The first month

Hi there....

This is an intorduction to the English language blog that I keep. The reason for starting it is the growing amount of friends and acquaintences that fail the proper knowledge of the Dutch language to be part of the fun on aandegang.blogspot.com.

So, to make it clear, my name is Reinier Vriend and I am kicking around. I'm on my way to Australia for a semester of university exchange at Monash Uni, and before ariving there I travel thru S-E Asia.

Up to now I visited Thailand, traveled North and then into Laos, and moved down South into Cambodia. Right now I'm in my second city of millions Phnom Penh, that moves me with its radical history of atrocities commited by numerous regimes that have been in power. A visit to Angkor Wat, a temple complex built over the centuries from 800 AD till 1300, shows another side of the Cambodians, which is the power to resist all the hardship that has been their burden over time. I expected a visibly agressive society, but nothing of that has come true. I am really welcomed as a guest.

Christmas passed without noticing it, but New Years will not! Beach town Sihanoukville is the stage on which the show is gonna take place and I'm really looking forward to it.

Light me some firework while I think about all of you, rocking my hammock, facing the sunset whit a coconut in my hands,

Bye!