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Trip Start
Nov 22, 2008
1
10
Trip End
Dec 09, 2008
Perth,
Western Australia,
Australia
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
This time we walked along the river to the north, passing the main entertainment and tourist district where we had eaten the previous nights. Although it was a bit quieter here during the day there were still plenty of tuk-tuk drivers and people wandering around trying to sell all manner of useless tourist items. Our walk took us up past the Wat Phnom, which we decided not to enter as the locals were charging for access.
Next on the list was the railway station, so we headed off in a westerly direction, taking us through some typically dilapidated local streets. Activity intensified closer to the station, with some ad hoc markets just of the main drag, Confederation de la Russie. The station itself was closed as the train wasn't running that day but one could see through to the adjacent storage and marshaling yards. Hundreds of presumably disused wagons littered the space, giving a sad impression of Cambodia's extremely limited railway operation and showing how much larger it used to be.
Soon we were once again heading down Monivong, passing the interesting New Market. Unfortunately this structure was undergoing a lot of work so there was no great desire for either of us to visit or take any photos, as I was hoping to do. After continuing south for a bit, passing a few western or western-modeled establishments in town, we chucked a left to head east and back to the hotel. I was actively looking for a stall to trade my riels in for a flavoured Fanta but had no luck and with my departure from the country continually approaching I started contemplating keeping my 2 notes.
Partly because this is a South-East Asian holiday and we were yet to do so, we opted for a Tuk-tuk ride to the airport, saving what we had little of (money) and spending what we had a surplus of (time). It took a while to haggle an acceptable price but I'm glad to report that the addition of 2000 riels to our US Dollar price sealed the deal.
Despite our efforts we still arrived at the airport too early to check-in so we sat inside, enjoying the air-conditioning and listening to music to kill time. Air Asia finally opened their check-in desks later than anticipated and we got rid of our bags, paid the departure tax and headed to the departure area. As Charles had predicted, our flight was running late (about 1.5 hours), just as it had been doing all week. This provided an interesting twist to the gate waiting procedure. Air Asia does not allocate seats on their flights so there is a tendency for passengers to queue in front of the departure gate from about 30-45 minutes before the flight is due to depart. Some people clearly didn't get the late flight memo and decided they would stand at the gate some 2 hours before the flight would actually leave.
To add to the confusion Air Asia (Thailand) operate a flight to Bangkok, scheduled to depart shortly after Air Asia (Malaysia)'s flight to KL and this was running on time. When passengers saw a red Air Asia plane land they all rushed to the KL flight queue. Charles and I could see that this plane was a 737, meaning it was the Thai aircraft as Air Asia (Malaysia) have recently become an all-Airbus fleet, flying the A320 exclusively. After the departure call was made for the Bangkok flight a little more information was provided regarding our delay and people started to leave the queue and sit down once again. Charles and I had a pretty good idea of when our plane would actually arrive and thus joined the queue near the front a few minutes before our plane landed. We were able to thank our sound knowledge of the airline and Charles' research for securing us each window seats with ease.
Onboard we both had an interesting time with our pre-ordered food for this flight: a 1901 New York Chicken Hot Dog. 1901 is a weird food chain in Malaysia and the "Hot Dog" came in a sort of kit with the pieces separate. The sauces that came with it include mayonnaise and a scary green relish. The 1901 website even describes it as being "laced" with this tangy relish, hmm... Charles also made a new friend in the younger passenger seated next to him. Turns out that this kid was travelling with his parents and sister around the world. His parents quit their jobs in Canada and decided that this is what they wanted to do.
I was not overjoyed to be back at Kuala Lumpur's Low Cost Carrier Terminal but this time the queues weren't bad and we had our escape planned in advance. As I've documented previously, the airport-KL Sentral buses are pretty dodgy so we had to wait for the bus to fill up before heading into town. Thankfully we had time and this vehicle wasn't in such bad nick like the last one we were on. At Sentral we took the monorail through town and past our previous local station to the Tune hotel. This establishment is owned by the same group that owns Air Asia and is similarly budget. The inside of the lift was a giant advertisement, the whole floor that our room was on was an ad for a paint company so each colour on the wall had its code and name written on it. Inside the room were several ads, including a painted Big Mac poster above the bed. This place was so cheap that soap was not included and the TV was locked up in a cabinet because we hadn't paid to use it. We did decide to pay for air-conditioning and it was worth it. The only redeeming feature of the hotel is that if you get the right room the monorail is directly outside your window, but we weren't so lucky.
In the morning we headed out well in advance of our flight time, beginning another long trip to the airport. One of the first monorail services of the day took us back to Sentral where we sat waiting for the bus to leave for half an hour. Surprisingly with the larger aircraft check-in was much faster and easier than our previous departure from the LCCT, although the Air Asia X check-in desks had the luxury of a queue rope to deal with larger volumes of travelers.
Breakfast was Halal Maccas, which meant a McMuffin with chicken sausage patty and no bacon. It tasted just as good as it sounds... Once through immigration we were able to go into a waiting pen, getting our boarding passes and passports checked prior to leaving the building to save time getting the larger group of passengers out of the terminal at the time of boarding. Unfortunately our flight was delayed, due to a late departure from Melbourne Charles informed me. There were chairs to sit on and our seats on the plane were allocated so there was no pressure to queue but the announcements being made in the terminal were so loud that it's a wonder we didn't all have headaches by the time we actually got onto the plane!
The flight home was much emptier than the one over so Charles and I were both able to enjoy a pair of seats to ourselves and Charles scored himself an unexpected window seat. For reasons unknown the staff weren't able to get the inflight entertainment system working so we were left high and dry for the flight. It forced me to do a bit of reading, which I did enjoy, but being a day flight meant that sleep never came easily.
Mum and Dad picked us up from the airport, where we cleared Customs and AQIS with ease. Our return precedes an interesting time; Charles embarking on a Melbourne trip with uni friends a few days later, Christmas, Charles doing a solo round the world and then me going back to Europe in January. Watch this space!
