Cambodia Travel Guide - Siem Reap

What I did in two and a half days:

day one:
visit the rulous group
had dinner khmer traditional restaurant (chicken amok+ palmtree wine)
good nice hike intro to the temples

day two:
sunrise, small circuit bayon, tam prohm etc dinner with roy traditional khmer BBQ
lost driver

day three:
big circuit, angkor wat but no sunset

After a while the temples and ruins start to look the same even for the trained eye.
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Angkor Wat - DOs and DONTs -- a short travel guide

- PACK LITE: you can get t-shirts and other crappy touristic stuff to wear for 2-3 $ a piece; you can wash clothes (no undies) for 1$-2$ a kilo/24 hrs return

- Search HOTELS: deals run from 3-4 $ to XXXX...but i am talking backpacking stuff and budget...for a whopping 13$-15$ you should get something decent clean and good service. i paid 16 and had to share it with a tiny gecko for a couple of hours until i successfully hunted it with my slipper.

- do not trust blindly your hotel reps, or tuktuk drivers; explore..while it might seem risky but there are many GOOD places where you can grab a bit to eat and a beer and for a fraction of the recommended places. Obviously it comes with the usual warning to do your homework and have a trained eye for such things. But for example, all the "recommended" places charged me 8-9-10 $ for a meal with a drink, while a traditional khmer kitchen meal (w kitchen) at a regular place should not surpass $5 probably, and I had dinner at one place with 2.5$ out of which 1$ was the Angkor beer. it even came with a tiny desert!!!! all was the same quality as the recommended places, for which probably the owners have agreements with hotels and tuktuks (btw social networks are far more advanced here than facebook, once you get there people know most things about you, they remember them and mulage themselves after it aka your behavior, typing schemes etc)

- do not go for the sunset at ....; it is a huge tourist trap with people climbing and getting down desperately the pyramid to see the sun set ...not even AW but the SR plains. So, still if you like type type of adventures/events... go there at least around 4:30 pm and leave before 6 so that you don't catch the rush hour on the steep steps of the pyramid. anyways, all your pics will have much more than the sunset and yourself in them so might as well think it through.

- DO the sunrise at Angkor wat; although is crammed with tourists you should do it. it is a grreat view and totally worth your while getting up at 4 am. Also, do the Angkor Wat ( a bit) aftewards, although your guide / book tells you to come back in the afternoon. i did it (not enough) and it was my only chance to see it in the warm colors of the sun (the next day it was cloudy all day) and I regret not spending at least one hour over there.

- DO not get "instant" guides. poeple will glue to you and then ask a lot of money. i got two of these guys..students or not I felt that 10$ would be enough for their 30-40 min tour of AW but apparently they felt that only the police bribes would sum up to that, so although they took the money, not sure how happy were they. either way, that's how much i felt it was worth it (to get a full day guide is somewhere 27-30$, so you should do that if you must) myself I tend to move in my own pace..what i like i gave it 2-3 hrs...others I skimmed through. with a guide you will spend probably a decent amount of time in your visits.

- Tuktuks (15 a day max). Get a good map. Deal the tours if you can. They will again skip some temples, saying that they are closed, too far or who knows what. Be inquisitive. BTW, get the best english speaking driver if you can. Although Cambodians have a funky way of pronouncing English (i couldn't get 50% of what they were saying) you might get lucky. Guides on the other hand seemed great. Profi ones that is. I even saw Russian speaking ones (/??) damn..

- BETTER YET: have time? aka 5-7 days to roast it in SR? Go for the bike man..there are regular bikes (sometimes free from your hotel courtesy) or electrical ones (for people that have less than the required will to bike around for 20 km or so a day, which in Netherlands is next to nothing btw). Most temples are not as far as your trusted new friends let you know. you can easily do them.

- Another myth: heat. I had no problem walking around and climbing the temples in a scorching 30 C. to be honest I was expecting something more humid. But again, I went there in November almost....so yeah, might be very different in the season (April-July). Moreover, I didn't feel that I need to getaway at noon (do people actually do this?? you loose then an extra hour to get back and forth + the time to have your siesta or whatever...:):..)

- Fun: night market and pub street. both loud cowded with gringos and people trying to sell you stuff from t-shirts and other take-home-crap to fish massage (no happy ending there) and coke and meth (was offered many times during my short 3 hrs interlude on the pub street) --could be the can of mirinda i was holding in my hand :))??

- pack extra picture cards (SDs, CFs, etc) and AN EXTRA BATTERY. I will surely drain out, especially in the day you do the sunrise.

