Most of our daytime hours in Kampot were spent with Chuck, a remork driver and guide we hired to take us to the salt fields, pepper plantations, and to see regular life around the Cambodian countryside. We rode through a fishing village. Small wooden houses sat very close to the road, reminding me of old main roads curving through little towns all over the rural U.S. The similarities stopped there. These little houses of unpainted wood sat high on stilts. Under the stilted houses, families gathered on platforms that looked like bed frames–eating and working all together, sorting beans, sewing, and talking. Hammocks swayed nearby, shoes lined up by the doorsteps. Chok told us this was a Muslim fishing village that speaks Cambodian/Khmer, while Muslims in Phnom Penh speak Arabic.
Bull / Ox near Kampot Cambodia.
Pepper Plantations and Salt Flats
Chuck took us to a pepper plantation, where acres of peppercorn plants grow around rows of brick pillars and wooden poles. Black, white, and red pepper are all grown from all the same plant. Fresh peppercorns were drying in the sun, and we sampled each variety, biting into one little peppercorn at a time. Sharp kicks to the tastebuds, followed by a little coughing, and a lot of water. We also saw acres and acres of salt flats. Sea water is flooded into the fields and then blocked. And then they wait. Evaporation leaves behind salt, which is gathered, treated with iodine, packaged and distributed in Cambodia.
Warehouses along the salt flats in Kampot, Cambodia.A worker in the salt flats, Kampot, Cambodia.Little red-roofed house amid the salt flats, near Kampot, Cambodia.Peppercorn plants growing under netting near Kampot Cambodia.Peppercorn plants growing around bricks, Plantation near Kampot Cambodia.Sorting and drying peppercorns at a plantation near Kampot, Cambodia.
Palm Oil
Later I noticed an ant of a man climbing palm trees. Chuck stopped and told us the man was collecting palm oil. Ladder-like rungs were nailed into the trees for ease of climbing, and bamboo-shaped plastic buckets hung in bunches with the foaming oil. We passed thatched roof barbershops, kids on bikes coming home for lunch, workers in the fields, attentive and angular cows, chickens with baby peeps on their heels, railroad tracks, red dirt roads, potholes, puppies, the bluest blue bird, and loads of little kids who beamed big smiles from doorways, waving and shouting “hello!” Life is so hard, and yet they smile.
Climbing up to get the palm oil. Near Kampot, Cambodia.Palm oil containers. Near Kampot, Cambodia.House on stilts, near Kampot Cambodia.
Raindrops in Cambodia
As we rode around in that remork, seeing so much, I had this feeling that time is wasting and going by too fast. There’s never long enough time to stop, to linger.
It pounded rain overnight, on our last night in Cambodia. We were in Siem Reap again, and we’d spent the hour before bed repacking and preparing for the trip to India tomorrow. It was long after midnight and I was restless, unable to sleep as I listened to the rain.
I stepped barefoot out onto our covered patio. The rain was furious, giant drops, straight down, and as solid as a wall. It smelled fresh and wild, mingled with the scent of the oil from the still-burning bug candle near the door. I curled up in the wicker chair, to watch the rain.
We’re always moving on. Or maybe it’s really just waiting to move on, to start over on life number two, or life number 2,000. What would it feel like to recognize that I’d just been reborn as a merit bird in Cambodia—destined to be caught and released, again and again and again? Or maybe I’ll come back as a color—like the orange of a monk’s robe. Or maybe I’ll be recycled as a degree of humidity, or a particle of red dirt. Or maybe a single raindrop in a monsoon.
Riding in the remork with Chuck, near Kampot Cambodia.Until the cows come home, near Kampot, Cambodia.A cow looks back. Near Kampot, Cambodia.Friendly dog along the road in Cambodia.Rice field in Cambodia.
Kampot is a small town on the Praek Tuek Chhu river just southeast of the Elephant Mountains and about three miles from the Gulf of Thailand. The town is known for salt fields, pepper plantations, and its French colonial architecture. We were looking forward to seeing more of the Cambodian countryside.
Cow near a Cambodian People’s Party building, Cambodia.
