They Started As Strangers
-- Part 14
They Started As Strangers -- Part 14
Sunrise at Angkor Wat was fantastic as usual. But it surprises me
the number of people that will get up to see the sun rise over Angkor Wat,
and not actually visit inside the temple. They don't know what
they're missing.
Photo courtesy of Reeb
Photo courtesy of Antman
There is a moat around the outside of the temple, but there are also a
couple of reflecting pools further inside Angkor Wat's temple
grounds. Reeb and I spent some time trying to get some shots of the
temple and the sunrise reflecting off the ponds, but it was tough to
concentrate on setting up shots with all the touts around.
When the sun finally got up, we all went deeper into the temple complex
and started exploring. Reeb was more than a little concerned about
climbing into the temple but when he saw MikeM and I scamper up the steep
steps, he quickly joined us.
Photo courtesy of Reeb
Photo courtesy of MikeM
KoolKarl at Angkor Wat
It's good to be a young man and live the live you please,
For a young man is the king of every kingdom that he sees.
KoolKarl was having a blast exploring the temple. Every time he
saw us, he thanked us for letting him join the group because he was sure
he'd never have found out about the sunrise over Angkor Wat on his
own. KoolKarl might have been young and a little naive, but it was
good to have a guy with his energy in the group.
The way down...
On the way out of Angkor Wat, Reeb and I started feeling a little
thirsty so we approached the touts to buy some water. Some of the
touts started to complain that we were buying too much from one stall, and
we should spread the wealth a little. On one hand, the touts are a
bother. But on the other hand, even the more successful stallkeepers
are pretty poor. At least that's how they looked to me…
Just for snicks we did a little shopping at other stalls but they all
had pretty much the same stuff, and it was all stuff we really weren't
interested in buying. On last year's trip I felt sorry for a lot of
the poor shopkeepers and ended up buying a bunch of crap I didn't
want. I promised myself that I wouldn't do the same thing again this
year, but it was difficult.
Photo courtesy of Antman
Photo courtesy of Antman
Photo courtesy of Antman
We made our way back to the bus and were surrounded by touts
again. This time they were all children selling books and
film. I felt sorry for the touts selling film, because I didn't see
many film cameras around; I don't think anyone in *our* group had
one. Everyone seems to be going digital these days.
We noticed there was a steel cable lying on the ground. One of
the children stepped on the cable, and a policeman quickly ran over and
started yelling at the child. Other children said that because that
one kid stepped on the cable, he had to pay a fine of $1 USD to the cop.
I gotta admit it was nice to have a 'no touts land' even if the police
had to enforce it with an iron fist.
I also noticed that all the vehicles would park half-in and half-out of
the tout-free zone. I guess the drivers were doing their part to
give the touts access to customers while giving the visitors a chance to
escape.
It's only a 5 or 10-minute drive to the Ta Prohm for breakfast, so it
really isn't much of a hardship to take a little break and go back.
The Ta Prohm lobby
Breakfast at the Ta Prohm is a glass of orange drink, some pretty good
coffee, an egg cooked any way you want it, two half-pieces of dried out
bacon or two dried out cocktail sausages, a piece of toast, and a
croissant. Not exactly the breakfast of champions.
As we were finishing up our small breakfast, the girl from the front
desk said we had a visitor - that must be Tess, our Cambodian girl
friend. I told the girl it was okay to send her back, and then
thought to run after her to escort Tess to our table.
It was good to see Tess again, but her choice of clothes was a little
shocking; she was wearing deep black pants, a bright red top with a large
white "Hello Kitty" on the front, and some kind of strange red
kamikaze headband. It was easy to see that Tess was no longer the
simple Cambodian girl we left behind last year.
Tess was a little hungry, so we had a little fun getting to know each
other again while she ate. When she was finished, we all gathered
our things and made our way to the minivan.
Photo courtesy of Reeb
Photo courtesy of Reeb
As we were driving away, Tess asked if we could pick up her friend.
