Not only was I lucky enough to get to the beautiful country of Thailand, but I had the chance to go AGAIN. And on top of that.. fly over to Cambodia for 4 days. This time around I went with my friend Lloyd. We turned out to be great travel partners! Traveling with friends is always a gamble. Sometimes people can make the best friends but when you travel and are put into situations, problems can arise at how you both deal with everything. Well... by the end of the trip, Lloyd and I were able to communicate through our eyes and developed a type of joint intuition. Especially in these two countries where you need to be on your game at all times with the haggling and sketchy situations you are unwillingly put in.. I'd say we did pretty damn well! I mean we were smack in the middle of the first two days of Bangkok protests and came out in one piece right! Not funny? Ok..
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| Amar and Pop Bernie made a visit <3 |
Bangkok
I was able to do some of the things I didn't get to do last time, which was great! This included seeing Wat Arun- a beautiful older temple on the other side of the river, and taking an overnight train. The overnight train was quite the experience and I recommend it to any traveler who wants to save a few bucks and see the country side. Unfortunately we had the top bunks which had no windows so there was not a lot of "countryside watching" to be done. I did my fair share of research on Trip Advisor before buying tickets at the train station. There are way too many scams that go on in this country and I wasn't about to get ripped off. It turned out to be way too easy.. we ignored all the random men trying to sell tickets around us and went right up to the counter.
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| Wat Arun |
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| Day 2 of Bangkok Protests |
Krabi was gorgeous, just as I remembered it. We had wonderful food and too much sun (ha that's a joke! There can never be too much sun when you've spent the last 2 months living in below freezing weather.) I'll never get over those long-tail boats. Beautiful.
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| One of many tuk-tuk rides |
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| AoNang Beach, Krabi |
Three days later it was on to Ko Phi Phi. A quick 90 minute ferry over to the island and then it was a 15 minute trek along the beach to our hostel. (There are no cars on Phi Phi, only bicycles and rolly carts that you can hire to carry your luggage.)
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| Took a little morning hike up to Phi Phi Viewing Point. Gorgeous! |
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| Finally did Dr. Fish... Weird stuff |
By the time we got back to Krabi, we had about 5 hours until we needed to be at the airport. We were tired, hungry, irritated and just wanted to sit down and not be annoyed. That's the last thing we got. By this point we were beyond done with the haggling of Thailand. We didn't make it two steps out the doors of that ferry terminal before being bombarded by taxi drivers asking where we were going. After much ignoring and yelling, we took a seat and ordered some lunch from a sweet old woman. After being bitches to the taxi drivers who would not let us enjoy our meal, a kind taxi driver came over with a map and sat down with us. Unlike the rest, actually wanted to help us, so we finally agreed on a price and hitched a ride with him into Krabi Town. He had agreed to come back 2 hours later to drive us to the airport. After some compromising on a deposit price, we spent a lovely afternoon at a corner bar drinking some Lipton. The man, to our surprise, had kept his word, and two hours later showed up in the exact spot he dropped us off at. We had lovely conversation on the way to the airport, learned he was going to Holland to visit his sister and her kids. I shook his hand and told him he was a good man. It was a lovely experience to end Thailand on after all the recent frustrations we had dealt with. A wise friend told me last night, after telling him this story, told me some of the best stories you take with you are these tiny ones that make a huge unexpected impact. Off to our quick red eye flight to Bangkok where we popped a squat on some seats and slept the night away, bags tightly secured around our wrists.
Siem Reap, Cambodia
With our lovely night's sleep (that's a lie) but it was worth us not having to pay for a hostel for 8 hours, we were off to The Kingdom of Cambodia!
Fast forward through the old wooden airport and Visa process that involved your passport being passed through a line of grumpy-looking old Cambodian men staring you down... we settled into our hostel and went out to explore Siem Reap!
