Siem Reap, Angkor Wat - Wow.

I(Devon) had heard a lot about Angkor Wat (translation - Temple City) and studied the bas reliefs in an art history class in college, but for some reason I always figured it was an overrated bunch of decaying stone...I was wrong.  It was a highlight of our trip and an absolutely incredible place, I understand why it is one of modern wonders of the world.

Our first experience in Siem Reap, the city near the temples, was being accosted by tuk tuk and taxi drivers, who we now see as something more akin to confidence men, who were waiting like hungry vultures for us when we stepped off the bus, some even had our names written down because we had mistakenly given our names to the bus company.  The drivers buy names of passengers so that you think they are the people from your hotel there to pick you up.  It was nuts, luckily we saw one jolly, smiling gent near the bus station exit holding a very legitimate looking sign with my name and the name of the hotel we had booked called Two Dragons.  We immediately loved our little family run hotel.  The owner Gordon is from Santa Barbara and runs it with his beautiful, sweet, Thai wife, Ning, but really their little, boisterous, hilarious, five-year-old, Matthew, runs the place.  He took a liking to me (Devon) and was our entertainment on a few occasions as we enjoyed the delicious food they served at the little restaurant at the hotel.

Gordon was sweet and helpful as was our wonderful tuk tuk driver who drove is around the three times we went to the temples.  His name was Bunny (pronounced Boo-nee) and he was training to be a temple guide so we basically got a tour guide for the price of  tuk tuk driver.  We feel very lucky that we found him as he was very genuinely sweet and always intelligent about where to meet back up so we could find him easily when we stumbled, tired and dazed, out of touring around the temple grounds.

The first night we didn't know we needed cash to get our three day pass, but Bunny was a known figure around the entire complex and spoke with a guard  who let us in and told us how to avoid the other guards who would fine us $100 for entering without a ticket.  Just entering the complex is an experience.  We drove around the 200meter wide moat that the surround the main Angkor Wat (which is actually just one temple in the complex) as the light was fading to dusk.  The natural beauty of the forests there are amazing and lush.  We climbed a hill right after the guards got off duty to a beautiful ruin with an amazing view of the sunset over the grounds.  That is all we did the day we got into town.

The next day we hired Bunny for the entire day (for $15) and he took us to about 10 temples including Angkor Wat.  We got up at 4:20am to get to the sunrise and watched the sky turn to day over the beautiful outline of the main Angkor temple from behind one of the two big ponds so we could see the reflection as well.  It was stunning and felt spiritual, even with loud, rude tourists increasingly congregating behind us.

Just entering the main temple complex is an experience as you cross over the large moat that was intended to represent all the oceans of the world.  The bas relief carvings gallery was incredible, we couldn't believe how well preserved it was after about 900 years of weathering!  Our favorite was the Churning of the Sea of Milk- the daemons and devas (gods) made a pact to work together to churn the Sea of Milk into an everlasting life potion.  It depicts The gods on one side of a mountain and the daemons on the other, with Vishnu at the center over seeing the operation. Both sides are shown pulling a huge naga (sea dragon) wrapped around a large mountain to twist the mountain back and forth to churn the sea. My (Breen) favorite piece of the story is the humanity of both sides: the gods never intended on sharing the potion with the daemons, and of course the daemons had plans to stab the gods in the back the second the job was completed. The wars that followed, and other holy battles, were depicted on the outer bas reliefs all around the main temple.

We won't give a blow by blow of all the amazingness because there is just too much! The Bayon, the overgrown "Tomb Raider" temple (particularly stunning), and the much more well preserved, auburn colored Bantay Srei were all highlights on there own.  All we can say is, GO!

We were also surprised by how much we liked the town of Siem Reap.  We had both imagined it to be a very podunk town with bitter locals serving the masses of balongs (in Cambodia this means foreigner).  However, due to all the tourism, the government provides the town with money to have beautifully renovated French architecture and many gardens and clean streets and everyone was very friendly to us.  The Cambodian people are a warm, resilient people.  Following the terrible Khmer Rouge they have seemingly bounced back quickly and forgivingly, without seemingly harboring much resentment of the past.

We went to a free concert at one of the completely free childrens' hospitals at the recommendation of Bunny.  A Swiss doctor who founded and runs the multi-hospital organization, and who performs under the alias Beaticello played his cello and explained the history behind the hospitals in between beautiful solo performances of Bach and personal Cambodian-inspired compositions.  He also made a plea for donations of both money and blood to keep the hospital running.  We were enthralled as we learned about sickness and the government's lack of funding and what an amazing organization it was, run by a wonderful man.  However, when we got back to our hotel, Gordon proceeded to de-mystify him and the organization, saying he does not have his facts straight and that he makes up statistics, is a spotlight whore, and won't let people into the hospital because some of what he says are blatant lies to raise money.  What he does is commendable, and his goals are something we believe in and even Gordon thinks his heart is in the right place; this is just another question of whether the ends justify the means.  It was an interesting and confusing evening to say the least and we are still on the fence.

Overall, if we had had more time we would have stayed longer.  Like many of the places we have been, we fell in love with Siem Reap and Angkor Wat, but our trip was rapidly coming to and end and we had to move on to see the second largest city in Cambodia, Battambang...

Love,
Breen and Devon