Ant-Bread and Circuses

We flew out of Laos and into Siem Reap, Cambodia. We were going to be there for four days originally but plans were tweaked and we made it nine instead, as we are so breathtakingly dynamic. We were met at the airport by our tuk-tuk driver, Sok, who we had pre-booked on the back of some excellent feedback on one of the blogs that Chan reads.  Say hi to Sok:

He dealt with the bodybags better than most taxis.

He must be the best driver in Siem Reap as it says so on his shirt:

 

If you're not aware, Siam Reap is the biggest tourist draw in Cambodia. It is nestled right next to the Angkor Archaeological Park - 400 square kilometres of temples and structures which formed the capitals of the Khmer Empire from the 9th - 15th centuries.  The most famous site there is Angkor Wat - a ridiculously big temple/fortress complex which is the largest religious monument in the world.  That's the thing in the picture at the top.

It gets a bit busy

As Chan briefly mentioned in the last Laos post, I've pretty much made my lifetime's quota for temple viewing, but Angkor is something else.  It's an actual ancient ruined city, which -despite the frequent crowds and tour groups- feels very Indiana Jones.  I'll put the Angkor stuff in a different post so that this one doesn't run away with itself.

Since we were there for over a week, we could get around pretty much everything at our leisure, which was for the best as the heat rapidly becomes punishing after 10am. Temperatures made it past 40°C (104°F) before lunchtime, so we did our adventuring in the morning and spent the afternoons hiding from the daystar by the pool or getting a massage.  It's hell being us.

Siem Reap (which means -rather optimistically as it turned out- "Siam Defeated") is not a pretty town. It's not the perpetual bustle of Phnom Penh, but the established and growing allure of Angkor means that it exists purely as the launchpad for wat-seeking tourists.  Pick a direction and you will find resorts and hotels under construction.  The night markets are thronged with tat merchants and rather aggressive ladies touting their massage parlours, both genuine and euphemistic.  When I made the mistake of venturing out on my own after dark, every moped and tuk-tuk driver in eyeshot would descend on me to peddle hookers, pot and blow.  Plainly I look like a discerning customer.  

Roadside petrol.  Illegal but universal. 

Cambodia has a similar unexploded ordnance problem to Laos, as the Americans weren't too fussy which of Vietnam's neighbouring countries they bombed.  More pressing in Cambodia though, are landmines.  Landmines were laid variously by the Khmer Rouge, the royalist forces, the post-Khmer Rouge government forces and the Vietnamese.

One chap who tried to help was Aki Ra, a child soldier who laid thousands of mines when conscripted into the various armies and militias of the time. One day, after the fighting had abated and after he'd seen the enduring harm the mines cause, he took it upon himself to start dis-arming them. He did this largely with a stick.  He would take the disarmed mines and UXOs he found back to his house, which became a bit of an attraction after a fashion.  He started charging visitors a dollar a time, which he used to finance his endeavours.

Eventually, after he was sat on few tens of thousands of disarmed mines, the Cambodian government called a halt to his activities until he received formalised training, which he eventually did.  Now he has set up his own NGO, Cambodian Self Help Demining, which sets about clearing "low-priority" areas not dealt with by the other NGOs.

He has a spanner for that

Now he runs a landmine museum that funds his activities and also supports a school he's established for bomb-maimed and otherwise disadvantaged kids.  We popped into the museum and learned of some more misery.  He's still tirelessly at it, though, despite rumoured chronic health issues due to exposure to TNT and RDX.  He reckons he's cleared (by hand) 50,000 mines.

Add it on the jobs-I-don't-want list

Also in the area is the Cambodia War Museum, which is largely made up of knackered Russian tanks and guns from the last 40 years or so.

Our guide was Moun, also known as "The Cat" as it is claimed that he has been clinically dead 13 times. The most recent occasion was last year when he was stung 50+ times when a nest of Asian hornets fell on his head while walking the grounds of the museum.  Apparently he had died until a doctor could be bribed enough to provide him adrenaline, which revived him.  He also said he is now cured of diabetes and his arthritis has vanished.  He may be a bit eccentric.

He was a child soldier for the Khmer Rouge, before joining the Vietnamese and Cambodian armies as circumstances dictated. He has been shot three times and blown-up several more.  His military escapades were brought to an end when he lost his lower leg to a landmine.  He pointed out his various scars, including the ball-bearings from a claymore mine which are still under his skin.

