Tong le Sap

Sunrise over a floating village on the Tong Le Sap

On our last day in Cambodia we caught a boat up the river from Siem Reap to Pnomh Penh, where I was conceived and spent the first few months of my life. The boat journey was quite long and I spent the time day dreaming about being pregnant. We left our hostel very early that morning and got a bus to the river where we were to catch the boat. As it was the dry season, we first boarded a small fishing boat at the jetty point that was to take us out to the floating village. From the village we would then board a bigger boat that would transport us to Pnomh Penh. The floating village was indeed unique. A traditional Cambodian village but floating on the water, complete with shop houses and a school. We even passed school children in crisp white starched shirts and navy shorts on various assorted water craft (I use the term loosely) making their way to a floating school. When we got to the big boat there were small children on the floating wharf (in the middle of what appeared to be an inland sea), selling the most delicious fresh French loaves, plastic cheese triangles (????), bananas and bottles of water. I suggested to Ross that we should buy some supplies as we did not know how long the journey was going to be. He declined, fortunately I decided to get myself some snacks as the journey took the whole day. When we saw the boat and realized that there was only the one boat and a tonne of people, I reminded Ross of Maria (Veronica’s Mum’s) suggestion that we jump on to the roof of the boat. Very sound advice. We were the first people to climb up onto the roof of the boat and I am so glad that we did. For those sitting inside, the tin shed like cabin would have been similar to sitting inside an oven (or coffin…). We were on that boat for 9 hours in the full sun (which was doubly strong reflecting back off the water onto us). At least on top of the boat we had fresh air, although we had no shade. Fortunately Ross and I both had hats and sunblock, even so we both still got horribly sunburnt and dehydrated. The other reason why it was great advice to sit on top of that boat was for safety. The boat was easily carrying more than ten times the recommended amount of passengers. If it suddenly sunk in the middle of our journey at least on top we would have had some chance of survival. I doubt that there were any lifejackets on that boat though and for most of the journey I was unable to see land on any horizon, so I would not have liked to hazard our chances of survival. Once we finally left the emptiness of traveling across the giant lake we started to make our way along the river where we were able to gaze at life along the riverbank. Many small children waved at us as we passed and we saw temples, more floating villages, fishermen and also the police. When we passed the police boat we witnessed an exchange of third world corruption first hand. A deck hand on our boat tossed a plastic water bottle full of wads of cash over to the police boat – in front of everyone. Corruption for all to see!