With today being a
designated rest day, we got up late for breakfast, then, after doing
some school work, the girls jumped in the pool and didn't get out
again for a very long time (by the time they did, the tips of some of
Zoe's fingers were red raw).
For lunch, we went
back to the pizza place (our pizza took a lot longer to come this
time as they hadn't stocked the wood-fired oven yet) and then walked
to a special cafe that Kate had found online. With tourism slowly
engulfing the whole of Southeast Asia in its commercial grip,
hospitality schools of various types have become popular with foreign
community-development NGOs. Most come with a restaurant or cafe
attached, giving the students hands-on practice of dealing with
customers in real-life situations. This was just such a cafe. It
specialised in cupcakes, offering a bewildering array of options and
we all ordered a cake each, Kate and I washing ours down with a
pretty decent coffee.
Back at the hotel,
the girls jumped back in the pool, and as the sun started to head
down, I cracked open the bottle of 2010 Madfish Riesling that I had
bought at a big, bright supermarket around the corner last night (and
chilled in the fridge in our room). Kate had managed to get a couple
wine glasses from reception and we sat by the pool and sipped (it
took all of our powers of self-control not to gulp) what proved to be
an absolutely delicious wine – crisp and ever so slightly off-dry -
matching it was a nice crisp packet of shrimp crackers.
For dinner, we went
to another place with a school attached – another establishment
called the Haven. We started with some satay sticks then had a
chicken amok and fish with ginger and chilli. The food was top notch
– by some distance the best we've eaten in Cambodia.
Back at the hotel,
the girls jumped back in the pool, while I went up to the room to do
a bit of work in air-conditioned comfort. Soon, however, there was a
knock on the door and a very excited Sarah implored me to come
downstairs to see something 'really cool'. One of the locals had come
in with a Tokay gecko on a string. These orange-spotted geckos are
truly impressive – the world's second largest, they can reach half
a metre in length. I was hoping to get to see one while we were in
Southeast Asia, but these weren't really the circumstances I was
hoping for, with the poor lizard tied up and probably doomed. The
locals were all terrified of it, shrieking as I reached down and
picked it up. When I tried to show it to a little local girl she
screamed and hid behind her father's legs, just a very small step
away from full-blown hysterics. In order to show everyone how
harmless it was, I stupidly stuck one of my fingers in its mouth.
With the whole width of my finger being bitten, all was well, but
then, when I tried to get it out, the gecko's jaws slid down until
there was just a little bit of flesh being pinched by its now very
firm and rather painful bite. And it didn't want to let go. I kept my
calmest face on as I tried everything I could to extricate my now
throbbing finger and eventually got it loose, bearing a neat red jaw
mark that took several days to fade.
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