I am a city boy. I do not like the outdoors. I am adventurous but I am averse to life-threatening danger. At the very least, there should be a clean toilet with steady supply of clean water before I can consider going to a place. So it took quite a while for Evil Twin Sister to convince me to go to Cambodia with her. Before the trip, the only things I know about the country are the landmines, Khmer Rouge and Angkor Wat.
In August 2010, I called her up to tell her that there was a massive AirAsia sale.
She asked me to come over her place to help her book. But because no one could ever tell how spontaneous we both can be, what was supposed to be just her trip to Cambodia ended up a four-country-ten-day backpacking adventure... with me.
So there, after an overnight sleep in Malaysia, we boarded our plane to Siem Reap, Cambodia in the early morning of July 2.
Up to that time, my entire fate in the next three days was wholly in the hands of ETS. She did all the research and necessary arrangements, all I need to do was to accompany her. I knew what we were supposed to do as she gave me an itinerary beforehand but it never really sank in. I still feared for dear life.
But the sight alone of Siem Reap International Airport from 50-feet in the sky slowly dissipated whatever stupid misconceptions I had of the country. I was in awe the more when we were finally standing before it.
Its quaint Khmer architecture evokes the elegance of an exclusive resort. As soon as you enter, a white stone elephant greets every visitor and balik-bayan alike.
It was refreshing, classy, and spic and span.
You wouldn't mind at all that it is relatively small and pretty straight-forward too, literally. After the white dumbo, is the immigration (which I won't post any picture of, why?, read on!), then the baggage carousel,
then the dufry shops (duty free),
then finally the exit.
No fuss, no frills. While I was excited to be there, I was also saddened that we couldn't make ours as beautiful as theirs. I bet it didn't cost as much to build as the PAL terminal in Manila. Whatever happened to us?
Anyway, an unusual thing happened to me though at the immigration. While in line, I was recklessly clicking away because I was loving what I was seeing. Until an immigration officer raised his voice on an elderly Muslim woman who took a picture of the immigration area. The officer even had to get the camera and delete the pictures himself. Did he not see me take pictures? I had my flash on the entire time! And when it was my turn, I handed him my passport and waited for him to take my picture. But he just handed my passport back. "Aren't you going to take my picture?". "No need, you can proceed." What!?! The only logical explanations I could think of are, that they have "past-life" scanner there that told them I was some royalty in my Cambodian past life, or that they were just racial-profiling the poor elderly Muslim woman. But hey, they took ETS' picture, too! Well, maybe I was just too cute to be evil, LOL!
The saying that "first impression lasts" could never be truer in Siem Reap, Cambodia. The good vibe I got the moment I set foot on the tarmac rippled to the entire time we were in this marvelously beautiful place, which I hope to be able to write about really soon, because every minute deserves its own space in my humble blog.
In August 2010, I called her up to tell her that there was a massive AirAsia sale.
She asked me to come over her place to help her book. But because no one could ever tell how spontaneous we both can be, what was supposed to be just her trip to Cambodia ended up a four-country-ten-day backpacking adventure... with me.
So there, after an overnight sleep in Malaysia, we boarded our plane to Siem Reap, Cambodia in the early morning of July 2.
Up to that time, my entire fate in the next three days was wholly in the hands of ETS. She did all the research and necessary arrangements, all I need to do was to accompany her. I knew what we were supposed to do as she gave me an itinerary beforehand but it never really sank in. I still feared for dear life.
But the sight alone of Siem Reap International Airport from 50-feet in the sky slowly dissipated whatever stupid misconceptions I had of the country. I was in awe the more when we were finally standing before it.
Its quaint Khmer architecture evokes the elegance of an exclusive resort. As soon as you enter, a white stone elephant greets every visitor and balik-bayan alike.
It was refreshing, classy, and spic and span.
You wouldn't mind at all that it is relatively small and pretty straight-forward too, literally. After the white dumbo, is the immigration (which I won't post any picture of, why?, read on!), then the baggage carousel,
then the dufry shops (duty free),
then finally the exit.
No fuss, no frills. While I was excited to be there, I was also saddened that we couldn't make ours as beautiful as theirs. I bet it didn't cost as much to build as the PAL terminal in Manila. Whatever happened to us?
Anyway, an unusual thing happened to me though at the immigration. While in line, I was recklessly clicking away because I was loving what I was seeing. Until an immigration officer raised his voice on an elderly Muslim woman who took a picture of the immigration area. The officer even had to get the camera and delete the pictures himself. Did he not see me take pictures? I had my flash on the entire time! And when it was my turn, I handed him my passport and waited for him to take my picture. But he just handed my passport back. "Aren't you going to take my picture?". "No need, you can proceed." What!?! The only logical explanations I could think of are, that they have "past-life" scanner there that told them I was some royalty in my Cambodian past life, or that they were just racial-profiling the poor elderly Muslim woman. But hey, they took ETS' picture, too! Well, maybe I was just too cute to be evil, LOL!
The saying that "first impression lasts" could never be truer in Siem Reap, Cambodia. The good vibe I got the moment I set foot on the tarmac rippled to the entire time we were in this marvelously beautiful place, which I hope to be able to write about really soon, because every minute deserves its own space in my humble blog.
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