As inexpensive as Cambodia is to visit, the Angkor archeological park is actually fairly expensive for those that are not residents of Cambodia. $20 will get you in for one day, $40 for 3 days, or $60 for seven day passes. This is strictly monitored at most of the temples and you are given a photo ID card indicating the length of your admission privileges. Fortunately, Kalyssa is under 12 (by a few months) and is free. Unfortunately, as we pulled up to the ticketing booth, we didn’t realize that for a free under 12 child, you need a passport with you to prove that she is under 12. The guards at the checkpoint to the archaeological park said they would let her through, however, each temple has guards that check tickets, and it wasn’t certain that all of them would let us through. Our drivers suggested, that given that the temples were 15-20 minutes away and the hotel was currently 10 minutes away in the other direction, it would be best to return to pickup the passport and have it handy. I went ahead and did this with Pall, while, Natalie and the girls waited with Homm at the checkpoint.
When Pall and I were half way back to the checkpoint, he turned around while driving and handed me his cell phone and said “It’s your wife.” This struck me as just a little bit unexpected, but then my first thought was this couldn’t be good. She asked where the SD card was for her camara. Oooh, I know this one…its in the room, in my laptop….as I was using it while blogging last night…..sorry, would be happy to pick that up for you.
When we got to the hotel, I ran in and grabbed both items, and let Pall know what the purpose of the unusual call was for, and showed him the chip (without which my wife’s camera won’t function, and without which, I may leave Angkor without a wife…. As we pulled away, Pall asked me “Did you get the passport?” “Yes, I chuckled and responded.”
20 minutes later or so, we returned to the checkpoint, and we were finally on our way. We were driving along what appeared to be a very wide river. As we got to a bend in it, I realized the bend was a perfect 90 degree angle, and suddenly realized this wasn’t a river, this was the massive moat around Angkor Wat. This tremendous and perfectly square moat was created almost 1,000 years ago. While it would have been a feat today, what makes it more impressive is that it was built prior to the inventions of modern machinery. We continued around the moat, though we did not enter Angkor Wat, instead we started with Angor Thom.
Angor Thom’s primary characteristics are the dozens and dozens of Khmer faces on each of the towers. Walking through this temple as well as all of the other complexes was truly awe enspiring, to see the dramatic engineering feats of almost a millennium ago.
Upon first arriving, Natalie and Kalyssa took an elephant ride around the complex, while Allie and I did some early exploring. We then met up with them, and spent a good hour and a half walking around the complex and exploring the various halls and rooms of the complex before returning to our drivers under the increasingly hot Cambodian sky.
Our next stop was Ta Phrom, however, our drivers seemed to almost intentionally stop the Tuktuk directly infront of a couple Cambodian girls selling all sorts of trinkets. We listened to the script that would be repeated throughout the day: “For you, I discount, one dollah, sir please, just one dollaaa, I have post cards, very nice.” Of the two girls hawiking their souvenirs, the one, wearing an “NYPD” baseball cap, seemed somewhat bored with the routine, but carried on nonetheless. The other, was a little more self conscious, and would occasionally break character and giggle. After declining repeatedly, we ultimately gave in and ended up buying a few miscellaneous items.
After this episode, we continued to Ta Phrom. We made it through the courtyard and into the main structure when (names eliminated to preserve dignity…but thought its worth sharing for the humor of the story….) one of our group suddenly said… “Oooh….oooh…. I need a bathroom. Now. Really now….” Given the number of areas and locales of the countries we were visiting it seemed likely that this would happen at some point, and now was go time. (“Pun somewhat intended”). The bad news was we had just left our drivers, and they were circling the complex to meet us when we exited on the other side. We were only about one third into the complex however, and it made much more sense to back track. We did, and when we exited, we inquired of a young local girl of late teens/earlier twenties, selling items if there was a “toilet” (Bathroom is a western word…). She responded very kindly “No toilet, you can use the forest”. We explained we kind of neeeeded a toilet and she said, OK, its 3 kilometers that way. Ugh. So we found a tuktuk driver and headed out to the toilet. Aside from some temporary physical discomfort, we survived the ordeal, and a couple immodium later, were back in action siteseeing in Ta Phrom.
 |
| "Tomb Raider" Door |
 |
| Ta Prohm |
This site made famous, not only for many famous historical photos, but also for scenes from Tomb Raider with Angelina Jolie. These ruins are buried in the jungle, and many of the trees are actually growing directly out of the roof of the structure. This adds to the clear impression that this is an ancient structure, as the trees have amazingly wide trunks. Less restoration has been done on this temple, and many of the hallways are blocked by cave ins of the stone blocks.