- bring an laptop or better yet, a smart phone or an Ipod. would be great to relax yourself on the flights and transfers etc. Moreover, would provide a light way for you to stay connected with your friends and family and let them know that ALL IS GOOD here in the Kingdom of Cambodia an that the KHMER ROUGE are no longer around. :) nothing to laugh at here, but the people's ignorance. But again, NOBODY has heard of, or meet a Romanian before, so it is a two-way street ("MANIA.., wat?? ROMANIA/// RUMANIA...you know...Hungary, Poland..etc..ROMANIA"

Long London (L)eekend

4 days in London feels like a lot, but really, time really flies out there. Between museums, parks, outdoors and pubs it just evaporates into thin air and you feel like you haven't really done anything. While this feeling justifies your next visit of the briton capital, it is not entirely true. Just remember those long long walks you took from Shepherd's Bush all the way to the other side of Thames.

And although you missed the guard change and many other touristic opportunities, still Big Ben, or Eye pics you have, you walk (at least with your eyesight now after they banned it) on the Ai Wey's ceramic flower seeds in the huge hall of Tate Modern, had breakfast on the Cork street watching the latest output of the local art galleries, glance over the myriad of portraits at the National Portrait Gallery, and even a BBQ on the banks of the RIver, etc etc. Camden, East London, Soho are up for review next time I am there. All in all, London reminded me so much of the US,a good US however, one similar with NYC or Boston, where disparity is not that great and the urban environment is quite good. Obviously, the double-deckers, European architecture and posh style of living can only add a drop of much needed flavor to this picture, bringing it closer to an ideal city to live in. So, let's just live it to that...drawbacks for another time.

New Muzik in my playlist

Just few of the LPs that crowded my Itunes lately with a ranking attempt based on a 10 point system:

Tricky - Mixed Race (7.5 out of 10)
Ministry of Sound - Uncovered (9 out of 10)
Laroux- Sidetracked (6.5 out of 10)
Underworld - Barking (8 out of 10)
Sting - Simphonicities (8.5 out of 10)
Roykshopp - Senior (8.5 out of 10)
Linking Park - a 1,000 suns (8 out of 10)
Inception - OST (7.5 out of 10)
Guns n Roses - Family Tree (5 out of 10)
Evidence - the Layover (8 out of 10)
Dirt Nasty - Nasty as I wanna be (7 out of 10)

A different perspective of Bucharest

Despite my best intentions of coupling several administrative efforts (getting the Dutch MVV visa and other "required" paperwork) with participating to a Romanian R&D and Diaspora conference, obviously things did not worked out that (wonderful) way. Thus, I had to come back for the latter now, at the end of September; Still, I enjoyed it much more than my previous Romanian interlude. To be concise three reasons stand out: 1. weather (25 C and SUN felt heavenly after the stuff we get in the Netherlands) 2. beautiful women ("sweet Bucharest girls", as they are called in a famous Romanian song, all over the place, and despite not being in the market for such things, it just feels good to benefit from such geographic spillovers and 3.decently cheap and good food.) After putting together this ranking, i realized that basically I sound like a typical foreigner coming to Romania to stroll the country, get laid and eat well despite being bold and fat (as the majority of those tourists, later husbands --marriage tourism is quite large, I suppose-- are). Thank good that i don't fit at least from that perspective, girls still score me as 25-26 yrs of age, which always is flattering.:)) But getting back to the point, it was much nicer than before..and that because of one thing: i stopped carrying about it. And that's sad but relieving at the same time: on one side you kind of give up on the same stereotypes and deficiencies (complaints from all over the place --mostly justified but seldom just grievances for the sake of it) and take it as it is, just like being in Uganda or something like it. It is a bit cruel, but that's the reality. With all the crisis and the problems people have there it is hard to disconnect. But for a hybrid outsider like myself, it has just became easier. the whole big gloomy pictures (salary cuts, corruption, scandals, politicians that switch sides and fortunes all the time, protests, beggars, wandering dogs, gypsies and who-knows-what) they all blur away in a nice sunny late September in one of the central parks in Bucharest (Cismigiu).

