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May 23rd 2010

Published: May 27th 2010

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Tour de Fife

In the tuktuk on our way to the floating village on Tonle Sap lake

Hey everyone,

Since we were a bit slack on our last blog from Laos you are now getting another update from a whole new country only a couple of days later!

Well, we flew into Siem Reap from Vientiene to meet our friends Dave and Komi. We were pleasantly surprised with the city. It had a great vibe to it, well in the 'Old market area' (i.e. tourist hub), where we were anyway. Lots of boutique shops & market stalls for shopping and an great choice of restaurants & bars.

The taxi we got from the airport dropped us off at a decent looking place called 'Angkor River Star Guesthouse' for US$15 a night (all of Cambodia uses US dollars as main currency - the national currency of Riel is only used for small purchases or change). This was a bit more than what we normally like to pay, however it did include aircon and we felt like treating ourselves so we paid for one night. Well, as soon as the driver got paid his commision and we took our bags upstairs we quickly realised why we had not seen any other guests... the rooms in the floor

Typical Cambodian house in the countryside

Love the cows wandering free

below us were being renovated! The workers had 'convienently' been on a break when I was checking the room out. We were feeling lazy though so we chilled out in our room for a bit with the lovely background music of a thudding jackhammer and a buzzing drill. Needless to say, later that afternoon, when we wandered into town to explore, we looked for another guesthouse to move into the next day! We ended up finding a great one called 'Fresh Guesthouse' which also had aircon but for only US$12 a night, it was also right in the centre of the old market area but was set back from the road so not noisy :-)

The next day - after transferring to our new digs - Adam and I checked out the town some more and enjoyed the delicious Khmer (Cambodian) food on offer... Chicken amok and Khmer curry are 2 particular favourites of mine... washed down with 50cent Angkor beer of course!

After coming from Laos where we had to wakeup tuk tuk drivers to take us anywhere, we had to get used to the dozens of Tuktuk driver touts hassling us to use their services. It

The 'village on stilts'

Normally floaded during wet season they have made the most of the the dry weather and are drying shrimp on the mats in the middle of the road

was actually quite sad as the riots in Bangkok and the Volcano in Iceland have both significantly reduced tourist numbers everywhere, and the poor tuktuk drivers just ridiculously outnumbered the tourists around, and therefore somedays would be not earning a single thing. The other thing that we had been fortunate enough not to be confronted with before in our trip was all of the beggars. From street kids and mums with babies to homeless men with missing limbs - it was impossible not to be affected. Everything you read asks you to try and not give-in and give them money or buy what they are selling, as it just encourages them to continue doing it, but it is so hard! There are organisations in Cambodia set up to help these people but that is not what you think about when you have a gorgous 7 year old girl wearing torn and dirty clothes begging you for food or water right in your face. As you can probably tell - I am struggling with this a bit. I did give in a couple of times- buying 4 postcards from a cheeky 11 year old boy with a missing leg and I

The motor at the back of the boat

Lots of muddy water being sprayed at the poor locals who we passedalong the way :-(

had an awesome anklet made for me by a really cool guy with one hand and no legs.

Anyway, we met Dave and Komi bright and early at their hotel the next morning, it was awesome to see them - faces from home! It was only a short walk from where we were staying so we took them to see the old market area before heading back to their place to get a tuktuk to a floating village on Tonle Sap lake.

This proved to be a bit of an adventure to get out to. The hotel told us that it would be $15 for the 40min tuktuk ride there & back and $25 for the boatride (between us - not each). The tuktuk drive was great- after leaving the main road we went past heaps of country 'houses' (a real eye-opener as to the very basic conditions Cambodians live in but seem perfectly happy with too) but we soon got a surprise when our driver pulled over with no boat or village in sight, and insisted that with the river being so dry he could not take us any further in the tuktuk so we each had

Some locals we passed on the way to the lake

to jump on the back of a motorbike(his mates on bikes had now convienently turned up) for $4 each AND he then said the boat ticket would be $10 each! We got annoyed at this as it was now becoming a much more expensive trip than what we had anticipated so we demanded to be taken back to town. This made them reconsider and the boattickets were sold to us at the $25 for all 4 of us and only 2 motorbikes were needed as Komi and I shared one and Dave went on the back of the tuktuk drivers bike for free. I guess its fair enough they tried it on- but I'm glad we put our foot down as it would've totally stuffed our budget for the day. The 8km bike ride down an uneven dirtroad would've been impossible for a tuktuk so at least the guy wasn't lying about that! The scenery was a bit boring until we got to the village at the lake/river mouth where a surprisingly large amount of wooden and corragated iron shacks/houses/shops appeared high above our heads perched on stilts (in the wet season they 'float'). It was a cool site though

