Part II

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After viewing the awe inspiring Angkor Wat we stopped off at the Landmine Museum which is essentially in the backyard of someone's home. His name is Aki ra and he planted mines for the Khmer Rouge when he was a kid. He currently helps to defuse landmines in the four neighbouring provinces around Siem Reap. He actually fell ill a couple of weeks ago when he was helping to unload some TNT from a mine and he inhaled some of the toxic TNT. At the Landmine Museum there are lots of examples of defused mines from small toe poppers to larger tank mines. There are also many stories and biographies posted around the museum and a "minefield" that has a whole bunch of different mines planted everywhere. Some of them are really, really hard to detect and some of the scariest ones to me would be the ones with trip wires attached.

Aki ra not only spends his time helping to defuse the millions of mines that are still planted along the borders of Cambodia and Thailand, Laos and Vietnam but he has taken in many children and victims of landmines from the surrounding provinces. I can't remember how many children are now living with him and his family but it is definitely upwards of 15 or more. They invited us to come back in the evening to watch a performance they have been working on. More on that in a second...

We had a three hour break for lunch and time to relax a bit before heading off to see more temples so of course Penny and I decided to take advantage of using the pool! It was a much welcomed relief to be able to cool off in a pool of water. It was so nice to be able to take a dip, get out and dry off in the sun, and then have lunch delivered to us poolside! Can't really ask for much more. haha

Then before we knew it we were off to see two more temples. The first being Prasat Top. This was another interesting example of trees growing on top of the temple structures and essentially helping to hold the temple together.

Neak Pean was a bit different. It is a small island temple with a central temple sitting in the centre and is surrounded by eight pools laid out in a lotus pattern. Neak Pean means "coiled serpents" and the temple is named as such because of the naga (mystical multi headed snakes) that encircle the temple. The waters were thought to have healing properties. It is currently the dry season so there is no water in any of the pools so we were able to see the animal and human headwater spouts that are located at the outside centre of each pool. Human = Earth. Horse = Air. Demon = Fire. Elephant = Water.

On the way out we encountered the usual kids trying to sell their wares to us. It is fun chatting with the kids or playing games with them since they are so easily distracted. Then we pass by one of the tourist policemen and he says to me, Penny and Rowan while showing us his badge, "Hey, do you want to buy a souvenir?" Of course me and Penny start laughing because we think he is mocking the kids BUT then Rowan tells me that is the 3rd time that has happened to him. Apparently it is quite common for the tourist police to offer their badges and even their uniforms for sale to foreigners! You'd think they'd get in trouble for selling these things but it apparently is not a problem as long as his supervisor gets a cut! Unbelievable...

Next stop was at the Landmine Museum again to check out the performance put on by the kids. Basically they were acting out the recent history of Cambodia. It was a bit confusing with so many armies involved but we got the basic gist of it even though I must admit that Cambodian history is all very confusing to me. It was sort of like a school play and the kids seemed to really be enjoying themselves.

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