Battambang
is the second largest city in Cambodia
and not at all tourist orientated. It’s such a pleasure to not be hounded for massage,
tuk-tuk, motorcycle etc. Walking around town I actually get stared at. Either
because I’m so devilishly handsome or they have seldom seen such a scruffy
foreigner. I’ve been struggling to find someone to give me a shave for nearly a
week now. The barber that I went to in Siem Reap closed up shop when it got
flooded.
I arrived
on the final day of the water festival. Thousands of people have turned up to
watch the boat races on the river and there are hundreds of stalls selling all
manner of things. The boats seem to come in three sizes. The smallest is about
a 12 seater, the next size is about a 22 seater and then the large ones seem to
vary between 54 and 64 seats. I say seats, but half the crew stand. The
paddlers in the front half sit and paddle furiously. The back half stand with
the 3rd quarter also paddling furiously at the same pace as the
seated paddlers and the rear quarter stand and paddle at a half pace, every
second stroke of the front ¾ of the boat. The two guys in the rear seem to
paddle and steer as needed.
In the
evening the crowd quadrupled as all the working folk and rural folk came in to
join in the celebrations. As one of the very few westerners in town I managed
to attract a lot of stares from the rural kids who don’t get to see too many
foreigners. After dark the river was lit by floating candles that people had
bought to give thanks. Fittingly for a water festival there was a fine downpour
at the end of the evening.
The
following day I took a guided motorbike tour of some of the countryside:-
First stop
was to a place that is now known as “The Killing Cave”, where the Khmer Rouge
threw opponents down an opening into a cave where they died, if they were not
already dead. There is a shrine with a dying Buddha and containers of human
bones and sculls recovered from the cave.
The next
stop was another Ankgorian
Temple built on the top
of a steep hill. My knees were wobbly after simply climbing the stairs to the
top, I can’t imagine how they managed to haul the massive sandstone slabs to
the top to build the temple.
The final
treat was a ride on the Bamboo Train. This is tricky to describe, probably best
to have a look at the facebook photos (see link at the end). It is a bamboo
board about 4m x 2m resting on two rail axels and powered by a small petrol
motor. It is assembled when you get there and if another train is coming in the
opposite direction, it would be dis-assembled and re-assembled on the spot. I
was given the VIP seat, which consisted of two cushions. It’s a rough ride, so
the cushions were handy. Thundering along the Cambodian countryside on wonky
rails at 20 km/hr a few inches off the ground can be quite exhilarating.
Travelling
through the backstreets of rural Cambodia was an experience in
itself. People have very simple lifestyles. The primary crop in that area is
rice, but interspersed with small fruit plantations on the less soggy ground.
There was even a vineyard with grapes growing which surprised me.
The second
night back in Battambang was a complete contrast to the first. The streets were
absolutely deserted. It’s time to move on - back to Phnom
Penh for a couple of nights and then on to Ho
Chi Minh City (Saigon) in Vietnam.
Facebook photo's : http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=328711&id=744675149&l=464afe04d4
