4th Day
24th July 2011, Sunday
After breakfast, Pete came to pick us at 7.30am. Today would be our last day for Siam Reap as tomorrow we will depart to Phnom Penh early morning.
We went to Killing field, and Pete told us about the silver war in Cambodia which caused 4 millions of Cambodian were killed. Most of them were well educated eg. Doctor, Teacher, Lawyer, etc. There are a lot of human being bones kept in one big glass container and there are a lot of photos of victim who were killed during the war in 1975 to 1979. Before the victims were executed, they were actually gone through a lot of torture by the soldiers.
We went to War Museum (ticket - USD 2), here we can see a lot of weapons and few types of mines. The tour guide brought us and explained to us about the weapons and history of the silver war. There were total about 4 millions of land mines was buried under the ground, which mean 1 land mine can kill 2 Cambodians as the total population of Cambodia is 8 millions. His wife and 2 year old daughter were killed by land mine few years ago. Now, there is still news for Cambodian being killed by land mines every week. The tour guide was also injured during the war, he lost one leg and one of his eyes is blind. At the end of the museum tour, we gave him USD10 for his service as well as donation to him and the other daughter who is now 8 yrs old.
We were leaving for Tonle Sap lake and floating village at around 10.20am and reached there 10.50am. I started ti give away Joanne’s old clothes when we were at the harbour waiting for our boat to ride us to the floating village. Pete stopped me for giving the cloth to the people around the harbour as he said there is more poor kids at the floating village. When riding through the village, we can see small ‘sampan’ at both sides which is one family’s home. They cook, dining and sleep at the same area in the boat, there is no room. They cook, drink and wash with the water from the lake which is so muddy.
We can see small kids ride in the big pale to come nearer to us talking is their language which we do not understand, but we can guess that they were asking for money. I gave 2 t-shirts to one of the little girl. Then another small boy came to us, I gave him another T-shirt, he asked another one for his elder brother who was waiting on the other boat, too bad I do not have big size t-shirt.
Then we proceed to a school where I tried to distribute the clothes to some of them. All the kids were fight to get the cloth, I dare not to give anymore and pass to Pete, Pete also cannot handle it, and pass the clothes to their teacher, then only they listen to the teacher. After finish giving away the clothes, we took photos with all the kids. Then we went back to Siam Reap for our lunch at KFC.
We went to Cambodia Cultural Village which ticket price is USD11/pax. There were a lot of cultural shows, however we were managed to watch 4 of the cultural shows and we have to rush back as it was going to rain heavily. We went to Mother Home guest house to have a look, then Pete dropped us at Pub Street again for our dinner. We paid him USD20 for today trip and added in another USD20 for his nice and excellent service.
We had our dinner at The Red Pizza restaurant which served the same food as the past few days.
Then we went to night market again for our last shopping. We took tuk-tuk back to hotel to do our final packing and have to check out early in the next morning to get the bus at 7.30am.
WAR Museum, USD 2.00
Lunch @ KFC, USD 3.40
Ticket for Cambodia Cultural Village, USD 11.00
Dinner, USD 4.50
Souvenir @ night market, USD 6.00
Taxi and tip to driver USD40/4, USD 10.00
Total USD36.90
Day 5
25th July 2011, Monday
Waked up early in the morning, checked out and had our breakfast at 6.00am, the bus agent was punctual and picked us at 6.30am. We were the first customers they picked, then we round the Siam Reap city to picked some other customers and reached at the bus station at about 7.30am. We went into the bus and started our 6 hours journey to Phnom Penh which is actually 150km apart from Siam Reap, due to road condition is too bad, it has to take 6 hours drive including 45 minutes stop at one restaurant to give us some break time. We did not take heavy meals, but ordered some ‘kuih’.
We reached Phnom Penh at about 2.00pm and picked up by tuk tuk from Harvest Inn, it took more that 30 minutes to reach Harvest Inn which considered as hostel for me. Harvest Inn is owned by Singaporean couples. They decided to stay in Phnom Penh with their 2 kids. I am not sure what made them to have the decision, but it is actually a BIG move from Singapore to a poor city like Phnom Penh – the capitol of Cambodia.
We took our lunch at The Khemer Thai restaurant which serve local Khemer and Thai food.
Then we visited Genocide Museum TUOL SLENG former Office S.21 (USD2) where detention, interrogation, inhuman torture and killing after confession from the detainees were received and documented. The buildings have been turned into small cell 0.8 X 2 meters caging individual prisoners. One of the build was covered in a fishnet of barbed wire to prevent prisoners from committing suicide by jumping down.
I felt uncomfortable when turned into the building with the small cells; I did not stay longer in the building and came down from the building to have a break outside. We met one of the survivors who is now > 80yrs old. It was really a hard time for him to remember all the tortured that he went through.
Naga World is the only casino in Phnom Penh. We stayed about 30 minutes there and Kam gained some pocket money from the casino. ;)
We visited one of the 1st shopping mall and went back to Harvest Inn and ends of our Day 5 trip.
Mother Inn Hotel 4 nights USD 72/2, USD 36.00
Bus Ticket to Phnom Phen, USD 11.00
Lunch USD 20/4, USD 5.00
Dinner USD 22.20/4, USD 5.50
Ticket to Genocide Museum TUOL SLENG former Office S.2, USD 2.00
T-shirts USD 7.00
Total USD72.50
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