Cambodia1

So..I know I have a lot of stuff to write about and pictures to post but it is going to take me a while.


Sooo basically I'll start off with the first couple of days in Cambodia until I get tired for writing.

Thursday at 7 am we all meet downstairs (Audrey a girl from IU, Leo from Switzerland, and James from the UK, the boys both go to school in the UK together). We start off on our long journey that makes our flights cheaper and we are off to Macau. From Macau we arrived in Bangkok (before any of that crazy stuff happened, don't worry!!!) Well we literally leave our plane, go through immigration, check our baggage, shove an ice cream cone from dairy queen in our mouth and board the planed. No time for breathing...whatsoever!

So we arrive in Phnom Penh, Cambodia and it is humid and hot and amazing! We get in a tuk-tuk $7 US ...anywhere to leave the airport...and we are off to our hostel the Top Banana.

First you should know Cambodia is an extremely poor country. Second they except US $ everywhere, its basically mixed in with their money. Third if you are ever in Phnom Penh and are looking for a fun hostel to stay at, Top Banana will spoil you!

So we are in our tuk-tuk riding to our hostel for about 25 minutes, riding through the city. What an experience! We hear music out of speakers larger than all 4 of us. We smell the best bbq we've smelt since being in Asia, we see kids running around, people selling fruit...basically everything looked amazing! We check in to our hostel and had booked 2 rooms, but changed to 1 because the rooms were bigger than expected (as were the beds), and for safety it was nice for all of us to be together. The room we had though, came with 2 rooms, 2 full size beds, a stair case, a bathroom, 2 fans ...all for $5 p/person/night. Not bad :) So after we put some shorts on we mozied on upstairs and ordered the best food ever. They had shakes (mango, strawberry, raspberry, coconut, dragon fruit, passion fruit, banana, chocolate, and more). Meals ranged anywhere from fried rice with veggies or meat, to (excellent ..or so I heard) curry, to the best pancakes/crepes for not being in France. The food at Top Banana was so good, perfectly priced, delicious, and kept us coming back for more. That night we just sorta of hung out and walked around our hostel to get an idea of where we were at.

The next morning we woke up and decided to go to the Grand Palace and some other touristy must sees. First we stopped at the Russian Market for an hour. We all wished we'd stayed longer, because little did we know that the Russian Market was actually where the knock-offs were as close to real as you could get. A lot of Abercrombie, Polo, Old Navy, H&M clothing is made in Cambodia and anything that isn't up to quality is often resold at the Russian Market. We all bought a couple things but it would have been nice to go back. Next we went to a landmark where a little girl sold us rice cakes that looked sort of like Styrofoam. Not bad...(you can see a picture of her in my album). After that we took a stroll along the river to lunch. Along our way we passed a dead rat and a HUGE truck carrying pigs to be slaughtered....some already dead, it was GROSS!!! We stopped at a restaurant and tried some more Cambodian food and headed to the Grand Palace. It wasn't very crowded so I was able to get some great pictures. All of the buildings were really beautiful and had very similar architecture to the Royal Palace in Bangkok.

Sorry but its super late/early so I'm going to get to bed, here are the pics of Phnom Penh:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2610306&id=6844049&l=cfcffffde3

Enjoy!!