Day 12 and 13: Cambodia

Day 12: Got up in the morning and realized how different Siem Reip (Cambodia) was than Beijing and Hong Kong. Cambodia is definitely a 3rd world country. It pretty much has store shacks and roads, no malls. Siem Reip is the largest city next to Angkor, so alot of tourist stay in Siem Reip. Tourism is so big in Angkor they are even moving things like the jail out of town and into the countryside to build hotels to house the tourist, tourism in Angkor is one of the drivers of the economy for Cambodia.

The people are pleasant, though they are very aggressive about selling things especially the kids, they even accept dollars. I ended up meeting a German lady at breakfast and we decided to head over to Angkor Wat together. Angkor Wat was amazing. Angkor Wat, built during the early years of the 12th century by Suryavaram II, honors the Hindu god Vishnu and is a symbolic representation of Hindu cosmology.

Then we headed for lunch and I tried the Amoke, which is a coconut type soup with seafood, it was delicious....

Then we headed to Bayon aka 'smiling buddha temple'(since all the buddha's in the temple are smiling). One of the last temples built in Angkor, Bayon is one of the few Buddhist temples in Angkor; most are dedicated to Hindu dieties. Over 200 large faces adorn the 54 towers at Bayon.

Day 13: My tour guy and I headed to a couple of more temples, my favorites one before lunch was Ta Prohm aka the 'tree temple' as they have a bunch of trees coming out of the temple. A scene from 'Tomb Raider' was filmed here.

For lunch I had Lak Lok it is marinated beef with egg and and rice, very good. Then we headed to Bantea Srei aka 'woman temple' as this temple is dedicated to woman (gotta have one!!). Bantea Srei is about 1 hour from where I was staying and was out in the country side. The drive to the temple was very interesting. Most of the people are poor and most of the homes are one story homes made from straw that are elevated by poles. I saw water buffalo's, rice paddies, and children happily playing outside. Given that 36% of the population is under the poverty level, these children looked happy and the people were pleasant. Boy I was thinking despite the fact that these people don't have alot and lead a 'simple life' they are happy. It made me appreciate the more 'simple things in life', I think as human beings we sometimes tend to
complicate our lives and forget about the 'simple things'.

My tour guide Darrith was very good and I would recomment him. His email is darith_touch@yahoo.com

I was surprised to see so many westerns so meeting and conversing with people was easy.
I met an Aussie gal , Irish gal, and a Spanish guy at the internet cafe and we we headed for dinner. The Irish gal at dinner pointed out as 'travelers' we are all looking for a change in our lives and are open to meeting new people, thus it's easier to meet people. I was a little concerned at first about traveling on my own and not meeting people, but am definitely meeting other travelers from all over the world, as I haven't had a free evening until tonight.....