jasminedesirees | loveliness. | Page 21

Author Archives: jasminedesirees
- the killing fields
  
  Posted at 7:00 am by jasminedesirees, on August 4, 2014
  
  “It is better to kill an innocent by mistake, then to allow an enemy to go free by mistake”- Pol Pot
  
  If you’re going to be in Phnom Penh, make sure you allow time to visit Toul Slang and Choeung Ek, better known as The Killing Fields. During the time the Khmer Rouge was in power in Cambodia, 1.7 million people were killed, many of them in execution areas like this. That’s 21% of the population of the country.
  
  There are hundreds of killing fields all over Cambodia, but Choeung Ek is the largest, and was chosen for the site of the Cambodian Genocide Museum.
  
  When you enter the gate at Choeung Ek, you pay for your ticket (I believe it was about $4USD per person) and get a small audio player with head set, so you can take the audio tour as you walk around the grounds.
  
  At each stop, numbered 1-18, you learn more about the things that happened at Choeung Ek, and there are also additional recordings you can listen to, of people telling their stories about life under the Khmer Rouge.
  
  It is very hard to walk around the grounds and listen to the audio tour, and picture all of the horrible things that happened there. It made me feel sick to my stomach, even though it is a very green and peaceful place now, there are still reminders of the atrocities that occurred there surfacing through the dirt.
  
  Because so many people were buried in the mass graves, even though many of them were re-buried once the Khmer Rouge regime fell, and Choeung Ek was discovered, teeth and bone fragments, and scraps of the victims clothing can be seen all over the ground, especially after a big rain storm. The staff at Choeung Ek goes around every few weeks to pick up these fragments and place them in sanctified collection cases.
  
  The audio tour describes how people were transported to Choeung Ek, and then herded over to pits, where they were killed, usually by blunt force trauma. Bullets were expensive, so they weren’t used.
  
  The most horrible thing at Choeung Ek, for me, was the killing tree. In order to kill babies with the least effort, and without using bullets, Khmer Rouge soldiers would lift them by the feet, bash their heads into the tree, and then throw them into the nearby pit.
  
  It is very difficult to visit the Killing Fields, and to be face to face with the absolute worst of humankind, but it is important to understand what those people went through, and to give them the respect of acknowledging that these things really did happen.
  
  It also makes you angry though, and really reinforces the point that things like this are still happening in countries all over the world. It seems like there should be more that we can do to stop it now, while it’s happening, instead of waiting 40 years to visit the museum.
  
  You can learn more about Choeung Ek here.
  
  Posted in Cambodia, life, travel | 1 Comment | Tagged Cambodia, choeung ek, khmer rouge, killing fields, phnom penh, war
- ta prohm
  
  Posted at 7:00 am by jasminedesirees, on July 31, 2014
  
  My favourite temple out of all of the ones we saw at Angkor was Ta Prohm (and we saw a lot). Many of the temples at Angkor looked like Ta Prohm when it was rediscovered, and massive restoration was done to the temples to get them back to as close as possible to how they were originally, and to make it safe for people to visit them.
  
  Ta Prohm was not restored the same way, it was left as it was found to give people an idea of what the other temples had looked like after so many years of neglect, when the jungle grew around and through the temples because nobody was there to stop it.
  
  Some parts of Ta Prohm have been minimally restored, in order to make it safe for people to come in and visit, but mostly it’s just as it was found.
  
  It is so, so gorgeous in there. It’s so green and peaceful, and you feel like you are discovering an ancient civilization. It’s very, very serene, and so beautiful.
  
  It even manages to maintain that serenity when there are bus loads of tourists coming in to see it. Ideally, everyone would get to see it with as few other people as possible, but it doesn’t alway work out that way.
  
  The best tip I can give for this, is to go first thing in the morning, when everyone else is at Angkor Wat, and then go back and visit Angkor Wat when everyone else has moved on to other temples.
  
  I truly loved the time I spent here, seeing the massive trees growing up through the piles of rubble, and everything is this amazing shade of green. It’s a very special place, and I’m so glad I was able to see it first hand.
  
  Posted in Cambodia, travel | 1 Comment | Tagged angkor, Cambodia, ta prohm, temples, tomb raider, travel
- green gecko
  
  Posted at 7:00 am by jasminedesirees, on July 30, 2014
  
  This is kind of a sad story, and it was definitely a learning experience for me, but the point of traveling is to get out of your comfort zone and learn about the wider world, so I guess this counts as that.
  
