battambang

lonely planet describes Cambodia's second largest city as 'an elegant riverside town, home to some of the best preserved french period architecture in the country'. in reality apart from a couple of dilapidated houses with French style shutters over the windows near the river, i didnt see any preserved french architecture, the only possible link to its previous residence is one wide road that has a large grass bank running down the middle, on the whole the city is run down and far from picturesque. most visitors to cambodia only spend time in phnom pehn and siem reap so battambang is of the radar and unspoilt, although as a result there s not much to do. there are no bars to speak of and the only night club isnt open on monday and tuesday. i saw this as a good opportunity to have a day off the alcohol. what tourist there are congregate around two restaurants where the menus are in english. in just about every country i have been in there have been beggars, but here it was a new level, they didnt want you money, they wanted to scraps of your plate so they could eat. A couple of westerners on the table next to us gave a young girl the rice that they had not touched, she scooped it into a pint glass ran as fast as she could, probably back to her family so they could eat that day.

while i was successful in by alcohol abstention, i have tried before, not drinking usually ends up with just a couple of G&T's, helen and suz went from just one glass of wine, to just one bottle, to lets order another bottle to take back to the hotel, to hearing them drunkenly stumbling out of their room and paying a tuk tuk driver to go and find them some more alcohol. the next day helen and i went for a look around while suz stayed in bed nursing a hang over. we hied a tuk tuk to take us out to see some temples on a mountain and some killing caves. we drove out of the town for about 45 minutes before transferring to some motorbikes to climb the final part of the mountain. our drivers raced to the top with us on the backs, with no crash helmets it strange how the human brain acclimatises to situations and things that you would not dream of doing at home become second nature. one of the motor bike drivers volunteered to be our guide, he explained that he was being educated at the temple at the bottom of the mountain and that he was a trainee monk, although this he had no intentions of being a monk, as he wanted to have a business, but while he was educated there he lived a monks lifestyle, living at the temple, going out in the morning for collections, eating once a day and meditating at night.


our guide took us into a cave which is a huge archway that cuts right through mountain, then down into a sub cave there they was a hindu statue, where the monks sometimes come to meditate, i can see why, we sat there in silence you could not help but feel at peace with the world, we sat there in silence for what seemed like an eternity, while helen fought and fought of her temptation to take photos.



the temples on the top of the mountain had been destroyed by the Khmer rouge, and had been, or were still being rebuilt. as well as the Buddhist shrines there were also hindu temples. i know that these two religions intertwine with each over and one was born from the other but i found it remarkable that they still rebuilt the hindu place of worship. the only monument that the KR did not destroy was a mausoleum to Non Lol (the prime minister at the time of the civil war) wife. our guild explained that many believe that he and poll pot knew eachover, citing this and the fact that the KR did not enter the town where Non Lol lived allowing to live out his days until he died naturally in the 1990's. this surprised me as the KR were not fussy who they killed as they attempted genocide of their own people. and all of the ministers of the government were rounded up and shot. he thought that they knew eachover and were friends, i thought maybe it was like professional fighters with a nothing personal attitude. as both are dead i guess we will never know.

by the time we got to the killing caves the KR were back on form, there were two caves where they threw people down, the lucky ones died instantly the unlucky ones lived and were left in agony to slowly die of starvation. he also showed us a cage about the same size as a chicken coup but twice the height, where they put clever people, 6 at a time to die of starvation.

we headed of to the bamboo railway but by the time we got there it was poring down and it was closed. helen went to have a look at the platform and i stayed and played with the adorable children, its amazing how many friends you can make with a couple of high fives. two of the girls even sang me a song.



that night the girls stayed in so i went for diner alone as the girls stayed in. as there are only two restaurants i thought id be adventurous and go to the other one. i wasn't massively hungry and only ate about half of my food. i looked around the boarders of the hotel and could see in the shadows cambodian eyes eyeing up by food, one of whom was a lady with a baby, i settled the bill and called her over to my table, and offered her the rest of the food. the initial good feeling of helping someone was quickly replaced by sadness, realising that i had no right to feel smug about offering food that i did not want to someone. could her baby even eat my beef lok lok ?
This Feeling haunted me as i walked through the desolate streets on my way home. It was only 9.30 but the streets were practically deserted, apart from the occasional figures lurking in the shadows and the occasionally pedestrian you would see walking along. The way the locals slowly walked along reminded me of a zombie movie, slow, out of rhythm, silent, hunched, the poverty effected everything, even the people walked.
The only thing that i saw open was a massage parlour where all the girls sat in pink nylon jackets like the pink ladies in Greece, the discrepancy just made me even more sad. In truth they were probably prostitutes, and how much do you think they cost?

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