Our Adventures in Asia: Angkor Wat

I took a late afternoon flight from Saigon to Siam Reap and only gave myself an hour to get through immigration and take a elephant up to Bakeng Hill to watch the sun set over Angkor Wat, which I hear is just breathtaking, before going to hotel. Well, that was the plan. Thanks to a flight delay, I missed out on the elephant ride and sunset. Instead, I had a fantastic dinner at the restaurant Madame Butterfly, which was listed in my guide book as a very expensive restaurant. The entire meal costs US$6.5o. I had planned on calling my parents to check in on Sydney and then getting bed early since I haven' t been sleeping well. Again, that was the plan. The reality was that I couldn't dial my Dad's cell phone from my cell phone or from the hotel phone. Nor could I reach my hotel in Saigon. I was up all night worrying about it, although I'm not sure if I was more worried that Sydney was driving my parents crazy or the other way around. I'll find out in a couple of hours.

Siam Reap is located about 3 miles from Angkor Wat, and the main industry is tourism. As a result, most of the people here speak English and all prices are quoted in US dollars. There are many luxurious hotels available that are affordable. I stayed at the Angkor Palace Resort and Spa for $134 a night, and it was a beautiful hotel --- very reminiscent of our hotel in Phuket. While there are 1 million people living in Siam Reap, you wouldn't have guessed it because Siam Reap looks and feels like a small village. The town center runs about 3 blocks, and there are no traffic lights, street signs or paved roads in many parts of the city. We had to share the roads with oxen, ducks and monkeys at times.

Since I only had until 3pm today to take in the sites, I hired a driver and guide from the hotel. The driver costs $30 for the entire day and the guide costs $15 for 4 hours. I typically don't use a guide because I haven't had very good experience with them. They typically feel compelled to talk non-stop because I'm paying for their time or they just recite facts that they memorized from Frommers or they would steer you to the places where they were most familiar. Unless they look like Brad Pitt and have the storytelling talents of David Sedaris, I'd rather go it alone. The guide I had didn't meet any of my criterias and had all of characteristics that I wanted to avoid. He was a very nice man and knew many facts but he couldn't provide an interesting narrative. He just pointed to things and said "This is ________" or "That is __________." To fill the silence, he pointed out spiderwebs and informed me that they were made by spiders. The only reprieve I got from the constant chatter was when he excused himself to pee on a tree. I thought about getting myself purposefully lost in the crowd but I knew he would find me. They always do.

After about 45 minutes, I tuned him out and trained myself to mumble "Mmmm," or "Okay," or "Oh" every couple of minutes and hoped that they were timed appropriately. I didn't always succeed because he would repeat himself whenever I didn't react as he thought I should have. I have confess that I didn't learn much about these sites. The temples that I visited were erected in the 12th century and were dedicated to the various Hindu gods. The history of the Kings and the building of the temples are written in the stones in sanskrit but unfortunately, they haven't all survived through the various wars. The temples are practicing temples and contain various statutes of buddhas and incense for prayer. The religion in Cambodia used to be Hindu but now it is about 90% Buddhists. Angkor Wat is the only temple that is also a masoleum.

I first sight that I visited was Angkor Thom, which was a city near Angkor Wat and is survived by two important temples, the Banyon and Bunyeon temples. The Bunyeon temple was under construction so I didn't see much of it. Once you get through the gates below, you have several options to get to the temples. You can walk but it's crazy to do so because of the sweltering heat. You can take an elephant to the temples for $10 or a car and driver like I did. Or you can hire a cyclo driver, which is what most people did.