Visa Run - Pattaya to Sihanoukville (4 page)

“Sihanoukville,” he announced firmly. “You’re going on a visa run tomorrow, anyway. That’s the place for you,” he said.

Although I was a little jaded and disillusioned with Pattaya at the time, mainly due to the about turn of Jai’s character, I seriously doubted Ron’s prediction. Despite the ennui I was currently experiencing, there was no question that similar to a stick of seaside rock, I still had the words ‘Pattaya City’ written right through me. After all, the city was my home now, and I had spent the best part of the last quarter of a century in Thailand. After listening to bar-talk, I felt I knew what Cambodia was all about already, and I had no desire to spend any time in a country I had heard was mainly the hang-out of Cheap-Charlie backpackers and paedophiles. The army of heart-breaking child beggars I had witnessed at the border on previous visa runs didn’t look like much of a tourist attraction to me either, and I was sure I would miss the relatively civilized environs of Walking Street and Soi Eight in no time at all. I reflected that it would be hard to justify pouring dollars worth of beer down my neck in a shitty bar in Cambodia whilst surrounded by hungry, pitiful children and I knew I would soon miss the company of my Pattaya drinking buddies even though they were a bunch of knobheads. I also preferred my women over the age of puberty, and partaken of in the comfort of my own apartment and not on the floor of some tumbledown shack.

No, this time I was sure the old man was wrong. Everybody knew Cambodia was full of backpackers now, and I could see no enjoyment at all in drinking with long-haired weirdos dripping with ethnic beads and bangles picked up on their gap year travels. I’d seen thousands of the type around Asia before. You know the ones. They dress like locals and find everything ‘amazing’ and ‘incredible’ and watch every dollar like a hawk. At night they go to their five buck a night rooms to write up their travel journals which are mostly about the things they can’t afford to do. Eventually, they return to their home countries to finish University courses or start work in Daddy’s firm. There was no fucking way I was going to Sihanoukville, I thought to myself, as I took a drag on the fat and very powerful joint Ron had handed me.

During the course of the evening, after countless rums and coke and a journey through most of the red-light zones of the world, Ron also told me about his last and most recent trip to Sihanoukville, where he had become ill. Surprisingly, he really seemed to like the place. I found this strange, because most people I knew who visited Cambodia always seemed to be in a big hurry to get back to Pattaya and usually turned up again within a few days.

“The country is still recovering from the Khmer Rouge regime,” Ron told me. “At the moment it’s just getting going again. Sure, it’s poor and has its problems, but it’s fresh, exciting, and about as cheap as you can get. At the moment the people are still respectful to foreigners, the food is great, and once they lose their initial shyness, the women are even better. Give it another ten years and Pattaya could have a rival,” Ron assured me knowingly. The old man wagged a finger at the bag of piss that hung on a hook by his wheelchair. “If it wasn’t for that, I might even have stayed in Cambodia until I kicked the bucket,” he told me, never one to mince his words. “But at the moment, there is no decent hospital in Sihanoukville, and it looks like I will be needing one for a bit.”

I looked at the ominous colostomy bag with its rubber tube disappearing into Ron’s stomach just by the left tit of a mermaid tattooed on his abdomen, and I asked him if he thought it was such a great idea to be drinking and smoking ganga in his state. He gave me that rumbling guffaw and told me he knew he was going to die very soon. He said he doubted if a few more glasses of rum and a couple of spliffs were going to make very much difference and that although he could have afforded the expense, he wouldn’t go to stay in any of the many excellent hospitals around Pattaya because the doctors tended to frown on his alcohol consumption, and looked down on his fondness for wacky backy even more.

“You’ve got to understand I’ve had it, Joe,” he told me. “And I don’t mind at all. I can’t get around any more now and I hate being old, and I’ve done just about everything on my list of things to do before I die anyway.” It was obvious the old man had no fear of his impending death whatsoever—in fact he almost seemed to welcome it. He explained how this was because he had always done what his heart had told him to, and he knew he had lived his life to the full. He also said that although he had been no angel in his younger days, he had no regrets about that either.

“Sure, I’ve pulled a few strokes in my time,” he told me. “But I would rather be kept awake at night by the things I’ve done rather than the things I haven’t,” he assured me, with another one of his winks.