Phnom Penh to Kampot
It was supposed to be a three-hour bus ride, but it took five. Locals were headed to the coasts on this Chinese New Year weekend. Markets seemed to sprout up on the streets around us–either serving the traffic or causing the traffic as people in waiting cars got out to shop. People held their plastic bags high to squeeze between buses, cars, and motorcycles as they returned to their vehicles. Some cars going our way tried to avoid the market madness by passing on the other side of the road. But they stopped too, and then no one could get anywhere. Parking lot.
We were next to a car packed with eight people, including a granny with her neck stretching to catch a breeze, her bony little hand gripping the door as if to hold the window down. We saw monks walking through the market in saffron robes with yellow umbrellas and orange bags—barefoot. Barbershops under thatched roof huts. So many dirt roads cutting off from the main road, inward to the countryside. Loudspeakers of chanting around a temple or shrine. And the heat. Always the heat.
Monks making their rounds in Cambodia.Roadside barbershop in Cambodia.
Kampot
At last, we arrived in Kampot, and made our way to Rikitikitavi. A beautiful small hotel filled with art and geckos, and made more beautiful by the bonhomie of the Cambodian staff—Celine, Thean, Romly, “Monkey” and Pat.
After dinner and after dark, when the temperature was more reasonable, we walked along the river. The old wooden bridge was lit up like Christmas. Kampot’s bars and restaurants were hopping with tourists and expats galore, plus night-roaming dogs, cats, and bats. We stopped for mojitos at Cuban bar called Camp Potes, run by Jean-Jacques—“just call me Jackie”—a Frenchman from Reunion. Shelves behind his bar were filled with jars of Jackie’s homemade flavored rums and the place was decorated like a Havana living room. Salsa music blared from a single speaker. Later, we walked to a small market a mile down the river where a movie played in the night sky and neon-lit carousel rides ran for kids.
Math lesson. Kampot, Cambodia.Rice waiting. Kampot, Cambodia.High rise. Kampot, Cambodia.
Sorrow in Kampot
We ambled around the town sampling food and drinks, and browsing the shops and the clothes that hung on sidewalk racks (it finally dawned on us that these clothes are not for sale, but are laundry that’s been sent out.) One day, a crowded van drove by. The back doors were open and two live ducks hung upside down from the rear bumper, their beaks sometimes touching in the exhaust, the heat, the fear, the disorientation. My heart broke for them. And as I fell into sorrow, the yellow thread of the granny monk’s blessing caught on my camera and snapped.
The next morning, very early, we heard music. It reminded me of a popsicle truck, or one of those old jewelry boxes with the plastic ballerina, but with an asian twang. Was it from a temple or shrine? A 6 a.m. alarm? We asked Monkey. “It’s very sad music. For funeral.” That music played most of the day—coming and going in wafts like the smell of flowers. Soothing. LISTEN:
Kampot’s floating houses on the Praek Tuek Chhu river, Cambodia.The old white wood Entanou bridge over the river is for motorcycles and pedestrians only. Kampot Cambodia.
As I fell off to sleep that night, I wondered…maybe when we die, a popsicle truck comes for us. And then I felt sad for Cambodian children in the USA who hear the popsicle truck tunes coming down their street. I dreamed of ducks flying overhead, and of ducklings running after an unseen mother across a red dirt road.
Crossing a railroad track in the Cambodian countryside near Kampot.Looking across the Praek Tuek Chhu river at dusk. Kampot, Cambodia.
Early one morning, we waited at the Siem Reap bus station, watching a woman sweep up leaves and trash from the gravel and dirt parking lot. Baffling, quixotic–and beautiful as the sun silhouetted her in a cloud of pink, glowing dust.
Our Giant Ibis bus ride to Phnom Penh would be six hours, including a few breaks. We had a driver, a back-up driver, and an attendant who announced “comfort breaks” and handed out a bottle of water and a smashed croissant to every passenger. Once out of Siem Reap’s morning traffic, the drivers drove like the road was a racetrack. They jabbered on their phones while driving, and one drove single-handed as he peeled and sucked on a piece of fruit so enthusiastically I could hear it from row five.
