Cambodia: The Best And Worst Of Mankind
Door: senorita Laura
Blijf op de hoogte en volg Laura
25 April 2007 | Cambodja, Phnom-Penh
Hey Everybody,
We've been in Cambodia for the past 3,5 weeks and are about to leave for Vietnam tomorrow morning. We've spent a lot of time in busses. The roads are bad, the views are great. Cambodians put as much as humanly possible on any vehicle. We've seen scooters with six people or bundles of chicken and even cupboards on the back. Minibuses with loads of people inside, and about a dozen on the roof. The country also gave us a fake tan from the orange dust on the dirt roads.
Before Cambodia we still spent a few days in Bangkok. We saw the royal palace and the lying Buddha there. Both still as beautiful as six years ago. The temples and palace and all the Buddha’s are gold here, but it fits here, doesn't look tacky. The shopping I was planning to do last time resulted in buying the not so charming, but very comfortable fisherman’s pants and some silly t-shirts on Ko San Road. Also got my trousers fixed, as I do need something somewhat respectable to wear to the embassy, doctor and at the border crossings.:)
We took a bus to the Thai/Cambodian border and then caught another bus to Sisophon on the Cambodian side. We were planning a trip to a temple here, but as that was a 6-hour return trip on the back of a moto on a bad road, we decided to leave the next day. There were no busses leaving for Siem Reap from Sisophon, so we loaded ourselves in the back of a pick-up truck together with about 20 Cambodians. The road between the border and Siem Reap is in a terrible state as the government is getting money from an airline to NOT fix the road. So that was a rather uncomfortable four-hour trip.
In Siem Reap we rented bikes and bought a three-day ticket to Angkor Wat. We rode around the temple complex for three days and saw some beautiful temples, but of course nothing can beat Angkor Wat itself. It's been there since the 13th century and is still mostly intact. The temple is enormous and has lots of detailed carvings. Bayon temple was another favourite with hundreds of faces staring at you.
After Angkor Wat we took a tour to the north of Cambodia, Preah Vihear province. We visited Preah Vihear temple (on top of a mountain, very steep ride on the back of a moto to get there) Koh Ker (large pyramid like temple) and Beng Mealea temple (lots of climbing on fallen apart temple parts). We also saw the house and grave of Pol Pot, strange standing next to the grave of a mass murderer. During the rule of the Khmer Rouge,1975-1979, 3 million people were murdered. Almost 30% of the entire Cambodian population at the time.
We also spent the night in a small rural village. That was an amazing experience. The locals had almost never seen western people and they all came out to see us. There were four of us on the trip and we felt like we had to provide some entertainment as they were all standing there. So we did some silly tricks, said hello about a million times and the Aussie guys taught them Aussie Aussie Aussie, Oy Oy Oy (now everybody will know who came there before them :p)
Those people all had a smile on their face; it makes you wonder what we need all that fancy stuff for, coz I hadn't laughed like I did there in ages.
In the end we went to bed and the local children watched a film together on the one television the village had (no power here though, so they had a battery that they got charged in a village nearby)
We went to bed there...but we didn't get any sleep. Four people squashed together on a mat on the floor under a two person mosquito net is not very comfortable, and we also had the cows to keep us awake :)
After the trip we spent one more day in Siem Reap so I could find another doctor for my ear infection. First found a super expensive high tech hospital. The next attempt was a Chinese doctor with a torch who got the translator to say, "Yes, still some yellow" and then finally I found a real doctor who prescribed me loads more medicine.
We took a bus down to Battambang. There we visited some nearby temples from the comfort of a Tuc Tuc (apart from the holes in the road). Did lots of waving and hellos to the local children along the way who were greeting us. Felt a bit like the queen doing all that waving :p One of the temples was on top of a mountain. The temple itself wasn't very unique. But on that mountain the Khmer Rouge killed a lot of people by throwing them down 20 metre deep caves. There was a small temple in one of the caves where they found a lot of bodies. The temple contained the skulls and bones of the people they found there. That was the first time we really realised what happened here during Pol Pot's rule. Even though the evidence is there, you still can't believe it. How can people do these things to each other?
The next bus trip (on the Cambodian version of a motorway) was to Phnom Penh. We got stuck there for a day because it was Khmer New Year and the busses didn't run. So we went to the national museum and the royal palace. For us the new year was rather boring (throwing water is now banned in Phnom Penh) and rather annoying as for the rest of the week people tried to charge us more for everything.
