On our third day, the last day that our pass was valid for, we did the famous outer loop of the Angkor Wat area (see blog titled A VERY HELPFUL MAP). We hired the same tuk – tuk driver as we had for our first day since we liked him a lot. Brian decided to rent a bike for $2/day. That meant we squeezed the remaining 3 of us into a tuk-tuk and took off to the temples.
Our first temple for this day is named Pre-Rup, a Hindu temple that was built in the late 10th century. From this temple, we were treated to nice views of the countryside. On the top of the temple were three main towers, these were the highest towers to climb to. The temple had nicely restored carvings that were easy to distinguish the scenes. There was a tower in the middle that was highest of all the other ones, where you needed to climb maybe about 10 steps to get up to the top. Brian caught up to us at the first temple which was good because he was able to follow us for the rest of the day via his bike.
The next temple is another Hindu temple built in the late 10th century named East Mebon. Around the perimeter of the temple were elephants marking the 4 corners. These elephants were big, bigger than me and not entirely restored all the way. We walked around the perimeter for quite a while before entering the actual temple. This temple has been compared to a “mountain like ruin” because it rises three levels and has five towers. Nothing I can say that can't be explained by looking at a picture...
The third temple of the day was Ta Som, a small Buddhist temple constructed in the late 12th century. Many of the towers were similar to Ta Prohm in terms of having the same face like towers. It is a rather narrow but long temple to walk through. Walking within this temple, it seems that many parts of it are still being restored or there was nothing more they could do for this temple. At the end of the path, you reach a huge, tower tree growing over the temple again. I think this might be my favorite tree on top of temple photo shot. It may be the biggest one of all that we'd seen in Angkor Wat. Safeguarding this area of the temple was a one armed man begging us to purchase his postcards. He was a lovely man whom we talked with for about 10-15 minutes before we moved on. Most of the beggars in Cambodia started driving me crazy, but he was a good one. He talked with us and laughed with us but not in a way that he was strictly trying to get our money. That was refreshing for a change. We had two children come up and ask as well for us to buy their goods. Instead, we let them look at Katie's cell phone where she had many little toy charms dangling off of it. They were fascinated with the toys, so we gave them the toys instead of buying their goods. That was refreshing, too – to give something that we really didn't need or want but that they will enjoy and still not benefit their family as to prevent them from going to school. On our way out, we ran into Brian again, who was talking with two Cambodian women. We sat down in the shade with them and started chatting as well. These women, one aged 21 and the other I don't remember but probably around the same age were so lovely. They were fascinated with Haruka, telling her how beautiful she is and how they aren't that gorgeous. In fact, they were beautiful, funny and fun to be with. We all started practiced the Cambodian language (Khmer) and we ended up attracting a crowd of about 15 or 20 locals who were intrigued with our struggle of trying to speak their language. As usual, it was a lot of fun to speak with the locals that aren't trying to get something from you.
The last temple we went to before lunch was Neak Poan, a Buddhist temple built in the late 12th century. You walk up one long path full of vendors, as usual, trying to sell you goods. My favorite part of this pathway was the on-duty policeman laying in a hammock sleeping. It really makes you feel safe when you see that. =) haha. After that part of walking, you show your pass to a guard and continue up a smaller pathway to reach the temple. On this walkway, we had pleasureful music of land mine victims playing traditional Cambodian music. Since the government doesn't provide any type of support for land mine victims, and being either legless or armless prevents them from being able to do many types of jobs – most turn to begging for their living. Throughout my travels in the Angkor Wat area we came across many of these land mine victims playing music with a sign that said “we choose to play music so that we don't beg. This is how we will support out family, etc” and then there is a small bowl for donations. I still have a burning image in my mind of how happy one of these groups were. They were all smiling, genuine smiles and playing their music happily. I wish I had donated to that group since I can still envision that moment in time.
After all these walkways and pathways we finally reached this “temple”. This is considered to be a small island temple. There is a central temple that is placed at the axis of a cross or lotus pattern of eight pools. Since it was the dry season there was absolutely no water in any of the pools. So, it really just looked like scattered stones all around a plot of land. We were able to walk down a set of maybe 10 stairs onto the grass where it is usually covered by water and get a close up of that central temple. In the middle near the main temple was a really large stone horse that is believed to save drowning sailors. We walked around here for quite a while before deciding to head back to have lunch which I was definitely welcoming since my feet were starting to hurt pretty badly. On our way back up the paths, Brian screamed to us that he had lost his bike lock key. A small hunt had us returning back to the temple – I went one way and Brian the other. Luckily, it was only a 5 minute hunt until Katie spotted it since she trailed behind the steps Brian made in case he didn't see it. At last, we could actually go to lunch.
