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cambodia - 3 to 6 may 2012
Sunday, 13 May 2012
this should be one of the most exotic places that me and darling had visited overseas in 2012.. and that's cambodia! basically there's two parts of cambodia (the capital, phnom penh and the province, siem reap), but because angkor wat is the biggest reason i visited this country, and its nearer to the latter one so we had our trip based on siem reap only.
siem reap literally means "flat defeat of siam (thailand)". and that explains why the culture and people, and even the souvenirs sold here look very much like the thais but the standard of living was much worse than the current bangkok city. even though the currency used in cambodia is usd, but the price of the food, transport and services like foot massage, body massage, pedicure or manicure are relatively as cheap from usd1 dollar.
upon our arrival at the siem reap airport, we took a air-conditioner taxi instead of tuk tuk (mainly due to safety reason) to our accomdation for the trip, somadevi angkor hotel & spa. we will surprised that the hotel was quite a good catch in terms of location or facilities, afterall, i juz did some research and booked almost immediately.
the cabbie that took us to the hotel had a business deal with us during the journey, which he proposed to fetch us to the angkor archaeological park which comprises of all the ruins temple and sculptures and also the tonle sap lake for the next first few days. after some bargaining, we agreed on the price and it will be a day to day basis renewal service. afterall, we are not familiar with this place and are skeptical on the tourism safety, so it will be a intial good option.
because we reached there around late afternoon, we began to explore the places around our hotel by foot. to our surprise, we are pretty near the angkor night market, which is the only night life area, alike the local pasar malam in siem reap. that's also the place that we settled most of our meals in the entire trip. and that night, we travelled a tuk tuk back to hotel which only cost usd1 dollar.
and now the points of attactions. we purchased the 3-day pass into the park as we know we surely cant cover all in one day. and the first on the list is definitely the most famous of all, angkor wat, one of the seven wonders, which covers 81 hectares and is compareable to the imperial palace in beijing. in fact, it have 5 towers that symoblise the five peaks. sadly, darling would not climb up to Angkor Wat, as she is in shorts. and so im the brave soul that climbed up and managed to take a glimpse of the interior.
on this trip, we also visited the angkor thom which comprises of the bayon (gaint stone faces), baphuon, phimeanakas (very steep steps which darling give up climbing halfway), terrance of the elephants, terrance of the leper king. and darling should be thrilled to visit the ta prohm (strangler fig trees) which was made famous as angelina jolie's tomb raider shot was captured at this place (empty doorway). in order to visit ta prohm, we bypass the victory gate which had some face scrulpture.
aparts from the rest, phnom bakheng was an extremely popular and crowded spot for sunset view, and we managed to make our way there and stayed for an hour plus. however the clouds are really thick and it seems like it is about to rain anytime which can be quite diastrous to be trapped at the hilltop, so me and darling decided to head back down for safety reason.
in fact, there is alot of more ruin temples and scrulpture far into the east baray of the park, but i believe we had covered all the main ones and am truly happy and proud of our exploration achievement. with this, i closed another milestone on my wishlist.
last but not least, we also took the traditional wooden boat ride down the tonle sap lake (one of the largest in asia) where we saw the floating village of chong khneas, which is 10km south of siem reap and we donated a carton of noodle to the kids studying in floating school. from this ride, we understood how fortunate we are, and begin to appreciate life, as compared to their earning power of only usd30 per month.
in conclusion, siem reap was a pretty nice place to visit, if you want to be undisturbed from the constant city buzz. and i wanna thank darling for visiting this place with me, as this is something very different from those beautiful and clean countries, and not forgetting for bearing the 40degrees temperature, taking countless rides of tuk tuk and doing countless times of foot massage and knowing the difference between cheap and slightly higher priced body massage!!
Labels: cambodia, first-time, fun, holiday
xoxo,
dear |
14:54
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