Day 16

Angkor What? Well first of all, let me just sooo confused about what day of the week it is! We've been doing too much moving around I guess. Today was our last day in Cambodia and we spent it in Siem Reap. After spending much of the day yesterday trekking through REALLY hot weather and visiting temples, we decided that we were templed out. And it would have cost us another $20 per person to spend another day visiting temples so we opted to do something different. I know, a true historian or archaeology buff would be appalled, but we saw Angkor Wat and Ta Prohm and those are the biggies.

Anyway, this morning Phirom our driver picked us up, and the mom & daughter (Deborah & Elena) from the housebuilding who were also spending their last day in Cambodia. They are from Perth, Australia. Anyway, we headed out of the city in the van and went down this very dry, dirty, clay baked road with big potholes. Lining the side of the road were straw houses built on sort of platform floors.... and lots of naked babies running around. For a while Brennan was keeping count of how many naked babies he had seen but he finally gave up. I don't think he could count that high! Anyway, we later learned that the houses are built this way so that they can easily be moved whenever the rainy season causes the water to rise.

We were taking a boat through a village of Cambodian and Vietnamese boat people who live on the edges of the Tonle Sap Lake. It is a very large mucky muddy lake. Amazingly, the folks who live in these floatable houses and actual houseboats are some of the healthiest looking people we have seen in Cambodia. Their diet is made up primarily of fish and clearly it is good for them. But what a hard life! The houses/boats are not more than 12 by 12, and when the water rises suddenly it must be frightening. The boats that you take out are beautiful wooden boats. Ours was a private hire just for our group, some were a bit bigger and were full of Korean and Japanese tourists. We learned from our guide that last year several million tourists from other Asian countries visited Siem Reap for weekend getaways. It hasn't helped the economy much, however, according to him. He said that the Koreans stay in hotels built, run, and staffed by Koreans, eat in Korean restaurants, and take tours given by Korean guides. The same with the Japanese and others. Interesting.

Anyway, imagine a muddy, grassy, bog like river flowing into a lake that has dozens of these fairly large boat powered with rudders attached to engines that sound like lawn mowers. And then imagine that because it is the rainy season, the village is in the process of moving the school - which is also a houseboat but a fairly large houseboat. Now imagine that it is about 95 degrees, very humid and your boat gets stuck in the middle of this massive boat traffic jam as you try to make your way back at the end of your tour. Now imagine that your friends (Deb & Elena) have a flight to catch at 1 pm. And at 11:15 you're stuck in the water trying to figure out how you can climb from boat to boat in order to get to the edge of the river and walk back to where the van is parked. Imagine that Cambodia boat drivers in a state of "river rage" as they jockey for position and occasionally break chunks off of each others boats. Oh, and one more thing --- a lot of these villagers make their livelihood raising crocodiles and selling their skins, so along this river you're thinking of walking through to get to the edge there are literally wooden pens of crocodiles. We had a good (and aggressive!) driver so when a space opened up between the school boat and the river's edge, he quickly gunned his way through and we made it back to the dock without having to climb. Whew. Eventually there will be lots of photos of this, too. Our "deckhands" were about 5 & 7 years old and the cutest little guys in the world. They are working to help out their mom. As we were floating out in the lake, we were approached by about a half dozen little boys literally paddling their way along and floating in laundry tubs!!!! They made their way right to the side of our boat and asked for money. I couldn't believe it - even out in the middle of the lake I was a marked target for beggars. I jokingly asked the driver if I gave these kids a little money if suddenly 100 little kids would show up in tubs at the side of the boat. I was joking, but he was quite serious when he said, "yes - no give money unless you want the whole bowl navy out here." It's interesting that some little guys will look for boathand jobs to earn a bit of money while others will turn to begging. Makes you wonder what the difference is in them, and who will fare better in the long run.

