Cambodia, Continued

I need 75 hours of continuing education and decided that taking a 4 hour class on Khmer cooking was a great option. I really liked Khmer meals, they were tasty without burning your entire mouth out like Thai food.

Here I am grinding up some tasty spices to make Amok, a famous dish, not so much having to do with things going badly. 

Fabric was really cheap at the market and everyone loved our girls. I'm not sure if they gave us a bargaining edge, but the kids insisted on quick negotiations. 

 Here is a fine selection of fast food, complete with tails.

 Vegetables, pickles and crabs, oh my.

I've never seen fruit kept cold with such large blocks of ice, and you will be happy to know that even though you can't drink the water, all the ice is factory made and safe.

 Here are some real live fishmongers, getting all the fish ready for your delight on a table a little above waist high so that you really aren't safe from the scales.

We learned the silk making process at the Angkor Silk Farm.  First the tiny silkworms are fed a diet of mulberry leaves.

The silkworms are fully grown after a few weeks of eating. The girls and I had a great time playing chicken and touching the worms. They didn't get very big before Jane checked out of the competition.

Here we are learning the life cycle of the silkworm.  The woven baskets hanging on the wall are covered with little yellow silkworm cocoons.

The cocoons made of silk fibers are dried in the sun.

The cocoons are then boiled and small fibers from 20-30 cocoons are pulled together and spun into silk thread.

 Silk thread is then dyed Jane's favorite color (and a variety of others as well).

Silk thread is then woven into cloth by young ladies distracted by 3 little Hackett girls running around.

Next in our "How Stuff is Made" series, we visited Senteurs d'Angkor, where we saw the manufacture of finely scented soaps, lotions, candles, as well as hand-crafted baskets and boxes all made from local materials.

One of the girls' goals on this trip was to ride a baby elephant.  Here they are living their dream  - on a very safe and stationary cement baby elephant.

Apparently, in tourist locations in SE Asia, these little fish tanks are set up so you can effortlessly remove hardened skin from your feet while feeding your dinner (I don't actually know that they use these fish in their seafood dishes, but it seems economical to me). I thought it sounded like fun and we had to wait for dinner at the restaurant behind me. Little did I know that the gentle nibbling touted actually feels like walking on lava rocks. Once again my mom was right, beauty hurts.

You might think this is a refreshment stand.  It's actually a gas station, with recycled bottles full of gasoline for your motorcycle.

This is the view along the road on the way to Thailand, when one must stop for one's children. I'm sad we didn't get a water buffalo in this picture (they were everywhere), but at least no land mines went off. 

Cambodia

(Although we could have taken a hot air balloon ride and snapped the above photo, we did not).

Font Key:
Italics = Michelle
Regular = Ryan

Cambodia - located between Thailand and Vietnam, it's a hot steamy country still rebuilding after decades of civil war.   It reminded me of rural Brazil, with its dusty dirt roads, motorcycles, abundant fruit and simple homes pieced together with scrap wood.

Every night we would ask the girls what their favorite part of the day was and it was always . . .  Tuk-Tuks!

I'm not sure if there is anything that Ryan likes better than taking videos while in motion.  Be warned before you watch his "Tuk Tuk Montage", if you have a tendency for seasickness. 

Ruins: Angkor Wat. Built nearly a thousand years ago in the 1100's, this massive Hindu temple is Cambodia's pride and joy (featured on it's flag).  It wins the prize as the largest religious building on earth, and today it's actively used by Buddhist monks and visited by millions annually.

We caught the sunset, along with hundreds of other tourists. I hope you recognize the skill in getting pictures without all the scaffolding - yes we found scaffolding at yet another historic site. 

Our tour guide walked us right up to this muddy puddle and I thought that he had lost his mind until he pointed out the reflection. 

Here we are outside the 190 meter wide moat. 

Here we are learning all about the legend of the "churning of the sea of milk" from our friendly tour guide. 

Here's a bas relief of monkeys playing instruments and having a party.

Ruins: Ta Prohm. Another nearly thousand year old temple complex, this one was fascinating because of the many large fig trees growing over the walls and piled up stones. 

This was my favorite temple site because there weren't very many tourists there yet, the trees made great shade and the kids weren't tired yet.

There is something thrilling to know that  you are treading where Harrison Ford has gone before.

Following our intrepid guide through the rubble.

It's so tough to get everyone to look happy at the same time.

Ruins: Angkor Thom. Only 800-some years old, this "Great City" was the last capital of the ancient Khmer empire, not abandoned until about 1600.  The many large faces (200+) on the towers makes this temple complex unique. Below is the gate you go through to get on the grounds.  Buses, cars and even elephants go through there. 

Here are the girls with stone elephant trunks.

This was the greatest tree that we saw on the site.

Luckily we had our kids along so we could travel no faster than a two-year old which saved me from looking  like the one slowing everyone down.

One of the many, many faces. I felt like I was being watched the whole time we were there.

How many faces can you see?

South East Asia Trip

We have so many fun pictures and stories to share with you from our trip that it's been hard to get started.  How about a fun map with arrows to begin with?

1st Stop: Tokyo

Our trip stalled a little at the beginning.  Yokota Air Base, outside of Tokyo, has 3 flights a week to Singapore to carry official government travelers and usually has 20-30 seats open for space-available hitch-hikers like us.  We flew to Tokyo on Thanksgiving day hoping to fly to Singapore the following day, but due to a flight cancellation, we didn't get out until Monday.  The troubles with being stuck in Tokyo were that we only had one set of semi-warm clothing and Tokyo's incredibly expensive.

On Saturday we rode the train and monorail to Sanrio Puroland, a kid's paradise that like the 'Disneyland' of Hello-Kitty and other Japanese kid's characters.  Here you can see Michelle and the girls shivering in the rain just before we entered.

Here's a peek of the colorful fun inside.  The girls were really in their element - colorful cats around each corner, lots of little kids their size running everywhere, catchy music playing constantly, and lots of hands-on activities.

The sun came out on Sunday and helped us stay a few degrees warmer.  The trees were in full color, and on our walk around base the girls decided to decorate this bush like a birthday cake.

2nd Stop: Singapore

Singapore: a city-state on the tip of Malaysia, about 3x the size of Washington D.C., 5 million people.  They like to call themselves the "Garden City", and they've earned as you can't drive or walk anywhere without lush green vegetation and colorful flowers around you.  It left an impression on us as an extremely clean, green, and welcoming city.  It was so exciting to see all the signs in English.  Singapore was a British port a long time ago, and everyone there speaks English in addition to Malay and other languages.  Michelle was especially thrilled to listen to English hits on the taxi radios.  

Here we are walking from the subway station through the Arab district of Singapore.  Note the humidity affecting the camera lens, and yes that is Helen holding a barf bag. Traveling with kids is not for the faint of heart.

Singapore is only slightly less terribly expensive than Tokyo, and Michelle found us a great deal in a hostel on a 8ft x 10ft room with double bunk beds.  It was just right for 5 tired travelers.