At 7am I went in search of breakfast, which I found in the form of a friendly cafe, with a lovable rat who ran across the floor whilst I was eating; how cute!! I enjoyed a delicious breakfast, which took quite a while to prepare, leaving me 10 minutes late to meet Kim. Thankfully he was very graceful and forgiving, definetly unlike the majority of men, and we set off for our long day.
We passed some large pottery pots, which I think are supposed to be quite common or famous in this area. Also there was a selection of army members doing some kind of drill. Later on we also passed a water park, although I'm not sure how busy it was, it sounded rather quiet.
A funny sight passed us, as from the front I saw a motorbike carrying some produce made of a hay like material, but from behind, like a scene out of The Aristocats, was a moving haystack! It made me giggle. Another thing that I find adorable is little girls who smile at you when you smile at them, forcing you to smile even more, they are so adorable!!
We passed a field full of lotus flowers, a symbol of Buddhism. They are incredibly beautiful!
We arrived at the first visit of the day; Phnom Sampeau. I was greeted by a very happy young boy, with good English who offered to be my guide up the hill. It was a long and tiring walk up the hill. The road had been recently 'redone' or at least the foundations for the new road had, so it was incredibly bumpy and rough on the feet. It was in the same style as the re-laying of the roads we'd done in the National Parks of Costa Rica. The boy was 13, and spoke good English. He spends $5 a month on being taught for an hour each evening and his favourite subject is Geography. He would usually be charged more than that, but as he is so good at English, he is able to help other students with their pronounciation. He funds his studies, and that of his brother and general livings costs of the family, by his tour guide job. All his family work on the rice fields which pays very poorly. The temple was plainer than most, but the view from the top was incredible. Much better than the view I'd been disappointed by in Vietnam, and I sweated less on this walk! This temple had been used as a prison, or a waiting room for the killing cave. I seemed to be giving a way a lot of money up here, as not only did I give to some fund outside the temple, but an ancient cleaner lady who was hanging about begging in the cave I also gave some money too; I'll blame my generousity on the heat!
My joyful tourguide had gone down to the cave by sliding down the banister, whilst I took the more appropriate stairs. The killing cave is where the Khmer Rouge had got people to plunge so many metres to their death into this cave. It was a grim sight, and inside was the remains of many skulls and other bones from the seventys. A short walk away was a few Buddha statues, where we stopped for another breather. The boy enquired about whether I had an mp3 player or not, and I said I did, he wanted to see it, so I took it out and let him play on it whilst I took some photos of butterflies etc. We then saw a more impressive temple, with an even better view, with more people asking for donations etc, which I managed to resist!
The way down involved lots of steps, but wasn't too painful. I could see the main road which headed back to Battambang, and also the boy pointed out which school he goes to. He seemed to cough quite a bit, and after learning that 65% of all Cambodians have tb, I'm guessing he must be one of them!
At the bottom, I bought a drink from his aunts shop, where he lives away from his parents. I was then joined by lots of wild monkeys! I got quite excited, and whipped out my camera, and Kim was able to get some bananas for me to feed to them. He fed most of them whilst I took the photos, and whilst I was trying to give the banana to the smaller baby which hadn't managed to eat any banana yet, another larger and rather rude monkey grabbed the banana out my hand! Cheeky thing! Some of the smaller female monkeys had quite a few sores on their body from the male monkey.
It then started to tip it down, so I was quite thankful I was in the tuk tuk. We put the raincovers down at the sides, and Kim took off his shirt (he was wearing t-shirt underneath) and put on his poncho, a dashing white with pink-dots one!
The ride was very bumpy, so bumpy in fact that at one point, none of my body was in contact with the tuk tuk! I'd done a vertical take off! It didn't help with the period pain either was which beginning to be a pain!
Next stop was to Phnom Banan. It was still raining at this point so we hung out in the local cafe swinging in hammocks which was fun! I needed the loo, so asked if I could use the loo. I was told that it could only be used for number 1s (!) and so I preceeded to go through the 'kitchen' to the toilet, which was a curtain being held up by bamboo, a slight dip in the ground leading down to a river somewhere, and on top of the mud were two wooden slabs for our feet! I slipped, but thankfully not too severely, as I didn't fall in! Thank heavens!
