Siem Reap

making palm leaf walls

We started our time in Siem Reap not with a trip to the temples, but instead by going on an eco-tour/sustainable help-local-people type tour. It involved visiting a local village and having lunch with a family (who get paid for cooking our food), helping families to do what ever jobs it is they regularly do so we can see what life is like for them, and walking around meeting people.

grandmother and children of the family we made walls for

We rode into town on an ox cart and met a local family who were busy weaving palm leaves into walls for their house. They showed us how to help and we sat down and made a few wall pieces. These will get fitted together to form totally waterproof walls and roof for the family.
Our guide also talked us through some of the other activities that they often do in the village and how local people typically live. Upon finding out we were Australian he also exclaimed - Australia.... your prime minister is funny. This was not the first time someone has made that as the first statement about Australia, but funny varies from crazy to stupid or hilarious.

school made from water bottles

We also went walking through the village and visited the school sponsored by this tour organization. They provide the school free for children to help them learn English and practice other subjects. Most kids only attend school for half days in Cambodia, so for the other half they can come here. The walls are made of water bottles filled with rubbish/plstic bags/cloth. Great recycling I think!!

the hilarious sewing women

There was also a hilarious collection of sewing ladies working at the school. They insisted we come in a sit down with them, showed us what they are making, and seemed to find anything we said or did outrageously funny!!



The next day we settled in for a good dose of temples! My advice to anyone thinking of visit Cambodia / Ankor Wat would absolutely be to go in summer. Yes, it is somewhat hot.... but Australia is somewhat hot anyway. Yes there is a good chance that you might get rained on - but this cools you down from problem number 1. Mostly, the level of other people is dramatically reduced! Even at this reduced amount I found walking around Siem Reap difficult due to the number of tourists (mostly it was those that are so drunk they are dancing in the streets in a bikini, or so rude they are walking around temples in a mid-drift top and short shorts that got on my nerves). We were able to get away from people and sometimes see temples more or less alone.... but in the main sites were having to squeeze past people and wait for entire bus loads of people to take 20 selfies each before we could look at a carving. I imagine that in winter - which is high season, it must be hellish here!


Once you cope with / find strategies to lessen the other tourists' presence - you start to realise the massive size of these temples. It is pretty incredible. Ankow Wat itself is the largest religious building in the world. It also features amazing carvings depecting legends around the base. We declined the offer of a tour (although other people said they regretted not getting a tour.... We had done some pre reading and were too cheap to pay 3 each!). We were glad we did, I read aloud from the lonely planet book at the start of each carving wall so we all knew what was going on. At one point we were overtaken by a group with guide - who must have been providing much less information than the single paragraph I had!

My favorite was definitely Beng Melea. It took us almost 2 hours to get there in tuk tuk.... but because we left at dawn we were already finished walking around and leaving as bus tours arrived. The rest of the time we were completely alone. This is one of the jungle temples. It is slowly getting eaten by forest. It is kind of nice to see that once people leave.... the earth will just take back it's space. Grow over anything we leave behind. It must be very hard for the people in charge though. On one hand they cant move these trees because the trees are now holding up temples, plus people find it so interesting and serene to see the forest taking over. But on the other side of the argument, if they don't do something it won't be too long before the temple is nothing by crumbs at the base of the jungle.