Universally, bike

Today I had to buy a desk for my new apt. Surprinsingly, IKEA did not have more that 4-5 options for the lenght and width I was aiming for, so instead I opted for an almost mint white 2nd hand desk at a popular outlet here in Groningen. While finding it was exciting enough, bringing it back with one of the available cargo bikes at the store definitely topped that.These traditional bakfiets can (apparently) carry a lot of things and weight; while a bit hard to manouver, especially when taking a curve, breaking or accelerating, it felt great crusing the streets (almost like a truck).:)

Recover deleted photos / Unformat card

Ever had a problem with deleting your photos by mistake. Not me. Until yesterday when I did the mistake of not respecting my usual routine: copy RAW files, convert them to JPGs, and then share them and format the CF card. This time around, I just wanted to show them to my gf, and at 1AM, i got carried out and just format the drive going with the loop in my brain. But, no drama!! there are plenty of programs for recovery outthere (I used Photo recovery Genius but I saw at least other ten). Moreover, keep in mind that this is a drive, hence all the tools for HDD recovery might work just fine, since usually are formatted as FAT. So, no worries, you will get throught; just keep trying, for any help post a questions here and I will do my best to guide you. Because after all, this can be a very stressful situation, especially when you card is full with precious memories. Just do not write anything on it (eg take more pics) once this accidental erase/format happens. Cheers.

Short Romanian interlude...looking for a glimpse of summer

Going back home becomes harder and harder every time. Perhaps is just that I am perceiving all those wonderful places I grew up as a stage that I shouldn't regress back to, perhaps it is just hard seeing your family and friends grow older and weaker and you also loose track of the new branches and offsprings emerging in your family; or perhaps it is just a sharp reminder of why you left in the first place. Anyways, a sweet and sour mix (more towards the sour) just like a good chinese westernized food.

Anyhow, I got to go through these emotions again this week. Lots of useless bureaucratic paperwork for my new job in the Netherlands draw my sorry bottom to Bucharest, Sighet and Baia Mare to receive a provisional visa, exchange my birth certificate to an international one, and get a "nice" apostile for the Groningen city hall (i just wonder why we need this in the first place, and how legal is a color printed HP {probably 300dp} apostile with a stamp that you can barely see, and in Romanian only/?/?). However, a man's gotta do what a man gotta go. Especially if the law abiding citizen status is something one cares of. So I did it. Lots of tiring travel and some stressful situations (a close call of a car crash that freaked me out a bit), hope all is taking care of by now, so I don't have to re-do anything.

Now, getting back to the sunny side of the rainbow, it was nice going back home, enjoying one day of summer in Bucharest (38 C) with a biking tour of Park Herastrau, and a good hike day in the Carpathians. It was very exilirating going back to see the "pearls" of Bucegi Mountains (the Sphinx and Babele) two stone formations believed to be carved by ancient civilization on a plateau of 2000+ meters. See the Caraiman cross and hike to Omu peak. Despite the lack of bravery (no time deh! so I took the cabin up & down) in terms of hiking, it was a good workout. But more than everything, a sweet and sour mix...to revisit all these places where I have been with my friends hiking, while in college, with all the time on our side. A bit of nostalgie and sorrow but still some nice places to revisit. The pictures below are just a sample of what I am talking about.

Now, riding back the train, I see again the gray side of Romania. Autumn arrived here as well, incidentally about the same time that I arrived. Should we hope for some Indian summer? I wouldn't keep my fingers crossed but if you feel like it, go ahead. This morning the temperature plummeted to 5 C in my home region, and it should be hard to imagine mid-20s again. But hey, climate change is like a roulette, so it might work indeed.

'Till next time, Romania!

Finally...a good movie - INCEPTION

I would go as far as to call it the closest thing to Matrix that I have ever seen. The consensus is there: a smart, innovative, and thrilling movie, Inception is that rare summer blockbuster that succeeds viscerally as well as intellectually, according to the Rotten Tomatoes. The box office figures confirm also this. Despite its 2:30 hours, time flies by fueled by some memorable performances from a carefully chosen cast led by Leonardo di Caprio.

Ocean city

Getting back to OC was pretty fun as we haven't been here in a year. Definitely, this place puts the umm in the summer!! The private house and pool at Sunset Island, boardwalk buzz and plenty of waves and sun make it synonimus with summertime in many cases.

A Day in DC

Yesterday we decided to explore some more of the treasures buried in our host nation's capital. Despite a rough start in dealing with the (extremely) unpleasant people at the DC Metro who don't know how to step up from a monosyllabic conversation (and this is not just based on one experience), the day proved to be quite fulfilling. Very hot though..98 in the air..but who knows how many were there on the ground. A good start with a revisiting of the Natural History Museum where I got the chance to explore some new exhibitions and turn myself digitally into a Homo Sapiens; a nice lunch with a concert at the Old Post Office; then, an aerial view of Washington from the tower above and a visit to the US Bureau of Engraving and Printing, where millions of dollar bills are printed continuously (see attached new $100 bill) Then, a bit of business, by grabbing the latest issues of some industry journals for my research at the Library of Congress. The evening ended with a concert by a Louisiana Big Band from the US Marine Corp. Excellent music on the steps of the Capitol. The 100 F day went seemingly fast and relatively sweet (except the walking around town parts). till the next time..