I felt a tremendous admiration for the old seaman. It had taken a stroke and the loss of the use of his legs to end his travels, whilst all that had had curtailed my own wanderings had been a comfortable room, cable TV, a full fridge and several streets full of willing bar-girls. I looked at the old man with new respect. He jerked a horny thumb at the offending waste receptacle that hung on a hook on his wheelchair. “Reckon my best bet is to just keep on filling those bags with rum until I burst one,” he said with a gruff chuckle.

Ron finally became very tired and our conversation stopped. The only light in the room came from a flickering lava lamp that Nan had turned on some time ago. It was about then that something inexplicable happened. I don’t suppose I will ever know whether the illusion was caused by the dim, dancing light or was simply the result of a larger than usual intake of rum, coke and marijuana, but when I looked over at Ron, for a few moments I was astonished to see not the frail old cripple he had become, but the man he had been forty years ago. The tough, handsome young seaman now sitting opposite me glowed with life and virility. Shining, golden locks had taken the place of his liver-spotted pate, and his sunken flabby chest had turned into a pair of broad, suntanned pectorals with big copper-penny nipples. The big muscles in his shoulders and arms bunched like writhing pythons as gripped the sides of his wheelchair and leant forward.

Ron bent towards me and for a few seconds the spirited face I had seen in the photograph taken at Manila Bay four decades ago regarded me steadily. Just then, the lava lamp changed hue and the hula girl on Ron’s hard, bulging bicep danced as alluringly as she had done when she had first been jabbed into his skin with an inky bamboo spike in a backstreet tattoo parlour in Hong Kong more than forty years ago.

“You’re going to Sihanoukville for me tomorrow, Joe,” the apparition told me in a forceful voice that brooked no room for argument. “You need to take a look at the place, and I’ve got something I want you to do for me.” Once he had grasped my attention in this unusual manner, Ron turned back into himself again and I wondered where on earth he had purchased such a potent brand of marijuana.

The old man explained how he needed me to locate a girl who had helped him when he had fallen ill in Cambodia. He said he had been so sick when he left the country he hadn’t been able to thank her properly and how grateful he would be if could hunt her out and give some money to her. I asked him how the hell he thought I was going to find a girl I had never met in a place I had never been to before, and he assured me that Sihanoukville was very small and he would give me a photograph and a list of places where I might come across her. Ron was adamant I make the trip, and he made me give him my word.

“Thanks Joe,” he said, after extracting a promise from me that I didn’t really want to make. “You’re doing me a big favour, and I think you’ll love the place when you get there.”

The crafty old seaman had made his request in a way that made it impossible for me to refuse. After listening to Ron’s fascinating tales about the travels of his colourful past and assuring him I was a bit of an adventurer myself, I could hardly tell him that I couldn’t go to Sihanoukville for him because West Ham versus Wigan was on cable TV next week and there was a darts match down at the Lazi Pig beer bar in Soi Yamoto. Besides, how could I deny the wishes of old man who was plainly dying? Before I knew it, I found myself assuring old Ron that I would not turn around at the border as usual this time, but would continue on to the port town of Koh Kong and from there, travel by boat to Sihanoukville. The elderly mariner had been so persuasive it even seemed like a good idea to me at the time, and I couldn’t help thinking how it might be a good idea to be out of range of Jai’s ill-timed visits for a while, as well.

So that was that, then.

“Good boy,” said Ron approvingly, knowing he had won. “You won’t regret it.”

Just then, Ron coughed long and deeply, and Nan was immediately at his side. She told me I really ought to leave now as I had tired the old man and he needed to rest. Ron told her to go out to the kitchen and wrap me some of the delicious sweetcorn fritters she had made so I could take some home with me. Whilst she was gone, Ron surreptitiously pushed an envelope into my hand.

“There is four hundred bucks in there, and a photograph,” he whispered. “Half is for you, and half for Psorng-Preng when you find her.” I began to protest. I didn’t want the old man’s money. Just then Nan walked into the room and Ron silenced me with a weak squeeze on my arm. His hand shook as he did so, but for some reason the light touch of his feeble fingers on my forearm was as much of a warning to stay silent as a grip like a steel vice would have been.

Ron now looked terribly old and tired and Nan shooed me away from him, telling me that our drinking and yarning had exhausted her frail boyfriend.

“Out! Out! Out!” she ordered, flapping her hands at me as though I were a troublesome goose. I knew she was only joking, but I could tell from her manner that she really thought that the old man had had enough and it was time for me to go. I tucked the envelope that Ron had given me into my pocket, picked up my bag of sweetcorn fritters and stood up to leave. Nan took advantage of this to crush me to her enormous bosom once again, and Ron shook my hand.