After this temple, everyone was fairly hot and tired. Homm suggested a place for us to have lunch, that had air conditioning (a rare commodity in Cambodia) and we headed over there. The menus offered primarily Chinese dishes with a few western and Khmer twists here and there. Our meal was good, and we went out to talk to the drivers. Natalie and the girls were hot and tired and wanted to go to the pool. I on the other hand was interested in seeing more, and headed out with Pall to another temple.
Natalie and the kids headed back to the hotel with the intention of hitting the pool. However, the girls were exhausted and decided to take a nap instead. Our drivers had suggested a dinner show which included traditional Khmer music and dancing. This was at 7:00, so we planned on that, and Natalie took a shower and spent some time reading a book.
In the mean time, I headed out to one more temple. This one appeared very small, and as I walked in I got surrounded by the throng of touts selling postcards, keychains, flutes, and paintings. One young woman began talking to me as I walked, trying to sell her paintings, and hoping to get rid of some American quarters she had picked up. (In Cambodia, US dollars are the primary currency, and Cambodian riel are generally used in place of change (4000 Riel = $1) and coins are not used at all. I told her I would come back on the way out (as she appeared to have some pretty cool paintings. Shortly after entering the temple, which ended up being a very long and narrow set of ruins, a girl approached and asked me where I was from. When I said “America”, she recited the capital, current approximate population, president’s name, vice president’s name, and several other facts about the US. She then asked where I was from. I was quite surprised by the amount of American trivia the girl had memorized, and she continued to walk with me through the ruins. She asked me quite a few questions about me and my family, and where they were, and had a tremendous amount of knowledge about the structures (ie, many Buddhas are missing heads because of a Hindu regime that controlled the area around the 1200s that came in and cut off many of the heads. Each section of the temple I walked through she was able to explain the meanings of the carvings, and the history behind the temple. She explained that she really enjoyed hanging around the temple and practicing her English with tourists, and learning about different countries from them.
This girl was only 14, but had a very strong grasp of the English language and just a tremendous amount of knowledge about Khmer history, and the world. She said she was planning on coming to the US in 2017 and hoped to study teaching, so that she could become an English teacher. As we were walking, we walked past a man who had set up some wood carvings in a room in the temple, and was selling them. He began following for a while showing off his goods, against my persistent “no thank you’s”. At one point he showed me a wood carving of Apsara (a mythological nymph) which I thought would be rather nice. So I engaged him. The girl that was walking with me says “You do know that you do not have to pay his price. He will come down.”
As I neared the edge of the temple, I offered a couple dollars in return for all her assistance, (and realized I only had a five, so I gave her that. She was extremely grateful, and in return gave me some free keychains she had to pass along to my girls. (though she then did show me some of her art which she offered “at the same price she’d offer her friends.” This would normally be a common thing to say, though from the prices she asked, I think she was being honest. She said she was using the money to save for school, and from everything she shared over the last 45 minutes, she clearly was an extremely diligent student, so I did buy a couple items.
Outside the inner complex, I once again met up with the woman I talked to on the way in. I kept true to my promise to come look at her wares, although she clearly noticed I was holding a bunch of stuff that I bought in the temple, and expressed disappointment that the wood carved Apsara I was holding was very similar to several that she had. I negotiated hard on a painting that I only kind of wanted, (and spent 20 minutes or so doing so). Once we agreed on a price, she immediately snapped out of “sell mode” and we talked for another 15 minutes or so about me, my family, her background, etc. She was happy I had bought something as she said I was the first to buy anything, and it was already late afternoon. She had thrown in a can of coke with my purchase and I sipped that as I sat and enjoyed another opportunity to learn a little more about life in Cambodia.
After this, I headed back to my driver, and went back to the hotel. After a shower and some clean clothes, we all went out for a very nice dinner, wine, and a show. Our tuktuk drivers had suggested it, and accompanied Natalie to make the reservations while I was out exploring the temple. When the venue offered her a seating location, our driver told them, no that is not close enough to the stage, and got them to give us a front row seat. The food was pretty good, and though Kalyssa and Allie were exhausted and were falling asleep at the table, we all still enjoyed the show, and we headed back to the hotel to turn in early.
No comments:
Post a Comment