Kanchanaburi and Erawan National Park

Well, since I needed to get out of Bangkok, a trip off to Kanchanaburi seemd like the thing to do, since it was just a 3 hour train ride to hop over. The main attraction here is the Death Bridge over the river Kwaii (spellings vary everywhere). This is a bridge that was built in WW2 by prisoners of war. Since the Japanese Empire wasn't so keen on the keeping them fed, a large number of them died, meaning there are also a large number of grave sites around. For all that, it is a quiet, pretty spot. A nice change of pace from all the cities and big toursist spots I'd been going too





Oooooh yeah, definitely still sick in that picture.

Now, after reading all of the helpful Engrish language literature on the area, finding out (for the most part, the translation IS hard to understand in a lot of places) about all of the atrocities, horrible conditions, and numerous deaths and maimings of prisoners of war in this area, not to mention that this was a part of a deal the Thai government had with the Japanese, the thing that upset me MOST was this:



Now, this little guy is tied by less than a foot of chain. not being able to move at ALL other than rocking back and forth, she/he is picking at the tight metal ring on her/his ankle all the time, and trumpeting a bit of distress every few minutes. The only time the handlers will look at her is when they have the chance to rush some tourists with bananas, offering to let them feed the elephant for a low low price. I guess reading about mistreatment and then seeing it are two very different things. It's kind of the difference I found in Cambodia between hearing about the slums, then WALKING them.

Words mean nothing next to the real thing. They might as well be lies.

Not that I'm being melodramatic, or at least, not trying to be. It's just easier to be angry than not sometimes. That's all

As I said, the town has very little too it. I ended up getting a good Thai massage (first one in Thailand, though definitely not the last one I'd have while I was there), then hanging out in a restaurant with a Dutch girl just talking for a few hours over a meal (Thai salad, which involves lots of stir fried meat with chilis and lime... not sure how it's salad, but it was good anyway. Better with local beer). I ended up buying a book to read in the garden for later that night ("A Prayer for Owen Meany" , since I hadn't actually read the thing while it was in the bookshelf at home), and hitting the hay with a plan to go to the Erawan Falls the next day, first bus out in the morning.

It's only a an hour or so of hiking to get up to the top level of waterfalls (the falls aren't one big sucker, they're actually a series of 7 different falls.) Not that impressive to look at, but that's not the appeal.









SWIMMING!

You can climb in the caves around, or just look up and listen to the chattering monkeys that are around (look around, you'll notice one). A day of snacks, swimming and climbing help one feel better I think. And it was prettier than Kanchanaburi to boot. (apologies in advance for graphic image to follow)
































What the heck, just one more water picture ( Did I mention I thought it was pretty?)







After that, it was just back to town for knosh and sleep. The next day I booked a bus ticket for Chiang Mai...just had to kick around 'till it left in the afternoon. Hammock duty is such hard work.







PS: this blog is NOT in real time. I'm in Singapore in week 3 of school right now. This is just recap of where I was, since I was to lazy to do it while backpacking. Sorry for any confusion (there'll be time for Singapore later, I'm here all year after all). Take care all, hope to hear from you soon (and thanks for the comments already on here!)

Bangkok

Definitely fewer pictures of Bangkok than other places. This is partly due to my being sick after my first day there (skipped town fast after), and the fact I walked everywhere. Definitely the slow way to do things, though it was nice to just wander the place.

This is especially true since I arrived at about 10pm...after leaving Siem Reap at about 6am. There is no time change, it was just a LOOONG trip. The road between Siem Reap and Poipet (the border town) is hands down the worst road in existence. There are rumors that the government is taking bribes from an airline to not upgrade the road, which explains the terrible state of it. Let's just say, and my backside can attest to this, that was the longest busride that should have been short in my life.

After searching around and finally finding a decent place to crash around the Khao San road area (kind of backpacker touristy area, but easy to get everywhere, and a good room for cheap is always nice). Just a shot of Khao San road at night...



First day out, and it turns out the only full day In Bangkok I'll do, I definitely get the impression that they like their temples and images of Buddha in Thailand.



The one above is something like 40 feet tall. I thought this was impressive until later in the day. But first, off to see the palace.



The statues around are definitely scary. What ISN'T shown here that's MORE scary are the dozens of soldiers around with giant guns (honestly, I didn't know they MADE them that big!). It turns out that this is more common in Thailand than in Cambodia. That and the huge amounts of Royal Yellow banners around, since it turns out it's the Thai King's 60th year on the throne. His seal is on shirts everywhere, and his image is in every public space.

After borrowing some long pants from the security desk to gain enterance, I got to go in to see the shiny things. I have to say, the Thais know how to do shiny things




Definitely starting to feel sick in that above picture. The air in Bangkok is such that your boogers are grey, and everyone is hawking up spit onto the sidewalk to clear their throats (you definitely start to feel it).

