Cambodia Recap 4/5/13 - 4/14/13

Recap of Cambodia:

Time in country:  10 days
Money spent: approximately $360 USD each
Currency:  Riel (Only used for small change as coins as they operate on USD).  USD is main currency.
Conversion Rate:  4000 Riel to 1 USD

Food:
Food is called Khmer and we truthfully didn't get true, traditional Khmer foods.  We actually ate a lot of Mexican food and sandwiches.

Places Visited (in order):  Kompong Cham, Siem Reap, Phnom Penh, Sihanoukville (Otres Beach)

Random Thoughts:
We found Cambodia to be kind of dirty.  There was literally lots of trash on the side of the roads and throughout the country, not to mention that because of the time of year we were there, it was quite dusty and hot.

The people were friendly and nice.  Surprisingly, and luckily since we had been warned, we were not overwhelmed by too many child beggars.

The videos shown on buses were HORRIBLE!  It was Khmer music videos which included the same music played over and over with "dancers" making a few steps and doing some sort of hand waving thing.

Sihanoukville (Otres Beach) 4/11/13 - 4/14/13

We left Phnom Penh on a mini-bus journey to Sihanoukville town center where we hung around, ate lunch, and waited for the Vietnamese Consulate office to open up.  We had researched that it only took 15 minutes to get a Vietnam visa here, and sure enough, 15 minutes and $60 later we had a visa!  From the Consulate, we flagged down a tuck-tuck in the rain to pick up our bags and headed out to Otres Beach, a quieter beach farther away from town, to enjoy our last rays of sunshine by the sea.

Our days at the beach weren't perfectly sunny and lovely as much as they were rainy and stormy.  Oh well, we had plenty of time for hanging out, walking the beach, working out, and hiding from the rain in the common area of the hostel where watching movies (they had hundreds to choose from) from the couches was a guest favorite.  We stayed at a place called Footprints hostel, but we had our own bungalow which was pretty cool.

 

We had planned it out to be there to meet up with our friends, Chris and Annie, other American travelers that we originally met in Brazil, saw once again in Thailand, and they were on their way into Cambodia from Vietnam.  They got in late that evening after a full day of bus travel, but we all stayed up "late" for us old folks to catch up over some Angkor Beers. 

Chris and Annie stayed and our next few days were pretty identical.  After breakfast each morning, we headed to the water for some fun in the sun, after that we would head in for lunch, get out of the sun, play cards, and watch a movie or two...or three.  Then dinner, maybe some beer and more cards, but for sure another movie :-).  It rained almost every afternoon and most nights, so there wasn't much else to do.

 

 

 

We were so excited to get to meet up with Chris and Annie and had a great time catching up, sharing stories, and relaxing together.  We had 2 weeks of our trip left and they had another 2 months, so it was fun looking back on our trips and talking about home as well.  

 

We finally had to leave out one night for an over-night bus into Vietnam. 

Phnom Penh 4/9/13 - 4/10/13

Disclaimer: Subject matter and pictures may not be suitable for everyone.

On our way to the guesthouse in Phnom Penh, we noticed the Viva Phnom Penh location, and dually noted the location.  That's correct, once we did a little exploring of our surroundings and went through one of the local markets, we headed to Viva for more Mexican food.  We weren't that keen on what Cambodia had to offer us for food.

Many people skip over the capital city Phnom Penh because there's not too much to do there, but, there is a historical main attraction, for lack of a better word in this case.  At the end of the Cambodian Civil War in 1975 the Khmer Rouge regime (read: Commies), lead by a Cambodian named Pol Pot, ruled over Cambodia from 1975 - 1979. During this time they committed a mass genocide of the Cambodian people resulting in millions of deaths.  Cambodia lost between 1/4 to 1/3 of their population during those 5 years. 

We went out to one of the main killing fields Choeung Ek,15 km away from Phnom Penh, where the regime forceably transported prisoners to be killed.  We were given headphones to take an audio tour of the grounds.  Here's a little of what we learned from this day. 

It was discovered that there were over 20,000 mass grave sites around the country, known as killing fields, where over 1.3 million people were executed.  Prisoners included doctors, lawyers, teachers, intellectuals, suspected capitalists, professionals, non-nationals, monks, and citizens with glasses and/or anyone else who remotely had an intelligent idea of what an actual functional and healthy society should be.

 

 

Holes in the ground from the mass graves (these were excavated in the '80s)

 

There was no money for bullets, so executioners used hoes, axes, and other farm tools, and in this instance swung children against trees.

 

Inside the memorial marked by a Buddhist stupa

 

Pol Pot wanted to do whatever it took to dwindle his people down to an agrarian society like hundreds of years ago.  That time is now referred to as "Year 0".  The monetary system was abandoned, people were forced to work in the fields in slave like conditions, and many more died from starvation and disease due to "the near destruction of Cambodian society under the regime of Pol Pot". Cambodia would eventually overcome this horrible situation, in 1979, with the help of international aid and a Vietnamese invasion.