We went to Banlung in Ratanakiri province next. There we visited a beautiful volcanic lake and three waterfalls. Though the water was nice swimming wasn't much fun as the Cambodian men were finding us a bit too interesting and were staring at us all the time.
Bus trip back to Kratie where we saw the endangered Irriwaddy dolphins and visited a rural island in the Mekong River.
Bumpy bus ride to Sen Monorom in Mondulkiri province next. Visited another waterfall and left the next day as the elephant ride we wanted to do was full. Got into a bit of an argument with our hotel as we didn't have water and nobody bothered to fix it. When we moved to another guesthouse we weren't willing to pay full price for the first hotel, and well they didn't really like that...
Veerrry long bus ride back to Phnom Penh. The bus trip got even longer as for some reason Cambodians eat a full meal every three hours (don't know where they're putting it all and where it's going, everybody is short and skinny)
We visited the Tuol Sleng genocide museum. This former high school was used by the Khmer Rouge as a prison during its rule. 14000 people were tortured and killed here. Only seven people survived. There were mug shots of the prisoners, photos of the bodies that the Vietnamese found after they overthrew the Khmer Rouge and paintings of the torture methods used and you could still see the blood stains on the floor. It was the most horrific thing I've ever seen. But everybody should know about it to prevent something like this from ever happening again!
Yesterday we visited the Killing fields at Choeung Ek. This is where the prisoners from Tuol Sleng were executed. You could see the mass graves where they found the bodies. There was a big white stupa filled with the skulls of all the people they found here..it was 17 stories high.
The bikes we rented got stolen during our hospital search (new doctor, still infection, new antibiotics etc.) The people we rented the bikes from were asking a lot of money to replace the bikes. In the end we paid them that amount as they wouldn't leave us alone after we paid them what somebody else had told us a bike should cost.
Today we went on our search for a hammock as they are hanging under all the houses. A woman helped us find a hammock and when we couldn't find a cotton one she remembered she still had two at home that she didn't use. We got invited to her house and she gave us mango's and lunch and the hammocks. She wouldn't take any money for it. When she was guiding us around later we finally got her to let us buy her a drink. It was a good experience for our last day here.
For the people getting this far into my far too long message, hurrah, you've made it! :p
Just have to upload some pics and then I'll be done.
Ciao Ciao,
Laura
We've been in Cambodia for the past 3,5 weeks and are about to leave for Vietnam tomorrow morning. We've spent a lot of time in busses. The roads are bad, the views are great. Cambodians put as much as humanly possible on any vehicle. We've seen scooters with six people or bundles of chicken and even cupboards on the back. Minibuses with loads of people inside, and about a dozen on the roof. The country also gave us a fake tan from the orange dust on the dirt roads.
Before Cambodia we still spent a few days in Bangkok. We saw the royal palace and the lying Buddha there. Both still as beautiful as six years ago. The temples and palace and all the Buddha’s are gold here, but it fits here, doesn't look tacky. The shopping I was planning to do last time resulted in buying the not so charming, but very comfortable fisherman’s pants and some silly t-shirts on Ko San Road. Also got my trousers fixed, as I do need something somewhat respectable to wear to the embassy, doctor and at the border crossings.:)
We took a bus to the Thai/Cambodian border and then caught another bus to Sisophon on the Cambodian side. We were planning a trip to a temple here, but as that was a 6-hour return trip on the back of a moto on a bad road, we decided to leave the next day. There were no busses leaving for Siem Reap from Sisophon, so we loaded ourselves in the back of a pick-up truck together with about 20 Cambodians. The road between the border and Siem Reap is in a terrible state as the government is getting money from an airline to NOT fix the road. So that was a rather uncomfortable four-hour trip.
In Siem Reap we rented bikes and bought a three-day ticket to Angkor Wat. We rode around the temple complex for three days and saw some beautiful temples, but of course nothing can beat Angkor Wat itself. It's been there since the 13th century and is still mostly intact. The temple is enormous and has lots of detailed carvings. Bayon temple was another favourite with hundreds of faces staring at you.
After Angkor Wat we took a tour to the north of Cambodia, Preah Vihear province. We visited Preah Vihear temple (on top of a mountain, very steep ride on the back of a moto to get there) Koh Ker (large pyramid like temple) and Beng Mealea temple (lots of climbing on fallen apart temple parts). We also saw the house and grave of Pol Pot, strange standing next to the grave of a mass murderer. During the rule of the Khmer Rouge,1975-1979, 3 million people were murdered. Almost 30% of the entire Cambodian population at the time.
