Siem Reap, Cambodia

Just finished my second day of temple-hopping at Angkor and it was pretty much all that I expected. It's essentially a giant ancient city with dozens of sites spread out over many kilometers. I've been hiring a tuk-tuk for the day to ferry me around for about $15 USD. The most famous site is Angkor Wat. Most of them are varying combinations of gigantic thousand year old ancient temples and occasionally structures with other functions. They are all pretty impressive and it is something to imagine what this must have been like at the height of their civilization. Contrasting that with the general poverty all around me is somewhat disconcerting at times, though people here are very friendly and though I am often offered things to buy or asked for money, everyone usually has a smile to offer, especially when I try to speak the few words of the Khmer language that I have picked up.

Siem Reap is smaller and dustier than Phnom Penh but contrary to what other travelers told me, I find that people here hassle me less for moto and tuk-tuk rides, or perhaps I'm just getting used to it now. In any case I find the city to be somewhat charming though substantially more touristy than the capitol given the swarms of people coming in to visit Angkor. There's quite a lot of western pubs and restaurants and a large collection of upscale hotels but they are extremely out of place against their surroundings. My guesthouse is on a small side street, one side of which is for some reason covered with rocks leaving a small unpaved lane for motorbike and tuk-tuk traffic of which there is not much. There's not much else commercial on this steet, a few cigarette and food stands and people's homes. There are roosters running around and I often hear them in the morning. Once again, I hope the pictures will do the city more justice than the blog.

I'm really tired but I will try to write something more detailed soon. There are so many things I see to write about like unsupervised children everywhere begging, selling things, leading cows wherever one leads cows. I've seen legless or armless groups of musicians playing and trying to sell cds on tourist paths at Angkor, all landmine victims. I met a little girl who knew all the US states and their capitols, and a whole bunch of English, Spanish, Russian, Polish, and like 5 other languages. She wanted me to buy a t-shirt. Her name was Corn. My last day in Phnom Penh I went to the Killing Fields where the Khmer Rouge murdered thousands of people. There is a monument with 8000 skulls and mass graves that have thankfully been emptied but I heard not that long ago there were still bones all over. We saw only a few bones and some teeth. The background of the genocide throughout the country is very difficult to see and I'm sure even harder for so many people here to live with, including the repercussions of having all the countries teachers and intellectuals murdered and having to recover from that.

Anyway, I'm alive and having an interesting and good time and despite the awful history of the last 50 years or so, the people seem hopeful at least and I've met many who are in school at night and driving a moto or tuk-tuk during the day. I'm here for a few more days and then on to Bangkok. More soon...