Before I get to Siem Reap, I have one more digression to get through--traffic. The photo to the left was taken outside of my guest house in Phnom Penh. Here the scooters ran up and down the street in every direction all day. Crossing this street was no easy feat--and this was a narrow street. When I was in Phuket, I thought there was a ridiculous amount of scooters. That was nothing compared to Phnom Penh and Siem Reap. Not only are there a million scooters on the road, but there are no apparent traffic laws. Not to mention there are cars, trucks, bicycles, and pedestrians in the mix.

To the left we see a family of (count 'em) five on a scooter. This was not at all uncommon to see. I wondered exactly where all of these people were going? These scooters just move along at a slow speed and somehow avoid hitting each other or getting run over. I did what I could to capture pictures from the back of my tuk tuk, but it took too much concentration and I preferred to sit back and enjoy the scenery. It was fun to relax in my seat and watch this total clusterf**k (I've never been one to use profanity in my blog, but this is the only way the traffic can be aptly described.) unwind and intertwine.

Imagine if you had this scenario in a U.S. city. People would be losing their minds and raging all over the place. Here everyone is totally accustomed to this and they just drive slowly and stay out of each others ways. There are no stop lights and the side of the road you should drive on is merely a suggestion. I had a driver go about a half a mile down a busy street driving down the left side of the road into traffic. This was a sight to behold. Oddly, there is an order in this total disorder. Everyone works together and it just works out somehow. They work together by keeping their eyes open and avoiding each other.

Here's another picture of scooters everywhere. I think the traffic is indicative of their society in that there are no regulations or laws, but somehow through the chaos they find an order that works for them. It's every man for himself, but nobody runs over another person in the process. It's a strange web of cooperation through doing one's own thing while avoiding others doing theirs. It may not be the most orderly society, but it sure is fascinating. I could have ridden around for days and just watched the traffic, but there was too much more to see.


Here we see a small family on a scooter and a little youngster looking back towards me. Luckily the kid didn't look directly at me because I would've probably been harassed for money. That week I didn't see a single wreck, but I did have about fifty close calls in the tuk tuk. It's crazy how close the traffic comes to one another. Anyway, on the topic of more to see... I've been going through my Angkor Wat pictures and will begin my journey through Siem Reap in the next entry. There are so many pictures and I'll have to make some difficult choices. However, expect to see some spectacular temples in the upcoming week.

Lost in the Market

After going through my pictures from my trip it was striking how few pictures I got of actual Cambodian people. There's a good reason for this, which I'll soon explain. First, about these children... I took this picture at the killing fields of these friendly youngsters. Then I had to pay them. These same children later swarmed me in the parking lot outside after multiplying in numbers. This is really common, as there are children everywhere looking to make a buck to take home to their dirt poor families. I'll get further into this in a moment, but first I want to share an anecdote of what happened in the market after lunch in Phnom Penh.

I went to the central market area to look around and see what kind of bargains I could find. Mainly, I was looking for some light clothes since I packed very lightly. I should preface this by saying that it was extremely hot and humid this day, as every day was during my visit. The market was covered and everything was close together. In other words, it was absolutely sweltering. While I was at one particular stand looking at various shirts presented by the vendor, an industrious young boy stood next to me and vigorously waved his fan toward me. Since the killing fields I had grown weary of the children begging me for money, so my instinct was to ignore him until he went away. However, the fanning was greatly appreciated so I figured I'd employ his services. He also guided me through the market and showed me a place where I could find a 5 dollar Rolex. As I followed him, he'd often peer over his shoulder and flash a cute grin of satisfaction and excitement to be employed. While I looked at watches, he continued to fan me and I really wanted to take his picture when I was done. Then it happened...

Another kid caught sight of me tipping the boy and ran up to me and started fanning. Then another one came up, then another. Before I knew it, I was surrounded by children with their hands out, begging me for money. I couldn't convey to them that this boy had performed a service and was rewarded for it. These children literally chased me around the market, and I got lost in the labyrinth. I had to walk out of the market and down the street until they finally stopped following me. In this process I realized that I came out on a completely different side than I walked into and couldn't find my driver. I had to go back into the market and figure out where I came in while avoiding the children. Let me tell you, after the lunch I had this is not what I wanted to be doing. I wandered for a good half hour through the sauna-like market until I finally found my driver. I went straight back to the guest house from there and went straight to my room and had a rest. I was exhausted and overwhelmed by the afternoon, and needed to re-group before the royal palace (last entry).