"What friend?"
"Bery good friend!"
Okay… I don't know what would be worse, a backpacker or a
Cambodian boyfriend, but we threw caution to the wind and agreed to
stop. Living well paid off; Tess' friend Soph is a beautiful
girl. Tess and Soph grew up together in Siem Reap and have remained
friends. Soph currently lives in Phnom Penh, and is in Siem Reap
visiting Tess.
Soph was a little shy, so we asked her a bunch of questions to break
the ice. We learned that Soph was 27 years old and even though she
grew up in Siem Reap, this was her visit to Angkor Wat. That's hard
to believe, but that was her story and she was sticking to it.
Our plan for the morning was to have the driver drop us off at Leper
King, and we would walk through that, the Elephant Terrace, Temple of the
12 Women, and Bayon. The driver didn't speak a lot of English, but
we said goodbye to him relatively confident that he had a clue what we
wanted. I guess we'll find out in a couple hours.
Luckily, we were dropped off just as a large Japanese tour bus was
leaving. We walked around a little while looking at the stone
carvings before going up top to see the statues. I thought they were
statues of the Leper King, but the girls call him Buddha.
There were a few musicians here or there playing a recorder, type of
flute, and a kind of violin. It was nice to hear the music fading in
and out as it was being carried on the wind. There were also a few
children running around and mugging for peoples' cameras.
Photo courtesy of Reeb
Photo courtesy of Reeb
Photo courtesy of Reeb
The girls began to get quite agitated, and Tess started pulling on my
shirtsleeve and pointing at the statues.
There, dressed in his finest short pants, black socks, and sandals, was
a German guy trying to balance his camera and mini-tripod on top of
Buddha's head so he could take a picture of himself at the temple.
Sheesh…
Saying it as politely as I could, I asked, "Just what the fuck do
you think you're doing?" Taking the camera off of Buddha's head
and handing it back to him I added, "You don't put your camera on top
of statues around here. If you want someone to take your picture,
just ask."
He handed the camera back to me and asked, "Will you take my
picture, please."
"Of course I will... All you had to do was ask."
I tried to compose the best picture I could, hoping that he would be
encouraged to ask someone to take his picture again in the future instead
of pulling such a stunt. But I was pretty frosted. People that
do stuff like that really get my goat.
Photo courtesy of Antman
The statue used as a tripod
We spent a good amount of time at the Leper King examining the faces
carved into the stone. Some of the carvings really were
remarkable. I could spend all day there contemplating some of the
carvings, and I hope to some day.
Photo courtesy of Reeb
Winding our way through the passageways, we had to step over a few
strategically placed landmine victims that kept us entertained by playing
what looked like a homemade flute. I hate to encourage begging, but
it's hard to pass by these guys without putting something in their hat.
Tess and Soph had fun posing for pictures at the Elephant
Terrace. They loved to have their pictures taken and then look at
the results in the digital camera's LCD screen. KoolKarl didn't have
a digital camera, but it was easy to see that he and Soph were becoming
good friends.
The Temple of the 12 Women has been disassembled. According to
the plaque placed in the spot where the temple used to be located - a
leading French archeologist came to Cambodia and meticulously disassembled
the temple, numbering and charting the location of each individual stone
upon removal. It must have taken him and his crew years to do that.
When the temple was completely disassembled, he lost the paperwork.
Now all they have is acres of stones with neatly written numbers
written on each and every one.
They're hoping someone will write a computer program to figure out how
to put the temple back together again. Me too.
Photo courtesy of Reeb
There lies the Temple of 12 Women
We made our way back to the main road, and had a look at the souvenir
stalls to see if they had anything worth buying. Reeb and I were
impressed with some of the artwork we saw and since we both had new
accommodations to decorate, looked for out of the ordinary paintings that
would work in our homes.
When traveling, Reeb takes particular interest when he finds
handicapped people working in souvenir stalls. A local man in a
wheelchair had a stall that was full of colorful paintings (mostly
watercolors) of village life in Cambodia. And in each colorful
painting, one of the characters was a man in a wheelchair.
