Prom Rath Wat
|Greetings,
I've been sitting down in Siem Reap for a week and it's delightful after the hysterical hustle of Saigon in particular and Vietnam in general.
I've been exploring Siem Reap on foot, hearing and speaking with a variety of tourists and travelers and settling into the pace and rhythm. I will visit the Angkor Wat site and multitude of 7th-16th C. history, art and spiritual wonders down the road.
An orphan girl at a Christmas party.
Siem Reap population is about 130,000, a far cry from the 8 million in Saigon so you can appreciate the lack of motorcycles, noise and chaos as previously written. There are also 7.99 million fewer hustlers.
Minus small guesthouses and hostels there are approximately 110 hotels and 10,000 beds. Inflated stats say there is a 60% occupancy rate. Tourism is down due to world economics, tighter travel money, and small yet significant regional internal and border troubles. So it goes.
The Angkor National Museum was amazing. An excellent introduction into the Khmer culture.
My first Cambodian photography gallery is of Prom Rath Wat, a serene temple complex in Siem Reap. Enjoy.
Metta.