We’ve left southeast Asia, hopefully to return again someday. We’re in Tokyo now, staying near Shinjuku and have landed in another world altogether. 
Last night, as we waited for our delayed flight to Tokyo from Saigon, I began to feel a little depressed. Much like any event which you ancipate for a long time, like a wedding or a marathon, once it’s over you feel a bit melancholy, as that wonderful exciting day is now over and in the past. Here we are, six weeks into the journey and on the eve of visiting the country I’ve been the most excited about, and I can’t believe it’s actually here! It just feels like it’s all going too fast. Those first days in New Zealand seem ages ago – in the last six weeks we’ve been in six countries and on ten planes. We’ve been mountain biking in a rainforest, visited the Sydney Opera House, camped under the stars at Uluru, seen the Great Barrier Reef, walked around Angkor Wat, and crawled through the Cu Chi tunnels. From highly urban to hardly developed, we’ve seen an entire range of the world, even in the little slice we’ve been through. Many days I wake up in the morning and have to remind myself where in the world I am, without Rocapella to sing me awake and remind me. (Shout out to the readers who get the reference. 🙂 ) I keep telling myself to just soak in every day and take it all in. 
Onto the Vietnamese street signs: water edition. The river has signs! 

Lightning possible for the next 8 nautical miles.

Don’t drop your anchor here, there are loch ness monsters resting. 

Beware of suddenly rising submarines.

-s

Ring! Ring! Went my alarm at four in the morning to reminding us to wake up. The reason that we were waking up so darn early was because at five in the morning a taxi driver would take us to Angor Wat to see the sunrise over the majestic temple. The night before we had packed all of our stuff up because at the end of the tour we would be moving to a new hotel. Soon we had all woken up and gotten in the car and drove away.

To get in to the Angkor Wat complex, you have to present your passport and give them some money to get in. But in our hasty last minute packing, Mom had forgotten to get the passports and her wallet out of the safe. We still got into the complex. Sadly, the clouds were out and we did not see the sunrise over Angkor Wat although we still did a tour of it. The temple was amazing! We gasped in wonder at every turn. One of my favorite parts was the bas-relief. My favorite one was the one depicting the Ramayana. The Ramayana is an epic where, a devoted sage dose many a ritual and sacrifice, goes mad and starts to cut off his 10 heads. When he is on his last head, Brahma (the Hindu god of creation) came down and said that he would grant him a wish. Ravana thought and decided that he would ask to be immortal. But not even a god can make one immortal so then he said that he wanted to be a super powerful being, that could not be destroyed by gods or demons. Then Ravana was reborn with all his heads and 20 arms that is how the Ramayana started. Then he became a big bully and finally Vishnu (the Hindu god of preservation) said “This must be stopped”. Then the gods came up with a plan. The plan was able to happen because of a flaw in Ravana’s wish. The flaw was that he had not wished that human and animals alike could kill him. Armed with this knowledge the gods devised a plan. The plan was that Vishnu would be born into a family and he would eventually kill Ravana. Thusly it began. Soon through a few trials and tribulations the young prince Rama and his partner/brother Lakshaman destroyed Ravana. The end. For more on the Ramayana go to Ramayana: The Divine loophole. (Also available as a book on Amazon)

Back to “temples! temples! temples!”. A few of the other amazing things about the temples is; one, this was before the Egyptians! And second is that the four way intersections at the Angkor Wat usually point directly North, South, West and East. After our stunning experience at the wonder of marvels temple we went to retrieve our passports. Also the breakfast server place gave us a take away breakfast. The next temple we went to was called the Ta Prohm temple. Unlike Angor What!?!? (our Angor joke) this temple had trees growing in and around it. The reason that Angor What?! had no trees was because (as many know) the roots can disrupt and overturn stone. But this temple was not a major attraction and the trees looked cool was probably why they did not remove the trees. This temple older too. Lastly, one quick fact is that tomb raider was filmed here.

The next and last temple we went to was called Bayon temple. This temple like the last, was Buddhist. Angkor Wat was for Vishnu. Two things I learned from the temple guide was that the four headed Buddha’s that were everywhere were showing four different expressions. Also closed eyed Buddha equals mediating to get to enlightenment, open eyed equals that he reached enlightenment. After this we went back home and crashed on the beds and went to sleep. The End.

-hf

When we were biking and kayaking in Cambodia, we saw stilt houses in the countryside by the side of the road, and I wondered, what are those for? 

