We organized a ride to Phnom Penh via GetYourGuide, and the driver arrived to our hotel at 10am. It was 5.5 hours which is a bit of a haul, but when we thought about the rigamarole of getting to and through and airport with Millie, 5 hours being driven in a nice van didn’t seem so bad. And it was much cheaper.

She watched her movies, Nick watched his movies, and I listened to my podcasts while I looked out the window. Everyone was happy. She’s 100% all in on Studio Ghibli movies now and watched Spirited Away.

We stopped a couple of times. The first was at Cambodia’s version of Buc-ees. Clean bathrooms with endless stalls, a gift shop, local preserved foods, kitschy roadtrip decor, and Texas-themed snacks.

The next stop was a bit more traumatic. Unbeknownst to us it was an insect market. As I walked Millie to the bathroom we saw a platter of fried tarantulas. This freaked her out a little but she was fine. Then a few kids spotted us and ran towards us with live tarantulas in their hands, trying to show them off. She jumped into my arms in terror, which just egged one boy on more. I carried her to the bathroom and when we left he was waiting outside to taunt her more. I was not entertained and had to carry her, crying, back to the car.

I snapped this photo of the giant sculptures as we were driving away. We’ve spent much of the afternoon trying to pepper in tarantula facts that make them sound adorable and helpless, hoping to ward off nightmares.

We arrived at our hotel in Phnom Penh and waved goodbye to our driver and his one very long fingernail. We were too hungry to think about dinner and went to the pizza place nearby. It is the same chain as the one we went to in Hanoi and actually makes excellent pizza. Millie got her usual Margherita and Nick and I ordered fancy ones, sans cheese.

Once we were full we walked out and saw that the front street we had walked in on was closed down and packed with people. It becomes a walking street and night market on weekend nights. Nick noticed that unlike the night markets we went to in Luang Prabang and Chiang Mai, which were catered to tourists and selling souvenirs, this one seemed 100% for locals.

In front of the royal palace, families were having picnics and kids were running around on the lawn. There were lots of kids waving Cambodian flags. I’m not sure if this spot is always this patriotic or if it has to do with the border conflict or something else.

We stopped here for a while and watched Millie try to make friends, with mixed success. She played with a boy for about 5 minutes until he had to leave. Then she tried to make friends with a group but never quite broke through. She really tried which was equal parts heartwarming and heartbreaking. We watched her and talked about how proud we are of her for trying.

The market was filled with vendors whose whole mission is to either fill parents’ lives with cheap plastic or to make kids upset that their parents won’t buy them something. After lots of negotiation we decided that bubbles would be a good purchase. They aren’t something we’ll have to carry around forever and it could encourage interaction with some local kids.

These lasted for about 5 minutes of fun until Millie insisted on holding the bubble tube by herself. We warned her many times that it would be better for us to hold it so it didn’t spill, but nevertheless she persisted. Within 30 seconds of having possession of it she spun around and accidentally spilled it all. We didn’t buy another one since we had warned her so many times and it felt like a good lesson. There were lots of tears all the way back to the hotel, which dampened an otherwise fun evening.

Three Cambodia observations:

1. They know how to get the most out of an engine. The tuk tuks are all powered by old motorcycles, and get huge. As we were driving around the countryside today I kept noticing modded out old tractors, transporting massive amounts of things. I didn’t take a photo but will find some online and put them below.
2. The Cambodian currency is the Riel but almost everything is listed in USD. This seems to be the case in both touristy and non-touristy spots. I’m not sure why the dollar became so prominent here, it hasn’t been like this in any other country we’ve been to.
3. Speaking of dollars, it’s funny how quickly we become used to prices. Our average meals here have cost about $15-20, total. At tonight’s western pizza place we balked at the high “western” prices. When we paid the final bill it was $35 for our 3 pizzas and two beers. This would be probably $100 at home.