hey all!

heres my first post from asia! we have been here since 14th april, and have already spent time in singapore, cambodia and now vietnam.

so to start with singapore. we never planned to visit here but at the time of our flight there were riots in thailand where we should have flown to. in cairns we were getting lots of conflicting advice. the news at home and the consulate website were telling us not to go, but the travel agents both home and abroard were telling us it would soon blow over. qantas would change our flight to singapore for free so we took them up on it. it was only when we had booked this flight and the following one to phnom penh that we heard the riots were over!

still singapore was an interesting little stop off point. we were only here for a e few days but i think we got to know the city a little bit! the place was truly amazing, so futuristic, my lasting impression of the new town was tall imposing builings in shining white and glass and everywhere we went technology, right down to the advertising billboards. everything we saw was undeniably well designed giving the place a really sleek look. however i think i preferred the older areas of town, little india, china town and arab street. they seemed to have more character, i particularly liked arab street for its palace and its link to singapores past in the heritage museum. though singapore is a much more prosperous place than anywhere weve visited in asia and possibly on the trip so far, i was saddened because i thought in its rush to modernise its lost a little of its culture.

our next stop was phnom penh. had we not had come straight from singapore i think culture shock would have hit us less hard, but phnom penh was somewhere we needed to see as it was important not to gloss over the lives of so many cambodians, and asians in general. these people were really poor. a few days in phnom penh were difficult for us and weve all come out of it wanting to do something, which i think has turned our experience into a really positive thing. im glad we stayed in a hostel in the middle of town because otherwise, had we have been transported in to the touristy sights and left again, we would never have had that realisation. in phnom penh swa for the first time street vendors and beggars with severe disabilities because they have no national health service to look after them. there was always the background call of the tuk tuk drivers and the incessant beeping of horns. i knew of all this from india but this was the first time id had to deal with it myself. in phnom penh we saw the palace and national museum full of angkor wats beautiful sculptures and the killing fields and prison of pol pot. it was an alarming contrast. the killing fields were so thought provoking. i felt ashamed id not really heard of the massacre before my research on cambodia. pol pot excecuted the educated and liberal thinkers in order to create a society of farmers and land workers, and essentially turning the clock back. the torture and murder was apalling, what really hit home for me was when we were at the killing fields, there was a loudspeaker attached to a tree which drowned out the sounds of the dying victims.

our next stop was siem reap which was a really nice place, full of character and culture. we stayed here while visiting the temples at angkor, which was really amazing. the temples are a source of national pride and the many temples are dedicated to buddhism and hinduism. there are about 300 temples and all of the beautifully carved and unique. my favourites were angkor wat, ta prohm and banteay srei. ta prohm was the temple used in tomb raider with all the tree roots growing over the sculptures and carvings, really making us feel as if we were adventurers, discovering a lost city!

our final stop in cambodia was kampot. we had decided to go here on a recommendation from our travel agent due to the bokor hill national park that has an eerie french colonial ghost town at the hilltop and wild elephants in thew jungle beneath. unfortunately bokor hill was close due to construction (er what...?) so instead we explored kampot, where there is grown the best pepper in the world. we also visited a cave temple where naomi and i were blessed by a hindu priest who covered us in perfume. the kids here really made my day, they employed themselves as our tour guides but seemed to do it aqs much for the english practise as for the money. they were such happy, bubbly kids and knew so much about the temple while at the same time cheekily calling us their girlfriends and laughing at us in turn.

tune in for the next installment when u will learn of the puppy in the basket and the vietnamese passport control...

xx