This incident was indicative of a very unfortunate aspect of the Cambodian tourist industry. Everyone wants a piece of the money, and people are desperate. The rest of the week I never felt comfortable chatting with the locals because they were always trying to sell me something. They're also very aggressive about it. Every time I would arrive at a temple in Siem Reap, for example, there would be rows of vendors yelling: "Sir, cold beverage?", or "Sir, need scarf for your girlfriend?", or something in regards to what they were selling. The most unfortunate aspect of this is that they put the children to work. I wanted to buy things from children, but wouldn't because I would be swarmed by 15 other kids and they wouldn't leave me alone. I realized that I wasn't helping these people by paying children for services, but rather encouraging parents to put their kids to work. Over the course of the week, I must have bumped my head fifty times from keeping my head down to avoid eye contact. Very unfortunate, indeed.

Because of that I didn't take pictures of people. It's considered rude to take pictures of people in this culture without asking permission, but if I asked permission they'd want money and I'd just draw attention to myself and get swarmed. I took a few shots from the back of the tuk tuk, but it's difficult to get a good picture in a moving vehicle which is covered. So, what did I take over 400 pictures of?, you might ask. Mostly temples, is the answer. There will be many pictures to come of Siem Reap and the incredible temples of Angkor. Also, there will be some pictures of traffic, which is an entry in itself.

After lunch

Later that day, I would take a visit to the Royal Palace near the riverfront in central Phnom Penh. While I'm jumping directly to this, I'm skipping what happened in a trip to the market right after lunch. This portion of the day merits it's own entry, and I want to save that for now since it deals with a bigger issue that would constantly rear it's head that week. After the market, I took a rest at the guest house for a couple of hours and went to the royal palace by foot at 5:00 that evening. I've discovered that I appreciate fine architecture and enjoy looking at different buildings, and this series of buildings didn't let me down.

The thing that immediately hit me about the palace was the grandiosity in the middle of extreme poverty. While I had started my day seeing filthy, third-world living conditions and desperate people, this place was a sanctuary. Compared with the pictures from the last blog, the obvious disparity in cleanliness, order, and prosperity is striking. The plants and greenery are meticulously manicured, and the buildings are impeccably cared for. There were few people here, and it was quiet. It was nice to get away from the complete disorder I had seen all day.

To the left is a miniature model of the mother of all temples: Angkor Wat. Imagine this architecture on a vast grand scale, where one could easily spend a day without scratching the surface. This is just a teaser of what I would witness Sunday. I won't talk about it yet, but thought this model would give food for thought. The pagoda in the background is pretty impressive in it's own right. I've been to the biggest and best palaces in Korea and none of them come close to the one's I saw this week, nor do they come close to the one's in Bangkok, for that matter. Honestly, compared to Thailand and Cambodia, the temples and palaces in Korea are quite underwhelming.
There are pretty cool pagodas around Korea--I saw many in Gyeongju--but none of them carry the grace and artistry of the pagodas in this region. Having said that, that's about all I could possibly say about pagodas other than: "Look at the picture... pretty neat, huh!". I would go back to the guest house after that and have dinner. After an early start and plenty of activity in stifling heat, I turned in pretty early that evening. I had to get on a bus to Siem Reap at 7am the following morning, and had little desire to go out on the town given the heavy nature of my day in Phnom Penh. I spent the evening chatting with some local expats at the guest house bar, but declined to hit the town that evening. The next morning, I checked out early and embarked on a 5 and 1/2 hour bus ride to Siem Reap.

Sunny Cambodia

Wrapping my head around my experience in Cambodia and sorting through the 400 some-odd pictures I took is a somewhat daunting task, but I'll do the best I can. "Why Cambodia?" is a question I often heard before I left, and I wasn't exactly sure myself. I guess I was looking to see a different culture and gain a broader viewpoint of the world around me. As a certain idiot-buffoon (I could fill a book with descriptives, but I'll stop there) said: "Mission Accomplished." I arrived late on a Wednesday evening and did little except check into my guest house and chat a bit with the owner--a nice Irish expat named Rory. We stayed up a bit, drank Irish whiskey, and talked about travel and Cambodia. This was in Phnom Penh, the capital. My plan was to hang out in Phnom Penh Thursday, and take a bus to Siem Reap Friday morning. I would start my tour of the capital at 8 am the next morning, which was the latest start I would have all week.


