Day 2: Khmer Empire (27/03/19)
Angkor Wat, mostly known by its appearance in the Tomb Raider movie, was supposed to be the highlight of Cambodia. And it was, but not in the expected way.
The first day in Siem Reap, Tanguy, Lisa and I walked a bit around town and bought some souvenirs. Among them, I bought some blue Alibaba style pants to increase the hippie-homeless looks that I was starting to display.
That afternoon we also arranged a tuk-tuk ride that would take us the next day around Angkor Wat, and he even took us there already to see the sunset beforehand.
I was staying at a different hostel, so the next morning I had to wake up very early (4 am) to meet them at their hostel and start our journey to see the sunrise at the majestic Temple. Our driver was getting late and a different tuk-tuk driver who had followed me, tried to convince us to go with him instead. He was very persistent and was getting very annoying so I told him to -fuck off- and left us in peace. He didn’t. When our driver came, we were so thrilled to lose sight of the other guy that we jumped in with haste.
I should have noticed faster, but as we were taking off, I saw the annoying driver staring at me while picking something from the floor, rushing to his tuk-tuk, and disappearing in the dark. I immediately checked my pockets, I was wearing the Alibaba pants I just bought the day before, the pockets were too wide and when I jumped in our tuk-tuk my phone had fallen. I asked our driver to go back and try to chase the other guy, but it was too late.
I didn’t want to make my friends pay for my mistake, so we end up driving to Angkor Wat. I must say that the temple complex is impressive. And given that March is the hottest month, the attraction is not as packed with tourists as it uses to. However, the heat was extenuating, and my head was more focused on how to recover my phone than in enjoying the architectonic wonder of the Khmer Empire.
Before finishing the day I start to realize the symptoms of addiction and I cannot wait till the next day to go to the police and hopefully recover my phone. How could I know things only were going to get worse…
DAY 4: Change of plans (29/03/19)
For the next couple of days, I tried reporting the theft of my phone to the police, but no fucks were given. Someone suggested I should have showed them some money, but I didn’t want to push my luck and end up in another dark room.
Also, I was experiencing the withdrawal symptoms of phone addiction😵. In a different case, this could have been therapeutic, but right now the phone was my life. Nowadays, a backpacker🎒uses the phone for everything, contacting family and friends, navigating through cities, documenting the trip with pictures, booking transportation and accommodation, or even basic stuff like checking the time or setting an alarm.
In sights of the impossibility of recovering my phone, I had to decide whether buying a local phone (but I didn’t trust those and they were not that cheap) or ordering one on-line. But I already had lost many days to stay even longer in Siem Reap waiting for the phone. So I decided I would embrace the old way, I would travel for one month with no TECH!📵
But in my delusion that was not challenging enough, on top of that I would rent a bicycle🚴♂️ (remember we are in the hottest month of the year and I have not exercised for months) and I would ride through the country visiting random villages and staying to sleep in houses of random people…
I was committed, so I visited several bicycle rental stores until I found one that agreed on my idea (most of them thought I was crazy and they would never see their bike again). I also went to buy some patches, an extra tire, and an inflator, just in case. I bought a small notebook, a watch, and a pre-COVID face mask for the dust on the road.
I was already mentally prepared to go on the adventure when I met Facundo, and Argentinian guy of my hostel that told me about his experience volunteering in a nearby orphanage. It sounded interesting so I thought my long tour could wait and I would spend a couple days in the orphanage too.
The night before going to the orphanage, I went out with Facundo to the Pub he used to work. There, I met an interesting Spanish guy and we ended up talking about bizarre topics such as hugging trees