Mugs in Motion - Cambodia! (and other funny pics)
Alright, since we're out of cambodia we can now post the mugs we found along the way. It's just something that has to be done. Spread the wealth! Or, in these cases - share the funny people and other stuff we found while travelling through Cambodia!
Sorry, no shoes or hats. Oh, and no grenades either.
Mini-mug.
The winners of the competition "How many people can you fit on one moto?".
Sleeping mug - this time in a bus!
Rat anyone? Saw this in the kitchen area - we're just really glad we had the soup with no meat in it...
Seriously - this never stops to amaze us. No washing of hands in the urinal! REALLY? :P
Lots of do's and don'ts allover Asia. More don'ts, really.
Baby mug.
/ C &M
Sorry, no shoes or hats. Oh, and no grenades either.
Mini-mug.
The winners of the competition "How many people can you fit on one moto?".
Sleeping mug - this time in a bus!
Rat anyone? Saw this in the kitchen area - we're just really glad we had the soup with no meat in it...
Seriously - this never stops to amaze us. No washing of hands in the urinal! REALLY? :P
Lots of do's and don'ts allover Asia. More don'ts, really.
Baby mug.
/ C &M
Summary of Cambodia
Since we left Cambodia about 5 days ago, it's about time to give yo the summary. Thought this summary would be a lot shorter than the others, since we only stayed there for 6 days, but apparenty, we had lots to say about Cambodia.
Just a couple of minutes after we left Vietnam and entered Cambodia, we noticed how much poorer the Cambodian people are compared to any other country we've been to so far. People in countryside, the farmers mainly, are incredibly poor. Small, irregular and tilting wooden huts (to call them houses would be wrong) are everywhere. Most of them looks like they're about to fall apart any minute. It's dirty, dusty and filled with poverty. They also have a dark past, with civil war and then the Khmer Rogues who killed, tortured and enslaved so many Camodians. In spite of this Cambodians are the nicest people we've met so far, including Thais. Always a smile on their faces. The roads in Cambodia aren't as "good" as in for example Vietnam. The bus drove from one side to another on the road to avoid bumbs or holes, like slalom on asfalt. What also surprised us a little was that Cambodians are so much darker than both Thais or Vietnamese. First we thought it was because they're were working outside, probably about 10-12 hours a day. But also in the cities were people darker. We later learnt that Cambodia has lots of Indian influences and we apart of Indian culture, so our guess is that's why people are so much darker. Cambodia's very cheap too. No trouble finding a low budget guesthouse and the food is both good tasting (again Indian and Thai influences) och really cheap.
We only stayed in Phnom Penh for two nights, but the city itself was so much better than we expected it to be. Our images of Phnom Penh before arriving were a big, boring and quite urban city. But it was nothing like that. Not that big, about 1,3 milj, most houses were only two or three stories high and some really nice architecture too with the typical Khmer look, think Angkor Wat. There's some really bad shit going on in Phnom Penh - drugs and prostitutes are everywhere. What we've heard, guns aren't that uncommon either. But if you stay away from it and don't walk smaller streets at night, I think you'll have a pleasant visit in Phnom Penh, at least we did.
Riverside in Phnom Penh.
The Royal Palace in Phnom Penh.
After that we went to Battambang for a night and from there we took the boat to Siem Reap. Battambang is a boring city, really. Would never go back there, unless for the same reason as we went there this time - the boat to Siem Reap. Nothing to do, nothing to see. We heard there would be some nice french colonial buildings (yes, Cambodia was a french colony), but there was like, one. We took a picture and that was it. Luckily, the boat ride compensated for all for that. One of the best things we've done so far actually. Amazingly beautiful scenery and we also passed the floating villages, which is really cool (but poor). You could really get a look at the real Cambodia on that boat ride and the poor, hard working but yet so friendly people.
The french colonial buiding in Battambang.
People are very poor in Cambodia...
...but still happy!
Floating village.
