Cambodia Part 1: Temple Tigers

 

How to fuel up on the road less traveled

Have now been on the unpaved Southeast Asian road for almost 3 weeks and in true backpacker form I have shirked all "real world" responsibilities (assuming the reader buys the argument that I had any of these to begin with) and replaced them with an unwavering dedication to cotton pants, leather bracelets, beaded satchels and night market tank-tops.

Unfortunately, my relapse into the backpacker cultural abyss (first episode in Europe, 2008) has caused me to fall behind on my blogging, but fear not loyal reader, there are benefits to sporadic posting. While two weeks of overnight travel and "shoilets" (combined shower/Toilet enclosures requiring rubber flipflops and tolerance of damp tissue paper) have wreaked a mild degree of havoc on my outward appearance, it has also filled my mind with cobwebs so thick that I couldn't recall the mundane details of day to day life on the road even if I tried, so the next few posts will be filled with just the highlights (read: gross exaggerations), as I see them, of my adventures thus far. Enjoy!

Temple Tigers: aka Kelly, Me, Kora and Joel

 On October 7th, after two and a half twenty-five hour days in Hong Kong, I had regained just enough muscle strength and post-Borneo cognizance to repack my bag with clean underwear, cash and a well-worn passport and boarded a plane to Bangkok. With reading break less than a week away and considerably less on our academic plates than back at home, it hadn't been difficult to persuade a sizable group of Canadian exchange students (the best and brightest in the future of the legal profession no doubt)to skip a couple school weeks straddling our officially sanctioned holidays so we arrived in Thailand with a bang.

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Crossing into Cambodia at Poipet

One of our friends, Paul, had scouted out tickets to Boys Noize, a couple DJs who were spinning electronic beats at club 808. We sipped a couple casual redbull vodkas, headed to the club, yadda yadda yadda, and arrived at the Cambodian boarder just before noon on the 8th ("just the highlights"). We made our way sleepily though the midday heat, past the stray dogs and dsty Coca Cola bottles to the visa office, and after getting our passports stamped we hired a taxi to take us to Siem Reap.

True to travel guide warnings, we made it about 3/4 of the way into town before our taxi driver got "lost" and suggested we hop out (in the middle of nowhere in the scorching sun) and find our own way to the hotel. We refused to budge from his car and after a few misunderstood words exchanged in stern tones, we were pased off to a tuk-tuk driver named Tony who had a slightly stronger command of the English language and apparently a much better sense of direction. Before long, Tony had dropped us off at Mandalay Inn (highly recommended) and was eagerly negotiating a hire for rides to the Angkor Temples the next day. After much hesitation, we agreed that if he happened to be around at 5am the next morning, and if in fact we hadn't made other plans, we would ride with him (a BIG mistake in hindsight).

After dropping our bags, we wasted no time in hiring a new tuk-tuk driver and headed straight out toward Batenaey Sambre and Pre-Rup for sunset. As we drove through the park, we were all somewhat surprised to find that the thick jungle and excavated temple sites were interrupted by a large number of Khmer villages with numerous farming communities tending to cattle, chickens, sugar palms and rice paddies.

 

Scenic ride out to Banteay Samre

Tending to cattle in the rice paddies

Angry roadside cattle

We arrived at Banteay Samre and found ourselves in total isolation among the thousand year old ruins. The late afternoon sun cast long shadows over the warm stones as we set our eyes on the intricate temple carvings and made our way through the many arches of the Wat. We continued down the road to Pre Rup where we watched the sun melt into the earth, turning the skies bright shades of red and orange. We waited until the jungle palms could be seen only as dark blue silhouettes against the bright horizon and then made our way back into Siem Reap.

Peering through the windows at Banteay Samre

Up the stairs of Pre Rup for sunset

I love sunset clouds

Enjoying the view with friends aka Temple Tigers: Kelly, Joel, Kora and myself

Feeling quite peckish, we made our way to the touristy town centre in search of a good local eatery. We found ourselves at "Viva" a Mexican restaurant just off the main night street and enjoyed some surprisingly palatable enchiladas and nachos. Feeling sufficiently refueled, we wandered toward the night market but opted for a 30 minute foot rub (by the blind, who earn a living this way thanks to one of Cambodia's many charitable NGOs) instead of tacky t-shirts.

Night Market Massage

This kid was cute enough to be the next Maddox Jolie-Pitt
until he relentlessly began demanding milk- a popular scam
believe it or not!

It was on the way back to the hotel that I began to see the ugly scars left behind by nearly 40 years of political oppression, bloody genocide, armed conflict, and civil unrest. Kids who looked as young as 4 made their way quietly between the feet of tourists, armed with plastic bags, stopping on street corners and behind restaurants to beg for money and scour garbage piles for scrap metal and other valuable items. Young women appeared from alley ways with small children and empty bottles in their hands desperately asking for money. Men with leathery faces, hardened by years of armed conflict and demanding physical labour, smoked quietly in corners of local restaurants, deep scars and amputated limbs silently hinting at the unthinkable hardships endured by an entire country for generations and generations. Despite this horrible history, we found the people of Siem Reap to be incredibly friendly and helpful. Whether this warm welcome was the result of increased optimism for the future of Cambodia or of desperation for the powerful tourist dollar is still unclear to me, but I am hopeful that it is the former.

Other sights at Angkor: