Amazing Cambodia (6th October - 16th October 2006)

This morning we have to say goodbye to Saigon, and goodbye to a great hotel. Nearly every other place we've stayed in has had a side line in organising tours, selling food, or generally doing something that makes you feel as if you're cheating on your hotel if you go somewhere else. At our hotel they barely wanted to take any money off of us. When we gave the owner our laundry she even suggested we took it down the road because they'd do a better job.

We were originally planning on taking a boat along the Mekong Delta to get to Phnom Penh, but this was going to be a couple of days of travelling to get there and dam expensive compared to the $6 bus ticket, so we went with one of the travel cafes for $6. They tried to get us to upgrade to the express bus which would save us 3 hours, but we'd been burnt in Laos. Both buses are on the same roads, so the only way of saving 3 hours is to drive even quicker than the regular bus. So we went with the slow bus and it was great, it was just us and 4 Brits in a minibus until we got to the border. It was so nice to be back in the company of people that understood us. It was a mother and her 9 year old son (Tania and Alexander) and a couple on their way back from New Zealand (Leon and Vicky). So we had a good old natter all of the way to the border. Our guide for the first half of the trip to PP told us that under no circumstances should we pay the Cambodian immigration officials more than $20. They are notorious for finding problems with your visa application and you often have to pay an extra couple of dollars to lubricate those beauracratic wheels. So by the time that we got to the immigration office we were all ready for a bit of a fight, but it was actually quite painless. The only scam that we saw was after immigration where we were supposed to pay a dollar if we didn't have a health pass certificate. I'm pretty sure that all you had to so was sign it to say that you were healthy, but this guy was charging people if they didn't have proof. So basically there are controls that ensure that everyone is healthy and that diseases are not brought into the country. But this precaution can be bypassed for $1!! We dug out our record of immunisations (hepatitis, tetnus, yellow fever etc) and got out of paying. On the Cambodian side we had to move to a different minibus, and instead of the roomy chatty bus we had in the morning we had an overcrowded bus filled with drunk Irish and Canadians shouting, swearing and showing their new friends all of the rude pictures that they have on the phones - all of this with a 9 year old boy on the bus. It was horrible and such a relief to finally get to PP. We ended up taking a tuk tuk with Leon and Vicky to an area called the Lakeside and going for dinner with them.

We'd read and been told lots of bad things about Cambodia, constant pestering to buy things, beggars, pick pockets, muggings etc etc. So on our first mornig in PP we were really paranoid, but for our whole time in the country we never felt threatened and the hassle that you got from hotels or tuk tuk drivers was fine, you said no, and they pretty much left you alone. It was a breeze having come from Vietnam. Everybody that we met on our first day was brilliant, the helpful security guard at the bank the friendly tuk tuk drivers, efficient staff and smiling waving children. Amazing, when you think what they have gone through in the last 30 years.

Our first stop in town was the Tuol Sleng Museum. This used to be a school until 1975 when it was taken over by Pol Pot's security forces and it became one of the largest detention and torture chambers in the country. In the 3 years that the Khmer Rouge were in power over 17,000 people were kept here until they went to the extermination camp!!! It's been left almost exactly as it was left when the KR fell from power. Some of the rooms still have the beds that prisoners were tied to when they were tortured and there are pictures on the wall of the corpses that were found in the rooms. Most of the ground floor is dedicated to harrowing black and white pictures of the victims. These were mainly pictures taken by the KR when the prisoners first arrived at the prison. Upstairs you can see how the classrooms were altered to turn them into cells, either individual 6' by 2' cells or larger mass cells where tens of people slept all chained together. Finally there is a video, there was one odd bit where an old guard is quizzed about what went on at the prison by an ex prisoner who has painted various scenes from prison life. But the majority of the movie is the story of two young lovers who marry but have to live apart from each other and they both end up in S21. The story is told by an older family member and is very moving. All in not a pleasant morning, but definitely something that you have to go and see if you're here. Made it tough to enjoy our lunch.