On the plus side, they dress up their religious icons, such as our friend the Emerald Buddah below, in funny costumes. This little guy has 3 different ones. He has his golden rain cape on for the wet season (though they don't let you take pictures inside and close to him, so that's as good as it gets)



Just a shot of the palace proper (the guard picture is more for the elephant statue than anything)





Next stop after the palace is an easy walk over to Wat Pho to see the biggest reclining Buddha in Thailand. It takes me a bit longer since I have to duck in for a drink every 5 minutes, and I get distracted by all of the street vendors (pineapple on a stick is the best idea ever).

However, despite numerous stops for tasty food, I do make it. As promised, it is big and golden.







In case you're confused, the last was a gratuitous Buddha Booty shot.

And just some shots of around the temple grounds (they never have 1 of something, there are always TONS of buildings on temple grounds)





And, yeah. The rest of the day was just wandering markets and things, then off to chat with some people in the common room of the guesthouse, then making plans for going to Kanachaburi the next day. Tune in next time, same bat time, same bat channel (running off to dinner with friends in a few, and don't feel like working on the post later to be honest. Hope to hear from all of you!)

Siem Reap/Angkor Wat

I've been a bit lazy about this one, but here goes.

6 hour busride to Siem Reap from Phnom Penh. The countryside is really pretty, as you can see


Arriving in Siem Reap was something else though. I didn't take a photo of it, as something may have been taken off me, if I could have moved. The bus didn't go the the terminal it was supposed to, but rather took us out of town. This is a pretty reputable Cambodian bus company, so nothing too iffy could have really happened. What did end up going on was the bus was swarmed by tuk tuk and moto drivers. Literally, dozens of them creating a wall of people, all shouting and trying to get out attention so they could get our business, or take us to the guest house of their choice so they could get a comission. It was difficult to get off the silly thing, then there are hands. Just...hands, everywhere, touching shoulders and hair, all begging for a chance to get western money. It was claustraphobic and heart breaking to see the desperate people all around. Eventually we got our bags, and made it to a quite street in town to our guesthouse (street seen below.)




At this point, Jeremy, Darren (the two irish lads) and I went out in search of food, and luckily ducked under as the afternoon monsoon started (apparently Cambodia was in the wet season when I travelled there. I believe it)



There they are, above.

So, we just took it easy and explored town a bit, then rented bikes the next morning to make it out to Angkor Wat.

So, this bit is just us going into the main wall after crossing the giant moat, then Angkor Wat itself from a distance.






Climbing up the main temple steps to get a good view is a bit tricky, as the stairs are more like a ladder. It turns out later that these steps are relatively easy and not so steep compared to many of the surrounding temples.



There are huge walls that are nothing but carvings like the one below. This wall was a depiction of the Ramayana (a Hindu story about a war between Gods and Demons). Some of the temples are Buddhist, some are Hindu. Both religions are practiced by a few folk inside the temples still, regardless of what the denomination of the temple is. The temples used to be part of a city in an old empire, but only the temples were allowed to be made of stone,so only they have survived the centuries.








You knew I would be able to get in another elephant shot in there somewhere.

The next temple is a Buddhist one, called Bayon. Angkor Wat is a specific temple, but the whole area of temples is alos collectively called "Angkor Wat", though all of the temples have individual names and such.

This one is one of the prettier ones, especially after you notice...



...look below. Ignore the scads of tourists in the above...



...Faces! 4 of them on every tower, and there are a LOT of towers. it makes for a neat effect.

The next day, Darren took a day off touristing, so Jeremy and I got our bikes again, some flashlights (thanks for the headlight Dad), and made our way to Angkor Wat for teh sunrise.



Hooray being a backpacking hobo!



That's another temple up on a hilltop (they DO exist...they're just rare)



Jer and I ended up biking at around 30-40km that day, and we definitely got a lot of temples in on it. Bike riding in temperatures of about 35C and dealing with the humidity...thank goodness there were no hills.



But yeah, we ended up seeing alot, but showing each temple would be boring after a while.





So after a hard day of riding, a shower and a nap were in order (two long days of temple seeing is enough to temple out/tire out anyone.) We ended up just going for dinner later and enjoying some local beer before everyone was going their seperate ways the next day. Jer and Dar were off to Phnom Penh again to try to get to Vietnam, I was going off to Bangkok. Though I'd heard rumors of how bad the road between Siem Reap and the Thai border at Poipet was...but the ticket was dirt cheap,so I figured a 12 hour busride wouldn't be all that bad. More on that later. Instead, I get to leave you with the only guys with any kind of belly I saw in Cambodia (they show it off if they have it) in front of the moat around Angkor Wat.



Hope everyone is doing alright back home, remember to leave comments and e-mails,as I love to hear from you guys. Take care now

First Big Asian Stop: Phnom Penh

Hey there

Finally getting to the content of this thing, but I've only just gotten wired in my residence in Singapore, so this will be slow in being updated. I figure I'll start up with Asia and try to do this in chronological order. Peter and I did Vancouver for a few days before, but those pics will be up later. And in no way are these all of my pictures, I just want to give a quick summary on here. That, and I've had a long day, so I'm going to sleep as soon as this is done.

