The Grand Circuit
So my second big day of temple
gazing today. I am doing what everyone knows as the Grand Circuit, which is
just a flash way of saying you travel further between each temple…still only
costs me $15 to hire the Tuk Tuk and the driver for the day which isn’t bad. He
gets to spend a lot of time lounging around on his Tuk Tuk in the shade of
large trees chatting to the myriad other Tuk Tuk drivers doing exactly the same
thing. Not a bad life for them actually. Certainly doesn’t take a lot of
physical effort. I guess they leave all the hard physical work up to their dear
wives and teenage children at home. I didn’t see one female Tuk Tuk driver in
the whole trip, but I did notice that there are now a couple of female taxi drivers
in Ho Chi Minh city so perhaps in another 10 years Cambodia will start to have
females doing more of this kind of work.
I digress. I have plenty of
water, my umbrella for sun protection and my week long Angkor access pass around my neck.
We are good to go. Off the driver toddles, he is an older guy and very careful,
read slow. I think we are the slowest Tuk Tuk in town, he chuffs along, slowing
down to go over and around bumps, which means a lot of slowing down, basically
it means just going slow the whole time actually as the road is constantly
bumpy. But that’s ok, it gives me more time to look at the scenery and in
between temples more time for the sweat to attempt to dry. Weirdly enough, the
more temples I go to the more fascinated I am becoming with them and the more
photos I take. I thought it would be the other way around, but I think its
partly because there are less people at these more remote temples and therefore
you can spend a lot of time wandering slowly around without seeing anyone,
which makes it a more immersive experience. There are also so many good shots
to take, weird angles, strange corners, light and shade reflecting off 1000
year old pieces of carved stone. How can you not take a good shot!
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| So delicately carved, they look like they are made from timber. |
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| The little evenly spaces holes in walls of some of the small rooms supposedly used to hole precious and shiny jewels that would reflect light and create a sparkly effect. |
Each temple is different in its
layout, decoration, style, shape, height off the ground etc. Its interesting to
wonder why they were built in certain ways. Its also really hard to imagine a
whole city built up around these temples, all made out of timber and therefore
gone forever. I was reading today that at its peak the area known as Angkor was
the largest city in the world and renowned for its power, majesty and sheer
excesses. As in hundreds of elephants leading parades with the king standing on
the biggest one at the front. Thousands of people holding flags and marching
behind. It must have been amazing to see. Although life was pretty terrible if
you weren’t one of the kings family or immediate assistants. Just like all
monarch controlled countries before the 20th century if you weren’t
one of the few you were one of the many and the many had pretty terrible lives.
They suggest that thousands and thousands of slaves would have been employed
with elephants to cart the massive stones from the mountains 60km away and then
to carve the stones once in place.
Each temple I go to there are
loads of women, kids and some teenage boys trying to sell their wares as you
walk up to the temple complex itself, from water, to guidebooks to scarves and
trinkets. A trick the little kiddies have learnt to say is, “please give me a
dollar so I can pay for school.” Heart wrenching if it were true. But its not.
They have just at some point figured out that westerners feel sorry for poor
kids and give them money if they ask for it. There are lots of little scams
like this, similar to Vietnam, they catch on quick when they realise tourists
are loaded and usually have a generous spirit. There is one going in Siem Reap
that I read about online so knew to expect it. The American couple that I met
on the zip lining trip were completely taken in and only realised after when
they saw it mentioned on trip advisor. As you walk down the street a women or
teenage girl will come up to you carrying a baby and holding an empty baby
bottle. She asks for milk, not money so tourists think, “oh that’s good, I can
do that and feel good about myself.” So they go into a shop nearby with the
women, buy a big can of expensive baby formula and go away thinking they have
done their touristy bit to contribute. As soon as they are out of visual range the
women goes back into the shop, sells the un-opened container of formula back to
the shop owner for half price and pockets the money. The shop keeper gets a
good deal out of is and so does the lady. The baby doesn’t get anything. Not
great.
As I’m leaving the last temple of
the morning I realise that dark clouds have suddenly appeared and its getting windy. I jump in the Tuk Tuk
and we head off, back towards Siem Reap. We get just near some restaurants
lining a lake just before Angkor Wat and it starts to rain. He quickly pulls
into one of the restaurants and I jump out and run inside with seconds to
spare. Within a minute its bucketing down and the next few lots of tourists who
rush inside are already absolutely drenched. It pours for the next 45 minutes
while I’m having lunch and then clears up with perfect timing. That’s me done
for the day, I’m ready to go back, have a bit of a rest and then go into town
for a massage.
I’ve seen some hilarious things
on my walks around town and sitting in the Tuk Tuk whilst we travel through the
countryside.
For instance:
- A small motorbike pulling a strange little long trailer thingy on two wheels, similar to the second last photo. Sitting on top of it were 7, yes 7, double mattresses all wrapped up in plastic. And perched high on top of them was a young fella. I presume he was up there to help weigh them down and ensure they didn’t get some air under them and take the motorbike up and off into the yonder.
- I saw a teenager riding a bicycle with one foot stuck out to the side. Beside him was a friend riding a motorbike. The bike riders stuck out leg was sitting on the footpeg of the motorbike so he could get a free lift. They were travelling along together at probably 30km an hour.
- An older lady riding a motorbike with a small kid in front of her and one hanging on behind. Hanging off the handlebar was a plastic shopping bag. Inside the shopping bag was about 8 baby ducklings, all alive.
- A motorbike roared past us with a huge live pig strapped lying on its back across the back of the motorbike. Its arms sticking up and its legssticking straight out making it look very weirdly human.
- A motorbike with a guy and two women riding behind him. Each women was holding a small baby, you can the one of them being held off the side of the women in one of the photos below.
- A motorbike with two guys on it. The one at the back is just a young guy and he is carrying an 8ft ladder...it reaches way up above his head and nearly down to the ground. He has his whole shoulder through the ladder about 3 rungs up trying to keep it stable. It's swaying around dangerously each time his driver swerves erratically to get around slow cars etc.
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| The poor duckies were very much alive and just hanging quietly |
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