  Cambodia is a very poor country, I looked it up, and the average annual income for a Cambodian family is only $750 US per year. There are a lot of children who are poor, homeless and hungry, and a lot of children who are used by their families in order to make money, taking advantage of the visitors to the country that want to help where they can.
  
  We were chatting with a Cambodian man on one of our first nights in Siem Reap, and he was telling us about some of the schemes that people use to try to make money off of their children, including having tourists buy rice for hungry children, and then returning it to the store after they leave, and splitting the profits with the store owner.
  
  The tourists want to help the hungry children, and figure since they aren’t just giving them money, but actually buying them food, that they are really helping, but then the rice is returned, and the money is split between the adults, and often the children don’t get anything out of it.
  
  A few nights later, we were walking through the night market in Siem Reap, and a little boy, about 13 years old, came up to me, carrying a young child, less than two years old. He told me that his little brother was hungry, that he didn’t want money, or anything for himself, but just begged me over and over again to get some milk for the child.
  
  I still had that story in my head, so I was pretty cautious, but I decided to go along with him, because if there was any chance that he really did just want to feed his brother, I wasn’t going to say no to that. I was kind of suspicious right away, since the child was carrying an empty, and totally spotless sippy cup, that had never had anything in it, it kind of seemed like a prop.
  
  He also took me to a store about a block away, we didn’t pass any other stores, so it wasn’t openly strange, but he was quite intent on going to one certain store, so I thought that was a bit suspicious as well.
  
  As we were walking into the store, another obviously tourist couple were walking out, and I just had a bad feeling. He followed me in, and tried to get me to buy a canister of baby formula, and tried to get me to buy the large, expensive one, by telling me that the child needed that one because of his age, even though the smaller canister was exactly the same.
  
  At this point, the store door opened again, and another boy about the same age walked in with another tourist, and I heard the guy asked where he could find baby formula. I realized then that it was definitely just a money making scheme, and apologized to the boy and tried to leave, but he wouldn’t let me. He blocked me in the aisle, kept grabbing my arms and wouldn’t let me leave.
  
  I didn’t want to force my way past him, he was young but he was almost as tall as me, and I didn’t want to hurt the child that he was holding, but he wouldn’t let me go. Eventually I managed to get by him, but he followed me out of the store, yelling at me and grabbing my arms. When he finally realized that I was leaving and I wasn’t going to buy him anything, he swore at me, and grabbed the back of my arm, pinching me as hard as he could.
  
  He started to walk away, and then punched the little boy he was carrying out of rage. It made me sick, and I felt horrible, for the little boy, and also for the older one, because I wasn’t sure if he was going to get into trouble.
  
  The reason I shared that story is because I learned the hard way that there are good and bad ways to help. When you give children who are begging on the street money, and they become a viable income for the parents, it can cost them opportunities for education, since they are spending all of their time trying to earn money. But there are good ways to help as well.
  
  We learned about the Green Gecko Project through talking to some locals in Siem Reap, and decided to pay a visit. It is a school for former street kids run by a local Cambodian man, and his Australian wife. It started as just a one room school where kids could come to learn and get at least one good meal per day.
  
  It’s been nearly 10 years since it started, and some of the kids they started with are going off to university, law school, or pursuing internships in music and the arts. They currently have 75 students, and do a lot to support former students, and the community in general.
  
  They have visiting hours every week day, so if you are in the area and want to stop in, make sure it is during those hours. You can also check on their website, they have a wish list, including toothpaste, soap, clothing, shoes, that they are always in need of, if you’d like to help.
  
  They also accept volunteers, so if you have a special skill that you can teach, art or web design, or dance, etc and you’d like to spend some time in Cambodia, reach out to them.
  
  You can learn more about the Green Gecko Project here.
  
  Posted in Cambodia, life, travel | 2 Comments | Tagged Cambodia, children, donation, green gecko, volunteer
- angkor bayon
  
  Posted at 7:00 am by jasminedesirees, on July 29, 2014
  
  The second temple we visited at Angkor was Bayon. It’s a few minutes away from Angkor Wat by tuk-tuk, or a bit longer for those brave souls among us who chose to ride a bike all the way from Siem Reap, and then in between all the temples in the blazing hot sun (you are better men than I).
  
  Bayon is quite stunning, when you pull up and see it, it kind of takes your breath away. It’s made out of dark grey stone with the hundreds of jagged faces cut into it, and against the blue sky it looks very ominous.
  
