Cambodia: Temples, Red Dirt and Oki Oki Unga

Sunset at Angkor Watt

We arrived in Seim Reip Cambodia after a two hour flight from Kuala Lumpur and were met by our Tuk Tuk driver, Mr. Chien.  He would be our buddy for the next four days, driving us from temple to temple in the magical Angkor Watt.  The woman who ran the Sam So guesthouse where we stayed put us on a crazy schedule, visiting about 12 temples in three days.  The amazing Angkor Watt and surrounding temples are truly a wonder of the world, but we just happened to arrive at Chinese New Year, meaning we had to be enchanted along with the other thousands of tourists, mostly Asian, who had vacation time to enjoy the sites.  Even so, we still had a good time, and I managed to get a lot of photos sans tourists.

Tuk Tuks going into the Temple area

Temple nymphs dancing on the walls

Travel by elephant was an option we didn't take

Incredible detail in the carvings which have lasted thousands of years

Many temples are still covered by jungle trees.

Tom takes his Angkor seriously

Although Seim Reip was full of tourists, it also had great food and bars for cheap.  Meals were about three dollars and large beers 1$.  The food itself was spicy and flavorful but not so hot as some countries' cuisines.  As it turns out, Cambodians (and Laos and Vietnamese) eat just about anything that moves. We saw baskets of fried beetles and crickets, snake-on-a-stick, and rumors of a city who's specialty was fried tarantulas.

Some delicious food served in banana leaf bowls (without spiders or snakes)

Fried crickets (left) or snake on a stick, anyone?

We spent four days in Seim Reip and then caught a 10 hour bus to Karate and then another 6 to Ban Lung in the North East Province of Ratanakiri. Jan had an acquaintance Anne Thomas who she had met at a painting class in Fairbanks who'd been living in this area of Cambodia and Laos for 20 years teaching literacy and writing books for Minority populations.  We were wanting to meet with her to get an authentic introduction to some of the Cambodian people.

Buses in Cambodia are old style Greyhound, without the bathroom

The other possible way to get around, which we chose to avoid

  The buses in this country are similar to the old South American buses, without the salsa music, but old and slow and no bathroom on board.  You ride until the bus driver needs a break for a meal or a smoke, about every three hours, then visit the squat toilets behind the restaurant. Because most Asians are short, the seats are very close together without leg room.  On the other hand, they don't cost much money and they go just about anywhere.

street food

   By the time we arrived in Ban Lung, it felt like we were really into the outback, as part of our journey was on dusty, rutted, red dirt/dust roads.  When we got our luggage out from the bus compartment, they were covered with the red dust which also coated the countryside along the roads, making everything look burnt.   The land we traveled through was mostly flat, brown rice fields, with stilt houses lining the roads and miles of fields stretching to the horizon.

Stilt houses along the road.

The Cambodians were in the process of burning out the rubber tree plantations to plant casava trees, which made the countryside and town smokey, which wasn't great.  Ban Lung was up in the highlands and on the edge of the jungle covered mountains.
   Anne suggested a place to stay, so we ended up with our own little bungalow in the Tree Top resort, which was built in an old Cashew orchard.  It had a good restaurant and several cabins which were connected by boardwalks.

Tree Top eco lodge.... $12 a night.  Cambodia is cheap travel!

 

We spent about 5 days in and around Ban Lung,  and didn't realize it, but Anne had an agenda for us.   On our first day we went with her on the back of motor bikes to a student housing, where 40 kids were living and attending high school in town.  There were four different minority groups from villages around Ban Lung, each speaking their own language living here and going to school away from their village.  These groups are different from the  Khmer who populate most of Cambodia.  The minorities are like our Native American populations, and they are generally looked down upon as sub-human by the Khmer.  So the fact that these minority kids had made it to high school was really special. We met several of the kids and then were sent on a "field trip" with two of the boys who didn't have classes that day. We rode on the back of their motor bikes, Jan's driver 14 and Tom's 21.

Our drivers, Jung, 14 and Narot, 21

 The guys took us to a crater lake, several waterfalls and to one of the kid's houses in a close by village.  The parents were away for three days working in the fields, but the 10 year old brother was home alone there taking care of himself. The stilt house was sparse with a fireplace in one corner for cooking and only a few mats for sleeping, and a few clothes hanging on the wall.  It was really amazing checking out the house, and realizing where these kids have come from.

