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Published: December 13th 2005
Hi, yey pictures! If you check the last two entries I've put photos on there now too! Sorry it took so long.Also. sorry this is a really long entry but i've done exciting things and you know i like to ramble!!
Am writing this from Bangkok (again) but i've put Cambodia on the location as i think its exciting!!
Well Cambodia, where to begin! We left Koh Chang on 8th December and got the mini bus at 7.30am, which we thought at that point was bad enough. The journey to Aranyaprathet which is the Thai border with Cambodia (the Cambodian border down the street is called Poipet), took about 4 hours. I had taken my maleria tablet when I'd got home that night and then another in the morning, both on an empty stomach so spent the whole journey being sick and feeling grotty!
We then got out the mini bus and waited for an hour at the Thai immigration and then about 2 hours while we all tried to work out where our bus was! Everyone on our mini bus had yellow stickers and everyone was really nice so it wasn't too bad! Eventually, our guide came
and put us on the free tuk tuk to the bus stop. For some reason, commercial cars and buses can't go right up to the border, its probably for security, and so the governemnt provide a free transport to either the taxi rank or the bus stop. But it took a while to work this out!!
When we got on the bus we almost didn't all fit on. The bags had to be stacked down the isle and a Scottish boy had to sit on a red plastic chair at the front of the bus! It was really funny. Then the journey began. The roads in Cambodia were not meant for tourist buses, well were actually not meant for any motorised veichle really, except maybe for a motorbike! So the journey was like riding on a bike with square wheels. And the bridges were terryfiying; wooden suspensions that rattled and moanded as you went over them. But i loved every minute, it was like a proper adventure. The guide on the bus was telling us some bits about Cambodia's history and everyone was really friendly. We finally got to Siem Reap, the main tourist part and i think the
capital at about 10.30pm, 15 hours after we started! We stayed in the guest house the bus took us to which was fine.
The next day we went to the Old Market and planned the tour to the temples the next day. We decided that we wanted to go and watch the sunrise over one of the temples so got to bed for an early start! The next day we were up at 4.30am and I can't tell you how much it hurt! We went to Angkor Wat which is the largest temple and watched the sunrise from there. There were quite a few clouds in the sky which kind of ruined the effect a little bit, but it was still very atmospheric!
Angkor Wat is the place where the Khmer kings established their capitals between the 9th and 12th century. The largest is Angkor Wat which is the temple we saw first and is very beautiful. I think the film Tomb Raider was filmed there as well. There are some really steep steps which take you up to the temple, the rest is the palace i think. It really made my tummuy churn and on the way
down we met some English boys who hadn't been to bed and were still wasted from the night before. They stunk of alcohol but were really funny. There isn't much really to say about this but there's plenty of pics!!
The second temple we saw was Angkor Thom and this was the last Captial that was used of that time. I preferred this one to the other. It was more delapidated but it contains Bayon which is the palace i think and there are huge faces on the gates and built into the towers. There were also other temples around that are being rebuilt. The religion in that area changed from Hindu to Buddhist and so the styles of the temples changed as well!!!
We then went to the last temple of the day and my favourite Ta Phrom. This temple is in the undergrowth a bit and as you'll see, is surrounded by giant tree roots that have grown into the temples. Despite the hordes of Japense tourists, this temple had a really tranquil feeling to it. This may have been brought on by extreme tirdness or the hypnotic chantings of a Thai band that were playing
on the path, but it was definatley my favourite!We were all knackered and so decided to go back for a snooze!
On the way out that night, we saw the biggest bug. It was a black beetle and was the size of my palm! It was stuck on its back and was just wiggling its legs in the air, t'was disgusting! We were shreiking that loudly that some lads had to come out and have a look too and they were scared as welll which made us feel better! Lydia flicked it with her flip flop but i couldn't leave it on its back to die! So i righted it and when it got on its feet it stood there, looking like a bull terror and i swear it was not in a good mood so i legged it, eughh!
