Judging from the beaten paths and my memory, the same paths are still there. We passed through a young village and cursed the pi-dogs who snarled round us, and after a 5 minutes trip, suddenly I recognised the big trees, including the huge tamarind, under which the old Camp H.Q. Huts had been built. The mango trees by the side of the old ‘Hut I’ were still there, but otherwise, there was no recognisable feature. A strange village under our trees. Once we’d spotted the tamarind, though, it was easy to fix the rest of the camp. A narrow and overgrown path was all that was left of the main road past the ends of the huts, and along this we walked towards the gardens and the graves. Our rows of garden papaya trees were now bordered by rows of Siamese huts, and the papaya trees were giants; in the camp itself there was nothing to be seen like the junglely state of Kamburi. The peasants were cultivating the clearing we had made for them, and as you looked down towards the camp boundary away from the river, you could almost have sworn that the fence was still there just behind the familiar clumps of bamboos. With no difficulty I found the infamous tree under which my book had been so carefully buried, and although it was just beginning to rain, I couldn’t resist taking a photograph of this old enemy of mine.

Chungkai cemetery is very efficiently run, too, and also very clean; but whereas I used to think it was a very beautiful place before, I was now rather disappointed to see that the flame and red bushes that had always looked so pretty, had now grown up into huge straggling trees; and the rows and rows of cannas and zinnias and other bright coloured flowers, had given way to a few and a rather feeble few, of cannas alone. The rain was beginning to come down hard, and I ran up to a spot where I could take a picture of the big tree and cross in the centre of the cemetery before the rain made it impossible. We then, with the caretaker, ran through the cemetery to the far end, turned right, and slipped down to the pom-pom. We left in a hurry. This was a great pity, and I was most reluctant to go; but Pong wanted to be back over the bad parts of the road before dark, and the storm might have lasted hours had we thought of waiting.