"Did you paint these?"
"I paint everyting."
"What happened to your legs?"
"Land mind take my leg."
The artist wanted a pretty penny for his paintings, and Reeb didn't
feel like haggling with him. So Reeb paid full price for the
paintings he picked up.
The truth is that prices in all stalls seemed way out of whack this
trip. Silk tablecloths that I picked up last year for a few dollars
started the process at $20 this trip and the sellers didn't want to haggle
at all. I needed some silk tablecloths for myself and friends, but I
walked out of many stalls because the stall keepers simply would not
haggle.
Finally, I found a stall where the woman would haggle with me, and I
began the laborious task of trying to get the price down. As in all
the other stalls, the price began at $20 USD. I asked about her
family and she asked about mine, and the price was lowered to $15.
She has a sister living in California, so the price was lowered to
$10. As I began my last argument to lower the price to $5 (which was
a couple dollars more than I paid last year), a British woman walked
between us, waved a twenty-dollar bill in front of the stall keeper's face
and said, "I'll pay you $20 for this, but not a penny more."
I really wanted to choke her.
The stall keeper turned to me and said, "See? Lady pay
$20."
The keeper wasn't at all amused when I replied, "Maybe she's
Japanese…"
As we left for Bayon, I felt lucky to get a tablecloth for $10.
And I knew I wouldn't be buying as much stuff this trip as I did last
trip.
As we made our way through Bayon, MikeM and I stopped to help an
elderly British woman and her husband up the steep steps. It looked
like she hadn't seen the sun in years, and she was sweating
profusely. I don't think I've ever seen someone her age sweat so
much. MikeM had an extra bottle of water so he gave it to the
couple, and cautioned them to keep drinking water because dehydration can
sneak up on them. They accepted the water, but I got the feeling
they thought the whole thing was a joke. I wonder how the rest of
their trip went.
Photo courtesy of Reeb
Photo courtesy of Antman
Photo courtesy of Reeb
We were all starving. It was time to take a load off our feet and
enjoy our favorite food (or mine, anyway) at the Khmer Kitchen.
After the short ride back to the hotel, Tess and Soph showed us a
shortcut to the restaurant. The shortcut went through a shopping
area, and just before entering Tess warned us, "Move fast, and don't
stop."
I was on her heels the whole way. Rushing through the shopping
area it was hard to see what the problem was, other than the smell.
The smell was pretty strong, but no worse than any Chinatown I've been in.
The Khmer Kitchen in Siem Reap has the best pumpkin soup I've ever
tasted. We all shared other entrees too, but all I can remember is
the pumpkin soup. That's not to say the other entrees were bad; in
fact, they were all quite good. But the pumpkin soup is worth the
trip alone.
Tess wanted to get some sleep before she had to go to work this
evening, so I slipped her a few bucks before she left. Tess is quite
a girl.
When we got back to the hotel, we hit our rooms for a few minutes to
freshen up before heading into the jungle again.
As usual, Antman was the last one to join the waiting group in the
lobby. Only this time Antman was without Wifey.
"Wifey doesn't want to go back to the temples. She says she
doesn't feel well."
"So what? Grab your camera and let's go!"
"Well, if she's not feeling okay I should stay with her."
"No you shouldn't, you should go to the temples. You flew
halfway around the world to see the temples. She would want you to
enjoy your holiday. Sheesh…"
But there wasn't anything Antman could do, because he thinks he's in
love.
No problem for us (other than the usual Antman induced delay).
The rest of us jumped on the bus and were off to Ta Prohm.
Ta Prohm was pretty packed but we were able to explain to our driver
that we wanted to be dropped off at the temple's exit, and that he should
pick us up at the entrance. IMO, that really does make the walk
through the crowded temple much more enjoyable. Instead of traveling
around the grounds in a pack, we were able to swim against the current of
tourists and actually find a few moments of peace and quiet here and
there. If Ta Prohm is busy, starting from the exit is a pretty good
tip, IMO.
