Siem Reap and Angkor

Siem Reap is the small town where tourists base themselves when visiting the vast number of temples included within the Angkor complex. The town has been purpose built to cater for tourists, and don’t you know it. For us, this is good because we can gorge on decent western food, coffee and ice-cream – yum. But, after a while, it got on our nerves. 

Take three steps out of one’s hotel and you get the following:

“Hello, tuk-tuk?” No.

“Hello, moto?” No.

“Hello, marijuana?” No.

“Hello, opium?” NO!

“Hello, tuk-tuk?” No.

“Hello, splif?” No.

Then, once you have fought your way through the rickshaw men, and reach the main hub-bub of restaurants and market-place, you get the following:

“Hello lady, you want massage?” No.

[Having glanced in the direction of a shop/stall] “Hello lady, buy som-sing?” No.

“Hello lady, you want scarf?” No.

Then you get interrupted by, “Hello, tuk-tuk?” NO!!!!!!!!

Then when you are resting your feet in a café/restaurant within the temple region, you have children selling things coming over to you with the one of the following two:

1. “Hello lady, where you from?” England. “If I tell you the capital, the population and the name of your prime minister, will you buy som-sing?” No, but tell me anyway, and so they reel off the facts – pretty impressive. To test this, with various different children, we were from Germany, France and Holland to which we learnt their population. Finland failed.

2. “Hello lady, here is free bracelet for you.” Errm, no thanks. “No lady, free for you.” [Bracelet forced in my hand] “You buy from me later”. Uh-oh. Of course, we are then hawked down after visiting temple because they gave me ‘free bracelet’. “Please buy, only one daaaallaaaar” they whine.  

To further amuse you, James nipped to the shops on his own one evening, returning a little flustered. I asked why and here was what he was offered, all by the SAME guy:

“Hello sir, tuk-tuk?” No.

“You want joint?” No.

“You want lady?” No.

“Massage?” No.

“Opium?” No.

“Heroin?” Really no.

“Two ladies?” Slight hesitation… NO!

Oh, to be a tourist!

Anyway, so the Angkor complex; the eighth wonder of the world, which is why we are here. The templus (the official word for two or more temples, completely made up of course) were built between 802 – 1200 AD. This once was the capital of the powerful Khmer Empire. The complex stretches 25km wide and 10 km north to south (apparently the same size as Manhattan). Unbelievably, the whole city was abandoned in 1431 due to Thai occupation of Angkor. It wasn't rediscovered until 1860 by a French naturalist, then rather disturbingly, a French archeologist got his grubby mits on many of the most beautiful statues and carved stones in 1873 and took them back to France to 'enrich' their culture. There are still ongoing disputes about where they belong between Cambodia and France today. Ever since then, the templus have been cleared and are slowly being restored, primarily by France, but many other countries have poured money into conservation too, such as India and Switzerland. Many of the temples were modelled on Indian temples, with tall central towers communicating to the Gods above. Most were built with sandstone; easier to carve, with laterite used as the foundations.

We decided to do two days and a half days of the temples. Many would say this isn't enough, but actually it's pretty tiring! On our first evening, we climbed the rocky hill and temple of Phnom Bakheng to watch the sun set. It was absolutely bursting with tourists all trying to get the best picture. I of course managed to nab one of the best and highest (so not to get heads in the way) spots and watched the sky turn from bright beautiful blue to gray to orange, to pink and to red. We watched it disappear behind a cloud to then reappear from underneath it as though it were an upside-down sunrise. Magic. In the dusky light we explored a little and it was easy to see how much of the film 'Tomb Raider' was filmed here. Photos below:

Day 2 saw us exploring the Angkor Thom complex. Angkor Thom is a huge walled square full of dense woods and beautiful trees. The main road into the centre of it was a wide boulevard that reminded us of various royal estates in England. It included one of my favourites of them all, the Bayon. Dramatic, with wall after wall, level after level, passageway after passageway, smiling Buddha faces everywhere you look and intricate carvings in every nook and cranny. 

From the Bayon, we walked through the trees over to Baphuon and Phimeanakas, further through the trees and around the lakes on to the Terrace of Elephants and the Leper King. After lunch we then explored another of my favourites, the temple of Ta Prohm. This one was in the centre of another walled rectangle surrounded by enormous trees, except the trees did not stop growing on the outside of the temple; they had also taken over much of it. It was unbelievable to see such huge, old trees tangle its roots through the walls and bricks. I thought it showed perfectly just how old the temple was by the sheer size of the tree trunks. It was amazing and I felt a little like Alice in Wonderland, totally magical. 

Spot the face in the wall where this tree eerily and conveniently grew around.

Headless Buddhas; the works of the Khmer Rouge.

Day 3 then saw us up at 4.30am to race down the biggest and most impressive all the temples, the one we deliberately saved until last; Angkor Wat. Anyone who knows me knows I am not a morning person and really not my best at anytime before 9am. So, bleary eyed and chilly in the cool air before the sun heated it up, we stood, again with many others to worship the sun.We had one up on most people there though because being the good scouts that we are, we had cans of various coffees and mashed banana and Nutella baguettes! Unfortunately, the sun rise was not as spectacular as the sunset, but nonetheless it was enjoyable and I've never actually managed to get my butt out of bed for a sunrise before!

It was amazing how quickly the air was heating up once the sun had risen. After exploring Angkor Wat in the daylight, we took a tuk-tuk ride 20km north to a temple that was the furthest north of all of them. Banteay Srey is affectionately known as the Lady Temple. What is fascinating about this one, was because it was so far out, it was not discovered until 1914. It is a very small temple, with a walled square and moat surrounding it. The designs on this temple are the most intricate of all. Parts have been restored beautifully and the eye can clearly see Buddhas, elephants, serpents, dragons breathing fire, as well as horse and chariots, kings and servants and their swords, monkeys and the Khmer language. You could spend hours studying them. 

Our last day was spend chilling out, updating blogs and giving our bikes a once over, getting ready for the next day of travelling to Battambang by boat. Stay tuned.