Siem Reap - Home of Angkor Watt

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Hello All,

I'm writing you from within the heart of Cambodia in the small village Siem Reap, famous for being the home of Angor Wat. I arrived here yesterday by plane from Pnohm Penh. It was only a 50 minute flight, but it would've taken an unpredictable 10 hours by bus. The abundance of cheap flights coupled with the subpar infrastructure/roads in the region makes flying the only way to go. I landed in Siem Reap very early, just after 7:30 AM. This was great, since it gave me a full day here rather than wasting the entire day to travel. This village/city is pretty incredible; the entire place was built to cater to those visiting Angor Wat. I booked an awesome place; I am getting very good at finding these hidden gems. The internet really makes travel much easier. It is called Palm Village, a setup of about 20 ''huts'' embedded within a tropical jungle. It is beautiful; I can't even begin to describe the place without showing you my pictures. However, you can check it out through their website, http://www.palmvillage.com.kh . For only 30 bucks a night, I got my own little bungalow with AC and cable TV, a ride both from and to the airport, and a very good breakfast served either in your bungalow, poolside, or in one of the gardens. If I had known how great this place was, I would've at least planned on staying an extra day or two more than I am/did. I also got early check in (very early), breakfast the day I arrived for no cost, and free internet and printing. Being that I am leaving tommorrow back to Pnohm Penh around noon, I just paid my bill. For the $92 I paid (I charged everything to the room), I got all the things I just wrote, including rides to and from the airport, early check in, two nights stay, three great breakfasts, two dinners, a bike for my entire stay, two loads of laundry (which consisted of all the clothes that I have), a four handed 1 hr massage yesterday (two person), and today a 1 hr balancing session (best described as having somebody stretch you while giving you indian burns, to drain the lymph nodes). I don't want to leave, but I have two plane flights pre-paid in the next three days.

The first day I got here, yesterday, I took the bike and went riding. I rode to town, all through dirt roads and trails while checking everything out. The entire area is FLAT; completely level through to the horizon. The people around here are very nice; they all LOVE america, and like to practice their English. I have found that everyone in the entire region not just likes America, but LOVES America. They equate America to progress and modernism, in result envisioning English as the language of "opportunity". When I answer them that I am from America, their eyes widen. Two people have said how America has done such good for Cambodia, mostly in relation to rebuilding their country after the devastation of the Khmer Rouge. I don't think they realize that we in fact indirectly supported the Khmer Rouge during their ''jungle'' years; we wanted anyone to be in Cambodia other than the communist Vietnamese. However, through UN work, I was told Americans practically rebuilt the country and developed it to the level that it is today. While riding around town, all the kids come running to me saying ''hello, hello, hello, hello''. Yesterday while riding my bike, I was uncertain about the way back to the hotel so I stopped to ask these two kids if I were going in the right direction. I was pretty sure I was, but didn't want to go 10 miles in the wrong direction into the Cambodian wildnerness. The one didn't speak English too well, but did know what I meant when I said ''Palm Village, this way?". He said yes, yes, I ride? I said yes, figuring that he needed a lift in that direction (Cambodians ride three people to a bike). He directs me back to the hotel, which was just under 2 miles away, then says here, Palm Village. Then, he gets off the bike and starts walking back in the direction that I picked him up in. He went all that way just to show me where it was. That is how the people here are, very very friendly. Later in the day, I went
swimming and laid out by the pool reading my Angor Wat book preparing for my next days visit. Then I got the massage, then walked around the neighborhood where the hotel is. It is outside of the city, in a very ''residential'' area (if you can call groupings of huts with one mansion in such a way)

Today I visited Angor Watt; I want to get to bed so I will give you a short version. My words, not even my pictures can do it justice. It is INCREDIBLE; Indiana Jones but more amazing. It is a compound of all these temples constructed between 500 AD until about 1100 AD. You can read about it on the internet, and look at the pictures, so I won't go too much into it. It is in a huge area; just in the area of the temples, I have to have had ridden more than 15 miles, just riding from temple to temple, to wall to wall. The whole area is over 150 square miles, which equates to about 12.5 mi X 12.5 mi, so it's huge. Just as incredible as the temples and architecture itself, were the lakes and forests surrounding the area. The trees were so big and so old, with all the vines. I can't even describe it. While riding, I saw so many animals, all wild as are every other animal in the country (even dogs). At one point, I came across over 100 monkeys all running around. They looked like chimps, but greyish and smaller. There were also a lot of baby monkeys, along with a few HUGE big fat monkeys. They beat on the smaller monkeys. I had to have spent two hours with these monkeys; they were the coolest thing I've ever seen. At first, I was apprehensive; they weren't scared of people. You walk towards them and they run at you. There was this little Cambodian girl there that was playing with one of them, so that eased me a bit. They were all wrestling each other, and cleaning one another as you see on National Geographic. Jumping tree to tree, I couldn't believe what I saw. I got a bunch of pictures of it. After they got used to my presence, they tried to have me join the monkey wrestling session. They began jumping on my legs, jumping on my bag, picking my hair, it was crazy. These were wild monkeys, but they weren't too big. I was just nervous about rabies, but whatever, it's curable. The pictures I got are great. I wanted to take one
home with me; they'd make the best pet. Later in the day, I even saw a different species monkey that was really big. It was almost my size, but I only got a quick glimpse of it. I think it was a Urangutang. Joining the crowd were the typical elephants (so common here I'm already bored of them), along with many other animals. I was told that the movie Congo was loosely based on the monkeys and the temples. In the movie the monkeys were killers, the reality is much different. In the book I bought about Angor Watt, I read that when they discovered the whole compound, the place was overrun by monkeys, like a monkey city. They had adopted the buildings as their own.

OK, I will wrap things up now. Power is pretty iffy around here and I don't want to write this all over again. Tommorrow, I'm heading to Pnohm Penh, where I am staying another two nights. On the 29th, I have an early flight to Bangkok, from where I plan on taking an overnight train south to the port. From there, I have tentatively planned on taking a 5 hr boat ride to Koh Tao, an island off of Thailand known for some of the best scuba diving in the world. I have been corresponding with this scuba resort that I plan on staying. If you take a PADI scuba certification course there, then they give you 50 percent off of the bungalows, which are on the beach. Supposedly Koh Tao is an awesome, beautiful, very quiet tropical island, with unbelievable scuba diving and great scenery (mountains and jungle). The certification takes three days, during which you get to take 4 real deep dives, about two hours each. Then, I hope to stay an additional two days afterward, taking another two or three dives each day. Being that it costs over a grand for the PADI certification at home, this is a great deal. I figure that to do what I planned, the certification, 5 nights in the bungalow, along with 9 or 10 dives, it would cost under 500 dollars. Pretty good, about 100 a night when you think about it that way, making the certification free. The place is called Black Tip Diving, and they have their own resort, private beach area, with a big lagoon known for unbelievable snorkeling. I hope that I can pull off this plan, with getting there, booking the place, etc.

OK, I am out.

Dan

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Photos

Monk praying
Monk praying at Angkor Watt

Angkor Watt
This temple within the complex is surround by a huge moat.

The library
This was the library for one of the temples.

The forest
This was a HUGE complex, which included about 30 temples, many buildings, all of which was surround by lush forest filled with animals.

Buddha
The temples here aren't all Buddhist. About half of the temples are Hindhu, devoted to the worship of Hindhu dieties. They were built at different times, and were devoted to the dominant religion of such.

The art and architecture
Unbelievable.