Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Day 7 - Phnom Penh 9/16

We took our time getting ready and eating breakfast, and then headed out for Kara to show me her office (her organization helps girls that have been rescued from the illegal human trafficking that takes place in the city). It was nice to meet some of the people that Kara works with and see some of what she does over there.

After that we went to the market so that I could get a feel for what I might want to buy the next day, and then headed over to meet her friend Bayata (sp?) at a really neat restaurant...which I really should explain that most of their restaurants are not enclosed buildings...you just walk into them from the street. There really are not that many closed, air conditioned buildings in the city...which is fine for me since I like hot weather, and agree with their culture who thinks it is much harder on you to go in and out of air con (as they call it), so they just stay hot and sweaty all the time.

Anyway, the restaurant was kind of like Aunt Sue’s Tea Room for those of you from Marion, IN...but this was tea the Australian way...which apparently is having a RIDICULOUS amount of sweets. In Marion, the top, smallest plate was where your dessert were...here, the bottom, LARGEST plate it where there were SEVERAL desserts...plus another large cupcake that was on the top plate. And I am normally not a cold tea person, but the tea they gave us was AMAZING. All the food was good...and I could kick myself now for not getting a picture.

We sat and talked for a while, and then headed out into the city to go see the Royal Palace and the Silver Pagoda (which was not really at ALL what we were expecting.

I should also mention that everything is very cheap…so it only cost a couple dollars to see all this stuff. And, it is very convenient – the whole country takes either dollars or riel (their currency), so it makes paying for things very nice. Most of the country is either Buddhist or Muslim, so we saw a lot of statues, smelled a lot of incense, and saw silly (obviously not silly to them) spots where people would stick money for their gods.






A monk struck up a conversation with Kara...he was hiding on the other side where not a lot of people walk...probably because Kara didn't think they were supposed to talk to her! It was funny...the whole 10 MINUTE conversation was pretty funny :)


The wife of the king gets to wear a specific color for each day of the week :) :)








Does anyone else think it is funny that each foot of this elephant is in a pot?!? :)


A real frangipani tree...they are such simple, beautiful flowers...


I just thought this was so pretty...



Then we walked along the river for a while, which was very pretty, and then headed back. That night, we went over to her boss’s house where several American girls get together for dinner and Speed Scrabble every Thursday. It was a lot of fun, and I can understand why it would be fun for them to all get together, when they are in a city filled with people very different from themselves! We watched another movie before going to bed and then called it a day.

1 comment:

Gene and Annie said...

The temples are so neat but I bet it is sad to know that they don't believe in the one true God!!