We keep having run-ins with pestulent bugs! The night after we'd changed beach huts in Koh Chang, we were all getting ready in the communal loo area to go to bed, when this massive bug thing that had attacked Lauren earlier as we'd returned home, flew into the sink! We tried everything to get it out, i even
through sticks and stuff into the sink and it wouldn't budge! In the end, we had to get the lovely guys from the hotel to come and get rid of it! It was so embarrassing. They did seem to see the funny side though and even checked the loo to make sure there were non more hiding in there! Its not good. I don't mind them but they have a habit of landing on your lap or your hair when you least expect it! In Koh Phi Phi, a massive millipeed landed on lauren's lap whilst we were eating dinner and I've had one flying cockroach on my shoulder, which i think you'll all agree is unecessary harrassment and i intend to take it further!!!!
Anyway, back to Cambodia!! That night we went out and had cocktails, yey and a really tasty curry tea in the Temple bar. We then went to the Angkor What? (see what they did there!!) bar whcih was really cool! One of the bar staff was a larger than life Indian guy with loads of tatoos and i could imagine our friend Jacko working there!
The next day we went to the landmine
museum which was very poignant. Aki Ra, the man who runs the museum was in the army at the age of about 13 and was helping to lay the land mines. These were intended to keep out the Khmer Rouge who had taken hold of Cambodia and who killed 1,500,000 Cambodians in i think about 4 years. They were in power between 1975 and 1979. But then the Vietnamese went into Cambodia and helped them to over-throw the regime. Unfortunately, the mines have probably ended up killing more Cambodians and Thai people than anyone else, as they were mainly laid on the Thai/Cambodian border. We watched a video where Aki desctibed how the children were made to walk infront of the soldiers so that it would be the children who took the blow from the mines and not the fighting soldiers. He explained how he had watched a lot of his friends die, very sad.
The museum taught us about the different types of land mines and how they are triggered. It was awful to think that someone actually invented these devices with the sole purpose of taking someone's leg, the device specific to one or two. Or to
More Dancing Ladies
These appeared everywhere on the temples and i really loved them!decapitate someone, or spread the shrapnel so far that the maximum amount of people are either seriously hurt or ulitmately killed. The job Aki does is amazing. He goes to the border and deactivates the landlmines himself, with no other equipment apart from a long stick and a pair of pliers. He also takes in children who are either poor weith not much hope in life, or victims of landmines and schools them and gives them a home. It was definatley an eye opener and put some petty squabbles into perspective.
After that we went to what i think is a monument to the Killing Fields, which is basically a 9 mile stretch, one of the places where thousands of people were taken to be tourtured and killed by the Khmer Rouge regime. The methods they used were horrendous, the regime is said to be one of the most viscus of the 20th century and is listed with Hitler and Stalin in the atrocities they commited. The children and elderly were killed becuase they couldn't work and children were often seperated from their parents and killed in front of them. If you broke any of the rules or didn't
A Good View
The wall you can see on the horizon is the South gate produce enough rice or didn't completely support the regime then you were also tortured and killed. It as estimated that around this time 20 percent of Cambodia's population was killed, although there are differing figures depending on which source you get information from. There was also estimated to be 10 million land mines left in cambodia afterwards which apprently was one for every Cambodian left! Very scary stuff.
Cambodia does seem to now have a new hope in the face of tourism and they certainly do seem to be making hte mist of it. Surprisingly to me, a lot of Cambodians speak English and you can pay for almost evrything in either Riel, the national currency or Amercian dollars. The Cambodian people are very friendly and also very helpful. We didn't really see much of Cambodia perse as we only qwent to Siem Reap, but i think i would definalty return and i wuld recommend it! IT also felt like we were having a proper adventure!!!
We were ment to be returning to Bangkok by bus but by the time we actually sorted out booking it the bus was full! So, horrific journey number two, w got up
this morning at 3.30am!!! Og Lody, felt proper ruff! At least the taxi journey was quicker than the bus, only 3 hours, so we got there (to the border) much earlier than we have anticiapted and decided to get a more exensive but frequent bus back to Bangkok! We arrived here at 3.30pm, after getting a taxi with the best taxi driver ever! One Burger kings and some waxing and pampering later, we're all jsut about alive, but there's some serious bags around! I don't know how we manage to be so shit and get ourselves into the most ridiculous situations! Anyway, we're gong to Ko samui and the surrounding islands for the full moon beach party but apprently is raining, aarrgghh!!! The rainy season is meant to have ended weeks ago! Its bloody typical that just because we had intended to go there for Christmas for some sun, it bloody rains! We're going to see how it goes but we might only stay there for a few days as there's an utbreak of Denghi fevour which we def don't want to get!!!
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