Ankor Wat and the rest of Cambodia

Ankor

Fascinating Cambodian history

I’m sure most people aren’t too familiar with Cambodia history and don’t know what the Ankor temples are all about, neither did we until we arrived. Basically Cambodia is on the main trade route between China and India. A series of kingdoms spawned in the area, heavily influenced by Indian culture.

Once unified all these kingdoms became the greatest kingdom in South East Asian history; The Khmer Empire.

This empire built all the amazing temples, irrigated and cultivated the land and controlled the entire region. Eventually in 1432 the Thais sacked Angkor and the city was abandoned in favour of the Phonon Penh (still the capital today) area. The Thais and Vietnamese regained control over the area and most of Cambodia. The French saved the country fromextinction in 1864. They regained independence in 1953 under King Sihanouk and began to prosper. Due to his erratic policies he was overthrown by the army in 1970 and fled to Beijing. The Chinese pressured him to support the indigenous rebels the Khmer Rouge or Red Khmers. Cambodia was involved in the Vietnam War and it was carpet bombed by the US (killing thousands) and invaded with the help of the South Vietnamese to route out communists. They failed. Fighting broke out in the country and the Khmer Rouge took over Phnom Penh on 17 Aug 1975. Under the leader Pol Pot the Khmer Rouge implemented a horrific revolution, transforming Cambodia into a Maoist peasant farming country.

In 1978 Vietnam invaded again and overthrew the Khmer Rouge. In 1991 a peace agreement was signed and in 1993 a new constitution was adopted. The first parliament was not triumphant but the Khmer Rouge was finally defeated in 1998. Cambodia is now a member of Asean (Association of South-East Asian Nations) and slowlybeginning to prosper mainly from tourism.

The Temples

There are a lot of amazing temples in Siam Reap, the most famous being Angkor Wat. It’s impossible to see them all in one day, so there are a variety of tickets available: a one day pass for $20, a three day pass for $40 and a week pass for $60. As we’ve seen our fair share of temples on this trip so far but sill wanted to hit all the major spots we went with the three day option. Siam Reap is a small town run pretty much solely on tourism. On one opulent stretch of road you can find all the beautiful five star resorts- pure luxury.

Naturally we were housed on the other side of town near the ‘crocodile market’, a lively spot with plenty of restaurants and entertainment. For value and quality for money, Cambodia is one of the bests.

Our first day we spent touring Ankor Wat temple, getting a bicycle rickshaw there and a motor taxi back (yes the three of us on the bike). It’s spectacular; a monster of a temple- the labour involved constructing it would have been phenomenal.

The next two days we hired bicycles to tour the rest of the temples (averaging nearly 18km a day!). Siam Reap was like an oven, we spent most of the day cowering in the shade of the fabulous temples, with many eyes on us especially at The Bayon temple complex.

One particular temple was carefully deconstructed by the French as the foundations were about to collapse. They meticulously documented where each building block belonged but devastatingly these records were destroyed during the war and now the pieces lie like the worlds largest jigsaw puzzle while they try slowly try to reconstruct its magnificence.

The temple where they filmed the Angelina Jolie move Tomb Raider was one of our favourites, the trees are slowly reclaiming the land and engulfing the temples into its forest. Their massive roots charge between and along the temple walls, caging its beauty and slowly making it crumble.

Phnom Penh

Phnom Penh isn’t as friendly to the backpacker, while the selection of accommodation is vast and cheap so is the standard. We eventually found a fairly decent room and explored the area. The backpacker part of town is dirty but thankfully the rest of the city doesn’t follow suit. On our second day we visited the general museum and the horrific S21 prison camp.

This was previously a school before the Khmer Rouge, who turned it into an interrogation centre and prison; the last stop before the killing fields. It’s one of the eeriest, saddest places I’ve ever visited.

The fact that the tortures are so recent makes it even more poignant. Little cells with shackles, chains and beds still occupy the classrooms upstairs. Down stairs are hundreds of photos of the men, women and children incarcerated there, they would have eventually ended in a mass grave in one of the numerous killing fiends in the area.

It’s absolutely horrific stuff but doesn't end there, we next took a tuk tuk the 9km out of town to the nearest excavated killing field. There are thousands of these all over the country; some of the mass graves discovered have the sculls of up to 500,000 people! I’m almost in tears here writing about it. Imagine that they did this to their own people. In this killing field they didn’t have enough time in the day to kill everybody so they had to build a holding shed so the truck loads of prisoners could be housed for the night and slaughtered the next day. They erected a memorial monument containing some of the sculls found to honour the victims and so as the world would never forget the atrocity committed.

Sihanoukville

Sihanoukville is another Asian beach side resort. The beach is small, packed with hawkers and child labourers selling books and trinkets not giving you a moments rest on the nice free sun-beds. When you feel like getting away from the blazing sun for a cool dip in the water- you can’t- the water’s warm. Of course you can swim, but just not cool off; it’s actually like taking a bath the water’s that warm! All the little bar shacks along the beach sell the usual drinks and food, but most of them offer a portion of magic mushrooms or dope on the side, with a touch of loud Goan trance music! Away for the beach you’ll find some lovely restaurants with great prices.

We headed straight to the Vietnam embassy on arrival and didn’t have any problems obtaining the visa, although they added on a levy of $5 for no apparent reason but were still $20 dollars cheaper than Bangkok and we didn’t have to let our passports out of our sight.

While in Sihanoukville we swam, bathed, ate drank (small glass of bear 25c and $1 vodka/coke!) had a blind massage- $3.50 for 30mins by a blind masseuse, visited the Starfish bakery where all profits go directly to a Cambodian charity and got caught in a tremendous thunder storm!

We eventually left on a bus at 6.30am to Vietnam