Sihanouk Ville, Cambodia…my mini beach getaway.

I arrived in Sihanouk Ville too late to do anything, but check into the guesthouse. The 4 hour bus ride from Phnom Penh seemed more like 6 hours, but it was peaceful and if it had not been for the movies playing on the tv’s on the bus it would have been pleasant.

The beach in Sihanouk Ville was nothing special. Perhaps I went to the wrong beach, but the water comes right up to where the chairs are which is right along where the bars are. The cool thing about this beach is that is has personality. The local vendors offer everything from massages to fruit, to manicures and pedicures on the beach. I pretty much ignored everyone who came over trying to sell me something because there were just so many of them. Literally, every 30 seconds someone different came over offering a massage or a friendship bracelet or fruit or prawns or just to beg for money. I could only take it for about 1.5 hours before I had had enough. The scenery is nice with the islands off the coast in the near distance and the greenery that is nearby, but I definitely prefer the beaches on the Andaman Sea. The visibility in the gulf of Thailand is certainly not comparable. Some people say you can’t compare, but I say you sure can. There is nothing wrong with comparing two places.

My plan was to stay here for 3 nights, but I may just leave tomorrow morning on the first bus to Viet Nam. There are many different options and price points, but I think I will go with the most expensive option because there are supposedly only 3 stops and the driver takes care of getting the passports stamped once we reach the border of Viet Nam. I’ll pay the extra $3 USD to be comfortable and they will pick me up in the morning at the guesthouse, so I won’t have to scramble around, trying to get to a bus station in the middle of nowhere. I already have a flight booked from Ho Chi Min City (Sai Gon) to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia on December 24th, so I figure a few days in Viet Nam will be enough to see all that Sai Gon has to offer. My original plan was to be there for 7 days, but everyone with whom I spoke said 7 days was far too much time to spend in that city, so I thought about heading north to Hanoi, Viet Nam but all of the busses from Cambodia stop in Sai Gon first, so it just seemed like a huge waste of time and money, so the owner of the guesthouse in Siem Reap suggested Sihanouk Ville instead for a day or 2.
It was here in Sihanouk Ville that I first noticed I had jaundice. I wasn’t quite sure because the lighting in the bathroom was poor, but it looked like my eyes were very yellow. I was without internet, so I immediately went to a cyber café and googled malarone (my malaria prophylaxis) and jaundice and voila, there it was, one of the most sever side effects of this medication. Every website I found said that getting to a hospital immediately was advisable, but there was no hospital around, so I just drank a lot of water to get the medication out of my system and hoped the jaundice and all of my other symptoms of liver damage would go away as quickly as possible. I felt ok, but my urine was very dark and my bowel movements were much lighter than they should have been, so I knew that my liver was not functioning properly.
The next morning I boarded the bus to Viet Nam and I felt fine, but my eyes were yellow and I felt a bit uncomfortable looking at people when I talked to them. On the form that one has to fill out before entering the country, it asks if you’ve had jaundice in the last 10 days and of course I ticked the “no” box for fear that I would either be quarantined or immediately deported back to the Cambodian border. I entered Viet Nam without incident.

Here are a few pictures from Sihanouk Ville, Cambodia.

Hasta la próxima vez mi gente bonita,

a1globetrotter

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