WORLD OF WILL

Yet a nother bus and yet another arduous journey. This time we were issued with sick bags because the roads were so twisty and bumpy that there was a very good chance you'd become reacquainted with your noodle soup lunch. In fact there were a couple of points where we left the road entir ely and were just dr iving through rivers. I chose a seat without an arm rest so that I could stretch out, but soon realised that I was in the cargo section of the bus and was virtually swamped with various sacks and bo xes as we picked up more and more cargo en route. Phonsavan i s cold. I don't know if it's at a much higher altitude than other places we've been but it is definitely very much colder, almost Alpine cold, and my rucksack contains very little in the way o f warm clothing. We were asked if we wanted a room with air-con when we got to our guesthouse which I thought was taking the piss a bit. Phonsavan is also riddled with bullets. And bombs, shells, grenades and other ...

The national Cambodian sport of 'corruption' continued even as we tried to leave the damn country. Our over cr owded minivan was stopped three times on the way to the border by police wanting a back-hander. Then at the border itself we had to pay $2 'overtime' each to the Cambodia n offici als - because it was Sunday. When we asked for a receipt we were told that there were "no receipts on Sundays" and refused to hand back our passports until we paid u p. Then, after a short stroll through no-man's land, we arrived at the Laos border control and guess what... they wanted $2 each for overtime too! We were handed back our pass ports with a presumably ironic cry of "Enjoy your stay!" We eventually arrived at a little town called Nakasang where we caught a tail boat to Don Det. Don Det is an island in the middle of the Mekong, part of a group known as "4,000 Islands" - although from what I could see, about 3,995 of these were just a san...

There are certain differences you notice when you leave the big Cambodian towns and head into the countryside . One is that the women-folk seem to spend their whole day wearing pyjamas. Another i s the tuk tuks become bigger - they're almost like scoo ter -towed minibuses. But the main thing is the dust. An endless cloud of red dust. We'd left Siem Reap and headed to the little dusty town of Kratie . Dusty houses line dusty streets full of dusty people all trying to get on with their dusty lives. It's not an affluent town and people live hand-to-mouth above their crumbli ng shops o r in little wooden shacks. Which makes it all the more frustrating to see the lovely, shiny, new Tax Office standing proudly in the middle o f it all. Worried that your taxes are being mis -spent? Why would you think that? We have been seeing a lot of local weddings taking place (must be the season) and there are two thing s that stand out. One is the sheer brilliance of bright colour...