Cambodia, Day 7: Siem Reap and the Return to Korea

On the first day of 2011, I broke my fast at Curry Walla with  vegetarian samosas, chicken vindaloo, and a mango lassi,. I tried to see an exhibit about Tonle Sap lake, but a blind young man explained that it was closed for lunch. I wouldn't have time to see it before my flight, so I moved on. I visited an otherwise boring modern temple that had a bone monument out front.

 I returned my bike. and decide to go to airport Eurasian hobo-style. When Traveling in Europe, Dan, Mark, and I saw a sign in the cheapest hotel in Budapest that stated, "The cheapest way to the airport is to walk," and that became a motto for us. However, this time intestinal distress convinced me to hire a tuk-tuk instead. At the airport I spotted a lizard and watched it as I ate a Dairy Queen blizzard. 

Once through security I sat down with a book. Kafka's the Trial is either the worst or best airport reading ever, depending on if you internalize K's struggles and weariness with mysterious opaque bureaucracy, or if you see the Zen lesson that it can only hurt you and bother you as much as you let it. 

The flight movie was Chinese version of Planes, Trains, and Automobiles. I didn't see the end because cut off at the climax for ten minutes of Qi exercise stretching video. 

About seven other foreigners teaching in Korea and I were the last ones left in Guangzhou Baiyun International Airport. We exchanged stories about our travels in Southeast Asia of them. Most of them had spent their winter break in Thailand. We all expected to just sleep on the chairs in the airport, but instead we were given one day visas to China and were provided with a complementary hotel. After some bureaucratic confusion, I end up at very western nice hotel, complete with flat screen tv, etched glass walls, etc. 

I roomed with only one other person who went to Cambodia; those who went to Thailand were also at a nice hotel but in a shitty (literally garbage covered – I saw the pictures) neighborhood.

Back in Korea the weather was once again seasonal, and I saw a Korean man with an awesome backpack on travels of his own.