At dinner the other evening with my Niece, to hear her stories of her recent trip to Cambodia, food stalls and Angkor Wat came up. Those two entities are intertwined in my memory. Thereby hangs a tale.
On my first trip to Cambodia in early January, 1994, I visited Angkor Wat. Tourists had yet to discover it so we had this famed temple to ourselves. Siem Reap, the town next to Angor, was little more than a sleepy village. In 1997 Joanne and I were in Cambodia, to visit Lisa. We planned to visit Angkor Wat together. You know how plans are!
Lisa made friends with a Cambodian family while she was working there. On a day's outing to an historical site near Phnom Penh with this family, fate intervened. While Joanne and Lisa left to use the facilities, a nice euphemism for a walk in the woods, I was left with grandma. She bought food from a nearby food cart. Too polite to refuse of proffered food I ate and soon came down with raging food poisoning. With tickets to Siem Reap Joanne and Lisa left as I recuperated in Lisa's house. However, I did return to Angkor Wat on a subsequent trip.
So now the scene shifts to Bangkok. Some of the best food in Thailand is street food in Bangkok. The two times I got food poisoning in Bangkok it was from food in restaurants. Never did I get sick from Thai street food. In 1994 Phnom Penh was in the early stages of recovery from the Khmer Rouge and sanitation was iffy at the best.
Takk for alt,
Al
PS She said almost no one listens to her travel stories!
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