Cambodia – Where to, Gumshoe?

Siem Reap (Day 126): A Relaxing Day in Old Town

July 4, 2016

This morning was the only day we got to sleep in past 7am while in Siem Reap. We tried to take full advantage of the day of rest but still woke up around 7:30am. We had a more relaxed breakfast downstairs and planned out what we were going to do for the rest of the day. We had our temple pass for another day but I think we were templed out and just wanted to take it easy in town.

We took a tuk tuk to the centre of town to the Old Market. Like most markets in SE Asia, they had an assortment of souvenirs, local clothing options, and a wet and dry market – which is basically where all the action happens. As we walked down the rows of vendors, we continuously heard, “lady, want a scarf?” “buy something?”. I think having started out in Vietnam, these fairly mild calls were not distracting or uncomfortable.

After walking around for a bit, we walked towards a massage shop that we looked up online before heading out. As I mentioned before, there are so many cheap massage shops littered around the Old Town, but a lot of them didn’t seem too comfortable/relaxing (probably just good for a foot massage). Our massage shop was called, Lemongrass Garden, and it’s located across the street from the Park Hyatt Hotel (looks like a really nice hotel in a very central location) on Siem Reap’s “main street”. For a khmer massage, it was $12 USD for 60 minutes. This was about $4-5 USD more than other roadside salons that didn’t look very nice. It is also half the price of a more luxurious places, so basically it’s more middle of the road.

They gave us tea and a cold towel as we were deciding which massage to have. A Khmer massage is similar to a Thai massage – some stretching. Since it wasn’t described as being as painful as a Lao massage, I decided to do a Khmer one as well. We were lead into a room where the masseuses rubbed and cleaned our feet. Tim’s lady did his feet first, rubbing them with bath salts and spent probably about 8 minutes on him. My lady came after he was done and cleaned my feet but only took like 3 minutes. This was a very telling indication about whose massage would be better.

We were lead up two sets of steep stairs (I think all stairs in Cambodia are super steep) to our massage room. We got changed into the wide pants and shirt they provided. They had lockers right by our beds for our clothes and backpack. Overall my massage was relaxing but pretty weak (pressure wise). I enjoyed the massage in Luang Prabang more. I also felt very sticky from the mixture of sunscreen, mosquito repellant, and sweat on my body, so also felt bad for her touching me. As expected, Tim enjoyed his massage a lot more than I did. I have no major complaints though. It was relaxing and that was the point. After we were done our massage, we went back to the reception and they had another tea for us to drink before we paid. I would recommend Lemongrass if you get Tim’s masseuse (Tim: Khouch was her name), she seems more detailed oriented.

It was time for lunch and we had a pizza place in mind. The original pizza place we wanted to go to yesterday but was closed on Sunday. It’s called Belmiro’s and it’s owned by an American ex-pat from Boston. Yesterday we had Italian pizza, today we’re having American pizza. The pizza prices were more expensive than Il Forno’s but I suppose that’s because their portions are a lot larger (American style). They have medium and large pizzas, so we ordered a medium with half pepperoni and half sausage and spinach. The pizza came and it was huge. Their medium was bigger than Il Forno’s large. It was a thin crust New York style pizza. It was very tasty but we both thought Il Forno’s had better crust. Since it was the Fourth of July, many Americans came into the restaurant and were wishing each other a “Happy Fourth”. The restaurant even had a special menu for this week to celebrate. They were featuring Chili Cheese Dogs and Chicago style hot dogs.

After lunch we went to get fruit shakes from a place we saw that sold them for only $0.75 USD. We got a mango and pineapple shake and caught a tuk tuk back to our hotel. It was hotter today than the other days we’ve been here, so walking around wasn’t very appealing. Siem Reap is definitely quite dead in the afternoons as most people are either temple hopping or probably indoors.

When we got back to our hotel, I was contemplating going for a swim but my decision was made for me when it began to rain quite heavily again. I guess this is rainy season for a reason! We stayed inside, booked our hotel for Kuala Lumpur, caught up on some blog posts, and made room for my photos on my laptop (I’ve taken over 20,000 pictures so far!). It rained for the rest of the afternoon so we were glad we were inside.

For our last dinner in Siem Reap (and Cambodia) we decided to go to Sinn Sisa Mouth Café again. The owners are so sweet and we both really enjoyed the food there. We guiltily had pizza two days in a row for lunch so we should have Cambodian food for our last meal. We took a tuk tuk to the restaurant and when we pulled up, the wife saw us, smiled, and waved at us like she’d seen a friend. I smiled and waved back in the same way as we went into the restaurant. Today was a lot busier than our first visit. There were about 5 other tables eating or waiting for their food. The table beside us was an Asian American couple and it seemed like they came there for dinner everyday that they were in Siem Reap. As they were leaving they commented on how great the food was and that they would see them again tomorrow. Good food at good prices along with Khmer hospitality goes a long way (and Trip Advisor reviews help too).

We ordered Amok fish (one of the most popular Cambodian dishes) and Tim got drawn in by another garlic dish – this time pork and garlic. The picture was a bit deceiving because it looked like the garlic was fried but it came out more of a stir fry, similar to his chicken from the other night. I really liked the Amok fish, very subtle coconut and lemongrass flavor and the curry had collared green type vegetables in it. The amount of curry they gave could’ve easily fed both Tim and I. The husband gave us a plate of bananas and dragon fruit this time for dessert. We paid and thanked them for a wonderful meal. If you’re ever in Siem Reap and want Cambodian food, I would highly recommend it (I also wrote them a Trip Advisor review).

