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  Siem Reap, Cambodia
Sunday, September 2, 2007

I suppose if you were to pick two places to visit in Cambodia in hope of grasping a bit of what its about they would be the two we visited: the capital Phnom Penh and arguably the most amazing ruins on the planet, the temples of Angkor Wat. Just a shame we only had 6 full days but that's the kind of trip this is.

The first night in Phnom Penh (puh-nom pen) was quite memorable. Venturing off as I do upon arrival I ended up playing a game of keepy-ups with a bunch of mechanics who had just finished work for the day. Just as popular as it was in Vietnam, people playing with these feathery shuttle cock things. I then sat in a local open air diner where the food is cooked outside pretty much on the pavement, the seats are like children's plastic stools and the usual array of condiments - chili sauce, chili paste, ground up chili- sat in the centre of the table. Plenty of smiles from the locals at the sight of a tourist (in this particular place). Reminiscent of Lao people but nothing like the surprise of locals in places like Pakistan of course. Phnom Penh draws plenty of tourists being just down the road from Angkor Wat, I was by no means a spectacle

Torture bed, s21, Phnom Penh

. Later as I went to leave an internet cafe the heaviest rain I've ever seen started, flooding the street completely. Eventually I shouted down a cyclo-rickshaw, one where you sit in a buggy in front of the peddler. Like a baby I sat beneath a translucent rain cover unable to see anything but rain and lights. Having the memory of a baby I forgot for the millionth time to pick up the hotel card and had to direct him back and so got soaked in the process.

You cannot come to Cambodia as a traveler and avoid its shocking recent past.

"To keep you is no benefit. To destroy you is no loss." A bunch of evil lunatics got hold of power when the Americans (surprise surprise) dropped bombs on neutral Cambodia during the Vietnam war. Of the 7.1 million Cambodian at the time (1975) 1.5 million were executed, starved or died through forced labour. Visiting S21, the security prison, was a sobering experience. Even coming in to the complex you had to deal with the in-your-face begging of disfigured and limb missing men saying 'I'm a victim of Khmer Rouge regime, help me'. The rooms of this secondary school turn concentration camp were what really got to me rather than the exhibitions. I wont go in to detail because the photos will (once those particular ones are up) but I will say that these men did stuff that the Nazis wouldn't even dream of.

Cambodia may be the closest to the poverty seen in Pakistan but it has absolutely beautiful wats (temples) everywhere.

Statue captures the mood well in S21

The roofs are amazing. Though you wonder how different things would be if the money spent on religious buildings was directed at schools, hospitals etc.

One day I got out to the country. Tall palm trees dotted across the almost luminous green of rice paddies. Locals had no electricity and relied on batteries to run what they had, if anything. People ate frogs for lunch, with their hands and sat on the floor. People lazed in hammocks as naked and bare footed children ran around. People would come and stare as they did in Pakistan. Some/all of the wooden thatched houses didn't even have outhouses.

Siem Reap is the base town for exploring Angkor Wat and surrounding temples. One half day I hired a motorbike taxi, and on the full day a bicycle. I wanted to stay a week but even then I wouldn't have seen all the temples. Every one was different in a distinctive way: trees taking over some, others nearly completely restored; faces the theme at another; some low in height, long in plan, others pyramidal and square in plan. I would cycle until I saw one that interested me, explore it for 10-40 minutes (depending on its size) and then move on. Had a wicked time.

Cambodians seemed really quite friendly and generous. That they all know a friend or family member killed in the Khmer Rouge regime made me tread carefully in conversation. Though it was too short a stay to say much more.

Dubious of to whether I would like tourist saturated Thailand we headed onwards...

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S21	Conditions depicted by one of	Horrific	Excrement boxes still lay in some stairwells
Hatred and anger	Killing fields	Work had never been so much fun	My monk pal
01 National Museum, Phnom Penh	02 Cambodian countryside	03 Alien	04 Don't forget now...
05 Wildlife at Angkor temples	06 One of thousands and thousands of reliefs	07 Angkor Wat by day	08 Angkor Wat by sunrise
09 Snake!	10 Still actively used as places of worship	11 :)	12 Bayon
13 Baphoun	14 Dudes	15 Incense through sunlight, Preah Khan	16 Left to manifest
17 Tree roots	18 Tomb Raider temple! Ta Prohm	19 A lot in ruins. Ta Prohm	20 Like glue roots dribble down the temples
21 Gateways to Angkor Thom	22 Faces of Bayon	Angkor Wat at sunrise

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