Summer In Cambodia
Week 6

Day 36 – July 29, 2008

Today our tuk tuk driver “Noee” picked us up to take us to Angkor Wat, Angkor Thom, and the Jungle Temple.  I figured we would last about ½ a day, and I was right.  It was fascinating touring through all the ancient temples, but hitting the main ones and forgoing the informational tours about the ruins themselves I think was a good call.  After a while they started to look very similar.  The most interesting parts of the temples were the carving in the walls.  Many depictions of wars between competing “gods”.  There were also really intricate carved lattice work.  It was just incredible artistry with I’m sure very “low tech” tools.  We kept trying to figure out how they must have built these great monuments with little to work with. 

These temples were built between the 9^th and 13^th centuries at the height of the Khmer Empire.  Apparently this empire was one of the biggest in all of Asia, including the land which is now Thailand, Viet Nam, Laos, Myanmar, and of course Cambodia.  Something happened in their history that caused the downfall of this great empire, but historians are not quite sure what happened.  The sad thing is now the country is losing these historical landmarks due to real life tomb raiders; profiteers who are stealing pieces of the temple and selling them on the black market.  While it was interesting visiting these places, it does remind me that how fleeting power and prestige and human achievement can be.  As great as these places were, now they are simply curiosity markers.  These places were built as places of worship, but the god(s) they worshiped have no real lasting eternal power. 

The really interesting temple was the jungle temple.  Apparently when these temples were discovered they were all covered over by the jungle, with trees growing through them.  This one was left as discovered, with over 500 years of tree growth in tact.  It was interesting to see how the growth of nature simply overtook the manmade structures and became part of the temple themselves.  These were the parts of the temple that were used in the movie “Tomb Raiders” with Angelina Jolie.

Day 37 – July 30

We headed back to the city today, our bus leaving about 12:30 for the 6 hour ride back to Phnom Penh.  We relaxed in the hotel all morning, eating a leisurely breakfast and the packing our belongings.  Our tuk tuk driver picked us up after we checked out of the hotel and we headed the 1.5 miles to where the bus was departing. 

The driver brought us to a place off the main road headed towards the airport to a small dirt road which seemed almost like an alley really.  I was expecting to go to some sort of bus station, but there was only the bus we were schedule to board (one of several), with a couple of guys checking people and their bags in. 

The bus itself was pretty nice I must say.  The seats were comfortable and roomy, there was air conditioning, and there was a restroom on board.  A young woman served as the attendant for the trip giving some announcements and commentary along the way.  We took what was their “highway” which in most cases was the equivalent of a two way road.  Most of the trip we were traveling behind and avoiding an assortment of vehicles along the way, like motos, cow drawn carts, other buses and trucks.  It was really interesting playing chicken with the opposing traffic as the bus driver passed slower vehicles.  There were some pretty close calls. 

The countryside was nice to watch go by on the bus.  It really made me realize that this country is still probably about 80% agriculturally based in its economy.  I’m sure the tourist and manufacturing industries are growing, but most of the land here is used to grow crops.

We made it back to Phnom Penh at about 6:30pm, faster than I anticipated.  When we got to the office of the bus company there was a pack of tuk tuk drivers trying to get ours and everyone else business.  We had to wait for John and Oh to come and get us so we hid out in the office of the bus company. 

It was nice to get back to familiar surroundings and friendly faces.  After dropping off our luggage we went out for dinner with John and Oh and then went back to the apartment to unpack.

Day 38 – July 31

Today we were scheduled to have dinner with Paul and his family.  Paul has been wanting to take us to an Italian restaurant they discovered that has the best Italian food in the city.  He calls it “Luigi’s” but the real name of it is “Le Duo”.  It was really fine Italian food, better than any we’ve had in the states.  That’s another thing about a place like Cambodia and traveling outside of the states, you can find restaurants that aren’t corporation owned and so have a much more family feeling to them, or have more of a personal touch.  There are very few in Orange County and especially in or near Irvine.  The food was good, but also a little rich for my stomach after eating much of the simpler Asian foods that I’ve grown accustomed to in my stay.  We also celebrated Mai’s birthday belatedly.  It was a fun meal and a nice way to end up our time with them.

In the morning before lunch though, I got a call from Ravy asking if he could come over to the apartment for a visit.  I said sure and a few minutes later Ravy, Angkeara, and Cheata knocked on our door.  It was nice to have them come for a visit and to me it showed that they were comfortable with entering into our world (or at least the little bit of it we shared in Cambodia).  It was a really nice time to visit with them and I was reminded again that our time was coming to a close very soon.  Our family still wanted to do a little shopping so we asked if they wanted to come with us to the central market after lunch and they said yes!

After lunch we parted ways with the Sterns and headed over to the central market.  We found Angkeara and Cheata pretty quickly and they took Liz off to go shopping while Priscilla, Kenny and I did some of our own shopping.  We were looking for some more shirts and other clothes to bring back with us as gifts.  At these prices it was a really good deal.

We finished our shopping and Angkeara wanted to show Liz the Soriya shopping mall which was within walking distance, so they headed over by foot while the three of us took the tuk tuk.  Soriya was the first mall I went to see when I got to Phnom Penh.  It’s bigger than Soyanna but it’s also older and more crowded.  We walked around the mall a little bit, and then decided to head back home.  As we were leaving the mall it started to sprinkle, so we were leaving at the right time.  We didn’t want to get caught in a downpour. 

That evening we were scheduled to have dinner with Pastor Sanith and John at the Morning Café.  Priscilla said she wanted to go to the Sarika Grill so we changed plans.  It was a beautiful evening as we had dinner on the patio with the lights and music playing.  As we had dinner John and Sanith continued to express their gratitude and how everyone felt blessed by our presence and how much they desired to see our relationship be an ongoing one.  Pastor Sanith in particular talked about doing training seminars not only in the city but also in the provinces where the churches get very little training. 

I couldn’t help but think this was a fitting way to end our stay here, since I came to the Sarika Grill with Pastor Barnabas the first week.  They also treated our family to dinner which was also a surprise because I know they don’t have a lot of resources.  But again it showed to me their appreciation for all that happened in the last month.

Day 39 – Aug 1

Today was our last day in Cambodia.  It was really hard to imagine how the time went so quickly.  It sounded like a long time before I came, but it didn’t seem like a long time at all.  I wanted to gather all the youth (whoever was available) one last time to have lunch together and then to go back to the church for a little while before leaving to the airport.  We already knew that many of them wanted to come to see us off, but this would be one last time to gather together.  After we checked out of the apartment and moved all of our luggage to the church about 20 of us headed over to the Soyanna mall to their food court for lunch.  It was so much fun to just hang out with everyone, one last time.  While we were there I ran into the group from Youth With a Mission that I had met at the Youth Prayer movement meeting.  Again a divinely appointed meeting, since they were ready to head out to Siem Reap for their debrief time and vacation. 

It started to rain when we were on our way to the mall and by now the downpour had started.  I was afraid that our bags would get flooded out and hoping that someone at the church would move them into the van that they were taking us in.  After lunch we did a little bit of shopping.  In a lot of ways it really did feel like we were a big family just spending some time at the mall together.

We headed back to the church in the pouring rain and when we got there the church front yard was indeed flooded out, but all of our bags were loaded into the back of the van, whew!

Liz and I decided to stay at the church to hang out, while Priscilla and Kenny headed over to Paul and Mai’s to rest before heading to the airport.  At the church we mostly just played music together, sat and chatted.  As the time approached for us to leave for the airport, we all gathered together in the upper level of the church house and they wanted to gather around us to pray for us as they sent us on our way.

After the prayer time we piled into the van, as many as it would hold, and everyone else piled into the tuk tuk and we headed for the airport.  The rain was still coming down and Sanith remarked that it was good that my family could finally experience a real rain, even on the last day in Cambodia.