We walked to the night market after dinner because I wanted to check out the tank tops. I had a bought a few in Phnom Penh and sort of regret not buying more. The tank I got from Thailand 3 years ago is still in pretty good shape and the ones here are very similar. We didn’t see many of the same type in Vietnam so I figure this would be my last chance to buy them before going home. We walked past many stores and then one man said, “all tanks and t-shirts $1!” (was pretty impressed with him, we heard him speak Korean, Chinese, and Japanese). On one hand, I was really happy that they were only $1 USD, but on the other hand, I realized my bargaining in Phnom Penh wasn’t that great if he was already offering them for $1! It’s okay. I was already really happy with my 3 tanks for $5 USD, so this is even better. We spent about 30 minutes in the store looking through each rack. Their organization system is not very good, but I don’t know why that would surprise us. The women’s t-shirts and tanks were a lot nicer than the men’s. All the men’s t-shirts were a cut out v-neck, which I can’t picture many people I know wearing. Too bad they didn’t just have normal crew necks like in Thailand.

We were followed around by a Cambodian teenager who was more interested in staring at himself in the mirror, doing his hair, and posing in front of the mirror than really helping us. But I guess his job was to just follow us around and collect money while the boss man drew customers in. Since things were so disorganized, we spent a long time going through the racks. We ended up buying 5 more tanks but as we paid the boy said to Tim, “you guys took a long time to look “(in an annoyed tone). At this point we were a bit annoyed with him too because he kept asking us how many we would buy and so we said probably 5, will you give us a deal? He said no abruptly and we asked why did it matter how many we would buy then. As he handed his boss the money, Tim asked him if there was a problem that we took so long to look? He scurried away and the boss man out front apologized on his behalf. He kept saying “sorry my friend” to Tim.

We took a tuk tuk back to the hotel and called it a night. Another early morning for us as we’re flying to Kuala Lumpur tomorrow. We’re both really excited to go to Malaysia for the first time. We didn’t expect to go to Malaysia during our time in SE Asia, but this is a welcome addition to our itinerary.

Steps today: 6,500

Siem Reap (Day 125): The Main Event – Angkor Wat!

July 3, 2016

Our alarms went off at the ungodly hour of 4am. It was good that Dara was going to be waiting for us at 4:40am or else I would very very tempted to snooze. We came to Siem Reap for Angkor Wat and it would be a shame to not see it during its famed sunrise.

We headed down to the lobby, picked up our breakfasts to go, and saw Dara waiting outside for us. When we were about to leave, the EuroCup quarter-finals game between Germany and Italy was on. The game was in the middle of the deciding penalty kicks. Dara and Tim were intrigued so we watched the outcome of the game before heading out. Judging by Dara and the hotel staff’s reactions to the goals, they were cheering for Germany.

We eventually made our way to the car 20 minutes later and drove to Angkor Wat. Considering it was 5am, the streets were fairly lively. When we got to the parking lot, it was pitch black and Dara held a flashlight out for us to see where we were walking. Of the people who were up for the sunrise, they all walked down the middle path but Dara took us to the side and we ended up beating everyone to the view points. We camped out right in front of one of the ponds, where you can see Angkor Wat’s reflection. Dara told us that within 15 minutes this area will be packed, and he was right. Since it’s rainy season, we didn’t really see a typical sunrise, since there wasn’t much sun. It was cool to see the different coloured sky with Angkor Wat coming into focus. We stood there for about 45 minutes until about 6am. The grass was too muddy to sit down on so most people were standing – which is why our patch of grass was prime real estate.

After taking hundreds of pictures of Angkor Wat, we found Dara and he said we should eat our breakfast before heading into the temple. We camped out on the steps of the temple’s “library” and ate the breakfast the hotel packed for us. There were a million flies around, so it made eating difficult. The breakfast wasn’t that appetizing. I just ended up eating the bananas (Tim: I ate their omelette and sausage and it was good).

Even to this day, Angkor Wat is the largest religious monument in the world. It’s incredible that in the 12th century, they built the entire complex which stretches 162 hectares in just an estimated 35 years. We climbed to the top of Angkor Wat, which allows up to 100 people there at a time. There were some great views of the surroundings from the top, including watching mischievous monkeys go through the trash bins and then running away from the security guards. We saw a bunch of monkeys around the temple on our way out – a family of them and another monkey who attacked a young boy after the boy ran up to it suddenly.

Our next stop on our tour for the day was Ta Prhomn, the temple where some scenes in Tomb Raider was filmed. Angelina Jolie starred in it and subsequently adopted her first son, Maddox, from Cambodia. I just learned that she has honourary Cambodian citizenship because of all the humanitarian work she does for the country. She’s also currently producing a Netflix movie called, “First They Killed My Father” about the Khmer Rouge genocide that’s being filmed now. We thought Ta Prhomn was very cool, they had so many old trees that have grown over the temple walls. It’s interesting to see that all the temples are sponsored by different countries. If there is no country to sponsor the temple’s conservation, there is no work done to restore the temples. I didn’t see any temples sponsored by Canada (Angkor Wat is sponsored by Germany and Italy).

We saw a few other temples and palaces within the Angkor Thom gates. I was getting really tired at this point in the morning. It was warm and I just had a couple of mini bananas so I was starting to fade.

Our last temple for the day and tour was Bayon. Every time I heard the name Bayon, it reminded me of the show Survivor. They filmed the last 2 seasons in Cambodia so their tribe names were Bayon and Angkor. All the temples we went to today were all very different which was good. Bayon was very neat. It was built with hundreds of faces of the king all around. Most of the gates around Angkor had faces of the king around but Bayon was overkill. It was great for picture taking!

Our selfie with Mr. Hua and Dara outside of Bayon

After a pretty jam packed two days our tour of the temples was over. We have the pass for another day but I think we are “templed out” and will just take it easy in town for our last day in Siem Reap. Dara and Mr. Hua dropped us off in the Old Town, where we’d have lunch. We said our goodbyes and thanked him. Dara is a very kind hearted and patient guide, and he is very proud of his heritage. When talking about Cambodia, he always refers to it as “my country”. I don’t remember the last time I heard anyone describing their home country in that sentiment.