Photo courtesy of Reeb
The steel cable marking the tout zone
After Ta Prohm, we decided to call it a day. Reeb and I wanted to
do some shopping, and the rest wanted to take a nap before dinner.
We had fun finding our way through the stalls, but the prices were just
as screwed up here as they were at the temple stalls. The outrageous
prices and the unwillingness to haggle made it easy to pass on buying
anything. Hell, prices were cheaper in Bangkok; that's a big
change. In fact, I'll bet prices were even cheaper in Phuket!
I did find a couple oil paintings that I liked and was able to haggle
the price down a little since I was going to buy two, so I did buy
them. I also found a Buddha head that I liked but even though it had
a big crack in it, they wouldn't budge on the price.
"Buddha face bery beautiful. You see?"
"Yes, Buddha face is beautiful. But (pointing at the crack)
Buddha head very bad."
We went back and forth for a while but they weren't interested in
lowering the price, so we left.
When we got back to the hotel, Reeb still had some energy left so I
suggested he take our bus to see the sunset over Angkor Wat while I headed
up to the room for a nap.
Photo courtesy of Reeb
Photo courtesy of Reeb
Photo courtesy of Reeb
Photo courtesy of Reeb
Photo courtesy of Reeb
Photo courtesy of Reeb
That nap really hit the spot.
We met in the lobby at the appointed time and started out to the Khmer
Kitchen for dinner. Reeb hinted that he wanted to try someplace new
and I suggested he do so, but I came for the pumpkin soup and I wasn't
about to take a chance that some other restaurant's pumpkin soup wouldn't
be up to snuff. Usually I'm pretty easy about that kind of stuff,
but in Siem Reap I'm living for the pumpkin soup.
We split up after dinner, and Reeb and I ended up for after dinner
drinks at Tess' bar. Tess and I flirted a little and we talked about
living together in Siem Reap. But I was saddened to hear that she
has too many marriage proposals already, and doesn't know what to
do. Poor me…
After a couple more rounds we checked bin and hit the road. One
of those motorcycles with a rickshaw on the back skidded up to us, and we
were surprised to see MikeM in the back. Reeb was done for the day
so he wanted to turn in but feeling recharged from the afternoon's nap I
climbed in and we were off.
It turns out that MikeM was headed to Martini's. I hadn't been
there before, so I was up for it. I'd read a bit about the place and
was prepared to hate it, but it was actually a fun place.
Even though it was night outside, Martini's was much much darker
inside, and my eyes took a few moments to adjust before I could see.
The mamasan ran over, grabbed me by the arm, and started dragging me to a
table. Now I know how Stevie Wonder must feel…
The moment we were seated, a snack basket was delivered to our table
and we were surrounded by a half-dozen beer girls that were holding
full-page beer advertisements in front of our faces trying to get us to
buy their brand. For the most part they were brands that I had never
heard of before, so I pointed to the prettiest girl and made my order.
Then the hostesses started arriving at our table. I was quite
prepared to enjoy the company of two or three, but only one would sit with
a customer at a time. Too bad; some of the girls looked nice.
MikeM and I finally made our hostess selections, and dived into the
snack tray. The girls attended to our every need but if we took a
sip of beer while the girls were busy wiping our brow with a cool
refreshing towel, a server boy would quickly run over and top off our
glass. Now that's service!
As dark as Martini's was, it was also that loud. The volume of
the music was earsplitting. It was prolly just as well because our
girls didn't speak much English, and didn't understand a word of Thai we
said to them. But they were indeed pretty to look at. My girl
said she was 20 but if she was, then I'm a monkey's uncle. MikeM's
girl said she was 24 and looked even younger than mine.