Now let me just begin with saying.. I had researched and found out that they use both Cambodian Riel and US Dollars in this country. So we decided last minute to just exchange what we had into Riel. VERY. BAD. DECISION.... Lesson learned. While Cambodians will accept their own currency, they really don't like to. EVERYWHERE uses USD. And I mean everywhere. So it wasn't too long before we were fed up with the calculations and exchanged yet again... into USD. We decided not to calculate how much money we had actually lost through this whole debacle.. because it was so worth it. It was definitely weird to be using my own currency again, but obviously familiar and pretty cool.
Let's talk Cambodian food.. because well, why not!?
Three dishes that I became obsessed with..
Khmer Amok: A coconut-based fish curry (I always got it with chicken instead of fish.) Coconut milk curry- enough said. YUM. (About $3)
Khmer Lok Lak: Marinated beef on a bed of fresh lettuce, cucumber, onion and tomato. A very simple dish, but soooooo good. (About $4)
Khmer Fresh Spring Rolls: At our favorite restaurant, a set of three cost $1. Fresh spring rolls are usually all the same to me, but I don't know, there was something about these that were out of this world.. maybe it was the delicious peanut sauce or the fact that they were $1. Both?
As you see from these prices.. things are extremely cheap in Cambodia. It took us a while to get used to it. Lloyd ordered a $4 steak one night. We enjoyed a 3-set course meal for $6.50 another night. Angkor Beer is 25 cents at most places. Our tuk-tuk driver we hired for Angkor Wat.. His pay for a 7-hr workday: $15.
We had a found a great, reliable, travel agency shop near Pub Street (the famous Western bar and restaurant street in Siem Reap.) Within 20 minutes, we had taken care of money exchange, setting up our Kompong Phluk Village tour, and taking care of our tickets to the Phare Cambodian Circus as well as Rosana, the lady boy cabaret show. It always feels good when you meet legit business owners in SE Asia, who are not trying to pull a fast one on you and rip you off. Sometimes it almost seems to good to be true.
The morning after we got to Siem Reap, we were up early to meet our tuk-tuk driver who was supposed to take us to Angkor Wat. This deal was made with our taxi-driver the previous day who had driven us to the hostel from the airport. After going back and forth about prices, he had agreed that at 9am one of his coworkers would be there to meet us. 10am and 3 cups of coffee later out on the patio, we gave up. Our hostel couldn't have been more accommodating and called one of their own tuk-tuk drivers. As I stated previously... $15 for this sweet man, named Pen to drive us around for 7 hours. Waiting in the heat until our touristy asses came back from each temple, ready and waiting with ice-cold water to drive us to the next one. The sweetest man.
Angkor Wat. WOW. Breathtaking. Lloyd and I had watched a documentary on it before we left, but he took in way more than me, for he quickly became my own personal tour guide, shooting fact after fact at me as we walked through.
Here's a few quick Wikipedia facts:
Another big temple within Angkor was Bayon. Well-known for it's massive stone faces engraved into the towers that make up the temple.
And one of the coolest temples for me:
Ta Prohm. The trees grow out of the temples, exposing their enormous roots. It's quite the site. One of the largest trees is an ideal photo opportunity site, and we were surrounded by a comedy show of older Canadian/American accents. I'm talking 50-60 yr olds. I was actually overcome by quite an unexpected comfort standing next to them. I haven't been around older foreigners who speak my language. Not only that, but who are from my home country. (Thailand was full of Europeans and Asians.) A little unexplainable, but it was really nice to just be around this older population for a while. We got a few laughs out of them trying to work cameras for their family and friends.
Exploring the city of Angkor and all of it's temples was such an experience. Asian temples have started to grow into one. After time, they kind of become quite similar. I share this opinion with a lot of expats traveling and living in Asia. But the temples of Cambodia, the ruins put them in a league of their own. Such beauty in them.
