sophisticated lady

The story that follows is being shared in the tradition of turning my embarrassing foibles into entertainment (poorly written entertainment maybe). If you have a weak stomach, or just don't like hearing about as we put it in spanish, vomitando, don't read on. Otherwise...

Though the road from Siem Reap to Phnom Penh is quite smooth, any bus ride can be destructive after enough vodka. The night before had started innocently enough, but somewhere between $1 drinks and the desire to dance things got a bit carried away. Never the less M and I were highly motivated to get ourselves to PP, and upon awaking at 8:30 we somehow felt that taking the 9:30 bus was a better option than waiting for the 12:30. I admire our enthusiasm, really I do, no matter that we missed the 9:30 and instead found ourselves booked for the 10:30. Finding ourselves with a bit of extra time we spent half an hour bumbling around procuring water, noodles, and bread for the bus ride, promptly throwing ourselves on to what we though was the bus at 10. Of course, this being Cambodia we weren't on the bus, we were on the shuttle to the bus, which meant changing buses in the rainy muddy mess that is the Siem Reap bus stop. Safely on board I had a stunningly terrible realization, I was hungover, and not in that, “Oh, my head hurts.,” sense. No, no, more in that, “Holy shit, I might die, but before that happens I am definitely going to toss my cookies,” sense. As much as I tried to talk myself out of it, Ｉhad a distinct feeling that vomiting at 60kph was in my near future.

Luckily I have experience with this type of thing, there was an incident some years back where I emptied my stomach into a pint glass to a chorus of shouts from my mom while sitting shotgun in one of my family's cars. Additionally I spent most of my childhood suffering from motion sickness (severe enough that I had never driven down Highway 1 until I was in my twenties). So when it comes to throwing up I can give you a 30 second window before it is going to actually happen. Which means that I had enough time to hide beneath my scarf, procure the plastic bag that contained the remnants of my coconut bread and vomit straight into it, all the while Michael took photos of the proceedings, after which a very adorable Khmer couple across the aisle took pity on me and passed motion sickness pills across. I thought it would be smooth sailing after all that, passed out for a while, only to be awoken by the panic of needing another plastic bag. At this point I had the previously filled bag precariously stuck inside a larger plastic bag, in my panic I somewhat missed the bag and managed to coat the back of the seat, Michael's calf, and a portion of the floor with regurgitated water before aiming the rest of the mess into the bag. Now we had to petition the couple across the aisle for another bag to bag the now leaking other bags in. Luckily it was only about ten minutes to the first rest stop where I was revived by a bowl of noodle soup and green tea. This meal is conveniently a fantastic cure to hangovers, restoring precious salts and fluids in one easy to digest bowl. Meaning that by the time we got back on the bus I was feeling rough, but generally okay to suffer through the next 5 hours of bus ride.

And no, I will not be sharing the photos, I draw the line there.