Cambodia
COST: £578 (£491 without the fine 🙄) (£16.93 a day)
CURRENCY: USD and riel as change $/៛
DATE: 19th January 2020 — 16th Feb 2020
DURATION: 29 days
AGE: 18
TOP APPS: Hostelworld/CurrencyConverter/Grab
The first country in my 18-year-old Gap Year journey. A beautiful country, filled with friendly people, vibrant cities, profound cultural history and stunning temples.
This adventure describes my journey through Cambodia - with the help of the handy map below. Join me, through teaching English, elephants, tuk-tuk’s and a police fine from the largest religious monument in the world !
Contents:
🟠 Hope Agency
🟠 Mondulkuri
🟠 Phnom Phen
🟠 Kampot
🟠 Siem Reap
Hope Agency
I began with a flight from Heathrow to Phnom Phen, with a brief stop in Bangkok. The journey had begun. After the long flight and a bumpy taxi ride, I arrived at the Hope Agency, a school in a rural village 2 hours from the capital.
I passed my weekdays living and volunteering here. This was the perfect way for me to adjust to this new reality of travelling; living out of a backpack, getting to grips with the new 'monopoly-esque' money and a whole world of foreign culture, language and values.
I would recommend the Hope Agency. Whilst the organisation of the project was hit and miss, the intention behind it was well-meaning. The school is a safe place where children (who would often never leave the village) can interact and learn, have tooth brush and paste to clean their teeth and cultivate greater ambitions for their future.
The average day consisted of 5 lessons with students aged 4-23. Stay longer than a month, otherwise, it isn’t possible to substantially contribute to their learning or develop any connection. Personally, I found the big class sizes challenging and it was hard to get them to focus. You end up feeling like you’re not making a difference. But then, a class of older students communicates with you really well in English, and constantly improve, and you realise the work really does have a lasting impact.
Of course, a better option than this form of ‘voluntourism’ would be if Cambodian teachers were teaching Cambodian kids and not a bunch of young white girls. However, the project does more good than harm in my potentially white saviourist mind.
I went on walks/runs, exploring the temple down the road, or the Chinese quarry (modern-day colonialism but let’s not go there). The children are energetic and lovely and chatting with friends/reading at the end of an evening, swinging in a hammock, was often my favourite part of the day. Overall it was a lovely experience for my first time volunteering in a developing country.
Mondulkuri
The other volunteers had planned a trip to the North of Cambodia during the weekend I first arrived. I chipped in for a bus ticket and off we went!
After the overnight bus (with beds like coffins) we arrived in the Mondulkiri Province. Well known for its cooler climate, vast vegetation and elephants! We fit a lot into that weekend thanks to an amazing tuk-tuk tour. Furthermore, we stayed at a brand new eco-villa lodge called Gibbon Lodge.
We had an amazing experience, best moments below!
Loving the unknown - $20 each and the driver simply took us along his route. We weren’t sure what the next stop would be, but going with the flow in the beautiful hills, jungles and fields of the Cambodian countryside was sublime
Visiting a pepper farm, a coffee plantation, a river where locals chilled, Bousra Waterfalls, a
lookout point over the forests and a pagoda where locals were celebrating with Buddhist offerings at sunset
A m a z i n g food - morning glory* (steamed greens with soy sauce and garlic) is my all time favourite
*Menus can seem a little overwhelming to begin with - but don’t be afraid of local dishes! If you’ve gone all the way to another country make sure to really try the food :)
Mondulkiri Project - This sustainable NGO uses the money you pay for an amazing elephant experience to protect the forest and sanctuary. I felt honoured and more informed after our one day tour where we trekked, fed and washed elephants and had a traditional meal.
*Did you know that elephants flap their ears when they are happy?
Phnom Phen
After stumbling across the temple below, I wandered in and saw they had an evening meditation session. I attended and sat for my first-ever experience of meditation. Me, my thoughts, alone, for an hour. Talk about throwing myself in the deep end as always
Afterwards, I chatted with some South African meditators. I shortly found myself being invited to a bar, an ex-pat bar. Sitting at a table surrounded by people far older than me, we enjoyed drinks and discussion of all sorts of life advice, nostalgia and wisdom.
After a thrilling back street motorbike ride to top the night off, I was well and truly loving Phnom Phen . . .
Taking in the sights and smells of the ‘Russian market’ and getting myself some very yummy coconut sponge desserts
Finding an abandoned temple where I chilled and yoga(d)
Having a cheeky glass of wine at a rooftop bar
Walking through a night market and a friendly Cambodian pulling up his motorbike next to me, asking if I wanted a tour, and, after careful deliberation, him showing me his city and dinner at a Japanese noodle restaurant! Peculiar but great. He then went on to send me random stickers on Facebook for 4 months 👍
To understand this section briefly read this —-> Khmer Rouge
“There are no words. There is no song. There are no lessons. It just hurts.”
S-21 Prison
Visiting the ‘killing fields’ and the prison where thousands of Cambodians were murdered was heartbreaking.
The quote above, from the museum, provides an accurate account of all that can be said.
For further understanding I thoroughly recommend the book ‘First they killed my father’ by Loung Ung or the movie adaptation, directed by Angelina Jolie.
Kampot
This serene coastal province is the bottom red cross on the map at the top of this page. It has colourful French colonial shophouses, pedestrian-friendly streets and chill hostels. Here are some of my highlights:
Kep beach
Biking road trip up Elephant Mountain (felt like Mario Kart)
Exploring a ghostly Chinese owned casino in the hills of the mountain
Finding temples and statues like the one above
Looking out over what felt like the world from the top of the mountain
Chilling in the hostel with my Australian and American friends (We had travelled there together on a weekend off from the Hope Agency)
Massage for my sore ass after the bike ride
Siem Reap
After a ten-hour overnight bus ride sleeping next to a random (lovely) Cambodian on a queen size bed at the back of the bus, I had arrived in Siem Reap. The biggest tourist spot for one reason only: Angkor Wat.
This magnificent 8000-year-old metropolis is the worlds largest religious monument, with over 30 temples.
It was breathtaking.
“Cotten silk trees and their fairy-tale roots appear to hold the architecture in a wild embrace”
- extract about Ta Phrom
I’m not going to lie though, if you’re visiting a) get a tour guide and b) don’t go alone like I did. I was blooming lonely. My only company was my tuk-tuk driver, who felt more like an impatient fly than anything else.
It was for this reason that I thought I would try my luck and go back the next day, without the driver, just me, myself and the temples. But me (being me) and not wanting to pay for another expensive day pass, decided to colour in the date ‘15-02-2020’ to ‘16-02-2020’ on my pass with a red pen.
I made it through the first security checkpoint (general entrance) but as I was entering my favourite temple, I just happened to give my pass to the guard who had been working there years and not the newbie standing next to him.
A couple of walkie talk talks in Khmer later and a police officer turns up on his motorbike. I’m told to get on the back of the bike and am promptly escorted out of the park right to the police station.
In potentially one of the surrealist moments of my life, I am sitting in front of the Cambodian police officers (who are genuinely really nice) and, after a quick trip to the ATM to get $100, I pay the fine and am free!
It was as my heart was beating on the back of that motorbike that I learnt a life lesson: some mistakes you truly can’t take back.
That evening I then proceeded to try some very interesting Happy Pizza 😜 (watch the link). Somehow I managed to catch my bus to Thailand the next day, which you can read about here, and yeah, that’s life folks!