“What if I can’t find her?” I whispered to the old man, as I held his fragile fingers in mine.

“You’ll find her,” said Ron and he gave me yet another one of his winks.

Nan shut the door of the condominium behind me and I was alone in the corridor. I felt the weight of the envelope Ron had given me in my pocket, and I knew that this was the last chance I would have to change my mind. As I stood there, I heard the sound of a palm slapping well-padded flesh. Nan give a little scream of delight which was followed by the unmistakable laughter of the old man. The sickly-sweet smell of marijuana smoke drifted out from the crack under the door and I heard the clink of ice cubes in a glass. Despite his weakness, the old seadog was at it again. I smiled to myself, knowing that the frail old sailor was more of a man than I would ever be. Despite his immobility and the pain of his illness, I could see that he was still determined to make the most of his last days, and to hell with anything or anybody that stood in his way. It was about then that I knew I really was going to Sihanoukville in the morning—despite my reservations.

C
HAPTER
T
HREE

I sat between a hard wheel arch and miserable bastard who hadn’t stopped moaning since we left the border, and ten minutes out of Thailand, as the knackered minibus bounced over the rutted road to Koh Kong, I wished I had turned back around at the Cambodian Immigration station already. At every bump in the road—and there were a lot of them—my head struck the ceiling of the definitely not
farang
-sized rattling vehicle and my hunched knees cracked painfully into the torn plastic in front of me. The ignorant backpacker sitting in front of me had reclined his seat so far backwards that I was now forced to sit in a position a circus contortionist would have been proud of. The chemically induced high that had allowed Ron to persuade me to visit Sihanoukville much against my better judgement had now degenerated into a dull, throbbing headache, and I wanted nothing more than to be on my way home on the minibus that had brought me to the border from Pattaya.

“You’ll love it when you get there!” the old man had assured me confidently as I had staggered out of his his apartment the night before. “In fact, you probably won’t want to come back!”

Despite his best intentions, I knew old Ron was wrong. After all, everyone knew Joe Bucket was a Pattaya man through and through, and I had no inclination to visit an unknown beach resort the backpackers had given a nickname that sounded like something out of the ‘Enid Blyton Book of Brownies.’

‘Snooky’, for Christ sake. I was embarrased just to be sitting on the minibus going to a place with a name like that.

The truth was, I had become so used to Pattaya that I now felt uncomfortable when I was away from the bustling tourist trap. There were very few surprises left for me in Thailand any more, and I kind of liked it that way. I knew where I was and I felt safe there, and these days I felt more at ease in my room in the Happy Home apartment block than I did back in England. Now, for the first time in decades in Asia, the language that was being spoken around me made about as much sense as an Austrian yodeller, and I had no idea what the people were talking about. I was already beginning to realise that perhaps the real reason I had never continued on at the Cambodian border was simply a fear of the unknown.

Looking back, I must admit I was extremely close to following the example of my travelling companion who had been sitting next to me on the minibus from Pattaya. He was big, greasy and hairy and told me his name was Axeman and that he was a member of a motorcycle gang in Pattaya. In spite of his intimidating name and appearance, as Axeman told me about his life in Sin City he seemed far too personable and kind-hearted to be telling the truth to me. I had always been under the impression that Hell’s Angels went about busting each others’ heads with bike chains and trying out new drugs cocktails—not helping out homeless kids and doing bike rides around Isaan for charity.

“Yeah, I’ll come with you for a couple of days,” drawled Axeman, cracking open another beer and scratching a hairy belly under a Harley Davidson T-shirt. “I’ve always wanted to see a bit of Cambodia but I’ve never had anyone to go with.” I couldn’t help wondering if the rest of his chapter or whatever they called it wasn’t too busy helping old ladies across the street or weaving baskets to sell in aid of orphaned street kids to accompany Axeman to Sihanoukville.

In fact, Axeman changed his mind. As soon as we had crossed the Cambodian border the soft-hearted biker had taken one look at the two crippled children walking beside him and decided not to accompany me after all. A small girl of around twelve years old attempted to shield Axeman’s ample bulk from the sun with a tatty umbrella clutched in the hand of her one remaining arm. On the biker’s other side, a young boy on home-made wooden crutches struggled to keep up with him repeating the words, “One dollar! One dollar! No Mama! No Papa!” over and over again in a beseeching voice. There were quite a few beggars around the border area that day, and later on I was told that all of them have to pay a tax in order to operate there.