Previously one of the things that most people do when they come to PP is to visit the Killing Fields of Choeng Ek which is where the prisoners from S21 were taken to be executed and burried in mass graves. But the site has recently been sold to a foreign company who now profits from tourist visits and so understandably a lot of local people who lost family members (and there are a lot of them) aren't happy about this. So to show our solidarity we boycotted it. Besides, it's a bit gruesome, and you know what is there and what happened without actually going there to stare at it.

Instead we spent the afternoon at the Royal Palace and Silver Pagoda. The Royal palace looks a lot like the Royal Palace in Bangkok, so there was a bit of deja vu. Also, like in BKK most of it is closed to visitors as it's the royal residence. Inside the complex is a building called the Throne Hall which was used for coronations and other ceremonies. While we were here we met a very nice, albeit strange man with lots of rings, buddha images on a neclace and tatoos all over his arms. He seemed to take a fancy to the hair on my face, arms and he liked to touch my boobs. No idea what he was saying as he was touching me but it seemed to be good things and it made him happy. And then we met a funny old lady who was there more to pray than sightsee. She started talking to me in Khmer, and didn't stop even after I took out the phrasebook and told her that I didn't speak any Khmer. All she did was smile and start talking again. Later on inside that Silver Pagoda we saw her again and she started off again. Kamay reckons that she was saying prayers for me, but I'm not too sure. Silver Pagoda - why is it called this - 5000 silver tiles on the floor that's why!! Looks really cool even though most of it is covered by carpet. Then the rest of the pagoda is taken up by various important buddha images or gifts from overseas VIPs. A nice place to relax for the afternoon. Then we left here and walked back towards the guest house, taking in Wat Phnom on the way. Nothing too impressive, it's on the only hill in town and people pray at it and give offerings in the hope of receiving some good luck. We climbed the steps and looked at it from the top step after we were told it would cost us money to actually step off of the top step and walk around. How cheap are we? Back at the guesthouse we met up with Leon and Vicky for dinner and watched the England Euro qualifier.

Sunday is the day that the Hash House Harriers meet for their weekly run into the coutryside. In case you don't know HHH are "drinkers with a running problem". Basically a group of people (mainly expats) that get together and run a set route and celebrate afterwards with beer. Not really my cup of tea but it was a chance to get some running in and a chance to meet some of the huge NGO population. In the morning though we went to the Russian market as it was supposed to be an interesting place to pick up local products and hopefully a good chance to do some people watching. Actually it was all too crowded to relax there so we ended up just heading back to the g/h to pick up Leon and Vicky for the HHH. They were going to come along and spectate with Kamay. Turned out though that the place that we were running was about a 50 minute drive away and most people were going to be travelling there in the bck of a truck. They very wisely changed their minds about the spectating and I think that K wishes that she'd done the same. It rained on the way out there so everyone in the truck was soaked (we'd hitched a lift with a couple that had just moved to PP (Rob and Barbara) and Kate who worked with Barbara so were nice and dry in their car). When we got to the run course, which was completely waterlogged, I got to understand a bit more about what happens. In the morning the "hare" comes out and lays a trail by putting various paint markings on the side of the road and we are supposed to follow these wherever they go. Some times there are false trails that send you the wrong way other times you're going through dense bushes and thorns or along dirt roads. Not exactly the sort of running that I enjoy. Worst bit though was the post run stuff. It started off with just a couple of sociable drinks but then you all have to stand around in a circle while the ring leader kicks off the extra drinking games. So all of the people from other HHH groups have to drink a beer as a penalty for being a ¨spy¨, all of us HHH virgins have to drink, and then there are all of the extra punishments like losing a shoe in the mud, not running (this was K and it was a bit mean that they picked on her especially when she explained that she didn't want to get wet because she was in someones car so they hauled Rob out to drink a penalty as well). A couple of creepy guys there as well especially the sexpat that was visiting from Phuket. So probably won't be doing any more HHH events, but at least we got to meet Rob, Barbara and Kate and found out a bit about their work in Cambodia. Not surprisingly it's not easy working here, what with all of the corruption etc.

