I'm heading for vietnam tomorrow morning - fingers crossed it all goes smoothly. Apparently it's only an 8 hour bus ride, sounds piss easy.

At any rate, had a swell time in Cambodia the last few days - been relaxing, watching movies (Saw Kung Fu Hustle on DVD... not bad for a chinese comedy martial arts flick, though it aint not "Hero" either)...

...And... I'm getting used to the place (Cambodia), just as I'm about to leave... heh, cest la vie!

At any rate.. I went to the russian markets for some clothes. They have everything there... including a delightful semi-sweat shop setup in the middle of the clothes department (watch the nock off nike apparel appear before your very eyes!)... a cool engineering section with a surprisingly wide selection of precision tools - loads of acessories for lathes and milling machines... and of course parts for every 100cc motorbike ever built by asian hands.

All in all it's good fun - loads of weird smells and a lot of people manufacturing goods on site which kept me entertained (I get pretty bored wandering markets look at tat, being a lad 'n all)... so I got to watch jewelers working on custom pieces, a guy doing a valve grind, woman making clothes and carving/varnishing wood items - a smidgen of open air butchery... all the good stuff.

After that I wandered my way back, skirting past a load of engineering firms for a bit of a butchers hook (it's funny how the smell of dust and oil reminds me of my childhood) and generally letting my mind wander, eventually turning onto Molivong boulevard... which pretty much runs from one end of Phnom Penh to the other... half way along I stopped in an ptometrist to get my glasses fixed (I broke them back in Pakse a few weeks ago) which was free, a pleasant surprise!

After a bit more walking I decided I best get a haircut (been putting it off for weeks) - so I popped into a local barbers for a $2 cambodian special... I haven't got a mirror in my current room so I don't really remember what it looked like - nor did I care - I'm on holiday - all I know is it's now less hot.

Had to get some more reading material, decided for some fantasy to counter the rather depressing (and relevant) no-logo as I work my way through prime sweat shop country... but after searching one store only to discover they only had an almost complete set of L.Ron Hubbard books including his mission to earth bollix.. which though strictly you could call it "fantasy".. I wasn't really prepared to waste any more of my time (then I already have in the past ;o) plumbing the depths of scientological scat.  Long story short It took me a couple of stores till I bought a  Terry Goodkind book, "Wizardsv First Rule" - I'm sure Ben or Lyle will fill me on wether it's a series, and of course if it's shite or not, at some point in the future... for the first 300 pages it seems like a pleasant enough read.

The one advantage of a toilet/shower combination is that you can keep cool while on the can.