Siem Reap, Cambodia (Thank you for not being as depressing as the other cities I visited in this country)

After a depressing two days in Phnom Penh, Becky and I decided to get out of there as fast as we could -- and by fast, we ended up taking the slowest... bus... ever. (More later on how slow this bus was.) We were heading to Siem Reap, in the northwestern region of the country, home of one of the ancient wonders of the world: the temples of Angkor Wat.

We arrived in Siem Reap and found ourselves pleasantly surprised. It's a very small town that is largely dependent on tourism but has retained some of its small-town charm, and is a very walkable city with tons of decent options for food and drinks all within five or six blocks of each other. (Most of these options are "international." For example, we saw a Mexican restaurant and thought, "Mexican food in Cambodia. We have to try it." Amazingly, the burrito and margaritas we ate were pretty good.) We ended up at a nice hotel a few minutes from the main drag because we wanted as much peace and quiet as possible.

After settlig in, we spent the next few days doing what we had come for: touring the ruins fo the ancient temples of Angkor Wat. It's an amazing array of temples -- about 50 or so in all -- stretched over a region of about 50 square miles. Most are clustered near the main area called, not surprisingly, Angkor Wat. They are close enough together that the hardier tourists (read: younger) visit those temples by bike. (There's a large number of visitors over the age of 40; I'd guess about 25%. This is nice because, as I'll detail later, it means that luxury resorts have been developed to accomodate them, which in turn means that people like Becky and I get to exploit that luxury for free...) Biking seemed like a good idea at first, but it ended up taking us about seven or eight hours in the blazing sun and relentless humidity, so by hour five, I was inventing new curse words as a coping mechanism to deal with the pain in my back, knees, shoulders and most of all, ass. (Some of the neologisms were simple combinations of existing curse words, like assfuckshit. not very original, I'll admit. Other were more offbeat, and I'm still refining them, so they're not ready for publication...)

Back to the main subject: the ruins of the temples are incredible. The temples (almost all Buddhist in nature) were built between 800 and 1100 a.d. by various kings in the region. But calling them temples is a bit of a misnomer because they are really like little cities. Most of them have major perimeter walls, deep moats, and massive gates. It's estimated that about one million people lived in the main temple complex at its peak. The staircases are ridiculously steep and shallow and the doorways, as you can see, are not designed for people my height. Most of the ceilings of the temples have caved in so you have to imagine what they looked like, but even from what remains, it's clear that these were major engineering feats. One of the few temples that remains virtually in tact is the main temple -- Angkor Wat (pictured below) -- that is supposedly the largest religious structure in the world. We were told to get up at sunrise to see this impressive structure, which we did, but the clouds got in the way of the sunrise, so that sucked. The temple really gives you a sense of how much work it took to put these places together, and since it is still basically in tact, it's easy to see the intricate wall engravings and bas-relief on the wall surfaces.

After three days of visiting temples (we hired a taxi for days two and three -- my ass couldn't take another minute on the bike) we had temple fatigue. So we did what any true budget traveller would due: we found the nearest five-star resort and crashed at the pool. Most resorts in the area let you stay at their pool for a fee between four and eight dollars, but we decided to press our luck and avoid paying... and it paid off. Granted, we walked in like we owned the place, but we were still expecting some friction from hotel staff. Didn't happen; on the contrary, the pool boy brought us towels and asked if we wanted to order some drinks. Um, yeah! So that's how we spent days four and five in Siem Reap.

In between our relaxation time at the resort, we also rented a motorbike to explore the country and vist a museum documenting the toll that landmines have taken on the country. (Technically, tourists cannot rent motorbikes in Siem Reap -- because of the risk of people going off the roads and running over landmines -- but we bribed a nice lady to rent her bike for $5.) The museum was a real eye-opener both in terms fo the damage done by landmines and also the history of Cambodia over the last 30 years. It's run by a guy who's spent his last 20 years removing over a million land mines from the ground in Cambodia. Also, the motorbike allowed us to explore areas not generally visited by tourists including rice fields in the middle of nowhere. It was quite a sight to see peasant farmers doing their thing in the fields.

Thus ended our trip to Cambodia. After a week, we had seen enough. Yet before I leave the topic of Cambodia, a few parting thoughts:

First, scams are so prevalent people don't even try to hide them. An example will illustrate this. As I said before, we rented bicycles for $2 a day to see the ruins. We biked up to the entrance, about 7 kilometers away from our hotel, only to find we were at the "wrong" entrance and some guy in a "police" uniform told us we had to pay him $5 so he could take us to the ticket entrance 4 kilometers away. We were suspicious and knew it was a scam, but knew that we were facing a long day of biking so we agreed and got on his motorbike and he took us there. I mean, really, how blantant could this cop make it: "You need to pay me for me to help you." Who does that?? After we bought the tickets, Becky said to me, "Why don't we just not pay him, it's a scam anyway, what can he do?" So we just got on our bikes and rode away. He very lamely tried to follow us, and we basically just told him we wouldn't pay him $5, it was totally ridiculous. He claimed it cost $5 for gas, which was laughable -- the gas for the round trip may have cost him 20 cents, if that. After I played the ignorant tourist bit for a while -- "Oh, I thought you meant we just had to pay for the tickets; we just thought you were being nice..." -- he agreed that he would give us a "discount" for $2. Tired of this bullshit, I handed him $2 and rode away.

Second, everything -- literally, everything -- takes longer in Cambodia. I mentioned the bus ride at the beginning of this post. The bus itself was surprising pleasant, but the roads are laughable. The main "interstate" -- National Road No. 6 -- is basically one lane in each direction (sometimes less than that), occasionally unpaved, going through small villages, with animals and people walking on it all the time. Since the road is about as flat and straight as you can possibly imagine (if you've ever driven across America and ventured on Interstate 40 near Texas, it's just like that), it should have been a quick ride. But the bus never went above 40 mph, so a trip of about 150 miles that should have taken two hours on a paved highway took us six hours because of the conditions. Not kidding: at times, farm animals being herded along the side of the road were passing us because traffic would come to a complete halt on the "interstate"... (And this is just one of many examples. Another is the speed, or lack therof, of food preparation. If you order a fruit shake, i.e., fruit and coconut water blended together, expect a ten minute wait. Exactly why it takes ten minutes is still a mystery.)

Third, my unscientific study (with a 50% margin of error) tells me that 50% of the people in Cambodia do nothing but sit on the sidewalk. That's all they do. All day long. That, and pester you for taxi rides. Cambodian taxi drivers, I have a message for you: For the nine millionth time, I don't want a fucking taxi ride!

That's it for Cambodia. I'm off to Vietnam, and Becky is heading home to her job. Until next time, adios.

PS: With Becky gone, I may be the only remaining white person in Southeast Asia who doesn't smoke. Weird.