Siem Reap: What's a "WAT?"

Chelsea:
What's a "wat?" A "wat" is a temple! Monday and Tuesday were spent exploring the Angkor Wat complex which means "City Temple." We got up at 4am to meet our bus and guide, Crow, to head to the temple and watch the sunrise. We arrived around 4:30 and got settled in a great spot- we even got little plastic chairs because we bought tea/coffee. We sat in front of the small pond which reflected the temple. What an incredible sight- the sky started as a dark royal blue and gradually got brighter and brighter. It was so neat- it's funny how few people actually ever take the time to watch the sunrise at home, this experience would certainly make anyone think twice about it now. After that we headed back to the hotel for a little breakfast before we went back out on the road around 8:00. We went to the "Smiling Buddha" temple first. At the top of each tower rock formation there were four faces, one on each side, each with a different meaning: equality, sympathy, compassion and charity. There were also elephants and monkeys around this temple. It cost $15 for 15 minutes to ride in a basket on top of an elephant so we decided to wait and see if we can find a place where you actually get to sit on the elephant itself. We did buy some bananas and feed them though while we were petting them. They were very gentle and appeared to be treated well. They work for a few hours in the morning and then again in the evening but break from 11-4 daily. On our way back to the bus we came across a bunch of wild monkeys. They too seemed to be use to people as they allowed us to come quite close- one of the babies even decided to climb all over Nick. Next we went to Ta Phrom, the famous temple seen in the movie Tomb Raider. The temple and trees have grown together in this place. It's almost impossible to see where one starts and the other begins. The trees are between 400-500 years old and stretch far up in to the sky and winding roots dive deep in to the ground. According to our guide the two are so intertwined you could never remove the trees now without damaging the temple. It was quite a sight- just to stand there and be dwarfed by the roots of a tree- crazy! After a little lunch we went back to Angkor Wat and explored the temple itself. It is full of carvings and ancient inscriptions as well as statues. We climbed the central tower inside the complex on Tuesday and were treated to some pretty impressive views. Given it was a full day of hiking up ancient structures we headed back to the hotel to swim in the roof top pool before heading out for dinner and traditional dancing show.

We got to sleep in a little Tuesday morning which was nice and didn't head off to the temples until about 8:30. The first one we went to see (about an hour's drive away) is known as the women's temple. It was supposedly built by women and made of pink sandstone as opposed to the usual grey. Time has eroded the color and it's difficult to see the pink stone but there are places where it is still visible. The things that set it apart from other temples are it's carvings and it's size. The carvings are extremely detailed- faces are chiseled out with perfect symmetry and distingushed features which according to Crow, our guide, is because women have much more patience then men! The temple structure itself almost looks like a dollhouse in comparison to the others we have seen. Its miniature doorways and windows were made specifically for the women who lived there which averaged about 5'4" in height. Michelle and I had to duck a couple of times but Susanne had to duck every time she entered another section- she wouldn't make a very good Cambodian woman- too funny. Our next stop was alongside the road. We visited a typical thatch stilt home and enjoyed some palm juice candy which tastes exactly like maple sugar... mmmm! We bought three bundles each for $1- unfortunately it probably won't make it back to Canada for you all to try as we still have 3.5 weeks to go and candy around here is pretty hit and miss.

We continued down the road and stopped to visit the Landmine Musem. With the exception of the Preah Viear section of Cambodia near the northern Thai border, the majority of landmines that existed have been cleared. Aki Ra, the creator of this museum, is one of the main reasons this is the case. He grew up as a Khmer Rouge solider, holding his first gun at the age of 10- the gun was taller then he was! He later defected and joined the Vietnamese Army where he fought against his former friends and the Khmer Rouge. There is even one story stating how one day when he looked through the site on his gun, he recognized his uncle on the other side. He was a very good shot and began purposely missing his mark. He had no choice but to shoot because this was war and his uncle was the enemy but when asked why he kept missing he used the excuse that he had a headache and that his aim was off. This allowed him to shoot rounds over his uncle's head and gave him time to escape. According to the write up, he and his uncle laugh about it today. His job included laying and exploding landmines in attempts to catpure and kill the enemy. It was through this job that he came to know a great deal about the mines and how they worked. At the end of the war, he made it his personal mission to de-mine as many areas as possible. Before officially becoming a member of the international de-mining organization that works in Cambodia, he would go to villages all over the countryside and remove the landmines that existed in the farming grounds around peoples homes. To this day, it is estimated that he has cleared some 50,000 landmines on his own!

Our next stop was to the "Upside Down" temple. This temple was used as a place in which to creamate the bodies of those who passed away. It is known as the upside down temple because the bodies were burned upside down, head to feet instead of bottom to top or feet to head. The reason being is that it apparently takes 1-2 hours to creamate a body upside down as opposed to 3-4 hours rightside up. They also did it this way because they discovered that burning bottom to top caused certain veins in the corpses' arms to pulsate and in turn make it appear that the deceased person's arms were moving. This temple also had some serious steps! In order to get up to the top you had to climb at about an 80 degree angle on narrow little steps with a high rise and narrow run. The view at the top was worth it though- it was pretty spectacular to be standing on top of such a piece of history. Our day finished with the trip up the central tower at Angkor Wat that I mentioned above and a nice long swim in the roof top pool. The evening was spent relaxing for dinner on Pub Street eating enormous chicken kebabs displayed on a sword, mango salad served in a banana leaf and sweet and sour chicken and vegetables served in a pineapple- the presentation of food here is pretty neat. We also enjoyed a few pitchers of Angkor beer ($2 each) and some cocktails ($6). Unfortunately we couldn't convince anyone to try the "AK47" which conisisted of rum, vodlka, tequila, gin, triple sec and a little lime and sugar! :) A few of us then did a little shopping at the night market and Erin and I went for a foot massage. Super nice and super cheap- only $4 for an hour!! :) Tomorrow it's off to the floating villages.