"Phnom Penh" a Phnom Penh Travel Page by l_joo

Border crossing protocol
This section is to tell how we cross the border between Bavet (Cambodia) and Mocbai (Vietnam). We bought a bus ticket each cost U$6 from Phnom Penh to Saigon, this bus of course a much better spacious seats equipped with air con, comparing to the mini-bus where the air-con blown off halfway that cost U$10 from Siem Reap to Phnom Penh. Anyway the whole trip took us 12 hours to reach Saigon.

Crossing the border won’t take long but instead very exciting and eye opening experience. The atmosphere was quite like those Communist war movies where army troops holding weapons in anywhere around those frightening fences and walls. Our bus dropped all passengers quite far away on an open space of dusty dirt road where after wind blows our body became yellow.

Not far ahead we can see a small wooden hut with a crossbar written passport checking. As usual all passengers have to queue up to wait for the scrutiny works. About 30 peoples queuing up but suddenly I saw some local Vietnamese Cambodian features surpassing the queue directly advancing to the counter with their passport tuck in a few dollars, wow!
Border crossing is very exciting to me, always the atmosphere looks so serious but after all stamp chop and scrutiny passed, a bright sky and beautiful new territory is waiting for you.

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The Beef Noodles encounter

Phnom Penh morning
Quite a big city to me because we still expecting another about Siem Reap look-alike village. The overall mood and feeling are akin to Saigon. Both cities are not that safe at night, so we don't want to walk too far only just a few roads away from Capitol guesthouse (located at Street 93 at Boeung Kak Lake). The guesthouse cost U$6 for 3 persons, just fine in terms of condition with a single bathroom attached, no air-con. These areas have lots of hawkers meantime ‘taxi’ also are plentiful waiting in a bunch ready to fight for their passengers.

We found a restaurant selling beef noodles, perhaps I shouldn’t say I found because so many tourists found too. I am just another tourist who follows but somehow the noodles were so delicious. The noodles is located a few shop lots from our guesthouse. After noodles, we also tried the sweet potatoes soup and then of course the duck egg. Yes this is the duck egg that you should try in Phnom Penh. That little meal was fully sponsored by a local Cambodian who can speak fluent Malay language, he was so happy and delightful to buy us that meal because not many foreigners willing to sit down with them eating their duck eggs. The duck eggs are actually a baby duck just about to come out but they purposely cooked it in the right time so that customers can eat an egg-shaped almost in formed baby duck.

In the morning we walked into a local Cambodian coffee shop, this shop has lots of Cambodian elder citizens and working class enjoying their breakfast. This is the shop where we enjoy our first Cambodian breakfast. This shop has self-styled coffee and tea. We can eat with pork noodles or "fried oil cake", I can't find anyone who can speak Malay or English anymore, so that's all I can enjoy in this coffee shop. Prices are economical, don't worry.

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Naturally earth made grounds

Streets of Phnom Penh
Somewhere near the tourist area, we found a shop selling meaty food, I couldn’t tell what that is but only a photo for remembrance. In a nutshell, Phnom Penh is still heavily under developing, roads are still in bad conditions. Dirt roads as the one I stepped on are everywhere, but that does not mean I don’t like Cambodia.
Phnom Penh, like many other cities in our world, has many Chinese settlers. From restaurants, clinics, supermarkets to guesthouses. Cambodian writings are quite close to Thai but sorry I can't read them. The overall impression was great to me, so perhaps I will visit them again.