March, 2023
Siem Reap...Who Knew?
Wow! Going to Siem Reap we figured was all about Angkor Wat but as we discovered, there’s so much more. Shrines, floating villages and ants!
Buying lotus flower offerings outside the shrine of Preah Ang Chek Preah Ang Chorm.
Every day, traditional pin piet ensembles play for the hundreds of devoted followers who come to pray to Preah Ang Chek and Preah Ang Chorm who are believed to bring good fortune to the newly married and provide spiritual protection for Siem Reap.
Kneeling before Preah Ang Chek and Preah Ang Chom, believed to be two magical sisters who would grant the wishes of those who prayed to them. These girls have had quite a journey to reach their shrine. Originally installed in Angkor Wat in the 16th century, Dap Chhuon, the governor of Siem Reap in the 1950s, raided the site and stole the statues. Black magic helped Dap Chhuon and his five soldiers carry these incredibly heavy, bronze pieces to his headquarters. Before he was executed for trying to overthrow the monarchy, he tried to run away with his "sisters" to Thailand. Sadly, he had lost his magical powers and could no longer carry them by himself. The sisters were recovered and then their journey gets a bit murky (literally). One story says they were blown up by Pol Pot. The other, official one says they were thrown into the depths of the Siem Reap River from which they were dredged in 1982 and enshrined here opposite the Independence Gardens and the Royal Residence where the King of Cambodia stays when he's in Siem Reap.
Local women giving offerings and praying to the Leper King. Our guide told us a funny story about his own experience with this shrine. He needed a motorcycle and decided to pray to the Leper King. He promised that if he got a motorcycle, he would continue to share the name of the god. A short time later, he was at an event where a motorcycle was the draw prize. He won! He prayed to the Leper King in thanks and even made an offering of a roasted pig! Surely that would put him in the good books. But he neglected to continue to share his name. Needless to say, he and his girlfriend at the time eventually broke up and she got the motorcycle in the split. I guess the gods are listening…
I guess they don't make scooter helmets in children's sizes.
I guess public nap time is a thing in Cambodia as well as Vietnam.
Of course Adam needed to climb up on this Siem Reap river water wheel to figure out how it worked!
Local delicacy…chicken marinated in crushed red tree ants.
Don’t believe me? This one missed the crushing, I guess. They’re pretty small so you don’t notice any texture. Taste? Sour, like a lime.
A lotus field. Every part of this beautiful plant is used. The flower and leaf for decoration, the root, the seed and the fruit for eating. Apparently the fibres of the plant are also woven into fabric that is more luxurious than silk. We didn’t see any…probably a good thing.
Life on the river. The Siem Reap river is as brown and mucky as it looks. The locals swim and fish in it anyway, which offends my sterile, North American sensibilities. For washing, they can drop a chemical in a barrel of water which causes the dirt to drop to the bottom of the barrel and leave clear water on the top...clear water, not clean water. The Siem Reap river flows into the Tonle Sap lake which ultimately joins up with the Mekong River in Phnom Penh, in the dry season. Oddly, during the wet season, the flow changes direction and the Tonle Sap lake swells to six times its dry season size!
Every now and then, our boat driver had to stop and clear the propeller of garbage.
The floating village, Chong Kneas. This village is not unlike any other village except for the fact that it’s on the water and only accessible by boat. The 2,000 person community here is mostly made up of Vietnamese immigrants from generations ago. Then others came, escaping the Vietnam war or the Khmer Rouge. According to Cambodian law, immigrants can’t own land in the country so the ever ingenious Vietnamese got around this by living on the water! Remember how the French in Vietnam levied taxes on boats so the Vietnamese made floating baskets which didn’t qualify as boats? Everything you expect in a village is here: houses, shops, a school, a police station, restaurants and even gift shops for tourists! You can’t escape it! The houses are tethered to these bamboo moorings and they float around them as the water moves. It's amazing they don’t bump into each other. When the weather is bad in wet season, the houses are untethered and moved into the more protected Siem Reap river.
We stopped at a floating restaurant and crocodile farm. This was a small one with maybe a dozen crocs. There are others around the village and a big one in Siem Reap. This is the granddaddy here at the ripe old age of 17 years. He sure looks more like a granddaddy than a teenager. He is kept in a separate pen for breeding…I think he’d be more successful if he cleaned up a bit
The crocs need to be about 7-10 years old before they use them for meat and skins. I’m not sure about the business case for this type of farming anymore. Demand has dropped off as bringing in crocodile products is illegal in many countries.
Just driving around the neighbourhood...
That's a lot of responsibility on a little girl to keep an eye on her brother playing in the front yard...
It was Sunday homework day at the floating restaurant.
This little guy looks so done.
Maybe it’s easier to study in a hammock?
I’ll take your worm in a bottle of tequila and raise you this bottle of rice wine! Very medicinal with the added bit of ginseng, baby cobra and scorpion.
These ladies are making pontoons. Great recycling! Like in Vietnam, tap water isn’t drinkable in Cambodia, not even in hotels. As a result, there is a ton of plastic around.
This part of Chong Kneas village is inland. Remember how the Tonle Sap lake swells to six times its size? That’s why the houses here are built high up on stilts.
The family came to the window and bade us farewell, as we say farewell to Cambodia.