Viva Cambodia

Though we have only spent 3 days in Cambodia, I feel like I could write pages and pages on this place. It is an complex land, with complex people who have gone through incredibly tragic things in recent past. This is set side by side with the other-worldly beauty of Cambodia's ancient past - that of the awe-inspiring temples and cities constructed by the Khmer empires from hundreds up to a thousand years ago.

Welcome to Cambodia

Despite having gone through so much hardship (from the Khmer Rouge genocide which claimed over 2 million lives in the late 70s to the brutal Vietnamese occupation to the recent communist party takeover) along with being an incredibly poor population (average income is a couple dollars a day), the Cambodian people we encountered were all extremely nice, gracious, and had a certain pride for their country - an eagerness to show-off what Cambodia has to offer (I should note that we were only in Siem Reap, where most Cambodians we encountered were affiliated with the tourist industry - our view may be slightly skewed). By the end of our time there I really came to admire them.

I learned more from our taxi driver in a few days than I learned about Thailand our entire trip.

We were picked up by our driver and agreed to let him take us around the Angkor temples over the next 2 days. He had an incredible, tragic story that I get the feeling is similar to that of many other Cambodians: His father, a teacher, was murdered by the Khmer Rouge when he was seven. His brother was killed by a Vietnamese-planted landmine in later years (Cambodia is on of the most heavily mined countries in the world - 4 to 6 million still remain). He explained the current plight of his family and many other Cambodians: Education is not encouraged or supported by Cambodia's government. There is only one public university in the country and even that one costs around $500 a year. On a salary of a few dollars a day, hardly anyone can afford that, and thus, the population stays uneducated. Meanwhile, while elections are held in name every few years, the communist party controls the police and the army, and is unwilling to give up any power. Thus reforms, like funding for education and medical care, are impossible to implement. There is no freedom of speech, and any denouncing of the prime minister can result in harrassment or arrest. It seems Cambodians are forced to deal with a government that's goal is the suppression of its people - keep them uneducated and unconnected in order to stay in power.

That said, the people seem to maintain a cautious optimism that someday things might change, though without heavy international pressure, I'm not so sure.

I could go on and on, but nowwww, back to our trip!

We settled into our guesthouse (which was VERY nice for a price of $6 /night per person). The next morning our driver picked us and we started our tour of the Angkor temples.

Street outside our guesthouse

The Angkor temples were built over hundreds of years, from around the 800s to around the 1600s. There was a large Hindu influence in Cambodia in the early years, and thus, many of the temples are Hindu temples. Later, Buddhism took over, and many of the later temples reflect that.

Bayon Temple - Happy faces

Our first stop was Angkor Thom - which literally means "Great City". The architecture was incredible. It is really hard to capture this stuff in pictures and I recommend that it definitely checked out in person. The first temple we saw was Bayon - famous for its 54 towers containing 4 faces in opposite directions for 216 total faces!

Outside Bayon

Bayon Temple

Angkor Thom

We then visited a few other temples including my favorite - Ta Prohm. This one was overgrown with these amazing, huge trees. I felt like I was on the set of an Indiana Jones movie. Actually, it was used as the movie set for a recent temple hunting movie, Tomb Raider.

Temple hunting in Ta Prohm

Angkor Thom

Ta Prohm

Sweet - Ta Prohm

After a few more temples and palaces in Angkor Thom, we had lunch, and made our way over to the main event - Angkor Wat. Angkor Wat is the largest religious structure in the world, and damn is it large...Again, the pictures here don't do it justice, go yourself.

The Big One - Angkor Wat

Angkor Wat with some kiddies

Angkor Wat carvings

Inside Angkor Wat

We returned back to the guesthouse in the afternoon and wandered into town for some food. We had a specialty Khmer dish called "fish amok" which is a curry-like prepared fish served in a banana leaf.

Fish Amok with assorted side dishes

The next morning we set out for the second half of our Angkor temples explorations (there are tons and tons of temples everywhere, and apparently some people spend up to a week and beyond exploring them). This time we drove out through the countryside where it is rice-paddy dominated.

Watch out for the ox-carts

Rice farmers

Rice farmer

We visited a few amazing ruins - Banteay Srei, Sumrai?, and the Roulos Group.

2nd day temples

Banteay Srei, i think?

Boo!

Roulos

Kid dosing under elephant - Roulos

Towers in Roulos Group

Holy Cow

By then end of the day we were templed out, and because our time is short, decided to take off to our next destination: Hanoi, Vietnam. Cambodia was really great though, and I'd like to come back here sometime to get a fuller experience of the country.

Siem Reap, Cambodia