Cambodia Day 1 - Temples, Floating Villages and Crocodile Farms

It felt like it took an exceedingly long time to get from China to Cambodia.  Several weather delays and laps around the airport and I was more than ready to get out of cold, rainy, challenging China. There is a fine anticipation in landing in a country where you have never been.  In theory you have no support, no reprieve if you make a misstep.  This is of course not true, but the feeling of freedom to roam anonymously is exhilarating.  Upon stepping off of the plane in Siem Reap, the first smell that hit me was of campfires.  The breeze was warm and the sky was fairly dark without a lot of light pollution.  Once through customs and immigration, I looked with hope for my name on a signboard.  There was Baong smiling and ready to take me to my hotel.  He would be with me for the next three days.

View from the tuk tuk.  This form of transportation is far superior to a taxi, bus, donkey or any other transportation I've recently enjoyed.  

We rolled up to the little villa after dark.  Geckos were feasting on bug buffets on the lightly lit walkway.  This image sums up the pleasantness of it. Exotic birds lived adjacent, but you could walk 5 minutes and be in the middle of the market and entertainment district. Every morning held a simple breakfast and a quiet start.

The first morning in Cambodia I met Heng.  He arrived quiet, with a bicycle and a shy smile.  I too was feeling a bit shy, but we quickly overcame that.  We started with a long tarmac pedal.  The sun was blazing.  We peeled off onto a dirt track and began traveling through villages, backyards and field.

This is pretty much my view in Cambodia.  Heng is so dark people thought he was a foreigner too!

The first set of temples we saw were in the Rolous Group.  These were smaller temples and gave us almost solitary access to explore.  

I loved that this statue was so angry at his own tail.

This was the first of many Buddhist temples in our travels.  I particularly adored this one since I could hear the bats that lived above the ornately decorated ceiling. 

This little cat was of the bob tail variety.  We were fast friends.  Turns out that Cambodia has two kinds of cats, short tail and long tail.  He was pretty pleasant company.  

This is one of the women warrior guardians at the temples.  This theme would repeat itself as we continued on.

This massive temple had elephants at each terrace on the corners. It was simple, but also really powerful architecture.  As we walked away from this temple, the locusts began to roar.  This also repeated itself.  Its almost like they were guarding the entrances.

As we continued through villages, we came to a very busy market.  We pedaled through for a while, but eventually the congestion and mud made riding impossible.  Hoping off of our bikes, we meandered through.  I caught sight of a massive pig head on a table and a variety of meats sitting out in the open air.  The colors and smells are indescribable.  It is only possible to mention that it was overwhelming and consuming all at once. Heng asked me if I wanted to try some fruit.  I asked if he liked to eat it too.  With a sly grin, he said he did not.  I declined.  He had much better snack ideas as the trip went on.

A few of these fish tried to run for freedom and were captured to seal their fate!

On our way out of the village, I almost wrecked my bike thinking I had just seen a crematorium.  Well, that is exactly what I saw.  We did a u-turn as I tried to explain my academic interest in mortuary studies.  He was calm about it, but I'm sure he was doubting the sanity of his client.  It turns out that a majority of the population cremates.  It is a whole ceremony that the families are present for.  Thus, this seriously adorned, outdoor oven: 

These graves are much like those in Louisiana where multiple family members are interred together.  

A bit of a change of plans had us heading to the floating villages.  Given that it was off season, the lake was low.  This provided an excellent opportunity to see the infrastructure that keeps these villages dry.  We hopped in a little, but very long boat and navigated through a low muddy river to the lake.  Along the way, villagers were doing the operations of off-season: repairing boats, repairing nets, laundry, fishing, etc.  It was such a neat experience and it gave our legs a break from cycling!

At a certain point, river turned to Ton Sap Lake.  We cut out across the water.  It occurred to me we hadn't had lunch yet.  The engine went into high gear and we hustled to a rather make shift little floating home.  We approached from the living quarters and it slowly dawned on me that we were stopping for lunch.  I crushed a minor panic as we wheeled around to cute tables adorned with shells and little table cloths.  Pulling the vegetarian card, I had an amazing "full moon" egg, orange fanta and mysterious vegetables.  

Looking to my right at lunch, I asked about the floating box.  "Oh, that is a crocodile farm."  Sure, that makes complete sense.  Leaping to my feet, I rushed over to see if it was a joke.  Looking back with steely gazes were loads of smaller crocodiles.  Some were lounging in the shafts of sunlight that cut through, while others swam in the "pool" created by their floating enclosure.  

As a bonus, there was a pet python cage on top of the crocodile cage...of course...

One of my favorite photos from the trip. 

Happy and a little sunburned.

I was thrilled to have seen the crocodile cage, but I was hoping for a full on crocodile farm.  As I read my itinerary over and over prior to departure, I realized I was going all the way to Cambodia to ride bicycles and see crocodiles.  We loaded up to ride the tuk tuk back and I was a little bummed that we hadn't seen more.  Then it happened.  We passed the most sketchy little bridge with a sign that said "Crocodile Farm."  For $3 we got to go to the horror show that is a commercial crocodile farm.  I don't say horror because of mistreatment of animals or anything, it was just stark and full of mysterious concrete bunkers filled will all sizes of crocodiles being grown for skin and meat.  It was amazing and as we ran through the rain to see it all, I'm sure Heng was hoping this was the end of weird requests. 

***Warning, slightly graphic butchering photo after this photo***

That albino guy in the middle was pretty neat.  Look at the size of the monsters below him!

This is what I came to love about Cambodia.  Children are very capable of anything.  This young girl was processing alligator meat with her lunch casually sitting to the side.  This is the point where Heng and I realized we were standing in blood trails....ewww.

This is the horrible taxidermy they use to suck you into the attraction.  He was stinky and gross, but I had seen what I'd come to see and had an amazing day.  

The evening was filled with a nap during the big rain storm, a trip to the spa for a hot compress massage and finally a lady boy show at the night market.  I was completely in love with Cambodia at this point (and that never changed!)