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July 14, 2004
Interesting things of note in Cambodia
Firstly, I am now definitely chilled out, and my motivation to write has come back. I’ve kept a relatively brief overview of each day’s events on the laptop, just for my own memory’s reference. The interesting thing is now that I feel like writing, how MUCH ends up coming out, compared to the dribbled bits of info I kept during the last couple of weeks. I’ve been filling in a few days at a time, working backwards, it’s easier to figure it out that way. I find myself going back and filling it out in a lot more detail also, so that’s quite possibly what will happen in the future, especially during ‘busy’ times. This ‘extra’ stuff is probably the most interesting, maybe for you fellow readers, but most definitely for me later on. The what’s and where’s are mandatory, but relatively detached.
(slight philosophical ramble)
The normal stuff takes hours, days to execute, and gives up a few lines, whereas the big stuff, the thinking, the thoughts, take only minutes to eventuate, to be thought about, so when the time is there, a lot of the thought stuff comes out.
(end ramble)
Also interesting is that I compare myself with fellow travellers, sometimes feeling like a veteran, knowing some language, being able to communicate a little better with locals than others… while at other times I feel like a tourist. Some of these guys have been travelling for years, and they not only know how to speak Khmer/Thai fluently (enough), but travel around like seasoned travellers, knowing where to go, what to do, and what to expect (or, if not what to expect, are not concerned at all by it). So I guess I’m generally somewhere in between.
I’m having more difficulty changing my mindset to riel than I expected. I thought that it would pose no problems, as 1 baht = 100 riel. However, the unexpected confusion comes because many people bill in us dollars, and accept in either. So I end up having to convert to and from US dollars/riel quite a lot…. In Thailand, I only had to convert to US dollars ‘after’ the transaction, usually only for my own reference.
Posted by Dan at July 14, 2004 02:40 AM