I concentrated on the Cambodian countryside:fairytale haystacks—tall and egg shaped, small houses sitting very high on stilts (how much monsoon-season rain necessitates that height?!), curled roof lines, red dirt paths heading off into fields and neighborhoods, an open warehouse of spirit houses for sale, a white ox with a neck hump wallowing in a pond, a rabbit-eared cow waiting in front of a golden gate, a front yard filled completely with a three-foot layer of empty plastic bottles, cooking oil (or gasoline?) in glass coke bottles for sale, a wooden house with a single red potted flower hanging by the door, an ornate white throne-like sofa with garish gold trim for sale on the roadside, colorful coffins at a coffin maker’s shop, a roadside market with attendants hanging in hammocks above tables of unwrapped meat, and always—that red, red Cambodian dirt.
Cambodia’s motorcycles and red dirt roads, Siem Reap to Phnom Penh.Floating village on the Tonle Sap River, Cambodia.
Phnom Penh
Six hours later, we arrived into a hot, sticky Phnom Penh and checked into the Monsoon Boutique Hotel. The hotel was near some questionable establishments but it was clean and cheap, and just a five-minute walk from the river, restaurants, and bus station. Our concealed balcony overlooked any bawdiness on our late-night street.
On Chinese New Year, about twenty ladies dressed in red from the bar next door spilled into the street to celebrate. Despite the mid-day heat, the Chinese dragons and lions danced for more than an hour to bring good fortune to the bar and the community.
Chinese New Year celebration in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.
At a shrine by the Mekong River, pink and white lotus flowers were arranged with incense sticks in coconut vases, waiting to be purchased as offerings. Not 25 feet away, dumpsters overflowed with yesterday’s discarded—but still fresh—offerings. In the middle of the shrine crowd, a small cage teeming with twittering finches sat on the sidewalk. I later learned these were “merit birds”. Tiny wild finches are captured and caged. Worshippers buy a merit bird to release during prayers—signaling forgiveness and a return to good. Many birds will be captured again, sold again—repeating the cycle like reincarnation, or sin and forgiveness—again and again and again. All those tiny souls, waiting to be bought, waiting to fly free, all at the whim of guilty and guilt laden humans.
The Preah Ang Dorngkeu Shrine along the Mekong, Phnom Penh, Cambodia.Lotus flower arrangements near the Preah Ang Dorngkeu Shrine, Phnom Penh, Cambodia.Discarded offerings of lotus flower arrangements near the Royal Palace, Phnom Penh, Cambodia.
When we passed back through Phnom Penh later in the month, we stayed at the Foreign Correspondents Club on the banks of the Mekong River. This place was popular with foreign journalists and aid workers during civil wars and unrest. Our room was a delightful step back in time with squeaky, shiny wood floors and french doors opening on to a balcony with an old-school tile floor, overhead fan, and wooden chairs overlooking the Mekong River. I sat transfixed out there—freshly showered, with a steaming cup of coffee, journal, and camera, staring at the mighty Mekong as the water went pink in the coming light of dawn and orange draped the skies at dusk when the neon lit up.
The balcony at FCC, Phnom Penh, Cambodia.Morning on The Mekong River, Phnom Penh, Cambodia.
The Mekong River
The river called to us as we sat watching the world go by from our FCC balcony. One evening we took a sunset cruise on the Tonle Sap and Mekong. As we waited on the quay for our boat, a child of no more than five years old was begging near the street. His fist was tightly clenched around his Cambodian Riel folding money—maybe it was safer in his fist than in this pocket judging by all the kids around him hustling for money and food. I asked one of the boys where he lived—and he pointed out to the river.
As we would soon see, there are villages so very poor on the banks of the river. Dogs barked, and lush green rice fields passed by. And in the shadows of a 5-star, high-rise hotel and just across the river from the neon lights of Phnom Penh, sit hundreds of crooked tin shacks on stilts, and tents housing entire families on small fishing boats. The fishing boats were preparing to go out at dusk. Men hopped along the boats, moving things and we saw a woman untangling nets while nursing a baby.
River cruise boat docking on the Mekong, Phnom Penh, Cambodia.Village along the east bank of the Mekong River, Phnom Penh, Cambodia.A fishing boat pushes out near the Sokha Phnom Penh Hotel, Cambodia.