“Sorry, Joe,” Axeman mumbled at me disconsolately. “I can’t handle a week of looking at these poor little bastards.” With that, the big motorcycle gangster disappeared in the direction of the Thai immigration office and went back to his leather-studded cronies and their hogs in the old Las Vegas gogo bar. I couldn’t blame the intrepid devil-worshipper and thought about following him, but as well as not relishing another buttock-busting journey on a couple of minibuses, I still had Ron’s money in my pocket and to have turned back now would have been a very poor show.

I sighed and shouldered my bag, and looked around the border area for yet another minibus driver to take me into Koh Kong. When I found one, I wedged myself in beside the little bald git who was whinging about everything in sight and behind the dreadlocked backpacker who immediately crushed my legs as he reclined his seat right back in order to be comfortable on the short journey, not giving a fuck about who was sitting behind him. We drove down a dusty road bordered by fields and made our way across the monstrous new bridge to the port town of Koh Kong. The minibus driver told us between twenty to a hundred tourists make the journey every day depending on the time of year; it seemed pretty bad luck to me to have got stuck next to and behind two of the most cretinous of them.

As I sat there, I was already sure I had made a terrible mistake. I looked at my watch. If I had turned around at the border as usual I would have made it back to Pattaya in plenty of time for the soapy shower show at the Wide World gogo bar—but where the hell was I heading now? I glared at the back of the snoozing, dreadlocked traveller’s head in front of me. I debated booting the back of his chair, but I decided against it as he was twice the size of me and looked a bit barmy as well. I cheered myself up by reminding myself of the amusing scenario I had witnessed at the Happy Home when I got back from Ron’s place the night before. As if to remind me not to forget her in my stay in Cambodia, my favourite city had given me a goodbye chuckle that was typical of Pattaya.

I had arrived back at my room at the Happy Home around midnight to encounter a completely naked Russian couple in the corridor on the fourth floor. The guy was semi-conscious in the corner, legs splayed apart, his genitalia displayed very ungracefully for all to see. His attractive, large-breasted partner was seemingly doing her best to kill him with one of the round metal lids she had grabbed from one of the large trash-bins that stood at the end of every corridor. She was certainly pulling no punches, and wielded the heavy cover ferociously. There was quite a lot of blood splattered up and around the walls, as well as a generous amount of claret running down her boyfriend’s face. It appeared that she had already broken his nose with the unusual weapon, and was now attempting to do the same to his head. I debated going to the poor bloke’s assistance, but both of the Thai security guards who worked at the Happy Home were standing there smoking cigarettes and regarding the incident with interest so I guessed they had the situation in hand and left them to it. Shortly afterwards the police turned up and took the now-hysterical girl away, wrapped in nothing more than a bedsheet. The security guards told me later that the girl’s boyfriend had apparently sneaked off for a short-time in Soi Six under the guise of going for a game of golf. This indescretion would probably have gone unnoticed—aside from the dose of gonnorhea he had brought back and given to his girl as a holiday present. I couldn’t help thinking the lovebirds maybe should have gone to Southend-on-Sea where the ladies of the night are much less alluring.

Back on the minibus to Koh Kong I concentrated on ignoring Groucho and the moronic backpacker and contemplated the scrubby trees lining the sun-blasted fields on either side of the bumpy road. I was still only ten minutes away from Thailand, the Cambodian driver and his mate were still jabbering away to each other in a language that sounded very much like the chorus from Neddy Seagoon’s Ying Tong Song and I felt lost already. Thankfully, it wasn’t long before we reached Koh Kong; the port town where I was to board the boat for Sihanoukville the next day. The minibus pulled up outside a wooden guest house and everyone got off. I wondered if the driver had brought us here simply to earn a commision, but in fact the ramshackle guest house was situated right opposite the jetty on the river where the boat left for Sihanoukville in the morning, and at three dollars a night I wasn’t about to argue. In fact, to my surprise, although very basic, the rooms were spotlessly clean. The polished wooden floors literally gleamed and the little restaurant upstairs that looked over the dirty brown river served a variety of cheap and tasty meals and snacks, including sandwiches and toasties. My first meal in Cambodia was a not very exotic but certainly welcome bacon and ham sarnie, and as I tucked in I began to feel that perhaps I needn’t have worried so much about the horror stories I had been told in Pattaya about uncooked Khmer food and the subsequent food poisoning it was bound to induce after all.