Siem Reap was our third and last city we visited. Way more touristy than the two previous. Of course because of the temples in Angkor. Siem Reap itself hasn't that many things too see or places to go. But since it's crowded with tourists, you'll always be able to have a nice night out at some of the many bars in the city. Angkor was the highlight of our Cambodia visit. It's just incredible to watch all the temples. Huge, beautiful and mysterious. It's not hard to understand why people refer to them as "the 8th wonder of the world".
One of the massive trees covering the Ta Promh temple.
Faces of Angkor Thom.
Almost catching up with our blogging now. Right now we're in Koh Pha Ngan in Thailand, waiting for the Full Moon Party that will take place the 21st. We'll give you an update of our two nights in Bangkok within a couple of days.
/ C & M
Just a couple of minutes after we left Vietnam and entered Cambodia, we noticed how much poorer the Cambodian people are compared to any other country we've been to so far. People in countryside, the farmers mainly, are incredibly poor. Small, irregular and tilting wooden huts (to call them houses would be wrong) are everywhere. Most of them looks like they're about to fall apart any minute. It's dirty, dusty and filled with poverty. They also have a dark past, with civil war and then the Khmer Rogues who killed, tortured and enslaved so many Camodians. In spite of this Cambodians are the nicest people we've met so far, including Thais. Always a smile on their faces. The roads in Cambodia aren't as "good" as in for example Vietnam. The bus drove from one side to another on the road to avoid bumbs or holes, like slalom on asfalt. What also surprised us a little was that Cambodians are so much darker than both Thais or Vietnamese. First we thought it was because they're were working outside, probably about 10-12 hours a day. But also in the cities were people darker. We later learnt that Cambodia has lots of Indian influences and we apart of Indian culture, so our guess is that's why people are so much darker. Cambodia's very cheap too. No trouble finding a low budget guesthouse and the food is both good tasting (again Indian and Thai influences) och really cheap.
We only stayed in Phnom Penh for two nights, but the city itself was so much better than we expected it to be. Our images of Phnom Penh before arriving were a big, boring and quite urban city. But it was nothing like that. Not that big, about 1,3 milj, most houses were only two or three stories high and some really nice architecture too with the typical Khmer look, think Angkor Wat. There's some really bad shit going on in Phnom Penh - drugs and prostitutes are everywhere. What we've heard, guns aren't that uncommon either. But if you stay away from it and don't walk smaller streets at night, I think you'll have a pleasant visit in Phnom Penh, at least we did.
Riverside in Phnom Penh.
The Royal Palace in Phnom Penh.
After that we went to Battambang for a night and from there we took the boat to Siem Reap. Battambang is a boring city, really. Would never go back there, unless for the same reason as we went there this time - the boat to Siem Reap. Nothing to do, nothing to see. We heard there would be some nice french colonial buildings (yes, Cambodia was a french colony), but there was like, one. We took a picture and that was it. Luckily, the boat ride compensated for all for that. One of the best things we've done so far actually. Amazingly beautiful scenery and we also passed the floating villages, which is really cool (but poor). You could really get a look at the real Cambodia on that boat ride and the poor, hard working but yet so friendly people.
The french colonial buiding in Battambang.
People are very poor in Cambodia...
...but still happy!
Floating village.
Siem Reap was our third and last city we visited. Way more touristy than the two previous. Of course because of the temples in Angkor. Siem Reap itself hasn't that many things too see or places to go. But since it's crowded with tourists, you'll always be able to have a nice night out at some of the many bars in the city. Angkor was the highlight of our Cambodia visit. It's just incredible to watch all the temples. Huge, beautiful and mysterious. It's not hard to understand why people refer to them as "the 8th wonder of the world".
One of the massive trees covering the Ta Promh temple.
Faces of Angkor Thom.
Almost catching up with our blogging now. Right now we're in Koh Pha Ngan in Thailand, waiting for the Full Moon Party that will take place the 21st. We'll give you an update of our two nights in Bangkok within a couple of days.
/ C & M
The temples of Angkor
As some of you know, we visited the temples of Angkor a couple of days ago. Since we've been busy travelling and sightseeing we haven't had time to show you what we saw and experienced there. Until now...