The floating village on Tonle Sap lake

The 'fenced' areas are where they farm the fish they sell to Siem Reap

still not the main village we were heading for. This instead was where we had to get off the bikes and then hop on a boat for a very slow ride down the incredibly low and ice-coffee coloured river, we had to stop several times to use a pole to push us along when it got too sludgy! We finally reached Tonle Sap lake and thankfully it was worth the painful trip to get there - the 'village' was an amazing grouping of completely self-sufficient wooden huts in the middle of the lake. The crazy constructions of timber and bamboo would've made any western building inspectator's jaw drop and some of them quite frankly defied the laws of gravity, but somehow it all worked! Some even looked quite homely with hammocks, plants and caged pigs! They survive by farming fish and selling them to Siem Reap - quite amazing really. After the long return trip, including a funny moment where Adam's return motorbike trip was shared with his drivers wife and 3 year old daughter (although he thought the wife was trying to pinch his wallet- lets hope that was all she was going for!), we headed to Temple bar

One of the larger 'houses'

and quickly sunk several 50cent beers before dinner and then headed home for an early night to be ready to explore the Angkor temples the next day.

We decided to use our guesthouse tuktuk the next day to get around Angkor, as it was slightly cheaper ($12 for all 4 of us for the whole day) and the driver 'Narun' was a cool guy who gave us free water and much needed refreshment towels all day. We kicked off at 9.30am and had a full-on day ahead as we decided to see all the main temples in one day, ending at sunset. Well - one thing is for sure - the temples definately deserve all the hype, the only country to have a building on their flag and deservedly so... they are simply mind-blowing. The mind boggles at how so many of these huge and complex structures were constructed in an age before modern building techniques and equipment let alone electricity! I could go into loads of details; as even though I still marvel at the photos they don't really do it justice - but that would take too long - so I'll just do a quick rundown of

Honestly how do these things stay upright?!

Closeup of the unique construction methods

what we saw...

1. ANGKOR WAT 2 hours
Main temple - amazing bas-relief and carvings on walls. Kept going up and up - surprisingly massive! Constructed early-mid 12th century. Massive manmade moat around it.

2. PRASAT KRAVAN 15 mins
Very small compared to Angkor Wat. Red brick - built almost 2 centuries earlier than Angkor Wat.

3. SRAH SRANG 10 mins
Multi-tiered platform on west edge of baray (man-made lake).Opposite entrance to Banteay Kdei.
Heaps of begging kids ambushed us here and were quite indimidating!

4. BANTEAY KDEI 1 hour
Largely unrestored maze of a temple. Nearly deserted and easy to get lost amongst the many passageways within the ruins.
One little girl followed me around and kept trying to sell me stuff, when I repeatedly said 'sorry' she replied with 'sorry not money'! This amazed me - they have certainly been trained well.

5. TA PROHM 1 hour
The 'Lara Croft' and/or 'Indiana Jones' temple. Truly spellbinding. Massive fig and silk-cotton trees have grown through the temple, their roots simultaneously destroying and supporting it. More ruined than previous but similar style. Constructed only half a century later than Angkor Wat.

6. TA KEO

Adam looking like part of the family

Heading back from seeing the floating village

30 mins
Plainly decorated towering 'mountain pyramid' type temple. Ridiculously steep and narrow steps can be climbed to get to the top - super dodgy but worth it!

7. THOMMANON 10 mins
More of the same really - some of the reliefs really detailed.

8. CHAU SAY TEVODA 10 mins
We were the only tourists at the smaller temple at the time - directly opposite Thommanon. We were given incense by a nun who then led us to a porico where we put it front of a buddha statue - she then blessed us and tied a 'good-luck' red string around our wrists, before asking for a dollar from each of us!!!

9. BAYON in ANGKOR THOM 1 hour
The second most famous temple after Angkor Wat with giant stone faces in the top tier towers. Very busy/geometric design. Unfortunately the heat of the afternoon sun was getting to us and by kept us hunting out the rare pockets of shade most of the time.

10. PHNOM BAKHENG 1 hour
Another temple/mountain.One of the earliest built in Angkor at 9th century AD. Incredible 360degree views over Siem Reap, Tonle Sap lake and the Angkor temples. More

Angkor Wat!!!

Shame about the green tarps covering restoration work at the front

steep narrow stairs to access but worth it to watch the sunset from!

So as you can see it was a full-on and long day! We were lucky that for most fo the day it was overcast as when the sun came out in the late arvo it totally zapped us! The thing I couldnt get over was how we could amble through and explore these 1000 year old places, at our own pace and pretty much unsupervised. Anything like this in a western country would be behind glass or roped off, with all loose pieces safely preserved in a museum rather than strewn on the ground exactly where they fell! I can't quite decide if this is a good or bad thing.
After going back to our rooms to freshen up when we got back to town around 7pm, we met up for dinner at a nice street stall, followed by drinks at a great bar called 'Angkor What?'.

