 forefront.
It was a learning experience – on how I react to pressure (bag packing!!) and problems (like getting scammed), that the person I like the most is myself because when only left to my thoughts I did not get bored, that everyone is interesting if you actually listen to what they are saying, how nice it is to be disconnected (I swear I freed up a lot of time when I did not have mobile data and there were no “pressure” to respond to messages, or no notifications popping up every now and then etc) and a lot more. So yes, I got crazy emotional and may have shed some tears – but it’s for the travel companions I wish could have seen the things I saw (like my mom) and for the confirmation that yes, I can do this.
We entered Banteay Kdei via the East Gopura Fourth Enclosure. This entrance is across Srah Srang. I have no photos of the lake, but it’s populated by so many souvenir stalls and peddlers will hound you when all you want is to stare at the lake and think about your life.
The third enclosure. Banteay Kdei also used to be a temple city but no one has any idea about its actual function.
There were a lot of Apsara dancers sculpted on the columns so I’ll be taking a wild guess and say this is the dancing hall.
It was already the golden hour when I went and I swear, it looks more whimsical in real life. It felt like I was in a scene straight from a movie.
I actually do not have a lot to say about Banteay Kdei.. and not a lot of photos as well. At this point, I was taking breaks like crazy. My legs are tired and covered in a sheet of sweat.
Nature meddling with thousand-year-old structures by growing within.
West gopura and another pillared structure.
After exploring Banteay Kdei, the tuktuk driver, Tet, brought me to Phnom Bakheng for the sunset. If you’re not wearing a shirt, you can buy from any of the souvenir shops at the bottom of the hill where the temple is located. Tet settled for a bottle of water while I had my nth cup of $1 fruit shake. I think I spent so much on fruit shakes while in Siem Reap. It was just so hot!
You can opt to climb up the hill by an elephant for $20/person.
I swear I weighed my options. $20 is equivalent to a fancy meal back home and I would burn it for a 15-minute ride. I have also read somewhere on the *~internetzzz~* that riding an elephant is supporting animal abuse. I was mulling over these thoughts while waiting for another tourist to book an elephant ride (I wasn’t willing to pay $40 to go solo), but the lady told me I could go on a solo ride as long as I tell anyone who asks me that I paid full price.
 Since I was alone, I was left to balance on the seat by myself and I could feel the chair tilting sideways a couple of times. We encountered around four elephants on their way down and the elephant I was on had to walk near the edge of the road. I had to mentally berate myself when I looked down my possible cause of death after chanting “don’t look down, don’t look down” for the past 10 minutes.
But the scenery when we got to higher ground was so worth it. You can see Angkor Wat from here!
The queue to the temple for the sunset was crazy! Only a limited number of people can go up and you need to get an ID, which they collect from the visitors who are leaving the temple. All of us tourists had the brilliant idea to climb early to wait for the sunset so it’s best to come an hour before sunset. I got in because the woman manning the elephant booth tipped me that I would need a shirt to enter the temple, so do buy/wear one when you go. I have no photos of the sunset, though.. well I do, but it’s really something you have to see for yourself (because I took crappy photos that do not do it justice). Sitting cross-legged on thousand-year-old bricks of a temple above the hill in Siem Reap, watching a sunset that would probably fetch a lot of money if it was a painting, have made me very grateful. Whatever has happened, is happening and would happen, I am fortunate enough to live through and witness so many sunrises and sunsets in one lifetime.
Hello, OOTD on my way up to my room at Cambana d’Angkor Suites.
I ordered room service for dinner because no matter how hard I tried to push myself, there was nothing more I wanted that evening than to watch CSI while in a tub.
I have always been the type of person who has a hard time letting things go. I can hold a grudge like my life depended on it. Half of my teenage years were spent trying to make a dysfunctional relationship work out. Dust gathered over the uneven stack of chocolate boxes I have accumulated on the bottom left corner of my three-door wardrobe. I have a box full of letters, movie tickets, faded receipts, and heck, even bits and pieces of dried petals that had been crumbled by time.
I had lunch at Khmer Angkor Kitchen. I still have the receipt and everything on the photo cost me $10. I guess that’s why I fell in love with Vietnam. For about the same amount, I would already be dead from food coma.
East Mebon is smaller than the previous temples I went to, and because I didn’t chance upon any guides or any of the details they put up at the entrances of every temple, I don’t have anything but photos. 😦 Based from the map though, this is the east entrance.
There were a lot of moss at the lower parts of the temple, which is curious because the area seems dry for moss. Hmm.
I had to climb so many stairs, at around 1:30 in the afternoon. You can just imagine how sweaty I got.
It still did not explain why the chambers smelled like they burned something in there.
How to take portraits of yourself without a monopod/tripod? What I do is find a surface I can put my camera on. It does not even have to be super flat, as long as my camera won’t fall off. There are a lot of these surfaces in the archaeological park, so don’t worry about that. Anyway, I take a photo after placing my camera to ensure that it’s taking the angle I want, so I know how I should adjust it (placing camera straps under the lens to tilt it upwards etc) and where I should stand. Here’s the product! It only took one test shot and one final shot to get my photo. When I’m satisfied, I don’t take more photos – which saves memory space but could be awful when you get home from the trip and discover it was a crappy photo all along. Haha!
They placed wooden stairs on top of the actual stairs. When I went, not all the stairs had a new one on top of it, and you can see the state of ruin it is in with the steepness and the missing steps.
The brick chambers are there as well, similar to East Mebon. I still don’t know what it is for.
The World Monuments Fund has been working on restoring the temples in Angkor. To spot a restored one, you just have to find a structure with different colored bricks.
From the highest tier, you can view the different enclosures as well as the courtyards.
Placed my camera on a narrow surface and prayed to the heavens above that the strong wind does not contribute to it falling to the ground.
The chambers/towers are all sealed up. I’m really curious what it’s for.
A photo of me with the stairs – primarily because I’m vain, and size comparison to how high one tier is.
And yes, it was very windy. The heat and the wind combined, and I swore I could almost hear my skin crackling as it burned.
Robert Frost’s The Road Not Taken always resonate with me.  It’s the worst on bad days – second guessing yourself is no fun at all. I had a traditional upbringing: take on a challenging course (engineering) from a reputable university, graduate and get your diploma, work for a big company, earn money, and everything else will follow. In deciding on what to do with my future, there are so many factors affecting the decision-making process, and I couldn’t help but lie in bed at night and wonder which path I will take.
The path to Preah Neak Pean.
An artificial lake surrounds Neak Pean, as it is used as a reservoir to irrigate rice fields during the dry season.
It’s so easy to chase after what is tangible: money, title, stability. But what about the “follow your heart” sayings, if you don’t even know where your heart is headed?
Our next stop was the Temple of Ta Som which was constructed between the end of the twelfth century and the beginning of the thirteenth; it was begun during the reign of King Jayavarman VII. I entered via the Third Enclosure West Gopura.
The temple features three enclosures with monumental gateways known as gopuras and a central shrine decorated with intricate carvings.
The temple was likely