Yes I know. I am slightly off schedule with this one. But I have been travelling too much recently and it was hard to catch up. The first chapter of my tale I was able to write after being back from Egypt, just before going to Germany, then to France, to Germany again and again. And now I am once more in Egypt since a week and it seems I need a quite Cairo weekend to be able to get together my notes on this one. It is a tale of anguish and heroism, of stupidity and failure, but also of frogs, snakes and monkeys. Well actually no monkeys, but it always sounds good to mention them.

Where should I start? I believe one could make the argument, that I should start where I have left my story the last time: “The next morning I met up with my brother and eventually after a lengthy breakfast we got on our way to Cambodia. But as they say, that is another story…” That means, after a night on the train from Chiang Mai to Bangkok, we went back to the train station and got the train to the Cambodian border. It was a trip without too much excitement, if one discounts the odd Singaporean traveller who hidden behind large sun glasses rambled on and on about his opinion of Thailand and the other countries in the region – most of which were not too positive. In the early evening we arrived in Aranyapratet, the Thai border town. From here we took a Tuktuk to the border, where we were welcomed by not so friendly, bribe extorting Cambodian officials. Forcing people to pay an express fee seems to be rather common on this border point, where the only alternative is to wait until the officials give up on a bribe, which might be hours later. Finally we arrived in Poi Pet from where we got a ride to Sisophon, the first stop of our trip.

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