Finding Nemo

Koh Rong has the best dive sites in Cambodia.  There was a large diversity of ocean life, and it was surprisingly clean.  I didn't see any trash in the water like I did in Thailand.  There were parrotfish, grouper, shrimp, an octopus, clown fish, and varied coral and sea anemones.  The diving and snorkeling was easy, barely any current, and the water was so warm that only a light shorty wetsuit is needed. 

On the boat, I overheard a conversation.  A Finnish girl asked a group of guys, "You're all American?  Where are all the fat people?"  If there is one thing Europeans know about the inhabitants of North America, it is that most of them are fat.  One of the American guys replied, "Uh, they live in the Midwest."  Oh, if there's going to be inappropriate stereotyping, let's at least get our facts straight.  I turned to the group and announced, "The fat people are too poor to travel."  Everyone stared at me for a couple seconds, and then laughed uncomfortably.  (I guess it wasn't funny because it's true.)

Everyone on the boat fished except the two vegetarians.  What a couple of wusses.  Almost everyone in the group caught at least one fish.  One guy caught six.  I felt sad to see all these beautiful fish being hooked and slaughtered.  We had just swam with them an hour ago.  What happened? 

One day I went snorkeling on my own at a small reef that extends into a point on the island.  There were the same kinds of coral, but the fish were different.  They were smaller, but there were more schools of them. 

One of my favorite parts of the day was watching the sunset while swimming in Gulf of Thailand.  Afterwards, we ate dinner on the boat.  The crew roasted up fish, chicken, and veggie kabobs.  There was one other vegetarian on the boat, and I noticed that we got more kabobs than the others, I guess to make up for the lack of meat.  Although I don't care for the it myself, there are a couple good things about the meat in Cambodia.  First, it's not genetically modified.  Second, it's always fresh. 

When it was night, we jumped into the sea again.  This time our goal was to swirl up the plankton, so they glow.  It's like swimming with thousands of little shimmering lights in the water.