Finally, internet access! The power outages on this island are as frequent as the nightly monsoon downpour. Yesterday we went to discover the south of the island with Sao beach being our main destination. It’s only 25km away but the roads are in a disastrous condition, parts of it dirt-tracks with more pot-holes than solid parts. Driving a motorcycle is actually better than driving in a car as the latter doesn’t have much options in avoiding the holes.

I had to write a post titled with that sentence, it was inevitable. Phu Quoc has been treating me well, it is a pleasantly undeveloped island and even though there is several resorts on the island, it is still far away from Koh Tao and other Thai islands. The town I’m staying at still has few English signs and the harbour is full of fishing boats. They look a bit dodgy, wouldn’t want to go out to sea with these.

From all the countries in SEA I was interested in Vietnam the most. Simply because it is the only country I had an idea of before I came here. I heard about it and saw it in movies, books, computer games and a few school lessons. Yet the more I learned about travelling here, the less I was eager to come. In Vietnam I have the highest probability of being scammed, cheated and having my stuff stolen.

On Wednesday the bar belonging to my guest house hosted a NLHE poker tournament with $5 buy-in. Of course I had to join in and so did nine others, making a total of ten players. Those without a clue were gone soon and in the end I was fighting with a French railway engineer and a US online pokerplayer for the first price. Our weapons were monopoly and scrabble pieces as they didn’t have proper poker chips in the bar.

Kampot is a bit of a strange place. My room costs me $5 a night but meals at the restaurant go for $3-$5. If you’re used to food being about $1 that’s quite a lot. There is not many street food places around here and those that are there don’t look like I want to eat there. Locals are surprisingly disinterested in me. Usually any sign of white skin makes a centre of attention but not here.

Phnom Penh is an interesting city but not really to my taste. It is much dirtier than Bangkok and at the moment parts of the city are under water. That makes strolling around a bit disgusting at times. Watching Phnom Penh makes it obvious that Cambodia is way less developed than Thailand. The guy who hosted me has a really large place (seven bedrooms) and there was always a couple of couchsurfers at his place.

Friday started with a visit to Cambodia’s recent history. The Tuol Sleng museum in town is a former school that was turned into a prison by the Khmer Rouge. They used it to ‘interrogate’ political opponents and interrogation here as the same meaning as with the catholic inquisition. Those unlucky enough to end up here were either tortured to death or tortured and then brought to a killing field outside the city.

Left Bangkok at 3:30 in mildly cloudy weather. Really felt sad about leaving Thailand as I had such an amazing time. The flight to Phnom Penh takes a little over an hour and about 20 minutes before our arrival the weather changed. Nothing like sitting in an airplane that’s heading for a tropical thunderstorm. We finally bumped through the clouds and below us stretched the surroundings of Phnom Penh. The area is so heavily flooded, it would have looked like an ocean hadn’t there been the occasional tree line.

Recently I met with Chiang Mai based couchsurfer Palm, who runs a shop selling handmade shoes in her own designs. She mentioned that she’d be visiting a new shoemaker to see if they could do business together and I had asked her to take me along. Thus on Monday I joined her mum and her for the drive to nearby Lamphun. The shoemaker’s place is just a small shop in the outskirts of the city and had a very rural feel to it.

It’s been almost a month in Thailand again. Can’t believe how fast time is flying. On Tuesday I’ll leave Chiang Mai to get on a flight from BKK to Phnom Penh on Thursday. My stay in Thailand has been very different this time. Rather than just having a look at the country, I got in touch with the Thais (and Karen) and they have been amazingly friendly, helpful and open. They answered my countless questions and gave me insight into their culture, their thinking, their lives and worries.