for 9 weeks and begin to feel the stress of traveling in Asia during the hottest time of the year.  To combat this, Heather sneaks into the plushest hotel in town to enjoy an afternoon at the pool, while I blissfully spend the entire afternoon in our air-conditioned room channel switching between 2 bad Keneau Reeves movies.  In the evening we find an excellent rooftop bar at The Soup Dragon, tended by an Australian.  We booze it up, quickly catching a buzz that we lose with slow service at a mediocre dinner.  The next morning brings a long travel day and our return to Thailand.

~ continue chronologically to Thailand ~

~ continue by country to China ~