I know you could probably do Angkor Wat and all the temples on your own for much cheaper, but it was nice to be accompanied by a local guide and get to know how life is here. He’s around our age and has two boys (6 and 8 years old) and parents to support. Being in SE Asia and seeing how hard everyone works and hustles to even survive makes me feel like an extremely spoiled brat. I don’t take for granted how lucky Tim and I are for all that we were blessed with. But sometimes you can’t help but feel guilty for our blessings when there are many others who are not as fortunate as us. It’s not to say they aren’t happy, because all the Cambodian people we have met and interacted with seemed to be very happy and so kind despite being very poor by western standards (Tim: And if they’re happier than you, then what does it say about money and happiness?). I can see why Angelina Jolie fell in love with Cambodia while filming here. Any way, that’s something I originally wanted to reflect on coming on this trip. What makes people happy? I know it’s not material things, that’s for sure.

Back to today. We were craving pizza and found a few highly rated places to try in Siem Reap. After going to two of them and finding out they weren’t opened for lunch, we went to our third choice. The restaurant is called Il Forno and is just off Siem Reap’s Pub Street. The prices were cheap for western standards but expensive for Cambodian standards. We shared a large salami pizza ($9.50 USD) and ordered a couple of soft drinks ($1.25 USD each). The pizza was Neapolitan style and was surprisingly very delicious. The crust was perfectly chewy and it tasted just as good as the Italian pizzas we had in Melbourne. It definitely hit the spot and satisfied our pizza craving. There’s a huge ex-pat community in Siem Reap, so that’s why there are so many western restaurants in the Old Town.

After lunch we took a tuk tuk back to our hotel, washed up, and rested for the rest of the afternoon. I took a nap for a couple of hours. We got ready and went back into town to the Night Market to find something for dinner.

We walked around the Angkor Night Market and it was basically all the same souvenir trinkets and clothing we’ve seen at most other markets in Cambodia. For dinner we found some street vendors across the street and ordered noodles, skewers, and a mango smoothie from different vendors (they were all in a row, how convenient!). Our street side dinner cost us $4 USD.

After dinner we walked around the streets and found dessert at a pancake truck, which was more like a crispy crepe. The banana chocolate pancake was $1 USD, but we later found some other stands just off the main roads for $0.75 USD. There are so many massage shops around the night market, all trying to get you to go inside. The massages are extremely cheap – $3 USD for an hour foot massage. In addition to massages, they have a lot of fish spas, which I’m too scared to try (because it’s dirty). The fish spas were also a lot cheaper than Thailand since $2 USD could buy you unlimited time. The fish were also a lot bigger than the ones I remembered seeing in Thailand. Maybe these fish get fed more?

We grabbed a tuk tuk back to the hotel and called it a night. It was a pretty long day.

Steps today: 18,000

Siem Reap (Day 124): Temple Hopping

July 2, 2016

This morning we were getting picked up by our guide, Dara, at 8:30am in our lobby. We went for a pretty quick breakfast downstairs since we kept snoozing our alarms. We got to the lobby just in time and Dara was already sitting there waiting for us. My parents and family friends used Dara when they were in Siem Reap 4 years ago, so I felt a bit connected to him already.

We introduced ourselves to Dara and our driver, Mr. Hua, and hopped into his Toyota Highlander. They were both very nice and were your typical friendly Cambodians. Dara was wearing a tour guide uniform which we saw around the temples. He’s a certified Siem Reap tour guide for Angkor Temples, which takes 3 years to complete and another couple of years to select a language to specialize in. We booked a two day tour to visit the temples with him for $150 USD. Since we wanted to watch the sunrise at Angkor Wat, Dara suggested we do that on our second day together and start at the temples further away. He didn’t charge us extra for the sunrise tour.

The first stop we took was to get our Angkor passes. Tours here don’t include the prices of your tickets so we bought our own. There’s a day pass for $20, 3 day pass for $40, and a 7 day pass for $60 (we bought the 3 day pass). When we got to the counter they asked where we were from and then asked if we were Cambodian. Cambodians get to visit the temples for free. They also take your photo and print it on the pass to avoid people from sharing or selling unused tickets.

Our first stop was to Banteay Srie, a pink colour sandstone temple that is known for its intricate carvings. When we arrived, there were a lot of tour busses. We hadn’t seen so many tourists since we were in Japan, or maybe not at all. It’s crazy because this is their down season and it’s still pretty busy. Dara told us that during down/rainy season, the tourists are mostly Asian – Chinese, Korean, and Vietnamese. And during high season (October – December) it’s more North Americans and Europeans. This temple was nice. The detail of the carvings is pretty amazing considering this was built over 1000 years ago!

On the way to the temples, we drove through the Cambodian country side, which according to Dara, has no electricity or running water. It’s only about 15 minutes outside Siem Reap and life is totally different. There were a bunch of street vendors on the side of the road selling palm sugar and palm products.

Next on our agenda was the “grand tour”, which is made up of Prerup, East Mebon, Tasom, and Preah Khan. It was hard remembering which temple was what. My first impression of the temples was that they were all quite grand for their time. The other temples did not have as many tourists which was nice. It’s quite tiring going from one temple to the next and climbing up the steep steps to the top of the temples (so glad I didn’t wear flip flops), especially in the heat! It wasn’t even that hot out (28 degrees), relatively speaking, and was a bit overcast and it was still draining. It’s really nice being able to get into the car after each temple and have air conditioning blasting. Mr. Hua would also give us ice cold water when we came back into the car. I could only imagine how uncomfortable it would be to be temple hopping during their “hotter season”. Cambodia has 3 seasons which the locals call “Cool Season” (too hot), “Warm Season” (way too hot), and “Rainy Season” (way too hot and humid).

