Patti:We are now on day 4 in Cambodia. We arrived in Phnom Penh and our tuk tuk ride to our hotel was chaotic, to say the least. It was a mosh pit of cars, bikes, tuk tuks, scooters, and pedestrians with no apparently rules of the road. Traffic lights were completely ignored and everything was in constant motion. The only rule that seemed to exist was never come to a complete stop. To add to the adventure, it was raining and obviously had been for some time as many of the side streets were flooded and those on scooters were submerges past their feet in the puddles. This is something that truly has to be experienced to understand. We only spent half of the following day in Phnom Penh with time to go to the Genocide Museum and the Killing Fields. It is so hard to comprehend that people could treat each other this way and that this atrocity happened only 40 years ago. As with learning more about apartheid when in South Africa, I have come to realise what types of horrors happen in the world as we live safely and typically naively in Canada. The second half of that day was spent on the bus to Siem Reap and taking in the views of the countryside of Cambodia. Many of the dwellings were grass huts built up on stilts as we travelled though mostly the delta area of the Mekong River. Yesterday and today we spent our time touring the various temples of Angkor. We had a tuk tuk driver for each day and he transported us from place to place. The Bayon at Angkor Thom was amazing with all the sculpted faces and bas relief on the walls and was my highlight. Our two day tour was overwhelming in so many ways; the sights, the stifling humidity and heat, and the young kids’ persistency trying to sell bracelets, books, postcards, water, food, drinks, flutes, scarves, fruit, t-shirts, sunglasses, and on and on. I thought I did pretty well to only buy 10 bracelets, a shirt, a pair of pants, and a flute. We had a long, educational conversation with a 10 year old Cambodia girl today at lunch. She told us about her family, about her school, and about how she talks to tourists to sell them things. She had a great sense of humor and we really enjoyed her company. We had some fun with another group of young people as we set up the slackline and they soon joined in with some coaxing from us. They caught on very quickly and showed us how it was supposed to be done. It was a great two days at Angkor Wat but we are heading back to Thailand by bus tomorrow.