Therefore, when there’s floods, the houses don’t get flooded because it floods a lot i mean a lot. Also they retreat under when it is hot because they produce a lot of shade. 

And when it rains really hard, they also retreat under these houses with their cows, tools, hammocks, rice bags, table and chairs and some other animals will be under it too like geckos and flies. And also if I ever lived in a stilt house it would be our house on stilts. I sort of like living in a stilt house because I’m sort of afraid of floods. And also if I ever put anything under my stilt house it would be like an art studio. But when it rains or floods I can just quickly pull up a rope and then all the art stuff comes up and they don’t get wet. 

-lb

On our second full day in Phnom Penh,  we went to the Genocide Museum and the Killing Fields. Eric and HappyFrog have written excellent posts about our visits there, so I will only add on a few thoughts of my own. I, too, was of course horrified. Not only by what we saw, not only by what happened, but also because unlike the Holocaust this tragedy is not nearly as well known though is similar in terms of pain and loss of human life. I was also struck by how recent it all is. We’ve spoken to a few Cambodian people here who speak English – our guide at the museum, a taxi driver, and our tour guide, all of whom tell of their family’s history with the Khmer Rouge. Everyone here has lost people, everyone here has a story to tell. It was only forty years ago that the regime ruled Cambodia, and the people who were young during that time are only now middle aged adults. 
The audio tour at the Killing Fields gives you perspective of this, with survivors telling their tale of how they survived. Some ran to the borders and were able to flee. Our taxi driver’s father had been born as a child of farmers, so even though he was a doctor when the regime took over, he was able to do the work and “pass” for a rural farmer and thus avoid imprisonment and death. One of the survivors of the Tuol Sleng prison was on a truck with his wife and infant child to the Killing Fields. The truck had to stop and somehow he and his wife were able to run, she with the child in her arms. She was struck, and the baby fell to the ground, still crying, but in that moment he could only think to flee. He lives with the guilt of leaving his child. Most of the soldiers of the Khmer Rouge were no more than teens at the time, either brainwashed by them or forced into service because if you didn’t comply, you were dead yourself. These young soldiers have not been persecuted, instead our guide told us that they are to be forgiven for their heinous acts and considered as victims themselves. She also told us that almost all people of that time have significant psychiatric issues related to the trauma. 
I wonder, how as a people and a country do you heal after a time like this?
-sf

Today we went to the prison where the Khmer Rouge held prisoners and tortured the prisoners for information. Before I elaborate on that I should tell you some history. The way Khmer Rouge came to be was when the monarch went off on a trip to Russia. During the time that he was gone, military Leaders formed a coup. A coup is when a military overthrows a high ranking official, further more the coup was funded by the U.S.A. The funding money that the U.S.A. gave to the coup, thinking that they would use it to improve the city, but that was a bad move. All the coup did was give the money to the rich and keep it for themselves. Because of that the rich became richer and the poor became poorer. Some of the poorer farmers and peasants ran away into the Jungle and formed the group known as the Khmer Rouge. Soon the Khmer Rouge rose to power and overthrew the coup. During that time the Vietnam War was coming to an end. The Khmer Rouge had had a grip on Cambodia for four years, then they started going into Vietnamese territory and burning villages. Soon the well battle hardened Vietnamese solders completely destroyed the Khmer Rouge in two seconds. That is the end of the history lesson and onto my experience in the prison and Killing Fields.

The first place that we went to was the prison. This is the place where I felt that it was hardest for me. There were a few reasons that I think that I was so disturbed. One was because the guide’s mom had lived through the Khmer Rouge regime and the guide told us that before the regime, her family had 11 members and after the regime her family had four members left. Also the way they were treated was horrible. First, the prisoners were in the prison because the Khmer Rouge was growing more and more paranoid (this was before the Vietnamese came) and putting all sorts of people in the prison as “spies” : common people, other Khmer Rouge officers, rich people and learned people. Those were the reasons that they were there. The way they tortured them was terrible too. First the “cold group” came in and asked the prisoners to tell them that they were spies, and if you did not tell them, you would move on to the “hot group” and they would come and torture the prisoners. They asked NO questions. The torture included whipping them then pouring salt water on them or pulling of finger nails and putting alcohol on the wounds, etc.