The next day we had a lazy start recovering from the day before. We met the others and found a hotel just down the road from them that had a pool in a stunning garden setting. So we

Closeup of just one small section of one of the several bas-reliefs

Lower corridors surrounding Angkor Wat temple

paid our $3 admission and just swam and chilled out before getting baguettes for lunch and then returning for more pooltime. At about 4pm we went to Dave and Komi's hotel where we all got a massage. Komi and I had an hour traditional Khmer massage (much like thai just not as hard pressure) while the boys just got a 1/2 hour back massage each. The funny thing was - the hotel didn't actually have a 'spa' as such so we had to share rooms in the hotel. I would've loved to have been a fly on the wall in Adam and Dave's room as I am sure it was just a little awkward for them! Afterwards we headed up to the hotel's rooftop bar and watched the sunset while having a beer and cigar in the rooftop spa! An extravagant treat for the backpacker that's for sure! Unfortunately Dave suddenly got sick with what ended up being gastro so we parted ways after giving Komi some advise and drugs to hopefully help Dave with the flight back to Singapore early the next morning.

After those action packed 3 days, we lazed around the next day before heading to

Inside the lower part of Angkor Wat

Phnom Penh the day after. Phnom Penh is a large and superbusy city - getting us prepared for Vietnam I guess. It didn't have the same atmosphere as Siem Reap though and almost had a sleazy undertone at night. So we decided to just stay long enough to learn about the appaling atrocities of the Khmer Rouge regime in the 1970's and visit the 'Choeung Ek Memorial' (the 'killing field') and Toul Sleng Genocide Museum (S-21), before heading down south to Sihanoukville for some beachtime.

Well- I won't go into too much detail about the Khmer Rouge as it is worth everyone learning about it for themselves. What went on was horrific and disturbing acts of human nature at its worst, with mass killings of innocent Cambodians all in the name of re-creating a 'fair' communist society. The day was incredibly sobering and trying as it was impossible not to get emotional when you are confronted with the reality of what happened to these people only a short-time ago.

We watched a video in the morning at a pub along the riverfront about the Khmer Rouge regime - then saw more detailed videos at each of the places

About to go in and explore...

Angkor Wat

we visited. I found these helpful to understand what happened but certainly still left me baffled as to how humans could do such things to other humanbeings.

At Choeng Ek Memorial (most famously known as 'the killing field') we saw the pits that were the mass-graves, the tree where babies were killed by smashing their heads against it and, the most moving of all, bone and clothing remnants still lodged in the ground poking up everywhere. 17,000 men, women and children were executed here over 4 years.
The memorial itself is a large stupa that contains 17 levels of clothing, skulls and bones that were excavated from the mass-graves,all behind protective glass. Pretty much every single skull had a large crack on top where the person was killed using blunt instruments to save on bullets.

The Toul Sleng Genocide Museum was a highschool prior to 1975, but the Khmer Rouge converted it into S-21 prison, where inmates were held in tiny brick or wooden cubicles and tortured until being taken off to the forementioned killing field. The school has been pretty much left how it was found when the Khmer Rouge fled in 1979, and was turned into

Making our way up to the top...

very steep and narrow stairs - they must've been tiny back then!

a museum as a memorial and testament to the maddness of the Khmer Rouge regime. A couple of the buildings contain rooms with board after board of black and white photographs of just some of the thousands of victims. I can't even begin to explain how gutwrenching seeing their faces was.

WARNING: I have put some photos from the Killing Field and Toul Sleng at the end of this blog - they are pretty heavy so if you dont want to see them stop looking when you see the lady in pyjamas photo.

A difficult day seeing horrific things that you really don't want to see, but that also gave me a new appreciation for Cambodia and its people. A true testament to the amazing strength and character of the Khmer people is that even though they have suffered so great and are still a poor country trying desperately to recover, they do so with a friendly smile on their face that makes anyone visiting their country feel instantly welcome.

After this we definately felt like we need some chilled out beachtime so we hoped on a bus yesterday and headed to Sihanoukville in the south. It

Nearly at the top...

Still in Angkor Wat!

is a nice beach with a pretty relaxed atmosphere. Sort of a cross between the Perhentain Islands and Koh Tao. We are here in low season though so the long stretch of mostly empty restuarant/bars along the beachfront, means that we stand out like sore thumbs to the dozens of kids wanting to sell us bracelets. We got suckered in last night by 2 charming young kids and before we knew it we had half a dozen of them surrounding us, telling us that if we didn't buy from them as well we were ''bad tourists'' and that ''bad f*cking things would happen to us". Yep- I have never heard 9 year olds swear so prufusely - shocking, annoying and sad all at the same time. Anyway - we will be better next time and just ignore them, other tourists have told us this approach works.

Not too sure how long we will spend here as it is nice but can be a bit dangerous/seedy at night... we just met up again with Seb (who we travelled through Laos with) and we will probably head into Vietnam together in the next few days.

Till next update...