I wrote this for the first time with pen and paper at night before bed (on the trip itself), following my shower and glistening with bug spray. There are mosquitoes here in Siem Reap that have a lot of bad diseases so I am trying to protect myself as best as possible. There don't seem to be any mosquito nets where I am staying, so I covered myself with spray (100% deet!), sprayed my pajamas, and sprayed my sheet. I brought the sheet with me and also am using it as my towel, so I am drying off with one side and spraying the other side with bug spray at night. Talk about multi-purpose....
I stayed with Savada (one of the girls in the dorm) and her family Monday and Tuesday night before we headed back to Phnom Penh on Wednesday morning. Both of her parents were gone when we arrived, but one sister is here. Her family runs a travel business from their home and live in the country about 3km outside of town. In one house at the front of the property lives one of her brother-in-laws (2nd floor) and several of the people who work for her family (1st floor). In the house in the back there is the office on the first floor, in addition to a living room-ish space, an empty room (where we stayed - only a mattress in there), a bathroom, and the room where her sister, another brother-in-law, and nephew live. Her parents live upstairs. There is one kitchen that everyone shares, and there is another small bathroom in there. They have a few cars, mostly because of their business, and have electricity. Still, there are no showers, just big buckets of water to use for a bath. This seems to be better than some of the homes where girls live because if they live further in the country, they do not have electricity. Apparently two of the girls are from really poor families, and one of them actually is from a fairly abusive family, so it is amazing she has been able to come live her and go to school at all.
We took a bus from Phnom Penh at 8:30am. It was supposed to take 5 hours, but it seemed to take more like 6 hours. The road was pretty good, but lots of honking as we passed people (if you are in a car, that is what you do to let them know there is a car there). As soon as we got out of town, which took forever!!!, we started seeing brren - trees, rice fields - along with cows and water buffalo. Even though the cows seemed to spend all their time eating, they were so skinny - bones sticking out everywhere. They were a very different kind of cattle then in the US. It was nice to see some nature since there really isn't any of that in Phnom Penh, but it wasn't exactly what I was expecting. Maybe just not as lush as I thought it would be, I guess. There were lots of little towns on the way - most of them on some form of stilits to avoid the floods of the dry season.
Crossing the might Mekong. See how brown it is? Lots of dirt from all the flooding right now.
A close-up picture of some of the houses right along the river.
The interior of the bus. I have no idea who thought frilly little things in this fabric was a nice looking idea. It was so strange! We also listened (loudly) to popular Khmer songs the whole way there. It wasn't so bad actually, kind of nice to have in the background.
The bus stopped two times on the way. At the first one we bought some snacks at a small conveniance story. I later left these on the bus by accident...oops. At the second we shared a bowl of khmer noodle soup (it sounded like noman chuk, but I know that is not right). It tasted like it might have had coconut milk in it, which is the first time I've had that in food here. That is very dfferent from Thai food where everything seems to have coconut milk. Likewise, I haven't had any curries, which suprises me a little because my sister-in-law makes curries a lot!
This is the first place we stopped. Another bus in addition to ours pulled up while we were there.
Savada buying some rambutan's (the red hairy things) for her family. I got a bag of fried bananas to try.
We got into Siem Reap at 3pm, and her sister picked as up at the station. As soon as the bus pulled in, it basically was attacked by tuk tuk and moto drivers, making it hard to even get off the bus, much less wait for someone to get you. Then, as soon as you made it through the throngs of drivers, you were attacked yet again, but this time by herds of children begging for food. They grabbed at everything you had, and it was pretty oppressive. It didn't exactly leave me with warm fuzzies about Siem Reap, that is for sure. I am glad I was with someone else because that would have been tricky to deal with on my own.
After making it to her house and dropping off our things, we went into town to check out some stores (one of the people who works for them drove us around the whole time we were there - it was nice!). The first places is called Artisans and was started in 1992 to revive things like traditional wood and stone carving. Today they also have copper making, painting by deaf women, and silk weaving on a silk farm outside of town (that we visited the next day!). We went on a free tour of the site, which was very interesting. If you think some things are overpriced, visit this place and take a tour. I guarantee it will change your mind!
Here is one picture from the workshop. There were so many to choose from, but this is all I will post now.
We also walked through the Old Market - Psaa Chaa - and all of the stores near there. The market is known for being overpriced, but I found some very good deals, perhaps because it is the low tourist season and because tourism overall is down from the economy (??), I found some scarves and t-shirts at one stall for great prices form a very nice woman who spoke good English. I spent $11 and got 4 cotton karma scarves and 4 t-shirts! It was $12, but I asked if $11 would be okay since I was getting so much. Afterwards, I felt a little bad because it really was so cheap. In general it was a very different shopping experience from the Russian Market in Phnom Penh, which is so messy and crowded and where the people don't speak English very well. Maybe I should have gotten some more things there, but I didn't have enough room to carry it all home!
A view into the market. Look how wide the aisles are...and there is a ceiling fan! The Russian Market feels more like a fire trap than anything else. Not at all like this place. Of course, this market basically is completely directed at foreigners and tourists.
Here is a crazy store in the market that is selling all kinds of dried fish and meat.
Afterwards we needed a snack to revive us after all the shopping :) At a stand outside, we got this thing that was sort of like crepes with egg and banana inside and then some sweetened condensed milk on top. It sounds strange, but it was very good!
Our snacks:
Then we wandered around a few of the streets with all fo the restaurants (pub street and the alley behind pub street). I got three nice rubbings in a small shop there for $5 total - very good prices so I am happy about that. They have lots of rubbings there, but none like that in Phnom Penh.
A stand in the market selling all different kinds of rice:
Here is a view of pub street at night. Like Siem Reap's Times Square :)
Tuesday morning we are planning to leave for Angkor Wat at 7:30am and basically do the temples all day. Then maybe go to this North Korean restaurant for dinner. I read about it in a NYtimes article about things to do in Siem Reap, and it sounds hilarious! Or, we might go to a place that has a buffet with the traditional Khmer women's dance. I wish there were time to do both! Then Wednesday we will take the bus back to Phnom Penh at 7:30am so no time for anything that day. Just a long ride back home.
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