For lunch, we stopped by a local restaurant in the countryside which was obviously for tourists only. Tour guides and tuk tuks all dropped of tourists here for lunch. There aren’t any other options around so this was pretty much it. The restaurant had hammocks off to the side for drivers and guides to hang out in while tourists ate. The restaurant was a Cambodian restaurant whose prices were about double the price of restaurants in the city. This was still cheap and it was a bit understandable since getting electricity and running water in the countryside is very expensive. Tim ordered a pork noodle soup and I had grilled pork with rice, both dishes were $6.50 USD each.

After we were done lunch, we continued on to two more temples. It was only our first day, but a lot of temples already looked quite similar to me. I think it’s really cool how huge trees grow around and almost take over some of the temples. I think it’s good that we started off at the smaller temples before going to the main event tomorrow – Angkor Wat and Ta Phrom (Tomb Raider temple).

We finished our day close to 3pm. Dara dropped us off at our hotel and said he would be at our hotel tomorrow morning at 4:40am for the sunrise (so early!). As soon as we got into the hotel it began to pour. Such good timing!

We rested the rest of the afternoon. Since it was pouring for most of the afternoon we just stayed inside and watched the storm. At around dinner time, it dried up and we headed out into town. We took a tuk tuk ($2 USD) to a Khmer restaurant called, Sinn Sinsa Mouth Cafe. I read about it on Trip Advisor and it was one of the few restaurants that were highly ranked that weren’t western/non-Khmer food.

When we got to Sinn Sinsa, we were warmly greeted by the owners – which seemed like a husband and wife team. Their kids were hanging out and it was like we were eating in their home. There weren’t any other tourists while we were there (guessing because it is down season), just other locals hanging out. The husband took our orders while the wife did all the cooking. We ordered a luc lac beef, garlic chicken rice, and morning glory. They gave us mini bananas for dessert, which was nice of them. So far this is my favourite Khmer restaurant. The food was really good and price reasonably, very generous portions, and the owners were so nice.

We took a tuk tuk back to the hotel, washed up, and went to sleep early. We had to be out and ready to go by 4:40am!

Steps today: 10,000

Siem Reap (Day 123): We Made It Alive!

July 1, 2016

It’s our last morning in Phnom Penh and our last breakfast at TEAV Hotel. I changed it up today and ordered a western breakfast and Tim ordered fried rice again. We booked a car to take us to the airport at 10:30am so we didn’t have much time in the morning to do much besides pack and have breakfast.

Our flight to Siem Reap wasn’t until 12:55pm, but with Phnom Penh’s crazy traffic, it took around an hour to get to the airport. The airport is only 11km away! At one point we were stuck in traffic for about 20 minutes because there was construction on the road. We were flying on Cambodia’s national airline, Cambodia Angkor Air to Siem Reap. Out of the domestic terminal, the 4 flights that were leaving around the same time were all going to Siem Reap. The only other city that flights fly to domestically is Sihanoukville (the south coastal city).

The domestic terminal was surprisingly nice and modern – very new compared to Laos and even Vietnam. There was free WiFi in the terminal and a good cafe called Blue Pumpkin, which apparently has the best ice cream in Cambodia. We saw a Blue Pumpkin store along the river yesterday but didn’t try it so I’m glad they had it at the airport so we could try. Tim and I shared a coconut ice cream in a cone for $1.75 USD. The cone was really good. It wasn’t a normal waffle cone, it was like an egg roll cookie cone.

When it was time to board, the skies opened up and it was like the same downpour as we had yesterday. Since the plane wasn’t right at the gate and we had to take a shuttle bus to take us right to the plane, a lot of people got wet until airport staff brought out large umbrellas. We also realized that departure times in SE Asia are more of an estimate of departure time and generally it’s actually the time you board.

The plane was another smaller place – similar to what we took from Hanoi to Luang Prabang (Tim: ATR 72). The flight time was only about 45 minutes, but it felt like the longest flight ever because of the bad turbulence. There were a couple of times where the plane just dropped a bit and everyone (or a lot of people) on the plane yelped. I was one of them. I grabbed Tim’s hand and held it pretty tight, said a prayer, and hoped we would land in Siem Reap safely. Tim said he wasn’t scared. I hate small planes!

Obviously we landed safely, but seriously that was the worst flight I’ve ever been on. I haven’t been that scared for a while. Tim said he was more scared on our honeymoon when our plane was trying to land in the Maldives. I don’t remember that at all, but the way he describes it I suppose it was probably more of a true concern than bad turbulence. Basically right as we were about to land, the plane went full thrust and pulled up again because (as we were told later) there was a plane that didn’t clear the runway. (Tim: So as Kait mentioned, it was significantly scarier for me because in my mind, being so close to touching down and then having the engines go full thrust and the plane pulling up made me think there was imminent danger. It was an abnormal occurrence and it was probably the only time I’ve been truly scared on a flight. Planes don’t crash from turbulence, so it’s not a concern to me, other than spilling a drink. It’s also good to remind myself that the tuk tuk rides we take are probably significantly more dangerous than any plane ride we’ll ever take).

We collected our bags and someone from our hotel was waiting for us at arrivals. The hotel we booked includes free airport transfers which is nice. We were picked up in a tuk tuk and made our way to the hotel.