Unfortunately that day brought on a huge rush of emotion. As we were eating lunch on the grounds of Angkor Wat, we had child after child come up to us, doing what they've been taken out of school to do. Begging for money, selling postcards, etc, mumbling, holding out their small, dirt-covered hands. Lingering. Some would leave after a simple, "No thank you." Most would stay. Not after two "no thank you's." Not after four.
We would resort to ignoring them and trying to focus on each other instead of the poor child next to us just doing what they've been told to do. It killed me. Especially the children who would linger there until you're ready to just grab them in a huge hug and take them away. I looked over to my left at one point and saw three kids playing jump rope. (Pictured left.)
Lloyd and I discussed, whether they get "play time" as a reward when they sell a certain amount of merchandise. Or maybe they have a designated time, like the equivalent of an adult's "lunch break" to play. To be a kid. To remember for a little bit that, oh yeah, I'm only 6 years old. Lloyd saw a boy laugh at another kid when he wasn't able to sell a foreigner something. I'll never forget this scene:
Siem Reap, Cambodia
With our lovely night's sleep (that's a lie) but it was worth us not having to pay for a hostel for 8 hours, we were off to The Kingdom of Cambodia!
Fast forward through the old wooden airport and Visa process that involved your passport being passed through a line of grumpy-looking old Cambodian men staring you down... we settled into our hostel and went out to explore Siem Reap!
Now let me just begin with saying.. I had researched and found out that they use both Cambodian Riel and US Dollars in this country. So we decided last minute to just exchange what we had into Riel. VERY. BAD. DECISION.... Lesson learned. While Cambodians will accept their own currency, they really don't like to. EVERYWHERE uses USD. And I mean everywhere. So it wasn't too long before we were fed up with the calculations and exchanged yet again... into USD. We decided not to calculate how much money we had actually lost through this whole debacle.. because it was so worth it. It was definitely weird to be using my own currency again, but obviously familiar and pretty cool.
Let's talk Cambodian food.. because well, why not!?
Three dishes that I became obsessed with..
Khmer Amok: A coconut-based fish curry (I always got it with chicken instead of fish.) Coconut milk curry- enough said. YUM. (About $3)
Khmer Lok Lak: Marinated beef on a bed of fresh lettuce, cucumber, onion and tomato. A very simple dish, but soooooo good. (About $4)
Khmer Fresh Spring Rolls: At our favorite restaurant, a set of three cost $1. Fresh spring rolls are usually all the same to me, but I don't know, there was something about these that were out of this world.. maybe it was the delicious peanut sauce or the fact that they were $1. Both?
As you see from these prices.. things are extremely cheap in Cambodia. It took us a while to get used to it. Lloyd ordered a $4 steak one night. We enjoyed a 3-set course meal for $6.50 another night. Angkor Beer is 25 cents at most places. Our tuk-tuk driver we hired for Angkor Wat.. His pay for a 7-hr workday: $15.
We had a found a great, reliable, travel agency shop near Pub Street (the famous Western bar and restaurant street in Siem Reap.) Within 20 minutes, we had taken care of money exchange, setting up our Kompong Phluk Village tour, and taking care of our tickets to the Phare Cambodian Circus as well as Rosana, the lady boy cabaret show. It always feels good when you meet legit business owners in SE Asia, who are not trying to pull a fast one on you and rip you off. Sometimes it almost seems to good to be true.
The morning after we got to Siem Reap, we were up early to meet our tuk-tuk driver who was supposed to take us to Angkor Wat. This deal was made with our taxi-driver the previous day who had driven us to the hostel from the airport. After going back and forth about prices, he had agreed that at 9am one of his coworkers would be there to meet us. 10am and 3 cups of coffee later out on the patio, we gave up. Our hostel couldn't have been more accommodating and called one of their own tuk-tuk drivers. As I stated previously... $15 for this sweet man, named Pen to drive us around for 7 hours. Waiting in the heat until our touristy asses came back from each temple, ready and waiting with ice-cold water to drive us to the next one. The sweetest man.
