Cambodia x Bangkok

Assalamualaikum and hello my silent readers,

We meet again in my post segment ‘one year one country (gituw)’. I just came back from Bangkok last Wednesday and here I am writing and updating my blog. This year I went to Cambodia and Bangkok for 4 days with my new travel partners Liyana my UUM’s friend and cute little girl Wani which is Liyana’s friend. It is kind of awesome to travel with someone new. Making new friend when travelling (checked). This trip is the cutest trip ever; I don’t know why but I think is kind of cute. Thanks for being my travel partners for this year so let’s get started:-

Day 1 

12:55 PM   Boarding from KLIA – Siem Reap (Cambodia) – RM 75 / one way without luggage

I booked in February so my trip is in July by AirAsia. The journey is about 2 hours.

02: 45 PM   Reach at Siem Reap International Airport

We stayed in Visoth Boutique Hotel for 3 days 2 nights – 17 USD/ per person.

*My review about Visoth Boutique Hotel*

front entrance

pool in Visoth Boutique 

Photos  by me

Booked thru booking.com and we got a free shuttle (provided by the Visoth Boutique Hotel you can request from them in order to save your budget) from Siem Reap International Airport to Visoth Boutique Hotel the journey about 14 mins by TukTuk.

Totally recommend Mr. Tang to be your TukTuk driver. He is such amazing guy and always gives useful information during this trip.

The room and the service that provided include the tuktuk driver for this hotel is 5 over 4 star it is very comfortable and the location of this hotel is very near to Halal restaurants just 5 mins walking and  10 mins walking to go Angkor’s night market.  The location it is very strategic, I love to stay in Visoth Boutique except the water in the hotel for shower, it kind of smells rust water.  The bathroom and bedroom is clear and clean just the smell of their water. If you want to stay in Cambodia I totally recommended you guys to drink mineral water because the water in Cambodia is quite unclean.

However, in terms of security you need to be extra careful and always bring your valuable or money with you. I find some of my stuff a little bit scattered after we went back from visit Angkor Watt for day two because whole day we are busy  touring  Angkor.  My friend also told me that all her things is not the same place as she put before so we assume that maybe the cleaner trying to find some of our things because when we reached at our hotel all the things were perfectly arranged and clean. 

You can stay at this hotel but need to be extra careful.

So we hired Mr. Tan to be our half of the day to be our TukTuk driver until night - 10 USD from 4PM -10PM 

04:15 PM - Visit Theam's House - free entrance 

Photos by me

This place is amazing for take some photos, it is some sort of paint exhibition. This place will provide you some tour guide and will guide you into the exhibition and explain about the paint but I truly don’t like one of this exhibition guide because she is kind of rude when I asked some question for example ‘what aspired him (the owner of the exhibition) to open the exhibition and shared to public?’ then she answered ‘ I don’t know’ and making unpleasant expression face. Before we end our tour we asked ‘ can we take a picture?’ then she said ‘yeah, if you want go out that way!’ I was like tahi nyaa perangai. 

Tips: if you want to visit Angkor Watt for next day without queue for 30 mins, you can purchase a day before after 5 pm. The ticket will valid for the next day and it will save your time. Angkor Watt pass for a day - 37 USD / per person 

Then we proceed to Royal Garden - free entrance

photos credit to google I forgot to take a picture

From left : Mr. Tang (our Tuk Tuk driver for whole day in Cambodia , cute little Wani, D,  pretty Liyana)

7:30 PM - Dinner at Muslim Family Kitchen (5mins walking from our hotel) 

The dinner was great and delicious.  Total is 17 USD for three person. 

08:00 PM went to Night Market (15 mins walking)

Photos by me 

There are a lot of stuffs especially for tourist can buy some souvenir, but you need to make an offer because one of my friends wants to buy an XXL T-shirt for her father at first they offer 32 USD then she keeps bargain until she got 8 USD. So this need bargain skill so good luck to you. 

Day 2

 05:00 am - Went to Angkor Watt to see the sunrise. 

I have read a lot of review about how amazing and magical to see the sunrise at Angkor Watt and it is so worth it to wake up earlier in the morning.

So this is the map to visit all the temples or Angkor in the Cambodia with your ticket pass. We start from Angkor Watt first, then move to Bayon. In order to reach one place to another place is quite far, so we buy a small tour, that offer by the hotel which is 20 USD (include 5 USD for sunrise) for the TukTuk driver for a whole day to bring all of the locations. For a small tour they only bring us around Angkor Watt and Angkor Thom if I am not mistaken but we didn't manage to finish our tour because the place is so big and my friends already tired huhu so here some pictures I manage to visit some of the temple it was amazing. 

cubit sikit

nampak tak ada lembaga kecik tengah tengah tu, gigih panjat sorang2 yang lain semua give up

Photos by me

01:30 PM - we ended our tour and go back to our hotel. 