  There are tons of faces carved into Bayon, it reminded me of Olmec from Legends of the Hidden Temple (90’s Nickelodeon kids? Anyone? No?), and they are all different. Bayon is a lot smaller than Angkor Wat, but there are lots of random pathways and sets of stairs, so there is lots to explore.
  
  We only had one day at Angkor, so we had to see as much as we could. I ended up getting physically dragged out of Bayon so we could move along to the next temple, but I probably would have spent the whole day in there if I could’ve.
  
  Posted in Cambodia, travel | 0 Comments | Tagged angkor thom, angkor wat, Cambodia, history, temples, travel
- land mines
  
  Posted at 5:52 am by jasminedesirees, on July 28, 2014
  
  While we were in Siem Reap, we made a trip out to visit the Cambodian Landmine Museum. It was about an hour away by tuk-tuk, but the ride itself was worth the cost (about $10USD).
  
  We drove through small towns and villages, and by farms and roadside stands, and I really felt like we got to see a part of the real country of Cambodia, outside of the bustle of Phnom Penh and the tourists in Siem Reap.
  
  The museum itself isn’t huge, it will only take you 35-40 minutes to go through the whole thing, depending on how closely you read all of the information there, but it’s really interesting.
  
  It all started with a man named Aki Ra, who was a child soldier for the Khmer Rouge. As a child, he planed thousands of landmines around Cambodia. He eventually switched sides, and fought for the Vietnamese allies that were fighting against the Khmer Rouge.
  
  Once the war was over, he saw the destruction that landmines had caused during the war, and were continuing to cause, and began finding and dismantling land mines, by himself, using just a stick and his knowledge gained from years working with all different kinds of landmines.
  
  He kept all of the land mines he dismantled. People began to come see his work to learn more about landmines, and the museum was born. It’s been in a few locations, it used to be pretty close to Angkor Wat, but has since moved.
  
  In addition to his work with landmines, Aki Ra and his wife also opened a school for children. They began taking in and educating children who were affected by landmines. All of the proceeds from the museum go towards the school.
  
  As a visitor you aren’t able to visit the school, since it is disruptive to the children, but you can donate goods such as toothpaste, shampoo, shoes, etc to the school for the children when you visit, just check the wish list on the museum website so you can see what they are most in need of.
  
  It was pretty crazy to find out that there are still an estimated 3 million landmines in Cambodia today. I would definitely recommend visiting if you have time while you’re in Siem Reap, you will get a much greater understanding of the war and the genocide in Cambodia.
  
  You can learn more about Aki Ra and the landline museum here.
  
  Posted in Cambodia, travel | 0 Comments | Tagged Aki Ra, Cambodia, khmer rouge, land mines, siem reap, travel, vietnam war
- infinity
  
  Posted at 4:31 am by jasminedesirees, on July 24, 2014
  
  My view today, relaxing before three straight days of diving.
  
  Life is better underwater.
  
  Posted in Indonesia, travel | 0 Comments | Tagged Flores, Indonesia, Labuan Bajo, scuba, travel
- angkor wat
  
  Posted at 7:00 am by jasminedesirees, on July 23, 2014
  
  A lot of the places we’ve seen on our trip so far have been amazing, but one of the ones I was was looking forward to the most was Angkor Wat, mostly because it’s somewhere I never thought I’d be able to go.
  
  The first time I ever heard of Angkor Wat, I was sixteen, in my social studies class. I don’t even remember what the context was, or why we were talking about it, but I was instantly interested.
  
  I remember hoping that one day I would make it there, but at the same time, I figured it was very unlikely, since I was just a kid from a small town in Saskatchewan. The world seemed infinite to me then, and I didn’t even know anybody that knew anyone who had ever been to Cambodia.
  
  The next summer, I found a book called First Born by Doris Mortmain at my grandma’s house. It was completely ridiculous, but it is still one of my favourite books ever. In one scene, the author describes the two characters having a picnic at a beautiful ruined temple in the middle of the jungle in Cambodia. The book takes places in the 1960’s and 1970’s and she never names the place outright, but I knew it was Angkor Wat, and it made me want to visit even more.
  
  I always thought Angkor Wat was beautiful, but I was also fascinated with the history, it was built a thousand years ago, and was all but forgotten about (by the outside world, locals knew about it, obviously) until Cambodia was colonized by the French in the 1800’s. I always wondered what the first people who stumbled upon it were thinking, one minute they are chopping through jungle trees, the next minute they are faced with this enormous, amazing structure that nobody knew was there.
  
