Battambang

Battambang, Cambodia has been a great experience, thanks largely to our tuk tuk driver, Chinchin. We hired Chinchin to take us to a couple of temples, but he also took us all over the countryside to see more of the real Cambodia. Yesterday he took us to rice fields, peanut fields, fruit farms, and even to a market where fruit bats inhabit the trees (those suckers are HUGE!). First we went to the bamboo train. It is basically a platform that runs full speed along some very rickety tracks. I think the locals use it to get from A to B quickly. Tourists use it just for the experience. The thing goes so fast and "cars" run in both directions, so when one is coming straight at you, you just have to hope your driver (the guy behind you running the motor) sees it. When there is a jam like this, they just lift the platform off the tracks and let one another through. Here we are on the bamboo train, just at the beginning:

Here's Oli helping our driver get the car facing the other direction so we could go back.

After the bamboo train and Chinchin's tour of the countryside, we went to Banon Temple. I think we must have walked over 1,000 steps to the top, but it was pretty. Then we went to the killing caves, where the Khmer Rouge executed more thousands of people. Being in these places, there's an overwhelming feeling of sadness. It's unbelievable that so many people went through so much terror.

Today we went again with Chinchin to see a temple just north of the city. Along the way we stopped at a local market which was really interesting. Then we stopped at a small village where they make bamboo sticky rice. Chinchin said they make the rice in the bamboo because it's easier to carry with you when going to the fields for work. It was quite tasty.

After the sticky rice, Chinchin took us to the river to a fish market. In this area their primary harvest is rice but they also consume and sell loads of fish from the river. We saw them drying the fish, fermenting the fish, and making fish paste (which smelled as awful as it sounds).
Here's Chinchin at a "petrol station" filling up. It's cheaper for them to get gas from Thailand so they bring it over in bottles. You see a lot of strange colored coke and fanta around here.

We also went to another killing field. Here, Chinchin told us his family's story during the Khmer Rouge era. The more I learn about this time, the less I'm able to wrap my head around it. It's just so hard to understand the cruelty and horror behind all of the killings. There was a memorial here housing skulls, clothing, and bones of the victims. The memorial also has stone carvings showing many of the horrible things the Cambodian people had to endure during this time. Here's some writing from the memorial, very well said I think.