We arrived to Siem Reap by boat on friday afternoon. As we told you, we met Sophie, who we knew from Hoi An, and her boyfriend Simon on the boat. The four of us decided to go to the same hotel and in the Tuk-Tuk on the way there, we got to know the driver, Cobra. He offered to drive us around in Angkor for two days and also tell us a little about the temples. For a small fee, of course, but it was an acceptable fee.
Angkor is a region that served as the seat of the Khmer Empire from approximately the 9th to 13th centuries. The Angkorian period began in AD 802, when the Khmer hindu monarch Jayavarman II declared himself a "universal monarch" and "god-king". The temples of the Angkor area number over one thousand, from small pillars to the great Angkor Wat. Said to be the world's largest single religious monument! To quote Wikipedia. :P
We set out 5 am on saturday morning. The reason was of course to watch the sunrise at Angkor Wat. It was kind of crowded, lots of salesmen but it was still amazing! It was a sight like nothing else to watch the sun slowly rise over the almost 1000 year old temples. After the sunrise, we went into the temples. The inside of Angkor Wat itself wasn't really that amazing, but still impressive. Knowing that this site was built and used by people over 1000 years ago makes you feel kind of small and insignificant. Still, we're glad we live in this time, and not a 1000 years ago. :P I mean, there would be no beer, no Scrubs, no cell phones, no facebook. How did people even survive? A mystery...
Sunrise @ Angkor Wat. Amazing!
The city of Angkor is huge, and we tried to squeeze in as many sites and temples we could the first day. We saw Ankor Wat, the biggest temple, Bayon - the temple of many faces, Ta Phrom - the temple in which the first Tomb Raider movie was shot (that means we walked on the same ground Angelina Jolie once walked. Never felt closer to her.) But jokes aside, that temple was really cool. Trees more than 100 years old growing through the temple roof, huge piles of massive stone now crumbled, from what used to be large temple sites, the jungle slowly reclaiming it's former place by growing all over the site. The rest of the day we spent visiting lots of temples, some fascinating, some not so fascinating.
Chris in front of the Bayon temple.
Bayon temple, notice the faces on the pillars.
Goofin' around at the Bayon temple.
We returned onto town exhausted around 6 pm and had some dinner, got some shopping done at the market and had a "fish massage"! A fish massage is basically dipping your feet in a tank full of fish, hungry for the dead skin cells on your feet. Wierd at first, but relaxing!
Fishy massage...
The next day we picked up were we left off by taking a 1 hour tuk-tuk ride to an ancient temple site by a waterfall. Even though that site wasn't that fantastic, the tuk-tuk ride was still great. It is really the best way to see and feel the countryside. After that we saw another temple, and then headed back to Ta Phrom (batteries in all of our cameras ran out the day before) and then a quickie to Angkor Wat again for some more pictures. We went back to Siem Reap for a quite night and left monday morning for Bangkok & Thailand!
Enjoying the Tuk-Tuk ride!
Buying PETrol on the road to the temples.
Ta Phrom - "The Tomb Raider" temple.
Chris at Ta Phrom.
Bros @ waterfall.
/ C & M
We arrived to Siem Reap by boat on friday afternoon. As we told you, we met Sophie, who we knew from Hoi An, and her boyfriend Simon on the boat. The four of us decided to go to the same hotel and in the Tuk-Tuk on the way there, we got to know the driver, Cobra. He offered to drive us around in Angkor for two days and also tell us a little about the temples. For a small fee, of course, but it was an acceptable fee.