We’re staying at Silk D’Angkor Boutique Hotel. It was really difficult to pick a hotel in Siem Reap because there are so many of them. The fact that there are so many hotels in Siem Reap was evident on our tuk tuk ride. All we saw were large hotels and resorts on the main road into the city. We got a pretty good deal on this hotel because it’s rainy season. If we stayed 4 nights, we only had to pay for 3 and there was a 15% promo code I found online so it was $100 USD for 4 nights. The hotel is older and not as modern as TEAV but we have no complaints. At least we have a large window, which we haven’t had in a while. We even have a view of the pool which is nice.

For the rest of the afternoon we decided to just relax and hang out at the hotel until dinner. I wasn’t feeling 100% and Tim wanted to catch up on our personal finances so we did just that. We knew the next couple of days would be longer and more draining. We got changed and went down to the pool and hung out there for an hour or so. It was nice. Seems like the hotel clientele are all Caucasian. I haven’t seen any Asians yet.

After we washed up, I looked up some restaurants for dinner and we took a tuk tuk to a restaurant called Lilypop ($2 USD ride). Lilypop served a mixture of Thai and Cambodian food and is actually run by a Belgian guy (with Cambodian cooks). The restaurant was already busy for 5:30pm so we grabbed a table outside. Tim ordered luc lac beef again and I tried amok chicken, which is like a Cambodian coconut curry. We also ordered green beans with pork to share. The best dish was my amok chicken. The beans were mediocre and Tim’s luc lac was probably my least favourite of the ones he’s had so far. The biggest kicker for us is that the rice they serve is brown! Maybe we aren’t the restaurant’s target market. They had mango sticky rice on the dessert menu and we got it to share. If there’s mango sticky rice on the menu, I’ll usually order it for dessert. This was probably the most disappointing dish for me. The sticky rice was way too mushy and had no particular taste. I have yet to have a really good mango sticky rice on this trip so far. I’ll keep looking!

We didn’t want to pay another $2 USD to go back to our hotel. Since the sidewalks here look pretty walkable, we just walked back. We’ll explore more of the town another night, but I just felt like going to sleep early. Our hotel is close to a huge Duty Free store (DFS Galleria) with all the luxury brands. It’s a bit weird to see such a high end complex in the middle of Siem Reap when everything else is very old.

We’re looking forward to seeing some of the temples tomorrow! We hired a local tour guide for the next two days to take us around. My parents used him when they were here 4 years ago and had great things to say about him.

Steps today: 4,500

Phnom Penh (Day 122): A Rainy Royal Day and Three Markets

June 30, 2016

I think the fact that there isn’t much natural light in our room makes us sleep in. It seems like we’re the last people in the hotel to have breakfast. Today we both ordered Cambodian breakfast – fried rice and fried noodles. I think this hotel has the best breakfast we’ve had so far.

We’re both really happy with the service at this hotel. Everyone is super friendly and accommodating. For example, Tim collects banknotes and coins and wanted all the Cambodian Riel denominations. But this is actually harder than it seems because all the ATMs give out USD and the only change you get when paying are small denominations. Tim asked the guy at reception if the hotel had riel that he could exchange for (they convert 1 USD = 4,000 riel in Cambodia). The hotel didn’t have all the bills so the guy at reception got a tuk tuk driver to go to the bank and take out one of each Cambodian banknote for Tim. That was really nice and definitely something they didn’t have to do for us but they did. It made Tim’s search for all the bills really easy.

The same tuk tuk driver who went to the bank for Tim drove us to the Russian Market for $3 USD. The Russian Market has nothing Russian in it. There’s the Russian Market and also a Russian Boulevard because the Russians funded the construction of the road in Phnom Penh after the Vietnam liberated Cambodia from the Khmer Rouge.

The market was filled with everything from souvenirs to home tools to raw meat. We walked through the rows of vendors and were pleasantly surprised that we weren’t harassed to buy things even if we touched a t-shirt. It was definitely more relaxing than shopping at Ben Thanh in Saigon. I bought some tank tops similar to the neon pink owl top I bought in Thailand 3 years ago. I wear it a lot more than I thought I would so these are to replace it. I bargained on my own and was really proud of myself for getting 3 of them for $5 USD!

We were pretty full from our heavy breakfast and didn’t end up eating at the market. There seemed to be a lot of good food options in the market though. Around the outside of the market there were pineapple vendors who cut and sold mini pineapples that you could hold by the stem and munch on as you walked around the market. We shared one and it was tender and very sweet! We saw these small pineapples while in Vietnam and Laos, but didn’t try them there. The ones we saw in Laos were being cut while the pineapple was being swarmed by flies. These ones were fly free (from what we saw) so I felt better about eating it.

While walking around the outer part of the market, we saw a street vendor that sold sugar cane juice and smoothies. She had some seats under a tree so we decided to get some drinks here before heading to the Royal Palace. We ordered one sugar cane juice ($0.60 USD) and a mango smoothie ($1 USD). Across the street we saw a fried chicken stall that I noticed while on the tuk tuk yesterday. Tim is a fried chicken fiend and went across the street to get some chicken for us to eat. He’s the one who said he wasn’t hungry in the slightest (10 minutes before he saw fried chicken). He brought back 4 pieces for us to share. They looked good and were only $0.60 USD each! It tasted like KFC but with sweet chilli sauce. As we were finishing up our lunch it started getting really windy. Being in SE Asia for 3 weeks, I knew what that meant. As soon as I felt that gust of wind I told Tim that it was going to start pouring soon. Sure enough, I was right!

We took a tuk tuk to the Royal Palace ($2.50 USD) and as soon as we got there it started to pour. Like torrential downpour. We both took out our rain jackets and umbrellas. Wearing rain jackets with a t-shirt underneath in humid weather was not pleasant. I was also wearing Toms (canvas shoes) which was probably the worst shoes I could’ve worn today. My feet were soaked and I knew they would be that way for the remainder of the day.