07:30 PM - Dinner at Muslim Family Kitchen and went to Night Market buying some stuff 

Day 3

06:00 AM waiting for mini bus to pick up from Visoth Hotel 

You can request for a free pick up by Giant Ibis company

07: 45 AM  Depart from Sieam Reap to Bangkok by GiantIbis bus - 33 USD per person 8 hours journey

get ready for 8 hours journey

*My review about Giant Ibis bus transport*

There are a lot of direct buses from Sieam Reap to Bangkok from ‘fast and expensive’ or ‘cheap but annoying’. Based on my friend research, Giant Ibis is one of the bus company well establish in

Cambodia and most reliable. I do agree, for 33 USD is totally worth it. You can get free breakfast which is bread and fried rice (no meat only eggs and some of the vegetables), free wifi along the journey and USB charge for every chair. The chair is comfortable and the space is big. It will have 3 stops if you want to go to the loo for 10 minutes.

Once you reach at the border between Cambodia and Thailand. One of the staff of Giant Ibis bus will collect all your passport in order to get the stamp, the good news is you just stay on the bus then after that follow the staff to go the immigration process. Surprisingly, it's just 15 minutes when we at the border. We do not have to wait in long hours. Good service and totally reliable.  5 star. 

05:00 PM - Reach at Bangkok, check in Sleep Tight Hostel - 350 THB per person for one night 

*My review about Sleep Tight Hostel* 

Photo credits to Google

Booked via booking.com, for me it is a little bit quite pricey. The location is good near to night market and pub street for non-Muslim. However, if for Muslim I am totally not recommend it because it is so hard to find halal food in this area. Me and my friends only eat halal kebab and some biscuit thanks to Wani for a whole night. The room is more smaller than in Cambodia, the bed it is okay and the toilet is a little bit smelly. Above all I gave 2 star, you can get free breakfast which is bread toast. 

07:00 PM - went to Night Market around Ban Phan Thom area - 10 mins walking from hostel

To be honest, it is quite disappointing our trip in Bangkok. There’s nothing special there. It is a lot of similarities to KL for their night market just like Jalan Tar. They did not have any special Thailand crafts to buy as a souvenir and it's just clothes. Phuket is much better.  Mostly some of Bangkok’s people are ruder; some of them chase us from entering their stall. Maybe because we are Muslim and wear scarf kot. 

10:00 PM  - went back to our hostel

Day 4

08: 00  AM : Went to Chinatown by Uber

According to our itinerary, we plan to watch sunrise at Wat Arun but is just a planning. We missed to watch sunrise huhu lewat bangun letih sangat. Nama hostel pun sleep tight memang sleep tight habis ah. So we plan just to continue shopping at Chinatown area. We take an uber to reach the destination it cost 93 Bath.  All I can say is a disappointment. There’s nothing special to buy, but we didn’t lose hope we try to go to Little India to buy some Thailand Silk but the price is quite expensive. In order to heal me from disappointment I buy some Thai Songket for 4 meters at first they offer 1000Bath I try to bargain to get 800 Bath but at the end I got 950 Bath. Okay lahh sebab dah cantik sangat tak tahan pergi mana-mana teringat kat awak jea maka saya pun beli. Bargain dekat Cambodia lagi best dari kat Bangkok, orang Bangkok memang tak bagi eh eh taik nyaaa.   

11:30 AM - Back to our hostel by Grab Taxi - 99 Bath 

Travel in Bangkok is quite hard especially when you want to take Grab Taxi or by Uber because they can’t speak English. This Grab Taxi driver asked my friend to use her phone to open google map. I was like, based on my knowledge laa dorang kan boleh tengok Map dalam application Grab dia pehalll doo, nak menipu la tu. Memang menipu pun, according to the Grab application we only need to pay 79 bath plus with 20 bath booking fee so total is 99 bath but he asked for 120 bath. Then my friend argues and he agrees. Ni sejenis tahi jugak punya orang. 

12: 15 PM - Check out and went to Dong Muang Airport by Grab Taxi - 120 Bath 

Kali ni driver Grab Taxi dia cerdik sikit. At the Dong Muang Airport you can find Halal Restaurant at level 5. 

04:45 PM - Boarding to KLIA 2 by Air Asia  - RM 143 one way

So that's all my journey for 4 days 3 nights in this two country. I do not snaps a lot of picture in Bangkok because there's nothing interesting there. So hope you enjoy reading this and as references for some people. Thanks to Liyana and Wani for being my travel partner for this year. It was so much fun to travel with both of you guys. 

Thanks for reading my post and hope see you in next post.  

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