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Published: October 9th 2006
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Indiana Clones We're both a little tired out after spending three days doing our best impressions of Harrison Ford and Angelina Jolie around the
Angkor Temple complex. Not sure we looked quite that glamorous as we got up for sunrise at 4:45am.
Over the three days we visited about 25 different temple sites which were spread out over a huge area. It took us an hour in a tuk-tuk to get to the most distant one we visited. Fortunately we were guided by our patient and untiring driver Mr Khoeun. The tuk-tuk itself only gave up the ghost once but watching the repair was a fun experience.
It would be hard to pick a favourite as we liked different sites for different reasons. Some were simply awe inspiring, some were great fun to climb (although less fun to climb back down!), some were being swallowed by the jungle and others were good simply for their tranquil atmosphere.
The tranquility was generally shattered at the entrance to each temple by one of two things, as you were either surrounded by kids selling everything imaginable or by the hordes exiting yet another tour bus.
The kids have clearly picked up every
sales technique in the book, including a powerful line in emotional blackmail. But when it comes down to it, there's just something extremely wrong about a primary school age child trying to sell beer.
The tour groups are slightly easier to avoid than you might imagine, and considerably less persistant than the kids. Although one Japanese tourist felt he'd done a particularly good job of finding a moment of quiet to reflect on the huge bas-relief on the side of Angkor Wat.
He looked extremely pleased with himself as he managed to allow the rest of his group to be led away further in to the temple while he remained behind to launch a spectacularly audible and lengthy bout of flatulence into the atmosphere.
The look of satisfaction quickly drained from his face when he turned to catch his tour group to discover David standing about 10 yards away photographing on the other side of a pillar and trying desparately to contain his laughter. The poor gentleman must have been saving it up all day for the perfect moment of peace amongst the thousands of tourists, only to be rumbled at the last second.
Thankfully as
it was a few seconds out of three long days it wasn't to be the lasting impression of Angkor. It's been another highlight of the trip, and another place we hope to return to some day. Thoroughly recommended to anyone who liked Indiana Jones as a kid or Tomb Raider as an adult.
The Beat Goes On We never expected to be listening to a cellist performing Bach in Cambodia but it made an interesting end to a day of tourism. The free concert was in aid of the local childrens hospital - run on charity - where you were asked to donate either some money, some blood or both.
The
performer and founder of the hospital was quite a character and explained the dire health situation for children in Cambodia between tunes. Another reminder that we're in a third world country, something that's a little too easy to forget amongst the tourist splendour of Angkor.
Making Friends in Phnom Penh An interesting city where pavements are meant for parking not pedestrians. In fact if you do walk anywhere people give you strange looks and shouts of "tuk-tuk sir? miss?" follow you.
Our introduction to the city was
A splash of colour
You're never too old to play in the puddles smoothed by Gech - the owner of Sunday Guesthouse who is possibly the most friendly and helpful person we've met so far. Where else could you be entertained by magic tricks before dinner? She made us a present of a set of magic sticks. We'll practise and show you all when we get home.
The longer you spend in the city the more you are struck by the number of kids on the streets. We found a great project dedicated to helping them. Eating in the
Friends restaurant run by the kids was probably a better way to help than buying postcards and books on the street corner - and of course it also satisfied our tastebuds!
Life's a beach After all our city hopping we decided to take it easy for a week and headed to the south of Cambodia to relax at the beach in Sihanoukville. Our guesthouse was literally on the beach which meant you could sit and watch the waves over breakfast, lunch and dinner.
We didn't do a whole lot whilst we were there other than some planning for the next stages of the trip but we did discover a cool little place
Rainbow
No sign of George, Zippy and Bungle called the
Starfish Cafe where we had some fantastic home baking, an indian head massage and bought a few souvenirs. Naturally, Carolyn was the subject of the massage and the shopping, while David gravitated toward the baking. Mmmmm, cheesecake. It was easy to justify our decadence as it was for a good cause.
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WOW!!!
What great photo's now I see what youwere dping on Sunday morning between Skype messages. Seems you are having a great time, Cambodia seems like a really good place to visit - I shall put it on the list! Keep Safe Simon