Once we finally were back on dry land it was a wild ride back to town. Phirom dropped us off at the hotel at about 11:50 and headed to the airport with the others. We had to be out of our rooms by noon to avoid an extra charge. We quickly packed and went to the lobby for a drink before heading to the pool for a while. There was something going on in the lobby. There was still lots of security there for the ASEAN energy ministers conference, but everything was stepped up. Finally one of the bellboys came over and excitedly told us that Hun Sen, the Prime Minister of Cambodia would be arriving any minute. He would be the equivalent to the president of Cambodia. So of course, we had to hang out and gawk with the rest of the Cambodians. On his arrival they had Apsara dancers do a welcome dance, complete with flower petals for him to walk on. Very cool. After seeing our glimpse of Hun Sen, we hit the pool for an hour before Phirom picked us back up. It was absolutely beautiful and warm perfect water. Forget the Caribbean - go to Siem Reap for sunshine and warm water!!

We visited the market in Siem Reap after he picked us up. We had been told prices would be much higher there but we didn't find that. It was actually airier and not as crowded as the markets in Phnom Penh. Of course they didn't have all of the pirated DVD's either. We picked up a few more things until the guys couldn't stand it anymore. I'm a terrible bargainer, too. I hate having to barter with people who have so little, but I know that it's part of the game. If you pay more than half of the original asking price you've probably been had.

There is also a FCC (Foreign Correspondents Club) restaurant in Siem Reap so we headed there for a snack and cold drink before heading to the airport. There was a pool table there (hooray!) so B & K enjoyed their last few moments in Siem Reap after all.

At the airport we had no problems getting through customs, although the immigration people were very curious about Brennan and Kaley. I heard several tell them, "You lucky." Kaley has said that she wants to learn some Khmer before visiting again so that she can at least say a couple of things when they say "You no speak Khmer?" Right now we still only know how to say Greetings, Thank You, Food, and Dog. That doesn't quite cut it!

As we were waiting to board there was some kind of excitement going on at the airport. Several firetrucks outside, lots of people running around with walkie talkies, but no announcements in English about what was going on. Our plain arrived safely and was quickly turned around to take us to Bangkok so we left with no clue what was happening. That's the hard part of travelling in a country like Cambodia. Sometimes you're just not sure what's going on! Oh, one other very yucky thing. The bag that we had taken with us to the housebuilding and Sihanoukville was CRAWLING with bugs when we took it out of the van at the airport. I have suspected that "we brought back guests" from Sihanoukville and I think they hatched from sitting in the hot van all day. Since I didn't feel good about that bag anyway, I had put all of our dirty clothes that we wouldn't need in Honolulu in it thinking we would just leave it closed. When we got to the airport to check our bags they asked if there were any bags we didn't want in Bangkok that we wanted sent straight to Honolulu. Bonus! The buggy bag stayed in the belly of some plane all night and we didn't have to touch it. You know if you try to bring so much as an apple back into the country you can get in huge trouble because of concerns about flies and bugs.... but we can bring a suitcase covered with creepy crawlers and it's no problem. Don't worry, I'll be spraying it with the strongest bug spray I can find before we go any farther with it! We all have a good many bites all over us - but we've faithfully taken our malaria medicine so I feel like we don't have to worry about it. The other bug bite concern is dengue fever, which is survivable but makes you feel like you'd rather not from what I understand. The incubation on it is very short, though, so if we were going to have a problem with it we would have by now.

Anyway, our last day in Cambodia will go down in our history as one of our more bizarre days and that is somehow fitting. Cambodia has become a wonderful place to visit for the adventurous at heart, but it is the most bizarre mixture of progress and simplicity that you'll find anywhere. It can be joyful and despairing, progressive but backwards, poverty stricken but full all at the same time. Much of it leaves you scratching your head. As we were travelling to the airport, Derek came up with the best travel slogan for Cambodia that we could think of.... "Welcome to Cambodia. Please watch your step." Steep stairs, broken streets, slippery clay mud, big old spiders, and piles of elephant poop might await you at every turn. But if you have an open heart and mind, it's all part of the adventure.

Our flight to Bangkok was about an hour on Siem Reap Airways. Again a nice large prop plane. They don't waste any time. As soon as the last person is boarded (and they board early!) the plane takes off! No sitting around, no lengthy instructions, you just go. I liked it.

Tomorrow we cross the international date line and get the day back that we lost on the way here. Go figure.

Hugs -
Lisa & Crew