The KR years have left a huge number of orphans on the streets of Cambodia and more than 40% of the population is under 15, that's a lot of children. Something that had been suggested to us while we were here was to visit one of the orphanages for a chance to play with the kids, and help out with their English. So we did a bit of research into it and it turns out that there are a lot of very dodgy outfits out there where they are just a cover for phedophiles or where you can take the children away from the orphnage for an afternoon....... Luckily we found one that looked reputable and lots of people had good things to say about it. It was called the Lighthouse Orphanage, with 40 children aged between 2 and 16 and was about 6kms outside of town. So on Monday morning we found ourselves a friendly tuk tuk driver who drove us to the central market to pick up some exercise books nd pens and then on to buy a 20kg bag of rice. Lots of fun haggling over the price that the rice seller was charging us, and I'm sure that kamay telling her that we were getting it for orphans helped us to bring the price down. We got to the Lighthouse Orphanage and explained to one of the men working there what we were there for and he was very happy to receive our gifts and gave us a tour of the orphanage. It was really basic with just two open sided rooms for 40 children to sleep in and two rooms for teaching and eating. There was also a vegetable patch where the children could learn abpout the growning of veggies and a large play area for football, volleyball etc. After the tour and a bit of a chat we got to play with the children. At the beginning they were a bit apprehensive but eventually we got a bit of a following and ended up playing football and asking them questions via our Khmer phrasebook and the English that they knew. Then a couple of them got hold of our sunglasses and camera, so we didn't see these again until we left. The camera was filled up with pictures of themselves with our glasses on. When it started to rain we all went inside and Kamay amazed them all with her origami skills. Around 1.00 we had to leave because their teacher had arrived and it was time for school to start. It was sad to leave them, but there was no way we were going to do an Angelina Jolie and adopt one. At first the playing with the children felt a bit like it was the reward that was given to you for bringing a donation, but by the end I realised that the children got a lot out of it as well, meeting new people and practicing their English, just a shame that it's only temporary. Judging by the list of vistors in the register they get a lot of people doing the same thing as us, (although obviosuly not enough that the orphanage runs smoothly without concerns for money, our gifts and the monetary donation that we made would only get them through a couple of days) so the children have lots of temporary friends like us. Sad.

After saying our farewells to the orphanage our friendly tuk tuk driver took us to the National Museum where we would be looking at what is supposed to be the worlds finest collection of Khmer sculptures. A great warm up to what we'd be seeing aroung Siem Reap. Before we went inside though we went across the road for lunch at the Friends Restaurant. This is a restaurant ran by an NGO, the food is great and it also has the advantage of providing training for some of the former street kids. So many good deeds today that by the end of lunch I almost felt wings growing from my back and Kamay had a strange circular glow above her head.

On Tuesday morning we were up early for the bus to Siem Reap. Well, actually we were up early for the bus to the bus station. We all got hurded onto a coach and then hurded off again 5 minutes later when we got to the bus station and got onto a much more crowded bus. The road to Siem Reap was so much better than I'd expected, amazing how a single lane of asphalt can feel so good when you've been expecting a bum numbing journey from hell. After finding a hotel we went out in search of internet and on our way also found a driver to explore the temples with. Originally we thought we'd spend at least one day on a bicycle and maybe a day in a cyclo if we could find a cyclo driver that was willing to let me cycle Kamay around, but then we met Cham Roeun (apparently in Khmer this means Tiger). He was such a nice guy, he was only about 50 but looked closer to 80, he spoke just enough English for him to understand where we wanted to go without knowing enough to take us to "his friends gem store". We arranged for him to take us out to Angor Wat for sunset and eventually he ended up driving us around for the whole time that we were in town. Each night we'd go thorough a very pleasant ritual of arguing over the price that we'd pay for his services. One night we managed to bring the price down by a dollar if we spent 10 minutes in a couple of shops on the way back to town. If we did this he'd make back the dollar in the way of commissions from the shops he was so nce and asked us so nicely we couldn´t refuse.

