Siem Reap, Cambodia
Things started to go wrong when someone lifted Simon's wallet. There were about five taxi drivers and ten locals surrounding him and leaving me well alone. That was when the car had broken down and he was negotiating transport to Siem Reap. I was watching his back. Obviously I didn't do a very good job but when you're focussed on a bunch of large scowling men talking in a language you don't understand, it's hard to see everything.
We had entered Cambodia in the dark, a direct result of my talking to girls for an hour instead of packing. It took six hours of bus and tuktuk rides before we arrived at the border, one of the most depressing places I have ever been. We walked across a bridge over the open sewer that is the Thai / Cambodian frontier, small naked children begging for money around our feet.
The road to Siem Reap was like a massive one lane motocross course with five lanes worth of traffic. We bounded and rolled, the taxi stopping to carry four plastic barrels of gasoline which sat in the boot with our backpacks, tempting cars to rear end the bumper. We kept our mouths shut as to not risk biting off our tongues, bracing ourselves over every bump.
I thought that the theft of our money was the worst thing that could possibly happen. After the second tire burst and we were running on a buckled rim, watching trees move at walking pace, I changed my mind. We gave the rim five minutes to last and for the car to stop. After twenty five I went to sleep.
I slept through the kindness of the people who lent us their spare tire. I had in fact slept through all of the tire changes and our drivers' smiling efforts to deliver us to Siem Reap. When you focus on scowling, It is hard to see everything.
Monday, April 26, 2004
Friday, April 23, 2004
Bangkok, Thailand, South East Asia
It is the rooster that wakes me first, the crowing mixed with the sound of mopeds forcing my eyes open. Looking out from my window I see the temple tops glistening in the early morning light across the street. The manic activity of last night has disappeared, the tuktuk three wheeled taxis, the rush of people, bells on the side of the food carts. The shouts of vendors, the roar of motor bikes, the sounds of a thousand people talking, all are replaced by the sound of a solitary man sweeping the streets.
In the gym around the corner, down the alley filled with stalls, the kick boxers climb from their hamolks and twist strips of white cloth around their brown hands. The smell of incense fills the room as monks across the street begin to pray, kneeling in the early morning light.
Across the river district a man drops scraps of bread into the brown water and watches as dozens of catfish slide over each other for the food. The first rocket boat of tourists motors past, cameras flashing at the swimming boys who wave at the lens.
I arrived in Bangkok three nights ago and now it is time for me to leave Thailand and continue onwards to Cambodia. I will be sorry to leave this city for I have seen but a fraction of its personality.
It is the rooster that wakes me first, the crowing mixed with the sound of mopeds forcing my eyes open. Looking out from my window I see the temple tops glistening in the early morning light across the street. The manic activity of last night has disappeared, the tuktuk three wheeled taxis, the rush of people, bells on the side of the food carts. The shouts of vendors, the roar of motor bikes, the sounds of a thousand people talking, all are replaced by the sound of a solitary man sweeping the streets.
In the gym around the corner, down the alley filled with stalls, the kick boxers climb from their hamolks and twist strips of white cloth around their brown hands. The smell of incense fills the room as monks across the street begin to pray, kneeling in the early morning light.
Across the river district a man drops scraps of bread into the brown water and watches as dozens of catfish slide over each other for the food. The first rocket boat of tourists motors past, cameras flashing at the swimming boys who wave at the lens.
I arrived in Bangkok three nights ago and now it is time for me to leave Thailand and continue onwards to Cambodia. I will be sorry to leave this city for I have seen but a fraction of its personality.
Friday, April 02, 2004
Sydney, Australia
I have been studying marine biology, focusing on sharks and wanted to get closer to those that I have read about. When I finally stepped into the shark tank in Manly Aquarium and saw a very toothy grin ahead of me I felt extremely nervous but kept on walking (negatively buoyant and without fins), my scuba gear like a giant octopus against my back.