  It’s certainly not undiscovered anymore, millions of people visit Angkor each year. It’s only been reopened to tourists since the early 90’s, and the number of visitors has been increasing ever since, but even though it no longer feels like a forgotten place, it’s still pretty amazing.
  
  We got up early to visit Angkor Wat at sunrise, I’d read somewhere that if you get there super early, it’s quiet and you can even get some of the temples to yourself sometimes. That was not my experience at all, there were at least a few thousand people there when we got there at 5:30 in the morning.
  
  I’ve seen amazing pictures of Angkor Wat at sunrise, so if you have the opportunity to go, definitely do it, unfortunately for us, it was really grey the day we went, and we couldn’t see the sky at all behind the clouds.
  
  Even though it was pretty busy when we got there, Angkor Wat is pretty massive and there are lots of different areas to explore, so by the time we made it to the courtyard at the very back, there were hardly any other people around. It was really peaceful there, and we just saw on a ledge and hung out for a bit, while I tried to convince myself that I was actually really there.
  
  Angkor Wat wasn’t even my favourite out of all the Angkor temples (I would move into Ta Prohm if I could) but being there just reminded me that if you really want something, even if it takes a very long time, you can eventually make it happen.
  
  One tip if you are visiting Angkor, especially if you are only going to be there for one day, go to the ticket office around 5pm, right before it closes, the night before the day you are going and buy your ticket.
  
  The ticket will get you into the temples for the rest of that day, so you can check out sunrise, there are a few good spots to watch it, and it is good for all day the next day, so you can get up early and get started without having to wait in line for a ticket in the morning.
  
  Posted in Cambodia, travel | 7 Comments | Tagged angkor, angkor wat, Cambodia, history, siem reap, travel
- tiger
  
  Posted at 7:14 am by jasminedesirees, on July 22, 2014
  
  I’ve put off writing this post for awhile, just because I’m still not really sure how I feel about it. One of the very popular things for tourists to do in Chiang Mai is visit the Tiger Kingdom, a place where you can see, take pictures of, and even interact with tigers.
  
  You can choose which group of tigers you’d like to see, they have baby ones, teenagers, and full grown adults, the price varies depending on which group you want to see.
  
  I’d had a few friends that did it, so I kind of new what to expect, and I already knew I didn’t want to interact with the big ones. Tigers are wild animals after all, and in order to have people in the cages with them, taking pictures and touching them, they drug them, to keep them sleepy and easy to handle. The whole idea of that just made me very sad.
  
  We opted to just see the baby ones, because they are too small to do any damage they aren’t drugged, and you get to go in and see them and play with them for about 15 minutes. It was a really neat experience, the babies are mostly running around playing with each other, and you try to get a picture if you can.
  
  I was sitting on the floor and one of them came and laid beside me, and he batted at my fingers and wrapped his paws around my leg. He chewed on me a little bit, but I like to think it was out of affection, and it didn’t hurt at all.
  
  After our time was up, we went and had a drink at the cafe on site, where you can watch people doing their interactions with the big tigers. The adult tigers were mostly just laying on the ground, or up on a pedestal sleeping, while groups of tourists laid on them, pretended to be biting them, or made growling faces beside them.
  
  It was kind of awful to watch, these big, powerful, beautiful animals spending hours out of the day drugged to sleep so that tourists could pay to lay on top of them.
  
  It seemed very disrespectful, and I remember thinking that if one of the tigers did wake up and bite someone, it would serve everybody right. Not that I wanted anybody to get hurt, but if you don’t want to get bit, maybe don’t lay on top of a sleeping tiger.
  
  So even though playing with the baby tigers was really neat, I still wouldn’t go back, and I kind of wish I hadn’t gone at all.
  
  Posted in Thailand, travel | 2 Comments | Tagged chiang mai, Thailand, tiger, travel
- koh samui
  
  Posted at 7:42 am by jasminedesirees, on July 21, 2014
  
  Not much to report from Koh Samui, we were staying on the East side of the island, on Chaweng beach, and we pretty much settled into our beach chairs and didn’t move for three days.
  
  Chaweng beach was so gorgeous, the ocean was crystal clear, and the beaches were white sand. We had amazing weather (it was so hot the polish was melting off my toenails) so we weren’t feeling very ambitious to do anything that didn’t involve the water.
  
  We went stand up paddle boarding one day, which is one of my favourite things to do, they have hover crafts and jet skis that you can rent, and there is an inflatable obstacle course with trampolines, rock walls and sea-saws that is pretty fun whether you’re a kid or a grown up.
  