The music played in the bar was a mix of the usual Asian disco music,
and obviously local tunes. The disco would play for about 20
minutes, and all the modern style dancers would jump up and strut their
stuff. Then the DJ would start playing local music and the dance
floor would clear to reveal a group of dancers forming a pinwheel and
dancing in a counter-clockwise fashion. Maybe the word 'dancing' is
a bit of a stretch; while walking in a circle around the dance floor they
would take two steps forward and one step back while making strange Khmer
hand gestures. It occurred to MikeM and I that these were the same
gestures that one might see carved in stone at the Angkor Wat
temples. It was all very interesting to watch.
After a while, some familiar faces started to wander in. First it
was Antman and Wifey, and then KoolKarl and Soph. Way to go,
KoolKarl; Soph was a good catch!
The way the bar works is that they leave all the empties on one's
table, and then count them up at the end of the evening when it's time to
pay. I supposed that's usually a good idea, but KoolKarl, MikeM, and
I were thirsty and the hostesses weren't shy about accepting a drink (a
cola that is) if one were offered. Needless to say that after a
while there wasn't a lot of elbowroom left at our table.
A few bottles of courage got me to jump on the dance floor during a
disco set. Martini's never saw the likes of Dancing Papa before but
that's okay, I was paying the piper. Even Wifey dragged Antman onto
the dance floor. It was fun to make up new dance moves, and watch
the girls try to copy us.
We danced until we couldn't dance any more. Then we would cool
off with a round or two, and get back on the dance floor. Maybe
KoolKarl didn't want to seem uncool by being seen shaking what his mother
gave him on the dance floor, but it didn't bother the rest of us. We
just kept dancing until we were ready to collapse.
During one of our rest periods, the mamasan came over to sit with us
for a while. She pulled out all the stops to get me to barfine my
new friend, but I told her I could not because I only loved her.
That got her to rest her head on my shoulder, and a lovely oily stain on
my shirt - not to mention a few dirty looks from my new friend.
Soon it was time for more dancing. One of our girls made a small
flashing ball appear out of nowhere. The girls had fun dropping the
ball down their tops, and then watching the progress the flashing ball
made until it dropped out the bottom of their shirts. MikeM got a
hold of the ball and started waving it around as if we were in a strobe
light. That looked pretty cool for a while, but then I think all the
dancing, beer, and heat started to get to me; it was time for a looooong
rest.
My girl tried to pull me back onto the dance floor, but that was
it. I was really done for the evening.
"Check-bin, please!"
Even though the large table was covered in empty bottles, cans, and
snack wrappers, Antman wanted to argue the price. Screw that.
At times we had 9 people drinking at our table, and the bill worked out to
a little over $4 USD each for the entire evening. That's a pretty
good deal in my book. I really didn't understand how anyone could be
upset about that price, but that didn't stop Antman from getting all
worked up about it.
The mamasan made another stab at trying to get us to BF our friends,
but I wasn't going anywhere near that idea. MikeM toyed with it for
a little while, but I think the price ($30USD) put him off. $30 is a
pretty stiff barfine, but I think that included all the night's activities
to come. Add a tip on top of that, and maybe it's not so bad after
all.
I passed out a couple tips to my new friends, and made my way out the
door into the night's cool air. Boy, I never thought I would write
something like that about Siem Reap but Martini's didn't have very good
air circulation (if any), and it was stifling inside.
I stumbled about the small parking lot for a short time, and our driver
soon found me. Antman and Wifey were next into the contraption, and
finally MikeM joined us for the ride back to the hotel.
Hmmm… I wonder what happened to KoolKarl and Soph. I
think they ducked out while we were paying the tab. No problem…
We knew he was a backpacker when he joined us…
Martini's was surprisingly close to the Ta Prohm Hotel, and I wondered
why we never went there before. But I will again, that's for sure.
We all fell out of the contraption in front of our hotel, and were
promptly accosted by the massage girls next door. I'm not saying it
wasn't tempting but I was too pooped, and the girls at the massage shop
next door wanted a lot of money. One can do a lot better in Siem
Reap than $20 for a one hour massage, and little hope of a happy ending.
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