As a quick summary for those of you who have missed out on the past few blog entries I have written, I am in the middle of travelling through Cambodia in SE Asia at present, and this current entry not only covers the back-end of the 2 weeks that I spent in the Cambodian capital city of Phnom Penh, but it also covers my experiences in the town of Siam Reap as well. (For those of you who are interested, Siam Reap is 300ish km N-NW of Phnom Penh by the way).
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So anyway... where shall I begin?...
Hmmm... well if I were to start writing this in chronological order I suppose... the first thing I did after I spoke to you last involved me paying a visit to a local orphanage as it goes... (actually it was here that I ended up playing football with the future Pele of Phnom Penh which was pretty cool)... but anyway... what a wonderful place it was though... oh and what happy children there were there too...
Moving on back to the rest of my week's adventures for now however... and from this point onwards (ie. after the amazing experience that was the above)... I have to say that it all got a little bit random to say the least I'm afraid...
Firstly there was my visit to a local market with a geeky German tourist who was staying at my hostel, a very innocent-looking girl incidently, who then went on to tell me about the time when she got herself scammed recently in a 64,000 (yes a 64,000!) US Dollar game of Blackjack would you believe (in a Vietnamese bedroom of all places as well!)
Anyway... then after meeting her it turned out that it was time for me to put the world to rights with a strange nurse from Oz of course, a rather odd character who turned out to be obsessed with trying to cannulate himself in a very drunken state, so that he could then try to inject himself with the job-lot of vitamins he had on him (erm... why not just have a fruit-shake instead mate?!)...
But finally though, and on top of rubbing shoulders with these colourful characters may I add, I then had the nice surprise of finding myself being invited to my hostel-owner's 2 year-old son's birthday party as well! Talk about living the high-life, eh?!
Well I never!... And what a strange night that blossomed into!...
Ha ha!... as a quick introduction to this weird and wonderful evening actually... let's just say that it didn't really turn out to be your normal "let's play pass-the-parcel, let's get a magician round" toddler-type occasion (as any normal person would imagine it to be anyway)... as instead (by the time some rich Western tourists took over the planning part of it)... it actually ended up becoming more of a whisky-swilling, pig-eating type scoff-fest that was being held at a posh German Hoghouse...
Bless the locals who went there though... as the poor guys didn't have a clue what to do when the mammoth portions of European nosh came out onto the table... whole knobs of butter were being eaten in one go... slices of bread were being picked up to be eaten with forks... sausages were being stared at like they were aliens... meat was being put into people's mouths with knives... etc... etc... etc... (in fact, at one point even, the poor child whose birthday it was actually started to throw-up everywhere because of all the rich food it was eating!)...
Anyway... hmmm... back to speaking about my travels I guess... and my main mission for the back end of this week was for me to visit the ruins of Angkor...
Have you heard of them?
Well as a quick introduction for those of you who haven't... they are all that remains of a settlement that was originally built during the period between 9th-15th century A.D.
Ha ha! The thing is, I don't know if the kings of this time were having a competition with each other as to who could build the biggest, most elaborate buildings for the gods to live in by the way... but anyway... they ended up becoming the nucleus of what you could say ended up being a very large built-up area indeed (in fact some say that they formed the central part of the biggest preindustrial city in the world with a sprawl of 1,150 square miles would you believe)...
Onto the present moment however... and the main remains of which are now mostly situated in an area that starts 5km north of the town of Siam Reap, which incidently is where I am staying now...
Oh, and more importantly I suppose... after all the recent goings on in Cambodia... and as you travel round the country now... it soon becomes apparent that they are in fact the main source of national pride for the locals, as a symbol of the main "Angkor Wat" ruin (which is the world's largest religious building incidently) appears practically everywhere over here... on the national flag... on the local currency... on the national beer label...
Moving on though... and what did I personally make of these ancient ruins when I went to see them earlier on during the week?
Ha ha! Well if the truth be known... I went to visit them with high expectations and I still came away impressed.
Three days of hiring a cycle, getting away from the crowds and exploring some of the most awe-inspiring (and oldest) man-made buildings I have ever seen...
It's been a magical experience, it really has.
Further to this however... and I know that it's not really my place to go on about the history of the ruins and all the religious stuff that goes with them here really... but even so... what I will say on the matter is that it does all go on to make pretty interesting reading as it goes... especially when you consider the fact that one or two of the 12th century pastimes of this country (that are represented on some of the carvings at these places) are now in fact being exported to the Western world as being products of their richer neighbour perhaps...
Anyway...
I'll shut up now!
But before I go though... here are 5 of my favourite photos of the past few days for you to enjoy...
Speak soon ;o)