Jan and her cute guys

After a quick dinner at the bungalows we were picked up again and taken back to the student houses where we met with about 30 high school kids who wanted to "practice their English".  Anne was there to interpret for us and led a discussion on our life in Alaska.  As we talked, Jan drew pictures on the blackboard... moose, fir trees, beaver, fur parka, dogsled etc.  How do you explain these things?   Finally we got an idea of how to break the ice and Jan dredged up one of her old Outdoor school songs... the old seal hunt "Pho-Eskimo" song Oki, oki unga.  It has actions and a story to follow, so the kids sang along and REALLY liked it. We had to sing it about three times and they wanted me to write down the words.  We had to explain that Oki oki unga weren't really words. Then we said it was their turn to sing for us, and after quite a bit of confusion and discussion amongst themselves they figured out some songs and line dances that they all knew.  We ended the night with the "Hokey Pokey" which loosened everyone up.  Anne said she had never seen the kids have such an entertaining evening, so I guess we did our job.  The kids were really sweet and friendly so we came back the next two nights and did some more practice with them. It was fun to have a little purpose during our travels.  

Jan, "teaching English" with a few of the Minority Students

 

Jan and Tom outside of a village "girl's house".  When the girl reaches puberty, she is given a house of her own outside of her family house so she can keep company with boys she might want to marry.   The house on the left is a marriage house where the couple live after they are married.

Our new friend Anne Thomas

The next day we got two new drivers: Thit and Phat who picked us up on their motorbikes and  took us off on a 25km motorbike ride to Phat's village.  They had slaughtered a buffalo that morning (we think in honor of the community leaders brother's return home from somewhere?) and were having a traditional Gong Ceremony that evening.  Anne told us that this was a special thing since the old tradition was fading out for the young people's desire for modern music.  So we went with the boys who barely spoke English, (and without Anne, our interpreter), on the back of their bikes down dusty red roads to the village.

Phat's Tampuin village where they held the buffalo gong ceremony

When we got there the party was well underway.  We pulled up on our bikes and about 100 people stopped what they were doing to stare at us.  The boys took us over to a central platform ringed by men and their jugs of homemade  rice wine with straws sticking out of them.  Since it is impolite to refuse the drink, we pretended to sip out of the straw. We faked it pretty good on the first one, but then we were invited to drink from the next and then the next until we had "drank" from about 15 of them while everyone watched.  Not sure if they could tell we were faking it or not, but they smiled and pretended that we had partaken.  As we were "drinking" the wine, I could look down near the wine jug to see a macabre bowl full of animal parts and other gooey looking unrecognizable substances I guessed were food.  I was mainly hoping that we wouldn't be offered any of that, but of course, later, we were.

Home made rice wine, the ceremonial drink. Everyone had their own urn-full that we were encouraged to try.

 
The sacrificial buffalo, or what was left of it was front and center and held in some kind of ceremonial bamboo bin.  We were glad that we hadn't been invited to see the killing of the animal, as Anne said that part was pretty gruesome.   The villagers were gathered around a central covered platform and in two separate buildings, one for the men and one for women.  We were invited into the men's building, which meant taking off your shoes and climbing up a ladder.  Inside there were maybe 15 men sitting in a circle on the floor of the very sparsely-furnished room.  Some men were very old, some middle aged a few younger but all very drunk on rice whiskey!

Tampuin Chief and honored brother in the men's hut

  Women kept bringing in food and we tried a little of the cooked meat wrapped in some kind of leaf.  We were also offered the whiskey and we tried a little....it must have been 90 proof!  The chief and his brother were wasted, but they asked us to take their pictures, so we did.  We finally got up and went back outside, pulling along our teen age drivers, so they wouldn't get drunk. Groups of old women wearing hair turbines and sarongs were gathered in one area outside sitting cross-legged on their stacked rubber thongs for seating. Their leathery skin and blackened teeth from chewing beetlenuts made them look exotic and hard lived.  Anyone who has lived to that age has survived the rein of the Kemer Ruge in the 60s and 70s have had a hard life.  They were pretty smiley at us, but I don't think they particularly liked having their pictures taken, as they would turn away when I got my camera out.  There were lots of teenage kids, mothers with babies in slings and a bunch of little kids.   Packs of dogs and pot-bellied pigs roamed in and out of the groups of people looking for things to eat. It was quite the scene, very primitive.  But everyone seemed to be having a fine time.

