I'm sure you're wondering what the title of this post is all about! Be patient...I'll get to that in a bit.
After the fun of the island and a day of recovery in Sihanoukville I was collected from my hostel by a lady called Shelbee and taken to her house in Otres Village on the southern coast of Cambodia. The plan was to stay at her house, which she built herself, and help her with odd jobs for a few hours a day in exchange for free accommodation and breakfast. I found Shelbee through a website called HelpX which is not unlike the WWOOFing site, through which I arranged my stint on the organic farm in Malaysia last December, however HelpX is not limited to farms and puts volunteers in touch with people who need help with anything from English teaching to bar work. It's a fantastic way to save money whilst travelling but also serves as an opportunity to be involved in a local community rather than purely sticking to all the tourist areas, sights and traps. I've been offered many bar jobs throughout my travels in SE Asia however they breed a type of mandatory, hardcore drinking culture that I'd prefer not to be forced into! We arrived at her three storey, wooden house on a peaceful road surrounded by mango trees and I thought to myself "yep, I'm going to be very happy here for the next few days", particularly after the crazy week I'd just had.
Shortly after we'd got there one of her friends came to visit and casually asked me if I'd met Shelbee's two 'killers' yet...ummm no?! These formidable sounding beasts turned out to be her guard dog Rottweilers, Sacha and Pacha, trained to attack intruders - a security method that Shelbee assured me was essential in a Cambodian village, particularly since there had been a lot of recent robberies. For the first few days, whilst they learnt that I was a friend of Shelbee's and not to be attacked, the dogs were kept behind closed doors and slowly introduced to me. On the second day, as I was coming downstairs, the Rotweilers mistook me for an intruder and started barking ferociously, one of them came charging towards me and started to bite my leg just as Shelbee yelled at them to back off. Luckily the dog's teeth didn't pierce my skin and I was merely left with a purple and blue bruise above my knee (plus I was uncontrollably shaking all over - scary stuff!!!). I know many of you may think I was mad to stay on after that but in the end they were just doing what they're trained to do and after it happened, bizarrely, the dogs began to take a shine to me and the male dog who'd bitten me, Pacha, constantly followed me around the house and with each wiggle of his happy, stumpy tail my fear dissolved.
I was told that a dog down the road had rabies and rumour had it that it'd contracted it from a rat or a bat. As if that didn't worry me enough Shelbee said that the 'tuk tuk mafia' were in town robbing houses and apparently they are like ninjas when it comes to breaking into buildings. It sounds humorous but it wasn't. I didn't sleep a wink that night. Every sound was a potential mafia-ninja or rabid bat/rat/dog to me!! I risked stabbing myself in the face by sleeping with my open pen knife in my hand. This was definitely a T.I.A. moment (let me refer you to my previous blog post)! The next morning we heard on the grapevine that a robbery during the night had turned bloody only five doors down from us. Shelbee and I went for dinner in the village to get all the gossip; two 'mafia' members had broken into a house and stabbed the security guard, the police had been called and they shot both of the robbers dead on sight as an example to any other potential criminals. Wow...
Despite the hazards, believe it or not, I was very content during my six nights stay; if travelling teaches you anything it's making the most of any situation plus, after being on the road for so long, I was desperate to save some money. I had the whole top floor of the house to myself, my host would cook me a mega breakfast every morning and I'd spend 3-4 hours painting her house whilst listening to psytrance, drinking copious amounts of PG Tips and chatting about our travels - Shelbee has had a very interesting life and she told me all about her crazy times living in London, Sri Lanka and Goa. We'd be finished by lunch time and I'd spend my afternoons sprawled out on the sand or going for runs along the beach.
After the fun of the island and a day of recovery in Sihanoukville I was collected from my hostel by a lady called Shelbee and taken to her house in Otres Village on the southern coast of Cambodia. The plan was to stay at her house, which she built herself, and help her with odd jobs for a few hours a day in exchange for free accommodation and breakfast. I found Shelbee through a website called HelpX which is not unlike the WWOOFing site, through which I arranged my stint on the organic farm in Malaysia last December, however HelpX is not limited to farms and puts volunteers in touch with people who need help with anything from English teaching to bar work. It's a fantastic way to save money whilst travelling but also serves as an opportunity to be involved in a local community rather than purely sticking to all the tourist areas, sights and traps. I've been offered many bar jobs throughout my travels in SE Asia however they breed a type of mandatory, hardcore drinking culture that I'd prefer not to be forced into! We arrived at her three storey, wooden house on a peaceful road surrounded by mango trees and I thought to myself "yep, I'm going to be very happy here for the next few days", particularly after the crazy week I'd just had.
Shelbee has four dogs in total - this one is a Mexican Hairless called Bambi. I painted her by accident.
Close up of a tiny Cambodian spider and its multiple eyes!
Pacha, the 'killer' who turned out to be my little buddy!
I was told that a dog down the road had rabies and rumour had it that it'd contracted it from a rat or a bat. As if that didn't worry me enough Shelbee said that the 'tuk tuk mafia' were in town robbing houses and apparently they are like ninjas when it comes to breaking into buildings. It sounds humorous but it wasn't. I didn't sleep a wink that night. Every sound was a potential mafia-ninja or rabid bat/rat/dog to me!! I risked stabbing myself in the face by sleeping with my open pen knife in my hand. This was definitely a T.I.A. moment (let me refer you to my previous blog post)! The next morning we heard on the grapevine that a robbery during the night had turned bloody only five doors down from us. Shelbee and I went for dinner in the village to get all the gossip; two 'mafia' members had broken into a house and stabbed the security guard, the police had been called and they shot both of the robbers dead on sight as an example to any other potential criminals. Wow...
Shelbee and I.
My view whilst going for an evening run.
Despite the hazards, believe it or not, I was very content during my six nights stay; if travelling teaches you anything it's making the most of any situation plus, after being on the road for so long, I was desperate to save some money. I had the whole top floor of the house to myself, my host would cook me a mega breakfast every morning and I'd spend 3-4 hours painting her house whilst listening to psytrance, drinking copious amounts of PG Tips and chatting about our travels - Shelbee has had a very interesting life and she told me all about her crazy times living in London, Sri Lanka and Goa. We'd be finished by lunch time and I'd spend my afternoons sprawled out on the sand or going for runs along the beach.
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