He told us something that I hadn't really thought of before: that being a child soldier is particularly fraught because your comrades are children, and therefore have an 8 year-old's understanding of firearm safety.  He has a nasty burn mark from his friend firing an RPG-7 without checking the back-blast area. Apparently leading a platoon of kids is just a Keystone Cops farce of random gunshots and explosions.  That didn't happen to the Secret Seven.

Taking us on a tour of the wrecked T-55s and assorted other armour, Moun pointed out matter-of-factly the shoe and piece of his friend's tibia in the back of one vehicle, in which he was killed when it hit an anti-tank mine.  That was jolly.

Back to more wholesome activities.
Phare, an acrobatic troupe from Battambang,  have set up a big top in Siem Reap where they perform daily to packed crowds and acclaim. We caught a show while we were there. Here's an excerpt:

The performances contain some manner of social message, but I think I might've struggled to extract it. The story of the performance we saw is that of a disfigured bloke who wants to join in with the antics of his fellow villagers .  They violently reject him and -in exile-  he prays to the gods, who turn him into a woman with magic powers. Bear with me.  After he gives the guys from town blue balls, he conjures up some manner of plague.  The villagers take up torches and pitchforks and kill him/her. The gods reappear and explain that he/she was afflicted by an evil spirit so it wasn't his/her fault. They then resurrect him, minus his afflictions, after which he is accepted into society with raucous fanfare. Hmm. It's a bit Glenn Hoddle.   There's something about forgiveness there, I guess?

"Now you are normal, you may have this chicken"

It was good anyway.

Since we can hardly top the embryonic duck scotch egg in the raw horror stakes, we set out to eat some stuff with too many legs at the Bugs Café.  Insects are a cheap and healthy protein source, so there is no reason why we're not eating them already.  Oh hang on, yes there is:

Nope on a stick

Bugs Café is the brainchild of a French and a Cambodian chef, who dream up contemporary Cambodian-influenced food using creepy-crawlies.  We had the 'Discovery Platter', which consists of: 2 spring rolls with red and flying ants; 1 tarantula donut; 1 bug skewer (two grasshoppers, one tarantula and one giant waterbug); 1 Mediterranean Feuilleté (I didn't know either) with red ants; and a cricket and silkworm curry.   

Let's watch the footage:

The aftermath:

"Why?"

In summary: the spiders were the best bit, tasting a bit like Chinese crispy beef.  The grasshoppers were least palatable - they had a strong bran-like taste.  Not a fan.  The silkworms didn't add much in flavour but had a meaty texture. The crickets were fine if I wasn't picking antennae out of my teeth for next hour.   The waterbug was all carapace; a bit like shelling a big prawn or crevette but with nothing left to eat afterwards.  The ants were inoffensive filler. They don't look great if you pick them out though:

Yum

Fighting back our new-found insatiable insect hunger, we paid a visit to the Banteay Srei Butterfly centre- the largest butterfly enclosure in SE Asia.  Here they rear butterflies and moths in a protected environment (as this country is apparently hostile to all life) for supply to zoos around the world. And Changi Airport, probably

You're not fooling anyone, dragonfly

Now I'll get on with figuring out which Wat was what for the Angkor post. 

Kurzfassung auf Deutsch: Ich wollte nur einen Grund, das Wort "Schmetterling" zu verwenden. 

Luang Prabang

Our final stop in Laos was the city of Luang Prabang, which is designated a UNESCO world heritage site. Legend says that Buddha smiled when he rested there during his travels, prophesying that the site would one day be home to a great and powerful city.

Like many UNESCO sites, the designation is a mixed blessing: it brings tourists and their money and it encourages national and international funding of the are; but the influx of tourists does raise prices to the exclusion of locals. There is also the selfish dichotomy of visitors expecting preservation and rejecting modernisation. 

There is a level of sneeriness in the traveller community against "tourists" and the expectation of "travelling off the beaten path" or "going where the locals go". Our travelling style is to do our own thing, usually under our own steam but we'll mix up the usual tourist sites with the unusual. The problem with not going where tourists go is that it can (unconsciously) project the idea that travellers want places to stay the same and for the locals to live their lives without the impact of globalisation. For locals this can sometimes be felt as western travellers (who can afford not to work for two weeks of their year) wanting to keep the local people from developing and enjoying the benefits of technology and financial gain. I mention all this because a search for commentary on Luang Prabang will reveal a raft of people complaining about tourism now that the town is "discovered".

