Angkor What??

We got a bus to Siem Reap on Friday the 30th of May, listening to all the latest Khmer hits, karaoke style. At a bus stop on the buses break we could buy delicious (and nutritious) deepfried crickets and bugs, with a sprinkling of chilli, mmmm crunchiness. We could also purchase fried tarantulas, which were huuge.



Arriving at the Siem Reap bus stop and getting off the bus was insane. Everyone was mobbed by like 50 taxi drivers, we couldn't get off the bus there were that many in front of the door.. all of them''miss miss, SIR SIR I take you!'' ''I talk you first.. you now come with me'' They grab you and try and pull you to their taxi..one took my bag off me and started to take it away. I ended up yelling at them to go away because you can't even talk to one with out another interrupting trying to talk to you. The reason they're all so crazily keen to take you is not because they're desperate for the $1 it takes to get to your guesthouse...it's because your taxi driver is usually the one who ends up getting the gig to drive you around the temples for the next few days, which is very lucrative.

Our driver Setirit took us around Angkor Wat area for 3 days.

Angkor, derived from a Hindu word means 'capital city'. And all around Siem Reap are the remains of the Khmer Empires various capitals during different kings reign. The Khmer Empire existed from the 9th to 12th centuries and was the biggest empire in SE Asia at that time, covering modern Cambodia aswell as Laos, much of Thailand, and the bottom of Vietnam. It was in the middle of the trade route between India and China, and there were many traders from both regions. However Hindu missionaries from India made a larger impression on the Khmers and their writing, culture, law and politics were thoroughly Indianised. Hindu was the national religion, Buddhism coming much later. The Empire fell into dissaray after the 12th century, and was left for the jungle. All the locals knew about it being there, there was a Buddhist monastery there, but they were happy to leave it as it was. It was not until a French explorer stumbled on it in the 1800s that it was re-introduced to Europe.

We literally wore our camera's out taking photos here, far too many to download here, so here are some from our favourite temples that we saw over the 3days.

ANGKOR WAT was built by the great Khmer god-king Suryavarman II in the first part of the 12th century. The King built Angkor as their state temple and dedicated it to one of the main Hindu gods Vishnu. Archaeologists reckon that Angkor was part of a wider metropolis that covered 1000km with a population of nearly 1 million. That's way bigger then any of the cities in Europe would have been at the time. It has lots of cool carved bas reliefs all around it with Hindu legends, and war battles. This is probably the most impressive and well known of all Angkor temples.

Bas-reliefs

Bayon is unsettling. Every which way you look in this crumbling temple you see this spookily serene face staring back at you. There are 37 towers (supposedly to represent the 37 counties of the Empire according to a random Khmer dude who told us) all with a Buddha-like head on each of its 4 sides.

TA PROHM

The second day we gave in to all the little sweet girls(but astute business people) and brought their trinkets and postcards. Thinking maybe that would ward off other little midget salespeople.. but if anything that just shows you have money and you can be convinced to buy. So we sat for 20 minutes having a drink, hoping the little girls would get bored and harass some one else, but no, they turned into petite zombies and like a broken record stood by our chairs and repeated '5 for 1 dollar, 5 for 1 dollar' for their little trinket hangy things.. we tried to talk to them, but they were determined to break us down.These little girls and also boys appear at EVERY temple. Luckily we are not swayed by little girl cuteness, otherwise you would all be receiving mini cross bows and tiny whistles as presents.


The third day we drove out to Banteay Srei, which is probably the most detailed of all the temples. The finale was meant to be Angkor Wat at sunset but a massive storm that came out of nowhere took care of that pretty quickly.















When we weren't hanging out at temples, we looked around Siem Reap which has lots of interesting places to hang out and have a drink, including one place that had crocodiles and a drink pulley system. Sounds a bit cryptic, but was very cool. And we didn't take any nice pictures, so you will just have to use your imagination!

Well this is it for Asia. Finally moving on to India!

After Cambodia, we hung out and did nothing in Bangkok for a few days before our flight to Delhi. It was hugely fun, to just hang out, knowing our way around the city and not having to consult a map. We caught up with friends we had met on our travels, had our last Thai massages and reunited with our favourite beer Chang.

It was a very good ending to our first 2 months, and we almost didn't want to leave...but all good things must come to an end....

So you can begin new good things!