I see them now in the waters of the aquarium and not from the plexiglass tunnel like most people. I view these creatures inches from my mask, nothing except water separating me from them. Dark shapes, shadows in the murky blue, gliding softy through the water towards me. Sleek and streamlined, rows of teeth, a curved dorsal fin, the grinning slit of a mouth. Grey nurse sharks, a species nearly extinct in the wild, four hundred left to wander the seas. I felt sorry for the sharks trapped in places like this tank, swimming round and round, following the contours of the glass. That is of course till I stopped and thought about where the rest of the species are, stuck on walls or fleeing from men with nets. Even when kept in captivity they still look like what they are: Masters of the deep, a species so adapted to killing they have no natural predators. Born into the world when the eggs hatch inside the mother, the strongest pup must kill his siblings before he can leave the uterus. Once out into the world he has at his disposal a streamlined body that can travel at amazing speeds, seven rows of teeth and a mastery of senses including two that humans do not even possess.
The first is an ability to detect the electric fields given off by fish and to travel quickly to their source, a sense so acute that he can feel a twelve-volt battery several nautical miles away. The second relies on the lateral line, a long string of pressure sensors extending down the sides of a shark to the nose, with which he can feel vibrations around him. This sensitivity is most acute in the nose, and if hit there the shark will flee from any humans unfortunate enough to need to defend themselves. Attacks by Grey Nurse sharks are extremely rare however because they will only eat what they can fit inside their mouths and therefore do not register divers as food. This does not apply to a shark that feels threatened however as it will bite to defend itself, everting and dislocating its jaws to a size where it could swallow a basketball or alternatively your head.
Suddenly a massive dark shape charges into me, throwing my tank around and eclipsing the light as I stagger back. A two hundred and fifty pound Tasmanian stingray, looking like a black pancake being hurled upwards from the pan has just careened into me. Like a cat this ray is trying to get its food and its belly scratched at the same time. Looking up as she slides over my body I can see her mouth, rows of rollers designed to crunch up mollusks and crustaceans.
Usually all I think about is the past and future but there, under the water with these sharks cruising around my head I was fully absorbed in the present. This is a state I would like to be in more often - without the help of underwater predators.
I have been studying marine biology, focusing on sharks and wanted to get closer to those that I have read about. When I finally stepped into the shark tank in Manly Aquarium and saw a very toothy grin ahead of me I felt extremely nervous but kept on walking (negatively buoyant and without fins), my scuba gear like a giant octopus against my back.
I see them now in the waters of the aquarium and not from the plexiglass tunnel like most people. I view these creatures inches from my mask, nothing except water separating me from them. Dark shapes, shadows in the murky blue, gliding softy through the water towards me. Sleek and streamlined, rows of teeth, a curved dorsal fin, the grinning slit of a mouth. Grey nurse sharks, a species nearly extinct in the wild, four hundred left to wander the seas. I felt sorry for the sharks trapped in places like this tank, swimming round and round, following the contours of the glass. That is of course till I stopped and thought about where the rest of the species are, stuck on walls or fleeing from men with nets. Even when kept in captivity they still look like what they are: Masters of the deep, a species so adapted to killing they have no natural predators. Born into the world when the eggs hatch inside the mother, the strongest pup must kill his siblings before he can leave the uterus. Once out into the world he has at his disposal a streamlined body that can travel at amazing speeds, seven rows of teeth and a mastery of senses including two that humans do not even possess.
The first is an ability to detect the electric fields given off by fish and to travel quickly to their source, a sense so acute that he can feel a twelve-volt battery several nautical miles away. The second relies on the lateral line, a long string of pressure sensors extending down the sides of a shark to the nose, with which he can feel vibrations around him. This sensitivity is most acute in the nose, and if hit there the shark will flee from any humans unfortunate enough to need to defend themselves. Attacks by Grey Nurse sharks are extremely rare however because they will only eat what they can fit inside their mouths and therefore do not register divers as food. This does not apply to a shark that feels threatened however as it will bite to defend itself, everting and dislocating its jaws to a size where it could swallow a basketball or alternatively your head.
Suddenly a massive dark shape charges into me, throwing my tank around and eclipsing the light as I stagger back. A two hundred and fifty pound Tasmanian stingray, looking like a black pancake being hurled upwards from the pan has just careened into me. Like a cat this ray is trying to get its food and its belly scratched at the same time. Looking up as she slides over my body I can see her mouth, rows of rollers designed to crunch up mollusks and crustaceans.
Usually all I think about is the past and future but there, under the water with these sharks cruising around my head I was fully absorbed in the present. This is a state I would like to be in more often - without the help of underwater predators.