Another part of the somber day was a visit to the S-21 Genocide Museum which was a high school turned prison where men, women, and children were held to be interrogated, tortured, forced into confessions, and later taken to the killing field to be executed. 

 

 

The Khmer Rouge kept detailed records of  names/ pictures of every prisoner

It was a tough day seeing and learning about the tragedy that happened here just less than 40 years ago!  We were embarrassed that we really didn't know anything about the genocide in Cambodia before that day.  As a banner at the killing fields stated, "Knowledge of past genocide is to prevent it from re-happening on Earth".

That evening Matt went along a street to get a $2 Cambodian haircut.  Although a little skeptical given the price and the location (open-air room on the side of a busy street), it turned out quite well ;-). 

 

Before

After

The next morning we took a mini-bus 3 hours south to the beach to relax.

Siem Reap 4/5/13 - 4/8/13

When you cross over the border from Laos into Cambodia, there is usually a "bus helper" that takes all the passports and visa applications through customs to expedite the process.  Of course, every traveler that uses this method over-pays a few dollars for the "service", but it was minimal enough to us that we went with ease and utilized the "service".  It made it a very easy crossing and we simply walked to the other side, no questions asked, except for the medical device we were shot with in the neck.  Not exactly sure what it was.  But the note they handed us, below, made us feel really comfortable entering Cambodia :-).

On our way to Siem Reap we stayed a night in Kampong Cham to break up the trip.  From there, we managed to find our way on a morning bus (apparently it was another "holiday" and drove the demand up for seats) where we were put on the back row atop the engine, which caused our seats to be very hot and add to our sweat box of a ride... but we survived.

It was not obvious to us before we started traveling; however, we quickly found out that the "thing to do" in in SE Asia was to go to Siem Reap and visit Angkor Wat.  It's a staple for tourism such as Machu Pichu, the Great Wall of China, or the Eifel Tower.  Thus so, the town of Siem Reap had plenty of restaurants, shops, spas, etc. focused toward tourists.  Lucky for us, our first day there we found a Mexican place called, Viva.  We know what everyone is thinking....."Mexican food in Cambodia???"......but we didn't care, it was actually pretty good.  We had been craving chips and salsa, and Kristin loved the mango margarita (all 4 times we went).

Now, a little bit about Angkor Wat, which actually means "Temple City" or "City of Temples".  The main temple, Angkor Wat, was actually built around the year 1100.  There are other temples around it built in the years previous to its construction, and then others such as Bayon, and Angkor Thom which were built later in the 12th century.  The wats were originally designed and used as Hindu temples, but in the 13th century transitioned into Buddhist use as they still are today.  Angkor Wat has gone through the most extensive amount of renovation as it is the main attraction, but there is continuous efforts on the other temples in the complex as well.

The travel rumor mill informed us that we needed a minimum of 2 days to see the wats (temples).  Our first day, we took bikes from our hostel and rode out to see the largest Hindu temple complex of the world known as Angkor Wat, in fact, it is the largest religious monument in the world!  We slept in and went after breakfast which meant it was HOT, a Houston in August kind of heat.  Despite the sun beaming down, we spent the afternoon riding around the temples and observing them in awe.

To us the next most impressive temple after Angkor Wat was the Bayon temple.  Each of the various temples throughout Angkor Wat were designed/built by a different king from the Khmer empire and has its own influences and symbolism based on the king's choosing.  Bayon was memorable because of the number of massive stone faces on the many towers.

More pictures from various "smaller" temples.

That evening after some more Mexican food, we headed back to the night market.  After all the walking from that day, Kristin decided to get a fish feeding pedicure while we watched a film on the history and significance of Angkor and how it was built.  The little fish "bite" off the dead skin on the feet.  Kristin said it tickled a lot!  

Can you believe Angkor Wat was completed in roughly 30 years?  Quite impressive given the lack of tools and technology back in that time, and the fact that because of the wet season they couldn't work for a few months out of each year.  The Angkor Wat temple is a powerful symbol in Cambodia and is used on many various items such as their flag, national beer, etc.  The temple is a source of national pride and means a lot to the country.  Despite the many hardships the country has endured, the temple symbolizes a great accomplishment that was built by their own people and has survived the test of time.

The next day we woke up at 4:30 AM and hit the road by 5 on our bikes (the evening before, Matt went and got a mountain bike to ride that was much better for him).  It is common for hundreds, if not thousands, of tourists to try and capture the classic photo of Angkor right at sunrise when the sun comes up from behind the massive temple.  Who'd want to miss out on that?  Well, sadly it was very cloudy that morning and we all missed out on the "classic photo".    Luckily, the people watching was still entertaining.

After the sun was up, we grabbed a bite to eat and then went on the "small circuit" tour of more temples.  It was much cooler starting out so early, so we were able to enjoy the temples a little more.  Having said that, we still grew tired and perhaps a little bored by 10:30 AM (we figured that might happen).  We felt like we had seen quite a bit of Angkor Wat (for us at least) and went back to rest, nap, and eat Viva (again) for lunch.  Don't judge.

The next morning it was time to move on and catch a 6 hour bus to Phnom Penh.