Right, so in case you didn't know, Siem Reap is the place to explore the Angkorian temples and there are a lot of them, the one that most people have heard of is the mighty Angkor Wat (which the Khmer's are so proud of they named a beer after it and put it on the flag) . The old 'god-kings' each tried to out do their ancestors in building bigger, better and more symetrical temples. This all started at the beginning of the 9th cenury and went on for over 400 years. To think that some of these places were built over 1,000 years ago really is mind boggling. And even wierder is that you don't just view them from afar, you can actually walk through them, obviously making sure that you don't touch any of the carvings (although not everyone sticks to this rule). This is pretty much THE reason most people come to Cambodia. And we had 3 days to explore them.

The place you buy your pass to the temples is about 20 minutes from Siem Reap and as we were buying a pass for the next day we were entitled to a free sunset. So we lined up for our pass, paid our money and got to spend an hour in Angkor Wat, the mother of all Angkor Temples. Not really long enough to explore it properly but we did get to climb some incredibly steep and dangerous steps up to the central tower and look around there for a bit. A good warm up for tomorrow. A lot of people come here at the end of the day so it was very busy, but this was what we were expecting to see for most of our time here. In the evening we found a nice restaurant which served up the best curry we'd had since Thailand, ah we were enjoying Siem Reap.

Up early on Wednesday as Cham Roeun was meeting us at 6.00 to start our tour. First stop was Sra Srang (Pool of Ablutions) which is a big pool of water that used to have a temple in the middle of it. Supposedly a good place for sunrise, but we were too late for this. Didn't matter though because we were the only ones here, well apart from the ubiquitos T-shirt, book, drink and postcard sellers. It's mainly children that do the selling, I guess their parents know that the cute factor sells more. Generally the kids were great, and you could have a bit of a laugh with them, although they didn't quite understand that "maybe¨dóesn´t mean ¨definitely later. They weren't as pestery as we were expecting though and I'm sure that they are used to rejection by now, even though they put on the sad puppy dog eyes. Just over the road from Sra Sarang was Baneay Kdei, our first proper exploration of a temple in Angkor and we had it to ourself as well!!! It was amazing, so tranquil - the temple is a large Buddhist monastery from the end of the 12th century so at the end of the Angkor era. It wasn't finished and a lot of it is in ruins which just adds to the attraction. Next was Pre Rup (Turning the Body) which was probably a royal crematorium. And again nobody there!! The next stop we weren't quite so lucky. We had a long drive out to Banteay Srei (Citadel of the Women) which a lot of people think is the jewel in the crown of Angkorian art. It's a Hindu temple that was dedicated to Shiva and has some of the most intricate carving seen anywhere on the planet. Some people think that the temple was built by a woman as the carvings are too intricate to have been done by a man. It really is stunning. Almost every inch of the interior is covered in decoration. This was one of the first temples to be restored, I'm not sure exactly what they do when they restore them, so no idea what state the carvings were like back in 1930 when they started the restoration, but now it really is amazing. On our way back to the main area we stopped off at Banteay Samre. Although this isn't one of the major temples we had a lot of fun exploring it and getting in the way of the loud Singaporians when they were trying to take photo's (there are signs up asking everyone to be quiet at the temples). This was followed by Eastern Mebon another Hindu temple that was built in the middle of the 10th century. Next was Ta Som and Preah Neak Pean. Preah Neak Pean was very cool - a small Buddhist temple with a large pool in the middle and surrounded by four smaller pools.

Then we ate lunch!! We ate some noodles with Cham Roeun and found out a bit about him, his children and grand children etc. Then it was on to the largest of todays temples, Preah Khan (Sacred Sword). On the way in you cross a processional walkway that depicts an Angkorian story called the Churning of the Ocean of Milk. Basically it's a tug of war between devils and gods which churns up the sea to extract the elixir of immortality, we saw this in some of the other temples later on. Inside the place is a maze of narrow corridors and we were here exploring for so long we were actually surprised to see Cham Roeun still waiting for us when we left. That was us done for temples for day one but on the way back to town we stopped off for a hot air balloon ride. They have a balloon on fixed line that rises 200m above the ground so that you can get an aerial view of of Angkor Wat and the surrounding area. The view wasn't as good as we were expecting but still worth going up for.

Last stop for the day was the Aki Ra Land Mine Museum. Aki Ra used to set land mines for the Khmer Rouge but now he spends his time de-mining and letting people know about the curse of land mines in Cambodia. The museum is filled with lots of information and also acts as an orphanage for children affected by land mines. There is one area that is devoted to telling the stories of all of the children that are staying there. These tell you where they are from, how land mines affected them and what they like doing now. It's worrying how many of the children were playing with the land mines when they blew up. Aki Ra and his staff visit villages and try to clear them of mines while also educating the locals on how to deal with these unexploded devices. All very worthwhile.

The next morning we met Cham Roeun at the crazy time of 5.00 so that we could see sun rise at Bayon. When we got there it was still dark so we had to wander around with our torches for the first few minutes. Bayon is the main temple in the Angkor Thom complex and epitomises the creative genius and inflated ego of the king at the time. It's another large one and definitely one of the wierdest. Included in the temple are 54 gothic towers decorated with 216 enormous faces. The place is amazing and for the first hour we had the whole place to ourselves!!! In the dark it was actually quite scary being there with all of those faces looking down at you but as the sun came up it was a bit easier to deal with. After exploring the main temple we went out side and looked at the carvings on the outer walls. You will not believe the work that went into decorating the outside of this place!!! From Bayon we went on to the rest of the Angkor Thom complex. Angkor Thom is a fortified city that was built by the king early in the 13th century and at it's peak probably supported around a million people. Inside is the Terrace of Elephants which was used as a giant viewing stand by the king, Preah Palily, a nice quiet temple with a few trees growing out of the brickwork, the Royal Enclosure and Prasar Suor Prat. This last one consisits of two towers that facing each other that may have been used in a form of trial. If there was a disbute the two parties would be made to sit inside the two towers and when one of the parties succumbed to disease they were found guilty!!!

After our early start this morning we were planning on having an early finish today so we started making our way to Ta Phrom (the temple that was in Tomb Raider). On the way we called into Thommanon and Ta Keo. This last one was never finished but does include a monstrous climb to the top. Ta Phrom was amazing, when it was found the jungle had completely taken over so that trees gre all over it. To try to restore it would be a nightmare and would probably mean taking the whole thing apart, so they just manage the jungle that is growing out of it. It was teeming with other visitors so a lot of the areas that everyone wants to take a photo of (e.g. the Tomb Raider tree where Angelina Jolie picked a flower before falling into the earth) were really crowded, but it was easy to avoid people and get some time around this incredibly atmospheric temple. After this was our "shopping trip" for Cham Roeun and then back to the hotel for a well deserved rest.

Final day and it was another early start so that we could get sunrise at Angkor Wat. We were there before 5.30 but already there were lots of people here to see the same thing as us. First of all you have to cross the 190m wide moat. This alone gives you an idea of what to expect inside - the place is going to be immense. After the moat you go through the gate and onto the 475m long avenue that leads to the main entrance. Most people were in the area around this avenue waiting for the sun to come up behind the main building. Half an hour or so after the sun had come up most people had cleared off to other temples so we were left with the whole place almost to our selves, it was such a mind blowing feeling to be walking around this place with nobody around you. We never thought that we'd get this. We spent close to 3 hours exploring the temple including more incredibly ornate carvings around the walls. Glad that we left this one to last, the first night here was just enough to get a taste for it. A perfect way to end our time here.