We also spent the night in a small rural village. That was an amazing experience. The locals had almost never seen western people and they all came out to see us. There were four of us on the trip and we felt like we had to provide some entertainment as they were all standing there. So we did some silly tricks, said hello about a million times and the Aussie guys taught them Aussie Aussie Aussie, Oy Oy Oy (now everybody will know who came there before them :p)
Those people all had a smile on their face; it makes you wonder what we need all that fancy stuff for, coz I hadn't laughed like I did there in ages.
In the end we went to bed and the local children watched a film together on the one television the village had (no power here though, so they had a battery that they got charged in a village nearby)
We went to bed there...but we didn't get any sleep. Four people squashed together on a mat on the floor under a two person mosquito net is not very comfortable, and we also had the cows to keep us awake :)
After the trip we spent one more day in Siem Reap so I could find another doctor for my ear infection. First found a super expensive high tech hospital. The next attempt was a Chinese doctor with a torch who got the translator to say, "Yes, still some yellow" and then finally I found a real doctor who prescribed me loads more medicine.
We took a bus down to Battambang. There we visited some nearby temples from the comfort of a Tuc Tuc (apart from the holes in the road). Did lots of waving and hellos to the local children along the way who were greeting us. Felt a bit like the queen doing all that waving :p One of the temples was on top of a mountain. The temple itself wasn't very unique. But on that mountain the Khmer Rouge killed a lot of people by throwing them down 20 metre deep caves. There was a small temple in one of the caves where they found a lot of bodies. The temple contained the skulls and bones of the people they found there. That was the first time we really realised what happened here during Pol Pot's rule. Even though the evidence is there, you still can't believe it. How can people do these things to each other?
The next bus trip (on the Cambodian version of a motorway) was to Phnom Penh. We got stuck there for a day because it was Khmer New Year and the busses didn't run. So we went to the national museum and the royal palace. For us the new year was rather boring (throwing water is now banned in Phnom Penh) and rather annoying as for the rest of the week people tried to charge us more for everything.
We went to Banlung in Ratanakiri province next. There we visited a beautiful volcanic lake and three waterfalls. Though the water was nice swimming wasn't much fun as the Cambodian men were finding us a bit too interesting and were staring at us all the time.
Bus trip back to Kratie where we saw the endangered Irriwaddy dolphins and visited a rural island in the Mekong River.
Bumpy bus ride to Sen Monorom in Mondulkiri province next. Visited another waterfall and left the next day as the elephant ride we wanted to do was full. Got into a bit of an argument with our hotel as we didn't have water and nobody bothered to fix it. When we moved to another guesthouse we weren't willing to pay full price for the first hotel, and well they didn't really like that...
Veerrry long bus ride back to Phnom Penh. The bus trip got even longer as for some reason Cambodians eat a full meal every three hours (don't know where they're putting it all and where it's going, everybody is short and skinny)
We visited the Tuol Sleng genocide museum. This former high school was used by the Khmer Rouge as a prison during its rule. 14000 people were tortured and killed here. Only seven people survived. There were mug shots of the prisoners, photos of the bodies that the Vietnamese found after they overthrew the Khmer Rouge and paintings of the torture methods used and you could still see the blood stains on the floor. It was the most horrific thing I've ever seen. But everybody should know about it to prevent something like this from ever happening again!
Yesterday we visited the Killing fields at Choeung Ek. This is where the prisoners from Tuol Sleng were executed. You could see the mass graves where they found the bodies. There was a big white stupa filled with the skulls of all the people they found here..it was 17 stories high.
The bikes we rented got stolen during our hospital search (new doctor, still infection, new antibiotics etc.) The people we rented the bikes from were asking a lot of money to replace the bikes. In the end we paid them that amount as they wouldn't leave us alone after we paid them what somebody else had told us a bike should cost.
Today we went on our search for a hammock as they are hanging under all the houses. A woman helped us find a hammock and when we couldn't find a cotton one she remembered she still had two at home that she didn't use. We got invited to her house and she gave us mango's and lunch and the hammocks. She wouldn't take any money for it. When she was guiding us around later we finally got her to let us buy her a drink. It was a good experience for our last day here.
For the people getting this far into my far too long message, hurrah, you've made it! :p
Just have to upload some pics and then I'll be done.
