John P. and John P.

Day Ten: 2/21 – Siem Reap (Angkor Wat)
Title: John P. & John P.


Greetings from Siem Reap Cambodia! I just spent the last hour plus IMing with Ilsa, so blame her for this being a blog of the shorter variety ;~> In yesterday’s blog I rehashed our time in Phuket. I failed to mention our arrival and the activities of the first evening in Cambodia. I plan to catch you up completely this evening… if I can stay awake ;~>

I was pleasantly surprised when we landed in Cambodia. The airport was really modern. It actually felt like a modern Japanese complex to me. There were floating pools, bonsai trees and it was super clean (except for the bathroom… it smelled like urine). To enter Cambodia Americans need a visa. You can order them ahead or just apply on arrival. We took the “apply on arrival” route. The process was fairly pain free. You hop in a queue, give up your passport and visa paperwork and wait for approval. The process took roughly 10 minutes. After receiving the visa you move on to the customs line. There were only a few people in line but this took a solid 15 minutes. Cambodian customs officials feel no need to hurry. Our guide later told us that government employees are paid poorly. I suppose this is an instance of employees that pretend to work and employers that pretend to pay them.

After clearing customs and collecting our checked bags we proceeded to the lineup of guides waiting with signs for passengers. We couldn’t find a sign that said “Dr and Ms Polansky” or any derivative thereof. This is the first time in all of the trips my dad and I have taken that we couldn’t find our guide immediately upon arrival. Fortunately a nice little Cambodian man who worked for the airport helped us. He was familiar with the travel agency that was supposed to be there to get us. He made a phone call and while dad was on the phone with the tour company our guide, Tim, showed up.

After the initial pleasantries Tim informed us that we had to wait for another couple before proceeding to the hotel. This marked another first for dad and me. We have never shared an airport transfer with another couple in a foreign country. This had me nervous that the invasion of the old people was about to begin. Eventually the couple we were waiting for showed up and we all proceeded to the van.

On the ride to the hotel we met John and Sigrid Purdon of Ontario, Canada. They are a very nice older couple that seem to be knocking on death’s door. Okay that’s not nice of me. Let me put it this way instead. They are old enough that it is clear dad feels young when he is around them. Tim told us that our tour for the next two days would just be the four of us. I was pleasantly surprised by this. I was trying to prepare myself for 25 touring old people. Turns out I only have to tolerate three ;~>

Upon arrival at the hotel John P. fell out of the van. And I don’t mean like a little slippage. I mean like a full on, trip over the step, summersault roll out. I only saw the very tail end of this because I was blogging in the back seat. I did, however, get the full effects of the gasps of all who saw the fall in its entirety. John didn’t seem to hurt himself which is a blessing considering that he has two artificial knees and one artificial hip (I’m not surmising this… it is fact). He was clearly and understandably embarrassed. The staff of the hotel seemed mortified. It’s entertaining that every time we enter or leave the hotel now the bellman basically get down on the ground to assure that we are aware of every step.

The check in process was pretty quick but kind of comical. The English of the hotel employees is decent but they really struggled with the fact that our party has two John P’s. I would not be surprised if we end up with the Purdon’s mini-bar bill at the end of the trip.

The woman who checked us in walked us to our rooms. Within two seconds of walking out of the elevator a bellman showed up in the hallway with all of our bags. The Purdon’s got their room first. Dad and I were then walked down the hall to our room. The room was very nice. It looked impeccably clean, which is not surprising because the hotel is only four months old. We had a beautiful fruit plate in the corner. The only problem was that there was one king bed. Dad asked the woman helping us if it would be possible to get a room with two beds. She told us she would go back to the lobby to check and to just wait in the room. Within a few minutes the phone rang. A room was available but it was on the fourth floor instead of the third. That wasn’t a problem for us. Dad and the lady agreed that we would meet outside room 421 for a key exchange.