The longest the prisoners stayed was six months. Six months of torture and then after the six months in prison they would be shipped off to the killing fields. The only reason you would stay six months was if the prisoner did not tell that he/she was a spy. If you told before that you would told that you would be taken to a new home. All that was crap and what they actually did was blindfold them and cart them off to the Killing Fields to be murdered. That in and of itself horrifies me – to lie to a person only to kill them. It disgusts me. The Khmer Rouge would also wipe out the whole family so that there would be noone to rebel. This included babies and kids too. Babies were taken forcefully from their mother and then killed by smashing them against a tree or throwing them up in the air and shooting them. Usually they killed prisoners in garish ways and without a bullet because back then bullets were expensive.

By the end of this I felt sickened and I hope that you tell other people about this horrific thing because they ought to know.

-hf

We made it to Bali by way of a two hour layover in the Singapore Airport. I had told the children that in Singapore it is illegal to leave a toilet unflushed, and the boy gleefully taunted the girl with this fact, as she has a reputation for leaving…shall we say “presents” for us in the bathroom. He was extremely disappointed to find out that they do not check the toilets after each use, and that irresponsible bathroom goers could get away scot-free. The kids also had their first experience on Singapore Airlines, which is of course THE BEST, and really, really want all of the rest of our flights to be with them in the future. If only. 
We’ve had a few days in Phnom Penh and are on our way to Siem Reap now. Phnom Penh can be described the way large cities in developing countries are always described in travel guides, which is sprawling, congested and polluted. And while the country and culture are millenia old, the city is a fairly new one in a way, rebuilding itself after the destruction wrought by Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge government which only ended in 1979. When the Khmer Rouge took power in 1974, the citizens of the city were ordered to leave and go live in the countryside, where they were put into forced farming labor camps. After the fall of the Khmer Rouge government, there was a return to Phnom Penh, but the city had seen destruction and it was first come first serve with regards to taking propery, so it wasn’t as if everyone just settled back into place. Add to that that approximately 40 percent of the population died during the 4 years of their rule, and you only begin to get the idea of what the city has been through. 
We settled into our flat, a nice duplex very close to the Genocide museum, which is made largely of concrete as are most buildings here. Next to us was a large open air restaurant called “Five Guys Fresh Beer” which is the only microbrewery in the country, as far as I was able to find out. We tried the beer, and I’m sorry to say that for beer snobs such as ourselves, it resembled nothing more than a watery homebrew you might be proudly offered by the potbellied suburban dad with a man cave in his garage. If this is you, I’m sorry. I’m sure your beer is delicious. 
After New Zealand and Australia, where an average lunch could easily cost us $75-100 and we cooked in as much as we could, restaurant meals for the four of us here range about $20-35, so we’ve been eating out and enjoying every bite. Interestingly, the currency in Cambodia is largely the US dollar, so it’s been nice not to have to divide or multiply to make sense of how much we’re paying for things. (They also have the riel and you will get change in riel notes, but everything is listed in American dollars)
Our first day, we hung out in the morning with plans to head to town center, have lunch, then tour the royal palace afterwards and check out some shops. The weather, however, had other plans for us! We learned quickly that when you feel the brisk breeze go through your hair, you’d better find shelter, and fast. 
Roads in Phnom Penh are somewhat harrowing, and are similar to other developing country cities, however were crazier than those in Denpasar mainly because Phnom Penh is much more densely populated. Sidewalks are nonexistent, car lanes are meaningless, motorbikes don’t bother following road signs, and the streets are filled with a mix of open air tuk tuks (a carriage pulled by a motorbike), motorbikes, scooters, taxis and buses. The air is thick with exhaust and your eyes start to water before too long if you’re in an open vehicle. 
We wandered around for a bit before settling on a spot for lunch and then headed to the palace. We stepped outside and noticed that during our lunch, dark clouds had amassed over the city. A strong wind blew through the street. Ah, we’ll be fine! We thought. 
A few drops of rain sprinkled down, and we noticed the street sellers rapidly covering up their stalls. Hmmm. Maybe we should reconsider our plans. No, we can make it, we thought. It’s just a few drops! We kept walking down the street and in about ten seconds the sky opened up and raindrops as big as marble hail descended, nearly drenching us before we dove under a shop awning. Two Cambodian Police officers were sitting there and they took one look at us, the idiot tourists, and kindly offered us seats, pulling out a stack of plastic chairs for us to sit down in and watch the storm thunder along. 

