I of the Sun by Richard Arthur

Author:Richard Arthur
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Troubador Publishing Ltd
Published: 2013-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

SIX

A busy night market at 4am, heaving with traders in shorts and woolly hats in amongst mud-stained, wooden stalls of meat and fish, fruit and vegetables, herbs and grains. The temperature was in the early 20s, chilly for Thailand; the air thick with the locals’ animated bargaining. I’d reached the provincial town of Trat. I edged through the market crowds in a sleepy blur unsure of where I was in this strange but busy hour.

I found a minibus which took me an hour down the coastline. Empty silvery beaches to the right, and a steep, gloomy mountain ridge to the left delineating the Cambodian border. The dark eerie road ran along the cutting edge of the two old enemies and neighbours. The gap between the ridge and the coast petered out till it was just 1km across, like the road to the end of the world.

I reached the border as the Sun broke across the horizon ahead of me. I stamped out and walked the long no-man’s land in the pastel dawn with my bag on my back, the sea appearing through the trees down to the right.

Every day started and ended with the heat. It was everywhere I went, all around me, inside of me, bearing down on me like a dead weight. But as I looked across at Cambodia, I saw there was no escape ahead. No 7-Elevens on the corner, no Toyota taxis or plastic franchise restaurants. Just the heat and humidity. Every minute of every hour of every day. Wringing you dry, slowing you down, draining your energy, dulling your senses, sucking the life out of you, altering your very reality.

Whereas Thai people in the street tended to ignore you, suddenly I was the centre of attention. Hoards of guys in cheap flannel trousers, shirts, flip-flops and baseball caps surrounding me, offering me visa services and taxis, kids and beggars with missing limbs flailing towards me for assistance. I weaved through and found a cramped old minibus headed for Phnom Penh.

It took the whole damn morning and afternoon. Weaving along muddy roads through the impoverished land, tired and sweaty, the engine breaking down three times. Four times we had to disembark at muddy river banks while the bus drove onto a rickety floating wooden barge and we chugged over to the other side. There were no bridges and little infrastructure; the country was clearly very poor. We passed ramshackle villages, over gentle hills and flat plains of endless fields, punctuated by tall palm trees and temples in the distance. It was beautiful. Despite being so near Thailand it looked very different. Perhaps it was just the lack of development that was so noticeable, or perhaps that this very lack of development brought the panoramic views of the natural landscape so prominently into view. I felt that raw, heart-pumping thrill of entering a new country for the first time, the more mystical the better.

We approached the capital by dusk. The long straight roads and concrete government structures on the outskirts reminded me of other former centrally-controlled countries I’d been to.

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