The Royal Palace admission cost $6.50 USD each. The palace grounds are all very nicely groomed and it would’ve been a nice area to just walk around if it hadn’t been pouring. I guess the bright side is that it wasn’t scorching hot! We walked through the palace grounds and went into the “silver pagoda” where the floor is made out of sterling silver. We actually missed this at first because on the map it doesn’t say silver pagoda, it just says “emerald Buddha”. Yes, there’s an emerald Buddha in the silver pagoda, so we totally missed the silver floor when we walked in (Tim: It didn’t help that 90% of the floor was covered in rugs, so you had to look at the edges to notice the silver). You aren’t allowed to take pictures inside the palace buildings so I can’t show you what it looked like. Let’s just say the fact that we missed it the first time and had to go back is all you need to know. The palace is a nice place to visit but it was a bit underwhelming for the admission price.

We found a tuk tuk outside the palace that agreed (after bargaining of course) to take us to the Central Market, Riverside, and then back to our hotel later in the night for $9 USD. Central Market is a nicer looking market than the Russian Market but it felt like more of a maze since it’s more of a circular configuration. Again, the market had everything. They even had a whole row of tailors and nail stalls (lots of people were getting pedicures). I just bought a bulk bag (probably 30+) of hair ties for $1 USD. I didn’t bother bargaining because I was surprised at how cheap it was already.

We stayed at the Central Market for an hour wandering around each row of vendors. I liked the Russian Market better. There were more vendors at the Russian Market whose products looked more appealing to me. We went back to the front of the market where our driver was supposed to meet us at 5pm. He wasn’t there and we waited for another 10 minutes for him before we decided to just find another tuk tuk driver. We were surprised that he wasn’t there since we didn’t even pay him or give him a “deposit”.

The next tuk tuk driver took us to the Riverside Night Market for $3 USD. Today was the first day we took tuk tuks between all our sights and it was awesome! Usually we walk everywhere but Phnom Penh isn’t a very walker friendly city. Basically everyone takes tuk tuks and I can see why. When we got to the night market it was still fairly early and vendors were still setting up. We went across the street and walked along the riverside. We read that Japan had donated money in developing Phnom Penh’s riverside walk way by helping the city deal with their sewage system, building a dyke to prevent flooding, and making it more aesthetically pleasing by lining it with palm trees.

While we were walking along the river Tim saw a noodle stand that he wanted to try. We went up to the stand and ordered noodles to share. A local came to help and translated for us since the vendor didn’t speak any English. We’ve been in Cambodia for 3 days now and we’ve noticed that people here are very nice and helpful. So far Cambodia and Laos has the nicest people during our SE Asia portion of our trip.

(Tim: The main reason this stall got my attention was because it looked like the lady was wearing pajamas). The noodles were really good ($1.50 USD). They were basically instant noodles stir fried with beef and vegetables and a sweet and spicy sauce. Beside the noodle stand was a grilled corn stand that seemed very popular amongst the locals. We tried one corn on the cob and agreed that it was pretty darn good. The corn was grilled and then dipped in a sweet onion sauce. The corn was only $0.50 USD. The little girl helping her Dad spoke English and helped me out. There were two different kinds of corn – yellow and white corn. She asked which one I wanted and I asked her which one she liked. She picked yellow so I went with that.

We walked back to the night market and as we were walking the tuk tuk driver who ditched us at the Central Market saw us! He told us that there was so much traffic on the way back so he got there 10-15 minutes after 5pm. He said he would drive us back to our hotel, less the amount we paid the other tuk tuk driver. We agreed to meet him after we were done at the market.

There wasn’t too much going on at the night market. There were some clothing stalls but nothing caught our eye. Maybe we were marketed out at this point in the day. At the back of the market there are a few food stalls. We shared some fried noodles with chicken ($1.50 USD, seems to be the standard price) which were good but I think I liked the instant noodle ones better. I was more excited for dessert since we saw a coconut ice cream stall that looked delicious.

We shared a fresh coconut ice cream for dessert. They cut a fresh coconut in half and they scraped the flesh off the shell and then piled 3 scoops of coconut ice cream, peanuts, and pieces of palm flesh. It was delicious and only $1.25 USD!

After dessert we went back to the tuk tuk and went back to the hotel. I couldn’t wait to take off my wet TOMS – so gross. When we got back to our room, our bed was decorated and there were rose petals with a bath drawn in the washroom. The manager at the hotel thinks this is our honeymoon so that’s why they decorated our room.

We’re leaving for Siem Reap tomorrow and will be there for 4 days. Looking forward to seeing the famous Angkor Wat! I enjoyed our time in Phnom Penh. It took a little to warm up to the city but I actually really enjoyed it. Phnom Penh isn’t the prettiest city and is a little rough around the edges but the country and city have been through hell and back so it’s understandable. As mentioned earlier, we both think that Cambodian people are some of the friendliest people we have met so far on this trip. As a whole, considering all that they have been through, there doesn’t seem to be a chip on anyone’s shoulder in the same way that we felt in Vietnam. We also learned that it’s not pronounced “Nom-Pen” like how we thought it was, but it is pronounced “Pah-Nom-Pen”. Now we know better!

Steps today: 17,000

Phnom Penh (Day 121): A Somber Afternoon

June 29, 2016

Today was a very emotionally draining day, which is why I’m struggling to write today’s post. We visited the Choeung Ek Genocidal Center (aka “killing fields”) and the Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum – which made for a very somber Phnom Penh day.

Our morning started quite late. We had a really good breakfast at the hotel and then got ready to head out. We found a tuk tuk outside the hotel and negotiated a fare to take us to the killing fields and then to the museum afterwards. Our tuk tuk driver was an older man who agreed to take us around for $15 USD. It started to lightly rain as we made our way to the killing fields, which seemed appropriate for what we were about to see.

