Angkor Wat: Not just another temple

So this weekend was our weekend to travel. We could both feel the travel fatigue getting the best of us since we weren’t really that excited about this trip. But, we already had the tickets and we decided to make the best of it. After seeing so many amazing temples in Bangkok, we were fairly doubtful that Siem Reap, Cambodia and Angkor Wat had much new to offer. Boy were we wrong! Cambodia proved to be an altogether different experience and I’m certainly glad we went.

This trip was trippy right off the bad. Our flight was delayed by 2 hours and when the flight did arrive we had to catch a bus to get on it. Then we found out that we were seats 1a and 1b but we weren’t first class or anything. To top it all off, the airplane had exposed propellers like a crop duster and had cartoon fish drawn all over it. Needless to say we were a little apprehensive about the flight.

Our Plane to/from Cambodia

When we landed safely in Siem Reap (Thank God), we were surprised at how small the airport was and how few people were arriving compared to other tourists destinations we’ve been to.  Going through immigration was an adventure, since the immigration officials were sketchy. One guy asked Angel 3 times if she was from Mexico, and the other asked me for a tip on the down low. The nice surprise was that most all Cambodians speak English and take dollars, which feels like a foreign currency by now. The adventure continued as we were expecting a car to pick us up only to find out that there was a little guy name Bullfrog with a tuk-tuk who would take us to the hotel. After all was said and done, we were just happy to go to the hotel and get some shut eye.

Saturday was the day for us to go to Angkor Wat. We got up later than we wanted, jumped in our tuk tuk with our driver and our guide and made the 15 km or so trek. Even though Cambodians do speak English, it was hard to understand a lot of words because they pronounce “th” with a “shr” or a “fr” and they accent letters where Americans usually pronounce them longer. So “three dollars” sounded like “free dollars” and “meters” sounded like “mater”. But right from the start, both the driver and the tour guide were very polite and professional and hard working. I always have a special appreciation for people who do their jobs well without complaining.

The first impressions of Angkor Wat and the surrounding temples upon arriving was that there were quite a few tourists and it looked like all the temples were growing inside a jungle. Surrounding the whole area is a moat that I think is 4 km by 4 km and 3 meters deep. It’s a good way to prevent enemies from attacking you, that’s for sure. We were immediately treated to some monkeys and chickens that were cute. The downside was that almost immediately there were little kids trying to sell us postcards and little souvenirs. And these kids were relentless. They followed me one time for about 30 minutes and repeatedly told me to give them a dollar for what they were selling.

I won’t go into all the details of each temple since some folks may actually want to visit themselves. But we went to three temples; the Bayon temple, the Ta Prohm (Tomb Raider), and of course Angkor Wat. Each temple was amazing in its own way. One of the things that was evident right away was that the recent floods of Cambodia and the years and years of tourist activity had taken a huge toll on the temples. Most parts of each temple were closed because they were falling down or had fallen down.  But in a rare sign of cooperation amongst many countries, multiple countries had volunteered to sponsor the rebuilding of certain parts of the temple. The engineer in me was happy to be able to see how all the pieces were going to fit back together.  The Tomb Raider temple was beautiful with several little spots to duck in and get good pictures.  Also, the trees were growing inside the sandstone and causing the temple to fall. The temple rebuilders also took a poll; people couldn’t decide whether to cut down the trees to save the temple or to leave the trees since they have been there for centuries as well and have just as much right to stand. I tend to agree with the people who say leave the trees, because there are thousands of temples but very few with marvelous trees the size of the trees in Ta Prohm. We also found a neat little spot where you could make a loud Echo when you hit yourself on the chest at a certain spot (on your heart). The tour guide wasn’t really able to explain why, and although I’m sure there’s an official scientific definition, I’m just so amazed by all of these little details that people were able to come up with over a thousand years ago, purposely or not purposely.

After visiting the Banyon temple and the tomb raider temple, we were starving from all the walking and decided to take a lunch break. It was a good thing too, because just before we got in the tuk tuk it started pouring raining. The weather was pretty scary but thank God we were tucked safely away in the tuk tuk. I felt pretty bad for our driver who just had a pancho to cover him while he drove through the pouring rain and lightning. I’m sure we were all pretty relieved when we pulled up to lunch. After eating a delicious lunch, I was especially grateful to our driver and tour guide b/c they decided to take us to the outskirts of the park instead of having us eat lunch in the more jam packed area. We didn’t see either of them at all during our meal though, and I’m thinking there’s some law or code that prevents them from eating with the tourists. Kinda sucks though, b/c I hate the idea of people thinking they are beneath me. Anywho, the rain chilled out over lunch and we were ready to see the main attraction, Angkor Wat, the not so seventh wonder of the world.

Our visit to Angkor Wat

There is so much that is amazing about the temple, but one of the more amazing things is that it holds so much history and so much of the beliefs of the people. Like the temple at the Great Palace in Thailand, it holds multiple (hundreds) episodes of a story about King Rhama fighting against the demon God for the hand of his lover. This version was a bit different from the Thai version, but the art and the inscriptions were just as incredible if not better. Again, I was taken aback by the fact that someone did this a thousand years ago with the most limited technology. Those people knew something about hard work and attention to detail! Our tour guide also shared with us a very personal story of the reason that Buddhists in Cambodia drink their parents’ bones when they pass away! He had lost his father only a few months ago and we could see the love was very real as he explained how important the ritual is to show respect to his parents. Even though we probably won’t be taking it up, I can certainly appreciate his point of view and respect the importance of his parents to him.

As we wrapped up our tour of Angkor Wat, it started to pour down raining again. We hurried to our tuk tuk just before we got completely soaked and headed back towards the hotel. Good timing once again! The rest of the trip went by very quickly.   It was weird that when we turned the tv on in our hotel “America, the Story of Us” was playing and we couldn’t help but watch it. After getting some cheap delicious food from the hotel and lounging around till about 10pm, we called another tuk tuk and headed over to Pub street, a one block version of 6^th street. We had a late dinner at a place called Red Piano, which turned out to have good priced, good tasting, western food. (Also made famous by Angelina Jolie.) I decided to be brave and try a “fishy” foot massage where all the fish attack your feet and eat at the dead skin and other particles. Needless to say they were having a field day on my feet.  To close out the night, we partied at “Angkor What?” and Temple Bar for about 40 mins and then took it to the house.

Sunday we did some shopping (i.e. got hustled), had some cheap ice cream, and then road to the airport to the drum of even more rain. Cambodia was certainly an unforgettable experience, in both good and bad ways.