The boat’s motor denied the river current’s attempt to sweep us downstream to Vietnam. Waiters brought us drinks and told us precisely when the Tonle Sap merged into the Mekong. Musicians played sad and delicate string instruments. Cambodian hosts asked us three times if we were enjoying their country, this city, this boat. “Yes, we are”, we smiled. They beamed. The Cambodians on the boat worked so hard to make the cruise nice for us. And when I learned the boat was owned by a Texan, only then was I disappointed—I wish I’d looked for a Cambodian-owned river cruise.
Fishing boats preparing to go out at dusk, Phnom Penh, Cambodia.Fishing in an orange dusk on the Tonle Sap, Phnom Penh, Cambodia.
Later, I sat on the FCC balcony watching the Mekong and all the mopeds’ bouncing headlights go by. I wondered what it’d been like here before all the outside influences, before wars, before motorcycles. A large man in a suit was walking with his dog along the river—he stopped to pick up the Bulldog’s poop and the dog wandered into the busy street. I held my breath, wishing that dog to be safe—and the motorcycles flowed around him like water running around a rock. The dog jumped back onto the sidewalk and caught up with his person. Does it maybe work like that sometimes? Does a wish thrown into the universe sometimes work like a Harry Potter Patronus charm? Can we wish good on people, on the environment, on animals, and it come true? A Golden Retriever went past, ears flapping and smiling up at me from a remork’s side car…maybe that’s a “yes”.
Our days in Siem Reap passed quickly. Remork rides with Sothea were a favorite part of every day–quiet, almost chilly morning rides to the temples and refreshing breezes in the chaotic afternoon traffic when we returned to our hotel.
Cambodia has this red dust. It colors the sky with a diffused, hazy pink at dawn and at dusk, and coats everything with a layer of grit. Hundreds of booths selling water, postcards, and snacks line the roads around the temples. One afternoon, we passed a woman sitting in the shade on the roadside, doing needlepoint—in all the heat, humidity, traffic, and dust—-calmly and fastidiously working on that fine material. I wonder if her hands have that sweaty grit, or if the material feels as dirty as my clothes do after just one day.
Ta Prohm and colorful wrists
The Ta Prohm temples are covered in strangler fig and silk cotton trees. French restorers decided to leave it as it was found so tourists could see it as the “finders” first saw it and demonstrate the power of neglect for ruins near a jungle. Work has been done to stabilize the ruins, to build walkways for tourists, and to maintain a look of “apparent neglect”. There are clink-clink-clink sounds of hammering as workers remake designs on concrete and stone amid all those tree roots slowly inching into the old buildings.
Ta Prohm’s strangler fig trees, Angkor Wat, Cambodia.Workmen rebuild and remake parts of Ta Prohm, Angkor Wat, Cambodia.Trees prying into the ruins of Ta Prohm, Angkor Wat, Cambodia.
We walked through the area in the morning, when it wasn’t yet jam packed with people. In one of the alcoves, a woman sat with baskets of string bracelets, incense, and a donation bowl. I stopped to look and we smiled at each other. I placed money in her bowl and she picked up a yellow woven bracelet and whispered a chant as she tied it to my right wrist, and without letting go of my hand, added a second blessing bracelet of bright red and pink braided over a purple thread. I motioned for permission to take her photo and she nodded yes, and gave my camera a shy smile. Later, as we stopped in a line of people in another alcove, a second blessing lady smiled at my colorful wrists. I smiled back and squatted down to put a donation in her empty bowl. She quietly sang a chant while adding a blue bracelet and then a braided yellow and red one. These women sit there among all the tourists, waiting and watching–and ignored by many who walk by. I wanted to spend a few minutes with these ladies, and get their sweet and simple blessings. It certainly can’t hurt to give a few dollars, spend a moment together in a place so special, and come away with good spirits and colorful wrists.
Blessing giver in Ta Prohm, Angkor Wat, Cambodia.
