“From the Future of Marriage. Those noble, free-minded women who set themselves the task of educating and elevating the female sex should not overlook one factor: marriage conceived of in its higher interpretation, the spiritual friendship of two people of the opposite sexes, that is, as marriage hoped for in the future, entered into for the purpose of begetting and raising a new generation. Such a marriage, which uses sensuality as if it were only a rare occasional means for a higher end, probably requires and must be provided with a natural aid: concubinage.”
Friedrich Nietzsche, “Human, All Too Human”, 1878.
Aside from a two-week tour of Vietnam in 2016 this was my second Asian incursion. Being a frequent traveller to Europe has taken the thrill out of international travel for me but I say this in a complimentary way. Europe ceases to cause that WOW factor. Instead, it is like returning home. A feeling of ease and comfort.
Asia, on the other hand is NEW to me. I am not wandering around mouth agape pointing here and there like the Smith family from Kansas City in Times Square but I am in a bit of a cultural shock which I embrace as exciting not intimidating.
The long flying time even in economy bulkhead seats is a negative and I would seriously consider premium economy or business class as a mandatory alternative particularly if you’re a tall person who has difficulty in sleeping in airline seats.
Shocking Singapore
Aside from the Bangladeshi construction workers there is an apparent dearth of toiling sweaty masses. A lack of homelessness and panhandlers. Prosperity. Modernity. Still remnants of a British colonial heritage and a vibrant ethnic minority. Love the shophouses. Yes, there is a Little India and an old-fashioned Chinatown. Shopping malls, beautiful roads. High-rises. Benevolent paternalism. Museums and art galleries. Stellar cuisine. Fascinating interracial/ethnic history. Much more to see than the inner city and worthy of another visit! Superb cuisine. Shangri-La Singapore best breakfast in Asia and beautiful rooms and gardens. Why stay anywhere else?
Eastern and Oriental Express
Luxury in a sardine can. As you travel through Malaysia witness the jungle and a country in transition with rural villages and poverty, a developing middle- and working-class high-rise culture apparent. A Kentucky Fried Chicken in every town. Excessive luxury for 3 days reaches an overwhelming point. NOT ANOTHER FIVE COURSE DINNER please. Spend the extra on a stateroom if you are travelling as a couple as a Pullman room nearly impossible for two.
Bangkok
Fascinating mix of glitz and poverty. Stick to the Chao Phraya River for transportation if possible. Check out Icon Siam Shopping mall particularly upper floors for authentic local cuisine. Stupendous cuisine. Peninsula Bangkok superb.
Cambodia
The basic Third World vibe. If I was back in 1973 as a long-haired backpacker this is where I would head. A country waiting to be discovered before it is corrupted with tourism. Such gentle welcoming people. How in earth did Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge ever flourish in such a country? There is more to Cambodia than Angkor Wat and I would dearly love to discover it. Damn it! Too old to backpack it. It is where the action is like the Eastern Europe Iron Curtain I travelled extensively in.
Due to the blustering and threat mongering of President Donald Trump of the disUnited States some Canadian provinces have prohibited the sale of American wine and spirits. This has been a severe blow to Californian wineries but has created an opportunity for Canadian wineries to benefit from this prohibition and show their stuff. But can British Columbian Cabernet Sauvignon help fill the vacuum before Canada becomes the 51st state?
100 cases produced. Aged 12 months in 30% new French oak and 70% neutral French oak.
What says Maison Smith Montpetit 2023 Cabernet Sauvignon to all the Orange Toadish authoritarian brouhaha?
Aroma: Blueberry and yet more of this fruit with aromas of fresh baked blueberry pie. Blackberry too with a tad of coal and raspberry. Rich, thick and powerful.
Palate: Tannins indicative of a full-bodied wine but not a bruiser. Blueberry reigns supreme but God forbid do not think jammy! A bizarre but joyous upward sudden lift of graphite, dark chocolate and raspberry. Long solid finish.