And then we could do nothing but wait. In a way, I was glad of this. One of the things I want the kids to learn (and I could use some of myself, let’s be real) is learning how to wait. In the US, we wait for nothing, and if we have to wait for something it is a great source of annoyance. I remember one patient who had been admitted, gotten labs done, a procedure through radiology, and lunch, and was still annoyed that the whole process had taken SO LONG even though all of that took about four hours, and then he was annoyed that results weren’t immediately available. I actually said to him, “Medicine isn’t like ordering from Amazon. Some things take a little time to figure out.” If there’s bad weather, we usually are able to escape it easily in our cars or our homes. Here, there was nothing to do but wait it out. Soon enough the storm subsided enough to allow us to walk out again, but the streets were too flooded for us to walk to our destination. We hopped a tuk-tuk to some shops a few blocks away instead, thinking that if the rain passed we’d make it to the Palace after all. Cambodia seems to have a big trade in the handicraft market, and many of them advertise that they specifically support disabled people or street children as well. We found some lovely scarves, souvenirs and gifts to bring along, and I even bought myself two dresses, the first new clothing I’ve bought since leaving. 
The rain showed no sign of letting up, and since we’d planned a trip to the Genocide Museum and the Killing Fields the next day, we wanted to get some books about Cambodian history and culture for the kids. We hopped a Tuk-Tuk again and went to the excellent Monument bookstore, where a very nice employee gave us great suggestions for books for ourselves and the kids. After this, we were hot, wet, and tired, and realized that a Palace tour just wasn’t going to happen. Back home we went, to relax and enjoy another night of takeout, but not before a slightly stressful tuk tuk ride.​

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-s

When we were in Phnom Penh we did not get bitten one bit because we had aerosol on. As mom mentioned in one of her blog posts but luckily we didn’t have to buy it because there is some in the flat where we are staying right now.

Here are some facts about mosquitoes. One, they make diseases like malaria, yellow fever and the Zika virus. And, they also transmit diseases. They have a virus in their blood and then they give it to people. They use saliva to numb your skin and then they bite you and when they are taking out your blood they infect you!

You can stop mosquitoes by using bug spray and having mosquito nets around your bed.

One more fact: only the females bit you. Not the males.

Me and my family got bitten in Bali and Australia. I’ve been bitten five or four times. Nobody got sick, too.

Also you are probably wondering: do Cambodians use bug spray? Well, no because when they are kids they catch the fever and then they build up an immunity when they are adults.

Here’s what a mosquito looks like:

 

 

lb

 

please read my moms post 🙂

thank you

We loved, loved, loved Ubud. The wonderful, welcoming and genuine people, the delicious food everywhere, the artistic handicrafts, and the feeling of overall relaxation made us wish we had stayed here for two weeks instead of just five days. It’s funny – in the States, I really don’t enjoy meeting new people or being super friendly. I mean, I can do it but all things considered I prefer just hanging out with people I already know and like or even just being alone. While traveling, I’ve become more open overall – I look forward to talking to people and learning about their lives and culture when it’s so different from our own, especially when the people you meet are so genial and want to share their lives with you as well. 
Random thoughts and little things from our stay here:
I couldn’t wait to introduce the kids to the bidet. I gave them fair warning of what it was, but the first time you feel cold water splooshed up your butt is not to be trifled with, and the girl sprang across the bathroom when she first felt it and we had to scramble to prevent the floor from flooding while I cried from laughing so hard. 
Bugs! You stay in the tropics, you get tropical insects. Huge wasps, spiders, ants, *shudder*. There were of course mosquitos as well but not awful, though we’ve all gotten bit. We’ll have to be better in Cambodia, as it’s rainier season there, and I’ve decided that we need an aerosol can of Deet. It just covers better than the spray, despite being worse for the environment. 
Bargaining. I actually LOVE bargaining with sellers. I think it’s fun – there is no way possible that I could negotiate anything that wouldn’t be a good deal to the seller and I know that my tourist dollars are what keep the place going, so my goal isn’t to really get the cheapest price possible, though I don’t like to be completely ripped off. But I love the interaction with the seller, the stock phrases of bargaining – “you give me your best price” “what is your discount?” “Oh no, that is too too much!” Said with a little tongue clicking for best effect of course! I especially like when you’re buying things from the people who have had some hand in making them, as it’s so different from the sterile purchasing of the States, where you can go through an entire transaction and not say a word to another person. 
And, of course, we end with the street signs:

This sign actually means “Hindu Temple,” but I like to think it means “Lego building up ahead.”

