I woke up at 5am this morning and had some work to do so did that until about 7am to get it mostly finished. I have more work to do in the next couple of days but it's not as important that its done immediately.
When we came in last night it was dark so we didn't get to see a lot of the resort.
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| Breakfast was super busy |
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| I couldn't trust it was decaf so didn't drink it |
In the lobby I went up to Bruce, who yesterday I asked if he was from Buffalo because he had a Bills hat on and when he said yes I told him what a mess I made of the girls Bronco this winter backing up into a pole that I, clearly, didn't see in the underground parking at Walden Galleria and he said "My wife scraped the car all up earlier this year too in that parking area". So anyway I went up to them this morning and said I wanted to show you what I did - needless to say he was impressed, lol. Mom asked me after what we were talking about and I told her and she said but it looked like you were discussing something - I said yes, we were commiserating over the parking at Galleria Mall.
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Jammed between the front tire and the mirror and running board - don't ask me how.
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It's not a long car ride to Angkor Wat from our hotel but we do have to stop at the Pavillion to get our tickets and we all have to go inside to get our photos taken for our 3 day passes. At the Pavillion Jo said she wasn't sure if the scarf she had around her shoulders was going to be acceptable as shoulder covering. I said "it's ok, there will be a gift shop where you can buy a T-Shirt - you can get the one that said "I didn't wear appropriate clothing to Angkor Wat!" or "this is my t-shirt of shame", lol.
Nin asked us how we slept and then said in Cambodia they don't say they "slept like a baby" because babies wake up every two and a half hours, they say "I slept like a pig".
Now, lots of facts interspersed with photos:
Angkor Wat was built between 1113 and 1150 and took 300,000 workers and 6,000 elephants to build - most Cambodians believe it was made by Gods. No slave labour was used, unlike the other 7 Man-Made Wonders of the World (The Great Wall of China, the Pyramids, the Taj Mahal, Machu Picchu, the Colosseum and Chichen Itza) as a Hindu Temple until the City moved in the 16th Century.
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We later went to an Artisan School and this is a representation of how they got the
sandstone the 45 miles from the quarry to the Angkor Wat site! |
Cambodia has approx 1,000 elephants here as well as tigers, pytons and monkeys.
The main export is rice, followed by textiles, fish and rubber/latex.
The moat was dug around the Angkor Wat Temple to protect it. It was hand dug and is 200M wide, 300M deep and runs around it 5 miles. Cambodia, including Angkor Wat which was the Ancient Capital City of the Khmer Kingdom was attacked by Thailand 4 times. After the final time, and a long drought, the King moved the Capital City to the Mekong River and renamed the city Siem Reap which translates to "Siam Defeated"
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| Stones have holes because they were lifted with Bamboo and carried by Elephants |
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| Nin offered to take everyones picture - $10 he would joke. |
The temple was rediscovered during the French Colonization in 1860. Nin says the French don't call it Colonization but they call it the period of French Protection. The name Cambodia is actually a new name given by the French - before that it was referred to as as the Khmer Kingdon which included Laosm Thailand and most of central and south Vietnam. The Cambodian language (Khmer) is derived from Sanscrit.
The area is large, approximately 400sq km and is totally flat. There are over 300 temples built between the 9th and 15th Century.
In the 1st - 8th Century "pre Angkor period" construction was done in clay brick
In the 9th to 13th Century "Angkor period" sandstone was used
In the 14th Century to present "post Angkor" they use timber and wood
Cheryl asked if there would be any Monks here and there are. She asked if she could be blessed and he said yes you can be blessed here but also at a Temple we will go to on our trip we will be blessed as a group. Nin was also a monk for 2.5 years and he said he would bless her...for $10. There are 110 monks here starting at 6yrs old and older. But he told us later that monks these days are bad. They use smart phones, sometimes change and go to dance clubs and get their photos taken with women, their 'sisters'. Nin explained that Buddhism isn't a 'real religion' is is more about a teaching philosophy.
This water basin is essentially part of the drainage system for the Temple to drain water away from the Temple and into the moat. Each level has drainage holes and the upper levels drain into here. There are 4 of these on each corner between the 1st and 2nd to level. If you block the drainage hole you could swim or cleanse yourself but you had to make sure you went into the right basin. There was one for each element in the body - fire, water, earth and wind. You had to go see a male fortune teller to be advised which element you were before you would be able to enter.
This is the centre of the 2nd level (there are 3 levels, 1 is hell, 2 is earth and 3 up the stairs represents heaven" and this is where the King is entombed. To show how exact the measurements were in 1113 when this was built Nin took his phone and set it on the North South line and it read exactly 0 degrees.
There were 50 steep steps up to get to the 3rd level. These original stone steps are no longer used.
Everyone was waiting in line to get their photo done in this window. I had David take my photo and I took some of him and Mary. When the next people apologized for taking a few photos I said "you're only here once, get the photo!" and other people behind them said "that's right!"
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This is a picture of me going back DOWN the stairs and from Mom's POV at the bottom.
I'm using my fan but she thought I had an ice cream and thought "Oh, maybe I should have gone up!"
These fans, once again, have been a complete life saver for not overheating. |
After this we made our way back to the meeting place to get on the bus and go to lunch. This part wasn't planned with much foresight. We are all soaked with sweat from the bottom out and we have to get on an air conditioned bus and then sit in an air conditioned restaurant for lunch before we go back to the hotel. They should have done a quick 15 min stop at the hotel for us to change.
As mentioned before we were soaked so we stripped down but we don't have our laundry back from the hotel yet so both dried our bras out with the hair dryer in the bathroom so that we can put them back on to go out again into the heat to sweat through them again likely before dinner. Lol. I asked Mom to call down to reception and ask approx how much time before our clothing was ready and they said within the hour and it was delivered in tidy packages but slightly damp so now its all hanging all around the room to try to dry it out.
We also have these tiny bananas in our room so I decided to have one so that I can hopefully not have as sore legs as I did after Titov Island!
The moment you go outside everything fogs up. Tuktuks reporting for duty!
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| Our tuktuk for the Tour #7 |
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| Bats in the Trees |
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They sell sparrows so that people can buy them and then release them to worship at the temple, and then they re-catch the sparrows to sell again.
They also sell flowers, fruits and incense right across from the Temple so the local people can buy them as offerings.
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We walked through Pub Street which is about a block long and filled with restaurants. Beers were advertised for 75 cents and Happy Hour is buy one and get one free.
Our next stop was the Artisan school and market. We saw artisans making wood working, copper etching, weaving and painting - and then you walk through the gift shop to leave. It really was beautiful what they were doing. The artisans work on salary and a skilled worker would make $300 a month.
We didn't buy anything, we took our tuktuk back to the hotel and are here now. It's about 6pm. We'll debate later whether to go back into Town for dinner or if we will eat at the hotel. I bet that hotel wins out just because I think that pub street gets busy. A few people ate at the hotel last night and said that it was good, they ordered traditional Cambodian dishes and enjoyed them, we'll likely share something.
Tomorrow we have 3 more temples - I was hoping we could do one or two and skip out on some but no. We have the afternoon free tomorrow though after 1pm.
Likely not a lot more happening today - if we end up going to Pub Street for dinner on a tuktuk I'll write it in tomorrows edition of the blog.
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