Since we had 5 hours to kill before our flight, we decided to rent the same van as yesterday and ride out to see the abandoned capitol ("Old Ponsavan", we'll call it) which apparently was bombed to smithereens by the Americans in the war. (Our other choices included waterfalls, caves, and temples, of course.) So we paid $25 to ride 30 minutes out to see the ruins.
Abandoned capitol? How cool. There would be a desolate deserted main street, jungle pushing up through the pavement, black gaping windows on the bottom floors and skylight showing through the windows on the ceiling-less upper floors. Perhaps we'd see an abandoned newspaper stand with some circa-1968 magazines still rotting on the shelves. There would be overturned tables in a restaurant with silverware strewn about from people fleeing the bombs. We'd be led through an abandoned overgrown hospital where the tour guide would point out brown blood stains where the screaming wounded were treated. The ultimate would be seeing the ass end of an unexploded bomb with an American flag painted on it sticking out of the wall of a now-empty primary school. It was going to be like going to the set of a Viet Nam war movie, but it would be the real thing. Rick and I were psyched.
So we pile into the van and ride 30 minutes. We get to this larger village / small town, and pull into the parking lot of a small government building. We are led around the back, and there is the ruins of a temple. We take a picture.
We get back in the van. The van pulls out, crosses the street, pulls into the parking lot of another small government building. We are led around the back, and there is the ruins of another building. We take a picture.We get back in the van. End of tour.
Doh.
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