Personality: Elbows up British Columbia Cabernet Sauvignon baby! Move over Cali Cabernet Sauvignon and thank the Trumpster for that!
Food Match: Roasted eggplant/cherry tomato and feta cheese pasta.
Cellarbility: Drink now as youthful as it is. Will improve through to 2029.
Price: $43 CDN.
RKS 2026 British Columbia Wine Rating: 94/100.
(Maison Smith Montpetit Bottega and Vineyards 2023 Cabernet Sauvignon, British Columbia VQA, Cawston, British Columbia (Produced by Mythology Vineyards, Osoyoos, British Columbia), 750 mL, 14.7).
“Marriage as a Long Conversation. When entering a marriage one should ask the question: do you think you will be able to have good conversations with this woman right into old age? Everything else in marriage is transitory, but most of the time in interaction is spent in conversation.”
Friedrich Nietzsche, “Human, All Too Human”, 1878.
“Desire to avenge and vengeance. To have thoughts of revenge and execute them means to be struck with a violent-but temporary fever. But to have thoughts of revenge without the strength or courage to execute them means to endure a chronic suffering, a poisoning of body and soul.”
Friedrich Nietzsche, “Human, All Too Human”, 1878.
21October 2025: Siem Reap: At the Supermarket, Plantation and a Farewell Dinner
Last full day of the tour anticipating a brutal day of travelling for the return to Toronto tomorrow. Had a leisurely buffet breakfast and several cups of tea. I will say the eggs I had for breakfast (and the one over my beef Lok Nok last night) were the best I have ever had. Produced by a local cooperative. Dark yolk and tasty. North American eggs are tasteless whether purchased from the farm or the supermarket and whether free range or organic. EURO eggs are superior to North American eggs but these Cambodian eggs are something else!
I took a walk in the environs around the hotel. A busy commercial section with numerous shops and businesses low key and basic. Restaurants, car repairs, footwear shops and so many pharmacies. Third world streets in action. I did stop at a shop La Plantation selling Cambodian spices including the famous Cambodian pepper KAMPOT sold to gourmands throughout the world. A very fashionable shop with two levels. It could have been in Toronto or New York in its design and merchandise. I purchased a variety of Kampot peppercorns.
I returned to the hotel for a lunch of Khmer beef and noodles which was excellent. Headed out down the main street outside the hotel to a supermarket. Two levels, modern and immaculately clean. Purchased dried jackfruit, 12 Monkey Cambodian tea and some more generic Cambodian peppercorns. Went to the swimming pool for a couple of hours and watched the entertaining rotund Americans bobbing in the pool and downing beer. I noticed all the men had mostly whitish beards. I thought they had the look of Santa Claus.
Before our closing dinner poolside several of us dropped in for a glass of champagne at the Champagne Bar and the American crowd was there beer in hands and baseball caps on the men’s heads. You could hear their conversations a mile away. Poor manners but highly entertaining!
ABC International finally delivered with its farewell dinner. Their Sicilian farewell dinner in May was a culinary disaster and my fish stunk. Two people were severely ill after that dinner, so I wasn’t expecting much in Cambodia but what a SPREAD! Sea bass, grilled chicken and beef, prawns, a variety of noodles and cheeses and a wide selection of desserts. And even a spectacular classical Khmer dance by performers costumed in silk brocades. The wine was of low quality and only two glasses per person…good old ABC International! That woman so ill from eating that fresh vegetable salad in Bangkok was going at the same type of salad with a passion (for illness) ! Hopefully her innards did not explode on the plane trip home! We learnt that two of our travellers had spent the night in a local hospital with severe influenza. I had passed by that hospital and declined on the opportunity to sell my blood at a kiosk outside it!
Off early in the morning to Siem Reap airport as gleaming and deserted as it was. A flight to Bangkok, connection to Hong Kong then a 16-hour flight to Toronto. Insane boredom. I can’t remember much more than not eating anything except some ice cream on Cathay Pacific and thinking like a child every hour saying, “ARE WE THERE YET”.