Village men performing the Gong Ceremony

Village boys with gongs, our two boy, Phat and Thit on the left

  The gong ceremony that we saw consisted several men banging on some large musical sounding metal discs of different sizes (12-15 inches) that were hanging from a pole, and one man beating a large drum which lay on its side.  Then about 10 young men each picked up more gongs and something to hit it with, like a stick, bone or old shoe, and marched around the buffalo beating the gongs for about 10 more minutes.   I'm sure the party would have gone on into the night, but it was starting to get dark so we got the boys to start back the long road home.  But wait, there was more!
      On our way back we passed a large group of people gathered for a wedding. The boys asked if we wanted to check it out, so we said 5 minutes, as we knew it was getting late.  They introduced us to a friend who spoke some English and he led us through the crowd who were relaxing and eating outside,  over to a house.  We took off our sandals and climbed the ladder into the dark room which was lit with a dull lightbulb or two.  Lots of people were sitting on the floor in groups eating from plates of food and the bride and groom were in one corner, crouched down on their knees with their hands folded on a mat.  Around one wrist on each of them was wound an inch thick bracelet of little strings.  In front of them was a bowl of cigarettes, and we had no clew as to what was going on.  Were we supposed to take a cigarette?, give them a cigarette?  We decided to give the couple a little bit of money and it seemed to be the right action.  The groom took the money and we were asked to tie a string around the wrist of both the bride and groom's wrists... As a blessing I think.  The people seemed very kind and happy to have us there, smiling and saying hello.   We found later that the weddings go on for three days.

Tom's red face after following Jan down 50km of dirt road

    We thought we were on our way home as the last vestiges of light were disappearing, but we took one more detour down some narrow dirt roads to SoPhat's home village.  He wanted us to meet his father and mother (or maybe to show us off, as he seemed to be enjoying nodding and smiling to friends as we went).  We arrived in the dark and his large family were gathered around a campfire. We were introduced and then stood around smiling for a while, not really able to communicate.  After shaking hands we took off into the dark on a harrowing ride home on rutted roads, looking out for other motorbikes zooming towards us with and without lights on.  We survived the night and the ride, and felt like we'd had a very authentic experience off the "banana pancake trail".

Thit, Tom's driver

Another minority, Krung, village store

Motor Bake parking, Ban Lung

Got up at 5:30  morning and caught an early mini-van to Phnom Penh.  We had the bench seat to ourselves, but the price to pay for not being crowded in was to be able to see the road and all of the traffic coming at us at high speed.  It did only take 8 hours compared to the big bus which takes 12.  Part of the road was under construction and bumpy and dusty, and all of the roads are narrow and full of traffic: motorbikes with several people riding on them or laden with goods (such as large, 3 foot wide baskets, lumber carried sideways, pots and pans and mattresses, kids walking and biking from school, double ox carts, truck carts, cows, dogs), all sharing the road. 

Casava bags piled high on a truck in front of our van, soon to be passed.

 Road is a relative term. There are no lines, so drivers generally pass whenever they see an opportunity.  There are often three vehicles all passing one way or the other at the same time.  We saw our lives pass in front of our eyes several times on the way, narrowly missing some oncoming vehicle.  We saw cars parked in the traffic lanes, one guy with his car angled out into the traffic lane who was under it repairing something.  And in small towns there were portable canopies for restaurants which came all the way out to the center of the road which cars from both lanes had to swerve around.   Our driver navigated this all at high speed.  Not one vehicle passed us on the 600 kilometer drive south, and the highlight was when we passed an ambulance driving at high speed with all of it's flashers on.   We made it to Penom Penh in one piece thank Buddah,  the best part was that our driver took us right to our hotel in this hectic, dirty city.
  So we end our travels in Cambodia.  The best thing about the country were the beautiful, ancient temples and friendly people we met along the way.  They locals seemed poor but happy and willing to help if needed. The students we met, were hard working and trying to better their lives and the lives of their community.  We took a step out of time, met some wonderful people and have experiences to remember.  See you next time.