Back in town to counter all of this old stuff we found a super modern cafe called Blue Pumpkin for lunch. It could have been taken straight from an I-Pod advert, everything was white including the huge bank of sofas and huge a/c unit in the corner, an amazing place that just seemed so out of place in a town so close to all of this history.

Saturday morning saw us in the back of a pick up heading to the ferry port where we were taking a trip along the Stung Sangker to Battambang. The boat ride was about 4 hours long and the first half was through what seemed to be some kind of flooded forest. The river was too wide to see the bank on either side but all around you trees and bushes were poking out of the water - really strange. Every now and then we'd get through the trees and would be in the middle of a floating village where we'd slow down and more people would come out on boats to join us. Then the last half was a lot narrower with lots of small villages lining the river where every 100m or so there would be another bunch of children shouting and waving. It was a great boat ride, way better than Battambang itself. Well all apart from the little boy in the seat next to us, he was probably about 3 years old and more than capable of getting to the toilet that was at the back of the boat. But no, he just stood up in the aisle, pulled down his trousers and pee'd on the floor. Luckily he hadn't drank much recently so it didn't make it across the aisle to us, but all the same... Battambang is Cambodia's second largest city and we'd been told that it was a nice place to relax in, but we didn't really take to it. It just looked like another dirty city, no great loss though, we were only there because the boat ride was supposed to be so good. There are a few temples that you go out and see but the main tourist attraction is the Norry, or bamboo train. We found a couple of "tour guides" that would organise a trip on one of these for us and it was ace - almost made it worth us staying the night in town. We drove out to a village 10kms outside of town where we met a guy with a Norry. It's simply a platform, about 6ft by 8ft made of bamboo that sits on top of four wheels that then sit on the train track and is powered by a small motor. Luckily there is only one train a day so the chance of meeting it are pretty slim, but there is a better chance of seeing a Norry coming the other way. If this happens the one with the least amount of stuff on is supposed to make way for the larger one. On ours was the two of us, the driver, the drivers mate, the two guides and two motor bikes so we weren't moving for anyone.

Since we've been in Cambodia we've seen several old men with 4cm wide red circles all over their backs and chests. We'd been thinking that it must have bene something to do with the Khmer Rouge and torture. After asking our guide though it turns out that it's medicinal and is called cupping. What happens is that the local witch doctor puts heated cups all over your body to try to bring out the sickness and it leaves you with these marks all over your body. So still torture then, just a slightly different kind.


In the morning we were on an early bus back to Phnom Penh and then it was another bus to Sihanoukville. This is a small town on the coast. We were coming here to take a boat that would take us back to Thailand and weren't expecting much from it as we'd been told that it was bit on the sleazy side. Actually it was great. We stayed at a place that is known as Serendipity Beach. The actual beach is very narrow but the water is clear and although there are bars and restaurants stretching the length of the beach they don't feel too oppressive. On the first night there we found a restaurant we liked where the food was good and best of all they had really comfy chairs right on the beach. We spent hours there on the first night just eating, drinking and chatting.

The next day was spent mainly around the same restaurant in the shade. Just eating, drinking, talking and reading. There were a lot of people around trying to sell massages, pedicures, kids selling bracelets and loads of crap that we just didn't need. Most of them were good fun and you could chat to them and they wouldn't get offended that you didn't want anything. Kamay did get a bit annoyed though with the old ladies that were offering pedicures and leg plucking. A couple of them would sit next to her talking to her stroking her legs telling her that she needed them plucked. It's one thing to sit there and talk, but when you start touching someones legs, that's just a little bit too much. In the evening the restaurant did a great bbq, Kamay had fish and for me they did bbq'ed tofu. It was nicer than it sounds and came with big fat chips, mmmmm.

Back to Thailand tomorrow.