20October2025 Siem Reap, Cambodia: Angkor Wat: Saving the Best For Last?
I have visited Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia and now Cambodia. I have witnessed and experienced an incredible amount and the question that faces me is Angkor Wat the actual highlight of this tour? Impossible to answer although it was the destination of overwhelming attraction and the hook reeling me onto this tour. An ancient city. An ancient civilization. I have visited the Acropolis of Athens and of Lindos, Tulum, Chichen Itza and Ephesus and all said and done Angkor Wat has been the most impressive.
On the bus at 07:00 after a quick breakfast. The Cambodian food at the breakfast buffet appears to have been sitting for some time. It could be attributed to the Americans staying here reluctant to experiment outside their full American breakfast. IHOP in Cambodia!
We arrived in the cool of the morning at Angkor Wat and it was surprisingly quiet for such an international destination. Sprayed up with DEET for malaria avoidance. By the time our tour had finished at 11:30 it was steaming hot. Advice received was do not feed the monkeys or you will face aggressive greed. Any monkeys seen this morning were minding their own business off in the distance. They may have been discussing the Cambodian-Thai border skirmishes.
It would be fruitless to describe the site in any detail. As pre disco Rod Stewart sings “Every picture tells a story don’t it”. I will say it is huge and well restored. This UNESCO World Heritage site is breathtaking. Built in the 12th century it is the largest temple in the world and the crown jewel of the temples that sit within the 155-square-mile Angkor Archaeological Park. Built by King Suryavarman II as a Hindu temple dedicated to the god Vishnu, the temple eventually filled with Buddhist elements as the new religion spread through the empire. The main temple, with its central tower rising to a height of 213 feet, was designed to represent Mount Meru, the home of the gods in Hindu mythology. One of the temple’s highlights are the bas-relief murals depicting historical events and various scenes from Hindu mythology and are considered some of the finest examples of Kymer art.
The intense heat and humidity necessitated a soft drink stop at a site concession before boarding the bus to an artisanal noodle making business run by a local family. It was in a village where feral dogs roamed, Children were seen in bare feet and selling cheap trinkets. Traditional rice noodle making is a laborious process which we watched from start to finish These artisanal noodles are sought throughout the world. We had a light rice-based lunch including curried rice noodles, puffy rice cakes and a variety of rice-based desserts. It was excellent and ABC International, our tour company permitted one soft drink per person! Of course in true ABC International spirit, beer was out of pocket. Several children approached us while boarding our bus offering cheap trinkets. Our tour director discretely slipped each of them a few American dollars widely accepted and welcomed in Cambodia.
Before returning to Sofitel we stopped at an artisanal workshop which due to the bus parking spots outside its entrance resembled a “tourist trap” but the wares including silks, leather and carvings were of impeccable quality made by local artisans and designed to foster economic benefits for the local economy. Impressive wares but who has room for souvenirs of any weight.
The evening option was to a “Cambodian circus” consisting of captivating choreography, story telling and folk music. No lions or chained bears here.
A late dinner at the restaurant at Sofitel for Cambodian Beef Lok Nok and rice (of course) on the side. Cambodian men eat 250 kilos of rice a year and women 190! Excellent and complimented perfectly with a glass of Chilean Cabernet Sauvignon. Watched a terrible Ringo Starr concert on a really poor large screen television.
“Among the small but endlessly abundant and therefore very effective things that science ought to heed more than the great, rare things, is goodwill. I mean those expressions of a friendly disposition, in interactions, that smile of the eye, those handclasps, that ease which usually envelops nearly all human actions. Every teacher, every official brings this ingredient to what he considers his duty. It is the continual manifestation of our humanity, its rays of light, so to speak, in which everything grows.”
Friedrich Nietzsche, “Human, All Too Human”, 1878.
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