We were lucky as we drove ourself there. We could gauge the increased prosperity of the local people as we entered the outskirts of the city, compared to the villages we had passed through in the hills. We were also able to see that the main tourist area comprised a small area of the city: only 3 or 4 streets.

UNESCO describes Luang Prabang as "an outstanding example of the fusion of traditional architecture and Lao urban structures with those built by the European colonial authorities in the 19th and 20th centuries. It's unique, remarkably well-preserved townscape illustrates a key stage in the blending of these two distinct cultural traditions."

We loved it. The city has a really laid back atmosphere and it is lovely to walk the streets, admiring all the buildings and confusing ourselves whether we are in Europe or South America or Asia. The place has character and oozes history. Everyone we interacted with in the city was pursuing a goal and in this city, unlike a lot of Laos, it seemed that people had the opportunity to realise their ambitions, albeit requiring more effort and struggle than most of us in the UK. A lot of people were entrepreneurial and utilised the tourist influx to be able to turn their artistic talents into a job. We ate in restaurants and bars which had good service, good food and excellently mixed drinks. We certainly wouldn't do these lovely hardworking people the patronising disservice of saying "good.... for Laos" as we think these would be rated as good places anywhere in the world.

We went a bit left-field and ended up having a nice meal in a tapas bar with very moreish croquettes.

One of the great things about Laos is the bread. Although we have loved the food in SE Asia, the fusion of Asian cuisine with a fresh crusty French loaf is quite something. I was reminded again why sandwiches are my favourite food as I stuffed my chops while people watching.

The night market in the centre of Luang Prabang, like most of the cities in SE Asia is tailored to tourists and is usually an area where the "nicer" goods from the day markets are brought to one central spot. We have visited a number of these markets in our travels and some that are not touristy at all. We really enjoyed the market in LP because we were able to browse the wares without being harassed or pressured or tugged or poked. We were able to take our time and because of that we actually purchased.

There are a number of superb Buddhist temples in the city. A particularly stunning example was Wat Sene.  Gareth says it was nice and all that, but that he is a bit a Watted-out now. 

Luang Prabang is situated along the mighty Mekong river.  We tramped along the river to cross one of the two bamboo bridges, built every dry season by local families who charge a small fee to cross. The bridges are washed away during the rainy season flooding and the families build them back up again when the river lowers.  

Meets regs

We mainly traversed the town by foot, which was for the best as Google Maps kept trying to direct us across motorbike bridges, resulting in Gareth trying to do a 12- point cul-de-sac turn in a two-tonne pickup while being swarmed by endless scooters. 

"Fucksake" - Gareth

I loved Laos. It was my favourite country so far in SE Asia. It is a beautiful country with very nice people and a sense of community. The population is in a very difficult position and effectively trapped in poverty as a result of things that occurred more than a generation ago. On paper the country could be doing ok, but they are stuck and many of them risk their lives every day just trying to feed their families because of the thousands and thousands of bombs left in their country. Whilst visiting as part of our big trip, we felt that all we can do is spend our tourist money in the right places and raise awareness of the situation in Laos, but we were left with an overwhelming sense of unfairness and helplessness about it. However, in Luang Prabang we discovered something we could do to help in a very small way. 

There is a Laotian organisation called Big Brother Mouse(go here and give them all your money), which promotes reading in Laos. Traditionally books have been rare in Laos and so the organisation raises funds to translate books into Laotian such as The Wizard of Oz and also arrange for new books to be written. They train teachers who will be unfamiliar with reading for pleasure. Finally they visit schools where they promote reading, leave a library and ensure that each child has a book of their own. 

Everyday, they gave two drop-in sessions at their offices, where young people come to practise English, and so they ask for English-speaking (normally tourist) volunteers to come and join the sessions. So off we toddled. I ended up working with a group of 3 young men (16, 18 and 21) who certainly kept me on my toes by asking me to explain words like 'sarcastic', 'corruption' and 'impress'. My brain hurt but I had a lot of fun especially teaching them words like whack and mystery. They seemed to benefit from the session. Gareth spent his time babbling away at his usual speed, but did help a Hmong college student with his grammar homework, so that seemed to work out. 

It was only something small but at least we felt like we were doing something to help this "forgotten" country.

Next stop: more Cambodia.