Last day in Siem Reap, and we’ll be heading to Seoul Korea this evening. We woke up to the sound of loud music which started at 5 am. Apparently my friend had a visitor in his room, and the frog that we've seen outside several times made an appearance! We ate breakfast at the hotel and met Jac. We learned that the music is part of a local wedding ceremony in the neighborhood. We hired a car to go to Pnom Kulen Mountain, as the tuk tuk can’t make it up the mountain. It was a long drive, a really long drive, and a good bit of it was a very rutted dirt road. I was cursing the coffee I drank for sure!
I forgot to mention the high level of foreign investment here ranging from private individuals to non-profit organizations. Quite a few homes have signs either like “The American Wilson family lives here” or “Donation by Cares for Cambodia.” Many of the donated items are wells, schools and homes. There’s also a lot of construction, but we didn’t see a lot being actively worked. Jac explained that much of it was started a few years ago but has not been completed. He showed us a large hotel that has been under construction for five years!
A couple of things I forgot to mention previously (this is what happens when I don’t bring my travel journal with me!):
First, at the monestary that we visited yesterday, we saw a memorial to the killing fields in Cambodia, where thousands were violently killed and buried in unmarked graves during the Polpot/Khmer Rouge regime. It was a large building with glass sides filled with bones and skulls.
The second thing I’ve forgotten about is the fact that when we toured Angkor Wat, Jac told us that the scientists who excavated and repaired it were trying to determine how they got the blocks to stay together without mortar, and they found sticky rice between the stones! Rather ingenious, I think, though makes me wonder about eating it!
We got to the mountain and parked, and the humidity was so heavy it could be cut with a knife. There was a strong smell of lilies in the air, though unfortunately, I’m quite allergic! We saw lots of Buddha shrines, as we’ve seen all along this trip. We walked through the market of stalls and up a long set of stairs to where the sleeping Buddha lies. Jac said they don’t know exactly how long its been there, but for at least a thousand years. It was cut from a large bounder at the top of the mountain.
We then walked down and through the jungle a bit, and saw the largest spider I have ever seen. It was black and yellow like the last one we saw, but the leg-span was like that of a small bird! It had a huge web too. We then went to see the thousand Linga under the river, which was a really long set of carvings. I don’t think I’ll do it justice, but linga are an ancient item that is a square with an oval in the center that sticks up that the ancient people believed if you pour water over it, it has healing powers. The bottom of the stone riverbed is carved with a thousand of them.
Next we walked through the jungle further and came across a small village that had a lot of children running around. We continued walking over a wobbly wood suspension bridge, then through a really old ruin, that Jac said was undocumented so he didn’t know anything about it, to a large waterfall with several viewing points. The last was the most spectacular, and we climbed down a long set of stairs and and over several wood planks nailed into the rocks to view the waterfall. The spray felt so wonderfully cool with the humidity! We then stopped and tried a banana cake, which was roasted in a banana leaf with bananas and sticky rice. It was really good though quite sticky! We also stopped on the way to try some red banana, which were good. Only about four or five bites to them, and they tasted a little different than plantains but not much different.
We headed back, and while the drive didn’t seem quite as long, it still was lengthy. I enjoyed the trip but don’t think I’d recommend it. Certainly not as much as our last three days. I’m really sad to leave Cambodia as I’ve enjoyed it tremendously.
We made our way to the airport and were happy to still have the air conditioned car as we’re dressed in jeans since Seoul is much colder. the first flight got in early to Hanoi, but unfortunately, you can't check in until 2 hours before. We were sitting on some metal chairs without armrests just next to check-in, and a Vietnamese man sat down next to me. Then another squashed in between us! So I'm sitting on 3/4 of my chair, and he keeps looking over at me as if to say 'why aren't you moving over more?' Welcome to Asia, where the concept of personal space is very, very different!
Time to go check in!! Thank goodness.. my New England sensibilities and need for personal space are at their limits.
S
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