Overwhelming
We returned to the area where all the remork drivers waited. To pass time in the heat, some drivers napped in hammocks, others sprawled out in their carriages—feet or hands dangling over the sides. Angkor Wat has so many temples and things to see: Ta Keo on a hill, Chau Say, the 200+ faces of Bayon, monkeys, Neak Pean’s ponds, Victory Gate’s row boat men sculptures, elephants in traffic, and the Terrace of the Elephants. We lost ourselves—even with a map. It was like walking through a museum of the finest treasures—where after a few hours, the immenseness floods the senses, and details start to get lost in a mind jumble.
Victory Gate, Angkor Wat, Siem Reap, Cambodia.Some of the 200+ faces of Bayon, Angkor Wat, Siem Reap, Cambodia.The South Gate’s soldiers on the Bridge, Angkor Thom / Angkor Wat, Cambodia.Bas reliefs at Angkor Wat, Cambodia.Ponds at Neak Pean, Angkor Wat, Cambodia.The long bridge walkway at Neak Pean, Angkor Wat, Cambodia. Panorama taken with an iPhone.
I also found the sheer number of tourists—particularly, the rude tourists—overwhelming. I do realize that a tourist complaining about other tourists is the height of hypocrisy. So, yes, I am part of the problem that many locals complain about when they are overrun with visitors. And I will fully admit that I was getting punchy with the heat and being tired. That said, I have a few suggestions for all of us tourists:
Be careful when walking with, or waving, a selfie stick in a crowd. Those sticks can bruise someone or crack a camera lens.
Everyone wants to see the site—not other tourists climbing into the site. Wait your turn, and stay on the designated paths.
Share the space. Take a few shots and move along. Don’t monopolize a spot for 15 minutes perfecting a pose. We saw so many people climb into temple windows, and pose there for so long that we started to make up names for their poses: “look thoughtful while resting chin on interlaced fingers” or “kick feet up and make sunshine with hands”.
Learn to say “excuse/pardon me” and “I’m sorry”—in many languages (or any language) for those instances when jostling through a crowd. At the very least, practice acknowledging others’ presence by saying something nice in your own language, smiling, or miming your intentions or apologies when bumping against others or stepping into their photos by accident.
Don’t patronize the animals. Monkeys should not be teased with food or for photo opportunities—they can bite, scratch, or snatch food or things from you or your child. It’s probably not fun for the monkeys, and it won’t be funny when it happens to you. If you must ride an elephant, look for a conscientious group that respectfully cares for the elephants, that takes care of the environment, and that is owned by locals (not foreign investors).
Traffic includes elephants at Angkor Wat, Cambodia.Elephant bas relief at Terrace of the Elephants, Angkor Wat, Cambodia.Elephant columns at a temple ruin in Angkor Wat, Cambodia.
A most special blessing
Our days in Siem Reap and Angkor Wat consisted of remork rides to the temples in the fresh mornings, lots of walking and seeing sites, and remork rides back to the hotel for a late lunch, poolside. After eating meals like veggie spring rolls or egg and cheese spaghetti, and mojitos, we’d retire to the room to escape the afternoon heat—the wind chimes outside our door gently tolling in the hot breeze.
View from an early morning remork ride, Siem Reap, Cambodia.
Early one morning we visited Preah Khan, another strangler tree location that is smaller and less crowded. We roamed the grounds with a handful of others. It was quiet, and mysterious in the still, hazy-mist of morning. We came across a curious pink plastic handbag sitting off the path by a cave-like structure. A few minutes later, we entered a portico clearing, and there sitting in a nook was a tiny, curled up, bald old lady monk in white. Her smiling eyes were cloudy and she had that universal-looking apple face of the very old—toothless and round. She was giving blessings and I was smitten.
Her smile was kind and peaceful as she took my hand and started her chant. She had strong nimble fingers—and bestowed her blessings with three simple strings of white, orange and yellow—knotted only once in the middle. A palm rub, then a gesture like pulling my soul from my heart, a touch to my forehead and then a playful “poof” of breath into my face and a radiant smile. She had this helpless look, but smiling, confident, and at peace—and she looked like a combination of grandmas from all over the world. I heard a guide say he’d been coming there for 10 years and she’d always been there. Precious. To this day, seven months later, those simple strings are still on my left wrist, along with the red yard tied by the boy monk. My treasures from Cambodia.
