18th July - Geoffreys' Birthday Bash!

A birthday is a very special time and every year you always try and outdo the year before.. this week was the birthday of a best mate here in Cambodia, and that guy is Mr Geoffrey the Saffer (South African).

Geoffrey's Birthday picnic by the river!

And so the planning of ideas began until he decided that this year he was going to throw a Boat Party! followed by a night on the town ! and so the planning, began, we managed to hire a decent sized boat for 2 hours for just $50, and entire buffet prepared, 3 crates of beer plus around 10 bottles of whisky and plenty more of Rum. The scene was set for an epic birthday in Phnom Penh!

Everyone met at the riverside for around 7pm and headed together over to the dock to board a lovely wobbly plank on the boat, in all there was around 23 people gathered for a night that we hopefully would never forget, and hell we now know we wont! 

The party kicked off brilliantly, blaring music, free flow of ice chilled beers and spirits and some amazingly delicious food

Warming up on the boat! (20mins in, 3 beers consumed and 5 shots finished.. each)

Enjoying some food and beer                                                 Andrew,  Myself,  Geoff,  Raksmey

Soon the party became full swing and everyone and myself were having an amazing time, Geoff was drinking those birthday shots like there was no tomorrow and the drinking games had begun! though soon enough the time on the boat time was over and the hilarity of watching over 20 stupidly drunk friends stumble down a terrible thin and wobbly gangplank trying not to take a soak in the river is something i'll never forget, one member actually froze mid way down and refusing to move without my assistance, which nearly saw me flop into the water :'), but we safely all made it back onto the dock without incident. and now the real fun began, trying to find enough tuk tuks that'd actually take 20 odd expats into the bar district of town, the infamous 51 street!

Group shots on the boat

After a brief search we managed to persuade our way into town and headed to our favorite spot, Howies, for a few games of pool, some dancing and more importantly to carry on the drinking games and to make sure the birthday lad could barely walk out! 

picture from a previous night to Howies.

Inevitably we got separated around 3am from the group and ended up being just me, Matt and Nandi, we decided to go to Nands since there was still plenty of beers left and  hopefully everyone would make their way back there to try and regroup! after a brief search for Geoff we assumed either he'd continued the party elsewhere or gone home!

So we headed back and after maybe 30 minutes of not hearing from anyone we resolved to continue our night anyway and hoped we'd find the birthday boy later on, and just as we were leaving the house.. guess who shows up, non other than Geoff and some of the group! Though at this point i don't think Geoff was quite able to walk never mind continue on but non the less he resolved to continue and push through and celebrate his birthday to the very last! 

from here we headed to the roof top reggae bar where the party continued and inevitably ended up in Soria malls' G-pot.

what seemed like hours later we realised at which point we had all be defeated by alcohol and exhaustion, stumbling from the club were met once again by glaring sunshine and 20'c sunshine at the lovely time of 7am.. 

Piecing together or fragmented memories from the night, it turns out Geoff couldn't remember much from getting into town and most of the group still don't even know how they got home!, so in all a successful night and a cracking birthday for our buddy! 

5th May- (WILD2) psychedelic trance party!

So it’s been a while in between posts and I apologise about the delays, but I’d like to fill you guys in on what’s been happening on this side of the world!

So in May, the group and I were invited to a secret Psychedelic trance festival, and not just any party, the Infamous W.I.L.D parties of Phnom Penh. The initial location of the party was kept a secret until the very last minute, and even then we only knew where we were heading on the shuttle bus. All we were told was to bring spare clothes and a towel! Exciting! And so off we headed and after 30 minutes on the road the buses arrived on the dock to the lovely island of Ko Dach in the middle of the Mekong River!, we stopped at a little island shop and stocked on supplies including way too many bottle of whisky and two crates of beer and off we went again!

As we arrive at the site of the party we can see the organisers have erected two stages and some amazing psychedelic roofing and posters all over the stage areas. Looking around we see almost 1000 party revelers starting their journey through one of the most amazing party experiences I have ever been too!

The festival kicked off around 5pm Saturday evening and the music kept beating until 12pm the following day.

Throughout the night our group and its 11 members went off on their own little adventures just gliding through the party and meeting so many new people from all over the world. The atmosphere at the party was absolutely amazing, so much love felt and having some of the best chats with complete strangers, many revelers disappearing into the river for a midnight swim.

