Relaxing in Siem Reap

After getting up so early yesterday morning(4.00 a.m.) to see the sunrise at Angkor Wat we were unfortunate enough not to have a really nice sunrise. Our bad luck was followed by a nasty breakfast (dirty cups, bad tasting food and overpriced). It was the first place in Cambodia where they tried to rip us off. To make things worse the weather changed from bad to awful throughout the day. It was raining cats and dogs and the temperature felt like 10 degree celcius. That would not have been so bad if we had left our warm clothes in the backpack (the day before was so hot that we decided to make some room in the backpack). Well, to top off our bad luck, Marcus has been fighting with a vicious flea that decided to jump on him and bite him up for good.

However, we still had a good day wandering around the temples since only few tourists were around. We were a little bit disappointed about Angkor Wat itself. The most impressive thing was the outside view from the entrance we had the previous day shortly before sunset. Even though the inside reliefs were quite nice and there were only a few people around we had the "same same but different" feeling. Our favourite temple here is the so called "Jungle Temple" - Ta Prohm. This is the one you have in mind when thinking of the mysterious temples in the Cambodian jungle with roots growing around through and over the walls.

The one thing we found quite sad is that many young children wait around the temples trying to sell various items (postcards, bracelets, flutes, books, etc) to tourists. Oftentimes they come up with a sad look in their faces and rely on your pitty to give them some money. Standard phrases are "Madame, wanna buy fluuuute? Two for one dollar." and "Can you give money?" as well as demonstrating their counting skills from one to ten in various languages. At the same time you can see the bundle of dollar bills in their shirt pockets. At least they seem to be going to school in the morning.

After visiting the Bantaey Srei temple which is famous for the incredible detailed stone carvings (it lies 30km north of Angkor) our tuk-tuk driver took us to the floating village (20km south of Angkor). The people here live in small wooden shacks built on stelts over the water (same same as Pfahlbauten in Unteruhldingen am Bodensee). We even saw them cooking with open fire directly in the house (remember, they are built from wood). Meanwhile it was raining heavily and the temperature dropped even further. Imagine our driver didn't have anything like a raincoat or a helmet or glasses to protect him from the rain and the cold. We were really happy to come back to our hotel and have a really hot shower. And our driver probably as well.

So after our long day yesterday we decided to take a day rest and hang out around Siem Reap. We've already had a good breakfast and are now organizing our further travels to Battambang by boat, Koh Chang by bus and on to Bangkok.

We still like Siem Reap (despite our day of bad luck) and it seems to be the one place in Cambodia where money can be found. Many new buildings are being constructed, modern hotels, ATMs and other "western amnemities" can be found. So it is quite different from the rest of Cambodia (so if you visit Cambodia be sure to see both sides of the country - Siem Reap and the countryside outside the "money center").