First impressions - Phnom Penh

Okay bare with me here. I wanted to update this with a little bit of what has been going on. I am still in Cambodia so I don't have time to think that much about the clarity and conciseness of my writing.

I've been here for almost one week now so let me start with my first few days.

After a long day of traveling from my town to Tokyo and flying about 6 hours to Bangkok, we arrived at night. We were spending the night in the airport to save money on a hotel since our flight from Bangkok to Cambodia was at 8am the next day. We got a 45 minute foot massage and then crashed out on the chairs until we woke up.

We took our one hour flight into Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia. I was really exhausted when we arrived because I barely slept in the airport, but the excitement got my adrenaline flowing and I was ready to go.

My first impression of Cambodia was paradise! Tropical paradise with palm trees, blue skies, and something I never seem to get enough of no matter where I've lived is HEAT! We got into our taxi that took us into the city. On the way, my surroundings started revealing how Cambodia is in fact, a 3rd world country.

Our taxi shared the road with just about everything one could imagine. Mostly, motorbikes - some people were walking with carts of fruit amongst us, others were cars, vans that were packed up with 20 people, motorbikes transporting whole families on them, including babies & infants. There are no lanes or lines dividing where people go - people weave in and out of traffic as best as possible. Horns around going off all round you - as they are used to indicate that you are going to pass, coming to an intersection - basically to inform everyone around you that you are there. They aren't used in an angry manner like back at home.

The sounds of honking and the engines of motorbikes are what filled my ears and continued to all day long. We arrived safely to our hotel, showered and quickly headed out to the city.



Our 1st sightseeing spot was aimed to be the Royal Palace. It seemed to be a straight shot from our hotel. So, we headed that way. We came across a market place. There was no possible way I could describe these in a manner to ever make anyone understand. I only hope I can describe it enough so it'll help me recall it years later when I am reading this.

Imagine person after person sitting and trying to sell their own goods - in 105 degree weather, probably without a recent shower. The sights, the sounds, the smells, especially the smells will be hard to forget. Chicken, shrimp, fish, unidentifiable dead meats all sitting out, waiting to be purchased. Some, very few had ice around it - the rest just sitting - being prebaked before purchased. All sorts of new fruits, random foods. It was so crowded, you are being pushed, barely able to move. I tried staying in on the path that was built to go between people's square tarp stores, but sometimes, you had nowhere to go but practically on top of the stores. People were even trying to get through with their motorbikes. We walked through this incredible maze before we reached a dead end. We couldn't get to the palace from here afterall. So, we had to turn around and make our way through the maze again.



There were definitely a few parts that if I were hungover or not feeling particularly well - I would have definitely lost my stomach right there on the street. On our way from the putrid smelling market to the palace we came into another challenge of being here. The constant begging - people all over are trying to sell their services to you - from tuk-tuk rides (a small cart that can sit 2-4 people being pulled by a motorbike), water, boat rides, books, DVDs, newspapers, post cards, practically anything to get your buck. It was at this time that we had been bombarded with "I'll give you a ride".

We were able to escape and ignore most of the begging. We finally came upon the Royal Palace to discover it is closed until 2:30 as one of the tuk-tuk drivers informed us. Our group of 4 walked across the street to sit by the water (the Mekong River) to figure out our next plan of action. The decision was to walk to Wat Phnom, the tallest structure in all of Phnom Penh. We weaved our way through traffic and got there.

The temple was gorgeous. You walk up to it via stairs, on both sides of the stairs were large, pink various statues. The inside had a very large, golden Buddha, beautiful paintings, flowers, donations- beautiful. Outside of this temple were monkeys! We left and decided to have lunch. We chose a cute cafe' on the corner of one of the main streets that offered vegetarian food. Although, I didn't admit it, at the time I was very relieved to be eating at a place with other Westerners. This is a country with all sorts of "don't drink the water" and "be aware of what you are eating" warnings. I am okay with it now, but at first I was very sketched out by those thoughts.

I had vegetarian spring rolls and one of the best salads I have had in ages. After eating, we headed back to the Royal Palace via tuk-tuk whereby we were finally able to go in. A bit of confusion on my part and I wasn't able to bring my camera in. I wil have to get doubles from Katie and she was the only one who understood there was a fee to bring your camera in.

The Royal Palace is this huge complex that has tons of unique buildings. They all have a gold roof and are constructed in architecture I have never seen before. The gardens were lush and green, the trees had cool yellow flowers, Buddha statues everywhere.