Ciao Ciao,
Laura
-
25 April 2007 - 14:56
Nicholas:
Wow, you have certainly seen a lot in 3.5 weeks. I found a website with the killing fields - I can't understand such communal madness either. But its good you also found the humanity of the people.
Now for Vietnam - a different sort of madness...
NX -
25 April 2007 - 15:29
Saskia:
Hoi Lau,wat een ervaringen en niet allemaal gezellig. Zo zie je maar elk ras is net zo goed of slecht als elk ander ras! (en fietse jatten doen ze ook overal!)
Heb jij de kindjes in Cambodja al "in de manen schijn geleerd?" Dat is toch wel het minste wat je ze aan cultuur bij kunt brengen.
Papa en ik gaan 7 mei naar Japan, zijn we toch weer even in hetzelfde werelddeel. We gaan daar naar het Samurai bloemencorso in Nikko (Ab Jan zei: "dan koppen ze zeker de tulpen tijdens het corso, tsjak, tsjak, tsjak!") Ja, ja elke kans om een bloemencorso te zien moet je grijpen. -
25 April 2007 - 17:49
Henny:
Hoi Laura,
Niet slecht, op de derde plaats net achter je ouders! Je hebt inderdaad veel meegemaakt de afgelopen weken. Deze week stuur ik nog wel een mailtje om wat bij te kletsen. Zo ben ik o.a. inhet weekend van 14/15 april in Hillegom geweest en de reisleiding had voor een uitstekend programma gezorgd. Kortom, het was weer heel gezellig.
Veel plezier nog en pas goed op!!
groeten,
Henny -
26 April 2007 - 08:12
Nicholas:
I think this should be noted after "Just have to upload some pics and then I'll be done."... => "I'm finally finished with the blog + pictures. Been on internet for 6 hours now, far too long. better find some food and my bed afterwards now."
...but it all makes great reading and viewing :-)
N
PS: I suppose it was nice and cool in the internet cafe ;-) -
26 April 2007 - 10:36
Caroline:
Hallo Laura,
Indrukwekkend wat je allemaal te zien krijgt onderweg. Foto's illustreren e.a.goed.
Leuke kindertjes daar. Bedelen ze veel of valt dat wel mee.
Heb je nog last van je oor?
Goeie voortzetting van je reis.
Groetjes uit een zonnig (25 o) Hillegom!
Caroline
-
29 April 2007 - 16:11
Sarita:
Oooooh, ik ben veeeeeeeeeel te laat..., maar ja, dat komt omdat ik ineens geen internet meer heb thuis, helasement!
Misschien moet ik verhuizen (m.a.w. word ik eruit gegooid..)(de argentijn is nogal onbetrouwbaar..) dussssssssss dat wordt snel op zoek naar een kamer met internet!
Hoeii, ik ga zo naar een voetbalwedstrijd van Barça, in het stadion!!
Je reis klinkt echt geweldig.. hoewel eeeuhm.. cambodja niet echt heel erg gezellig klinkt..
Wie weet wie weet gaat ik volgend jaar naar china en tibet, dat is het nieuwe plan!
Nou, viel spass nog, groetjes aan Mijke!!
Ennnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn... ik laat je wel weten of Barça gewonnen heeft!
XXXXXSAaaaaaaaar -
30 April 2007 - 15:53
Maureen:
Hey Laura,
Wat een fantastisch verslag en foto's weer! Wat naar, dat je een oorontsteking hebt opgelopen; hoop dat je nu opgeknapt bent,want dit verhaal moet een vervolg krijgen!?
Het gaat je goed en een goede reis verder! -
02 Mei 2007 - 18:43
Miranda:
Hoi Laura,
Wat maak jij toch ongelooflijk veel mee!!! Pas goed op met dat oor, hoor! Groetjes van Esmée. -
16 Mei 2007 - 09:22
Nicholas:
Greetings from Rindou-no-ie ryokan in Nikko! They welcomed us as old friends and bookmarked this site to read about your travels. The temples were in sunshine this time round which made them even more beautiful :-) ... Enjoy your last days in Vietnam NX -
18 Mei 2007 - 12:25
Ayumi:
Hello Laura,
I'm meeting your father and mother tomorrow. It is very exciting.How about
your Asian world?
Reageer op dit reisverslag
Je kunt nu ook Smileys gebruiken. Via de toolbar, toetsenbord of door eerst : te typen en dan een woord bijvoorbeeld :smiley