I had some lunch; rice and vegetables, in the company of a pig! and by the time I had finished, the rain had stopped, so I embarked up the 300 odd steps to the top. I was accompanied by a boy who spoke a bit of English, and who kept on fanning me! When I was about to collapse in a heap, he would take my arm and lift me up! I made it to the top, and gave the boy some money. I'm pretty sure that he was expecting it, but he looked at me strangely when I did, so maybe he was just being nice after all!
I wandered around. The place looked a bit delapdated. There was a nice view, and the shapes were quite interesting. It was built shortly before Angkor Wat, and I think it was instructed by the same king or something. There were lots of the 6-headed snake figures along the handrails for the steps etc, as well as lions.
We got back on the road, and after following a calf along the road for a bit, the calf decided to swerve in front of us, and somehow I missed what happened, as my heart lept into my mouth, and I looked behind to see the calf running off down another path. I really thought we were certain to hit the poor calf, but I guess she must have been a quick turner.
We stopped again later on as my driver was pointing out papaya being grown and also some pink dragon fruit (the insides being pink rather than the typical white). We bought some, and oh my heavens! They were delicious!! I have never tasted something so naturally beautiful, that was so colourful, in my life!
Back on the road, we were admiring another building and a local lady gave me a couple of green oranges! (Totally different to the usual oranges!), which I tried peeling initally, before learning that you eat the outside bit and the avoid the inner seeds! Whoops! It was kind of her though.
We passed a wedding, and I was curious to have a wee peek, so I bowed Khmer style to the people and they waved me in and then the guys who were dancing around waved me in, and I got dragged in (although I was quite keen to have a go!) in a Bollywood style dance around the dancefloor! It was good fun and really great to be included in something so random! They even got their official photographer to come and take some photos with me dancing! I was surprised that it was just men dancing; I thought there must have been some official separation, although it turned out the girls were just shy! A few more got up to dance to join me whilst the photographer was taking some photos.
We had to head back to Battambang and then head south to visit the third of our three temples, this final one being Wat Ek Phnom. This one was a bit plain, and very ruined from when the war was on. It had some nice carvings though, and a couple of adorable cats, one with brown eyes which looked a bit unusual! I played with the lively kitten, whilst the black cat snoozed, before heading back down to enjoy a sugar cane juice which was delicious! Kim then told me more about his family, and what happened to them in the war. He'd lost some half siblings due to starvation, and uncles and aunts had died of the same thing. His parents survived it, and at the age of three, he went to a refugee camp in Thailand. He worked collecting lotus leaves to sell at the maket for several years, a very hard job which allowed leeches to attack him in the water. They use lotus leaves instead of plastic bags at the markets, to wrap up meat and vegetables etc.
We passed the Pepsi bottling plant which basically was just a run down factory, and then we stopped off to look at some fruit bats that were hanging (!) out in a tree.
We'd watched some fishermen for a while, using bamboo as the frame for their net, and then they bent right down into the water and swept upwards in an attempt to catch fish. It looked like tiring work, although I was told it's not their full time job, I think they just do it for the extra food.
Back in Battambang, we passed a factory that prepares and cooks up dogs (to eat). I had wanted to go and see it, but he said I probably wouldn't be able to as they'd already have prepared the dogs and now it would only be in 'on the plate' form.
We witnessed a tree being cut down, and falling into the river, which was fun to watch and pretty spectacular! Kim laughed out loud when viewing the collapse of the tree on my camera.
I paid up at the hotel, and sorted out my transport for the following day; a ten hour bus to Sihanoukville! as well as having a refreshing shower.
I returned to the place where I had enjoyed my breakfast that morning, and had an even more enjoyable dinner. I unfortunatly cannot recall the name of the restaurant, which is a shame as I had hoped to write in to the Lonely Planet for a recommendation. The staff were very polite, and the restaurant had only been open a couple of months, so they were still learning the ropes. They were guided by an Australian who was just helping them out with getting started up. They made an absolutely amazing fruit smoothie! I'm not sure what the fruit was, but it was heaven! Their vegetarian sweet and sour dish was superb as well.
There were slightly fewer ants on going to bed that night thankfully, although I still had some bad dreams.
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