Angkor Wat. WOW. Breathtaking. Lloyd and I had watched a documentary on it before we left, but he took in way more than me, for he quickly became my own personal tour guide, shooting fact after fact at me as we walked through.
Here's a few quick Wikipedia facts:
- A Buddhist temple complex
- It's the largest religious monument in the world
- Was built in the 12th century by King Suryavarman II and acted as his home and state temple.
- Angkor Wat is the most well-preserved temple at the site of Angkor.
- It appears on Cambodia's national flag and acts as a symbol almost everywhere in Cambodia.
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| tuk-tuk drivers waiting.. |
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| Fresh palm juice... not a fan |
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| Was blessed by a monk |
Ta Prohm. The trees grow out of the temples, exposing their enormous roots. It's quite the site. One of the largest trees is an ideal photo opportunity site, and we were surrounded by a comedy show of older Canadian/American accents. I'm talking 50-60 yr olds. I was actually overcome by quite an unexpected comfort standing next to them. I haven't been around older foreigners who speak my language. Not only that, but who are from my home country. (Thailand was full of Europeans and Asians.) A little unexplainable, but it was really nice to just be around this older population for a while. We got a few laughs out of them trying to work cameras for their family and friends.
Unfortunately that day brought on a huge rush of emotion. As we were eating lunch on the grounds of Angkor Wat, we had child after child come up to us, doing what they've been taken out of school to do. Begging for money, selling postcards, etc, mumbling, holding out their small, dirt-covered hands. Lingering. Some would leave after a simple, "No thank you." Most would stay. Not after two "no thank you's." Not after four.
Later in the day at a temple, I saw two girls, no more than 5 years old, staring at the food that this Asian tour group was handing out to each other. Literally just staring. Not moving. (Pictured below)
Cambodian children surround Angkor. Their parents know that's where the income is. It's the major tourist attraction. They take their children out of school. They understand their innocence, and how that will affect us compared to a 40-year old coming up to us trying to sell a postcard.
Then you get the children on Pub Street, walking right into western restaurants because there's no law against that. Some wait for the second you're done with your meal, not letting you walk two feet into the street before coming right up to you and asking for something. Same goes for tuk-tuk drivers trying to get their own business. The second you grab your bag to leave the table, you're bombarded. Pub Street itself is so out of place on this city where poverty is everywhere you look. But you put a child in the middle of this street, wearing basically rags for clothing, shoeless, dirt-stricken skin, and your heart just breaks. Because all you really want to do is take them home for a shower, or give them a simple hug and tell them your life doesn't have to continue on like this. But all you can really do is say no thank you and walk away, because really.. where is that money going? Not directly to them I'm sure.
That night we went to the Phare Cambodian Circus. A circus, that works with Phare Ponleu Selpak, a non-profit, non-governmental association founded in 1994 by ex refugees and young Cambodians. They set up a school aimed to take in "street children", orphans, and trafficked children. The organization teaches circus skills, theater performance, music, and a range of visual arts. It was announced at the end of the show, that all of the performers we had just watched had recently graduated from the school, and was a major celebratory night for them. This show was absolutely amazing. As Lloyd said, they have almost nothing to work with. The few props they do have are put to use in ways that you can't imagine. Of course I connected to it on a whole other level because of my gymnastics background. The whole show was basically acrobatics. It was such a small venue so its was very intimate and you were with them the entire time. In the end.. I had a crazy idea to ask one of the girls to take a picture with me in a handstand.. yes.. this happened. And then the rest of the cast joined in. Lloyd has the pictures so I don't have them right now. These performers are tremendously talented. It works with a great cause and I recommend it to anyone visiting Siem Reap.
We also saw a Cabaret Show, called Rosana. Full lady-boy cast, which was definitely quite the experience. It was nothing like what we expected, but I'm not too sure what we expected in the first place.. They did a number for almost every Asian country. And then went on to do two numbers from the US, including a recent J-Lo song. I mean, wow. Wasn't my favorite part of the trip, but enjoyed it nonetheless.
