An interlude from Chau Doc

Have only nine minutes left before my time runs out … so I’ll be brief.

Sat in a pizza joint on the Phnom Penh riverfront, trying to persuade the waitress - through the medium of mime - that if she insisted on me tasting the “happy” herb topping I’d likely pass out and/or be sick, when I saw a monkey.

The monkey was on a lead and being fed rice and Red Bull by its owner, a local expat. Quite a crowd had gathered. One gentleman, who had only one leg and was selling knocked-off paperbacks, was quite smitten. He then produced a rather large and very hairy spider. For a dollar, the monkey’s owner bought the tarantula and placed it on the floor in front of the monkey. The monkey pushed it around with its feet for a bit, before picking it up, plucking the legs off one by one and eating them with an enormous monkey grin on its face.

It was a special moment.

Off on a two day tour of the Mekong Delta, so lots of photos to follow. Felt like Colonel Kurtz today sailing into Vietnam.

PS the last email from my mum contained the words “morphosing into a gun slinging, beer swigging, morose alcoholic…” and she wasn’t talking about my dad.