Rushing through Cambodia

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After experiencing heaps of horrid bus drives in Laos we decided to cheat and get a flight from Laos to Phenom. Yes I know it was expensive, but sanity was really important at this point for us. We arrived in the capital and were inidated with people trying to take us to their hotel. We ended up going to one in the centre of town, where we met good our great tuk tuk diver Mr. something. He was a character and a half. We decided to get as much out of the day. We started off at the capital museum, which although was nice to wonder around, we really didn't have any idea of actually what we were looking at. After skipping through there we were taken to the Cambodian palace, which was really nice. The others were templed out, but I thought it was really nice and worth the visit. There were so many beggars there. I remember waiting for the tuk tuk driver and watching this girl, she would go up to the tourists and ask for money and was in tears. As soon as they all left she stopped crying straight away. She could do it on cue. We were told not to give any money to the beggars because it promotes it and doesn't solve any problems. So we resisted. That night we played trivia at a local bar. The bar was nice, very backpacker and had a really annoying American tourist. But apart from that it was good atmosphere. We also caught up with Aimee and Sharon for a brief period of time.

The following day we headed to the Pol Pot places. It was a really sad day. We started off going to the killing fields. It was quite intense walking around and seeing the skulls of the victims and the mass graves. It was left exactly like it would have been back in the Pol Pot era. It was intense to say the least. After that we heading to the tourture/interigation area. Now that was intense. The place was swarmed with victims of the pol pot regime (we think at least). An image of a man whose face was burnt and someone melted will forever be stuck in my head. We got a tour guide to take us around the place and the rooms and the atmosphere was extremly depressing. The tour guide herself family were victims to Pol Pot, so it was sad at the end when she told us about the struggles her family went through. To say the least it was an emotionally exhuasting day. After that we left for lunch and to organise our bus tickets to Siem Reap.

The bus drive to Siem Rep was a bit ordinary, like on all the travel shows you see they actually do eat those spiders. Gave me a shock to wake up to a man walking pass with a bag of cooked spiders. Fair enough to say I jumped. We arrived in Siem Rep in the early hours of the morning. The following day we headed to this hostel reccommended. It was run and owned by tuk tuk drivers. It was really cool. The tuk tuk drivers would sit down and talk with you, smoke, drink and it was a chilled atmosphere. We woke up I think at 4am to see the sun rise of angkor wat. Funningly enough the sun rise was covered by the clouds so we didn't get the chance to see the sun rise. Wasn't the best of start. But Angkor wat and all the surrounding temples were absolutely amazing. They were MASSIVE, huge unbelievable. It just seemed to have gone on forever. I remember just sitting inside one of the temples thinking, how on earth they did it. The temples were so steep as well. To climb them you were literally on your hands and knees. It was probably the most impressive human land mark I have seen to this date. It was awesome. There were hundreds of people trying to sell things to you, but if you forgot about them then the place would have been exactly how it was left. It was a good way to see out Cambodia. Siem Rep was defintely another highlight of South-East Asia.

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