Tuesday, October 21st, 2008

Time	Event
1:40p	It's Tuesday, so this must be Cambodia So, for everyone who is reading this, it's probably Monday.  For me, it's Tuesday, which means we're in Cambodia.  This morning we rolled out of bed, had a nice (but quick) breakfast, and then got on a plane for Cambodia.  For whatever reason, I'm fine with going to Thailand but the idea of Cambodia makes me somewhat nervous—possibly because Cambodia is linked in my mind to images of the war and death camps from two generations ago.  Not at all relevant to modern times?...well, probably not.  But on the way in, Dad warned me in his very casual way that we might have some trouble getting out tomorrow because the newspaper says that protest action has been heating up, and protestors frequently shut down the airports.  It probably won't happen, but we'll see. Cambodia is beautiful; so lush and green that you expect a planted toothpick to sprout leaves and roots.  At the very modern, shiny, squeaky clean airport, we were met by our guide, Phum Nah.  We climbed into a car that would have looked right at home in American suburbia (they drive on the left here, unlike Thailand), and drove to the beautiful modern hotel where we are staying tonight.  Along the way, we passed canals covered in greenery, nearly-skeletal cows traipsing along the side of the road led by young kids, old women running fruit stands, gas stations where they sell gas and diesel in 1- and 2-liter bottles (about 1500 riels (~$0.75) per liter). The hotel is about 50 rooms, smaller than the Mandarin Oriental where we were staying in Thailand.  And yet, they do such a better job of making us feel welcome.  The small things are included—the bottled water in the minibar is free, were were given 2 days of complimentary wireless internet which friggin' WORKS (at the M.O., the wireless signal dropped every few seconds, and it cost >1200 baht (~$36) for two days of internet), and so on.  The room is scented with a jasmine-oil aromatherapy candle; the floors are a dark honey-colored wood with planks wider than my palm, and there is a deep bath big enough to wash a moose.  The staff is friendly, and it feels honest.  I really like it here. The one thing I haven't mentioned yet is the heat:  it's incredible, probably mid- to high-90s.  It's not nearly as humid as it was in Thailand, so I'm not sure why the heat is affecting me so much, but I feel like I'm being clubbed.  Dad, of course, is sitting outside on the porch reading the newspaper.  Me, I'm huddled in the air-condtioned room with my pants off so as to dump more heat while I write this.  But, time to wrap it up—Mr Phum will be back in about 15 minutes and we are headed for the temples over at Angkor Wat.  I'll post the pictures later. This is so exciting! (Comment on this)
6:26p	Back from Ankor Thom Today, we went to Angkor Thom (pronounced: Anchor Tom, who I assume is a Colgate-smile newsman with a Midwestern accent; what he has to do with a 9-12th century Cambodian ruin, I'm not sure). The city is enclosed in an 8m wall, 3km on a side. There are five gates in the wall, one on the north, south, and west walls and two on the east. The east gates are "Victory Gate" and "Death Gate" (which has nothing to do with Vlad Taltos). We drove first to Death Gate and then walked along the top of the wall (the inside has an embankment about 20 feet wide which then slopes away to ground level on the inside, but drops off into a sheer wall on the outside) until we got to Death gate. From there we went to Bayon, where our guide took our picture on either side of this face. From the second that we saw the ruins, I had the most disrespectful thought running a loop in my head: Best! Jungle Gym! EVVVVAARR!!!! I managed to control myself enough to NOT actually start rock-climbing on the carvings, but it was hard. Speaking of climbing, whoever built this place had really good knees; some of these stairs have risers eighteen inches high and five inches deep. The walls around the edges of Bayon are filled with carvings...hundreds of feet of carvings. All of these are <em>a millenia old</em> and still in excellent condition, to the point where you can recognize the nationality of the different human figures (the Khmer (*) are shown with short-cut hair and long earlobes, the Jam (enemy) have helmets like upside-down lotus flowers, and the Chinese (Khmer allies) have Van Dyke beards), and the species of various critters (peacocks, crocodiles, monkeys, domestic pigs, wild boars, etc). There are pictures of people with stomach aches going to the apothecary for herbal medicine, of fishermen casting nets (and just missing catching a crocodile), having a drunken party on a boat, and so on. We were there until 5:30, when it started to get dark. I had mostly gotten used to the heat by then, although I was absolutely sodden with sweat throughout. At sundown, we headed back to the hotel; Dad went out to locate a new camera battery (we flattened the old one, and left the charger packed with our main luggage back in Thailand, where we return tomorrow night). Fortunately, he was successful and so we can take pictures when we got to Angkor Wat tomorrow. Ok, time for a quick shower and off to dinner. Over dinner there will be traditional Cambodian dancing...I'm curious to see how this differs from the traditional Thai dancing that we saw last night. More news later. (*) Khmer == Cambodian people, pronounced 'kai-mare'; the Khmer Rouge were the Communists who briefly took power) (2 Comments | Comment on this)

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