Island in the Sun

The first weekend in June was one of those surreal, "pinch me" types of experiences. We took a bus down to Kep, one of the southern provinces in Cambodia, and took a small wooden boat out to an island (Koh Tonsay) in the Gulf of Thailand.
The ride out there was pretty rough, and we got totally drenched. There were at least 3 or 4 times that I was sure we would get flipped, but we didn't, and we made it safely to the island. Pulling up to the island felt like a scene from Jurassic Park (I had literally JUST finished reading The Lost World while we were on the bus down there). It was a super dense jungle on a relatively small island. We took a quick hike to a different part of the island, and we got settled in our huts.
The huts were super primitive, but they were right on the beach, and it felt great to live somewhere that simple (for a few days). They only have electricity on the island from 6(ish) to 10(ish)PM, and no outlets. We spent pretty much all day every day playing in the ocean, getting coconut oil massages, hiking on the island, reading, eating at our favorite little restaurant, drinking from coconuts, and napping.

Also, fun fact about the island, it was used as a hideout for the Khmer Rouge for a while, even after the Vietnamese army had driven them out of power. There are still old bunker-like things up at the top of the hill in the middle of the island. It's crazy to see these places and realize that this all happened relatively recently. Also, it's bizarre in Cambodia how you can just visit these places without really any rules. You can climb on everything, see everything, and there aren't fences and barriers to keep you safe/keep the sites intact. It's a little strange compared to how controlled everything is in the U.S.


All in all it was a pretty fantastic weekend. It was exactly what you would expect spending a weekend on an island in the Gulf of Thailand. Although beaches aren't really my favorite thing, this was pretty close to paradise.

Where the Wild Things Are...

The zoo in Cambodia was an entirely different experience than any zoo I've been to in the US. First difference? They let you into some of the cages. Obviously we were not mauled by tigers or anything like that, but we did get to wander around playing with/feeding monkeys for a while, and got chased around by hungry, pregnant deer.
The deer would sneak up behind you and try to eat the potatoes out of your bag while you fed bananas to the monkeys. They were quite needy. We had an Ecuadorian friend with us at the zoo, and she screamed and jumped away every time the deer got anywhere near her, so it turned into a pretty chaotic mess of deer, potatoes, Cambodian women, American college students, monkeys, screaming Ecuadorians, bananas, and a ton of red ants.
The animals that actually were "caged", we pretty much just behind chain link fences that you can walk right up to. It would be easy to lose a finger/arm if you so chose. I chose not to.

Slightly less intimidating than the large cats were the long armed monkeys (which I'm quite sure is their scientific name). Although the seemed less intimidating at the start, they provided the only scare (or two, or six) of the day (besides the red ants, and that hurt... a lot).
You can walk right up to the caged monkeys and shake their hands/feed them. Or, you can reach out to hand them a banana and have them stick out their foot to grab it, which you of course think is just so cute and funny until they quickly snatch your shirt with their hand and pull you against the cage. You can also be standing next to the cage while not paying attention and have them reach out and grab your shirt sleeve and tear it. *Disclaimer* I was not the one grabbed by the monkey in either of these stories, I was just a witness.
My favorite little guy at the zoo was an orphaned elephant that they found in the wild. He had a broken leg, and was wearing a cast when we saw him. First of all, I was sympathetic to his cause. I felt a bit of camaraderie, seeing as my leg is also not at its finest this summer. Luckily for me though, when we figured out I need surgery, we scheduled a surgery rather than shooting me. The elephants were all eating coconuts while we were there, and this little fella had a huge advantage. The bottom of his cast had a tire on the bottom, and he would step on it just enough to crack the coconut and then use his trunk to take pieces to his mouth. The other elephants seemed to struggle a bit with the "whole coconut" concept. I loved this little guy. If I could have an elephant as a pet, I totally would. Most of all, I'd really like an elephant to stay about size of a small-ish horse, and be my pet. Small enough to keep as a pet, big enough to ride. If anyone finds one of these, please let me know. ASAP.