A special blessing in Preah Khan, Angkor Wat, Cambodia.We saw the monk’s things at Preah Khan before we saw her, Angkor Wat, Cambodia.
To see more about our time in Cambodia’s Angkor Wat, please click here.
Angkor Wat: “Erected by some ancient Michelangelo”
On our first full day in Cambodia, we purchased 3-day passes for $67 for Angkor Wat, a place so revered by Cambodians that it is on their flag. It is the largest religious monument in the world—covering almost 500 acres.
Built in the 1100s AD as a Hindu temple and a capital city for King Suryavarman II’s Khmer Empire, it was converted to a Buddhist temple later that century. Later, it would nearly be abandoned. In the mid-1800s, a French explorer named Henri Mouhot wrote about Angkor Wat, and reestablished interest in the complex:
“One of these temples—a rival to that of Solomon, and erected by some ancient Michelangelo—might take an honorable place beside our most beautiful buildings. It is grander than anything left to us by Greece or Rome…”
A moat had stopped the jungle from overtaking the temple, but the complex needed much help to clear vegetation and restore some buildings. Today Angkor Wat, with its surrounding temples, is a UNESCO world heritage site.
We took a remork (Cambodian tuk tuk) to the temple, enjoying the cool morning air breezing on us in the carriage. Through the residential side streets, and main road motorbike chaos, into the red dirt land of Cambodia on the road to Angkor Wat, those rides were a favorite part of our day—talking to Sothea (the driver), and seeing life along the streets of Siem Reap.
Just outside the main entrance to Angkor Wat, we decided last minute to hire a guide to walk with us through the complex. Our expectation was that he’d take us to the most meaningful spots (he did), allow me time to photograph (he did not), and tell us about the complex with both facts and local stories. We got the facts—spewed at us without context or passion as we ran to keep up with him. Any questions set him to rewind-repeat-data mode. One hour of this fast-moving, fact frenzy for $15. Whew. I was glad to hear him say, “Time is up. You want ‘nother hour?” “No sir, thank you.” And that was the first and last day we used a guide. From then on, we decided to wander, see what we saw, and look it up in our book—a pace better suited to us.
Donation box at a temple at Angkor Wat, Cambodia.Walking around the almost 500-acre temple complex at Angkor Wat, Cambodia.Cool, dark tunnels in the Angkor Wat temples, Siem Reap, Cambodia.A building from 1100 AD at Angkor Wat, Cambodia.Bas relief of two women at Angkor Wat temple complex, Cambodia.
Red Yarn Blessings
It was after our guide left us that we heard a soft young voice chanting, and saw the teenage boy making the song. He was a monk. Shaved head, wrapped in an orange robe, seated in front of a woman and her young daughter. We watched and waited, and when they stepped down, we stepped up. He indicated our shoes. We took them off. He pointed to our places to sit. We sat, Bryan to my right. And then he began chanting while looking down at his accoutrements and monk tools. Next, a raised a scooper out of a bucket of water and shook it in our direction. I covered my camera in my lap and welcomed the cool drops of water in this 90+ degree humid day. He looked at me and indicated my left wrist. I offered my arm and he began tying a red-braided piece of wool yarn around my wrist while chanting—knotting it once, twice, how many times? He then took scissors and carefully cut off the excess. Then he did the same to Bryan’s right wrist. Bryan put money in the young monk’s basket, and we reached to get our shoes. I turned back to the young monk and asked him, “How old are you?” He hesitated for so long that I thought he did not understand my language, and / or was not going to answer. But as I picked up my shoes, he ever-so-quietly said, “Fifteen,” waited a heartbeat or two, and then smiled at me. My heart melted a little as I smiled back and said my best “saum arkoun nay” (Thank you in Khmer…I hope) and I stood to go.
The red string is to remind the wearer to be compassionate, to mind the tongue so as not to harm with words, and to be fearless, courageous, and brave. Some say it protects too—absorbing negative energy until it can hold no more, and falls off. As I write this, it is nearly seven months later, and the red yarn blessing is still secure on my wrist, and the young monk’s shy smile is tucked tight in my memories. I like this red yarn and its reminders.