When we exited the room the baggage cart was sitting in the hall with our stuff on it. Dad and I are capable, so we pushed it to the elevator and proceeded to take it with us to 421. We were standing outside of 421 for a roughly three minutes when we heard running and loud chatter down the hallway. We turned to see what was coming. The bellboy and the check in woman came flying around the corner. The look on their faces was one of utter concern. When they saw the baggage cart they both let out a HUGE sigh of relief. I think they were convinced that all of our stuff had been stolen. They were seriously REALLY scared. It was cute that they cared for the safety of our stuff that much. As we entered the room the woman showed us how all of the modern amenities in our room worked. I was pumped to see there was a plethora of electrical outlets. That and a high-speed wireless connection make me very happy. The woman continued her dissertation on the room and realized that our fruit plate was still downstairs. She quickly said something in Cambodian and the bellman took off running down the hall again. He seriously full out sprinted. Can you imagine seeing that stateside? I think not. The fruit plate appeared and the woman and the bellman quickly scooted out the door. Dad was trying to locate his cash but they disappeared before he could find it. This is the first time in all of the hotel stays I have ever made (we are talking a lot of hotel stays here) that a bellman didn’t wait for a tip. Cambodia is truly a different world ;~>

Our scheduled event for the evening was a traditional Cambodian dinner and dance. The food was surprisingly good. Normally tourist trap dinner shows have mediocre food at best. I actually think this food was one of the better meals we have had on this trip and we have had some pretty incredible stuff. The show was better than expected as well. This dance was more like a bunch of mini plays. The stories were entertaining and the dancers were pretty darn talented. Post dinner Tim returned us to our hotel and the five of us made plans to meet up in the lobby at 8:30 this morning for our day of Angkor touring.

The temples of Angkor cannot be easily written about. Frankly, I don’t even know that pictures will do the place justice. The majority of what we saw today was built in the 12th Century. The fact that anyone could build anything in the 12th Century is impressive, but to think that they were building ginormous multi-story buildings with huge towers by hand is crazy. Add miles (literally miles) of hand carved bas-relief and it nearly becomes unfathomable. I still can’t really believe it and I walked around it all day. If someone described the job to a contractor today, they would just laugh (sorry Mark but it is true ;~)

I could write much of the history of the place for you but it may be a better use of all of our time for you to just click this link (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angkor_Wat ) if you want more info. If you like history at all, I would recommend it because it is quite interesting and not nearly as long as most of my blogs ;~>

The neatest temple we visited today was Ta Prohm. Many who have visited Angkor and Ta Prohm note that wandering around the grounds makes them feel like they are in an Indiana Jones movie. It is amazing how accurate of an image this provides. Many if not all of the temples of Angkor were greatly neglected during the hundreds of years of fighting within Cambodia. When the temples were eventually rediscovered they were overgrown with jungle. All of the temples were cleared of the trees during restoration projects except for Ta Prohm. The trees were UNBELIEVABLE in this place. I really can’t begin to write about it. You all will just have to see the pictures or think back to the movie Tomb Raider (if you have seen it). Many scenes from that movie were shot at this temple. (Robin, Danelle and Joyce you will be interested to know that it was during the filming of this movie that Angelina Jolie fell in love with Cambodia and ended up adopting Madux. Evidently we ate lunch today at one of her favorite watering holes, The Red Piano). If you’d like more info on the temple click here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ta_Prohm.

We ate dinner tonight at the Foreign Correspondence Club. It is a very nice and new building with lots of bars and billiards. The meal was made more enjoyable by the fact that we were finally able to talk Tim (our guide) into eating with us. Normally guides magically disappear for meals and reappear at the perfect time. I still haven’t figured out how they do that. His continued dissertation on Cambodian history and cultural was great. Having a local guide is of tremendous value because it allows you an inside look into the actual lives that the people live in the places you are visiting. And in the spirit of honesty I also enjoyed having another person at the table who is young enough to know how to text message.

I am slightly sad to report that I don’t have a good Doctor P. fun fact for this blog. Dad and I didn’t have any real one-on-one discussion because we were with the Purdons all day. John P., however, did drop a fun Canadian term. He was talking about swimming somewhere cold (I don’t remember where) and said that it nearly froze his “Naughty Bits”.
Tomorrow is a “free day” on our itinerary. I had two requests. I wanted to sleep in and find a basketball hoop. Well dad has other ideas. He wants to visit one more Angkor temple, which is in the middle of nowhere. He arranged for Tim to pick us up at nine… so much for sleeping in. On that note I need to go to bed.

Have an excellent Thursday and I’ll write again tomorrow.

Katy