An early start the next day again, though a little less enthusiastic for me. The novelty of the first day of school had disappeared. I noticed a similar feeling with the folks as well and while mom groaned about her aching feet, papa prodded us onto breakfast. But once dressed and out we were ready for the day. I bid my folks goodbye and ran to meet up with my young buddy, while my folks took the Tuk Tuk to the Terrace of the Elephants (in Angkor Thom), a large wall structure with some amazing carved elephants along its full length. The Terrace of the Leaper King nearby was actually a double wall with carvings as well and most of the interior wall was in prime condition. A large part of this reminded them of the Aztec ruins in Theotihuacan in Mexico. Behind these were the ruins of the Royal Palace and bathing pools, apparently still in use. Shaded under large old trees it was an ideal shelter from the noonday sun. There was a congregation of nuns all dressed in white, some bathing in one of the pools. The other used to be reserved for men but there was little water in it, only a small group of children playing around it. Ta Prohm was next on the list, famous for the overgrown jungle and the fact it?s one of the most scenic old sites left as found. Huge trees engulfed the massive stones, making perfect images for the trigger-happy fingers of the many visitors. Not to be outdone, my mom zipped off a few rolls just on the entrance with the huge roots of the trees encircling the many stones. Other temples visited that day included Ta Som, with one of its gates completely overwhelmed by a large tree, and Preah Neak Pean, made up mostly of ponds. When they returned to pick me up that day, I could faintly sense that they were beginning to be ?templed out?. The temples were starting to look similar... But they had a third day left and one major temple to visit: Banteay Srey. This ruin was a bit further away and a taxi was the better option. It turned out to be another highlight of their temple visits: beautiful sandstone carvings with ornate Hindu designs. The pink colour against the blue sky and the water lily filled moat made for colourful shots. The extra distance and money it took to get there was well spent.

Since this was the final day of their passes and the folks were slowly fading in the sun... they decided to visit the silk farm.  Here they got a first-hand view of how silk is made... from mulberry tree cultivation to the worms being fed, to the cocooning and the extraction of the precious threads from the cocoons, to dying the threads and finally to the weaving using hand looms. It was actually a training centre were young people from the villages were given a chance to learn a trade that would give them jobs in the various work shops that they set up all over the province. In town we toured another such centre where stone and wood sculpture was being taught. Here too they were producing beautiful souvenirs for tourists made with traditional materials and tools. Another side trip was visiting the tiny landmine museum. If Laos has a large amount of unexploded bombs lying around the countryside, Cambodia has an enormous quantity of landmines all over the country, still maiming and killing thousands of people every year. Several foreign organizations help in finding and removing them (Princess Diana was a great supporter), but these displays (all sorts of mines and grenades) in a bamboo hut were the initiative of a former Khmer Rouge soldier who has become an activist himself.

One evening we saw an interesting documentary about a Swiss doctor who had been successful in building a children?s hospital in Phnom Penh and just finished a beautiful health centre in Siem Reap where kids are treated for free. Of course the main purpose of the movie was to collect money (he needs US$ 12 million per year to run the place), so when we just happened to bump into Doug of City TV in Toronto (in Siem Reap to do a documentary about Canadian healthcare workers), we suggested him to air the movie we had seen (he said ?why not?). One day we went to see the floating fishing village on the shore of Tonle Sap lake. First a Tuk Tuk, then 2 motor taxis on a very bumpy path to get to the pier where we needed to charter a boat to the village. The place was quite chaotic: all kinds of boats loading and unloading mostly baskets full of tiny fish, all kinds of road transport to carry the baskets away, filthy backwater, the smells, people yelling to get us rent their boat or buy their lunch? Papa ended up finding the best deal and it was good to be going off through the channel leading to the lake. There we spent an hour or so navigating through a myriad of houseboats, belonging mostly to Vietnamese settlers (they know how to make the fish paste). It was very picturesque, but of course we had some engine trouble and our boatman had to get wet to remove a piece of rope from the propeller, while we were bobbing on the waves.

That's it for now. After this we left Siem Reap to discover the rest of Cambodia. But more on that later...
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