A young monk trims a red yarn blessing after bestowing it in Angkor Wat, Cambodia.
Spirit Houses
As we walked around Siem Reap, we noticed colorful little houses on pedestals, often placed near door ways. The birdhouse-sized structures sometimes had offerings on their little patios—burning incense, a little bowl of rice, fruit slices, a piece of bread or cake, a cup of coffee, a shot glass of liquor or soft drink. These are spirit houses. Some are ornate, some simple and plain, and each one intriguing. I learned that they are common in Southeast Asia, and are considered a place to shelter and appease restless spirits, and to invite the good spirits of those recently departed. Friendly spirits are said to congregate in the spirit houses to enjoy food and drink, and it is their presence that keeps bad spirits away.
A small spirit house, beside an ancient tree. Siem Reap, Cambodia.A simple spirit house, Cambodia.Ornate spirit house with coffee offering. Cambodia.Incense and drinks at this spirit house, Cambodia.
The Night Market
After a daytime of touring, we’d return to the hotel for a little rest and to clean up. At sundown, we walked into the old town for dinner. In the cool of the evening, more people were out, laughing and talking, eating and visiting. We went to the touristy Pub Street to find meals, and ventured into the circus of the Night Market.
The Night Markets were always interesting. There were narrow lanes containing hundreds of small stalls selling brand-name knock-off clothing and accessories. One could also find souvenirs and t-shirt vendors, dimly-lit and calm massage shops–where several tourists always sat in recliners getting foot massages, and bright carnival-like stalls where tourists climbed up to sit and dangle their feet in a fish tank—the fish eating dead skin from their feet. In the streets, amputees begged with a poetic cadence, and the music of bands of land mine victims drifted into the night like smoke. Little girls demonstrated high spinning toys and glow necklaces, and served as translator when tourists bought the novelties from their nearby mom. Women sold fried tarantulas, scorpions, and snakes for snacks from large display tables hanging from their necks. There was so much going on there–and always the smells of moped exhaust, woodsmoke, and lemongrass.
Such strange and different things to see, but also so many things the same as home. And the hoards of tourists—all together, in places where we can buy bottled water, eat from a menu printed in English, find a cheap, fake version of an expensive brand, and be all together to marvel and be shocked by seeing fried scorpions served on a stick.This was everything I’ve come to love–and hate–about travel. As fascinating as it was, I longed to be away from this—away from the mobs of other tourists and the universal salad of globalization. Of course, being here in Cambodia makes me part of the problem.
I’m curious how other people feel about the increase in tourism and what it does to the places we all go. There are the crowds, the traffic, the overbooked hotels. And on the other hand, there’s an economic bump to the area. But who gets the bulk of the profits? My guess is the international company coming in, not the people who live there (who may only earn a small wage working for the tourism industry). Does anyone else worry about this, and plan trips differently as a result?
Along the street near the Night Market, Siem Reap, Cambodia.Near Pub Street, Siem Reap twilight, Cambodia.The Night Market, Siem Reap, Cambodia.At night, the smiling faces inside the shop of the Geological Institute in Siem Reap, Cambodia.
We chose Cambodia because of a Steve McCurry photo-—you know the photo…those trees hugging and prying into stone temples, and a doorway with monks in saffron robes peering out. This was the third stop on our around-the-world trip, and we were anxious to spend more time in Asia. And we found so much more than those jungle trees in beautiful Cambodia.
A kid smiles at me from the back of a motorbike in Siem Reap, Cambodia.
To Cambodia via Hong Kong
We flew from Brisbane Australia overnight, connecting in Hong Kong. There’s something about a night flight, and a flight to HONG KONG–a place name we’ve heard all our lives and now it was printed on our boarding passes! It was 4,300 miles and 8+ hours to Hong Kong, passing over places like Papua New Guinea, Indonesia, the Philippines, and the South China Sea. I slept little, instead eyeing the flight map, trying to see the land below, and reading.