Lunch was especially annoying on this particular day. There was only one restaurant, restaurant meaning a bunch of tables underneath a tent serving food. But at this one, the begging kids were relentless. There were two girls, who had to have been sisters who were just soooo adorable but sooooo annoying at the same time. They did not give up, ever. It was a good thing that we had chosen to eat here because shortly after sitting, a monsoon enraged and everyone who was stuck outside was soaked to the bone. 
We waited until the monsoon ended before we headed back on our way especially since Brian was still on his bike at this time. I asked our tuk-tuk driver to stop so I could use the bathroom. Haruka and I ran into the bathrooms and she showed me one of the funniest signs I have ever seen. There was a sign in her toilet stall that demonstrated the correct way to use the toilet. It shows a person, literally standing on the toilet seat and squatting to pee that way – with the no smoking sign over it. And then it showed a person sitting on the toilet seat and said “this is the correct way to use this toilet.” It was sooo funny!!!! Just as we were about to leave the bathroom, the monsoon returned and we had to run to our tuk tuk as we got soaked through to the bone. Poor Brian was on his bike at this time and literally was a wet dog.
After lunch and the monsoonal rains, we went to Preah Khan, a Buddhist temple constructed in the late 12th century. This temple was rather large with phenomenal carvings all over it, too. The reason these ones were so spectacular is mainly because they were in such great shape, still. When it was in use, it served as a Buddhist monastery and school that held about 1,000 monks. We saw one building left over that had columns as part of the architecture. This is one of the few buildings that has columns that dates back to this point in time. I'll just post some pictures regarding this temple as most of this stuff is easier to just look at as opposed to me trying to explain it to you in detail.
After we finished with Preah Khan, we asked our Tuk Tuk driver a big favor. We asked him if he could take us to this one temple that isn't really in the Angkor Wat area per se. He said he knew the way, he thought he did at least. This time as well as with the next few blog entries will include how getting there is usually the majority of the adventure and fun. We headed out of the main temple area and into where the civilians live. The roads were not really roads, but more or less a red sandy/earthen color that had been cleared for motorbikes, tuk tuks, bicycles, people walking, whatever to use. Brian followed behind us on his bike. He was able to keep up with us for the most part since we had to be very careful to avoid a lot of potholes and whatnot that didn't allow us to get up to a really fast speed. Furthermore, we had to stop a few times and ask the locals if we were headed in the right direction. At last we were finally overcome by two problems. #1 – we had a fork in the road and weren't exactly positive which way to go. #2 – Brian had a flat tire on his bike. Our tuk tuk driver took out his tool kit from underneath his seat and tried his best to fix the flat tire but it was continuing to release the air that he had put in. Meanwhile, two women riding their bike came our way. Mr. Driver asked them which way to the temple and thankfully they had come by because they pointed us to the opposite direction that he had thought we head in. Our solution to Brian's bike was to shove us three girls on one seat, the bike opposite of us and Brian kind of hanging out of the tuk tuk. We went like this for maybe another 10 more minutes until we finally reached where our tuk tuk driver told us “it's that way.”
He gave us some vague directions on how we could reach it, but he, himself had never actually been there. We headed straight past people's shacks as they watched in curiosity why 4 foreigners were walking through their quiet land. It did feel a bit invading but as quickly as we were there, we were gone, too. A few people just pointed for us to let us know we were headed in the right direction which was relieving. Brian & I were a bit of a ways up from Katie and Haruka. We came to a few forks in the road and decided to just keep heading straight. We had acquired a fan club. There were 4 kids following behind Katie & Haruka, probably aged 8-12. When we realized they weren't going to leave, we decided to ask them which way when we arrived to more questionable areas. A 15-20 minute walk with the aid of 4 kids had us safely arrive to this temple that has yet to be restored. It was a cool temple, like the others, but what made it phenomenal was being the ONLY 4 people there (8 if you count our young guides) and having to actually risk finding our way there.
