Cambuchia

Even though I had set the alarm on my $2 Casio watch, my eyes didn’t believe that I was actually waking up at 4:55 AM. Leaving enough time to brush my teeth, I was out the door and quickly hailed a motorbike to the Ancient City of Angkor. At the turn of the first millennium, King Suryavarman I united the warring clans of Indo-China into the Khmer Empire, establishing his capital in present-day Siem Reap. For over five hundred years, Khmer rulers expanded their glorified capital into an entire city of lavish temples and palaces of carved stone. I fumbled by way to Angkor Wat in the dark, among hundreds of other travelers. With a cup of hot tea, I sat beside a pool of lily pads and watched the sun, and its reflection, rise behind the acclaimed temple. Although a bit cloudy, the sky is sponged with powdery pinks, blues, and purples. As the sun peeked from behind the haze, I ventured inside the Angkor Wat ruin. Amid the incredibly detailed stone carvings, stacked pillars, and corn-cobbed steeples, I imagined the king’s doting ladies, floral garnishes, and lute players. Both Hindu and Buddhist deities mind the ruins and birds fly overhead like faithful guards.

I met some Israelis and we toured the other temples for the remainder of the day. The Bayon temple featured graceful faces on every stone steeple; Tah Prohm, the jungle temple, sprouted with massive centuries-old trees; and Angkor Thom, “Great City,” was the most impressive for its magnitude and grandeur. After climbing exhaustingly steep stairs in the Asian sun, we left antiquity for more modern attractions like the markets and the War Museum.

An advertised free tour guide showed us around the arsenal: a proud display of landmines, grenades, tanks, and machine-guns from the Cambodian civil wars. With one prosthetic leg, our guide limped around the military yard and served up dubious stories about personal casualties: “This is the type of landmine that killed my child in our rice field. I manned this tank in ’76. This was the gun that put me in the hospital for three months. After being shot before by an M-16, I didn’t think I could survive another. Here! Feel it! You can still feel the cap in my side!” I was horrified that a country of such antiquated peace and prosperity could drive itself toward and genocidal civil war. Seeing the donation box, I pulled five dollars from my wallet: “My boss is a bad man. Corrupt. He will keep it for himself.” But certainly, I wouldn’t put my money into his pocket either. Skeptically, I held onto the bill until the end of the tour, long enough for his “dead” child to vary curiously in age. Again, he sluggishly asked for money for his family - you know - because he was going to be out of a job soon. Not for this crooked man, but I truly did feel pity for the people of Cambodia who suffered through years of hollow violence. I wanted to help, but I felt uncomfortable fueling these remnants of bureaucratic corruption and malicious greed.

Phnom Penh only reinforced my nasty impressions of Cambodia. I was incessantly pressured to buy drugs by street crawlers. Massage parlors hosted crowds of seedy men who bargained for more than a relaxing muscle rub. I visited the infamous killing fields, where skulls and fragmented bones still pile in dirt pits. Located in the city’s center, I walked through the haunted halls of Tuol Sleng, an old school that the Khmer Rouge converted as a torture and mass extermination facility. The beauty of Angkor faded in my memory, and I couldn’t warm the chills from the back of my neck.

I ventured south to Sihanoukville, hoping for some R, R, & R (rest, relaxation, and rays), but loneliness got to me and my passion for travel diminished. I found myself thinking about home all the time, and only completing tasks for their own sake, not out of desire. I always wanted to scuba dive, and I signed up for a $200 course. I spent hours watching the educational video, skill training in the pool, completing class work, and taking an exam. These were all chores in the hope of actually scuba diving; but when I actually sank into the water, my feelings changed. My ears really hurt because of the pressure, and I felt really uncomfortable. Maybe I will try it again one day, but I honestly didn't care.

A big part of this trip was to find out more about myself and to get in touch with my heart, and I have successfully done this. I know that I didn't enjoy scuba diving. I know that I would have liked to teach English, but it just wasn't in the cards for me now. For over ten days, I hadn't made one real connection and idle backpacker chitchat became tiresome. I wanted to be with familiar faces. Traveling alone can be challenging and fun, but the emotional rollercoaster takes its toll. Almost every night, I slept a different grungy guest house, smushed everything into the same dirty backpack, and rotated the same three shirts. There’s still so much to see, but I guess there will be other travel opportunities. I couldn’t help but feel confused. I feel empowered with my accomplishments, but confronted with irrational feelings of failure and responsibility that waiedt for me at home. Am I willing to trade in my carefree vagabond days and submit myself to a routine with a job in New York? I promised myself I would not come home until my hair was ponytail-able and the snow had melted.

Pride aside, I decided to come home. NOW! Crying to my mom, halfway around the world, she settled my confusion and convinced me that it was time. I was relieved. But, when I tried to buy a ticket to Bangkok from my guesthouse, the manager said that all tickets were sold-out. I would have to wait another day.

I cannot possibly spend another day relaxing on the beach. I have a homesick rash and I will itch it until raw and infected if I am not on my way today. I want to be home NnnnOooooWwww! I strategized: My non-refundable plane ticket from Bangkok leaves in the morning. A family emergency. My father is sick. Julie! You backpacked around Southeast Asia for four months, and now one more day is sending you to the loony bin! Get it together, sister! Haven’t you learned anything from this trip? Where is this patience and go-with-the-flow attitude you so enduringly developed? I took another ride of a confusing emotional rollercoaster.

I was determined to leave Sihanoukville the next morning, and the manager was kind enough to guide me through a disjointed route to Bangkok: “No guarantees, but I know one guy who just made it to Bangkok in time for his plane home. Who knows, maybe you’ll have the same luck.” He sketched me a map with estimated travel times and costs: I would buy a ticket to Phnom Penh, but be sure that the driver let me off at a nondescript road junction. Then, I would have to hire a motorbike to take me two miles to Sre Ambel, a ferryboat across a river, for fifty cents. From the small port, there should be a number of small taxis headed for four more river crossings. I could hire another motorbike to the Thai border, an autorickshaw to Trat, Thailand, and an air-conditioned bus to Bangkok. Warning: “Be sure to make it to Trat by six o’clock, for the last bus out of town. You should have no problem.”

Problems were everywhere. The Phnom Penh-bound bus driver didn’t understand about Sre Ambel, motorbikes were scanty at the road junction, and ferry taxis ran very infrequently. Disastrously, my sandal got caught in the motorbike and shredded skin from my ankle until raw and throbbing. At the border, a hundred other backpackers waited in a snail-like line for their passports to be stamped by a single officer; and all the while, time atomically ticked away to six PM. I imagined the bus leaving without me, desperate and defeated. Miraculously, I arrived seconds before the single-occupancy bus departed for fateful Bangkok.