In Hong Kong, we had 70 whole minutes to change terminals and planes. We bought water, got some Hong Kong coins back in change, and I stood staring at a display of books… it took a minute in my groggy state to realize that these were for readers of right-to-left text—and were not stacked on the table backwards afterall.
Arrival in Siem Reap
We arrived in Siem Reap, Cambodia about three hours later, and exited the airport into a hot, hazy land, full of buzzing mopeds and smiling people. There was a closeness in the air, maybe the enveloping humidity and the smoke of wood fires, or maybe the dreaminess from our lack of sleep.
Traffic at dusk–Motorcycles, mopeds, and remorks (tuktuks) rule the streets of Siem Reap, Cambodia.
Mr. TinTin, a driver from the hotel, met us with a sign, escorted us to a waiting old Mercedes, and politely chattered in English with the full-blown AC on as he drove us to the hotel. We tumbled back out into the heat and smoke and sounds of buzzing motorbikes at the Privilege Boutique Hotel, and were greeted with sunny, smiling people offering cold white lemongrass-scented washcloths, and a dainty glass of an orange tasty juice I couldn’t identify. Nothing has ever felt more refreshing.
It was still morning and our room was not yet ready. So we sat and talked to our friendly hosts: Jasmine, Phally and Ken. I felt so welcomed here, it was as if we were long-lost family. They gave us advice on seeing Angkor Wat, filled us in on their elected monarch, and taught us a few important words and phrases in Khmer like Chul Mouy (which means cheers and to my ears sounded like “chew muy”). According to Jasmine, “You say this so the ears can enjoy it too”.
Lotus blooms floating in a vase in Siem Reap, Cambodia.Lotus pads floating in a hotel vase, Siem Reap, Cambodia.
These friendly Cambodians have a history that is equally grand and empirical, elegant and exotic, and cruel and haunting. There is Angkor Wat, a vast religious monument that is evidence of a time when Cambodia was the center of an empire. There are also the sophisticated architecture and cuisine leave-behinds from the Indochina era when Cambodia was under French protection as a buffer between Siam and a French Vietnam. And there are the lingering effects of Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge regime when 25% of the Cambodian population was tortured and murdered between 1975-1979.
Cambodia’s Recent History
There was a civil war in Cambodia in the early 70s. After, Pol Pot and his Khmer Rouge regime arrested and eventually executed almost everyone suspected of connections with the former government or with foreign governments, as well as professionals and intellectuals. This state-sponsored genocide killed more than two million Cambodian people—men, women, and children. There are at least 20,000 mass grave sites in this small country (a country about the size of the state of Oregon). Today, bones have been gathered and are placed in “Killing Field” stupas around the country. Sometimes, bones or teeth are unearthed in monsoon rains, or when farmers are tilling fields and are brought to local stupas or monasteries out of respect. While the bones remain unidentified, they are cared for, remembered, and give the world a place to contemplate the horrors of genocide. Please, if you haven’t yet, read “First They Killed My Father” by Loung Ung and see the movie, “The Killing Fields”. As painful as these may be, it is important to remember these atrocities and the events that led to them. It is astounding what unbelievable horrors and cruelty people can inflict on other living beings.
Unidentified bones from mass graves are brought to stupas out of respect for the dead. In the 1970s, Pol Pot and his Khmer Rouge regime tortured and killed 25% of Cambodia’s population in a state-sponsored genocide.
Lingering Impressions of Cambodia
I don’t want to end this post on this note. Cambodia is so much more than the haunted history of Pol Pot, mass graves, and land mines. I will remember it for being a land of French touches like baguettes and coffee, of beautiful green rice fields and white-water salt flats, of red dust and of dragonflies, of smells of night jasmine, lemongrass, and peppercorn; of humidity and a glorious diffused light from the woodsmoke and motorcycle haze, and being home to some of the friendliest people in the world. Remarkable. Cambodia reaffirmed how kind people can be.
Cambodians have ready smiles, waving from their motorcycle.A dog sleeps in the red dirt of Siem Reap, Cambodia.Name that fruit. Siem Reap, Cambodia.Penny Lane yellow, Siem Reap, Cambodia.Shutters on the French-influenced La Malraux restaurant in an alley of Siem Reap’s Old Market, Cambodia.