The temple was small with all the broken pieces still scattering the ground. Furthermore, for not being restored, the carvings were all still very intact. On one of the corners was another tree growing off of it and aiming straight for the sky. 
There was a lot of nature, as far as bugs, nasty centipedes or millipedes everywhere. It was so quiet. I asked the oldest boy, the one I believe was in charge of the other 3 some questions. I had bought a phrase book in the case I couldn't explain my vegetarianism to restaurants. I had the book with me so I told the boy that I was from America, my name is Sara and I'm 23 years old. He told me his name was Hao, but I couldn't figure out his age. All the kids didn't get too close to us, but observed us from afar. If we got too close to them, they got really uneasy and a bit nervous. With that in mind, I was very careful about how I talked to him and with my book. I really felt I had to build a bit of trust that I wasn't going to hurt him in any way. They played around in the temple as we checked it out. After about twenty minutes of being in there – our tuk tuk driver came pulling up on a motorbike with a woman to check on us. I am assuming one of those kids were hers and so she let our driver borrow her motorbike to make sure all was okay.
He went back to the street as all of us started walking back towards the street with the new woman in our presence. She kept trying to talk to us and we obviously couldn't understand anything. It's amazing to see how far along I have come in Japanese in this aspect. Not even for verbal language but even body language. She kept doing all sorts of motions to indicate something or other to us but I had no idea what she was even trying to indicate. I was using both American and Japanese body language and I don't think she knew anything I was trying to indicate. At some points she was kind of freaking me out with how loud sometimes she would raise her voice and then do a body language. I think she was just getting frustrated that we didn't understand. Brian had walked quickly ahead of us and by the time we had caught up to him, he had a band of about 8 kids following behind him and giggling. It was really cute. They all followed us back to our tuk tuk on the side of the road. We gave each of the 4 kids that helped us find the temple $1. That probably made them rich – as the average Cambodian family doesn't spend more than .50 per day on what they need. (according to CNN). While we were gone, Mr. Driver had fixed Brian's bike and so we could head back with our normal cargo minus Brian and his bike.
The sun was beginning to set and the day was coming to a close as we reached back to the Angkor Wat area. On our first day we had wanted to watch the sunset at a famous temple to do so but as a result of a high probability of rain we had not. While we were all rather tired, we held a small meeting on if we think we should try it out on our last day. Brian had really wanted to do it, so that's where we headed to next. This temple was named Phnom Bakheng, built in the late 9th – early 10th century, it is a Hindu temple. I was shocked at how many people were there to watch the sunset. I heard it was popular but I didn't expect there to be traffic back-ups and herds of people all headed up. This temple was built on top of a small mountain/hill. You could take elephant rides up for $15 or do what we did and walk the 15-20 mins of an easy incline to reach it. At this point, I wasn't as interested in the temple as I should have been but more or less of the sunsetting. From the top you could see views of a lake named Tonle Sap and what surrounds the area of Angkor. When we reached the top, there were just hundreds of people perched on the temple stairs watching like birds as the sunset. Unfortunately, it wasn't a spectacular sunset as the sun really didn't set but more or less just faded off into the distance.
Brian went back down since he had to ride his bike back and Haruka & I waited for Katie to return from frolicking off to take pictures. When the sun was nearly gone and we had not seen Katie yet, I took off around looking for her as Haruka waited in the same spot we were at. We searched for about 15 minutes with no luck. My last attempt – when I swore I saw someone that looked like Katie brought me to around the temple – I noticed something even better than the sunset, but the moon rising. It was the first night for a full moon and there it hung, stranded in mid air mesmerizing all that saw it. I quickly ran back to get Haruka so she could see it, too. At this point, the temple guards were trying to kick everyone down to the street but more and more people were beginning to notice the moonrising and not the sunset anymore. This moon was perfect for a photo op. I tried my hardest to capture the beautiful moon, but to no luck because my 3 year old camera just isn't capable of capturing that type of beauty.
Haruka & I headed back down by ourselves and found Katie with our tuk tuk driver waiting for us. We went back to town and had a really quick dinner at a restaurant and we all went back to the guesthouse. Brian was dead from riding his bike all day and the rest of us were tired just from all we had been doing for the past week now.
2 comments:
I miss you!!! And your link to the 1st 4 tmeples for some reason is not working!! Love, me
i can't wait to see you!! its almost a month away!! ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
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