On the third night at Otres Beach we were partying late and decided we wanted to continue on. Janna, a girl we met from Germany had mentioned she wanted to go to another beach called Serendipity. She had been living in Otres for a month but never made the full effort to get out there and because she was leaving in two days her time was running. So our crew of six people piled into a tuk-tuk and off we went. It was bizarro-land from the start. As we got close to our destination we drove by a street fight where a local chased another local down with stick and before we turned the corner the Cambodian with the stick had caught up with his victim took a big swing and down he went. We don't know what became of him... Anyway we finally got to the beach and lets just say I'm very very very happy we ended up in Otres because if we stayed in Serendipity I would have left the next day. It's not because of the violence we saw but because of the bar scene. It looked like a ridiculous spring break party. If you could avoid everyone dancing on the bar and get a chance to be seen you couldn't get a beer cause the bartenders were too busy grinding with each other. The prostitutes gave you plenty of attention though. I think we all made a silent pact that night that we would stay in Otres until we were ready to move to our next location.
We were supposed to stay in Otres for three of four days but we ended up staying for eight and after that eventful night in town the rest of our time there was pretty laid back and very fun until we awoke the morning before we would leave. It was around 11:30am when I heard one of the Cambodian women yelling frantically in Khmer. I couldn't understand what she was saying but it sounded to me like she or
someone else got into a scuffle. I opened the door of our bungalow and saw an object with a cloud of smoke following it, being thrown out the second story window of the building next to us. Then I noticed a fire extinguisher hosing down a back pack that was on fire. We quickly got out of our bungalow to find out what was happening and if we could help but it seemed the crew acted quick and got it under control.
We later found out that one of the guests staying in the dorm building had an electric kettle with him and decided it would be nice to make a cup of tea before bed but forgot to turn it off. It overheated and
finally caught fire to his mattress. I heard some of the flames were as tall or perhaps taller than the 4' 10" height of the woman I heard shouting. I don't know how much damage the fire caused but I'm sure glad those guys acted quickly and took care of the situation before the whole place went up in flames and it would have happened really fast. It kinda set an uncomfortable mood for a while as we took it in so a lesson wouldn't go unlearned. Our moods did brighten up though and we spent the rest of the day at the beach and then our nightly routine of ribs, whiskey and cold draft beers under a bright moonlight closed our time at Otres Beach.
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