Angkor is a region that served as the seat of the Khmer Empire from approximately the 9th to 13th centuries. The Angkorian period began in AD 802, when the Khmer hindu monarch Jayavarman II declared himself a "universal monarch" and "god-king". The temples of the Angkor area number over one thousand, from small pillars to the great Angkor Wat. Said to be the world's largest single religious monument! To quote Wikipedia. :P
We set out 5 am on saturday morning. The reason was of course to watch the sunrise at Angkor Wat. It was kind of crowded, lots of salesmen but it was still amazing! It was a sight like nothing else to watch the sun slowly rise over the almost 1000 year old temples. After the sunrise, we went into the temples. The inside of Angkor Wat itself wasn't really that amazing, but still impressive. Knowing that this site was built and used by people over 1000 years ago makes you feel kind of small and insignificant. Still, we're glad we live in this time, and not a 1000 years ago. :P I mean, there would be no beer, no Scrubs, no cell phones, no facebook. How did people even survive? A mystery...
Sunrise @ Angkor Wat. Amazing!
The city of Angkor is huge, and we tried to squeeze in as many sites and temples we could the first day. We saw Ankor Wat, the biggest temple, Bayon - the temple of many faces, Ta Phrom - the temple in which the first Tomb Raider movie was shot (that means we walked on the same ground Angelina Jolie once walked. Never felt closer to her.) But jokes aside, that temple was really cool. Trees more than 100 years old growing through the temple roof, huge piles of massive stone now crumbled, from what used to be large temple sites, the jungle slowly reclaiming it's former place by growing all over the site. The rest of the day we spent visiting lots of temples, some fascinating, some not so fascinating.
Chris in front of the Bayon temple.
Bayon temple, notice the faces on the pillars.
Goofin' around at the Bayon temple.
We returned onto town exhausted around 6 pm and had some dinner, got some shopping done at the market and had a "fish massage"! A fish massage is basically dipping your feet in a tank full of fish, hungry for the dead skin cells on your feet. Wierd at first, but relaxing!
Fishy massage...
The next day we picked up were we left off by taking a 1 hour tuk-tuk ride to an ancient temple site by a waterfall. Even though that site wasn't that fantastic, the tuk-tuk ride was still great. It is really the best way to see and feel the countryside. After that we saw another temple, and then headed back to Ta Phrom (batteries in all of our cameras ran out the day before) and then a quickie to Angkor Wat again for some more pictures. We went back to Siem Reap for a quite night and left monday morning for Bangkok & Thailand!
Enjoying the Tuk-Tuk ride!
Buying PETrol on the road to the temples.
Ta Phrom - "The Tomb Raider" temple.
Chris at Ta Phrom.
Bros @ waterfall.
/ C & M
Cruising through Cambodia
Yesterday we left Phnom Penh 9am to go to the city Battambang, Cambodia's second largest city (but only about 130 000 people), 30km northwest of Phnom Penh. Turned out to be a quite boring place, few bars, few points of interest and few people- The bus ride was ok, a bit bumby as usual. Same same , but different - one of our more popular sayings on this trip. Because on the bus ride, we met a Cambodian girl, who's been living in France for the past 6 years - Dara. She ended up being our tour guide in Battambang. She showed us around for a few hours and then three of us had dinner. We were suspicious in the beginning, since we haven't met very friendly locals so far. But she was the real deal and helped us a lot in Battambang!
So anyway we departed from Battambang about 7 am. And the boat ride was...awesome! Took us about 8 hours to get to Siem Reap, but we had beautiful weather on the way. Sunny, not a cloud and perhaps about 30C. We sat on the roof of the boat, where there were no seats (or railings) but that wasn't a problem, just had to hold on a little now and then. The best part about it though, was the scenery! It was amazing. We started out by going along the river floating through Battambang, which led us further out into the wetlands that is the "outskirts" of the huge lake between Battambang and Siam Reap. We got to see vast areas of trees growing right out of the water and floating villages. The boat went through unbelievibly narrow pathways through the vegetation on the water, forcing us to dodge branches on the roof of the boat! It was a great boatride, and after 8 hours we had reached our destination - Siem Reap!
Enjoying the cruise.
This is how narrow the river was in a few places!
Houses on stilts - this is how people live here.
Marcus & cambodian gangsta'!
One of the "floating" villages we passed.