Choeung Ek is located about 45 minutes outside of Phnom Penh. The tuk tuk ride there was an adventure in itself and I quite enjoyed riding in one through the crazy Cambodian streets.

Once we arrived at Choeung Ek, we agreed to meet our driver in 2 hours. Admission to the grounds, which includes a really good audio guide, was $6 USD each. The audio guide leads you around the killing fields and then to the memorial stupa at the end. As this is now a memorial sight, it was peaceful and quiet while everyone walked around and listened to their headsets and reflected on what we just heard. It’s hard to imagine that 35 years ago, the very area we were walking on was the site of mass graves and horrific atrocities.

While walking through the grounds, you couldn’t help but get emotional hearing what happened during Khmer Rouge’s reign of terror. Tim will be better at explaining what we saw.

(Tim: Taking over for the rest of this post)

The killing fields were previously a Chinese Cemetery before the Khmer Rouge began using it as a execution site. Prisoners from Security Prison 21 (S-21) were brought to the killing fields for execution after signing confessions that were tortured out of them. S-21 would be our next stop after the killing fields, as the former prison was now the Genocide Museum.

The Khmer Rouge, led by Pol Pot, tried to create a closed off, agrarian socialist society. Pol Pot glorified the farmer, and soon after the Khmer Rouge took Phnom Penh and began their regime, they evacuated cities and made everyone move into the rural areas to work on farms (as slave labour basically). Anyone that posed a potential threat to the regime was imprisoned and executed… Anyone educated, anyone in a profession, religious leaders, anyone with glasses even (meant you were educated?), were subject to imprisonment and execution.

(Kait: The following pictures may be disturbing but I also think it’s important to see them.)

After spending a somber couple hours at the killing fields, we found our tuk tuk driver and were on our way back into town to the Genocide Museum.

Before going in, we took a short break to go find something for lunch. We started making our way down the street adjacent to the museum and saw a street food spot with an awning that had a picture of Luc lac beef. That was easy. Kait and I shared a Luc lac beef and a noodle soup. We also got a fruit smoothie (can’t go wrong). After lunch, we made our way to the museum.

Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum, S-21 during the Khmer Rouge regime, and a high school before that, was converted into a museum and memorial after the Khmer Rouge regime fell to the Vietnamese. Of the 20,000 or so prisoners that entered the prison, only 7 survived. (Tim: Apparently 7 is the most often quoted number but more recent studies show the number was probably closer to 20-30).

Walking around the museum, I was disturbed by the many similarities I noticed between what they did here, and what I saw at the Auschwitz Concentration Camp. Different countries, different ideologies, different contexts, but similar tragedies. Both took photos and extensive documentation of the prisoners. Both have stories of orders being given to destroy all the photos and documentation when liberators neared the sites, only to have the soldiers their evacuate before they had time to destroy all the evidence. Both had policies of transferring prisoners to the execution sites under false pretenses. Both were disturbingly efficient about killing people. Both started at a certain pace of execution, which dramatically (and tragically) increased near the fall of their regimes. Both had soldiers who said they were only following orders…

I find the extensive documentation particularly disturbing and odd, but a clip from the Audio Tour gave an explanation that I found somewhat plausible. By requiring and strictly adhering to rules that required detailed documentation, they took the act of genocide and mass murder, and made it procedural. It became something easier for a soldier to follow through on. They’re just following detailed instructions…

Both Auschwitz and S-21 had rooms filled with portrait photos of hundreds of prisoners. I found the portraits particularly moving. It’s haunting to see so many beautiful faces, young and old, male and female, knowing they were all imprisoned here, tortured, then executed. But I find it important to pay my respects and give them my attention.

While there isn’t conclusive evidence on the total number of people who died, estimates put it at 1.5-3 million people, with the best estimates putting it around 2 million people, or 1/4 of the entire Cambodian population at that time. It’s fascinating to me to see how countries come out of tragedies like this… Even as an outside observer (i.e. tourist), knowing the history is so recent, it’s almost too much for me to process. And yet, the people in Cambodia seem very forward looking and optimistic. I imagine the country has changed a lot in the last 20 years, and will continue to change. It makes me interested in revisiting the country in the future.

(Kait: Putting the pictures into this post and recounting what we saw yesterday still brings up a lot of emotions. Throughout the museum there were testimonials from many women who were forced to marry men under the Khmer Rouge regime. If they didn’t comply and reproduce they were both killed. Their stories were all very similar – they were all forced into loveless and abusive marriages. Looking at the ages of the women, they were all our parent’s age. It made me really sad and also very appreciative of our lives. All the victims who died under Khmer Rouge were extremely unlucky to be born during a horrific time and place. They suffered under no fault of their own and that’s what is really upsetting.)

After our somber afternoon, we made our way to Mok Mony, a restaurant recommended to us by Kait’s cousin, Chloe. Looking over the menu, we went with another Luc Lac beef and a marinated beef dish. For dessert, we got Mango Sticky Rice which was one of our favourite dishes in Thailand.

It was a long day, but I’m really glad we had a chance to visit the killing fields and the genocide museum. We learned a lot of about the recent history of Cambodia, and I think it helps to put a lot of things in context for us about the country. I’m looking forward to seeing more of Cambodia.

Steps Today: 11,000

Phnom Penh (Day 120): Chicken Wings and #35?

June 28, 2016

Today we flew to Phnom Penh! A new country for the next week. Our flight was at 11:50am, so we didn’t have much time to do much other than have breakfast and pack up. Tim went out to the main street to find a tuk tuk that would take us to the airport. We paid 50,000 LAK = $7.95 CAD to get to the airport.

The Vientiane international terminal is pretty small and old. There wasn’t much there in terms of restaurants or stores. The best food option was probably the Dairy Queen at the departure check in, but once you got past customs, there was not much available and everything was 4 x the price as it would be on the street. We spent some of our last kip at the departure gates on some ice cream bars.