Now for one of the last things we did.. Kompong Phluk.This is an isolated floating village on Tonle Sap Lake, about an hour tuk-tuk drive outside of Siem Reap. Wow. Wow. Wow. Like nothing I've ever seen before. We had our own private boat with a driver who spoke barely one word to us, but through smiles we expressed our gratitude at the end of the tour. We were on that boat sailing through the village for probably a little under 30 minutes before we made our first stop. During that entire time, Lloyd and I did not speak one word to each other. We were so engulfed in what was going on around us. What our eyes were taking in. Unreal. Again, I had to remind myself a few times that this was not a show being put on for us. This is a self-sustaining village with people who have close to nothing, and they are as happy as can be. Almost every child I saw was laughing, smiling, waving at us, some were pushing their friends in the water.
Most were naked or barely clothed. All the adults and older children were doing some kind of manual labor. Working on their house, working on their boats, pulling up nets out of the water, etc. Everyone had a job to do. Their houses were extraordinary The way they are built, the way they are sustained, the way some are bare, but how others are decorated in some small way. It was quite amazing. Lloyd and I said the same thing as we left... we would love nothing more than to spend a few days in that village. Forgetting everything we know, living the way they do, experiencing what it's like to not have anything of what we're used to. It was an unreal experience. This is something that everyone needs to see. We thought the city of Siem Reap opened our eyes... this was on a whole new level.
I am so grateful for this vacation. Cambodia has become that country that holds a special little place in my heart. It holds such warm, kind, hardworking people. And my hope is that these children will one day find that there is more out there, get back to school, and seek opportunities to make a change in their lives..
Cambodian children surround Angkor. Their parents know that's where the income is. It's the major tourist attraction. They take their children out of school. They understand their innocence, and how that will affect us compared to a 40-year old coming up to us trying to sell a postcard.
Then you get the children on Pub Street, walking right into western restaurants because there's no law against that. Some wait for the second you're done with your meal, not letting you walk two feet into the street before coming right up to you and asking for something. Same goes for tuk-tuk drivers trying to get their own business. The second you grab your bag to leave the table, you're bombarded. Pub Street itself is so out of place on this city where poverty is everywhere you look. But you put a child in the middle of this street, wearing basically rags for clothing, shoeless, dirt-stricken skin, and your heart just breaks. Because all you really want to do is take them home for a shower, or give them a simple hug and tell them your life doesn't have to continue on like this. But all you can really do is say no thank you and walk away, because really.. where is that money going? Not directly to them I'm sure.
We also saw a Cabaret Show, called Rosana. Full lady-boy cast, which was definitely quite the experience. It was nothing like what we expected, but I'm not too sure what we expected in the first place.. They did a number for almost every Asian country. And then went on to do two numbers from the US, including a recent J-Lo song. I mean, wow. Wasn't my favorite part of the trip, but enjoyed it nonetheless.
Now for one of the last things we did.. Kompong Phluk.This is an isolated floating village on Tonle Sap Lake, about an hour tuk-tuk drive outside of Siem Reap. Wow. Wow. Wow. Like nothing I've ever seen before. We had our own private boat with a driver who spoke barely one word to us, but through smiles we expressed our gratitude at the end of the tour. We were on that boat sailing through the village for probably a little under 30 minutes before we made our first stop. During that entire time, Lloyd and I did not speak one word to each other. We were so engulfed in what was going on around us. What our eyes were taking in. Unreal. Again, I had to remind myself a few times that this was not a show being put on for us. This is a self-sustaining village with people who have close to nothing, and they are as happy as can be. Almost every child I saw was laughing, smiling, waving at us, some were pushing their friends in the water.
I am so grateful for this vacation. Cambodia has become that country that holds a special little place in my heart. It holds such warm, kind, hardworking people. And my hope is that these children will one day find that there is more out there, get back to school, and seek opportunities to make a change in their lives..
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