Weekend Trip To Siem Reap

Can you find the hidden faces?

Feeding the elephant - this one is for you Kyle :)

Language Corp 2009 (minus a few)

After our first week of classes were completed, it was time for a little fun and exploring as a group. All 26 of us (plus some teachers and guides) hopped on a bus and headed to Siem Reap, Cambodia. I was so happy to get out of the city and into the country! We were told the bus ride would be around 6 hours long - give or take depending on how many herds of cows we ran into…seriously!?! We never ran into big herds of cows, but we did come face to face with stray dogs, naked children playing in the road, floods and head on cars, busses, trucks and tuk tuks. I can’t begin to explain the rules of the road here. I felt like we were playing chicken with every car we passed. By the end of the trip I could no longer look forward b/c it freaked me out too much. Although they have double lined “highways”, the yellow line means nothing. To get around someone, you simply honk and pray the car coming at you in the other direction either slows down or moves to the shoulder so you don’t have a collision.

Along the way, we stopped at a few “rest areas”. One thing I am mastering is the squat. Cambodians do not have sit down toilets, so my thighs are getting a great work out. Another thing Cambodians do not have is toilet paper. They have what we have started calling “bum guns”. These guns look like the squirty thing on the back of your sink at home, but here they are in every bathroom stall, located next to the toilet. Sorry Southeast Asia, but I will not be using these while I am here. I will stock up on TP instead.
At these rest stops were various types of food and bugs to eat. The weirdest/grossest ones I’ve seen so far were fried snake on a stick and huge fried tarantulas. I stuck to what I knew…an imitation of Pringles.

After our forever long bus ride, we finally arrived at our hotel in Siem Reap. Here we had roommates and I got to room with my friend Leah. Little did we know the fun we would be having in our very own rooms (explanation to come later in this post). Once we got settled, we branched off to find real food, no more fried buggies for this girl. A group of 8 of us decided to take our chances and head down the street, away from the hotel and rest of the group. There was one minor problem…the streets were flooded. We’re not just talking ankle deep water, try knee deep. A few had sandals, others tennis shoes - do we wear them and get them soaking wet and risk them not drying in this humidity thus causing them to smell like vomit or do we take them off and carry them? Since I already have one pair of shoes smelling like sewer, I decided to go barefoot. Smart choice? I don’t know. All I know is, I NEVER thought I’d walk barefoot in knee high water in a foreign country. We didn’t just walk a block or two either, it was probably atleast a mile or so. Every step I secretly prayed I was not stepping on broken glass, needles, dog crap, etc. It was rather entertaining. We finally made it to a place called Temple Bar where all 8 of us ordered pizza - very American and so good! I needed a break from noodles for a meal.

We finished dinner and trekked back to our hotel. My feet were nasty and my legs itched so a good hot shower was in order…easy enough right? Wrong…I somehow managed to flood the bathroom. Don’t worry though, remember those bum guns I told you about? Well the water from those need to go somewhere, so luckily the overflow from my shower simply drained down the bum gun drains. After Leah and I both managed to flood the bathroom, we went to bed where we were greeted with a few other surprises: the smell of sweaty gym socks on our pillows that felt like mountain ranges when you laid down on them and gritty sand in the sheets - ahhh the life of a traveler! It’s great isn’t it?

The next day we spent 8 hours exploring various temples around Siem Reap. Honestly, I don’t think I can put their beauty into words. Some of the temples we visited were: Bayon Temple, Tomb Raider (by far my favorite) and Angkor Wat. All were simply breathtaking. As soon as facebook allows me to upload pictures I will!

Overall the weekend was great! I am so glad I was able to see another part of Cambodia. This country is beautiful and wish I had more time outside exploring than in the classroom learning…isn’t that always the case?

PS Congrats to Jessie, Kelsey, Leah and Courtney (and soon my sister!) for becoming mommies! I cannot wait to meet your little ones!!!

xoxo