Inside one of the buildings called the Silver Pagoda was a gorgeous hall that all the way in the front had lit up statues. We walked into a little museum building that described how certain colors had to be worn on certain days by (I think) "royal" family members.

Everything in the complex was amazing. It's hard to believe just on the other side of this place contains such poverty. As we were leaving, all the kids that approached us to buy their water came back again. We decided to check out a park afterwards. A young boy begging us to buy his water followed us nearly all the way there. The park must have been the young person hang out as there were dozens of motorbikes parked there with college-aged kids just hanging out around them. It looked like it could have been fun as a localk. Passing by a really cool tree, we checked out another colorful temple.

After that, we walked back to the river area and decided we wanted to do a sunset boat ride on the Mekong. We borrowed some beers, hired a boat all to ourselves and off we went! We passed by what are known as "floating villages" People live in shacks that are placed on some sort of floating wood. Electric lines are hanging over these shacks bringing electricity to the individual shacks. It was really funny to see these shacks that look like they haven't been updated in 40 years, ready to fall apart at any point and then a TV screen flickering in the midst of it all.

Just as we were getting off the boat, it started to rain which felt phenomenal since the weather was sooo intensely hot. We had dinner at a restaurant owned by a French man. Ending the night really early after a few drinks, we went back to the hotel and I was crashed out by 9:30!

Day 2

We met our tuk-tuk driver about 9:45 to take us out to the depressing part of our trip. Our itinerary for the day included the Killing Field's from PolPot's genocide, and a prison turned museum explaining this. The drive out to the killing fields were enlightening - we were able to see how the locals a little bit outside of the city live. Basically, shacks on top of shacks amongst their garbage. Literally, garbage decomposing right there, under their feet. Again, some of the smells will be unforgettable in my mind.

We finally reached the Killing Fields. The first thing in view is a huge tower high in the sky that is filled with bones of victims that were recovered from the fields. The clothes were on the bottom row and the top just filled and filled with skulls divided by the age of the victims. I was shocked to learn through some of the signs indicating significance and history that more people were killed in this genocide than in WW2. Why have I never learned about this at school? At the killing fields, you basically walk around the area where there were mass graves, with signs that tell you really depressing facts. For example the magical tree - the tree that a loud speaker was hung off of to mask the moans of victims and painful cries of those being tortured.

It was wierd to walk over ground normally, as a priveledged tourist - where so many people suffered and died. It's hard to imagine such atrocity there. It was a depressing way to start the day. After that, we went to Tol Sleng prison or S-21. At one point, this was a high school turned prison during the genocide. It was here that thousands upon thousands of prisoner's were tortured and killed here. Most people went from here to the killing field's to die. They described in detail the torture and murder methods used.

The prisoner turned museum showcased photographs of the thousands that were murdered. It showed the rooms in which this happened, and on the wall of the rooms was an after-torture photo of a person in that room. It also had interviews of those who worked there and what they are doing now and how they felt at the time. Most felt they had no other choice; they did not want to partake, but by refusing, they would die. It took a lot not to cry. I have never been to the WW2 holocaust museum in DC - but this was pretty bad.

Moving away from the depressing history of this country, we went to a marketplace next. It was inside a hot, stuffy, crowded area. Basically, they cram as much stuff as possible inside it with little room to move. All sorts of things are sold, including but not limited to: silk, designer bags (Lisa's heaven), purses, shoes, socks, clothes, food, Cambodian art, crafts, anything you can really imagine.

Do as the locals do. When it's really hot, nap in the midday. We did just that, napped after a long, strenuous day in the heat. Before dinner, we tried a famous coconut ice cream dessert. It was soooo tasty - you get three flavors of ice cream, some peculiar fruit and stuff that tasted like nothing I've had before served to you inside a coconut. mmm mmm.

We drank a few beers back at our hotel before having dinner and going out for the night.

Some random thoughts about Cambodia I want to share:

• I have seen people carrying the following items on their motorbikes while moving: a chair, ladders, pieces of glass, infants, and even texting on their phone
• Even though there are very few schools, the students who can afford to go wear uniforms
• Anchor beer tastes great

Click on the Cambodian landscape to see pictures of day one

Click on Cambodian Fruit to see pictures of Day 2

That's it for Phnom Penh. I am sure I won't get to blog about the last 3 days I have spent in Siem Reap until I return back to Japan. My days in Siem Reap have been amazing with all the temple seeing I've done. I have hundreds of pictures and some videos that go with this blog. I might add them into this blog or just post links - so check back. I leave for Bangkok on Friday morning - leave for Japan Saturday night - will be back to my house sometime Sunday.