Myself, I discovered the addictive property of trying to learn to Poi and in the early hours of the morning, I tried my hand at trying to perform poi’s doused with Kerosene! (With a professional on hand just in case of course)

Eventually the sun started to rise and the revelers watched, tired and distant from their psychedelic experience from the night before, listening to the continuing beat of the music seemingly in pure euphoria.

Slowly, the revelers ebbed away happy but drained, to use the remainder of the day to recover and sleep, trying to piece together their epic adventure the night before… and wonder when the hell I acquired a fedora.

 

Khmer New Year! 13th-16th April

Hello everyone!

Some of you may know that in Asia, most countries celebrate their new year not on December 31st like western Countries, but within the month of April, for example the Chinese new year and the Thai new year. In Cambodia this year, their new year fell between the 13th-16th of April and so my school decided to give all of its teachers a full week from work to celebrate this fantastic holiday. Most Cambodians go to visit their families in the province's and give thanks to each other and for all to have a social drink!

For most expats however, the Khmer New Year is a brilliant excuse to head to one of the popular beach resorts, Namely Sihanoukville, for its legendary beach parties on golden sand and drinking into oblivion. Me and my friends (Geoff, Léana, Dennis and Matt) decided (on Matts previous experience) however that instead of hardcore partying and blacking out in a ditch somewhere, that we would rather go into Nature and live self sufficient for 4 days.

Below is the video of our epic journey through the beaches and jungle of Cambodia. that saw us discover beautiful islands, golden beaches, Hundreds of Ants!, fishing, swimming and loving life and all kindly edited and uploaded by Matt!

So please enjoy!!

The Friday Feeling!

So after my 50 hour working week, Its finally Friday!, and in Phnom Penh that usually only means one thing, to venture into this sprawling city and experience some more of its vast and varied nightlife; from the smaller bars around Riverside where you can easily grab a cheap pint and play a game of pool. To a full night around Phnom Penh's (PP's) Notorious street 51, where most of your hearts desires can be found, which usually means leaving the clubs merry but exhausted and being greeted by daybreak and the city starting to come to life for its daily grind.

 And last night was no different!, Me and my housemates had heard from our local Tuk Tuk driver that Loco bar, a rather small bar around Phnom Penh's riverside, have a brilliant happy hour from 7-10pm

                 
So after pre-drinks at my apartment, our group of 6 jumped into the car and headed over to Loco to see if the bar is worth the attention its been given. In short it was! What it lacks for in space it certainly makes up for in friendliness and enjoyability. On arrival we were greeted by the owner, who kindly showed us to some stools right by the bar and within the minutes the drinks were flowing  and each of us trying our hand at the bar games offered to us by the bar girls. Needless to say we lost 80% of the games!

Me losing terribly at Jackpot

We stayed around Loco much later than expected due to how much fun we were all having, meeting all the workers at the bar plus many an Expat, our group ended up looking like a contingent from the UN.

On leaving Loco around the early hours of Saturday, the owner happily gave some white 1664 bottles' for the road and an open invitation to return whenever we wanted! And so our group, Beer in hand, headed to the Notorious Street 51 area seeking another bar called Howie's which has a free American Pool table with the rule of winner stays on, a brilliant way of meeting more people in the city and enjoying your night to the maximum.

Geoffrey playing against the owner himself! that Concentration!

After staggering from Howies around the glorious time of 3am, with only one pool win between us. we were split between going to PP's biggest club Pontoon and heading to the dizzying heights of the Rooftop bar with the stunning views over most of the city and after a quick group vote we chose the latter, again the drinks were flowing and at this point in the night most of us were particularly merry and we had already lost a member who had to stumble into a tuk tuk and get home before the spin of the room knocked her down!

And now the time had hit 4:30am and unfortunately i had to attend a meeting at work at 8am so for me the night was over, a small but epic trip around Riverside and Area 51 was a blast and the group had a blast. Soon after my departure the remaining 4 ventured to PP's biggest Casino to try their luck on the cards and wheels with even some small success had! but for what can be said for the nightlife in Phnom Penh, you could venture here for months and still not be able to visit the many bars and attractions to be seen in this epic city.

The First Post

So my name is Sam Henshaw and Ive been living in Phnom Penh (Cambodia) for just over a month now. I'm currently an English teacher at an International English school teaching Kindergarten. I've never written a blog before nor had much of an interest in writing. But after traveling for a while now I thought it'd be a good way to keep a collection of my travels for my future self to look over with fond memories. The blog will basically
cover what i get up to in Phnom Penh plus tips I pickup while on my travels.