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Other entries in Siem Reap

Angkor Wat

Where to begin...

Well, it's pretty hard to think, since Cambodia assaults you in every which way as soon as you step foot in it, I saw Angkor Wat, which is huge, and all of this happened over three weeks ago.

After arriving it became obvious that this country was definitely going to be the sobering place I had imagined, and had been told it would be.  Knowing a fair bit about the history of the country helped explain what I was going to see, but did not help prepare me in any way for it...  As soon as I stepped off the plane in Siem Reap I went straight to a guesthouse and slept - hey, I'd been up all night to catch the flight, and was a little worse for wear.  Upon waking up at 5pm and heading out for dinner and a drink, I was immediately approached by crowds of people selling things.  This was different from the other places though, as most of them were missing a limb or two.  I bought some postcards and a book called 'First they Killed my Father' (about a young girls' experiences under the Khmer Rouge regime).  Going to bed late, I was woken up for my Sunrise tour of Angkor, which I declined and told them I would take the day after.

After an uneventful day I went to bed to watch some Discovery channel (hey, it's everywhere) and get a good nights sleep in preparation for the days early start (5am).

Well I don't wake up well at 5am, but since this was a rare case I dragged my ass out of bed and climbed aboard the moto driven by 'Navee' for my $10 all day tour of the temples.  We stopped to buy the entrance pass after some gas ($20 for one day) and proceeded to Angkor Wat to catch sunrise.

I thought, being around 5:30am, there wouldn't be too many people there - WRONG.  There were, at best guess, close to 4000 people on the grounds.  Of course, I don't know shit about crowd size estimation, so it could have been anywhere from 2000-4000 (I ain't guessing low).

Well after taking my sunrise photos at Angkor Wat I got back on the moto and proceeded through one of the gates of Angkor Tom to the temple in the center of the old walled city: Bayon.  Bayon is the temple that has something along the lines of 264 faces, 4 to a column, all facing in the four different compass directions.  I was told that early morning was the best time to see it as the sunrise makes the faces more alluring.  I can agree with this, the photos I took around 6:30-7:00 were definitely better than most of the ones I saw taken in the flat light of the later day.

After Bayon we took a quick tour past the terrace of the Elephants, and, after some brief negotiations for more money, headed 35kms north to the Temple of Bantrey Sai (sp).  This temple is one of the smaller ones, but is very ornate and well preserved. It is surrounded by a wall and a moat, and I spent a pleasant 30 minutes in the shade of the wall, looking at the temple across the moat and listening to music.  For some reason the Outkast was deemed most appropriate, don't ask me why.

Upon seeing me with the Ipod, Navee wanted to listen to 'Hot Tunes' while we drove, so putting one bud in my ear and one in his, we drove back to the main temple complex listening to all the club/dance music I have.  I learnt that really good tunes are dangerous, since it makes him drive fast, swerve a bit, and start dancing while on the bike.

Once we got back to the main temple complex I toured a few more temples, all merging into one at this point, and enjoyed a few more periods of sitting in the shade and listening to music.  After these stopovers, we finally headed to Ta Phrom, the temple I had been looking forward to visiting all day.

Ta Phrom has been left in pretty much the same state in which it was discovered.  Short of clearing a few pathways, and a few of the scrubby smaller things that obscured a lot of the structure, the major trees and encroachments on the temples are still as they were when the temple first emerged out of it's thousand year jungle sabbatical.  Well after dragging myself around Ta Phrom, and evading the thousandth pack of kids trying to sell anything under the sun (hands over your pockets with the expensive stuff in) I announced I was ready to go home.  No climbing the hill to watch sunset, I'd been at this temple exploring gig from 5:30am to 3:30pm, and I was ready to go.

Upon getting back to town I asked Navee if he wanted to play a game of snooker.  Off to the snooker hall we went, where you just drive your bike right through the door and leave it parked next to the table you are playing on... Most things in this country are just not quite as you expect them to be.  After three games, which I soundly beat him in (there is no such thing as three games, you just keep adding the points till you leave here...) we headed out. 

'Do you want to go and see the floating market?'    - No

'Do you want to go see the landmine museum?'      - Tomorrow

'Do you want to do X touristy thing?'                       -  No, I've done enough today

'Do you want to come to my house and meet my brother and sister and have a beer and my sister will cook you real Cambodia food?'

Why yes, yes I did.  So off we go into that part of Siem Reap that they don't bother putting in the guidebook.  Where not one sign has any English on it, short of the western ads for Coke, Lays etc. which are everywhere.  We get to the store where the cheapest case of beer is Asahi at $8us for 24 cans.  We also then have to go to the ice store and buy a block of ice, which will go in the cooler.  Back we get, where the house is a room 15'x15', with a shared bathroom round back and three people living in it.  They have a little Coleman gas stove that they take outside to cook on, and small TV, stereo and laptop.  The ice is cut with a cleaver and put in the cooler, along with the beer.  Well we eat our 'pig surprise' salad, some fish soup, some rice and another dish I can't quite remember.  This pig surprise salad contained: pork, pig fat, blood sausage, liver and another organ I can't place, probably due to lack of having eaten it.  The blood sausage was not to my taste, I had to choke it down, the liver was ok due to an English childhood, and most other things were fine.  Well as soon as dinner finished, the neighbors start coming out, bringing fish and fruit and all sorts of things for me to try, and in turn take a beer and sit down.  Well 24 beer doesn't last 10 people very long, so off to the store we go,  Back with a few more beer, 375ml bottles of whiskey that cost $0.60 and some coke for me, soda water for most other people, more ice,  and a bottle of the most awful liquor ever.  The most awful liquor is 'Wrestler Red Wine' - blow up the photo of it to original and read the description on the lower right.  All I can say is, it's a lie.

Well after that the Cambodians start getting quite happy and decide to have a party, where the stereo gets brought out and we have 'Cambodian disco' with more hut tunes.  Apparently Michael Jackson has been to Cambodia.  Finally they have to wrap it up, since there are many many people living in the vicinity, and soundproofing is not part of Cambodian architecture.  Upon getting back to my guesthouse I believe I passed out immediately.

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