  Chaweng is the most popular beach on Koh Samui, so if you are coming here during the high season, December to February-ish, it would be pretty busy, and maybe somewhere you’d want to avoid. The whole island is beaches so you definitely have options, but because we were here in July, there were not many other people, and it was still really relaxing and peaceful.
  
  There are lots of fun things to do on Koh Samui itself, there is some really great shopping and restaurants, they have an English language movie theater which we checked out on a rainy Sunday night. It was three dollars per ticket for us to go see a movie on opening weekend, I’ll probably never be able to go to a movie in America again, just on principle.
  
  They also have tours to nearby islands, Koh Tao and Koh Pha Ngan, both of which are supposed to be totally gorgeous. We absolutely meant to go, I swear, but our beach chairs were just. so. comfy.
  
  Koh Samui was probably the most expensive Thai island we visited but it was definitely one of my favorites. I’d visit again, anytime.
  
  Posted in beach, Thailand, travel | 0 Comments | Tagged beach, island, koh samui, Thailand, travel
- railay
  
  Posted at 7:16 am by jasminedesirees, on July 17, 2014
  
  We spent a few days in Krabi, near Ao Nang. It had a nice, long beach, lots of good restaurants, and shopping, and some fun bars, but unfortunately, it absolutely poured rain for most of the time we were there.
  
  We did get one nice day, and it completely made up for the others. We took a boat to Railay, about a 15 minute ride, and it was absolutely gorgeous there. The boats dropped us off on the west side of the island, but we were told to walk across the island to the other side, and then back across to a hidden beach on the southwest side, where there is a massive cave, and a lookout point.
  
  muddy path to the lagoon
  
  as close as I could get to the lagoon, you can just see the water mocking me for being a chicken
  
  It was not very hidden, as most of the people on the island find their way over the the cave beach eventually, but it’s definitely worth a visit. It isn’t huge though, so if you come on a day where it is really busy, come check it out, swim in the cave for awhile and then when you’re ready, go back to the main beach where you get dropped off, it is just as beautiful, and way less busy.
  
  The real story about our trip to Railay, is our struggle up to the viewpoint. I’d heard about it from a few people, and it’s mentioned in every description of Railay, so I figured it would be pretty easy to access, maybe up a set of stairs like the viewpoint in Phi Phi.
  
  It wasn’t.
  
  the start of the climb up to the viewpoint
  
  view from the top
  
  The viewpoint is just off the path to the cave beach, and it is a really intense climb. It is very steep, up a jagged rock face, with just a few areas of plateau where you can rest. There is a rope running up to the very top, wrapped around various tree trunks, but it is the same rope all the way up, and if anyone else is climbing (and it’s about 20 minutes to the top) and grabs the rope, it throws you off balance.
  
  Ordinarily, it would be a bit treacherous, but likely doable for anybody in even semi-decent physical shape, but when we visited it had been raining for 4 days straight, so on top of being steep, it was also very slippery.
  
  They actually rent mountain climbing equipment at little shops all over the island, which I obviously declined. Instead I wore flip flops and a backless Brandy Melville sundress, which was slightly annoying on the way up, but was actually a deathly nuisance on my way down, as it flared out whenever I moved so I couldn’t see where my feet were stepping.
  
  I ended up finishing the climb down in my underwear, with my dress tucked up into my bra. You’re welcome fellow climbers.
  
  The view from the viewpoint alone is worth the climb, but there is also a lagoon in the mountain crater at the top, although it is another, more dangerous climb to get there, it’s supposed to be gorgeous.
  
  Unfortunately, the rain that had turned the viewpoint climb into a sloppy mess had turned the lagoon climb into a suicide mission. We passed group after group of people who had tried it, but ended up turning back.
  
  Since I can never take anybody’s word for anything, we had to go too, and after slip sliding our way to the bottom of the first hill on hands and knees before we even reached the rocks to climb down, we realized that we weren’t going to make it.
  
  By the time we got to the bottom I was barefoot, and so muddy from head to toe that when we reached the cave beach, I just threw myself in, clothes and all. You can see my muddy little rat feet here, the rest of me was even worse.
  
  Posted in beach, Thailand, travel | 6 Comments | Tagged beach, island, railay, Thailand, travel
← Older posts

Newer posts →
- Follow loveliness. on WordPress.com
- Follow Blog via Email
  
  Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.
  
  Email Address:
- Popular Posts
- Recent Posts
- Instagram
  No Instagram images were found.
- Categories
  Categories
- Archives
  Archives
- Search for: