A Big Surprise

When I first visited Cambodia many years ago it was very much as how I imagined the Wild West was like when first seen by the pioneering Americans way back then. So, I was expecting Siem Reap to be a little like Luang Prabang when we touched down after flying almost due south from Laos. Wrong! I just hadn’t really appreciated that the population of Cambodia is about 2.5 times bigger than Laos and that Siem Reap is a large city of around 1 million inhabitants full of bustling markets

with a few not so bustling inhabitants,

strange speciality shops,

some iconic methods of public transport

and a very modern, well policed and friendly tourist ‘walking street’.

and on top of all that, the level of spoken English in every area of this city is quite astounding. Definitely not what I was expecting.

Siem Reap is, however, not typical of much of Cambodia which is still a very poor nation overall. For those who don’t know, it’s the go to destination for those who want to see and explore the many temples built up to 1,000 years ago in Angkor, the ancient capital of the Khmer (Cambodian) empire and located a short distance from Siem Reap’s city centre. Of course, many of these temples have disappeared over the years but those that remain either in whole or in part are stunning – the most famous of which is Angkor Wat, originally built as a Hindu place of worship but turning into a Buddhist temple towards the end of the 12th century.

It’s an amazing feat of engineering

which took and estimated 300,000 labourers and 6,000 elephants (!) 35 years to complete

It’s vast, being the largest religious monument on the planet and covering an area of more than 400 acres with a sense of history at every turn. Little wonder, then, that, excepting the Covid years, around 2.5 million people visit Angkor Wat every year with Siem Reap city used as the base for most of these tourists.

A few miles in every direction from Angkor Wat can be found a whole host of smaller but equally impressive temples

Our taxi driver told us that it is estimated that more then one thousand were built between the 9th and 15th centuries in and around the city of Angkor of which a mere 70 0r so survive (albeit in various states of decay) to this day.

Perhaps the most famous of these (after Angkor Wat itself) is the temple of Ta Prohm which owes it’s fame mainly as it featured strongly in the Lara Croft Tomb Raider movie!

It really is an extraordinary structure – what’s left of it- and is a perfect example of how man made buildings, if left alone, will always revert back to nature.