Our flight to Phnom Penh was a code shared flight and operated by Vietnam Airlines. The final destination for the flight was Ho Chi Minh City. It seemed like the majority of passengers were going back to Vietnam. They served a small lunch and gave us drinks. The meal was a salad, Vietnamese deli (mystery) meat, and a piece of cake. The flight to Phnom Penh was an hour and 10 minutes, which went by pretty quickly.

We arrived at Phnom Penh’s airport and it was quite modern. Once we got down to the arrivals area, customs officers directed passengers who required visas to fill out visa application forms. We lined up and got our visas and paid $30 USD each (same rate for all countries if you’re entering on a tourist visa). Tim paid for both our visas and gave the custom’s officer $100 USD. The custom’s officer only gave him back $30 USD and Tim firmly asked for the other $10. You could tell from the officer’s expression that he didn’t accidentally forget the extra $10. Welcome to Cambodia! We purposely flew into Phnom Penh over Siem Reap because we read that the customs officers aren’t as corrupt as the ones in Siem Reap. For the most part we didn’t have any trouble and weren’t asked for bribes of any sort while getting our visa.

Once we got our bags we walked outside to where all the drivers with signs were waiting. We saw Tim’s name and went with the driver from the hotel. The hotel offered the same rate as what we read a taxi would cost from the airport so it was a no brainer to just be safe and book the car. Our hotel driver came and picked us up in a Lexus RX 300 (SUV) and we realized that particular Lexus is very common in Phnom Penh. Phnom Penh streets are very congested with scooters and a lot of SUVs! It was more reminiscent of Vietnam traffic and we knew while walking around we had to be on high alert again. Tim said we shouldn’t have gone to Laos until the end because it made us “soft”.

After about a 30 minute car ride through lots of traffic, we arrived at our hotel. We’re staying TEAV Boutique Hotel, which is a fairly modern boutique hotel in the middle of the city. We’re paying $45 USD/night, which is a bit discounted for the slow season. The staff came out and greeted us, checked us in while giving us cold cranberry juice and ice cold towels.

We were shown to our room and it was indeed very modern inside. Concrete floors, high ceilings and it smelled like lemongrass oils (the kind you smell when you got to a spa in SE Asia or a Thai spa in Vancouver..so good!). We settled in and planned to just walk around our surrounding area called the “BKK” district of Phnom Penh. BKK is where the majority of hotels are located as well as many restaurants.

We walked to the Independence Monument to take some pictures then made our way into the BKK. We were surprised to see so many foreign based restaurants and coffee shops. There are a lot of Korean and Japanese chains that we recognize. We have also noticed that in Laos and now in Cambodia, there are a lot of signs and plaques with Japanese flags on them thanking them for their contribution. Apparently Japan has invested a lot in Laos and Cambodia’s development (even buses in Vientiane say they were all donated by Japan).

While walking around BKK, we decided to go to Bon Chon for our very late lunch. Bon Chon is a Korean fried chicken restaurant that has locations all around the world. The first time I ever had Korean fried chicken was in New York, probably 10 years ago, and it was from Bon Chon. It was the only restaurant back then to serve it and I was hooked. It was the best fried chicken I’ve ever had and every time I went to visit my sister we always got it delivered. So it definitely bring back a lot of good memories. I wished Vancouver had a Bon Chon. There’s some places downtown that serve Korean fried chicken but it’s not the same.

We ordered garlic fries and a medium combo to share. Prices in Phnom Penh are all in USD. If change is under $1 USD, they give Cambodian Riel back. It’s a bit confusing and I’m not sure why they have to use both. Seeing as prices are quoted in USD, food in Cambodia is probably going to be more expensive compared to Laos and Vietnam. But I suppose going to Bon Chon for our first meal wasn’t exactly a good representation of what prices are like in Phnom Penh.

I haven’t had Bon Chon for a while and it was pretty darn good. It was very juicy and the skin was so crunchy. Being a nicer restaurant in Phnom Penh, the service was really good. It was definitely not a cheap meal by Cambodian standards and since we’ve been in SE Asia for a few week, I felt a bit guilty for having such an expensive meal. Our lunch was $15 USD (how things quickly change from being in Australia).

After Bon Chon, we walked towards a large mall called Aeon Mall (which is a Japanese branded mall). We walked for about 20 minutes and finally got there. It doesn’t seem like many people walk in Phnom Penh. There weren’t many tourists or locals walking. I guess everyone is in a tuk tuk.

Aeon Mall Phnom Penh is huge and it’s really nice. The mall is celebrating its 2 year anniversary so it explains why it looks so new and pristine. There’s a large department store with a supermarket on the bottom level (Japanese style), a movie theatre, a great selection of restaurants, and a bunch of pretty good clothing stores (like Mango from Spain).

We walked around the mall to see what options we had for a light dinner and ended up eating at Pepper Lunch. It’s a casual Japanese restaurant that has locations all around Asia and North America (including Vancouver). Pepper Lunch seemed like a very popular place amongst locals. We shared a beef and egg on rice combo. It was pretty good. The Pepper Lunch in Richmond has been opened for a couple of years now and I haven’t even been to that one yet!

After Pepper Lunch, we went downstairs to the supermarket to browse around. Tim bought a few Cambodian beers and I got a bag of green basil Lays chips. Prices are still fairly cheap, just not as cheap as Vietnam. We walked back to the hotel to plan out our day tomorrow, catch up on blogging, and watch TV shows (Tim couldn’t wait to watch Game of Thrones).

We’re in for an emotionally heavy day tomorrow as we plan on visiting the killing fields and learning more about Khmer Rouge.

Steps today: 15,000