The Adventure Begins

The fun starts on a Philippines Airlines flight from Manila to Bangkok. Since I'm traveling on my dime, I don't get to enjoy the luxury of business class. PAL (as it's called locally) is actually a pretty nice airline; economy class in Southeast Asia isn't probably what you're imagining- i.e., peasants in the aisle with their water buffalo, tea leaf reading, and the obligatory flying chickens. The best part of my flight from Manila to Bangkok was the constant back and forth of two drunken Brits sitting behind me. For the better part of three hours, it was like listening to 'Liza Doolittle and Bert the Chimney sweep only surlier. I couldn't understand a word they were saying, but it must have been pretty funny based on the bark of their "i'm too drunk to realize how loud I am" laughing. Further adding the fun was the fact that they smelled a lot like what I imagine Amy Weinhouse must smell like- booze, cigarettes, and taxi cabs. Bert the chimney sweep is a pretty classy guy though, judging by his drink order of Sprite and Vodka- the true choice of any self respecting gentleman scholar. Long story short, my travel mate Joe and I make it to our hostel in Bangkok for a short rest before our train to Cambodia departs at 0600.

We arrive at the train station without any issues and purchase our tickets. The 6 hour train ride costs about $1.25. You get what you pay for- no one's going to confuse this ride with the Orient Express (looking at the picture above, it does say "ordinary train"; maybe 2.50 would have gotten me the extraordinary one). No AC or toilets, but the price is right so we settle in to a seat built for two-Asian sized people and hope for the best. I'm a firm believer that the best way to travel anywhere is by train; you really get a sense of the people and a good view of the countryside. The ride was hot, but Thailand was beautiful. It was extremely green, which is a color we don't get a lot of in Manila, and the air was fresh. There wasn't a lot to see other than trees and fields; every 30 minutes or so a train station would pop up out of nowhere.

More people would jump on for the ride, as would food vendors. The vendors had baskets full of rice and egg dishes, served with an as yet unidentified meat. If people wanted some, they just reached into the basket and pulled it out. No matter how hungry I was I didn't want to risk an amoeba so I passed on the grub. Good decision? you be the judge:

I probably could have handled it, but better safe than sorry. During the course of the ride Joe and I met a fellow traveler by the name of Fiona (a Scot). She was back packing around southeast Asia after she lost her job- a casualty of the world financial crisis . I guess that's as good a time as any to pack up and hit the road. Anywho, she was headed to Siem Reap like us, so we all decided sharing a cab would be a good economical idea. We crossed over from Thailand to Poipet, Cambodia and were on our way.