Stop here if you need an Auto Metallic. 

Beware of men pushing younger girls into the street. 

Here is where the slender people run across the street. 

This street crossing is for larger people wearing jackets. 

And last but not least, this crossing area is for the people who have grown so large they can no longer wear jackets. Poor guys. 

-s

Our last full day in Ubud, and we were determined to visit the Monkey Forest! Well, I was anyway. Eric, he is not so interested in the monkeys as he feels we have enough experience with mischievous wildlife without ever leaving our house. I’ll add here that the girl was a massive pill today and part of my desire to go to the monkey forest was to see if they might claim her as one of their own and take her off our hands. She woke in the foulest mood, screaming at the top of her lungs because I said “no” to screen time. She recovered during the day but went back into fit mode at the end of the day, babbling angrily in that way of hers where we have no idea what she’s even talking about. It’s like if you combined Animal’s guttural screams with the nasal wah wah sound of Charlie Brown’s teacher. Sigh. 
Anyway, back to the day at hand. We took the morning off and just relaxed after the busy day yesterday and also scheduled our free foot massages that came with our stay at this Villa. We sat in a room off the side of the infinity pool and blissed out and then did some blogging from this beautiful spot. 

 After noon, we headed into town. I had a few shops I really wanted to visit, the first on my list was Threads of Life. A fair trade fabric and dyeing center that focuses on helping rural communities to be self sufficient and uses natural dyeing methods as well to be environmentally sound. There’s a lot of cheaply produced souvenir stuff around to buy, and I want to try and buy responsibly wherever we go if I can. The displays of ikat dyed fabric and batik were so, so pretty. I picked up a scarf for myself! They had three different patterns and I spent a long time trying to pick out the one I want, finally resorting to the KonMari method and choosing the one that sparked joy when I held it. 🙂 
We stopped in for lunch where I had another big plate of my favorite Indonesian dish, Nasi Champur. This plate was quite different from the first one I had, and if I ever come back here I’m going to create an instagram account where all I do is take pictures of the different plates of Nasi Champur everywhere. Every single thing in this meal was incredible. We’ve eaten mostly Indonesian food while here, and the boy loves it too. The girl…well…hasn’t quite taken to it, but we’re working on it. 🙂

One of the things that was on our must do list for the girl was getting a fish pedicure. We chose the big fish and Eric, the girl, and I got in. The boy took one look at the tank, his eyebrows went up and he shook his head in absolute refusal. There is nothing quite like having a swarm of fish nibble at your feet, and the sensation is, well, unique. 

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We decided, at this point, to go back to the wood shop to get the slab table we’d loved yesterday, thinking we’d have plenty of time to get back to Ubud to see the Monkey forest afterwards. I had completely forgotten how long it takes to make things happen in places that are not the US. First, getting a car took a while. Then the traffic took forever. Then we had to negotiate with the wood seller, then of course, when that was all done, my credit card was declined for a possible suspicious transaction! After some time on the phone, it was all cleared up and we are now the proud owners of a large chunk of suar wood that will end up at our house as a table. In about a year. The interaction with the wood seller was pretty funny. The shipping cost to the US ended up being $666, and I noted that this was the number of the Devil in the US! The seller said to me, “No problem, we can make it $750 instead,” with a smile and a knowing look, and I said, “No no no, I’m not much of a believer anyway!” (Side note: it only takes about 2-3 months if you’re having it shipped directly, but since we’re not home for a while we’re having it stay here until we’ll be back since we’ll have to pick it up from the port of Denver ourselves. I have NO IDEA where the port of Denver is.) 
Of course, after all this, the Monkey Forest Sanctuary was almost closed, and we were stuck with the girl, with no chance of returning her to her true people. . We managed to spend 4 days in Ubud and miss the number one tourist attraction here, though we did see a few monkeys wending their way around restaurant patios. I’m a bit disappointed, sure, but there are plenty of other monkeys to be seen around the world and like I’ve said before, it’s impossible to see everything! I also didn’t make it back to any of the ikat fabric shops and I wish we could have done that too. If I could redo one thing it would have been to skip the cremation attempt on the first day and go to the Monkey Forest at that time instead. If I could redo anything else it would be to have simply spent more time in Bali, and this is one of the places on our “must revisit” list. 
-s