On the boat we met a friend from Hoi An - Sophie, from England. Sophie and her boyfriend Simon are on route to see Angkor Wat as well. We joined them in the same Tuk-tuk to Siem Reap city centre and we're now staying at the same hotel. Tomorrow morning at 5 am (!) the four of us are going to watch the sunrise in Angkor Wat and then spend the entire day there! Gonna be legendary!
/C&M
So anyway we departed from Battambang about 7 am. And the boat ride was...awesome! Took us about 8 hours to get to Siem Reap, but we had beautiful weather on the way. Sunny, not a cloud and perhaps about 30C. We sat on the roof of the boat, where there were no seats (or railings) but that wasn't a problem, just had to hold on a little now and then. The best part about it though, was the scenery! It was amazing. We started out by going along the river floating through Battambang, which led us further out into the wetlands that is the "outskirts" of the huge lake between Battambang and Siam Reap. We got to see vast areas of trees growing right out of the water and floating villages. The boat went through unbelievibly narrow pathways through the vegetation on the water, forcing us to dodge branches on the roof of the boat! It was a great boatride, and after 8 hours we had reached our destination - Siem Reap!
Enjoying the cruise.
This is how narrow the river was in a few places!
Houses on stilts - this is how people live here.
Marcus & cambodian gangsta'!
One of the "floating" villages we passed.
On the boat we met a friend from Hoi An - Sophie, from England. Sophie and her boyfriend Simon are on route to see Angkor Wat as well. We joined them in the same Tuk-tuk to Siem Reap city centre and we're now staying at the same hotel. Tomorrow morning at 5 am (!) the four of us are going to watch the sunrise in Angkor Wat and then spend the entire day there! Gonna be legendary!
/C&M
Tourists in Phnom Penh
Woke up early today (we hate it) and had breakfast at our hotel. On our to-do list today, among other things, were the Killing Fields, so that's exactly where we went. The bus left 9 am and half an hour later we were there. The Killing Fields are, like we wrote yesterday, the fields were the people of Cambodia "not fitted" to be a part of society - according to the Khmer Rouge - were taken for execution. The area is filled with mass graves, today excavated. One of the mass graves held up to 450 people - women, children, young. Many of the trees on the fields were used as "killing trees" - where the Khmer Rouge would smash the heads of the people, especially children and infants(!). It was a way to save bullets. Others ways including using hatchets, knives & axes. Since the main religion in Cambodia is Bhuddism, the graves were excavated so that the bodies and spirits of the dead could be placed in a place where they could be honored by the living. So, a memorial stupa was built, now holding the bones of the victims. It's a really depressing place. Feels strange walking on the fields. So terrible things happened there. It's astounding how people could do this to each other. And it wasn't even in war or people of a different religion. This was their own people they massacred and slaughtered. Terrible. But it's a good thing that this place exist - to remember the ones who died and to never forget what happened.
Chris in front of the Memorial stupa.
Skulls.
After the Killing Fields we headed back into town for some sightseeing. We had lunch, enjoyed a coffe by the river, and then had a massage - performed by blind masseurs - hence the name of the place: "Seeing Hands Massage". Relaxed, we continued our tour through the city, past the royal palace, a silver pagoda,a couple of other monuments and even watched saw some monkeys climb the electrical wires just above the street.
A monkey playing with an electrical wire. Living on the edge!
Tomorrow, we're off to the city of Battambang, 30 km northwest of Phnom Penh. Staying there for just one night and from there we're going by boat to Siem Reap - and Angkor Wat :D
/ M & C
Chris in front of the Memorial stupa.
Skulls.
After the Killing Fields we headed back into town for some sightseeing. We had lunch, enjoyed a coffe by the river, and then had a massage - performed by blind masseurs - hence the name of the place: "Seeing Hands Massage". Relaxed, we continued our tour through the city, past the royal palace, a silver pagoda,a couple of other monuments and even watched saw some monkeys climb the electrical wires just above the street.
A monkey playing with an electrical wire. Living on the edge!
Tomorrow, we're off to the city of Battambang, 30 km northwest of Phnom Penh. Staying there for just one night and from there we're going by boat to Siem Reap - and Angkor Wat :D
/ M & C
