Cambodia: Siam Reap

The last days in Phenom phen were kind of fun. We spent one day at an orphanage playing with these wonderful little ones. For children who have so little in there life, it humbled me to see them so happy and full of hope. So many western kids are such little brats who bitch and moan, and these kids only had one pencil a piece and they were so content. We spent the day playing games and I went over the alphabet and the numbers with them. When we were leaving I was in the tuk tuk and the kids started handing me there books (so I could write my name in it and they would remember me that way!)..I think this was one of the best days I've ever had. Later that night we all went to the market and did some shopping, the rule in Phenom Phen is they name a price, you offer them a quarter and settle on a half. Pretty simple, so I got a few things. The next day we were off to Siam Reap which is the capitol. A crazy russian girl who has been traveling for 4 years and a really cool english chick named Jaqui joined us for the journey, so the 6 hour bus ride wasn't so bad. We found a place to stay in the loney planet guide book and got a nice room with a fan for $6. The next day we rented out a tuk tuk and hit Angor wat which is anchient temples and ruins. Very cool to see, some of them were featured in Indiana Jones and Tomb Raider and they were absolutely amazing. The only negative of the day were the children selling things, and as tempting as it was to buy stuff I know it would encourage parents to keep them out of school if they made money. Although one girl managed to name the capitol of several countries so I was forced to buy a bracelet. The night life in Siam Reap was limited to one street fill with foreigners and loud music and restaurants. We spent some time at the night markets which were very cool and the vendors are much calmer than they were in Phenom Phen. We had dinner at a cafe and hung out at a few clubs that just weren't all that fun. When we were heading home the girls got attacked by kids who kept begging them to take them home. Its was shameless disgusting behavior and we could see the mother kind of egging the kids on. At one point a one armed gold toothed pimp who I met earlier at dinner (and who spoke the best english of any one in Cambodia) got involved and yelled at the kids. At this point we knew things were about to go south so everyone just looked down and ran out of there because the last thing we needed was to deal with this character. Siam Reap was much more cosmopolitan than phenom phen but Cambodia as a whole is a country that is struggling to stay alive. We got up the next day and hopped a bus to Bangkok, and soon as we crossed the Thai border and switched buses we felt that we were some where modern