THE STORY SO FAR.

Hey Guys!
Sorry i haven't been able to blog up until now but these first few days have been absolutely hectic! So I'll run you all through what i have been doing and a few (most of my favourite moments so far).
We landed on Tuesday evening in Bangkok, this was quite an event in itself, as Sam and I must confess we weremislead by thepilots overview of the weather upon arrival. After hearing a confident summary that the weather outside was a warm 26 degrees celsius i quickly removed my hoodie, expecting to be hit by a burst of heat upon exit from the plane. However once we actually exited the plane we were met by an almighty rain shower, the like i had been hoping to avoid in warmer climates such as Thailand! Beware of false weather assessments (rule 1 of travelling).
The airport process was all fine, and we quickly headed to Kaohsan road in a taxi, just to give you guys an idea of how cheap it is here, a 1hour and a half journey cost us just 500 baht, the equivalent of 10 pounds!
So anyway, on with the stories, the first night was a good one, good accomodation, good beers, good food. Just about what we needed after all our travelling. The next day was certainly eventfull. Basically, we got scammed. We ended up paying 30 baht (50p is roughly one pound) for a tuk tuk which promised to take us to tourist information and the hotel we needed to check into that evening. Reasonable i hear you all say. His claims that the hotel was one hour and a half's walk away were an outrage, it turned out we could see the accomodation from the first night from the window of our new hotel's room. Hilarious, such a good learning excperience. So that evening we hadour group meeting prior to the tour, really cool, our tour leader Steve who is an Aussie living in Cambodia is a great guy. Also met some really cool guys in the shape of Chris - a scottish lad and Morris - a dutch guy whose travel list reads like a who's who.
The next day we departed Thailand for Cambodia by bus, luckily our half of the group had the party bus, chatter was stimulated by the incredible party lights the bus housed and contined for the duration of the four hour journeys. Really started to settle in with the whole group enviroment.
So the next couple of days were pretty much dedicated to the ancient and splendid Siam Riep area of Cambodia. The province translates to "Land defeated by Thailand"and houses the ancient capital of Cambodia at Angkor Thom. We spent the 6th excploring the temples of Angkor Thom, namely the awesome Angkor Wat, Ta Phrom and Bayon.
We watched the sunrise at Angkor Wat which was just unbelievable. Such an awesome experience, I managed to get some brilliant pictures which I'll be sure to show everyone when i get home. Ta Phrom was also a real highlight, notably because of the clash between the Jungle and the temple. The temple is really delapedated in parts mainly due to the expanding roots of the trees living there. This was probably my favourite of all the temples we visited but I couldn't help but feel slightly saddened at the manner in which the temple was being destroyed. The Khmer (Cambodian People) seem to be caught between exploiting the benefits of the hyper tourism they are experiencing and the preservation of the very sites the tourists flock to see. The short sighted approach which i fear they are currently adopting is a troubling one, seeing such awe inspiring places makes you hope that future generations too will have the chance to sustaianbly visit and enjoy the wonders.
Bayon temple is the home of the "Smiling Buddha's". This was a brilliant place to visit and the picture assosciated with this current blog is one of the temple here. Ok so i know at this point i'm rambling but the hardcore readers who are still mildy interested at this point need to know how inspiring the place was. I hadthe most spiritual experience i have possibly ever had here, while the group were wandering with the tour guide I snuck off and found a real hidden gem. I discovered a shrine to the buddha at which 4 local Cambodian women were praying at. They invited me to pray with them, saying so sabbai and nodding 3 times while clasping matches in closed palms. It was so relaxing and a really authentic experience. In Buddhism you are supposed to pray 3 times, once for the mother, once for the father and once for yourself. It's hard to explain on a blog how moving the moment was but it was one i will take with me from my travles for sure.
Talking of moving experiences, watching the sunset with Morris, Chris and Scott from a mountain temple was one of the best moments of my life to date. We all got a beer each, trekked up the hill and proceeded to take a sickening amount of photos before finally kicking back and just enjoying the views. This was something only half the group ended up doing, theothers opting for sleep as preferential. Definetly missed out on what was an unforgetable moment!
So that's pretty much the story to date. Today was devoted to travelling, a 6 hour bus ride from Siam Reap to Phnom Penh. Even that was awesome. Stopped off about halfway, met a local woman who was selling sugar cane juice from the front of her house and purchased some of that. The people here are so friendly. It's a totally different atmosphere here to the one found in Bangkok. It is so rich in it's culture and history, the predominanlty 90% Buddhist population is infused with hindu influences to form a relaxed, happy and charming populus. It is a land of huge historical conflict and has been dominated in the past by myth for example the myth that Solar and Lunar eclipses are caused by the Demon King who swallows the Sun and the Moon. I feel certainnow that a country can be shaped and defined by its perople and for that reason i am confident Cambodia faces a bright future. The Khmer people live in such poor and backward conditions in the majority but with their continuing development and outlook on life it is somewhere I am determined to visit again and i hope these charming people are on the path to a more prosperous future while retaining therecultural flair and individuality.
Ok guys, off for some dinner now with the gang.
Take care, All my love and best wishes to you all.
Dave