This weekend Jon Kroeger and I hopped a flight to Siem Reap, Cambodia and toured the famous temples and ruins of Angkor Wat. Actually, Angkor Wat is only one of roughly thirty temples in the vicinity, but certainly the most famous. In our short stay there we were able to see five or so. We hired two motorbike drivers for the entire day at a cost of only $10, which we found well worth the price, despite the fact that helmets are only for drivers apparently. The tourist crowd at the temples was surprisingly small, which could be attributed to the 115 degree weather. At times, we were the only humans in sight at the temples of Angkor Wat, Angkor Tom, or Ta Prom, which was very satisfying. Ta Prom is the temple where the jungle trees are beginning to reclaim the structure, but is best known as the film site for some Tomb Raider movies. That night Kroeger and I went around Siem Reap and found that Cambodian real is not nearly as accepted as US dollars. There is truly no need to exchange money if going there. We saw the classic Anspara dancers and noticed a lot of fish massages available. This is where you place your hand or feet into a tank and small fish nibble at them giving you a weird and, to some people, desireable sensation. Overall, not much to the town itself, but the temple complex of Angkor Wat is one of the more amazing cultural sites in the world.
-J. Vanzant
