Wednesday, January 30, 2013

Cambodia Day 7: More Lackluster Adventures In Siem Reap


I woke up today feeling pretty gross in the same clothes I wore all day yesterday. I made my way downstairs and was planning on ordering breakfast but there were only a few pancakes left and I wasn’t going to pay $2 for cereal and just ended up sitting downstairs for a while.
I checked at the front desk to see if my laundry was done early but no such luck. I had originally planned to head back to Angkor today but it I went in shorts I would have been limited in what I was actually allowed to see so I figured there was no point. I went for a walk into town and checked out a temple there. Luckily there didn’t seem to be any employees or monks around so I didn’t get scolded or kicked out for showing my knees. I can’t remember the name of the temple, Wat Somethingorother, but it was pretty cool. I liked the area outside the actual temple best though. There was a nice garden with some statues of animals.
I was pretty hungry after the temple since I skipped breakfast so I made my way back to the hostel and had some Khmer noodles. I decided that since I was back at the hostel anyway I might as well have some downtime so I grabbed my laptop and chilled in one of the comfy chairs near the pool. I applied for a few more jobs in Australia so keep your fingers crossed I hear something back soon.
For some reason I cant seem to have a completely lazy day where I don’t do anything at all while I'm on this adventure. I got pretty stir crazy after about an hour at the hostel so headed out again. I looked into renting a bike but between the rusty piece of garbage with shoddy breaks that I took for a test spin and all the crazy Cambodian drivers I figured that was a trip to the hospital waiting to happen and walked instead. I followed the river for quite a while and happened upon a temple and the royal residence. The residence was more of a house than a castle but it had a pretty cool garden leading up to it.
On my way home I stopped at Blue Pumpkin (if you ever come to Cambodia you need to check this place out) and got a scoop of raspberry sherbet. If it wasn’t so expensive I would live off the stuff. Especially in this heat! I desperately wanted to go swimming when I got back but my bathing suit was with the laundry I was waiting to get back so I just hung out in my air conditioned room instead.
My laundry was ready early, which was pretty exciting until I realized my ninja turtle shirt was missing. I had a minor freak out before realizing that it was just in another part of my bag. They did however lose some of my underwear and I don’t really want to know how they managed that or what they are currently doing with it.
In all of the frustration about the ninja turtle shirt I completely forgot to change my clothes before heading out for dinner. I ended up at a restaurant on Pub Street called Red Piano; just in time for happy hour meaning I got a free drink with my meal. I was craving western food so I ordered carbonara (trading one noodle for another seems silly in retrospect). The meal was too heavy to be eating in this heat so although it was good I only managed to eat about 75% of it.
On my walk back to the hostel I saw a sign for a free Apsara show starting in a little over an hour. I bumped into Freya (the German girl who I went dancing with a few nights ago) in the bar and asked if she wanted to join me. A little while later we met Luke, (yet another Englishmen) and invited him to join as well. The sign advertised that the dancing started at 7:30 but it was closer to 8 when they finally got going. The first dance they did was called the blessing dance. I swear the song lasted about 20 minutes and I wouldn’t really call what they did dancing, it was pretty girls in pretty dresses making large movements with their arms and occasionally walking in a circle. It was worth going but we left as soon as the first song ended. I had experienced all the Apsara I needed.
I have just been relaxing at the hostel ever since. Not quite the day I had planned but I'm pretty happy with the way it turned out. I am heading back to Angkor tomorrow with Freya and hopefully catching up with Rachel as she is supposed to get in early tomorrow morning. Guess I should probably go get some sleep.

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