So, after ripping my hair out in Singapore trying to store my bag and get some paperwork done, I ran as fast as I could to get a flight the heck out so I could travel a bit. It turns out that registration was a week before I thought it was, so I therefore only had 3 weeks instead of the 4 I thought, so I looked for what would be a good starting point. Since I was already intimidated by Singapore at first (jet lag really sucks, and the heat and humidity here is unreal), I figured Bangkok would be a bad place to start, so I booked the next flight to Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia. Next morning, got to the airport at 4am for the flight.



So, Cambodia definitely looked flat from the airplane. I was not dissapointed there, it makes Saskatchewan look like the Rockies.

Starting the day at just after 8am, I got my visa ($20 US at the airport. As I would later find out, the reason Singapore would give me no Riel, the local currency, is that it is used as chump change. Everything is done in terms of US dollars. If something is less than a dollar, which is often, the change is given in riel, which is about 4000 per USD), then off to get a guest house and off for the sights. Phnom Penh had a lot to see just off the back of the motorcycle taxi (a moto), from the occasional gold building, to the far more frequent tin roof held up by sticks. Everyone has a spirit house outside of their house, and that seems to be the concentration of the families' wealth.
So yeah, that's just a shot from riding on the back of a moto (oh, yeah, Mom, you're not supposed to read the motorcycle stuff)

As I said, I went to Phnom Penh, since it made a good starting point to the trip to get around to some of the sights I wanted to see. Since I figured Bangkok would be too overwhelming, of course I should start my sightseeing at the Killing Fields of Choeung Ek, the place where the Khmer Rouge regime of the 70's killed tens of thousands of people.

When you first drive up, the first thing you see is the temple, or Stupa. On the very flat land, it's easily the first thing that draws your attention.

The smell of incence is nice, and it was rather sunny. It's very easy to see how pretty this little temple is.

That is until you notice the thousands of skulls that fill it up.
Intimidating, yes. And a bit strange how the genocide that happened here is a tourist attraction. but then, I was a tourist visiting it, so what do I know.

So, after the stupa, time for a stroll around the fields themselves. Not that big of an area, but with signs like this dotting the place, adding helpful tidbits in broken Engrish about how many headless corpses this particular site had in it, I found that it took me a while to get through it all.
The pits are everywhere, and you just sort of amble through them. At this point, the only thing that I can think of is how many different butterflies are here. Seriously, I have never seen so many different colors and shapes, not to mention so many together in one spot, as I did here. There's a temple of skulls right behind me. Strange country so far.


After the killing fields, it's a 20 minute moto back to the city to the Tuol Sleng Genocide museum. This was a highschool before the Khmer Rouge turned it into one of their worse prisons, from which only 14 people ever came out of alive.


A lot of it is just something like this. A room with a picture and the torture device in the middle of the room. Other rooms have stories about victims from family members, or some of the "before and after" pictures taken by the Khmer Rouge for their records. I have a few more graphic photos around, but I had to stop taking pictures after a while, it got to be pretty extreme. There's no tip-toeing around what happened here.


So, after cells and things, I'm still jetlagged, so I went back to my room for a quick nap. I figured a pretty picture was needed, since this first brush with Asia was more gruesome than I thought it would be.

A wander around the city was next. Two rivers meet in Phnom Penh, the Tonle Sap and the Mekong. There's a whole different set of slums over by the river, with street vendors and starving animals all over the place. Almost everything is in disrepair. But there are some really pretty carvings, and flowers carved out of coconut, and children all over the place playing soccer in every available space. Avoiding the games can be tricky, since vendors take up the sidewalks, and the traffic doesn't follow any particular side of the road, so you just have to walk out slowly and make sure they notice you before trying to get across.


Amidst all this activity, are government buildings, like the one below. I think this is the entrance to the palace complex, though from a funny angle.

There are very few buildings over 2 stories high, and absolutely no towers to speak of. However,


there ARE elephants. I figure that's pretty cool.

There are also a ton of Buddhist monks about. Apparently there's an academy for them here, so they line the streets. When trying to dodge traffic, a good rule is to go with the monk, since drivers tend to actually try to avoid them more often than the whities.


A quick turn from the Tonle Sap drag brings me to the only hill in the city, which houses Wat Phnom, or, "Temple on the Hill". the name Phnom Penh means "hill of Penh", Penh being the woman who found some statues at the site and started the city, according to local legend. Everyone in the picture is looking off to the side, since they're going to go feed some of the scads of monkeys that cover the place.

That night, I was eating in the guesthouse, and got talking to some Irish lads. I had been thinking about heading to Siem Reap the next morning, since I have now seen most of Phnom Penh's sights. They were going to be doing the same thing, so we all book on a bus together, and shipped out the next morning. Wave to the Independence Monument on the way out, and off to Siem Reap and the temples of Angkor.

Day one in Asia was certainly different than I expected.