After breakfast at the guest house, I employed the services of a tuk tuk driver. A tuk tuk is a covered wagon pulled by a motor scooter. I would spend a lot of time on these in my time in this country. These drivers will cart you all over town wherever you want to go and wait for you while you look around--all for about 12-15 bucks a day. It's a great way to see the city in an insulated environment. While I am an avid walker, Cambodia is definitely not a place you'd want to walk around in. In the confines of South Korea, I can walk freely down any street in any city and have never once felt unsafe. I wouldn't say the same here.

See what I mean? This is not exactly a pedestrian's paradise. This country is POOR. It was striking to me when I rode a taxi from the airport to the guesthouse how ghetto the capital looked. I thought it might have just been that stretch of road, but it certainly wasn't. Riding in the tuk tuk from one tourist attraction to the next, I witnessed poverty like I'd never seen. The majority of these people live in shacks, with no running water or electricity. Public utilities and sanitation are nearly non-existent here. Building codes?? Yeah, right. Families are happy to have a roof over there heads where they can take respite from the blazing hot sun.

Since the ride had been so inspiring so far, my driver wanted to start at the killing fields. Briefly, the Khmer Rouge regime, under the leadership of Pol Pot, came into power in the late 70's and worked to transform the populace into a peasant slave class. Within days of their rise to power, they had sent men, women, children, and elderly to the fields to work grueling 14 hour days. Any form of dissent warranted execution. In fact, they executed innocent people just to keep the populace in fear. The skulls in this picture fill the entire building pictured at the beginning of this entry. On this day, the killing fields were a quiet and pleasant place with trees and flowers masking the horrors of the past. To their credit, the people of Cambodia are not in denial about this cruel and disgusting part of their recent history. They've used it as a tool to bring tourism and help their impoverished economy, and it feeds their national identity. After all that horror, they're still here. It would be impossible for me to visit this city and not admire the peoples' tenacity.
After the killing fields, I went to the genocide museum, but there's a stop in-between that I want to mention first. My driver was taking me on a circuit that appealed to tourists, so I figured he knew the places better than I did. My ears were tweaked from the flight, so I was a little hard of hearing as to the next destination--not to mention his thick and hard to understand accent. We ended up at a firing range on a farm where for 15 dollars you can have the privilege to fire an AK-47 at a target. I refused to do it, and bought a beer to be polite. After seeing the carnage of the killing fields, the last thing I wanted to do was fire a weapon designed to kill other humans. By the way, the vast majority of the victims were bludgeoned to death because they couldn't afford to waste money on bullets. I wasn't allowed to take pictures at this place, but I did witness an American tourist posing with his freshly fired AK for his complimentary picture. This left me with a really uneasy and disturbed feeling. I felt quite sick at that moment, actually.
The genocide museum was no less gloomy than the killing fields. This was a high school that was renovated into a prison where the Khmer Rouge would detain and torture peasants and soldiers alike. They took tedious records of every prisoner and kept their photos, much like the Nazis did. With the above picture, one can use their imagination how these devices were employed in the torture of helpless victims of one of the cruelest regimes ever. Sadly, some of these techniques are still employed by so-called civilized societies. This is a picture of a cell in which a prisoner was kept. Trust me, this was tiny. Prisoners would be kept in these cells for months on end and would be fed porridge (a very nice way of putting it) out of rusty bins. This was a holding facility for the poor souls that were killed at the first stop of the tour.




After all this immediate poverty and gloom, I decided to take a break. I stopped on the riverfront at a famous pizza joint and had some of the most delicious pizza I've ever had. My heart and mind were heavy at this point, but I also realized that I was on vacation and wanted to enjoy myself. I dined at "Happy Herb's Pizza". The name is a play on words... the owner is a jovial guy named Herb. Nobody told me that and I never met him, but I'm pretty sure that's why the place is named that. The pizza was great and later that afternoon I ... I ... well, I don't really remember what happened. I remember the Heineken cost 80 cents. This pizza must have had elements of Chinese food, because I was hungry half an hour later.