After I dumped my bag I had a walk around Koh Kong to kill some time, but due to an horrendous smash up on the Rayong to Trat road involving a truck driver high on amphetamines who had wiped out several motorcycles, the traffic had been heavy and we had arrived late, so there was little time to explore the small town properly. Many people had told me that Koh Kong was a shit-hole, but I was surprised to find I disagreed. Sure, it is a shack-lined dustbowl of a town, but after the concrete metropolis of Pattaya, it was not without a certain charm. There were plenty of old-fashioned wooden houses and shops lining the quiet streets and motorcycles and bicycles in various states of disrepair spluttered along the dirt roads. Pigs in wooden trailers were being pulled behind some of the motorcycles whilst others dragged impossibly heavy looking tree trunks behind them that bounced dangerously on the bumpy surface. It didn’t take me long to notice there were also some extremely attractive Cambodian girls knocking about and this raised my spirits considerably. I also couldn’t help observing how young everyone looked. It was a hot day so I bought a cold can of beer and sat at a stone table outside a tiny store to drink it and watch the world go by.

I sipped the ice-cold beer straight from the can outside the open-fronted store—which was little more than a hut—and three small street kids sidled up to where I was sitting. The small boys were all barefoot and as grubby and ragged as hell. The oldest and biggest lad was around ten years old and his companions perhaps a year or two younger. I expected them to attempt to beg a note or two (there are no coins in use in Cambodia), but their grimy leader pointed a dirty finger at my drink and then pointed to a plastic bag he was carrying which contained several empty cans. I realized that the trio were simply collecting the empty cans for scrap, so I motioned to the boy that I would let him have mine just as soon as I had finished my beer.

Whilst the boys waited they indulged in a spot of play-fighting, and I was taken aback by the ferocity of their game as they attempted to impress the watching
farang
. They punched and kicked each other with real venom, and I winced as some of the older boy’s blows smacked hard against the head and body of his smaller friends. I flinched again when the youngest of the lads took a kick to the stomach delivered by the dirty, bare foot of his much bigger pal and he flew over backwards, cracking his close-cropped head on the sidewalk with a hollow thud. I expected the small boy to cry, but the doughty little fighter picked himself up and, rubbing his head, threw himself back into the fray, laughing. He received another heavy thump round the ear from a small bony fist almost immediately, but shook that off as well. I watched the street-kids bashing lumps out of each other in playful delight for ten minutes, and I couldn’t help thinking that I wouldn’t want to come up against one of them in a dark alley in five or six years time.

When I had all but finished my drink the ringleader pointed at the can and raised his dark eyebrows at me. I nodded to him and he grabbed it, then threw back his head and drained the last few drops of beer with exaggerated relish. Then, the three ragamuffins chased each other down the street, yelling and cuffing at one another. I would like to have given the boys a dollar or two, but realized if I did every other
farang
that came to Koh Kong would be pestered by the tough little urchins.

When I had finished watching the youngsters punch each other silly I walked all around the small town and through the crowded, smelly market place. I was struck by how friendly all the local children were. Nearly all of the kids I passed greeted me with a wave and a ‘Hello’ and I was surprised when none of them asked for money. When two lovely teenaged girls pedalled by on their bicycles and smiled at me shyly from under lowered eyelids, I almost felt I had started to enjoy myself already. I finished up with a walk along the road that runs parallel to the Kah Bpow River, and stopped at a bridge just before the headquarters of a mining company to look at the ramshackle hamlet of wooden houses built over the scummy water. As I leant on the concrete rails a shining blue kingfisher plunged into the filthy water in front of me and emerged with a wriggling fry in its beak. The beautifully irridescent feathers of the little bird contrasted strangely with the rubbish strewn waters from where it had taken its squirming prey.

Back at my guest house, I sat in the elevated restaurant and had a nightcap of another couple of beers and looked out at the wide expanse of dirty river and the gigantic new Koh Kong bridge. The huge structure had been built to take the place of the boats that until fairly recently had been the only way of crossing the muddy waters of the Kah Bpow River. The young waiter told me that the bridge had opened on April fourth in 2002 and before that, the crossing could be extremely hazardous in bad weather. When I paid for my second beer I tipped the teenaged Cambodian a twenty baht note I still had in my wallet and he smiled at me gratefully. He immediately went behind a wooden counter and returned with a handful of sweet-smelling brown and green stalks and leaves which he placed on the table in front of me together with a pack of King-size cigarette papers. It had been a long journey and a tense day for me, so I took him up on his offer.